Anti-luck Virtue Epistemology Research Articles

Lotteries, Possible Worlds, and Probability

A necessary criterion of Duncan Pritchard’s Anti-luck Virtue Epistemology is his safety condition. A believer cannot know p unless her belief is safe. Her belief is safe only if p could not have easily been false. But “easily” is not to be understood probabilistically. The chance that p is false might be extremely low and yet p remains unsafe. This is what happens, Pritchard argues, in lottery examples and explains why knowledge is not a function of the probabilistic strength of one’s evidence. This paper argues that, contra Pritchard, modality holds no epistemic advantage over this type of “probabilistic evidentialism” that he criticizes. I begin with a review of Pritchard’s argument supporting modality over probability; second, I explain the problems with this argument, and third, I offer an alternative explanation of the lottery example (which purportedly shows modality is superior to probability). At the completion of the paper, modality and probability are on equal epistemic footing.

Better virtuous than safe

According to the safety principle, if one knows that p, then one’s belief in p could not easily have been false. In this paper, I pose a dilemma for safety theorists by asking the following question: In evaluating whether or not a belief is safe, must we only examine the error-possibilities of the same belief as formed in the actual world? If ‘yes’, safety meets a familiar objection regarding necessary truths and the objection also extends to contingent propositions. If ‘no’, however, there is no necessity of safety for knowledge. It is argued that this dilemma poses a threat for a number of safety principles from the recent literature. In the end, I draw implications of my arguments for the debate between robust and anti-luck virtue epistemologies. The result is that anti-luck virtue epistemology suffers from the difficulty with the safety principle whereas the robust variant remains intact.

프리처드의 반-운 덕 인식론, 지식의 인식적 의존성, 인식적 프랭크퍼트 사례들

프리처드는 강건한 덕 인식론이 게티어식 사례들에 적절히 대응하지만 인식적 의존성으로 인한 트릴레마에 적절히 대응하지 못한다고 주장하며, 자신의 반-운 덕 인식론을 제안한다. 본 논문에서는 프리처드의 반-운 덕 인식론이 인식적 의존성으로 인한 트릴레마에는 적절히 대응하지만, 인식적 프랭크퍼트 사례들에는 적절히 대응하지 못한다는 것을 보여줄 것이다. 우선 2절에서는 강건한 덕 인식론이 게티어식 사례들에 적절히 대응한다는 것이 다루어질 것이다. 그 다음으로 3절에서는 프리처드의 반-운 덕 인식론이 강건한 덕 인식론에 대한 반론으로 제기된 지식의 인식적 의존성으로 인한 트릴레마에 적절히 대응한다는 것이 다루어질 것이다. 그 다음으로 4절에서는 안전성 조건이 포함된 지식 이론들에 대한 반례들로 제시된 인식적 프랭크퍼트 사례들로 인해 프리처드의 반-운 덕 인식론이 직면한 문제가 다루어질 것이며, 그 문제에 대한 오류 이론을 통한 프리처드의 해결책이 켈프에 의해 제기된 첫 번째 반론에 적절히 대응하도록 개선될 것이다. 마지막으로 5절에서는 켈프에 의해 제기된 첫 번째 반론과 그 외의 추가적인 반론들에 적절히 대응하도록 개선된 오류 이론을 통한 해결책에도 여전히 반론들이 있다는 것을 보여줄 것이다.

The genealogical method in epistemology

In 1990 Edward Craig published a book called Knowledge and the State of Nature in which he introduced and defended a genealogical approach to epistemology. In recent years Craig’s book has attracted a lot of attention, and his distinctive approach has been put to a wide range of uses including anti-realist metaepistemology, contextualism, relativism, anti-luck virtue epistemology, epistemic injustice, value of knowledge, pragmatism and virtue epistemology. While the number of objections to Craig’s approach has accumulated, there has been no sustained attempt to develop answers to these objections. In this paper we provide answers to seven important objections in the literature.

Sorte, Virtude, e Anulabilidade Epistêmica

http://dx.doi.org/10.5007/1808-1711.2016v20n2p179 Duncan Pritchard has suggested that anti-luck epistemology and virtue epistemology are the best options to solve the Gettier problem. Nonetheless, there are challenging problems for both of them in the literature. Pritchard holds that his anti-luck virtue epistemology puts together the correct intuitions from both anti-luck epistemology and virtue epistemology and avoids their problems. Contra Pritchard, we believe that there is already a satisfactory theory on offer, namely, the defeasibility theory of knowledge. In this essay we intend (i) to examine Pritchard’s anti-luck virtue epistemology, and (ii) to defend the defeasibility theory of knowledge as an alternative to Pritchard’s theory. We will provide the reader with reasons for believing that the defeasibility theory is better than Pritchard’s theory because the former is more economic and more ecumenical than the latter, since it goes without non-epistemic notions and remains neutral as for the internalism vs. externalism debate.

Why Anti-Luck Virtue Epistemology has No Luck with Closure

Why Anti-Luck Virtue Epistemology has No Luck with Closure

A sensitive virtue epistemology

We offer an alternative to two influential accounts of virtue epistemology: Robust Virtue Epistemology (RVE) and Anti-Luck Virtue Epistemology (ALVE). We argue that while traditional RVE does offer an explanation of the distinctive value of knowledge, it is unable to effectively deal with cases of epistemic luck; and while ALVE does effectively deal with cases of epistemic luck, it lacks RVE’s resources to account for the distinctive value of knowledge. The account we provide, however, is both robustly virtue-theoretic and anti-luck, having the respective benefits of both rival accounts without their respective shortcomings. We describe this view here.

Anti-luck virtue epistemology and epistemic defeat

This paper explores how a certain theory of knowledge—known as anti-luck virtue epistemology—can account for, and in the process shed light on, the notion of an epistemic defeater. To this end, an overview of the motivations for anti-luck virtue epistemology is offered, along with a taxonomy of different kinds of epistemic defeater. It is then shown how anti-luck virtue epistemology can explain: (i) why certain kinds of putative epistemic defeater are not bona fide; (ii) how certain kinds of epistemic defeater are genuine in virtue of exposing the subject to significant levels of epistemic risk; and (iii) how certain kinds of epistemic defeater are genuine in virtue of highlighting how the subject’s safe cognitive success does not stand in the appropriate explanatory relationship to her manifestation of relevant cognitive ability.

Against Mixed Epistemology

http://dx.doi.org/10.5007/1808-1711.2015v19n2p183We can call any reductive account of knowledge that appeals to both safety and ability conditions a mixed account of knowledge. Examples of mixed accounts of knowledge include Pritchard’s (2012) Anti-Luck Virtue Epistemology, Kelp’s (2013) Safe-Apt account of knowledge, and Turri’s (2011) Ample belief account of knowledge. Mixed accounts of knowledge are motivated by well-known counterexamples to pure safety and pure ability accounts of knowledge. It is thought that by combining both safety and ability conditions we can give an extensionally adequate reductive account of knowledge. In this paper I argue that the putative counterexamples to pure safety and pure ability accounts of knowledge fail to motivate mixed accounts of knowledge. In particular, I argue that if the putative counterexamples are problematic for safety accounts they are problematic for ability accounts and vice-versa. The reason for this, I argue, is that the safety condition and ability condition should be understood as alternative expressions of the same intuition — that knowledge must come from a reliable source.

Anti-Luck Virtue Epistemology as Religious Epistemology: A Response to Bobier

In a recent paper, Christopher Bobier (2014) has argued that Duncan Pritchard’s (2012) Anti-Luck Virtue Epistemology (ALVE) cannot account for knowledge that we have through Divine Revelation. This gives philosophers who believe that Divine Revelation can be source of knowledge reason to reject ALVE. Bobier’s arguments are specifically against ALVE, but they serve as arguments against all sorts of (modest) virtue epistemologies. In this paper then, I will critically examine Bobier’s argument, and contend that (modest) virtue epistemologies are compatible with knowledge through Divine Revelation.

Anti-Luck Virtue Epistemology and Divine Revelation

Anti-Luck Virtue Epistemology (ALVE) states that for S to have knowledge, S must have a virtuously formed safe true belief. S’s belief that p is safe if, in most near-by possible worlds where S’s belief is formed in the same manner as in the actual world, S’s belief is true. S’s safe belief that p is virtuously formed if S’s safe belief is formed using reliable and well-integrated cognitive processes and it is to S’s credit that she formed the belief. In this paper, I offer a novel counterexample to ALVE. I offer a case where an individual forms a belief on the basis of divine revelation. Intuitively the person has knowledge, but ALVE predicts otherwise. The upshot is not only that we have a counter example to ALVE, but also, that ALVE may not serve the needs of an adequate religious epistemology.

Anti-luck (Too Weak) Virtue Epistemology

I argue that Duncan Pritchard’s anti-luck virtue epistemology is insufficient for knowledge. I show that Pritchard fails to achieve the aim that motivates his adoption of a virtue-theoretic condition in the first place: to guarantee the appropriate direction of fit that known beliefs have. Finally, I examine whether other virtue-theoretic accounts are able to explain what I call the direction of fit problem.

Saving Pritchard’s anti-luck virtue epistemology: the case of Temp

Virtue epistemology is faced with the challenge of establishing the degree to which a knower’s cognitive success is attributable to her cognitive ability. As Duncan Pritchard notes, in some cases one is inclined to a strong version of virtue epistemology, one that requires cognitive success to be because of the exercise of the relevant cognitive abilities. In other cases, a weak version of virtue epistemology seems preferable, where cognitive success need only be the product of cognitive ability. Pritchard’s preference, with his anti-luck virtue epistemology, is for the latter. But as Christoph Kelp has recently argued, this preference is not without controversy. Notably, Kelp argues that Pritchard on the basis of his anti-luck virtue epistemology is impelled to cast the wrong judgment in a case that Pritchard himself discusses many times in his writings, the so-called ‘Temp case’. Though Pritchard argues that Temp lacks knowledge because his cognitive success is not a result of his cognitive ability, I concur with Kelp that Pritchard’s epistemology should in fact attribute knowledge to Temp, and show this by locating weaknesses in three distinct arguments Pritchard uses to show that Temp lacks knowledge. I subsequently argue that if Pritchard wishes to persist in denying knowledge to Temp, he should endorse what I call the ‘true description’ requirement. I close the paper by providing an argument for this requirement, controversial though it is.

A Problem for Pritchard’s Anti-Luck Virtue Epistemology

Duncan Pritchard has, in the years following his (2005) defence of a safety-based account of knowledge in Epistemic Luck, abjured his (2005) view that knowledge can be analysed exclusively in terms of a modal safety condition. He has since (Pritchard in Synthese 158:277–297, 2007; J Philosophic Res 34:33–45, 2009a, 2010) opted for an account according to which two distinct conditions function with equal importance and weight within an analysis of knowledge: an anti-luck condition (safety) and an ability condition-the latter being a condition aimed at preserving what Pritchard now takes to be a fundamental insight about knowledge: that it arises from cognitive ability (Greco 2010; Sosa 2007, 2009). Pritchard calls his new view anti-luck virtue epistemology (ALVE). A key premise in Pritchard’s argument for ALVE is what I call the independence thesis; the thesis that satisfying neither the anti-luck condition nor the ability condition entails that the other is satisfied. Pritchard’s argument for the independence thesis relies crucially upon the case he makes for thinking that cognitive achievements are compatible with knowledge-undermining environmental luck—that is, the sort of luck widely thought to undermine knowledge in standard barn facade cases. In the first part of this paper, I outline the key steps in Pritchard’s argument for anti-luck virtue epistemology and highlight how it is that the compatibility of cognitive achievement and knowledge- undermining environmental luck is indispensible to the argument’s success. The second part of this paper aims to show that this compatibility premise crucial to Pritchard’s argument is incorrect.