Högre seminariet i teoretisk filosofi: Tricia Magalotti
Seminarium
Datum:torsdag 27 februari 2025
Tid:13.15 – 15.00
Plats:D700
Reasons explanations of belief and the wrong way problem(s)
Abstract
According to one epistemological framework, epistemic justification should be tightly tied to reasons explanations for belief. Evidentialism about epistemic justification, the view that justified beliefs are the ones that are based on good evidence, seems to fit closely with this way of thinking of things. But, even those who deny evidentialism may wish to hold on to the idea that there can be psychological reasons explanations for belief that differ from merely “mechanistic” explanations for belief.
Reasons explanations of the sort I have in mind are ones that identify a cause of a belief that also rationalizes the belief. Anyone who wants to defend the legitimacy of these sorts of explanations has an interest in the project of specifying what it is for a rationalizing cause of belief to cause the belief in the right way. This is important for avoiding deviant causal chains but also in other cases.
In this talk, I attempt to shed new light on the “wrong way problem” for evidentialists (and reasons explanations of belief more generally). I also suggest an approach for how to go about solving the problem.
