A dilemma for internalism?

Internalism about epistemic justification (henceforth, 'internalism') says that a belief B is epistemically justified for S only if S is aware of some good-making feature of B, some feature that makes for B's having positive epistemic status: e. g., evidence for B. Externalists with r...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Synthese (Dordrecht) 2010-06, Vol.174 (3), p.355-366
Main Author: Crisp, Thomas M.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Aristotelianism
Belief
Education
Empirical evidence
Empiricism
Epistemic justification
Epistemology
Externalism
Internalism
Intuition
Justified beliefs
Logic
Logical givens
Metaphysics
Philosophy
Philosophy of Language
Philosophy of Science
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Summary:Internalism about epistemic justification (henceforth, 'internalism') says that a belief B is epistemically justified for S only if S is aware of some good-making feature of B, some feature that makes for B's having positive epistemic status: e. g., evidence for B. Externalists with respect to epistemic justification ('externalists') deny this awareness requirement. Michael Bergmann has recently put this dilemma against internalism: awareness admits of a strong and a weak construal; given the strong construal, internalism is subject to debilitating regress troubles; given the weak construal, internalism is unmotivated; either way, internalism is in serious trouble. I argue for two claims in this article. First, Bergmann's dilemma argument is unmotivated: he's given no good reason for accepting one of its crucial premises. And second, Bergmann's dilemma argument is unsound: the crucial premise in question is false.
ISSN:0039-7857
1573-0964
DOI:10.1007/s11229-009-9457-4