Thinking for a Change

Thinking for a Change

Bonjour critiques the three foundationalist conceptions of epistemic regressive termination. He is quite effective at describing what is not the truth and why it is that such is not. However, he lacks effect in telling us what is the truth. In this article I will reiterate Bonjour’s arguments against the regression-solves of the three foundationalisms, and thereafter I will provide an alternative solution to this wicked epistemic crux. The three foundationalisms discussed are: Strong Foundationalism, Weak Foundationalism, and Externalism.

Regression and Foundationalism

When we speak of Knowledge, it is commonly thought that we are speaking of i) justified, ii) true, iii) belief. These attributes hinge on one another nicely, for belief is supported as belief by being true, and true belief is supported as true belief by being justified. But here is where philosophers feel the need to do such-as-they-do and apply the sequence-in-question to itself. In other words, they then ask ‘What is it that supports justified true belief as justified true belief?’. The common thought is that justification is itself based on auxiliary beliefs, and that those beliefs then require justification, which themselves require justification, and so on ad infinitum. So how do we stop this regression? There are believed to be four ways to deal with the regress: i) the regress terminates in a belief for which justification is simply unavailable, ii) the regress is unsolvable and thus continues ad infinitum, iii) the regress is circular, meaning that it terminates by justifying one belief with a belief previously justified in the sequence, iv) it terminates in a belief for which no justification is required (Bonjour, 1978). Vis-a-vis solution four, foundationalists believe that there are certain ‘foundational’ beliefs which justify themselves, and thus require no outside justification; this is known as the strong camp, or the ‘classic’ camp. These foundationalists believe that there are ‘basic beliefs’ which are “uniquely able to provide secure starting-points for the justification of empirical knowledge and stopping-points for the regress of justification” (Bonjour, 1978).

Weak foundationalism is next up to bat, and it is the argument of weak foundationalists that beliefs are not strong enough to stand alone, however there are still beliefs which possess certain --weaker-- self-justificatory attributes, and it is when many of these weak beliefs come together that they form a stronger, whole foundational claim - “[b]y combining such beliefs into larger and larger coherent systems, it is held, their initial, minimal degree of warrant can gradually be enhanced until knowledge is finally achieved” (Bonjour, 1978).

Bonjour is entirely unconvinced by these foundationalist arguments. He claims that the very concept of having a belief which is self-justifying (in either the strong or the weak sense) is inherently contradictory. For it is the nature of a belief in the traditional account to require independent justification, so any belief which requires no independent justification is therefore not true, and therefore not a belief, and thus is incapable of conferring justification on some other belief; for the concept of an unmoved mover is no more rational in epistemics than it is in theology (Bonjour, 1978).

The further move of the foundationalist is to escape from the sticky web of subjective inference, and go outside of the self. This concept is known as Externalism, and it makes the claim that the regression terminates in a belief which is justified by a source of knowledge from the world outside of the mind. For example, my belief that I am observing a white table is justified by the fact that there is a white table which I am observing - from the mind to the world we have now come, and it would be ridiculous to request further justification because there being a white table is not a belief, it is an observable fact, and therefore exempt from such justificatory requests. Bonjour, while seeming to enjoy this option more than the others, is still dubious of its authority over the regress. He brings up the concern that this seems like an ad hoc escape from under the thumb of the problem of regression, meaning that: the whole issue with regression is precisely the fact that it is internal. I find Bonjour’s proposition of the ad hoc-ness of the externalist account to be weak - I believe it to be a perfectly reasonable solve, to claim that: ‘listen, this problem is so insurmountable because you are fundamentally misunderstanding the scope of possible solutions; and when this wider scope is taken into account the problem actually becomes much less of a problem and more of an honourable mention’. Although I can see how such a solution would cause distress to anyone who has spent months or years attempting to solve this problem, only to be told ‘you misread the question’.

Another move of the externalist is one of ‘givenism’, and givenism rides the fence between the subjective and objective: positing that there exist certain ‘semi-cognitive’ states which are capable of justifying other beliefs without the need to be justified themselves (this sounds strangely familiar?). In describing givenism, Bonjour says that “[a given is when] mind or consciousness is directly confronted with its object . . . It is in this sense that the object is given to the mind” (Bonjour, 1978). In any case Bonjour remains unconvinced and suggests that, for givenism to be practical, the process of which the mind obtains objects would need, necessarily, to be infallible; which is plainly not the case - for I often see a face on the train of a person who it is not, and I often hear the voice of my mother calling me home when engaged in an unpleasant conversation.

Bonjour concludes that foundationalism “appears to be doomed by its own internal momentum” (Bonjour, 1978), and thus we may find ourselves right back where we started concerning the regressive epistemic crux. He does not leave us entirely high-and-dry though, for there is always skepticism. He also alludes to coherentism as a possible solution, while yet not suggesting that he is indeed claiming such - for “arguments by elimination are dangerous at best” (Bonjour, 1978).

Further Considerations

As I have digested the argumentation of Bonjour I have begun to formulate my own opinion of the solution to regress. It is not a foundationalist claim, and although I fail to pinpoint its precise location in the epistemic lexicon, I certainly sense elements of coherentism, contextualism, reliabilism, and even skepticism within it.

I find that the problem with knowledge is that we (humans) are the creators of the concept of knowledge, and are also the source-points of thought. Therefore we are attempting to determine objective facts about a subjective experience, and we are doing so by standing in the subjective and casting our gazes-of-longing out towards the unknown objective, and as they say - a fish cannot tell that it is in water. So how can we know the world for what it is, by means of that which creates it? The answer, I believe, is to step outside of it. God, for example, could be capable of observing human knowledge because God is from without that which it examines. But God would not be able to observe God knowledge because God exists within its own set, and therefore only Super-God would be able to observe God knowledge, yet even Super-God would not have access to Super-God knowledge. You likely recognize this pattern of problems - it is a regress, albeit an inter-being regress rather than an intra-being regress.

While this inter-being problem is the same, and just as impossible to solve, it does in fact provide an interesting potential solution to the intra-being problem. If we, as humans, were able to step outside of ourselves, then we could look back in and know knowledge! This, similarly too, may sound familiar (and familiarly problematic) because it is another solve vis-a-vis the unmoved mover, or the self-justifying justifier, or the unjustified justifier (depending on your perspective). And here we find our solutions, in precisely the last place anyone would look to find them: within the problem itself. The solution to epistemic regression is to step outside of the self without stepping outside of the self; to justify the unjustified without the use of justification.

I can demonstrate this paradoxical conception by reference to the evolution of astronomical theory. Let us examine the progression from Ptolemaic astronomy to Copernican astronomy, or more plainly: the evolution from the geocentric Universe to the heliocentric Universe. When Ptolemy posited that the Earth remained stationary at the center of the Universe and the heavenly bodies traveled in perfect paths of uniformity around the Earth his model was extremely useful for understanding, and accurate for predicting, many things about the cosmos and the world in general - but Ptolemy did not have knowledge. Then Nicolaus Copernicus comes along and develops a theory that the Sun is in the middle and the planets move around it! This theory also explained much about the Universe and had strong predictive capability. This is where it is going to get a bit weird for you linear-rationalists out there: Copernicus does not have knowledge of Copernican astronomy, but he does have knowledge of Ptolemaic astronomy! He is able to justify his knowledge of Ptolemy’s suppositions by reference to his own suppositions and their subsequent alignment or misalignment. In the scientific lexicon, the separation between Ptolemaic and Copernican astronomy (and other ‘sets’ of the like) is known as differing paradigms. Copernicus is able to observe Ptolemy’s paradigm from without, because he is within his own paradigm and this affords him an objective view of the past which is based upon, and justified by, his subjective view of the present.

The criticism will certainly surface that Copernicus cannot justify his knowledge of Ptolemy unless he is able to justify his knowledge of himself (which I have said he cannot). But to claim such is to misunderstand my argument - for Copernicus has no need to justify his knowledge of himself precisely because Ptolemy had no need to justify his knowledge of himself! As history will support: the Copernican theory of the motions of the heavenly bodies was certainly not the last development in astronomy. For after Copernicus come Galileo and Keplar, and thereafter Newton, and thereafter Einstein, and thereafter Hubble - each one, in turn, justifying the previous and further justifying all those before (justification by means of confirmation, or disconfirmation). Today, 1.86 millennia after Ptolemy, there are still elements of his theory that hold true - for example, the supposition that there are celestial bodies outside of the Earth and they move around: this statement can be claimed as strong knowledge for it is many justificatory iterations deep and yet still holds to be the apparent case.

One interesting development of this particular way of looking at knowledge is that one may never possess knowledge in the present, for one remains locked within one’s own paradigm. This is not to say that one must come to death before others may know whether or not one’s knowledge held merit, but rather to suggest that it is impossible to come into a belief and at the same moment possess that belief as knowledge. In the immortal words of Mario the Astrophysicist: “it is a temporal issue - wherein true, justified belief holds up over time” (Mario, In-Class Discussion, 2018).

Bibliography

Bonjour, Laurence. (1978). A Critique of Foundationalism. In L.P. Pojman. (2005). The Theory of Knowledge: Classical and Contemporary Readings (3rd ed., pp. 182 - 193). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.

The Will[iam James] to Believe

The Will[iam James] to Believe

William James seems to set out upon a quest to critique W.K Clifford’s The Ethics of Belief in his own article The Will to Believe. James’ line of argumentation came across to me as disreputable based on the tone of the criticism, and also the apparent complexity of his premises.

In regards to the first point, I found that James came across as more of a character assassin than a critical philosopher. For he uses such vocabulary as “[d]oes it not seem preposterous on the very face of it to talk of our opinions being modifiable at will” (James, 520, emphasis added), and also referring to Pascal’s Wager as an attempt to “force us into Christianity” (James, 520, emphasis added) going on to reference the same argument as a “last desperate snatch at a weapon against the hardness of the unbelieving heart” (James, 520, emphasis added). Perhaps it was nothing more than such linguistic-choices which caused such repulsion at James’ later reference to Clifford as an “enfant terrible” or a ‘terrible baby’ (James, 521).

As I sat with this repulsion I set out to look past the emotions and seek James’ authentic argument; I was disheartened to find that this too I found fault with. James makes several binary classifications to setup his counterargument. The first is a Genuine versus Ingenuine option, of which he is only concerned with genuinity. Genuinity is then classified based on a tripartite binary distinction of its sub-attributes: Living versus Dead, Forced versus Avoidable, and Momentous versus Trivial. For the purposes of this paper I shall assume the reader is familiar with the particulars of each classification. The issues I find with these classifications are two-fold. The first is the complexity of the setup: for I am well aware that, given enough assumptions, one may derive any valid conclusion. Secondly, I find the distinctions themselves to be homogeneous. James allows that, to avoid the option of ‘believe this theory or don’t’, that I may choose to withhold judgement; but in the same breathe James manages to deny the possibility to withhold judgement from such an option as to ‘go with this truth or without it’. It seems perfectly reasonable to presume that I may entirely avoid the option of taking or rejecting the truth by simply walking away and forgetting I encountered such an option. The momentousness is similarly problematic, in that the true distinction between momentous and trivial seems to be complete bafflegab that could be twisted any-which-way to suit oneself. As I mentioned, the only option one need be concerned with is genuinity, and genuinity is defined by being forced, living, and momentous.

Chaos in The Deep

But allow me to suspend my disbelief and examine a later section of James argument which seems to hold some sound conclusions regarding the nature of belief. This is the argument for religion. James claims that religion says two things:

1. “the best things are the more eternal things” (James, 524), and
2. “we are better off, even now, if we believe the first affirmation to be true” (James, 524)

These two arguments land with me as a sort of mashup-flavour of Aquinas’ ontological argument for the existence of God, and Pascal’s wager -thus combining to create an argument that God exists and also that one ought to acknowledge that God does so exist- This is the beginning of the softening of James’ unbelieving heart towards the Pascalian position which he so quickly dismissed earlier on in the paper.

There are a few passages which follow this initial trailbreak, the sensibility of which particularly appealed to me:

We feel, too, as if the appeal of religion to us were made to our own active goodwill, as if evidence might be forever withheld from us unless we met the hypotheses halfway to take a trivial illustration: just as a man who in a company of gentlemen made no advances, asked a warrant for every concession, and believed no one’s word without proof, would cut himself off by such churlishness from all the social rewards that a more trusting spirit would earn - so here, one who should shut himself up in snarling logicality and try to make the gods extort his recognition willy-nilly, or not get it at all might cut himself off forever from his only opportunity of making the gods’ acquaintance (James, 525)

the essence of this passage seems to be: by seeking rationality for our faith, we disallow ourselves the experience of faith itself. Later down the same page James claims that “a rule of thinking which would absolutely prevent me from acknowledging certain kinds of truth if those truths were really there, would be an irrational rule” (James, 525). Which makes sense, especially in the light of the previously referenced passage. There seems, within this toiling narrative, to be an underlying taste of the thought that religious believers tend to commit a fallacy of thought by assuming that there is no possible other alternative than their particular religious narrative; but so too do non-believers commit this fallacy by assuming absolute certainty of the religious-foil.

James proceeds to conclude in an epic fashion, saying:

if we believe that no bell in us tolls to let us know for certain when truth is in our grasp, then it seems a piece of idle fantasticality to preach so solemnly our duty of waiting for the bell . . . We stand on a mountain pass in the midst of whirling snow and blinding mist, through which we get glimpses now and then of paths which may be deceptive. If we stand still we shall be frozen to death. If we take the wrong road we shall be dashed to pieces. We do not certainly know whether there is any right one. What must we do? ‘Be strong and of good courage.’ Act for the best, hope for the best, and take what comes . . . If death ends all, we cannot meet death better (James, 526)

which serves to express the ultimate epistemic truth: ‘we don’t know what we don’t know’. Metaphysically speaking, everything is uncertain; even the uncertainty itself is uncertain. Methodologically speaking, however, we can only play with the toys we are given and thus the only position that actually does anything for us is the pragmatic position: believe whatever works best to solve the puzzle(s) of your own personal reality, and if those beliefs cease to serve you, then you ought to cease serving them, and progress to a more functional understanding of the mist you are obscured within.

I am now thoroughly satisfied with my choice of reading. I came in with the belief that James was an ignorant and unskilled critic, and I set out in this paper to break him down and expose his faults to the world. In my exercises to better understand the depth of his argument, however, I came to see him for what (I now believe) he is truly saying, and it is a position with which I firmly identify. Perhaps this was his plan from the get-go, to antagonize the reader into grasping his position. Or, perhaps more likely, is the possibility that the God of my own understanding is that which antagonized me into choosing this analysis, as a means of demonstrating to me that to claim objectivity in the frigidity of the unseen and unseeing tempests of metaphysical reality will be certain only in dashing me to pieces upon the rigid crevasses of the valley below.

Bibliography

James, William. “The Will to Believe” in The Theory of Knowledge: Classical and Contemporary Readings, 3 ed. Pojman, Louis P. (Belmont: Wadsworth, 2003), 518 - 526.