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Philosophy in Review/Comptes rendus philosophiques Editor / Associate Editor / Directeur directeur adjoint Roger A. Shiner Robert Burch Philosophy in Review Department of Philosophy Department of Philosophy University of Alberta Okanagan University College 4-115 Humanities Centre 3333 University Way Edmonton, AB Kelowna, BC Canada T6G 2E5 Canada VlV 1V7 Tel: 780-492-3307 Tel: 250-762-5445 X7386 Fax: 780-492-9160 Fax: 250-764-6428 E-mail: [email protected] E-Mail: [email protected] URL: http://www.ouc.bc.ca/philosophy/Shiner/index%20new. html As a rule, P.I.R. publishes only invited reviews. However, we will consider for publication submitted reviews of new books in philosophy and related areas. Reviews must be a maximum of 1000 words and will be accepted in either French or English. En general, C.R.P. ne publie que les comptes rendus qui sont explicitement invitees. Neanmoins, nous prendrions en consideration la publication de comptes rendus soumis, si Jes auteurs traitent de livres philosophiques (ou de livres sur un sujet apparente) qui viennent de paraitre. Les comptes rendus devraient etre de 1000 mots au maximum, et le manuscrit redige en frarn;a.is ou en anglais. Subscription prices for a volume of six issues Institutions Individuals Students $116 (Canada) $55 (Canada) $42 (Canada) US$121 (U.S.A.) US$58 (U.S.A.) US$46 (U.S.A.) Cdn$175/US$128/£73/El 15 {World) Cdn$85/US$63/£36/E56 (World) Cdn$65/US$48/£27/ €40 (World) Prix de l'abonnement a un volume de six numeros Institutions Indiuidus Etudiants $116 (Canada) $55 (Canada) $42 (Canada) US$121 (E-U.) US$58 (E-U.) US$46 (E-U.) Cdn$175/US$128/£73/E115 (World) Cdn$85/US$63/£36/E56 (World) Cdn$65/USS48/£27/E40 (World) Subscriptions should be sent to the publisher: Les abonnements peuvent etre pris chez l'editeur: Academic Printing and Publishing 9 - 3151 Lakeshore Road, Suite 403 Kelowna, BC, Canada VlW 3S9 Tel: 250-764-6427 Fax: 250-764-6428 E-mail: [email protected] Website: http://www.academicprintingandpublishing.com Publications Mail Registration No. 08491 - ISSN 1206-6269 Agreement number 40032920 © 2005 Academic Printing and Publishing Published six times a year Volume XXV, No. 6 December • decembre 2005 Table of Contents • Table des matieres William P. Alston, Beyond "Justification": Dimensions of Epistemic Evaluation . 391 David Matheson Alain Badiou, Theoretical Writings. 393 Edvard Lorkovic Timothy Chappell, Reading Plato's Theaetetus.. ..... .. ............ 395 David Hitchcock Frederick E. Crowe, Developing the Lonergan Legacy : Hi.~torical, Theoretical, and Existential Themes. • . 398 Mark Doorley Brian Davies and Brian Leftow, eds., The Cambridge Companion to Anselm . 400 Toivo .J . Holopainen Harry G. Frankfurt, On Bullshit . 404 Christine McKinnon Julian H. Franklin, Animal Rights and Moral Philosophy . .. ...... .. 408 Michael Allen Fox Bill E . Lawson and Donald F. Koch, eds., Pragmatism and the Problem of Race. 413 Naomi Zack Noah Lemos, Common Sense: a Contemporary Defense . .. ...... ...... 416 Amy M . Schmitter Peter Ludlow, Yugin Nagasawa and Daniel Stoljar, eds., There's Something About Mary: Essays on Phenomenal Consciousness and Jackson's Knowledge Argument. 419 Chris J . Onof Michael P. Lynch, True to Life: Why Truth Matters 404 Christine McKinnon Erin McKenna and Andrew Light, eds., Animal Pragmatism: Rethinking Human-Nonhuman Relationships... .. ............ .. ... 408 Michael Allen Fox tso part or this publjcation may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any fo rm or by any means. without the prior written permission of the publisher or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying. a license from CANCOPY !Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency! I Yonge St., Sre 1900. Toronto, ON M5E IES, FAX 1416) 868-1621. Aucune portion de ceue publicalion nc pcut Ctre reprodult.e, entreposCc dans un syst.eme de recuperation ou transmise, sous quelque forine ou pa.r que1ques moyens que ee soit sans le consenlemer1 l prCaJable, par ~cril-, de r~dileur ou. d•ns Jes cas d'une photocopie ou touL autre reprographie, une license de CANCOPY (Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency) 1 Yonge Sl., SLe 1900, Torooto, ON M5E IE5, FAX (416) 868-1621. :.!ailed in December 2005. Doris Olin, Paradox . 422 John R. Cook FrankJin Perkins, Leibniz and China: A Commerce of Light . 424 Justin E. H. Smith Jacques Ranciere, The Flesh of Words: The Politics of Writing. 427 Jean-Philippe Deranty Jacques Rancicre, Politics ofAesthetics. The Distribution of the Sensible. .. 427 Jean-Philippe Deranty Nicholas Rescher, Cosmos and Cognition: Studies in Greeh Philosophy. .. 431 G.S. Bowe Kenneth A. Richman, Ethics and the Metaphysics of Medicme: Reflections on Health and Beneficence. 433 Robert. Scott Stewart Sahotra Sarkar, Molecular Modi'/.~ of Life: Philosophical Papers on Molecular Biology. 436 Karola Stotz David Stern and Bela Szabados, eds., Wittgenstein Reads Weininger . 439 James C. Klagge William Sullivan, Eye of the Hearl: Knowing the Human Good in lite Euthanasia Debate . 442 lain Brassington Douglas Walton, Abductiue Reasoning. • . • . 444 David V. Newman Marcel Weber, Philosophy of Experimental Biology. 447 Jonathan Kaplan Phillip H. Wiebe, God and Other Spirits: Intimations ofTrcmscendence in Christian Experience.. ....... • . 450 Aaron Fcllbaum Martin O. Yaffe, Spinoza's Theolog1cal-Pol1t1cal Treatise . 452 Graeme Hunter WiUiam P. Alston Beyond "Justification": Dimensions ofEpistemic Evaluation. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press 2005. Pp. xviii + 256. US$45.00. ISBN 0-8014-4291-5. The central negative message of this book is that. a good deal of English­ speaking epistemology in the second half of the twentieth century (including much of Alston's own earlier work) has been predicated on a mistake, viz. the assumption that justification is a unique belief-status of central importance from the epistemic point of view. The positive message is about what epistemology looks like once its practitioners have been disabused of that 'juslilicatiorust' assumption and recognize that there is 'an irreducible plu­ rality of[positiveJ epistemic statuses-epistemic desiderata-ofbelief, each of which defines a distinct dimension of epistemic evaluation' (47), and none of which is to be identified with justification. Instead of wasting their time in fruitless debates about justification, epistemologists under the new, plu­ ralist dispensation will fmd plenty of rewarding work to be done exploring the nature, interrelations, realizability, and practical importance of the many epistemic desiderata (both merely putative and real). The primary argument in support of the negative message comes out in the book's first chapter, and goes essentially as follows: (Pl) There are radical and longstanding disagreements, spawned by the clash of a great many deeply incompatible views, about whatjustification amounts to. (P2) The best available explanation of these disagreements is not that (a) '[a]s is typical for philosophy, it's just a very tough problem' (22), but rather that (b) 'there isn't any unique, epistemologically crucial property picked out by "justified" ... land d]ifferent epistemologists have been emphasizing, concentrating on, "pushing" different epistemic desiderata, different features of belief that are positively valuable from the standpoint of the aims of cognition' (22). (C) Therefore, (b). More time co uld have been devoted here to a consideration of alternatives to (b) other than (a). Consider, for example, the following one: (c) there are many irreducible epistemic desiderata, justification is one of them, and sorting out which of them is justification is a very tough problem - particu­ larly when they are all valuable. This explanation would block the move to (C), since if true it would falsify (P2) by falsifying the first half of the conjunct (b); but it would still allow us to go 'beyondjustification'in that it would encourage epistemologists to focus their attention on more than just that status. Regardless of whether one accepts the claim that justification is a mere chimera, however, the advice to go beyond it and focus attention on other desiderata is refreshing and worthy of emphasis. In Chapters 4-7 we are treated to a discussion of various desiderata, whose interrelations are help­ fully sketched in Chapter 3. Once truth, as the 'master epistemic desideratum' (42) is set aside, we have, in descencling order of epistemic importance 391 (determined by the closeness of the tie to truth), desiderata falling into three main groups: directly truth-conducive desiderata (e.g., being based on an adequate ground, being formed by sufficiently reliable processes, being the product of intellectual virtue) are such that their possession by beliefs renders the beliefs(objectively) li kely to be true; indirectly truth-conducive desiderata (e.g., higher-order knowledge of positive epistemic status, successfully defen­ sible likelihood of truth) are such their possession by beliefs presupposes that the beliefs are likely to be true, and helps the believer arrange things so as to be better able to acquire true as opposed to false beliefa; and belief-system desiderata (e.g., explanation, coherence) are such that they add something above and beyond the positive epistemic value of their possession by arrange­ ments or systems of belief, which epistemic value depends on the pervasive likelihood of truth in those systems. Putative desiderata of the deontological sort (e.g., being held permissibly or blamelessly, having a causal ancestry that does not violate intellectual obligations) are ruled out in Chapter 4 as merely putative, on the grounds that they either assume a kind of voluntary control over beliefs that we don't have or lack a requisite tie to truth. This discussion of various desiderata contains gems of insight that alone render the book a must-have for serious epistemologists. The treatment of adequacy of belief grounds in Chapter 5 and the functional solution to the well-known generality problem for reliabilism in Chapter 6 are particularly rich and provocative. The final three chapters of the book take up a number of meta-epistemo­ logical issues that arise in connection with a 'first philosophy' approach to epistemology.
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