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Foundationalism and the Idea of the Empirical FOUNDATIONALISM AND THE IDEA OF THE EMPIRICAL CIARA FAIRLEY University College London Submitted for the degree of PhD, May 2007 1 ABSTRACT This thesis is about foundationalism in epistemology. It distinguishes between different forms of foundationalism and defends one particular version of this doctrine. Chapter 1 gives an account of the motivations for foundationalism, including the so-called epistemic regress argument. It criticizes recent accounts of the core doctrines of foundationalism, such as those of Michael Williams and Ernest Sosa, and proposes a different account according to which foundationalism is the view that (a) some of our beliefs must be non-inferentially justified, (b) perception is a source of non-inferential justification, and (c) perception is a basic source of such justification. Chapter 2 gives an account of traditional foundationalism and tries to identify both what is right with it and what is wrong with it. It argues that the basic insight of traditional foundationalism can be detached from some of the other doctrines with which it was associated by the traditional foundationalists. That insight concerns the role of perceptual awareness or acquaintance as a regress-terminating source of epistemic justification. Chapter 3 exploits this idea in defending a more modest form of foundationalism according to which ordinary perceptual beliefs may be foundational. Chapters 3 and 4 focus on two influential arguments against the view that ordinary beliefs about the world around us can be non- inferentially justified by perception. The first argument trades on the alleged fallibility of perceptual justification, the second on its defeasibility. It is shown that neither argument poses a genuine threat to the more modest version of foundationalism that I defend. Chapter 5 compares perception with other sources of non-inferential justification such as memory and testimony. It defends the view that perception is a privileged source of non- inferential justification, even if it isn't the only source of such justification. It also contrasts foundationalism with traditional forms of externalism such as reliabilism and explains why the latter should not be counted as a form of foundationalism. 2 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Thanks to Mike Martin for getting me started on this topic and for his input in the early stages of my research. In the last two years I have been helped by Quassim Cassam whose support, encouragement, and own example made it possible for me to finish this thesis. I would also like to thank Marcus Giaquinto and Paul Snowdon for useful discussions and feedback on earlier drafts of some of the following chapters. I gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the Royal Institute of Philosophy. This thesis is dedicated to those who have helped me most; you know who you are. 3 TABLE OF CONTENTS PREFACE 5 1. WHAT IS FOUNDATIONALISM? 16 1. Introduction 16 2. The Epistemic Regress Argument 27 3. Conclusion 53 2. THE HISTORICAL FOUNDATIONALISTS 55 1. Introduction 55 2. Historical Foundationalism 57 3. Revisionary Epistemology 68 4. The Idea of the Empirical 81 5. Conclusion 87 3. THE ARGUMENT FROM FALLIBILITY 89 1. Introduction 89 2. Propositional Perception 93 3. Non-Propositional Perception 101 4. Having Reasons 116 5. The Argument from Fallibility 129 6. Conclusion 143 4. THE ARGUMENT FROM DEFEASIBILTY 149 1. Introduction 149 2. Perceptual Defeasibility 150 4 3. The Argument from Defeasibility 159 4. The World Made Manifest 169 5. Historical Foundationalism Reconsidered 174 6. Indefeasibility and the Mental 183 7. Conclusion 185 5. THE PRIMACY OF PERCEPTION 188 1. Introduction 188 2. Concept Empiricism 194 3. Basic Knowledge 196 4. Generating Knowledge 202 5. Perception and Explanation 219 6. Conclusion 230 BIBLIOGRAPHY 233 5 FOUNDATIONALISM AND THE IDEA OF THE EMPIRICAL PREFACE When I first encountered foundationalism as a topic in epistemology I had a certain understanding of what it was supposed to be. I thought that foundationalism was roughly the view that not all of our justification could be inferential and that perception is the basic source of justification that is not inferential. So foundationalism, as I understood it, was a doctrine both about the structure of human knowledge or justification, and its sources. This initial impression was strengthened when I read Contemporary Theories of Knowledge by Pollock and Cruz. They claim: The simple motivation for foundations theories is the psychological observation that we have various ways of sensing the world and that all knowledge comes to us via those senses. The foundationalist takes this to mean that our senses provide us with what are then identified as epistemologically basic beliefs. We arrive at other beliefs by reasoning (construed broadly). Reasoning, it seems, can only justify us in holding a belief if we are already justified in holding the beliefs from which we reason, so reasoning cannot provide an ultimate source of justification. Only perception can do that. We thus acquire the picture of our beliefs forming a kind of pyramid, with the basic beliefs provided by perception forming the foundation, and all other justified beliefs being supported by reasoning that traces back ultimately to the basic beliefs (Pollock & Cruz 1999: 29). Though Pollock and Cruz ultimately mishandle this insight they remain virtually the only commentators in this area to acknowledge the importance of perception. Their book had a lasting impact on my thinking. 6 I thought that if I had correctly understood foundationalism it was pretty obviously true. Although some of our beliefs are justified because we have inferred them from other things that we are justified in believing it seemed obvious to me that they cannot all be justified in this way. Some of our beliefs must be non-inferentially justified and perception is the obvious source of such justification. How then could foundationalism – which says just this – fail to be true? It came as something of a surprise, then, when I discovered that not only is foundationalism not a position that most philosophers think is true. It is a position that most philosophers think is false. That left me puzzled: how could so many philosophers be so critical of a position that seems to get so much right? This thesis is to a large extent a direct product of that puzzlement and a more or less direct attempt to resolve it. The first thing that I discovered when I starting reading more widely was that other people don’t all understand foundationalism in the way that I did. The historical foundationalists – people like C. I. Lewis, Roderick Chisholm, and A. J. Ayer - agreed that our knowledge of the world rests upon a foundation of basic beliefs and that those beliefs are not justified in the way that the rest of our beliefs are justified. But while I took basic beliefs to include ordinary beliefs about objects and events in the world around us, the historical foundationalists took them to be beliefs about our own minds.1 And 1 It sounds odd to say the foundational beliefs include ‘ordinary beliefs’ about the world. Aren’t ordinary beliefs supposed to be the beliefs that are supported by more basic beliefs? If the former are basic, what would be an example of a non-basic belief? This problem arises where we assume we can individuate the foundational beliefs in terms of their subject-matter. We will see later this is a mistake: foundational beliefs are not ‘about’ any particular subject-matter. What distinguishes these beliefs is the source of their justification. Here, all I mean is that the foundational beliefs might include beliefs like this: ‘the squirrel is 7 while I thought that the basic beliefs are justified by perception the historical foundationalists claimed those beliefs are infallible and so either justify themselves or are justified by some sort of special introspective awareness. This seemed a long way from the rather commonsensical doctrine that I had always taken foundationalism to be. In recent years foundationalism has enjoyed something of a renaissance. Unfortunately, the form of foundationalism that is popular nowadays is a long way from the position that I call foundationalism. Sometimes called ‘formal foundationalism’, the new foundationalism is a bland doctrine that normally involves no more than a commitment to the idea that epistemological properties like justification supervene on non- epistemological ones. Since this makes just about everyone a foundationalist it’s not a position that I felt very excited about defending. I think that foundationalism is a substantive doctrine though not the very unattractive doctrine the historical foundationalists made it out to be. Foundationalism, as I understand it, has got three basic components. The first is that there must be such a thing as non-inferential justification and there must be because otherwise we face a vicious epistemic regress. This is the least contentious of what I regard as the three basic elements of foundationalism. I think that the so-called epistemic regress argument for foundationalism is a good one and I will explain why in chapter 1. Later in later chapters 3 and 4 I will counter various arguments that are supposed to show that there could not be any such thing as non-inferential justification. on the fence’ ‘Ross is at the party’ and so on. This is something more traditional foundationalists denied. 8 The second component of foundationalism is that one of the sources of non-inferential justification is perception. Standard undergraduate textbooks on foundationalism tell us that the basic or foundational beliefs are either self-justified or need no justification. Such beliefs are obviously not justified by perception. Robert Audi, Keith Lehrer, and Jonathan Dancy all think of basic beliefs in this way. So what I am representing as the second essential component of foundationalism is one that very few standard discussions acknowledge.
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