Sosa on Knowledge, Judgment and Guessing
Sosa on Knowledge, Judgment and Guessing J. Adam Carter Penultimate draft. Forthcoming in Synthese Abstract In Chapter 3 of Judgment and Agency, Ernest Sosa (2015) expli- cates the concept of a fully apt performance. In the course of doing so, he draws from illustrative examples of practical performances and applies lessons drawn to the case of cognitive performances, and in particular, to the cognitive performance of judging. Sosa’s examples in the practical sphere are rich and instructive. But there is, I will argue, an interesting disanalogy between the practical and cognitive examples he relies on. Ultimately, I think the source of the disanalogy is a problematic picture of the cognitive performance of guessing and its connection to knowledge and defeat. Once this critical line of ar- gument is advanced, an alternative picture of guessing, qua cognitive performance, is articulated, one which avoids the problems discussed, and yet remains compatible with Sosa’s broader framework. 1 Introduction The topic of this paper is a particular kind of cognitive performance— guessing. As Sosa (2015) sees it, guessing is like judging, but not quite. Both guessing and judging have an alethic aim. When we guess, as well as when we judge, we aim to get it right. But judgment, on Sosa’s view, does not aim merely to get it right. Judgment has a further epistemic aim, which is to get it right aptly. And getting it right aptly involves competent risk assessment. 1 Competent risk assessment—and not just hitting the relevant target any old way—is obviously important when engaged in sports, such as basketball.
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