The distinction between true belief and knowledge is one of the most fundamental in philosophy, and a remarkable effort has been dedicated to formulating the conditions on which true belief constitutes knowledge. For decades, much of this epistemological undertaking has been dominated by a single strategy, referred to here as the modal approach. Shared by many of the most widely influential constraints on knowledge, including the sensitivity, safety, and anti-luck/risk conditions, this approach rests on a key underlying assumption — the (...) modal profiles available to known and unknown beliefs are in some way asymmetrical. The first aim of this paper is to deconstruct this assumption, identifying its plausibility with the way in which epistemologists frequently conceptualize human perceptual systems as excluding certain varieties of close error under conditions conducive to knowledge acquisition. The second aim of this paper is to then argue that a neural phase phenomenon indicates that this conceptualization is quite likely mistaken. This argument builds on the previous introduction of this neural phase to the context of epistemology, expanding the use of neural phase cases beyond relatively narrow questions about epistemic luck to a much more expansive critique of the modal approach as a whole. (shrink)

Many virtue-based approaches to propositional knowledge begin with the ability and achievement intuitions. In this paper, I rely on this pair of intuitions to explore the relationship between knowing how and knowing that. On the view that emerges, propositional knowledge is a kind of success through cognitive know how. Rather than simply equating know how with ability, I reveal deeper connections between both kinds of knowledge by focusing on the role of self-regulation.

Can epistemic luck be captured by modal conditions such as safety from error? This paper answers ‘no’. First, an old problem is cast in a new light: it is argued that the trivial satisfaction associated with necessary truths and accidentally robust propositions is a symptom of a more general disease. Namely, epistemic luck but not safety from error is hyperintensional. Second, it is argued that as a consequence the standard solution to deal with this worry, namely the invocation of content (...) variation, fails. Third, it is considered whether the condition can serve some restricted theoretical role; the hypothesis is rejected. Finally, it is tentatively suggested that epistemic luck’s hyperintensionality derives from its being an explanatory notion, and an analogy is drawn with failures of probabilstic conceptions of explanation in the philosophy of science. (shrink)

The final chapter of Elgin’s defends the claim that some mistakes mark significant epistemic achievements. Here, I extend Elgin’s analysis of the informativeness of mistakes for epistemic policing. I also examine the type of theory of competence that Elgin’s view requires, and suggest some directions in which this can be taken.

We are witnessing a certain tendency in epistemology to account for the anti-luck intuition in terms of risk. I.e., instead of the traditional anti-luck diagnosis of Gettier cases and fake barn cases, a new anti-risk diagnosis seems to be preferable by many. My goal in this paper is twofold: first, I contribute to motivate that drift; and second, I defend that we ought to partially resist it. An anti-risk diagnosis is valid and preferable for fake barn cases, but we still (...) need an anti-luck diagnosis for classic Gettier cases. The paper thus defends the Solomon-like result that we need both concepts—epistemic luck and epistemic risk—to deal with all the cases where knowledge is undermined. (shrink)

My interest is in how shifting from an anti-luck epistemology to an anti-risk epistemology can enable us to make sense of some important epistemic phenomena. After rehearsing the more general arguments for preferring anti-risk epistemology over its anti-luck cousin, I argue that a further advantage of this transition lies in how it puts us in a better position to understand certain trade-offs with regard to epistemic risk. In particular, there can be ways of forming beliefs that are epistemically low risk (...) along one axis of evaluation while being epistemically high risk along another axis of evaluation. I further show how this idea plays out in terms of collaborative inquiries, where the framework provided by anti-risk epistemology enables us to understand how epistemic risk can be distributed across such a collective enterprise and thereby effectively managed. (shrink)

A distinctive approach to the theory of knowledge is described, known as anti-luck epistemology. The goal of the paper is to consider whether there are specific features of this proposal that entails that it is committed to pragmatic encroachment, such that whether one counts as having knowledge significantly depends on non-epistemic factors. In particular, the plausibility of the following idea is explored: that since pragmatic factors play an essential role when it comes to the notion of luck, then according to (...) anti-luck epistemology they must likewise play an essential role in our understanding of knowledge as well. It is argued that once anti-luck epistemology is properly understood—where this means, in turn, having the right account of luck in play—then this putative entailment to pragmatic encroachment does not go through. (shrink)

Part one offers a précis of my book, Epistemic Angst, with particular focus on the themes discussed by the participants in this symposium. Part two then examines a number of topics raised in this symposium in light of this précis. These include how best to understand the ‘non-belief’ account of hinge epistemology, whether we should think of our hinge commitments as being a kind of procedural knowledge, whether hinge epistemology can be used to deal with underdetermination-based scepticism, what the status (...) of my acceptance of the closure principle amounts to, whether one’s total evidence in fact supports our hinge commitments, and the nature of the kind of reasoning that Wittgenstein employs when advancing a hinge epistemology. Finally, I offer some remarks on the notion of epistemic risk in the context of the sceptical problematic, and show how this has application to legal epistemology. (shrink)

In this paper, I develop a serious new dilemma involving necessary truths for safety-based theories of knowledge, a dilemma that I argue safety theorists cannot resolve or avoid by relativizing safety to either the subject’s basis or method of belief formation in close worlds or to a set of related or sufficiently similar propositions. I develop this dilemma primarily in conversation with Duncan Pritchard’s well-known, oft-modeled safety-based theories of knowledge. I show that Pritchard’s well-regarded anti-luck virtue theory of knowledge and (...) his recently proposed (allegedly superior) anti-risk virtue theory of knowledge clearly succumb to the dilemma, and so they are inadequate as they stand. If Pritchard’s safety-based theories of knowledge are shown to be inadequate by the dilemma that is developed in this paper, then a number of other safety-based theories of knowledge (e.g., Beddor and Pavese’s, Luper’s, Dutant’s, early Pritchard’s, and others) look to be in jeopardy in this connection as well. (shrink)