Abstract

It is widely held that beliefs respond to evidence. However, it is not easy to make precise exactly in which sense beliefs are so responsive. In this paper, I develop and defend a novel minimalist account of evidence-responsiveness. I argue that in order for an attitude A to count as minimally responsive to the evidence, e, the attitude holder must follow at least one epistemic standard which appropriately explains her holding A given e. The account given here allows that attitudes may still show responsiveness in this minimal sense, even in cases where we ignore evidence against them or when we lack the capacity to revise them. It also offers a systematic way of demarcating the boundaries between beliefs and other attitudes like imaginings and acceptances. While beliefs are not the sole attitudes whose evidence relations are bound by epistemic standards, beliefs and non-beliefs undergo different forms of regulation.