Christoph Jäger | University Professor, University of Innsbruck (original) (raw)
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Papers by Christoph Jäger
In 'Process Reliabilism and the Value Problem' I argue that Erik Olsson and Alvin Goldman's condi... more In 'Process Reliabilism and the Value Problem' I argue that Erik Olsson and Alvin Goldman's conditional probability solution to the value problem in epistemology is unsuccessful and that it makes significant internalist concessions. In 'Kinds of Learning and the Likelihood of Future True Beliefs' Olsson and Martin Jönsson try to show that my argument does " not in the end reduce the plausibility " of Olsson and Goldman's account. Here I argue that, while Olsson and Jönsson clarify and amend the conditional probability approach in a number of helpful ways, my case against it remains intact. I conclude with a constructive proposal as to how their account may be steered in a more promising direction.
According to Fred Dretske's externalist theory of knowledge a subject knows that p if and only if... more According to Fred Dretske's externalist theory of knowledge a subject knows that p if and only if she believes that p and this belief is caused or causally sustained by the information that p. Another famous feature of Dretske's episte-mology is his denial that knowledge is closed under known logical entailment. I argue that, given Dretske's construal of information, he is in fact committed to the view that both information and knowledge are closed under known entailment. This has far-reaching consequences. For if it is true that, as Dretske also believes, accepting closure leads to skepticism, he must either embrace skepticism or abandon his information theory of knowledge. The latter alternative would seem to be preferable. But taking this route would deprive one of the most powerfully developed externalist epistemologies of its foundation.
have responded to the common charge that reliabilist theories of knowledge are incapable of accou... more have responded to the common charge that reliabilist theories of knowledge are incapable of accounting for the value knowledge has beyond mere true belief. We examine their ''conditional probability solution'' in detail, and show that it does not succeed. The conditional probability relation is too weak to support instrumental value, and the specific relation they describe is inessential to the value of knowledge. At best, they have described conditions in which knowledge indicates that additional epistemic value is likely to be forthcoming in the future. We also argue that their motive analogy breaks down. The problem, we conclude, is that being produced by a reliable process is not sufficient for a belief to be justified.
Alvin Goldman and Erik Olsson have recently proposed a novel solution to the value problem in epi... more Alvin Goldman and Erik Olsson have recently proposed a novel solution to the value problem in epistemology, i.e., to the question of how to account for the apparent surplus value of knowledge over mere true belief. Their " conditional probability solution " maintains that even simple process reliabilism can account for the added value of knowledge, since forming true beliefs in a reliable way raises the objective probability that the subject will have more true belief of a similar kind in the future. I argue that this proposal confronts significant internal problems and implicitly invokes higher-level epistemic conditions that run against the spirit of externalism.
According to one of the most influential views in the philosophy of self-knowledge each person en... more According to one of the most influential views in the philosophy of self-knowledge each person enjoys some special cognitive access to his or her own current mental states and episodes. This view faces two fundamental tasks. First, it must elucidate the general conceptual structure of apparent asymmetries between beliefs about one's own mind and beliefs about other minds. Second, it must demarcate the mental territory for which first-person-special-access claims can plausibly be maintained. Traditional candidates include sensations, experiences (of various kinds), thoughts, beliefs, desires, and also affective states such as emotions. I reconstruct five prominent privileged access claims that have traditionally been maintained for emotions and discuss logical relations among them. I then argue that none of these claims stands up to scrutiny. The truth is that we often suffer from affective ignorance, and that third-person ascriptions of emotional states should often be credited with more rather than less authority than corresponding self-ascriptions. I conclude by considering, and rejecting, five potential objections to my argument.
1 2 3 Your article is protected by copyright and all rights are held exclusively by Springer Scie... more 1 2 3 Your article is protected by copyright and all rights are held exclusively by Springer Science +Business Media Dordrecht. This e-offprint is for personal use only and shall not be selfarchived in electronic repositories. If you wish to self-archive your article, please use the accepted manuscript version for posting on your own website. You may further deposit the accepted manuscript version in any repository, provided it is only made publicly available 12 months after official publication or later and provided acknowledgement is given to the original source of publication and a link is inserted to the published article on Springer's website. The link must be accompanied by the following text: "The final publication is available at link.springer.com".
One of the key tenets of Linda Zagzebski's book Epistemic Authority: A Theory of Trust, Authority... more One of the key tenets of Linda Zagzebski's book Epistemic Authority: A Theory of Trust, Authority, and Autonomy in Belief (2012) is the " Preemption Thesis for epistemic authority ". It says that, when an agent realizes that an epistemic authority believes that p, the epistemically rational response for her is to adopt the authority's belief and to replace all of her previous reasons relevant to whether p by the reason that the authority believes that p. I argue that such a " Hobbesian approach " to epistemic authority yields epistemically paradoxical results. This becomes especially virulent when we apply Preemption to cases in which the agent and the authority share their belief (same-belief cases), or in which both have either a positive or a negative graded doxastic attitude toward a given proposition. As an alternative I propose what I call a " Socratic approach " , according to which learning that an epistemic authority believes that p not only gives us strong reasons to adopt this belief, but also provides us with higher-order reasons for re-evaluating our own reasons for and against p, thereby fostering our overall understanding of the topic.
Drafts by Christoph Jäger
John Martin Fischer's core project in Our Fate (2016) is to develop and defend Pike-style argumen... more John Martin Fischer's core project in Our Fate (2016) is to develop and defend Pike-style arguments for theological incompatibilism, i. e., for the view that divine omniscience is incompatible with human free will. Against Ockhamist attacks on such arguments, Fischer maintains that divine forebeliefs constitute so-called hard facts about the times at which they occur, or at least facts with hard 'kernel elements'. I reconstruct Fischer's argument and outline its structural analogies with an argument for logical fatalism. I then point out some of the costs of Fischer's reasoning that come into focus once we notice that the set of hard facts is closed under entailment.
In 'Process Reliabilism and the Value Problem' I argue that Erik Olsson and Alvin Goldman's condi... more In 'Process Reliabilism and the Value Problem' I argue that Erik Olsson and Alvin Goldman's conditional probability solution to the value problem in epistemology is unsuccessful and that it makes significant internalist concessions. In 'Kinds of Learning and the Likelihood of Future True Beliefs' Olsson and Martin Jönsson try to show that my argument does " not in the end reduce the plausibility " of Olsson and Goldman's account. Here I argue that, while Olsson and Jönsson clarify and amend the conditional probability approach in a number of helpful ways, my case against it remains intact. I conclude with a constructive proposal as to how their account may be steered in a more promising direction.
According to Fred Dretske's externalist theory of knowledge a subject knows that p if and only if... more According to Fred Dretske's externalist theory of knowledge a subject knows that p if and only if she believes that p and this belief is caused or causally sustained by the information that p. Another famous feature of Dretske's episte-mology is his denial that knowledge is closed under known logical entailment. I argue that, given Dretske's construal of information, he is in fact committed to the view that both information and knowledge are closed under known entailment. This has far-reaching consequences. For if it is true that, as Dretske also believes, accepting closure leads to skepticism, he must either embrace skepticism or abandon his information theory of knowledge. The latter alternative would seem to be preferable. But taking this route would deprive one of the most powerfully developed externalist epistemologies of its foundation.
have responded to the common charge that reliabilist theories of knowledge are incapable of accou... more have responded to the common charge that reliabilist theories of knowledge are incapable of accounting for the value knowledge has beyond mere true belief. We examine their ''conditional probability solution'' in detail, and show that it does not succeed. The conditional probability relation is too weak to support instrumental value, and the specific relation they describe is inessential to the value of knowledge. At best, they have described conditions in which knowledge indicates that additional epistemic value is likely to be forthcoming in the future. We also argue that their motive analogy breaks down. The problem, we conclude, is that being produced by a reliable process is not sufficient for a belief to be justified.
Alvin Goldman and Erik Olsson have recently proposed a novel solution to the value problem in epi... more Alvin Goldman and Erik Olsson have recently proposed a novel solution to the value problem in epistemology, i.e., to the question of how to account for the apparent surplus value of knowledge over mere true belief. Their " conditional probability solution " maintains that even simple process reliabilism can account for the added value of knowledge, since forming true beliefs in a reliable way raises the objective probability that the subject will have more true belief of a similar kind in the future. I argue that this proposal confronts significant internal problems and implicitly invokes higher-level epistemic conditions that run against the spirit of externalism.
According to one of the most influential views in the philosophy of self-knowledge each person en... more According to one of the most influential views in the philosophy of self-knowledge each person enjoys some special cognitive access to his or her own current mental states and episodes. This view faces two fundamental tasks. First, it must elucidate the general conceptual structure of apparent asymmetries between beliefs about one's own mind and beliefs about other minds. Second, it must demarcate the mental territory for which first-person-special-access claims can plausibly be maintained. Traditional candidates include sensations, experiences (of various kinds), thoughts, beliefs, desires, and also affective states such as emotions. I reconstruct five prominent privileged access claims that have traditionally been maintained for emotions and discuss logical relations among them. I then argue that none of these claims stands up to scrutiny. The truth is that we often suffer from affective ignorance, and that third-person ascriptions of emotional states should often be credited with more rather than less authority than corresponding self-ascriptions. I conclude by considering, and rejecting, five potential objections to my argument.
1 2 3 Your article is protected by copyright and all rights are held exclusively by Springer Scie... more 1 2 3 Your article is protected by copyright and all rights are held exclusively by Springer Science +Business Media Dordrecht. This e-offprint is for personal use only and shall not be selfarchived in electronic repositories. If you wish to self-archive your article, please use the accepted manuscript version for posting on your own website. You may further deposit the accepted manuscript version in any repository, provided it is only made publicly available 12 months after official publication or later and provided acknowledgement is given to the original source of publication and a link is inserted to the published article on Springer's website. The link must be accompanied by the following text: "The final publication is available at link.springer.com".
One of the key tenets of Linda Zagzebski's book Epistemic Authority: A Theory of Trust, Authority... more One of the key tenets of Linda Zagzebski's book Epistemic Authority: A Theory of Trust, Authority, and Autonomy in Belief (2012) is the " Preemption Thesis for epistemic authority ". It says that, when an agent realizes that an epistemic authority believes that p, the epistemically rational response for her is to adopt the authority's belief and to replace all of her previous reasons relevant to whether p by the reason that the authority believes that p. I argue that such a " Hobbesian approach " to epistemic authority yields epistemically paradoxical results. This becomes especially virulent when we apply Preemption to cases in which the agent and the authority share their belief (same-belief cases), or in which both have either a positive or a negative graded doxastic attitude toward a given proposition. As an alternative I propose what I call a " Socratic approach " , according to which learning that an epistemic authority believes that p not only gives us strong reasons to adopt this belief, but also provides us with higher-order reasons for re-evaluating our own reasons for and against p, thereby fostering our overall understanding of the topic.
John Martin Fischer's core project in Our Fate (2016) is to develop and defend Pike-style argumen... more John Martin Fischer's core project in Our Fate (2016) is to develop and defend Pike-style arguments for theological incompatibilism, i. e., for the view that divine omniscience is incompatible with human free will. Against Ockhamist attacks on such arguments, Fischer maintains that divine forebeliefs constitute so-called hard facts about the times at which they occur, or at least facts with hard 'kernel elements'. I reconstruct Fischer's argument and outline its structural analogies with an argument for logical fatalism. I then point out some of the costs of Fischer's reasoning that come into focus once we notice that the set of hard facts is closed under entailment.