VRG: Maddy on Descartes & Stroud
Maddy begins the book with what she calls a 'character study' of someone referred to as 'the Second Philosopher' (SP). It's tempting to cut out the middle-woman and just call SP 'Maddy', but I shan't - on the off-chance that there is some distinction to be made between their views. In any case, the proposed plan of Part One of the book is to offer an account of what second philosophy (read 'austere naturalism') is by way of seeing how SP responds to the views of various philosophical figures. These are, primarily, Descartes, Stroud, Hume, Kant, Carnap, Quine and Putnam, each of whom is devoted a section to themselves. In this first post, I'll discuss sections 1.1 and 1.2, on Descartes and Stroud respectively.
1.1 Descartes's first philosophy
The focus of this short section is the nature and purpose of Descartes' method of doubt. Maddy makes two key claims about Descartes and gives two important clues as to how she pictures SP's response.
The first claim (p.12) is that Descartes does not think that the method of doubt shows that our ordinary beliefs are unjustified or unreasonable. Rather, what the method shows is that they are not certain (more accurately, not certain at this point in the dialectic of the Meditations). I forgo the question of whether this is an accurate portrayal of Descartes. The important point is that the SP accepts it. She agrees that she is not absolutely certain that, for example, she is not dreaming but continues to think it reasonable to believe that she isn't and also that she knows that she isn't (p.16). The first point to note is that, we are talking here about ordinary dreaming as we all know it. Second, SP is endorsing the view that a belief's being reasonable (which I take to be something like justification) does not require certainty. Indeed, a belief's counting as knowledge does not require certainty. How is it that SP thinks she knows that she isn't dreaming, and so has hands? Well, she notes phenomenological differences between waking and dreaming consciousness, and notes that her current experience is of the waking sort. She then cites various facts about human perceptual and cognitive systems that she thinks allow her to come to beliefs about middle-sized objects hands. End of story.
But Descartes wants to push SP further and get her to suspend all her reasonable beliefs, or rather all those that are merely reasonable, i.e. not certain. The way to do this is to suppose the she is being deceived by an evil demon. But why? Here is the second key claim about Descartes. The purpose of the method of doubt is to place scientific enquiry upon foundations that can be known with certainty. A subsidiary reason, highly specific to Descartes' own project, is that the method will wipe the slate clean in order that Aristotelian metaphysics can be replaced by his own mechanistic corpuscularism. This is the purpose of the evil demon hypothesis. And SP's response to this latter reason is predictable. SP already believes the most up-to-date scientific theories, so lacks this motivation to go in for the method of doubt. To the first reason, SP agrees that it would be a good thing if her (reasonable but not certain) scientific theories could be based upon absolutely certain principles, and so she sees what Descartes has to offer. Noting that his project fails to deliver the result it promises, she leaves the method of doubt to one side and continues as she was before.
What are the clues here concerning SP's methods? They are related. First, when asked how she knows that she has hands (or that water=H20) she does not say that science says so and that she trusts science. Rather, she cites various facts. Facts that we would call scientific. Second, when confronted by Descartes' method of doubt she does not reject it as 'unscientific'. Rather, she judges it according to both its own and her own criteria of success. It fails, and so she moves on. Both of these are important. For SP does not have a general account of what counts as a scientific approach, by means of which she sorts the acceptable from the unacceptable theories and methods. Rather, her pragmatic attitude is that she will be happy to accept what works. This is a line that reoccurs throughout Part One of the book, and it marks a distinction between SP and a number of other naturalistic philosophers. Naturalists sometimes distinguish between the scientific and the non-scientific (or the empirical and the non-empirical) in order to draw the boundaries of legitimate enquiry and methodology. SP doesn't do this, and in this way avoids some of the sorts of objects that such proposals tend to receive.
1.2 Neo-Cartesian Skepticism
The section on Stroud (dubbed a neo-Cartesian) contains a great deal more than that on Descartes. It also expands upon some more controversial claims implicit in 1.1.
Stroud interprets Descartes differently. Or, at least, his assessment of the result of the dreaming argument is different. The possibility that we are dreaming robs our beliefs, thinks Stroud, not only of certainty but also of reasonableness. Stroud argues that we cannot rule out that we are dreaming, for any test a positive answer to which would rule it out, could itself be dreamed to have a positive answer. Now, to block SP's reply that she can very well tell the difference between finding a test to be positive and dreaming a test to be positive (because of the phenomenological differences between dreaming and waking consciousness) Stroud must reply that what needs to be ruled out is that what SP takes to be waking consciousness might itself be a dream. We are thus introduced to the 'extraordinary dreaming hypothesis' and the necessity of ruling out of a dream that is like no other of which we are aware.
Extraordinary dreaming is just like the evil demon, and SP admits that it can't be ruled out. It has been designed so that it can't be. Her reaction, however, is to deny that her being unable to rule it out undercuts the reasonableness of her beliefs. Indeed, that it undercuts her claim to knowledge. Here again we see SP's fallibilism. She maintains that we can be said to know things, despite our being unable to rule out certain alternatives. But failing that, she maintains that we can be said to have reasonable beliefs, despite our being so unable. After all, in ordinary life we don't require that people rule out the evil demon hypothesis before they can legitimately claim to know something.
Here Stroud distinguishes between practical and theoretical contexts, suggesting that although the concept of knowledge requires the ruling out of all alternatives, we do not make this requirement for practical purposes. Suppose that we give Stroud this. The question becomes what we should make of 'reasonable belief'. Should we think of reasonable belief as requiring certainty or not? Or might reasonable belief exist at a level below that of absolute certainty? On which side is common sense? Maddy suggests the latter, and I am inclined to agree.
But the question can be put acutely: is it legitimate for SP to employ her empirical methods of belief justification in order to justify those beliefs that she, in turn, uses to justify the adequacy of her empirical methods? Stroud's negative answer to this question seems unreasonable to SP, since it effectively ask us to justify our methods of belief formation without relying on any methods (or, at least, those methods that we take ourselves to have discovered are the best). The question that SP asks of Stroud is why we should suppose that in order for a belief to qualify as reasonable, it must have been generated by a method that can itself be justified without relying on the best available methods.
Questions: How much work is fallibilism (the thought that we can know that P even though we have not ruled out not-P) doing here? And is fallibilism really consonant with our everyday notion of knowledge? If not, then it is Maddy, not Stroud, who is departing from common sense in her defence of it.
But, in any case, can/should we make do with reasonable belief? Fallibilism about reasonable belief might seem more palatable than fallibilism about knowledge. Stroud appears to deny this also but, once more, where does common sense side here?
Finally, is it legitimate to demand that we justify our empirical belief forming methods 'from the outside', i.e. without employing any of them? Supposing that this can't be done, as the sceptic insists, what would it show? That we lack knowledge? That we lack reasonable belief? Or that it is a wrongheaded demand?
1.1 Descartes's first philosophy
The focus of this short section is the nature and purpose of Descartes' method of doubt. Maddy makes two key claims about Descartes and gives two important clues as to how she pictures SP's response.
The first claim (p.12) is that Descartes does not think that the method of doubt shows that our ordinary beliefs are unjustified or unreasonable. Rather, what the method shows is that they are not certain (more accurately, not certain at this point in the dialectic of the Meditations). I forgo the question of whether this is an accurate portrayal of Descartes. The important point is that the SP accepts it. She agrees that she is not absolutely certain that, for example, she is not dreaming but continues to think it reasonable to believe that she isn't and also that she knows that she isn't (p.16). The first point to note is that, we are talking here about ordinary dreaming as we all know it. Second, SP is endorsing the view that a belief's being reasonable (which I take to be something like justification) does not require certainty. Indeed, a belief's counting as knowledge does not require certainty. How is it that SP thinks she knows that she isn't dreaming, and so has hands? Well, she notes phenomenological differences between waking and dreaming consciousness, and notes that her current experience is of the waking sort. She then cites various facts about human perceptual and cognitive systems that she thinks allow her to come to beliefs about middle-sized objects hands. End of story.
But Descartes wants to push SP further and get her to suspend all her reasonable beliefs, or rather all those that are merely reasonable, i.e. not certain. The way to do this is to suppose the she is being deceived by an evil demon. But why? Here is the second key claim about Descartes. The purpose of the method of doubt is to place scientific enquiry upon foundations that can be known with certainty. A subsidiary reason, highly specific to Descartes' own project, is that the method will wipe the slate clean in order that Aristotelian metaphysics can be replaced by his own mechanistic corpuscularism. This is the purpose of the evil demon hypothesis. And SP's response to this latter reason is predictable. SP already believes the most up-to-date scientific theories, so lacks this motivation to go in for the method of doubt. To the first reason, SP agrees that it would be a good thing if her (reasonable but not certain) scientific theories could be based upon absolutely certain principles, and so she sees what Descartes has to offer. Noting that his project fails to deliver the result it promises, she leaves the method of doubt to one side and continues as she was before.
What are the clues here concerning SP's methods? They are related. First, when asked how she knows that she has hands (or that water=H20) she does not say that science says so and that she trusts science. Rather, she cites various facts. Facts that we would call scientific. Second, when confronted by Descartes' method of doubt she does not reject it as 'unscientific'. Rather, she judges it according to both its own and her own criteria of success. It fails, and so she moves on. Both of these are important. For SP does not have a general account of what counts as a scientific approach, by means of which she sorts the acceptable from the unacceptable theories and methods. Rather, her pragmatic attitude is that she will be happy to accept what works. This is a line that reoccurs throughout Part One of the book, and it marks a distinction between SP and a number of other naturalistic philosophers. Naturalists sometimes distinguish between the scientific and the non-scientific (or the empirical and the non-empirical) in order to draw the boundaries of legitimate enquiry and methodology. SP doesn't do this, and in this way avoids some of the sorts of objects that such proposals tend to receive.
1.2 Neo-Cartesian Skepticism
The section on Stroud (dubbed a neo-Cartesian) contains a great deal more than that on Descartes. It also expands upon some more controversial claims implicit in 1.1.
Stroud interprets Descartes differently. Or, at least, his assessment of the result of the dreaming argument is different. The possibility that we are dreaming robs our beliefs, thinks Stroud, not only of certainty but also of reasonableness. Stroud argues that we cannot rule out that we are dreaming, for any test a positive answer to which would rule it out, could itself be dreamed to have a positive answer. Now, to block SP's reply that she can very well tell the difference between finding a test to be positive and dreaming a test to be positive (because of the phenomenological differences between dreaming and waking consciousness) Stroud must reply that what needs to be ruled out is that what SP takes to be waking consciousness might itself be a dream. We are thus introduced to the 'extraordinary dreaming hypothesis' and the necessity of ruling out of a dream that is like no other of which we are aware.
Extraordinary dreaming is just like the evil demon, and SP admits that it can't be ruled out. It has been designed so that it can't be. Her reaction, however, is to deny that her being unable to rule it out undercuts the reasonableness of her beliefs. Indeed, that it undercuts her claim to knowledge. Here again we see SP's fallibilism. She maintains that we can be said to know things, despite our being unable to rule out certain alternatives. But failing that, she maintains that we can be said to have reasonable beliefs, despite our being so unable. After all, in ordinary life we don't require that people rule out the evil demon hypothesis before they can legitimately claim to know something.
Here Stroud distinguishes between practical and theoretical contexts, suggesting that although the concept of knowledge requires the ruling out of all alternatives, we do not make this requirement for practical purposes. Suppose that we give Stroud this. The question becomes what we should make of 'reasonable belief'. Should we think of reasonable belief as requiring certainty or not? Or might reasonable belief exist at a level below that of absolute certainty? On which side is common sense? Maddy suggests the latter, and I am inclined to agree.
But the question can be put acutely: is it legitimate for SP to employ her empirical methods of belief justification in order to justify those beliefs that she, in turn, uses to justify the adequacy of her empirical methods? Stroud's negative answer to this question seems unreasonable to SP, since it effectively ask us to justify our methods of belief formation without relying on any methods (or, at least, those methods that we take ourselves to have discovered are the best). The question that SP asks of Stroud is why we should suppose that in order for a belief to qualify as reasonable, it must have been generated by a method that can itself be justified without relying on the best available methods.
Questions: How much work is fallibilism (the thought that we can know that P even though we have not ruled out not-P) doing here? And is fallibilism really consonant with our everyday notion of knowledge? If not, then it is Maddy, not Stroud, who is departing from common sense in her defence of it.
But, in any case, can/should we make do with reasonable belief? Fallibilism about reasonable belief might seem more palatable than fallibilism about knowledge. Stroud appears to deny this also but, once more, where does common sense side here?
Finally, is it legitimate to demand that we justify our empirical belief forming methods 'from the outside', i.e. without employing any of them? Supposing that this can't be done, as the sceptic insists, what would it show? That we lack knowledge? That we lack reasonable belief? Or that it is a wrongheaded demand?
Labels: Descartes, Naturalism, Scepticism, Stroud
posted by Joel at 10:59 am
11 Comments:
Does Maddy think that someone with a true reasonable (justified and non-accidental) belief has knowledge? For it seems to me that that such a person does is part of our common sense conception. And it seems to me that part of that ordinary conception is that our (largely perceptual) methods for accruing such beliefs are not deceptive. But if that is so then common sense seems to buy into the idea that these methods are justified as a whole, and that means it would expect them to be capable of external justification. So on this understanding, common sense is on the side of Stroud not Maddy.
But perhaps Maddy prefers to say a person with a true justified belief does not have knowledge but only 'reasonable belief'. However, this retreat looks like putting common sense on Stroud's side also: we started with the common sense notion of (non-accidental) jtb being knowledge and on discovering it wasn't susceptible to external justification retreated to 'reasonable belief'.
This can be posed as a dilemma: there is a world of difference between a common sense unreflective notion of reasonable belief and a sophisticated post-reflection-on-external-justification
notion of reasonable belief. The later only makes sense if we started with the common sense idea that someone with a fallibly acquired justified and non-accidental true belief has knowledge, putting common sense on Stroud's side. The former seems to incorporate the idea that beliefs are reasonable because mechanisms for acquiring them are non-deceptive per se, that is, these mechanisms are justified (taken to be reasonable in common sense) *because* they, apart from in exceptional circumstances, yield *true* beliefs (if the mechanisms aren't sceptically reflected on then surely it is natural to presume that believers who operate with them take them to be non-deceptive in this way). But then, on this horn of the dilemma common sense is on Stroud's side too!
Maddy’s portrayal of the Second Philosopher is winning and invites identification with the SP’s steady confidence in her position. I can’t help finding this confidence troubling, however. Take the SP’s reaction to non-scientific claims (p. 15) and compare it to her reaction to Stroud’s philosophical outsider (pp. 32-35). Part of what troubles me is that both are put aside pretty much on the same charge.
The astrology case: The SP does not appeal to any special authority of science. So she can avoid objections of scientistic prejudice, especially when dealing with non-scientific views. On the SP’s account, scientific and non-scientific views have in common that they both seek to establish reasonable beliefs about the world without aspiring to certainty. In a rough and ready sense, astronomy makes claims about the stars in the sky, these claims lacking the certainty needed to rule out that human fate is determined by the stars in the sky. Its non-scientific counterpart, astrology, makes claims about the stars in the sky, lacking the certainty needed to rule out that the stars in the sky have no bearing on human fate. Yet, according to the SP, there is not a plain stand-off here. This, I think, is how she argues (compare Maddy’s quote from Feynman, p. 15):
The astronomer has a reasonable case for her own theory (there is empirical evidence and a body of working hypotheses in its favour) but has no ultimate case against the astrologer (by virtue of fallibilism, she has no ultimate case for non-astrology, astronomy).
The astrologer has no ultimate case against the astronomer (by virtue of fallibilism, she has no ultimate case for non-astronomy, astrology), and she has no reasonable case for his own theory either (there is no empirical evidence and no working hypothesis in its favour).
The astronomer cannot disprove astrology, because she has no ultimate case against it. However, nothing astronomy says about the stars in the sky suggests any connection between them and human fate. As astrology doesn’t generate reasonable beliefs about the stars in the sky, all reasonable beliefs about the stars in the skies come from astronomy. The astrologer’s inability to add reasonable beliefs to those of astronomy renders astrology pointless. Note that on Maddy’s premises, this failure is not due to a successful case against astrology but to its own inability to support reasonable beliefs about the stars in the sky and their connection to human fate.
Stroud’s Descartes (the philosophy case): The SP takes issue with Stroud’s reinforced Descartes for the move from “inside” inquiry into knowledge, based on ordinary perception and reasoning, to an “outside” inquiry for which no evidential argument is good enough to reassure us of knowledge. Facing this challenge, the SP cannot just revert to her ordinary ways but has to concede that she has no case against Stroud’s philosophical outsider. However, that she has no such case is to tell against the philosophical outsider in the end. This, I think, is how that part of Maddy’s argument goes:
The second philosopher has a reasonable case for her own theory (she relies on “inside” evidence and method) but no ultimate case against the philosophical outsider (there is no “outside” equivalent for “inside” evidence and method).
The philosophical outsider has no ultimate case against the second philosopher (there is no “outside” equivalent for “inside” evidence and method), and has no reasonable case for her own position either (she rejects “inside” evidence and method as unreliable).
Again, the SP is not in a position to disprove the philosophical outsider. As she admits, she is defenceless against demands of “outside” justification of her project. However, she is saved, because the outsider’s quest for a view from nowhere doesn’t give the outsider any leverage against the SP. This quest doesn’t yield “outside” justifications disproving the SP’s “internal” reasonable beliefs, and it doesn’t yield reasonable beliefs of its own, so that there is no danger for SP’s beliefs from that direction either. In the end, the philosophical outsider’s quest does not shake the SP’s confidence that her methods are the best for the sort of investigation flowing from ordinary perception and reasoning. It fails to show that everything the SP stands for is beside the point. Consequently this quest should be dismissed as pointless.
I’m surprised that Maddy doesn’t go straight for this conclusion. Instead, she remarks that the philosophical outsider’s failure reveals something profound about the human condition, namely that “we can’t step outside our system of beliefs and methods” (p. 35). I find this startling. To begin with, the SP couldn’t have dreamt up the philosophical outsider with her “inside” methods. So it is not clear to me what significance she could possibly attribute to the outsider’s comprehensive quest, and thus why she actually attributes any significance to the failure of that project. Shouldn’t she treat the outsider (on account of his quixotic quest) like the astrologer? On her account, neither figure has the special authority to disprove the SP. Neither figure comes up with reasonable beliefs about the world that would challenge the continuity of her investigation. So the SP gets her way by default.
In the end, it doesn’t even matter that the philosophical outsider actively denies the possibility of reasonable belief, whereas the astrologer simply doesn’t have any reasonable beliefs. We seem to be left with the SP’s default view, because short of certain knowledge, all that could change things is a reasonable belief that forces the SP to give up her position. In that respect, the respective pursuits of the outsider and the astrologer -- the view from nowhere and the connection between human fate and the stars in the sky -- must strike the SP as equally hopeless. Apart from presenting her own “internal” case over again, she has nothing to say about these pursuits.
However, Maddy should be able to distinguish between the astrologer and the philosophical outsider. She might want to acknowledge that in contrast to the astrologer, the philosophical outsider is able to threaten the continuity of her investigation. Failing to hold reasonable beliefs (like the astrologer) simply leaves it to the SP to improve her open approach to the world. The suspension of reasonable beliefs in the course of a more comprehensive reflection on the nature of knowledge might suggest to the SP that open reasonable belief systems may not be improved by continuous revision only but by more varied and profound reconfigurations. As long as her confidence immunises the SP against this suggestion, it seems to me, she is only paying lip service to the depth of the philosophical outsider’s quest.
Matt: "it seems to me that part of that ordinary conception is that our (largely perceptual) methods for accruing such beliefs are not deceptive. But if that is so then common sense seems to buy into the idea that these methods are justified as a whole, and that means it would expect them to be capable of external justification"
I think this probably begs the question against SP. For SP's view seems to be that common sense does not suppose that the presumed reliability of sense perception, etc., requires an 'external' justification. All the stuff about Stroud introducing special philosophical (i.e. non-common sense) questions suggests that SP doesn't think that common sense takes a stand on the issue of the necessity of a justification that presupposes none of our accepted standards of empirical belief acquisition.
Christian: "The astronomer cannot disprove astrology, because she has no ultimate case against it. However, nothing astronomy says about the stars in the sky suggests any connection between them and human fate. As astrology doesn’t generate reasonable beliefs about the stars in the sky, all reasonable beliefs about the stars in the skies come from astronomy. The astrologer’s inability to add reasonable beliefs to those of astronomy renders astrology pointless. Note that on Maddy’s premises, this failure is not due to a successful case against astrology but to its own inability to support reasonable beliefs about the stars in the sky and their connection to human fate."
I disagree - SP does have a successful case against astrology. SP has a number of emprical methods that she can use to come to the reasonable belief that astrology is false. What more could be required of a 'sucessful case'? Surely not that we can say with certainty that astrology is false, for that presupposes the falsity of fallibilism. Perhaps the point is that a fallibilist has no rights to claim a 'successful case' on any occasion, but I think that is a claim that Maddy would reject.
Christian: "Maddy...remarks that the philosophical outsider’s failure reveals something profound about the human condition, namely that “we can’t step outside our system of beliefs and methods” (p. 35). I find this startling...Shouldn’t she treat the outsider (on account of his quixotic quest) like the astrologer? On her account, neither figure has the special authority to disprove the SP. Neither figure comes up with reasonable beliefs about the world that would challenge the continuity of her investigation."
One relevant difference here is that we can understand the allure of Stroud's position even if we reject it. Not so in the case of astrology. But isn't there a more significant difference? Astronomy is an empirical theory, a false one by SP's lights. Stoud's project, however, is presented as something that that emerges from a consideration of our everyday conception of knowledge. So there are two prongs of attack: one is that which you identify (the sceptic presents us with no reasonable beliefs to challenge SP's world picture), the other is the claim that Stoud's project is not implicit in our ordinary conception of knowledge (neither are we given any other very compelling reasons for engaging in it).
I'm not sure whether I agree with SP here (although I'm tempted), but it does seem to me that the treatment of Stroud really is different than the treatment of Mystic Meg, and rightly so.
By the way: I forgot to say in the original post, next week we'll be reading 1.3 (on Hume).
Joel: 'I think this probably begs the question against SP. For SP's view seems to be that common sense does not suppose that the presumed reliability of sense perception, etc., requires an 'external' justification. All the stuff about Stroud introducing special philosophical (i.e. non-common sense) questions suggests that SP doesn't think that common sense takes a stand on the issue of the necessity of a justification that presupposes none of our accepted standards of empirical belief acquisition.'
It might beg the question against SP but only because SP builds into the idea of common sense what it wants to get out. My point was that presumably common sense just takes its perceptions to be true *simpliciter* rather than 'true by virtue of only relying on internal (perceptual-evidential) methods'. To have the latter conception presupposes the sceptical process Stroud takes to be 'fundamental to the human condition'. (Why the modifier 'internal' unless one has the contrast notion of 'external'?) But if common sense takes perceptual-evidential methods to be truth-apt simpliciter and *therefore* knowledge-yielding, then presumably in order to operate with them and understand their epistemic role in the way it does, although it doesn't have to hold that such methods would pass an external test, it would naturally, if questioned by a sceptic, expect them to. This is the point of Stroud's 'plane-spotter's manual' example: it is natural, if one takes a body of beliefs to be true, to expect the methods through which they were formed to be truth-apt. On finding out this test can't be met in the case of our perceptually based beliefs, common sense might retreat to something like Maddy's SP. But this is now a sophisticated conception of knowledge informed by sceptical reflection. In other words, I take SP to be perfectly fine and dandy, I just take issue with the idea that it itself is not the product of common sense undergoing sceptical thoughts that follow 'naturally' from its conception of knowledge. I also accept, as does Stroud, that the very idea of an external test being appropriate for perceptually based beliefs per se is wrongheaded. The point is that this is a wrongheadedness that common sense naturally engenders, rather than one forced on it by dastardly philosophers.
I should've added in the last comment that common sense's expectation that perceptually based beliefs pass an external test draws on the idea that if a given belief-forming method is taken to be truth-apt (such as the method of spotting planes according to a manual), it is natural to expect the method itself ('as a whole') to be non-deceptive and thus to a pass a test of its veracity. The plane-spotter's manual can pass this test by being validated by the plane manufacturers etc., independently of any plane-spotting activity. Stroud's point is that it is natural to generalise this expectation to all belief-forming methods. However, in the case of perceptually-based beliefs per se, this generalisation turns out to have its limits, as the sceptic is happy to point out. Again, the point is that scepticism arises out of this generalising tendency in concert with a prereflective conception of perception as veridical, both of which are part of common sense.
I was taking it that common sense thinks SP's methods are reliable, as they pass the various tests we have for reliability generally: the results of each method coheres with the results of others, the are predictively successful, etc.
A philosopher may say that those tests are 'internal' in some sense, and go on to require that they pass an 'external' test. But these terms are simply not common sense terms. So, again, I disagree that common sense expects anything about 'external' justifications.
Yes, it is natural that if one holds true a body of beliefs, one would expect there to be a way of showing that one's methods are reliable. But perceptual beliefs pass this requirement. What they, arguably, don't pass is the requirement that the belief-forming methods be shown to be reliable without relying on any perceptually derived beliefs. Such a test would require, for example, that in arguing that visual perception is a reliable guide to the world's layout one must set aside all scientific knowledge concerning the nature of eyes, medium sized physical objects, the nature of light, etc.
My impression is that common sense wouldn't require such a thing. But a philosopher might, and here is where Maddy and the sceptic differ. For, whist both agree that no empirical belief can pass the test, Maddy thinks that beliefs need not pass the test in order to qualify as reasonable (or as knowledge, I'm not 100% sure whether she wants that further claim. If she doesn't, then perhaps she is departing from common sense, but my hunch is that she does).
Stroud's likening of this position to Descartes' supposedly circular reasoning is, it seems to me, right to the point. But, the question is, where exactly is the circle supposed to be?
Apologies for the late posting. (The lateness was unavoidable.)
Maddy distinguishes two forms of sceptical grounds which stand to undercut the Second Philosopher’s appeal to her ordinary justifications: what she calls the hypothesis of extraordinary dreaming, and the requirement of philosophical as opposed to everyday justifications. (p. 30). She is not sure whether Stroud’s version of Descartes slides between these two (p. 30, no 18), and he does not distinguish between ordinary and extraordinary dreaming (p.25, n. 9), but she rightly considers that it is worth distinguishing between the two. The philosophical challenge for external justification cannot be met; neither can the extraordinary dreaming possibility. But I am not sure how comfortable we should be with the way Maddy deals with the latter, the extraordinary dream predicament (=EDP). The worry is that SP emerges as simply too weak still to hold interest as a form of naturalism to which there might be opponents.
Here is what she says. She concedes that the EDP cannot be ruled out. And then says that “if I were to awaken from the grand delusion you now ask me to imagine, I have no idea what kind of reality I would find. The delusion itself is so all-encompassing as to include everything I think I know about dreaming and waking, plus the overall picture of the world and people and myself in which that is embedded, in short, everything I’ve ever experienced or hope to or expect to or dread to experience in the future.” Although the predicament seems far-fetched, and is certainly not endorsed by SP, “she can’t refute the hypothesis; indeed, she can’t so much as show it to be unlikely” (p. 24). And what cannot be ruled out here sounds very much like allowing a weak form of Kantianism: accepting that the world as we experience it to be, going by our best lights, may not be the way the world is in-itself; that the latter is not something we could ever know.
Now the SP does not regard this as a serious problem (unlike the ordinary dream challenge), “the revised challenge [i.e. EDP] seems much less troublesome” (p. 24). SP accepts a two-level split here. In effect this allows for knowledge not to be closed under known logical implication. SP cannot rule out EDP, since every ground she has for judgment on the matter, her best methods of investigation and belief-formation, are precisely undercut by that extreme hypothesis; but that does not mean that at the ordinary, everyday level her best belief-forming methods are insufficient to establish the reasonableness of the belief that she is not currently dreaming in the ordinary sense, or the knowledge that she has hands. SP takes the view that despite, and indeed in virtue of their strict confinement to the everyday, ordinary level, our best methods for belief formation, for justification of belief, etc. result in something that deserves to pass as knowledge, justified belief, etc.
What might be worrying, is that there is nothing here that the Kantian would not accept. SP's ordinary methods for belief formation, etc., are precisely those the Kantian would advocate at the empirical level. They are what give us knowledge of empirical reality. (At least as far as aposteriori truths go; what to say about mathematics, say, is another matter.) And this is what raises the worry that SP might be too weak as a form of naturalism. A form of naturalism that can be found even in Kant, might seem too weak to help understand the current debate on naturalism.
Of course it might be that SP has more to say, beyond the characterization of her position given so far: she might want to oppose any kind of transcendental framework. (I have not read further into the book; and in particular have not read the Kant chapter.) But note: it is difficult to oppose any such framework without venturing precisely into the prohibited area. (That was surely the point of G.E. Moore’s steadfast refusal even to look that way.) And SP has in fact already pulled in her horns, and appropriately ends the section by accepting a form of Humean humility (pp. 34-5). We have “well-honed ways of trying to find out what the world is like; they have delivered a picture of the world that is stable, predictively useful, admirably coherent, and explanatory...” (p. 33) – but the claim that that picture limns the structure of reality as it is in itself has been given up, as we have seen in the discussion of EDP. And that metaphysical modesty is not something that can readily be articulated, let alone held in place, without extending beyond the resources available to the naturalist.
Hi Mark, this is an interesting challenge, but I think that SP can justibiably respond that her position is being misrepresented. You say,
"the claim that that picture limns the structure of reality as it is in itself has been given up, as we have seen in the discussion of EDP".
To my mind this puts Kantian words in SP's mouth. As I understand it, the Kantian will want to maintain the truth of empirical beliefs in the face of the possibility that the world-as-it-is-in-itself markedly differs from the world-as-we-experience-it. Not so for SP, however. The possibility that SP agrees that she cannot rule out is that all her emprical beliefs are false. In this, she is refusing to draw the two-level distinction that you take her to.
I think that SP does claim that her picture "limns the structre of reality". What she denies is that she can be certain of that fact. Contrast,
Humean modesty - our knowledge of the (one and only) world is fallible.
Kantian modesty - we can know the world-as-it-appears-to-us but not the world-as-it-is-in-itself.
That latter Kantian characteristation is one that SP would reject (even though, perhaps the Kantian would accept both Kantian and Humean modesty). If so, it doesn't seem right to say that there is no disagreement between the two.
Joel, hi,
Thanks for this. The point I was making was only about Maddy's specific treatment of EDP in this section – and I can see that she might well not have thought it necessary to steer clear of the problem I was raising. But even if inadvertently, I do think she ends up with that two-level split which allows knowledge not to be closed under known logical implication, and in a way that invites a specifically Kantian (not Kant’s) construal. Without going into long discussion, here are two brief comments on each of the points you raise.
1. You write:
… I think that SP can justibiably respond that her position is being misrepresented.
You say,
"the claim that that picture limns the structure of reality as it is in itself has been given up, as we have seen in the discussion of EDP".
To my mind this puts Kantian words in SP's mouth. As I understand it, the Kantian will want to maintain the truth of empirical beliefs in the face of the possibility that the world-as-it-is-in-itself markedly differs from the world-as-we-experience-it. Not so for SP, however. The possibility that SP agrees that she cannot rule out is that all her emprical beliefs are false. In this, she is refusing to draw the two-level distinction that you take her to.
This doesn’t seem accurate. Yes, SP does agree that she cannot rule out that all her empirical beliefs are false, but this is part of her fallibilism, and applies in virtue of constraints working at the ordinary, everyday level: we cannot rule out that we will discover new evidence in support of other beliefs, improved methods of belief-formation, etc. It is not at all her response to EDP. SP regards that skeptical challenge as not being troublesome precisely because she denies that it “undercuts the reasonableness of her belief that she has hands” (p. 24). It is Stroud’s Descartes who thinks that EDP impinges on our ordinary beliefs, threatening to render them unreasonable, or false, but this is where SP disagrees. As she suggests (pp. 31-2) her response is that while she cannot rule out such hypotheses as EDP, this does not impinge on the reasonableness, justification for current beliefs, or on their status as knowledge. This seems immediately to bring into play a two level split between the EDP hypothesis at one level, and ordinary justification, etc., with all the associated fallibilism, being shielded from the impact of it at the ordinary level.
2. Your second point:
I think that SP does claim that her picture "limns the structre of reality". What she denies is that she can be certain of that fact.
Contrast,
Humean modesty - our knowledge of the (one and only) world is fallible.
Kantian modesty - we can know the world-as-it-appears-to-us but not the world-as-it-is-in-itself.
That latter Kantian characteristation is one that SP would reject…
But note, she says: “If I were to awaken from the grand delusion you now ask me to imagine, I have no idea what kind of reality I would find.” (p. 23). And she goes on to expand on this, in a way which precisely suggests that EDP forces us to accept that it is not simply that our knowledge of the one and only reality is fallible, but that the reality we would be confronted with were we to awaken from that extraordinary predicament would not be in any way one and the same world as appears to us by our current best lights. And again, the force of her response to EDP seems to turn on this.
But as I say, even if I am right, perhaps as we go along not much will turn out to hinge on the form SP has taken in this specific treatment of EDP.
Mark
With regards to the first point: the fact that, as you rightly say, Maddy denies that EDP undercuts the reasonableness or her ordinary beliefs is not incompatible with the claim that it shows that she cannot be certain that they are true. This is because she thinks that reasonableness requires less than certainty. So what you say is compatible with my interpretation of Maddy. And it suggests that there is no two-level response here. Sure, the response to Stroud contains elements not contained in the response to ordinary dreaming, etc. But only because the challenge is different. In both cases, however, SP agrees that she cannot be certain of the truth of her beliefs, maintining that this doesn't undercut their reasonableness.
To the second point: There seems to me to be highly a significant difference between the following two claims (the first of which is from your last post):
A: "the reality we would be confronted with were we to awaken from that extraordinary predicament would not be in any way one and the same world as appears to us by our current best lights."
B: the reality we would be confronted with were we to awaken from that extraordinary predicament would not be in any way like the way we currently take the world to be by our current best lights.
A invites a two world reading, since it suggests that that which we are aware of is the/a world, regardless of what might happen. That is, its the empirical world, and what we can't know about is the world-as-it-is-in-itself.
B doesn't invite this reading, as it suggests that the possibility of us "waking up" is nothing more than the possibility of us discovering that the world is quite unlike what we currently take it to be. The latter view seems to me to be consistent with everything that Maddy says.
Hi Joel,
Thanks. I'll be brief.
On the first point: As I read it, it is not just reasonableness of belief that EDP fails to undercut. SP doesn't go in for certainty, but where she has established fallible truths, they too do not stand to be impugned by EDP. EDP is not taken by SP to cast a shadow over them. (Again, see pp. 31-2 for example.) And that suggests that there is a two-level response here.
On the second point: Two-world reading not required, the point is the degree of incommensurability that would preclude mere Humean modesty/fallibilism as per your original suggestion.
It remains to be seen whether any of this matters in the longer run.
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