Abstract
I argue that recognizing a distinct doxastic attitude called endorsement, along with the epistemic norms governing it, solves the self-undermining problem for conciliationism about disagreement. I provide a novel account of how the self-undermining problem works by pointing out the auxiliary assumptions the objection relies on. These assumptions include commitment to certain epistemic principles linking belief in a theory to following prescriptions of that theory. I then argue that we have independent reason to recognize the attitude of endorsement. Endorsement is the attitude of resilient and committed advocacy which is appropriate for researchers to have toward their own theory. Recognizing the importance of endorsement, and of its resiliency, gives us reason to deny the epistemic principles that serve as auxiliary assumptions in the self-undermining objection. This defuses the objection, and provides additional support for the theory of endorsement.
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Notes
This version of the generalized CV principle is adapted from Elga (2010) and Matheson (2015a). I have framed CV in terms of credences, but a similar principle can be formulated for categorical or full beliefs. For ease of exposition, I will focus on the credence version of the principle, but my proposed solution will apply to both versions.
Here I am following Lasonen-Aarnio (2013).
For an overview of this dispute, see Matheson (2015b).
For examples of moderate conciliatory views, see Kelly (2010), Sosa (2010), Lackey (2008), Levinstein (2015), Wiland (2018) and Worsnip (2014). The purpose of the “significantly” qualifier in my version of CV is meant to avoid issues dealing with a moderate view so weak that it meets the letter of CV, but fails to call for any serious revision of belief. Such a theory might avoid the problem, but would fail to be an interesting or plausible view.
Note that I am calling the principle an “-ism” because I want to highlight that it involves a theoretical commitment to such a principle, as that is what leads to the self-undermining problem. Also note that, as stated, it might be possible to build a view that packed enough into the ceteris paribus clauses of both CV and SV to technically satisfy both. But the resulting view would either (a) still face the self-undermining objection, or (b) have to include an ad hoc provision against it. Moreover, I don’t think anyone actually defends a view that would be well-described in this way.
For some related problems for conciliationism, see Mulligan (2015). Mulligan’s paradoxes involve problems where conciliationism offers conflicting advice. However, these paradoxes don’t result from applying conciliationism to disagreement about CV, but instead arise in cases of disagreement about peerhood. Thus, I think they are distinct from the self-undermining objections discussed here, and require separate treatment.
Again, this is a point made by Matheson (2015a).
Note that Most Credence could also be formulated in more general way, so that it concerns belief in any normative claim or any proposition which includes rules about how to act. Here, I formulate it in terms of theories because self-undermining arises when evaluating the theory of conciliationism.
Generally, enkratic principles constrain what kinds of belief states and actions (or intentions) are rationally compatible. They are so named because they rule out the rationality of akrasia: believing that one should do something, and yet not doing it. Enkratic principles in epistemology usually involve prohibiting akratic beliefs: believing something (to a certain degree), while (justifiedly) believing that one should not so believe. For more on enkratic principles, see Horowitz (2014) and Broome (2013).
Weatherson (2013) and Elga (2010) (in a footnote) both suggest a third formulation of the self-undermining problem. This alternative version suggests that CV is self-undermining if it suggests any lowering of credence in itself. The argument actually requires commitment to a different enkratic principle, which we can call the weighted average principle. This principle is that one should follow rules which are derived from a weighted average of rules contained in all the theories one has some credence in (with the weights provided by the credences). The same endorsement solution applies to this version of the self-undermining problem as the one appealing to the Most Credence Principle. So, I will focus on the version relying on Most Credence, for ease of exposition.
This notion of endorsement is inspired by the acceptance/belief distinction, especially by the work of Cohen (1989), Levi (1980), Maher (1993), Whitt (1990) and Van Fraassen (1980). Recently, several philosophers have recognized the need for a provisional acceptance attitude of some kind, e.g., Goldberg (2013), McKaughan (2007), and Barnett (2019). Elgin (2010) appeals to Cohen’s notion of acceptance to help with disagreement problems. I think endorsement does the best job of playing this provisional acceptance role.
For this notion of suspension, see Friedman (2017).
These features help distinguish the view from competitors, e.g., those proposed by Goldberg (2013) and Barnett (2019). For these reasons, only endorsement has the resources to give the solution to self-undermining on offer below. Goldberg’s account requires that one be more confident than not before it is appropriate to champion the view. Barnett’s account of inclination requires that the subject have most confidence in a theory. Neither appeals to extrinsic epistemic reasons.
This intrinsic/extrinsic terminology is originally due to Steel (2010), though I develop the distinction differently than he does. Lougheed and Simpson (2017) are concerned with a similar distinction. On my view, extrinsic epistemic reasons include considerations of whether a theory or research program is worthy of pursuit in the sense suggested by Laudan (1978). Thus, a number of philosophers have explored what I take to be extrinsic epistemic reasons. For an overview of the literature on pursuitworthiness, see McKaughan (2007) and Whitt (1990). Relevant work on this topic includes Laudan (1987), McMullin (1976), Nickles (1981), Whitt (1992), McKaughan (2008), Šešelja et al. (2012), Šešelja and Straßer (2013, 2014), Solomon (1994) and Longino (1990). For more about my take on the distinction, see Fleisher (2018).
I am using the normative language of reasons, but his is largely for convenience. The framework presented here is compatible with using “ought” language, or “value” language.
Strictly speaking, there is a third option: she could increase her confidence in CV. But this would obviously not be self-undermining.
Pittard (2015) makes a related point, though we disagree about the precise implications.
Note that one cannot save the self-undermining inconsistency argument by moving to talk of belief rather than adopting/giving up. This is because premise 4 of the argument is still necessary, and it is still false (as is the generalization, the Most Credence Principle). Moreover, adding a premise such as “follow SV if you believe it,” won’t help, as that still requires justification by a principle such as “if you have most credence in P, you should believe P.” And I think that principle is also false, or at least highly controversial. However, even if such an argument could be given, the same considerations apply to it as were raised for the belief version of self-undermining justification in the last section.
Thanks to an anonymous reviewer for raising this objection.
Certain extreme forms of steadfastism might not count the apparent situation-specific reasons as reasons. The Right Reasons view is a radical externalist version of SV that has this result (Kelly 2005; Titelbaum 2015). But even proponents of such views recognize the intuitive pull of these apparent reasons, and seek to explain them away. Moreover, someone like Connie would need to be convinced that right reasons is the correct theory, and come to believe it, before it could guide her actions.
Thanks to an anonymous referee for raising the worry in terms of utilitarianism.
Compare this to Lasonen-Aarnio’s appeal to particularism about higher-order defeat in (2013, 2014). She thinks that no enkratic principles are plausible, and so beliefs about theories or rules need have no effect at all on actions in these cases. In contrast, I do think some such rules are required, but not just any will do.
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Acknowledgements
For helpful feedback on this paper, I would like to thank Austin Andrews, D Black, Laura Callahan, Nevin Climenhaga, Marilie Coetsee, Andy Egan, Adam Elga, Megan Feeney, Melissa Fusco, James Gulledge, Alan Hájek, Branden Fitelson, Ben Henke, Brian McLaughlin, Casey O’Callaghan, Emily Prychitko, Pamela Robinson, Susanna Schellenberg, Ernest Sosa, James Willoughby, several anonymous referees, and audiences at the Australian National University and the 2019 Pacific Division meeting of the APA.
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Fleisher, W. How to endorse conciliationism. Synthese 198, 9913–9939 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-020-02695-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-020-02695-z