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Rational supererogation and epistemic permissivism

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Abstract

A number of authors have defended permissivism by appealing to rational supererogation, the thought that some doxastic states might be rationally permissible even though there are other, more rational beliefs available. If this is correct, then there are situations that allow for multiple rational doxastic responses, even if some of those responses are rationally suboptimal. In this paper, I will argue that this is the wrong approach to defending permissivism—there are no doxastic states that are rationally supererogatory. By the lights of contemporary linguistics, ‘rational’ is an absolute gradable adjective, and as such, can only be applied to things that satisfy the top of the scale of rationality. For this reason, it is not possible to believe what is rational while also failing to believe what is rationally optimal.

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Notes

  1. See Nado (2019, p. 121).

  2. See Hedberg (2014, p. 3621).

  3. See Li (2018, p. 351).

  4. See Li (2019, p. 171).

  5. Along with Li, Enoch (2010) and Jackson (2021) also explore accounts of epistemic rational supererogation. Because it is possible to distinguish between epistemic and practical rationality, theories of rational supererogation can extend to both normative domains. Due to limitations of space, this paper will only consider epistemic cases of rational supererogation, though for an application of how the ideas discussed in this paper might apply to the practical case, see Siscoe (Forthcoming). For supporters of rationally supererogation in the practical domain, see Benn and Bales (2020), Kawall (2003), McElwee (2017), and Slote (1989).

  6. See Christensen (2007, p. 190 and 192).

  7. ‘Rational’ can modify a number of different objects beyond just doxastic states—we also often speak of rational actions and rational persons. For the majority of this paper, I will confine my attention to the behavior of ‘rational’ as it applies to doxastic states, though it may be that ‘rational,’ when applied to other sorts of entities, is not an absolute gradable adjective, a possibility I consider in Sect. 4.

  8. See Li (2018, p. 350).

  9. See Li (2019, p. 171).

  10. Because this paper is focused on Rational Supererogation, I do not consider whether or not rational ties might be helpful for the permissivist.

  11. See Enoch (2010, p. 957).

  12. See Jackson (2021, p. 318). See also Tidman (1996) and Hedberg (2014) for similar examples.

  13. For proponents of this view, see Berker (2018), Feldman (2000), Harman (2004), Kelly (2002) and Kelly (2003), and Whiting (2014).

  14. See Jackson (2021, p. 319).

  15. There are other discussions in the literature of epistemic supererogation beyond what we have discussed here, though the majority are primarily interested in accounts of supererogatory epistemic actions; see Bernstein (1986), Hedberg (2014), McElwee (2017), Nado (2019), and Tidman (1996).

  16. The view that ‘rational’ is an absolute gradable adjective is anticipated by Sorensen’s (1991) claim that rationality is an absolute concept.

  17. Those who distinguish between relative and absolute gradable adjectives include Kennedy (2007), Kennedy and McNally (2005), Rotstein and Winter (2004), and Rusiecki (1985).

  18. Due to its ability to capture the distinction between RAs and AAs (Kennedy 2007), the scale approach taken by the Cresswell (1977), Heim (2000), Kennedy (2007), and von Stechow (1984) has been the most influential. There is also a view, however, on which the basis for comparisons between gradable adjectives are quantifications over possible precisifications of that adjective’s extension. For more on this view, see Fine (1975), Kamp (1975), Klein (1980), Larson (1988), and Pinkal (1995).

  19. Following Kennedy and McNally (2005, p. 369), I treat the semantics of ‘purer’ and ‘more pure’ identically.

  20. Kennedy (2007), Kennedy and McNally (2005), and Rotstein and Winter (2004) all advocate for the view on which the extension of the pos form of gradable adjectives includes those items that “stand out” relative to the contextual threshold. The view that gradable adjectives enlist a standard of comparison, however, has a much longer history—see Barker (2002), Bartsch and Venneman (1972), Bierwisch (1989), Cresswell (1977), Fine (1975), Kamp (1975), Klein (1980), Lewis (1970), Pinkal (1995), Sapir (1944), von Stechow (1984) , and Wheeler (1972).

  21. See Kennedy (2007), Kyburg and Morreau (2000), Sedivy et al. (1999), and Syrett et al. (2006, 2010).

  22. There is reason for caution when using this diagnostic, as words like ‘totally’ and ‘completely’ can, in certain contexts, mean something very close to ‘very’. For more, see Kennedy (2007, pp. 34–35), and Kennedy and McNally (2005, p. 354), and Sect. 3 of this paper.

  23. Kennedy (2007) calls the principle that enlists the top of the scale in a term’s meaning the Principle of Interpretive Economy. For more on Interpretive Economy and its relationship to relative and absolute gradable adjectives, see Franke (2012), Frazier et al. (2008), Rett (2014), and Sassoon (2012).

  24. Technically speaking, vagueness and imprecision are properties, not of particular gradable adjectives, but of particular uses of gradable adjectives. As shorthand, I will speak of vague and imprecise terms for terms that can give rise to vagueness and imprecision in particular contexts, but vagueness and imprecision should always be thought of as a property of specific uses of gradable adjectives.

  25. Complete raw survey data for all of the empirical work contained in this paper can be found in the Appendix.

  26. This vignette was also used in a study conducted for Siscoe (Forthcoming).

  27. All survey data from both studies can be found in the Appendix.

  28. See the Oxford English Dictionary, 3rd Edition (2008).

  29. Even though I have described ‘rational’ as ambiguous, it might be more apt to call ‘rational’ polysemous. No completely precise definitions exist for differentiating between case of ambiguity and polysemy, see Sennet (2016a) and Sennet (2016b) and Viebahn (2018), but both are used to describe terms that have various meanings. Ambiguity is often used to describe a term whose meanings are not very closely related (‘bank’ can mean a financial institution or the side of a river) while polysemy applies when a term has two closely related meanings (‘fish’ can refer to a particular animal or the method of catching that animal). Because ambiguity and polysemy are discovered using the same kinds of tests, I will not make this distinction in the body of the text, although I do note wherever a polysemy theory of ‘rational’ would importantly differ from a case of homonymy.

  30. This test is often called the identity or conjunction reduction test, see Asher (2011), Bach (1998), Cruse (1982), Cruse (1986), and Cruse (2011), Falkum and Vicente (2015), Gillon (2004), Lakoff (1970), Sennet (2016a) and Sennet (2016b), and Zwicky and Sadock (1975). The conjunction reduction test has been employed for a wide range of philosophical applications, including debates over ambiguity theories of definite descriptions, Koralus (2013) and Sennet (2002), and know how, Stanley (2005). The conjunction reduction test can be susceptible to false negatives, see Geeraerts (1993), Moldovan (2021), and Viebahn (2018), but (23) provides positive evidence that ‘rational’ can be used to create zeugmas.

  31. See Douven (2009, pp. 315–352).

  32. See Podgorski (2016, pp. 1934–1936).

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  1. Florida State University, Tallahassee, USA

    Robert Weston Siscoe

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Appendix

Appendix

Study 1

  

Percentage of respondents (20 total)

Image/scenario

Prompt

Object 1

Object 2

Both

Neither

Survey data*

Pipes

If I asked you to point at the long one, which would you point to?

15

85

0

0

Elephants

If I asked you to point at the large one, which would you point to?

5

85

10

0

Lines

If I asked you to point at the straight one, which would you point to?

5

10

0

85

Doors

If I asked you to point at the closed one, which would you point to?

5

15

0

80

Math test

If I asked you to point to the one who has a rational degree of confidence, who would you point to?

0

25

15

60

Survey dara\(^*\)

Study 2

  

Percentage of respondents (21 total)

Image/scenario

Prompt

Object 1

Object 2

Both

Neither

Pipes

If I asked you to point at the long one, which would you point to?

4.8

90.5

4.8

0

Elephants

If I asked you to point at the large one, which would you point to?

0

95.2

4.8

0

Lines

If I asked you to point at the straight one, which would you point to?

0

14.3

9.5

76.2

Doors

If I asked you to point at the closed one, which would you point to?

0

19.0

4.8

76.2

Famous detective

If I asked you to point at the rational one, who would you point to?

4.8

71.4

23.8

0

  1. *All survey participants were native English speakers and high school graduates

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Siscoe, R.W. Rational supererogation and epistemic permissivism. Philos Stud 179, 571–591 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-021-01671-8

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