Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-p9bg8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-28T17:42:41.439Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

On the Arbitrariness Objection to the Threshold View

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 March 2017

MATTHEW LEE
MATTHEW LEE*
Affiliation:
Berry College
*
*<[email protected]>
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Proponents of the ‘Threshold View’ have held that to believe a proposition is to be sufficiently confident of the proposition’s truth, but that there is no sharp cutoff between degrees of confidence that constitute belief and degrees of confidence that do not. Brian Weatherson has objected that no plausible account of vagueness can support this view. In this paper, I reply to Weatherson’s objection. Along the way, I identify a way in which one might hope to maintain the Threshold View without a fuzzy threshold, and I reformulate the Threshold View to accommodate fuzzy thresholds without begging substantive questions about vagueness.

D’après la «théorie du seuil», croire une proposition, c’est être suffisamment sûr de la vérité de cette proposition, bien qu’il n’y ait pas de limite nette entre les degrés de certitude qui constituent une croyance et ceux qui n’en constituent pas une. Pour Brian Weatherson, cette thèse ne peut être appuyée sur aucune théorie plausible du vague. Dans cet article, je réponds à Weatherson et propose une reformulation de la théorie du seuil qui contient des seuils flous sans engager des présupposés controversables en théorie du vague. J’identifie également une façon de conserver la théorie sans avoir un seuil flou.

Keywords

beliefcredenceThreshold Viewcredal reductivismArbitrariness Objectionfuzzy thresholdvagueness
Type
Articles
Information
Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review / Revue canadienne de philosophie , Volume 56 , Issue 1 , March 2017 , pp. 143 - 158
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Philosophical Association 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Buchak, Lara 2014 “Belief, Credence, and Norms.” Philosophical Studies 169 (2): 285–311.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fantl, Jeremy, and McGrath, Matthew 2009 Knowledge in an Uncertain World. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Foley, Richard 1992 “The Epistemology of Belief and the Epistemology of Degrees of Belief.” American Philosophical Quarterly 29 (2): 111–124.Google Scholar
Foley, Richard 1993 Working without a Net: A Study of Egocentric Epistemology. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Frankish, Keith 2009 “Partial Belief and Flat-out Belief.” In Degrees of Belief. Edited by Huber, Franz and Schmidt-Petri, Christoph. New York: Springer, pp. 75–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Friedman, Jane 2013 “Suspended Judgment.” Philosophical Studies 162 (2): 165–181.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goldman, Alvin, and McGrath, Matthew 2015 Epistemology: A Contemporary Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hunter, Daniel 1996 “On the Relation Between Categorical and Probabilistic Belief.” Noûs 30 (1): 75–98.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keefe, Rosanna, and Smith, Peter 1996 Vagueness: A Reader. Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
Lee, Matthew 2014 Belief, Doubt, and Confidence: A Threshold Account. Ph.D. Dissertation. University of Notre Dame.Google Scholar
Lee, Matthew 2016 a “Credence and Correctness: In Defense of Credal Reductivism.” Manuscript submitted for publication.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lee, Matthew 2016 b “On Doubt.” Manuscript submitted for publication.Google Scholar
Peirce, C.S. 1992/1877 “The fixation of belief.” In The Essential Peirce: Selected Philosophical Writings. Vol. 1. Edited by Houser, Nathan and Kloesel, Christian. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, pp. 109–123.Google Scholar
Ross, Jacob, and Schroeder, Mark 2014 “Belief, Credence, and Pragmatic Encroachment.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 88 (2): 259–288.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stalnaker, Robert 1984 Inquiry. Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press.Google Scholar
Sturgeon, Scott 2008 “Reason and the Grain of Belief.” Noûs 42 (1): 139–165.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thagard, Paul 2004 “What is Doubt and When is it Reasonable?” In New Essays in the Philosophy of Language and Mind (Canadian Journal of Philosophy). Edited by Ezcurdia, Maite, Stainton, Robert, and Viger, Christopher. Calgary: Calgary University Press, pp. 391–406.Google Scholar
Weatherson, Brian 2005 “Can We Do without Pragmatic Encroachment?” Philosophical Perspectives 19: 417–443.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wedgwood, Ralph 2012 “Outright Belief.” Dialectica 66 (3): 309–329.Google Scholar
Williamson, Timothy 1994 Vagueness. London: Routledge.Google Scholar