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Explanatory Obligations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 June 2020

Kareem Khalifa  and
Jared Millson
Kareem Khalifa*
Affiliation:
Middlebury College, Middlebury, VT, USA
Jared Millson
Affiliation:
Agnes Scott College, Decatur, GA, USA
*
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

In this paper, we argue that a person is obligated to explain why p just in case she has a role-responsibility to answer the question “Why p?”. This entails that the normative force of explanatory obligations is fundamentally social. We contrast our view with other accounts of explanatory obligations or the so-called “need for explanation,” in which the aforementioned normative force is epistemic, determined by an inquirer's interests, or a combination thereof. We argue that our account outperforms these alternatives.

Keywords

Explanationneed for explanationwhy-questionsrole-responsibilitiessocial norms
Type
Articles
Information
Episteme , Volume 17 , Special Issue 3: Epistemic Norms as Social Norms Conference , September 2020 , pp. 384 - 401
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2020

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