Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rdxmf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T14:22:09.594Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

On Social Defeat

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 July 2020

B. J. C. Madison*
Affiliation:
College of Humanities and Social Sciences, United Arab Emirates University, Al Ain, UAE

Abstract

Influential cases have been provided that seem to suggest that one can fail to have knowledge because of the social environment. If not a distinct kind of social defeater, is there a uniquely social phenomenon that defeats knowledge? My aim in this paper is to explore these questions. I shall argue that despite initial appearances to the contrary, we have no reason to accept a special class of social defeater, nor any essentially social defeat phenomenon. We can explain putative cases of social defeat with our existing epistemological apparatus.

Type
Article
Copyright
© The Author(s) 2020. Published by Canadian Journal of Philosophy

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

Altschul, Jon. n.d. “Epistemic Entitlement,” In Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, edited by James Fieser and Bradley Dowden. http://www.iep.utm.edu/ep-en.Google Scholar
Ballantyne, Nathan. 2015. “The Significance of Unpossessed Evidence.” The Philosophical Quarterly 65: 315–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Becker, Kelly, and Black, Tim, eds. 2012. The Sensitivity Principle in Epistemology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Becker, Kelly. 2018. “The Sensitivity Response to the Gettier Problem.” In The Gettier Problem, edited by Hetherington, Stephen, 108–24. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burge, Tyler. 2003. “Perceptual Entitlement.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 67: 503–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cassam, Quassim. 2016. “Vice Epistemology.” The Monist 99: 159–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cassam, Quassim. 2019. Vices of the Mind. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chisholm, Roderick. 1964. “The Ethics of Requirement.” American Philosophical Quarterly 1: 147–53.Google Scholar
Chisholm, Roderick. 1966. Theory of Knowledge. 1st ed. Englewood, NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Conee, Earl, and Feldman, Richard. 1998. “The Generality Problem for Reliabilism.” Philosophical Studies 89: 129.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
De Almeida, Claudio, and Fett, J. R.. 2016. “Defeasibility and Gettierization: A Reminder.” Australasian Journal of Philosophy 94: 152–69.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dretske, Fred. 2000. “Entitlement: Epistemic Rights without Epistemic Duties?” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 60: 591606.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gettier, Edmund. 1963. “Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?Analysis 23: 121–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goldberg, Sanford C. 2017. “Should Have Known.” Synthese 194: 2863–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goldberg, Sanford C. 2018. To the Best of Our Knowledge. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Graham, Peter J., and Lyons, Jack C.. Forthcoming. “The Structure of Defeat: Pollock’s Evidentialism, Lackey’s Framework, and Prospects for Reliabilism.” In Reasons, Justification, and Defeaters, edited by Brown, Jessica and Simion, Mona. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Graham, Peter, and Pedersen, Nikolaj J. L. L.. 2020. “Recent Work on Epistemic Entitlement.” American Philosophical Quarterly 57: 193214.Google Scholar
Harman, Gilbert. 1968. “Knowledge, Inference, and Explanation.” American Philosophical Quarterly 5: 164–73.Google Scholar
Harman, Gilbert. 1973. Thought. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Harman, Gilbert. 1980. “Reasoning and Evidence One Does Not Possess.” Midwest Studies in Philosophy 5: 163–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hetherington, Stephen. 1998. “Actually Knowing.” The Philosophical Quarterly 48: 453–69CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kornblith, Hilary. 1983. “Justified Belief and Epistemically Responsible Action.” Philosophical Review 92: 3348.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lackey, Jennifer. 2007. “Norms of Assertion.” Noûs 41: 594626.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lackey, Jennifer. 2008. Learning from Words. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lehrer, Keith, and Paxon, Thomas Jr. 1969. “Knowledge: Undefeated Justified True Belief.” The Journal of Philosophy 66: 225–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Madison, B. J. C. 2011. “Combating Anti Anti-Luck Epistemology.” Australasian Journal of Philosophy 89: 4758.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Madison, B. J. C. 2014. “Epistemological Disjunctivism and the New Evil Demon.” Acta Analytica 29: 6170.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Madison, B. J. C. 2018. “On Justifications and Excuses.” Synthese 195: 4551–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meeker, Kevin. 2004. “Justification and the Social Nature of Knowledge.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 69: 156–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nozick, Robert. 1981. Philosophical Explanations. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Peacocke, Christopher. 2004. The Realm of Reason. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Pollock, John. 1986. Contemporary Theories of Knowledge. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.Google Scholar
Pritchard, Duncan. 2005. Epistemic Luck. Oxford: Clarendon Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pryor, James. 2004. “What’s Wrong with Moore’s Argument?” Philosophical Issues 14: 349–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pryor, James. 2018. “The Merits of Incoherence.” Analytic Philosophy 50: 112–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Unger, Peter. 1968. “An Analysis of Factual Knowledge.” Journal of Philosophy 65: 157–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wright, Crispin. 2004. “Warrant for Nothing (and Foundations for Free)?” Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume 78: 167212.CrossRefGoogle Scholar