Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gvvz8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T02:30:04.008Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Re-thinking the Duplication of Speaker/Hearer Belief in the Epistemology of Testimony

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 January 2012

Abstract

Most epistemologists of testimony assume that testifying requires that the beliefs to which speakers attest are identical to the beliefs that hearers accept. I argue that this characterization of testimony is misleading. Characterizing testimony in terms of duplicating speaker/hearer belief unduly resticts the variety of beliefs that might be accepted from speaker testimony.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2006

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

Davis, S. (2002). “Conversation, Epistemology, and Norms”. Mind and Language, vol. 17, pp. 513537.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fricker, E. (1987). “The Epistemology of Testimony”. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, vol. 89, pp. 159177.Google Scholar
Fricker, E. (1994). “Against Fallibility”. In Matilal, B. K. and Chakrabarti, A (eds), Knowing From Words. Dordrecht: Kluwer.Google Scholar
Fricker, E. (1995). “Telling and Trusting: Reductionism and Anti-Reductionism in the Epistemology of Testimony.” Mind, vol. 104, pp. 392411.Google Scholar
Goldberg, S. (2001). “Testimony Based Knowledge from False Testimony”. Philosophical Quarterly, vol. 51, pp. 512–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goldberg, S. (forthcoming). “Towards an Epistemically-Grounded, Semantically Useful notion of What is Said”. In Stainton, R. and Viger, C. (eds), Compositionality, Context, and Semantic Values.Google Scholar
Grice, H. P. (1989). Studies in the Way of Words. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Kenyon, T. (2005). “Non-Sentences, Implicature, and Success in Communication”. Ellipsis and Nonsentential Speech. Elugardo, R. and Stainton, R. (eds), Dordrecht: Springer.Google Scholar
Lackey, J. (forthcoming). “Learning From Words”. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research.Google Scholar
Sperber, D. and Wilson, D. (1987). “Preçis of Relevance: Communication and Cognition”. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, vol. 10, pp. 697711. Reprinted in H. Geirson and M. Losonsky (eds) (1996). Readings in Language and Mind. Cambridge: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Sperber, D. and Wilson, D. (1995). Relevance: Communication and Cognition. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Sperber, D. and Wilson, D. (1998). “The Mapping Between the Mental and the Public Lexicon”. Language and Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar