Hostname: page-component-6bf8c574d5-956mj Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-02-20T12:22:13.443Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

PERCEPTUAL KNOWLEDGE AND WELL-FOUNDED BELIEF

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 February 2016

Alan Millar
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Should a philosophical account of perceptual knowledge accord a justificatory role to sensory experiences? This discussion raises problems for an affirmative answer and sets out an alternative account on which justified belief is conceived as well-founded belief and well-foundedness is taken to depend on knowledge. A key part of the discussion draws on a conception of perceptual-recognitional abilities to account for how perception gives rise both to perceptual knowledge and to well-founded belief.

Type
Articles
Information
Episteme , Volume 13 , Issue 1: The Epistemology of Perception , March 2016 , pp. 43 - 59
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

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

REFERENCES

Armstrong, D. M. 1973. Belief, Truth and Knowledge. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Austin, J. L. 1962. Sense and Sensibilia. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Ball, B, and Blome-Tillmann, M. 2014. ‘Counter-Closure and Knowledge Despite Falsehood.’ Philosophical Quarterly, 64: 552–68.Google Scholar
Brewer, B. 2011. Perception and its Objects. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Campbell, J. 2002. Reference and Consciousness. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Chisholm, R. 1977. Theory of Knowledge, 2nd edition. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Conee, E. 2007. ‘Disjunctivism and Anti-Skepticism.’ Philosophical Issues, 17: 16–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Conee, E. and Feldman, R. 2001. ‘Internalism Defended.’ In Kornblith, H. (ed.), Epistemology: Internalism and Externalism, pp. 231–60. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Conee, E. and Feldman, R. 2004. Evidentialism: Essays in Epistemology. Oxford: Clarendon Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Conee, E. and Feldman, R. 2008. ‘Evidence.’ In Smith, Q. (ed.), Epistemology: New Essays, pp. 83–104. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Davidson, D. 1983. ‘A Coherence Theory of Truth and Knowledge.’ In Henrich, D. (ed.), Kant oder Hegel, pp. 423–38. Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta. [Reprinted in Davidson, D. 2001. Subjective, Intersubjective, Objective. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 137–53.]Google Scholar
Dougherty, T. (ed.). 2011. Evidentialism and Its Discontents. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dougherty, T, and Rysiew, P. 2013. ‘Experience First.’ In Steup, M., Turri, J. and Sosa, E. (eds), Contemporary Debates in Epistemology, 2nd edition, pp. 17–22. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.Google Scholar
Gettier, E. L. 1963. ‘Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?’ Analysis, 23: 121–3.Google Scholar
Goldman, A. I. 1976. ‘Discrimination and Perceptual Knowledge.’ Journal of Philosophy, 73: 771–91.Google Scholar
Klein, P. 2008. ‘Useful False Beliefs.’ In Smith, Q. (ed.), Epistemology: New Essays, pp. 25–61. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Logue, H. 2012. ‘Why Naïve Realism?’ Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 112: 211–37.Google Scholar
Lyons, J. 2009. Perception and Basic Beliefs: Zombies, Modules, and the Problem of the External World. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Martin, M. G. F. 2002. ‘The Transparency of Experience.’ Mind and Language, 17: 376–425.Google Scholar
McDowell, J. 1982. ‘Criteria, Defeasibility and Knowledge.’ Proceedings of the British Academy, 68: 455–79. [Reprinted in McDowell, J. 1998. Meaning, Knowledge, and Reality, pp. 369–94. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.]Google Scholar
McDowell, J. 1994. Mind and World. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
McDowell, J. 2011. Perception as a Capacity for Knowledge. Milwaukee, WI: Marquette University Press.Google Scholar
McGinn, M. 2012. ‘Non-Inferential Knowledge.’ Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 112: 1–28.Google Scholar
Meyers, R. G. and Stern, K. 1973. ‘Knowledge Without Paradox.’ Journal of Philosophy, 70: 147–60.Google Scholar
Millar, A. 1991. Reasons and Experience. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Millar, A. 2000. ‘The Scope of Perceptual Knowledge.’ Philosophy, 75: 73–88.Google Scholar
Millar, A. 2007. ‘What the Disjunctivist is Right About.’ Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 74: 176–98.Google Scholar
Millar, A. 2008 a. ‘Perceptual-Recognitional Abilities and Perceptual Knowledge.’ In Haddock, A. and MacPherson, F. E. (eds), Disjunctivism: Perception, Action, and Knowledge, pp. 330–47. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Millar, A. 2008 b. ‘Disjunctivism and Skepticism.’ In Greco, J. (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Skepticism, pp. 581–604. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Millar, A. 2011 a. ‘Knowledge and Reasons for Belief.’ In Reisner, A. and Steglich-Peterson, A. (eds), Reasons for Belief, pp. 223–43. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Millar, A. 2011 b. ‘How Visual Perception Yields Reasons for Belief.’ Philosophical Issues, 21: 332–51.Google Scholar
Millar, A. 2012. ‘Scepticism, Perceptual Knowledge, and Doxastic Responsibility.’ Synthese, 189: 353–72.Google Scholar
Millar, A. 2014. ‘Perceptual Knowledge and Background Beliefs.’ In Dodd, D. and Zardini, E. (eds), Scepticism and Perceptual Justification, pp. 128–48. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Millar, A. Forthcoming a. ‘Abilities, Competences, and Fallibility.’ In Fernández, M. Á. (ed.), Performance Epistemology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Millar, A. Forthcoming b. ‘Perception and the Vagaries of Experience.’ To appear in a volume edited by Gersel, J., Jensen, R. T., Thaning, M. S., and Overgaard, S.. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Pritchard, D. 2012. Epistemological Disjunctivism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Pritchard, D., Millar, A., and Haddock, A. 2010. The Nature and Value of Knowledge: Three Investigations. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Pryor, J. 2000. ‘The Skeptic and the Dogmatist.’ Noûs, 34: 517–49.Google Scholar
Pryor, J. 2013. ‘There is Immediate Justification.’ In Steup, M., Turri, J., and Sosa, E. (eds), Contemporary Debates in Epistemology, 2nd edition, pp. 202–22. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.Google Scholar
Quinton, A. 1955. ‘The Problem of Perception.’ Mind, 64: 28–51.Google Scholar
Searle, J. 1983. Intentionality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Snowdon, P. 1980/81. ‘Perception, Vision and Causation.’ Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 81: 175–92.Google Scholar
Snowdon, P. 1990. ‘The Objects of Perceptual Experience.’ Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Vol. 64: 120–50.Google Scholar
Soteriou, M. 2013. The Mind's Construction: The Ontology of Mind and Mental Action. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Strawson, P. F. 1979. ‘Perception and its Objects.’ In MacDonald, G. F. (ed.), Perception and Identity: Essays Presented to A. J. Ayer with his Replies to Them. London: Macmillan, pp. 41–60.Google Scholar
Warfield, T. 2005. ‘Knowledge from Falsehood.’ Philosophical Perspectives, 19: 405–16.Google Scholar
White, R. 2014. ‘What is My Evidence that Here Is a Hand.’ In Dodd, D. and Zardini, E. (eds), Scepticism and Perceptual Justification, pp. 298–321. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Williamson, T. 2000. Knowledge and Its Limits. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Williamson, T. 2013. ‘Knowledge First.’ In Steup, M., Turri, J., and Sosa, E. (eds), Contemporary Debates in Epistemology, 2nd edition, pp. 1–9. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.Google Scholar