This dissertation has two main aims. The first is to show that relying on the testimony of others is not as “epistemically special” as many epistemologists have made it out to be. More specifically, I argue that relying on someone’s testimony neither provides us with a non-evidential, epistemic reason to believe what we are told, nor does it allow us to literally inherit the speaker’s reasons for believing what they say. I also argue that our practice of epistemic buck passing does not demarcate testimonial knowledge and justification as being distinctive epistemic kinds. The second aim is to develop and defend a novel view according to which there can be genuine rational indeterminacy, i.e., it can be indeterminate which beliefs and credences one is permitted and required to have about the proposition in question. I argue that this view provides a unified solution to a wide range of epistemic paradoxes while also enjoying some important advantages over its rivals.

Creator

• Leonard, Nick

DOI

• https://doi.org/10.21985/n2-7thv-8g56

Subject

• Philosophy
• Epistemology

Language

• en

Alternate Identifier

• http://dissertations.umi.com/northwestern:14632
• etdadmin_upload_662248

Date created

• 2019-01-01

Resource type

• Dissertation

Rights statement

• In Copyright