Peter Klein

Infinitism is an ancient view in epistemology about the structure of knowledge and epistemic justification, according to which there are no foundational reasons for belief. The view has never been popular, and is often associated with skepticism, but after languishing for centuries it has recently begun a resurgence. Ad Infinitum presents new work on the topic by leading epistemologists. They shed new light on infinitism's distinctive strengths and weaknesses, and address questions, new and old, about its account of justification, reasoning, epistemic responsibility, disagreement, and trust, among other important issues. The volume clarifies the relationship between infinitism and other epistemological views, such as skepticism, coherentism, foundationalism and contextualism, and it offers novel perspectives on the metaphysics, epistemology, and ethics of regresses and reasons.

Infinitism, along with foundationalism and coherentism, is a logically possible solution to the epistemic regress problem. But unlike the other two views, infinitism has only been developed and defended as a plausible solution since the late 1990’s. Infinitists grant that although there is an ending point of any actual chain of cited reasons for a belief, no belief (including the last one cited) is fully justified until a reason for it is provided. In addition to differing with foundationalism about the existence of so-called basic beliefs, infinitism depicts reasoning as a process through which full doxastic justification is generated, rather than as a device for merely transferring doxastic justification from one belief to another. Thus, like coherentism, infinitism attempts to account for the origin of epistemic doxastic justification without invoking self-justified beliefs whose justification is transmitted through reasoning. But infinitism parts company with coherentism by maintaining (1) that circular reasoning is unable to provide a doxastic justification for any belief and (2) that there is a linear epistemic structure of our beliefs that reflects the fact that some beliefs are epistemically prior to others.

“Real knowledge,” as I use the term, is the most highly prized form of true belief sought by an epistemic agent. This paper argues that defeasible infinitism provides a good way to characterize real knowledge and it shows how real knowledge can arise from fallible justification. Then, I argue that there are two ways of interpreting Ernest Sosa's account of real knowledge as belief that is aptly formed and capable of being fully defended. On the one hand, if beliefs are aptly formed only if they have a specific causal etiology, namely that they are efficiently caused fully or partially by virtuous characteristics of the epistemic agent, then Sosa's account falls prey to what I call the problem of the Hazard of Empirical Disconfirmation. The HED problem applies to all forms of causal accounts of real knowledge and is simply that as we gain more empirical knowledge about the causal origins of our true beliefs that are the most highly prized we will discover that they do not always satisfy the required efficient causal constraints. Bluntly put, having sufficiently good reasons for our beliefs might not require that the beliefs have the requisite efficient causal etiology. On the other hand, there is a way of interpreting Sosa's views that does not include an efficient causal prerequisite. That interpretation makes Sosa's account of real knowledge almost identical to defeasible infinitism but expressed in an alternate vocabulary. Such a view is not subject to the HED problem and it can solve the deep problem in epistemology, namely how to get epistemically certain knowledge from fallible justification.

In Metaepistemology and Skepticism (Rowman & Littlefield:\n1995), Richard Fumerton defends foundationalism. As part of\nthe defense he rejects infinitism--the view that holds that\nthe solution to the problem of the regress of justificatory\nreasons is that the reasons are infinitely many and\nnonrepeating. I examine some of those arguments and attempt\nto show that they are not really telling against (at least\nsome versions of) infinitism. Along the way I present some\nobjections to his account of inferential justification

I will argue for two main points. First, the regress imbedded in infinitism need not be subject to the Structural Objection; and second, the Structural Objection does not pose a real problem for any regress. I will not be arguing for the correctness of my proposal directly. That is, as will become apparent soon, my proposal rests on two principles of reasoning which together entail infinitism and I will not present my arguments for those principles here. The purpose of this paper is to show that the objections raised by Gillett do not pose a grave problem for infinitism.

In ”Skepticism,” Peter Klein distinguishes between the “Academic Skeptic” who proposes that we cannot have knowledge of a certain set of propositions and the “Pyrrhonian Skeptic” who refrains from opining about whether we can have knowledge. Klein argues that Academic Skepticism is plausibly supported by a “Closure Principle‐style” argument based on the claim that if x entails y and S has justification for x, then S has justification for y. He turns to contextualism to see if it can contribute to the discussion between one who claims that we can have knowledge about some epistemically interesting class of propositions and the Academic Skeptic. He outlines the background of Pyrrhonian Skepticism, pointing out that the Pyrrhonist withholds assent concerning our knowledge‐bearing status because reason cannot provide an adequate basis for assent. He assesses three possible patterns of reasoning, and concludes that the Pyrrhonist view, that reason cannot resolve matters concerning the nonevident, is vindicated.

This article discusses contemporary response to the epistemic regress problem or Agrippa's trilemma. The epistemic regress problem is considered the most crucial in the entire theory of knowledge and it is a major concern for many contemporary epistemologists. However, only two of the three alternative solutions have been developed in any detail, foundationalism and coherentism. Infinitism was not seriously considered as a solution because of the finite-mind objection. This article also provides a brief evaluation of foundationalism, emergent coherentism, and infinitism.