-
Sind die meisten unserer Meinungen wahr? Zu Donald Davidsons 'extended claim'Logos. Anales Del Seminario de Metafísica [Universidad Complutense de Madrid, España] 4 116-136. 1997.Are our beliefs mostly true? Donald Davidson has proposed some very interesting arguments in favor of his "extended claim" that most our beliefs must be true. The main aim of this paper is to show that Davidson's arguments are not convincing. The most well known of his arguments is the argument of the "omniscient interpreter". The conceivability of a totally ignorant interpreter, however, shows that this argument fails. Davidson offers two more arguments for his extended claim: one of them based…Read more
-
56Knowledge, Assertion, and InferenceActa Analytica 29 (4): 487-490. 2014.This paper argues that three plausible principles are mutually inconsistent: One ought to assert only what one knows; If it is proper to assert some proposition q, then it is, barring special and not very common circumstances, proper to assert any proposition p from which q has been competently inferred; and Some propositions are both properly assertible and known by competent inference from propositions which one does not know. Each pair of two principles constitutes an argument against the rem…Read more
-
78Varieties of contextualism: Standards and descriptionsGrazer Philosophische Studien 69 (1): 229-246. 2005.Most contextualists agree that contexts differ with respect to relevant epistemic standards. In this paper, I discuss the idea that the difference between more modest and stricter standards should be explained in terms of the closeness or remoteness of relevant possible worlds. I argue that there are serious problems with this version of contextualism. In the second part of the paper, I argue for another form of contextualism that has little to do with standards and a lot with the well-known pro…Read more
-
421Meaning and More Meaningful. A Modest MeasureJournal of Philosophy of Life 5 (3): 33-49. 2015.We often describe lives (or parts of lives) as meaningful or as not meaningful. It is also common to characterize them as more or less meaningful. Some lives, we tend to think, are more meaningful than others. But how then can one compare lives with respect to how much meaning they contain? Can one? This paper argues that (i) only a notion of rough equality can be used when comparing different lives with respect to their meaning, and that (ii) the relation of being more meaningful is not transit…Read more
-
Glaube nicht an mich!: Dürfen Moraltheorien Selbst-Auslöschend sein?Conceptus: Zeitschrift Fur Philosophie 30 (77): 191-198. 1997.A moral theory is "self-effacing" if it tells one not to believe in it. Many people think that the aims of a moral theory (like utilitarianism) can be better reached if it is self-effacing. I argue here that moral theories should not be self-effacing. Except in a special case, the self-effacing character of a theory goes hand in hand with mutually incompatible intentions, practical dilemmas, or pragmatical paradoxes. Hence, if a moral (or non-moral) theory is self-effacing, one should rather giv…Read more
-
140Reliabilism—modal, probabilistic or contextualistGrazer Philosophische Studien 79 (1): 77-89. 2009.This paper discusses two versions of reliabilism: modal and probabilistic reliabilism. Modal reliabilism faces the problem of the missing closeness metric for possible worlds while probalistic reliabilism faces the problem of the relevant reference class. Despite the severity of these problems, reliabilism is still very plausible (also for independent reasons). I propose to stick with reliabilism, propose a contextualist (or, alternatively, harmlessly relativist) solution to the above problems a…Read more
-
218Involvement and Detachment: A Paradox of Practical ReasoningIn Allen Coates (ed.), Peter Baumann and Monika Betzler, eds., Practical Conflicts, Duke University Press. pp. 244-261. 2007.For each of the many goals of an agent it is true that the agent wants its realization. Given further very plausible assumptions, one can show that there is no good reason for an agent not to want the realization of all of his goals. However, it seems also true that reaching all of one’s goals would be extremely boring; most human beings would consider such a life not worth living. In this respect, leading a life is like playing some game: A game loses its point if one always easily wins. Human …Read more
-
1418Epistemic closureIn Duncan Pritchard & Sven Bernecker (eds.), The Routledge Companion to Epistemology, Routledge. pp. 597--608. 2011.This article gives an overview over different principles of epistemic closure, their attractions and their problems.
-
12Die Autonomie der Personmentis. 2000.This book offers a discussion of practical as well as theoretical autonomy.
-
61Can reliabilists believe in subjective probability?Philosophical Quarterly 48 (191): 199-200. 1998.According to reliabilist conceptions of knowledge, knowledge implies reliable true belief. Since reliability is an irreducibly probabilistic notion, one's view of knowledge also depends on one's view of probability. If one believes that all probability is subjective probability, knowledge becomes a relativized concept: knowledge is relative to a given body of beliefs of a given person at a given time. Since such a relativized conception of knowledge is extremely implausible and since reliabilism…Read more
-
277On the Inflation of NecessitiesMetaphysica 13 (1): 51-54. 2012.This brief paper argues that Kripke’s thesis of the necessity of origin has some implausible consequences
Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, United States of America
Areas of Specialization
Epistemology |
Philosophy of Mind |
17th/18th Century Philosophy |
Areas of Interest
Epistemology |
17th/18th Century Philosophy |