•  79
    Inference to the best explanation—or, IBE—tells us to infer from the available evidence to the hypothesis which would, if correct, best explain that evidence. As Peter Lipton puts it, the core idea driving IBE is that explanatory considerations are a guide to inference. But what is the epistemic status of IBE, itself? One issue of contemporary interest is whether it is possible to provide a justification for IBE itself which is non- objectionably circular. We aim to carve out some new space in t…Read more
  •  79
    Evidentialism, internalism, disjunctivism
    In Trent Dougherty (ed.), Evidentialism and its Discontents, Oxford University Press. 2011.
  •  79
    Epistemological Disjunctivism in advance
    Journal of Philosophical Research. forthcoming.
  •  77
    From Epistemic Anti-Individualism to Intellectual Humility
    Res Philosophica 93 (3): 533-552. 2016.
    Epistemic anti-individualism is the view that positive epistemic statuses fail to supervene on internal, physical or mental, properties of individuals. Intellectual humility is a central intellectual virtue in the pursuit of such statuses. After some introductory remarks, this paper provides an argument for epistemic anti-individualism with respect to a virtue-theoretic account of testimonial knowledge. An outline of a dual-aspect account of intellectual humility is then offered. The paper proce…Read more
  •  77
    A Puzzle about Warrant
    Philosophical Inquiry 23 (1-2): 59-71. 2001.
    A puzzle about warranted belief, often attributed to Kripke, has recently come to prominence. This puzzle claims to show that it follows from the possession of a warrant for one's belief in an empirical proposition that one is entitled to dismiss all subsequent evidence against that proposition as misleading. The two main solutions that have been offered to this puzzle in the recent literature - by James Cargile and David Lewis - argue for a revisionist epistemology which, respectively, either d…Read more
  •  75
    Knowledge or just a lucky guess?
    The Philosophers' Magazine 55 (55): 66-71. 2011.
    Our judgements about luck – and about related things, like risk – are for the most part sensitive to what is happening in close possible worlds rather than probabilities.
  •  75
    Varieties of Epistemic Risk
    Acta Analytica 37 (1): 9-23. 2021.
    My interest is in how shifting from an anti-luck epistemology to an anti-risk epistemology can enable us to make sense of some important epistemic phenomena. After rehearsing the more general arguments for preferring anti-risk epistemology over its anti-luck cousin, I argue that a further advantage of this transition lies in how it puts us in a better position to understand certain trade-offs with regard to epistemic risk. In particular, there can be ways of forming beliefs that are epistemicall…Read more
  •  74
    Veritism and the Goal of Inquiry
    Philosophia 49 (4): 1347-1359. 2021.
    Elgin has offered us a powerful articulation of an epistemology that does not, contra veritism, have a concern for truth at its core. I contend that the case for Elgin’s alternative epistemological picture trades upon a faulty conception of what a veritistic epistemological outlook involves. In particular, I argue that the right conception of veritism—one that is fundamentally informed by the intellectual virtues—has none of the problematic consequences that Elgin claims. Relatedly, I maintain t…Read more
  •  74
    Epistemic Luck
    Journal of Philosophical Research 29 191-220. 2004.
  •  74
    Hinge commitments and common knowledge
    Synthese 200 (3): 1-16. 2022.
    Contemporary epistemology has explored the notion of a hinge commitment as set out in Wittgenstein’s final notebooks, published as On Certainty. These are usually understood as essentially groundless certainties that provide the necessary framework within which rational evaluations can take place. John Greco has recently offered a striking account of hinge commitments as a distinctive kind of knowledge that he calls ‘common knowledge’. According to Greco, this is knowledge that members of the co…Read more
  •  70
    ABSTRACT This book symposium features three critical pieces dealing with Duncan Pritchard's book, 'Epistemic Angst'; the symposium also contains Pritchard's replies to his critics.
  •  68
    Doubt undogmatized: pyrrhonian scepticism, epistemological externalism and the 'metaepistemological' challenge
    Principia: An International Journal of Epistemology 4 (2): 187-214. 2000.
    It has become almost a conventional wisdom to argue that Cartesian scepticism poses a far more radical sceptical threat than its classical Pyrrhonian counterpart. Such a view fails to recognise, however, that there is a species of sceptical concern that can only plausibly be regarded as captured by the Pyrrhonian strategy. For whereas Cartesian scepticism is closely tied to the contentious doctrine of epistemological internalism, it is far from obvious that Pyrrhonian scepticism bears any such t…Read more
  •  64
    Philosophy for Everyone begins by explaining what philosophy is before exploring the questions and issues at the foundation of this important subject. Key topics in this new edition and their areas of focus include: Moral philosophy – the nature of our moral judgments and reactions, whether they aim at some objective moral truth, or are mere personal or cultural preferences; and the possibility of moral responsibility given the sorts of things that cause behavior; Political philosophy – fundamen…Read more
  •  64
    Ernest Sosa: Judgment and Agency
    Journal of Philosophy 114 (5): 274-276. 2017.
  •  62
    New Issues in Epistemological Disjunctivism (edited book)
    with Casey Doyle and Joseph Milburn
    Routledge. 2019.
    This is the first volume dedicated solely to the topic of epistemological disjunctivism. The original essays in this volume, written by leading and up-and-coming scholars on the topic, are divided into three thematic sections. The first set of chapters addresses the historical background of epistemological disjunctivism. It features essays on ancient epistemology, Immanuel Kant, J.L. Austin, Edmund Husserl, and Ludwig Wittgenstein. The second section tackles a number contemporary issues related …Read more
  •  61
    Closure and context
    Australasian Journal of Philosophy 78 (2). 2000.
    This Article does not have an abstract
  •  61
    It is nowadays taken for granted that the core radical sceptical arguments all pivot upon the principle that the epistemic operator in question is ‘closed’ under known entailments. Accordingly, the standard anti-sceptical project now involves either denying closure or retaining closure by amending how one understands other elements of the sceptical argument. However, there are epistemic principles avail- able to the sceptic which are logically weaker than closure but achieve the same result. Acc…Read more
  •  61
    Extended Knowledge and Social Epistemology
    with Spyrion Orestis Palermos
    Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective (8): 105-120. 2013.
    The place of social epistemology within contemporary philosophy, as well as its relation to other academic disciplines, is the topic of an ongoing debate. One camp within that debate holds that social epistemology should be pursued strictly from within the perspective of individualistic analytic epistemology. In contrast, a second camp holds that social epistemology is an interdisciplinary field that should be given priority over traditional analytic epistemology, with the specific aim of radica…Read more
  •  60
    Intellectual virtue and its role in epistemology
    Asian Journal of Philosophy 1 (1): 1-20. 2022.
    An overview is presented of what I take to be the role of the intellectual virtues within the epistemological enterprise. Traditionally, the theory of knowledge has been thought to be central to the epistemological project, but since, as I explain, the intellectual virtues aren’t required for knowledge, this might suggest that they have only a marginal role to play in epistemological debates. I argue against this suggestion by showing how the intellectual virtues are in fact crucial to several c…Read more
  •  60
    Philosophy in Prisons
    Teaching Philosophy 42 (3): 247-263. 2019.
    This paper describes a pilot study devoted to developing the teaching of philosophy within prison education in Scotland. The study paired the CoPI approach to learning and teaching with a set of educational resources created around a high-profile MOOC that introduced students to core topics in philosophy. The primary goal of the study was to determine the extent to which the teaching of philosophy in prisons in this specific manner could enhance the intellectual virtues, and thereby the intellec…Read more
  •  60
    Extended Epistemology (edited book)
    Oxford University Press. 2018.
    Extended Cognition examines the way in which features of a subject's cognitive environment can become constituent parts of the cognitive process itself. This volume explores the epistemological ramifications of this idea, bringing together academics from a variety of different areas, to investigate the very idea of an extended epistemology.
  •  59
    Epistemic Axiology
    In Pedro Schmechtig & Martin Grajner (eds.), Epistemic Reasons, Norms, and Goals, De Gruyter. pp. 407-422. 2016.
  •  59
    Ignorance and inquiry
    American Philosophical Quarterly 58 (2): 111-124. 2021.
    It is argued that the two main accounts of ignorance in the contemporary literature—in the terms of the lack of knowledge and the lack of true belief—are lacking in key respects. A new way of thinking about ignorance is offered that can accommodate the motivations for both of the standard views, but which in the process also avoids the problems that afflict these proposals. In short, this new account of ignorance incorporates the idea that ignorance essentially involves not just the absence of a…Read more
  •  58
    The truth about truth (review)
    The Philosophers' Magazine 30 (30). 2005.
  •  56
    Extended Self-Knowledge
    In Julie Kirsch Patrizia Pedrini (ed.), Third-Person Self-Knowledge, Self-Interpretation, and Narrative, Springer Verlag. pp. 31-49. 2018.
    We aim to move the externalism and self-knowledge debate forward by exploring two novel sceptical challenges to the prospects of self-knowledge of a paradigmatic sort, both of which result from ways in which our thought content, cognitive processes and cognitive successes depend crucially on our external environments. In particular, it is shown how arguments from extended cognition ; Clark A. Supersizing the mind: Embodiment, action, and cognitive extension. Oxford: Oxford University Press ) and…Read more
  •  56
    Assurance and Disjunctivism
    Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 102 (3): 715-720. 2021.
  •  55
    Understanding Deep Disagreement
    International Journal of Philosophical Studies 31 (3): 301-317. 2023.
    The axiological account of deep disagreements is described and defended. This proposal understands this notion in terms of the existential importance of the topic of disagreement. It is argued that this account provides a straightforward explanation for the main features of deep disagreements. This proposal is then compared to the contemporary popular view that deep disagreements are essentially hinge disagreements – i.e. disagreements concerning clashes of one’s hinge commitments, in the sense …Read more