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118On Lemke's Defence of a Causal Basing RequirementAnalysis 47 (3). 1987.LEMKE has recently taken issue (see ANALYSIS 46.3, June 1986, pp. 138-44) with my claim that no counterfactual causal account of the basing relation is plausible (see ANALYSIS 45.3, June 1985, pp. 153-8). Intuitively, a counterfactual causal account claims that belief is based on evidence if and only if the evidence either causes the belief or would have caused it had the actual cause been absent. This intuitive formulation accounts only for counterfactual causes of level one: events which would…Read more
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112Against Pragmatic EncroachmentLogos and Episteme 2 (1): 77-85. 2011.Anti-intellectualist theories of knowledge claim that in some way or other, practical stakes are involved in whether knowledge is present (or, where the view iscontextualist, whether sentences about knowledge are true in a given context). Interest in pragmatic encroachment arose with the development of contextualist theories concerning knowledge ascriptions. In these cases, there is an initial situation in which hardly anything is at stake, and knowledge is easily ascribed. The subsequent situat…Read more
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106The incarnation and the knowability paradoxSynthese 173 (1). 2010.The best defense of the doctrine of the Incarnation implies that traditional Christianity has a special stake in the knowability paradox, a stake not shared by other theistic perspectives or by non-traditional accounts of the Incarnation. Perhaps, this stake is not even shared by antirealism, the view most obviously threatened by the paradox. I argue for these points, concluding that these results put traditional Christianity at a disadvantage compared to other viewpoints, and I close with some …Read more
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99Adams on actualism and presentismPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 50 (2): 289-298. 1989.According to the TDT, no singular propositions about an individual and no "thisnesses" of individuals exist prior to the existence of the individual in question, where a thisness "is the property of being x, or of being identical with x" and a "singular proposition about an individual x is a proposition that involves or refers to x directly, perhaps by having x or the thisness of x as a constituent, and not merely by way of x's qualitative properties or relations to other individuals" (p. 315) …Read more
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97In Defense of CoherentismJournal of Philosophical Research 22 299-306. 1997.Alvin Plantinga and John Pollock both think that coherentism is a mistaken theory of justification, and they do so for different reasons. In spite of these differences, there are remarkable connections between their criticisms. Part of my goal here is to show what these connections are. I will show that Plantinga’s construal of coherentism presupposes Pollock’s arguments against that view, and I will argue that coherentists need not breathe their last in response to the contentions of either. Co…Read more
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95Fallibilism: Evidence and Knowledge, by Jessica BrownMind 128 (512): 1395-1402. 2019.Fallibilism: Evidence and Knowledge, by BrownJessica. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018. Pp. xii + 197.
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95Assertion, Knowledge, and LotteriesIn P. Greenough & D. Pritchard (eds.), Williamson on Knowledge, Oxford University Press. pp. 140--160. 2009.
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94Can Skeptics Earn Their Keep?Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 102 (3): 595-607. 2020.Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, EarlyView.
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91Norms of assertionIn Jessica Brown & Herman Cappelen (eds.), Assertion: New Philosophical Essays, Oxford University Press. pp. 233--250. 2011.
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91Warrant and Contemporary Epistemology: Essays in Honor of Plantinga's Theory of Knowledge (edited book)Savage, Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield. 1996.Alvin Plantinga responds to the essays in a concluding chapter.
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89Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Religion: Volume 1 (edited book)Oxford University Press. 2008.Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Religion is a new annual volume offering a regular snapshot of state-of-the-art work in this longstanding area of philosophy ...
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89Two approaches to epistemic defeatIn Deane-Peter Baker (ed.), Alvin Plantinga, Cambridge University Press. pp. 107-124. 2007.There are two different kinds of theories of the concept of epistemic defeat. One theory begins with propositional relationships, only by implication describing what happens in the context of a noetic system. Such a theory places inforrmation about defeat up front, not informing us of how the defeat relationships play out in the context of actual belief, at least not initially. The other theory takes a back door to the concept of defeat, assuming a context of actual belief and an entire noetic s…Read more
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87``The Swamping Problem Redux: Pith and Gist"In Adrian Haddock, Alan Millar & Duncan Pritchard (eds.), Social Epistemology, Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 89-112. 2010.
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85What is wrong with minimal foundationalism?Erkenntnis 21 (2): 175-184. 1984.attacks new defenders of foundationalism. Some simply took on the critics, 2 but others attempted to argue that even if the critics were right, only one form of foundationalism was suspect, not foundationalism itself. For, according to these defenders, foundationalism is not to be identified with the view of Classical Foundationalism (CE) that all of our knowledge rests on incorrigible beliefs. Rather foundationalism is the view that all of our knowledge rests on beliefs that are self-warranting…Read more
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81Epistemic Virtue and Doxastic Responsibility (review)Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 56 (4): 970-973. 1996.
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80Justification and Proper BasingIn Erik Olsson (ed.), The Epistemology of Keith Lehrer, Kluwer Publishing Co.. pp. 43-62. 2003.
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78On Behalf of Maverick MolinismFaith and Philosophy 19 (3): 348-357. 2002.In clarifying and defending Molinism, Thomas Flint argues against a position he terms Maverick Molinism. This version of Molinism maintains that, though counterfactuals of freedom have their truth-value logically prior to God’s acts of will, God could have so acted that these counterfactuals would have had a different truth value from that which they actually have. Flint believes this position is flawed, and presents an argument for rejecting it. I argue that Flint’s argument against Maverick Mo…Read more
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75Destiny and Deliberation: Essays in Philosophical TheologyOxford University Press UK. 2011.Jonathan Kvanvig presents a compelling new work in philosophical theology on the universe, creation, and the afterlife. Organised thematically by the endpoints of time, the volume begins by addressing eschatological matters and the doctrines of heaven and hell and ends with an account of divine deliberation and creation. Kvanvig develops a coherent theistic outlook which reconciles a traditional, high conception of deity, with full providential control over all aspects of creation, with a concep…Read more
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75``Closure and Alternative Possibilities"In John Greco (ed.), The Oxford handbook of skepticism, Oxford University Press. pp. 456-484. 2008.
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72Zagzebski on Justification (review)Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 60 (1): 191--196. 2000.The heart of the epistemological interest of Zagzebski’s book is found in the tasks of clarifying the natures of justification and knowledge in terms of the intellectual virtues. It is in virtue of undertaking this task that Zagzebski presents a version of virtue epistemology. Though the book has several interesting features apart from this task, I want to argue that in its fundamental tasks, the book is a failure. In particular, I will argue that Zagzebski’s virtue account of justification is i…Read more
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70Simple reliabilism and agent reliabilism (review)Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 66 (2). 2003.Though I find the project significant and unprecedented in this way, I am not convinced that it is entirely successful, and I will try to explain here the grounds of my concern. We can begin with Greco’s list of requirements for an adequate theory of knowledge, and the relationship he sees between simple reliabilism and his own theory, agent reliabilism.
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68The haecceity theory and perspectival limitationAustralasian Journal of Philosophy 67 (3): 295-305. 1989.This Article does not have an abstract
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67Religious Disagreement and Pluralism (edited book)Oxford University Press. 2021.Epistemological questions about the significance of disagreement have advanced in concert with broader developments in social epistemology concerning testimony, the nature of expertise and epistemic authority, the role of institutions, group belief, and epistemic injustice (among others). During this period, related issues in the epistemology of religion have reemerged as worthy of new consideration, and available to be situated with new conceptual tools. This volume explores many of the issues …Read more
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62The Intellectual Virtues and the Life of the Mind: On the Place of the Virtues in Contemporary EpistemologySavage, Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield. 1992.
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60``Coherentism: Misconstrual and Misapprehension"Southwest Philosophy Review 11 (1): 159-169. 1995.Some critics of coherentism have depicted it so that it founders on the distinction between warrant for the content of a belief and warrant for the believing itself. This distinction has to do with the basing relation: one might have warrant for the content of what one believes without basing one's belief properly, without holding the belief because of what warrants it. When the first kind of warrant obtains, I will say that a belief is propositionally warranted.
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Areas of Specialization
Epistemology |
Metaphysics |
Philosophy of Language |
Philosophy of Religion |
Logic and Philosophy of Logic |