Positive Epistemology

Edited by Jonathan Ichikawa, forthcoming with Routledge

Whether to believe something is often an important question. It can be intellectually important, as in the pursuit of pure knowledge; it can also be morally and politically important, when it implicates questions about whom to trust and what to do. Epistemology is the branch of philosophy that focuses on normative questions about belief. One of its central projects — perhaps its most central project — is the theoretical illumination of normative questions what one should believe, and what one shouldn’t believe.

It can be natural to frame that pair of questions together: when should one believe, and when should one not believe? In fact, however, much epistemology focuses much more on the negative: don’t believe unreliable sources, don’t believe on insufficient evidence, etc.

There is comparatively less discussion of positive epistemology. Positive epistemology is about the cases (if any) in which one should or must believe. While negative epistemology focuses on the possible error of believing too much, positive epistemology considers the possible error of believing too little; or equivalently, the possible error of mistaken suspension of judgment.

Positive Epistemology, edited by Jonathan Ichikawa, will commission fifteen new philosophical essays exploring the (putative) positive side of epistemology The volume is currently under contract with Routledge. Following is the tentative list of parts, chapters, and contributors.

Part 1 — Motivating Positive Epistemic Norms

·       Elís Miller: Epistemic Norms and the Obligation to Combat Ignorance

·       Mona Simion: Conceptual Obligations

·       Susanna Rinard: Practical Requirements to Believe

·       Genia Schönbaumsfeld: Dialectical Fearlessness

Part 2 — Positive–Negative Asymmetry?

·      Clayton Littlejohn and Stephen Finlay: Should We Believe Everything We May Believe?

·      Mark Schroeder: The Doxastic Basis of Asymmetry

·      Rima Basu: Challenges for A Positive Ethics of Belief

Part 3 — Ethics and Positive Epistemology

·       Sophia Dandelet: The Moral Pressure Towards Full Belief

·       Lauren Leydon-Hardy: Two Kinds of Epistemic Ought and Essentially Collaborative Epistemic Repair

·       Allan Hazlett: Belief, Suspension, and Liberty of Conscience

·       Georgi Gardiner: The Cognitive Limits of a Forever Marriage: On Thinking about Divorce

Part 4 — Politics and Positive Epistemology

·       Jen Foster: Doxastic Courage, Intellectual Humility, and Virtue in Political Conviction

·       Jonathan Ichikawa: Doubt and Inaction

·       Neil Levy: Deference to Burke

·       Matt Weiner: On Bait, and Falling For It