Unreasonable Selflessness

Authors

  • Rodrigo Borges Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul
  • Felipe Castelo Branco Medeiros Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15448/1984-6746.2016.3.25759

Keywords:

Jennifer Lackey. Reasonable to Believe Norm of Assertion. Moore's Paradox. Selfless assertion.

Abstract

According to Jennifer Lackey (2007), one should assert that p only if (i) it is reasonable for one to believe that p and (ii) if one asserted that p, one would assert that p at least in part because it is reasonable for one to believe that p. As data for this norm of assertion Lackey appeals to the intuition that in cases of ‘selfless assertion’ agents assert with epistemic propriety something they don’t believe. If that norm of assertion was true, then it would explain why selfless assertions are epistemically proper. In this paper we offer a reductio ad absurdum of this view. The result is that selfless assertions are not epistemically appropriate.

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References

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Published

2017-01-05

How to Cite

Borges, R., & Medeiros, F. C. B. (2017). Unreasonable Selflessness. Veritas (Porto Alegre), 61(3), 492–502. https://doi.org/10.15448/1984-6746.2016.3.25759

Issue

Vol. 61 No. 3 (2016): Epistemology, Language and Metaphysics

Section

Epistemology, Phenomenology and Metaphysics

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