Transparency and the truth norm of belief

Synthese 200 (3):1-18 (2022)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

That it can explain the phenomenon of transparency, namely the fact that if you resolve whether p, you have thereby resolved whether to believe that p, was originally put forward as a great virtue of normativist conceptions of belief. However, non-normativists have convincingly shown that the permissive version of the truth norm of belief, which is one of the most plausible and promising versions of it, cannot in fact accommodate this phenomenon. Alarmed by this situation, in this paper I re-assess the transparency phenomenon and its relation to different versions of the truth norm of belief. I argue that, contrary to how it appears, it is not even clear that the most tenable injunctive versions of the truth norm explain this phenomenon. I then argue that the transparency phenomenon consists of two distinct aspects which should be, but have not been, distinguished. What I call the ‘question-shifting’ aspect is explained by the truth norm, irrespective of how it is formulated, while what I call the ‘answer-shifting’ aspect is explanatorily empty and does not require any explanation, be it normative or otherwise. Therefore, understood properly, explaining transparency does remain a strength of normativist accounts of belief, and has no implications for which particular formulation of the truth norm we may adopt.

Other Versions

No versions found

Links

PhilArchive

    This entry is not archived by us. If you are the author and have permission from the publisher, we recommend that you archive it. Many publishers automatically grant permission to authors to archive pre-prints. By uploading a copy of your work, you will enable us to better index it, making it easier to find.

    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 102,323

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

No Norm needed: On the aim of belief.Asbjørn Steglich-Petersen - 2006 - Philosophical Quarterly 56 (225):499–516.
Transparency, Doxastic Norms, and the Aim of Belief.Asbjørn Steglich-Petersen - 2013 - Teorema: International Journal of Philosophy 32 (3):59-74.
The weight of truth.Xintong Wei - 2024 - Synthese 204 (2):1-24.
The Knowledge Norm of Belief.Zachary Mitchell Swindlehurst - 2020 - Thought: A Journal of Philosophy 9 (1):43-50.
The truth Norm of belief.Conor Mchugh - 2012 - Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 93 (1):8-30.
Transparency and Reasons for Belief.Benjamin Wald - 2015 - Logos and Episteme 6 (4):475-494.

Analytics

Added to PP
2022-04-25

Downloads
71 (#301,918)

6 months
14 (#225,774)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author Profiles

Alireza Kazemi
Institute for Research in Fundamental Sciences
Alireza Kazemi
Institute for Research in Fundamental Sciences

Citations of this work

No citations found.

Add more citations

References found in this work

Blindspots.Roy A. Sorensen - 1988 - New York: Oxford University Press.
Doxastic deliberation.Nishi Shah & J. David Velleman - 2005 - Philosophical Review 114 (4):497-534.
How truth governs belief.Nishi Shah - 2003 - Philosophical Review 112 (4):447-482.
On the aim of belief.David Velleman - 1996 - In J. David Velleman (ed.), The Possibility of Practical Reason. Monograph Collection (Matt - Pseudo). pp. 244--81.

View all 21 references / Add more references