Abstract

The fundamental question this dissertation explores is whether a subject who is considering some proposition about the perceptible external world can answer the question "What should I believe?" in a way that is both legitimate and compelling. Being able to do so would require having internal reasons for belief that correspond to cognitive goals that the subject finds valuable. The first chapter explores whether we have any internal truth-conducive reasons for our perceptual beliefs, and concludes that we do not. This is demonstrated by surveying various kinds of reasons which we may have for such beliefs, and arguing that none of them is both internal and truth-conducive, because none of them legitimately satisfies a subject's desire to believe the truth. In keeping with the project of finding internal reasons for belief, the second chapter explores evaluativist alternatives to truth-conducive reasons, and concludes in favor of the particular kind of evaluativism that is pragmatism. Finally, the third chapter addresses the question of whether we have the psychological ability to decide what to believe for pragmatic reasons, and answers with a qualified "yes." Thus the dissertation presents a motivation for directing our inquiries as pragmatists, a description of how such inquiries would proceed, and an affirmation of our ability to put the theory into practice