Liberalism and Conservatism in the Epistemology of Perceptual Belief

• Published in: Australasian journal of philosophy Vol. 88; no. 4; pp. 685 - 705
• Main Author: Neta, Ram
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Oxford Routledge 01.12.2010; Taylor & Francis Ltd
• Subjects: Background beliefs; Belief & doubt; Commitments; Conservatism; Epistemology; Independent justification; Knowledge (Theory); Liberalism; Perception; Perceptual experiences; Philosophy; Silins, Nico. 'Basic justification and the Moorean response to the skeptic,' Oxford Studies in Epistemology v.2 : 108-142; Wright, Crispin
• ISSN: 0004-8402; 1471-6828
• DOI: 10.1080/00048400903225734

Liberals claim that some perceptual experiences give us immediate justification for certain perceptual beliefs. Conservatives claim that the justification that perceptual experiences give us for those perceptual beliefs is mediated by our background beliefs. In his recent paper 'Basic Justification and the Moorean Response to the Skeptic', Nico Silins successfully argues for a non-Moorean version of Liberalism. But Silins's defence of non-Moorean Liberalism leaves us with a puzzle: why is it that a necessary condition for our perceptual experiences to justify us in holding certain perceptual beliefs is that we have some independent justification for disbelieving various sceptical hypotheses? I argue that the best answer to this question involves commitment to Crispin Wright's version of Conservatism. In short, Wright's Conservatism is consistent with Silins's Liberalism, and the latter helps to give us grounds for accepting the former.