In this paper I discuss two claims; the first is the claim that state-given reasons for belief are of a radically different kind to object-given reasons for belief. The second is that where this last claim is true, epistemic reasons are object-given reasons for belief (EOG). I argue that EOG has two implausible consequences: (i) that suspension of judgement can never be epistemically justified, and (ii) that the reason that epistemically justifies a belief that p can never be the reason for which one believes that p.

To be a doxastic deontologist is to claim that there is such a thing as an ethics of belief (or of our doxastic attitudes in general). In other words, that we are subject to certain duties with respect to our doxastic attitudes, the non-compliance with which makes us blameworthy and that we should understand doxastic justification in terms of these duties. In this paper, I argue that these duties are our all things considered duties, and not our epistemic or moral duties, for example. I show how this has the surprising result that, if deontologism is a thesis about doxastic justification, it entails that there is no such thing as epistemic or moral justification for a belief that p. I then suggest why this result, though controversial, may have some salutary consequences: primarily that it helps us make some sense of an otherwise puzzling situation regarding doxastic dilemmas.

Booth, Anthony Robert (2014) On some recent moves in defense of doxastic compatibilism. Synthese, 191 (8). pp. 1867-1880 This version is available from Sussex Research Online: http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/59411/ This document is made available in accordance with publisher policies and may differ from the published version or from the version of record. If you wish to cite this item you are advised to consult the publisher's version. Please see the URL above for details on accessing the published version. Copyright and reuse:Sussex Research Online is a digital repository of the research output of the University.Copyright and all moral rights to the version of the paper presented here belong to the individual author(s) and/or other copyright owners. To the extent reasonable and practicable, the material made available in SRO has been checked for eligibility before being made available.Copies of full text items generally can be reproduced, displayed or performed and given to third parties in any format or medium for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-profit purposes without prior permission or charge, provided that the authors, title and full bibliographic details are credited, a hyperlink and/or URL is given for the original metadata page and the content is not changed in any way. According to the doxastic compatibilist, compatibilist criteria with respect to the freedom of action rule-in our having free beliefs. In Booth 2009, I challenged the doxastic compatibilist to either come up with an account of how doxastic attitudes can be intentional in the face of it very much seeming to many of us that they cannot. Or else, in rejecting that doxastic attitudes need to be voluntary in order to be free, to come up with a principled account of how her criteria of doxastic freedom are criteria of freedom. In two recent papers, Steup (Steup 2012, Steup 2011 takes up the first disjunct of the challenge by proposing that even though beliefs cannot be practically intentional, they can be epistemically intentional. McHugh (McHugh forthcoming) instead takes up the second disjunct by proposing that the freedom of belief be modelled not on the freedom of action but on the freedom of intention. I argue that both Steup's and McHugh's strategies are problematic.

IntroductionIt is widely thought that we are at least sometimes responsible for our doxastic attitudes. We can be praised, blamed, or neutrally appraised for our beliefs, disbeliefs, and withholdings. However, many epistemologists have also pointed out that, despite the fact that we are responsible both for certain actions and for certain beliefs, there are crucial differences between responsibility for beliefs and responsibility for actions. In this paper we discuss one such alleged difference, namely that whereas in many circumstances two or more different actions are equally permissible, our evidence is always such that there is a unique doxastic attitude that we are epistemically obliged to have given that evidence. We call this thesis the Uniqueness Thesis (UT) and its denial the Permissibility Thesis (PT). Like many authors writing on this topic, we will interpret the issue deontologically: for a belief to be obliged or permitted is for it to be responsible or blameless. Thus, we do not understand the issue merely evaluatively, but deontologically: the question is not whether doxastic attitudes are obliged or rather merely permitted if they are to be ideally rational or ideally reasonable. The central aim of this paper is to defend PT by rebutting certain arguments against PT and by providing some considerations that favour PT over UT. If we succeed, we have shown that there is good reason to think that responsible or blameless belief is permissible rather than obliged belief. Also, if we succeed, we have shown that the gap between the way we should normatively assess belief and action may not be as wide as has been thought. This paper is structured as follows. First, we distinguish between several varieties of UT and PT and select those that we deem relevant to our discussion ( § 2). Next, we discuss a couple of objections to PT and argue that they fail ( § 3). However, even if we are correct that they do not succeed, it does not follow that UT is false. Therefore, we also discuss two arguments for PT ( § 4) and provide two motivations for PT by showing that it is entailed by two views that are quite popular among theorists working on doxastic responsibility ( § 5). Even if our strategy does not establish or demonstrate the truth of PT, it will provide enough reasons to prefer PT over UT. Varieties of PT and UTLet us start with a word on the terms that we and others working on this issue employ. It seems natural to think that every epistemically obliged belief is an *This paper is a collaborative effort to which each of us has contributed equally. bs_bs_banner