This paper offers a detailed criticism of different versions of modal scepticism proposed by Van Inwagen and Hawke, and, against these views, attempts to vindicate our reliance on thought experiments in philosophy. More than one different meaning of "modal scepticism" will be distinguished. Focusing mainly on Hawke's more detailed view I argue that none of these versions of modal scepticism is compelling, since sceptical conclusions depend on an untenable and, perhaps, incoherent modal epistemology. With a detailed account of modal defeaters at hand I argue that Van Inwagen and Hawke's scepticism is either groundless, or it leads to boundless and unacceptable modal scepticism. Additionally, I show that Hawke's conception of analogical modal reasoning is problematic. Either his principle of similarity is arbitrary or it begs the question about modal scepticism. In contrast to Hawke's restricted view of analogical modal reasoning, I present two examples of analogy-based modal justification of philosophically relevant possibility claims. My criticism of modal scepticism also shows that there is no good reason to insist on a sharp distinction between an unproblematic and a presumably dubious kind of modality. The upshot is that in absence of proper defeaters both Yablo-style conceivability and properly applied analogical reasoning are reliable guides to possibility, and also that modal justification comes in degrees. The proposed framework of defeaters of modal justification as well as the analysed examples of analogical modal reasoning trace out interesting new areas for further discussions.

The aim of this special issue is to promote discussion on the value of truth and doxastic axiology. A key question of doxastic axiology is how to evaluate beliefs. There are three major approaches to it: the deontological one, the virtue theoretical one and the consequentialist one. The majority of the proponents of these approaches accepts the thesis that beliefs are primarily valuable because of their epistemic features. According to epistemic deontologism, certain epistemic norms determine whether it is permissible or not to have a certain belief (see Cohen 1984; Pollock 1987; and Feldman 2000). According to virtue epistemology, a valuable belief is an achievement of the epistemic agent manifesting an epistemic virtue in forming the belief in question (

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Various forms of disagreement are ubiquitous in all fields of discussion, for example in morality, philosophy, religion, politics, and aesthetics. Disagreement is related to a wide range of topics in epistemology, semantics, ontology, and morality. 1 Given the complexity of these interrelated 1