UR Scholarship Repository

Title

[Introduction to] Believing Against the Evidence: Agency and the Ethics of Belief

Authors

Miriam S. McCormick, University of RichmondFollow

Files

Description

The question of whether it is ever permissible to believe on insufficient evidence has once again become a live question. Greater attention is now being paid to practical dimensions of belief, namely issues related to epistemic virtue, doxastic responsibility, and voluntarism.

In this book, McCormick argues that the standards used to evaluate beliefs are not isolated from other evaluative domains. The ultimate criteria for assessing beliefs are the same as those for assessing action because beliefs and actions are both products of agency. Two important implications of this thesis, both of which deviate from the dominant view in contemporary philosophy, are 1) it can be permissible (and possible) to believe for non-evidential reasons, and 2) we have a robust control over many of our beliefs, a control sufficient to ground attributions of responsibility for belief.

ISBN

9780415818841

Publication Date

2014

Publisher

Routledge

City

New York

Keywords

belief ethics, doxastic responsibility, norms of agency

School

School of Arts and Sciences

Department

Philosophy

Disciplines

Philosophy

Comments

Listen to Podcasts@Boatwright and hear Dr. Miriam McCormick discuss Believing Against the Evidence: Agency and the Ethics of Belief.

Read the introduction to the book by clicking the Download button above.

Recommended Citation

McCormick, Miriam S. Believing Against the Evidence: Agency and the Ethics of Belief. New York: Routledge, 2015.