Perspective and the Right Reasons View in Solving Epistemic Disagreements.

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In “The Epistemic Significance of Disagreement”, Thomas Kelly gives two responses to the question “How should awareness of disagreement, with those that you take to be your epistemic equal, effect the rational confidence you have in your beliefs?”. Kelly discusses two possible responses to the question. The first is Richard Foley's first person perspective argument. Adam Elga calls the second the right reasons view (Elga, 2007 pg. 485). Kelly pursues the latter, and does not go further than agreeing with Foley that we should only view these disputes with a first person perspective. I will show that Kelly's response to the question of epistemic significance of peer disagreement is not compelling. In my explanation of Kelly's argument, I will show that it is contradictory of him to assert the first persons perspective and the right reasons view. I will then examine the third person perspective, and show that this is more compatible with the right reasons view. Nevertheless I will propose an objection in the form of a question. Specifically, why should the difference between first person and third person change my thinking skeptically? Would this view only be attractive from the third person view? The third person perspective, the right reasons view as Kelly explains it, plus what I will call external Validation of a belief makes a more compelling argument. Kelly defines epistemic peers as two people that have an equal familiarity with the evidence and questions surrounding an argument (Kelly, 2005 Pg.10 ). Epistemic peers must also be equals with respect to epistemic virtues like intelligence (Kelly, 2005 Pg. 10). Kelly suggests that there is no significance in someone merely disagreeing with you that would entail that you los... ... middle of paper ... ...istinct asymmetry here because it is not possible for one third party to agree with both mine and Sam's conclusion. Therefore the assertion of the right reasons view, with respect to the third person perspective, and the validation of your belief from that same one third party makes a more compelling argument for keeping confidence in one's beliefs upon a disagreement. References (1) Kelly, Thomas (2005). “The Epistemic Significance of Disagreement.” Oxford Studies in Epistemology. Eds. Tamar Szabo Gendler and John Hawthorne. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Pg.1 – 36. (2) Rattan, Gurpreet (2014) “Disagreement and the First-Person Perspective” Analytic Philosophy. Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Pg. 1 – 23. (3) Adam, Elga (2007) “Reflection and Disagreement” Princeton University Copyright the Authors Journal compilation, Blackwell Publishing, Inc. Pg. 478 – 502.

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