Higher-Order Evidence and Calibrationism

The Element talks about the literature on the higher-order evidence debate and a new position to respond to that evidence.

Ru Ye (Author)

9781009124195, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 26 January 2023

75 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 0.4 cm, 0.122 kg

The higher-order evidence debate concerns how higher-order evidence affects the rationality of our first-order beliefs. This Element has two parts. The first part (Sections 1 and 2) provides a critical overview of the literature, aiming to explain why the higher-order evidence debate is interesting and important. The second part (Sections 3 to 6) defends calibrationism, the view that we should respond to higher-order evidence by aligning our credences to our reliability degree. The author first discusses the traditional version of calibrationism and explains its main difficulties, before proposing a new version of calibrationism called 'Evidence-Discounting Calibrationism.' The Element argues that this new version is independently plausible and that it can avoid the difficulties faced by the traditional version.

1. Introduction
2. Major positions in the HOE debate
3. Calibrationism and its main motivations
4. The problem of ignoring evidence
5. The conflict with conditionalization
6. Evidence-discounting calibrationism
7. Conclusion
References.

Subject Areas: Cognitivism, cognitive theory [JMAQ], Ethics & moral philosophy [HPQ], Philosophy: epistemology & theory of knowledge [HPK]