Noûs最新文献

{"title":"A Scale for Mixed Reasons for Belief","authors":"Matthew Vermaire","doi":"10.1111/nous.70049","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/nous.70049","url":null,"abstract":"Epistemic reasons matter for what you should believe. But then, some think there are practical reasons that matter, too. How could both sorts of reasons be weighed together to determine the doxastic states you ought to hold, all things considered? I argue for general constraints on any way of understanding such combinations and offer a well‐motivated decision‐theoretic model that, unlike its competitors, meets them. When epistemic reasons are conceived of as arising from the value or disvalue of a true or false belief, they can be weighed with practical reasons on a common scale.","PeriodicalId":501006,"journal":{"name":"Noûs","volume":"47 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2026-06-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148286047","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Perceiving Particulars","authors":"Dominic Alford‐Duguid, Umrao Sethi","doi":"10.1111/nous.70050","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/nous.70050","url":null,"abstract":"Causalists contend that you see a specific object (rather than a lookalike, or no object at all) because that object sits at the beginning of an appropriate causal chain that terminates in your visual experience. We argue that neither standard causalists nor their non‐causalist opponents can adequately accommodate a striking asymmetry between perception and thought. The asymmetry concerns the conditions under which a thought or sensory experience can inherit its object from another thought or sensory experience. Accommodating this asymmetry instead requires adopting a new and radical causalist view with important implications for the metaphysics of sensory experience.","PeriodicalId":501006,"journal":{"name":"Noûs","volume":"31 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2026-05-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148289644","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Planning for Mistakes","authors":"Sam Carter","doi":"10.1111/nous.70043","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/nous.70043","url":null,"abstract":"How should you decide what to do? Orthodox decision theory offers attractively simple advice: Do whatever has the most expected value. In what follows, I argue that this is not always good advice for agents like us. Agents like us are susceptible to error: Sometimes, we do not succeed at doing what is recommended by the advice we are trying to follow. For agents susceptible to error, there can be situations in which trying to do what they expect to produce the most value will be expected to leave them worse off. I will discuss why situations like this arise and give some concrete examples. I will also identify a condition on agents' credences, which is both necessary and sufficient for maximizing expected value to be the best advice for them to try to follow. However, crucially, this condition will not always be satisfied by agents like us.","PeriodicalId":501006,"journal":{"name":"Noûs","volume":"121 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2026-05-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148286066","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Knowledge and Argument","authors":"Spencer Paulson","doi":"10.1111/nous.70048","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/nous.70048","url":null,"abstract":"I argue that knowledge plays a distinctive role in psychological explanation that weaker epistemic states cannot because it is robust in the face of counterevidence in a way that they are not. Being robust in the face of counterevidence makes your belief robust in the face of counterargument. This makes knowledge well‐suited to facilitate epistemic social coordination. Since executive‐level belief revision works by running offline simulations that check for robustness in the face of counterargument, knowledge plays an explanatory role in executive‐level belief revision as well. The self‐monitoring system is in effect checking beliefs to make sure they are knowledge and revising them if they are not. It was selected for its ability to facilitate social coordination on the truth in this way. Assigning this explanatory role to knowledge allows us to see its importance while sidestepping major points of contention.","PeriodicalId":501006,"journal":{"name":"Noûs","volume":"46 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2026-05-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148286064","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Causal Second Law","authors":"Balázs Gyenis","doi":"10.1111/nous.70042","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/nous.70042","url":null,"abstract":"I argue that if a special science satisfies certain key assumptions that are familiar from physicalist accounts of the special sciences and from physics, then its causal regularities have an associated notion of entropy, and that this causal entropy cannot decrease from a robust cause to its effect. Due to its analogy with the second laws of thermodynamics and statistical physics, I call the latter conclusion the causal second law. In this paper, I clarify the key assumptions, prove the causal second law, give sufficient conditions for causal entropy increase, relate the causal second law to statistical mechanics and thermodynamics, and argue that the reversibility objection does not threaten it. In addition, I claim that the causal second law is compatible with a non‐metaphysical understanding of supervenience and the open systems view, argue that it does not imply a causal time arrow, reflect on relaxing the robustness condition, question whether it is necessary to invoke thermodynamics to show that special sciences' time arrows exist, and discuss a transition‐relative‐frequency‐based, special‐science‐internal characterization of causal regularities.","PeriodicalId":501006,"journal":{"name":"Noûs","volume":"3 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2026-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148289646","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Secrecy: An Epistemological Account","authors":"Jesús Navarro","doi":"10.1111/nous.70047","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/nous.70047","url":null,"abstract":"Although the ethical and political implications of secrecy are significant, I argue here that its fundamental nature is epistemological and that any account of its nature must be based on its epistemological profile. In particular, I propose examining secrecy within the framework of social and political epistemology, considering secrets as intentional disruptions to the social flow of knowledge. This requires us to postulate a crucial distinction between mysteries and secrets. A mystery is something that is difficult to know, thereby frustrating an individual's epistemic interests. By contrast, a secret is a specific kind of mystery that meets the following three conditions: (1) it is known by someone (the knower); (2) it is unknown to someone else (the unknower); and (3) it is intentionally concealed by someone else (the keeper) in a way that frustrates the unknower's epistemic interests.","PeriodicalId":501006,"journal":{"name":"Noûs","volume":"18 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2026-04-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147731772","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Against Propositionalism About Moral Laws","authors":"Derek Christian Haderlie","doi":"10.1111/nous.70046","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/nous.70046","url":null,"abstract":"Propositionalism, the view that moral laws are propositional, is nearly a truism in metaethics. Against this, I argue that those who hold that moral laws play an ineliminable role in moral explanation should reject it. If laws are to play such a role, they must make what explains relevant to what is explained. Yet if laws are themselves propositions, this requirement yields an explanatory regress. I develop a relational alternative according to which moral laws are generative relations rather than propositions. This relational account avoids the regress, preserves the explanatory role of moral laws, and has significant implications for metaethical theory. In particular, I show that it yields a nontrivial formulation of non‐naturalism and clarifies the relation between moral and metaphysical explanation.","PeriodicalId":501006,"journal":{"name":"Noûs","volume":"143 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2026-04-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147731771","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Form of Agency","authors":"William Hornett","doi":"10.1111/nous.70044","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/nous.70044","url":null,"abstract":"Philosophers often think agency is essentially connected with rationality, intention, or control. However, Minimalists argue that agency is just the power to cause a change; acids and boulders are agents too. Many philosophers treat Minimalism as a wild outlier, assuming its falsity without argument. My paper has three main aims: first, to show that Minimalism is actually an incredibly plausible theory; second, to show that it is false; and third, to defend an alternative theory of agency. I begin by providing a new argument for thinking that Minimalism is attractive as the default view of agency. I then argue that despite this attraction it is wrong, and I use it as a foil to defend my own view that agency is the distinctively animal power of discretion. I do this by first arguing for Deflationism about refraining, and then showing that this supports an argument for thinking that agency is a kind of two‐way power. Finally, I show how to arbitrate disputes about the extent of agency, as well as arguing that, if I am right about agency's nature, then it is prevalent throughout the animal kingdom.","PeriodicalId":501006,"journal":{"name":"Noûs","volume":"33 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2026-04-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147648885","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"In Defense of Comparability: Reply to Carlson and Risberg","authors":"Cian Dorr, Jacob M. Nebel, Jake Zuehl","doi":"10.1111/nous.70040","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/nous.70040","url":null,"abstract":"In “The Case for Comparability,” we argue that every comparative expression “<span data-altimg=\"/cms/asset/6a516e39-145c-4758-85bf-82e474f80c19/nous70040-math-0001.png\"></span><math altimg=\"urn:x-wiley:00294624:media:nous70040:nous70040-math-0001\" display=\"inline\" location=\"graphic/nous70040-math-0001.png\">\u0000<semantics>\u0000<mi>F</mi>\u0000$F$</annotation>\u0000</semantics></math>” obeys Comparability: if two things are at least as <span data-altimg=\"/cms/asset/44d42603-146b-4bfe-8734-e843800a4dd8/nous70040-math-0002.png\"></span><math altimg=\"urn:x-wiley:00294624:media:nous70040:nous70040-math-0002\" display=\"inline\" location=\"graphic/nous70040-math-0002.png\">\u0000<semantics>\u0000<mi>F</mi>\u0000$F$</annotation>\u0000</semantics></math> as themselves, then one of them must be at least as <span data-altimg=\"/cms/asset/666d85cc-43a3-47f2-907e-09a9143cc52b/nous70040-math-0003.png\"></span><math altimg=\"urn:x-wiley:00294624:media:nous70040:nous70040-math-0003\" display=\"inline\" location=\"graphic/nous70040-math-0003.png\">\u0000<semantics>\u0000<mi>F</mi>\u0000$F$</annotation>\u0000</semantics></math> as the other. One of our arguments appeals to the apparent validity of the Strong Monotonicity schema: <span data-altimg=\"/cms/asset/afa0db25-d1ab-4254-96d0-5eab3bd66f7a/nous70040-math-0004.png\"></span><math altimg=\"urn:x-wiley:00294624:media:nous70040:nous70040-math-0004\" display=\"inline\" location=\"graphic/nous70040-math-0004.png\">\u0000<semantics>\u0000<mi>x</mi>\u0000$x$</annotation>\u0000</semantics></math> is <span data-altimg=\"/cms/asset/b3df46cb-1af2-4045-8916-04d9cb3e1126/nous70040-math-0005.png\"></span><math altimg=\"urn:x-wiley:00294624:media:nous70040:nous70040-math-0005\" display=\"inline\" location=\"graphic/nous70040-math-0005.png\">\u0000<semantics>\u0000<mi>F</mi>\u0000$F$</annotation>\u0000</semantics></math>; <span data-altimg=\"/cms/asset/0ec60c6a-a698-43e3-8446-612ab526b3f7/nous70040-math-0006.png\"></span><math altimg=\"urn:x-wiley:00294624:media:nous70040:nous70040-math-0006\" display=\"inline\" location=\"graphic/nous70040-math-0006.png\">\u0000<semantics>\u0000<mi>y</mi>\u0000$y$</annotation>\u0000</semantics></math> is not <span data-altimg=\"/cms/asset/795e4567-cffc-454b-bdc5-86c17332aa8e/nous70040-math-0007.png\"></span><math altimg=\"urn:x-wiley:00294624:media:nous70040:nous70040-math-0007\" display=\"inline\" location=\"graphic/nous70040-math-0007.png\">\u0000<semantics>\u0000<mi>F</mi>\u0000$F$</annotation>\u0000</semantics></math>; so, <span data-altimg=\"/cms/asset/cad60893-9183-44ef-bba8-3542ce24d5b1/nous70040-math-0008.png\"></span><math altimg=\"urn:x-wiley:00294624:media:nous70040:nous70040-math-0008\" display=\"inline\" location=\"graphic/nous70040-math-0008.png\">\u0000<semantics>\u0000<mi>x</mi>\u0000$x$</annotation>\u0000</semantics></math> is more <span data-altimg=\"/cms/asset/00d48797-1836-45f9-85cb-9cfb42e26fd9/nous70040-math-0009.png\"></span><math altimg=\"urn:x-wiley:00294624:media:nous70040:nous70040-math-0009\" display=\"inline\" location=\"graphic/nous70040-math-0009.png\">\u0000<semantics>\u0000<mi>F</mi>\u0000$F$</annotation>\u0000</semantics></math> than <span data-altimg=\"/cms/asset/ca83c319-d96f-4254-ab58-296c4","PeriodicalId":501006,"journal":{"name":"Noûs","volume":"36 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2026-03-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147448445","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Virtuous Deferral","authors":"J. Adam Carter, Jesper Kallestrup","doi":"10.1111/nous.70041","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/nous.70041","url":null,"abstract":"Virtue epistemology has long struggled with the “Creditability Dilemma”: how can knowledge gained through deference be creditable to the knower if it primarily depends on others’ cognitive work? We propose a novel solution by developing a telic account of doxastic deference as a distinctive kind of social-epistemic performance. On our view, such deference succeeds when a deferrer forms a true belief that <i>p</i> in domain <i>d</i>, which answers their query, on the basis of the fact that a deferee states that <i>p</i> because of their epistemically superior competence in <i>d</i>. Drawing on Sosa's framework of performance assessment, we identify a metaphysical hierarchy of increasingly creditable achievements in deferential belief-formation, from mere accurate doxastic deferral through to fully apt doxastic deferral. This hierarchy reveals that the apparent tension between individual credit and epistemic dependence rests on an “inverse creditability” thesis which fails to apply in cases of deferential belief. Instead, the highest forms of deferential achievement often align with and track the cognitive achievements of those deferred to. This framework also illuminates expert identification and epistemic trespassing as problems of exercising deferential skill under suitably normal conditions.","PeriodicalId":501006,"journal":{"name":"Noûs","volume":"9 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2026-02-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146261010","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}