What are philosophical intuitions? There is a tension between two intuitive criteria. On the one hand, many of our ordinary beliefs do not seem intuitively to be intuitions; this suggests a relatively restrictionist approach to intuitions. (A few attempts to restrict: intuitions must be noninferential, or have modal force, or abstract contents.) On the other hand, it is counterintuitive to deny a great many of our beliefs—including some that are inferential, transparently contingent, and about concrete things. This suggests a liberal conception of intuitions. I defend the liberal view from the objection that it faces intuitive counterexamples; central to the defense is a treatment of the pragmatics of ‘intuition’ language: we cite intuitions, instead of directly expressing our beliefs via assertion, when we are attempting to avoid begging questions against certain sorts of philosophical interlocutors.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Intuitions and Begging the Question
Intuitions and Begging the Question. Under Review. Version of 4 July, 2009.
[...] Intuitions and Begging the Question is now under review. Check it out if you’re interested in reading what I think about intuitions, and making me wish I’d asked you for comments on it before submitting it. [...]
ReplyDelete[...] he calls ‘reasoned-to judgments’. Anything reasoned to is, Brian says, no intuition. I disagree, but let’s allow the stipulation. The question is whether we have any special reason to care [...]
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