- Preface
- I. A Critique of Empirical Foundationalism
- 1. Knowledge and Justification
- The traditional conception of knowledge
- The concept of epistemic justification
- The epistemological task
- 2. Foundationalism: The Main Conception
- The epistemic regress problem
- The varieties of foundationalism
- A basic problem for foundationalism
- 3. Externalist Versions of Foundationalism
- The basic idea of externalism
- Some counter-examples to Armstrong’s view
- A basic objection to externalism
- Some externalist rejoinders
- Arguments in favor of externalism
- 4. The Doctrine of the Empirically Given
- The idea of the given
- Schlick on the foundation of knowledge
- Quinton’s conception of empirical intuition
- Lewis on the given
- An appeal to the a priori
- 1. Knowledge and Justification
- II. Toward a Coherence Theory of Empirical Knowledge
- 5. The Elements of Coherentism
- The very idea of a coherence theory
- Linear versus nonlinear justification
- The concept of coherence
- The Doxastic Presumption
- The standard objections
- 6. Coherence and Observation
- An initial objection
- A suggestion from Sellars
- Coherentist observation: an example
- The justification of the premises
- Introspection
- 7. Answers to Objections
- Answers to standard objections (I) and (II)
- Some further objections
- A restatement of the coherentist account
- 8. Coherence and Truth
- The problem: justification and truth
- Realism and the correspondence theory of truth
- The metajustificatory argument
- Skeptical hypotheses
- 5. The Elements of Coherentism
- Appendix A. A Priori Justification
- The concept of the a priori
- Is there a priori knowledge?
- Is there synthetic a priori knowledge?
- The idea of a priori intuition
- Appendix B. A Survey of Coherence Theories
- The positivists
- Idealism: Blanshard
- Lehrer’s subjectivistic coherence theory
- Rescher’s pragmatic coherence theory
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index


The Structure of Empirical Knowledge
Product Details
PAPERBACK
$42.00 • £33.95 • €38.00
ISBN 9780674843813
Publication Date: 03/15/1988