[Christoph]
>Thanks for your comments on my worries about the relation between
>deontological justification, PF-rationality, and warrant. You suggest
>an interesting line of thought. I am not convinced, however, (i)
>whether the concept of internal rationality you use is Plantinga's
>concept, and (ii) whether this concept is systematically plausible.

>if I read Plantinga correctly, his concept of
>internal rationality is more ambitious than the one you
>propose, and one point is precisely that internal rationality does
>include much *more* than merely holding (prima facie)appropriate
>beliefs in response to experience.

Christoph,

Thanks for the response.

Of course I never actually said that internal rationality is *merely*
holding the appropriate belief in response to experience. *Sometimes* it
will include much more than that, if it is specified by proper function. You
seem to want to argue that there is always a deontological component. But
this is not Plantinga's view.

What I was arguing was that Plantinga's view is that internal rationality
and justification "overlap" (his own words), not that the former entails the
other (as you originally suggested). Hence, there will be occasions when
internal rationality involves the satisfaction of deontological requirements
(of some sort), but this is because in *that* case it is a requirement of
proper function. But it hardly follows from this that a deontological
requirement is specified by proper function for every belief we hold. And
what duty would that be?

Now you seem to agree at one point that I am correct in saying that an
entailment relation is too tight. But if you concede this, the problem is
gone for there is no deontological *requirement* for internal rationality,
even if there are instances in which internal rationality involves
justification.

Consider again the very quote you provide.

"and finally, if [a person] is internally rational, she will do what proper
function requires with respect to such things as preferring to believe what
is true, looking for further evidence when that is appropriate, and in
general being epistemically responsible."

Plantinga is not saying here that justification is necessary for internal
rationality, nor do any of the other quotes you provide imply this.

So you raise two issues. First, whether I have Plantinga's view correct.
Second, whether the proposed view is coherent. As to the first, Plantinga
read the post in question and agreed with my analysis. So I will take it on
his testimony that I have properly interpreted his text, or at any rate have
his actual position correct. I think that my belief that I have correctly
understood Plantinga is both internally rational and justified. :-) As to
the second, I don't see that there is any incoherence in my proposal, though
I would certainly be interested in seeing whether this is so.

Peace,
Michael
--------------------------------------------

Dr. Michael Sudduth
Assistant Professor of Philosophy
Saint Michael's College
Box #399
Colchester, Vermont 05439


>Thanks for your comments on my worries about the relation between
>deontological justification, PF-rationality, and warrant. You suggest
>an interesting line of thought. I am not convinced, however, (i)
>whether the concept of internal rationality you use is Plantinga's
>concept, and (ii) whether this concept is systematically plausible.
>Let me explain.
>
>You wrote:
>
>> Simply because internal rationality and justification overlap, the
>>former does not strictly speaking logically imply the latter. That
>>relation is too tight.
>
>That is right; but if I read Plantinga correctly, his concept of
>internal rationality is more ambitious than the one you
>propose, and one point is precisely that internal rationality does
>include much *more* than merely holding (prima facie)appropriate
>beliefs in response to experience. This seems to come out e.g. on p.
>112 of WCB, where Plantinga begins the main paragraph by saying
>explicitly that "there is more that internal rationality requires."
>And he mentions doxastic coherence, drawing the right inferences,
>making the right decisions, "and finally, if [a person] is internally
>rational, she will do what proper function requires with respect to
>such things as preferring to believe what is true, looking for
>further evidence when that is appropriate, and in general being
>epistemically responsible." On p. 255 he says that internal
>rationality requires "more generally that you have done your best
>with
>respect to the formation of the belief in question. You have
>considered how it fits in with your other beliefs, engaged in the
>requisite seeking for defeaters, considered the objections that you
>have encountered".
>
>Now as regards your first Elvis scenario -- periodically I am being
>appeared to Elvisly, I form the belief that Elvis is alive, and I
>simply ignore counter-evidence others present to me -- I agree that I
>am violating some sort of intellectual duty. But you suggest that I
>may nonetheless be internally rational. According to Plantinga's
>requirement, however, it seems that I am *not* internally rational
>here. Unless, of course, we read his "in general" as a proviso that
>would yield your result in the Elvis scenario. But then the question
>is: what could be the reason for dispensing with epistemic
>responsibility in scenarios such as this? I find it hard to think of
>any such reason. (One may, of course, implement a rather weak concept
>of internal rationality, such as the one you suggest. But I still
>feel that there is an inconsistency here in Plantinga.)
>
>Let me add a question concerning your second scenario. You wrote:
>
>[Michael]
>[Suppose] I stop having Elvis visions, but continue to hold the
>belief that Elvis is alive. After reading a persuasive book on
>cognitive pathologies I come to believe that my being appeared to
>Elvisly was the result of contracting Presleyania Oikia, a rare
>cognitive disorder that involves the production of Elvis sightings in
>the presence of large accumulations of tacky 1970s furniture and home
>decor. Now here I have plausibly acquired an undercutting defeater
>for my belief that Elvis is alive. Internal rationality would demand
>that,if I continue holding these new beliefs that I give up my belief
>that Elvis is alive. Perhaps it is also the case that in these
>circumstances, I would be violating intellectual duties of some sort
>if I continued to believe that Elvis is alive. In fact, perhaps
>proper function here demands that I withhold belief given the other
>beliefs I have. This case, unlike the other, will be one in which the
>internally rational belief is also deontologically justified.
>
>One essential difference with respect to the first case is that I
>don't have Elvis experiences any more, although you probably don't
>want to rule out that I remember having had them. Perhaps you also
>want to suggest that my counter-evidence is somewhat stronger than in
>the first case. Yet, I am inclined to say that in the first scenario
>too I do acquire undercutting defeaters for my belief that Elvis is
>alive, given that people present counter-evidence to me. It's just a
>slightly different case of defeaters provided by testimony.
>Furthermore, what is defeated are experiential reasons for my Elvis
>belief, only that in this first scenario I do not, as it were,
>"epistemically actualize" the defeaters I acquire. Perhaps you think
>that these differences are responsible for the first scenario being
>one with internal rationality, but without deontological
>justification, and the second being one where we are dealing with
>both types of positive epistemic status. In essence, do you mean that
>ignoring weak defeaters with respect to experiences may *not* violate
>epistemic duties, while ignoring stronger defeaters with respect to
>beliefs that are not supported by experiences (any more) *would*
>violate epistemic duties? This is an interesting idea, although in
>the present state I do not find it too convincing.
>
>Best,
>Christoph.
>
>
>
>> Webpage: http://www.homestead.com/philofreligion/
>
>
>