Epistemic Responsibility and Perceptual Experience

Santiago Echeverri (1)

1 IJN - Institut Jean-Nicod

Any theory of perceptual experience should elucidate the way humans exploit it in activities proper of responsible agents, like justifying and revising their beliefs. In this paper I examine the hypothesis that this capacity requires the positing of a perceptual awareness involving a pre-doxastic actualization of concepts. I conclude that this hypothesis is neither necessary nor sufficient to account for empirical rationality. This leaves open the possibility to introduce a doxastic account, according to which the epistemic function of perception is fulfilled by perceptual beliefs. I develop this claim by showing that the doxastic account satisfies a series of intuitive requirements of justification and belief revision.

Mots clés: Conceptualism; Epistemic Responsibility; Epistemology of Perception; Belief

Santiago Echeverri. Epistemic Responsibility and Perceptual Experience. G. W. Bertram, R. Celikates, C. Laudou & D. Lauer. Expérience et réflexivité: perspectives au-delà de l'empirisme et de l'idéalisme, Éditions L'Harmattan, 14p, 2010. ⟨ijn_00452608⟩