Dogmatism, Perceptual and Intuitive

As I understand it, dogmatism about perceptual justification is the thesis that, for a certain class of empirical propositions p, whenever one has an experience as of p’s being the case, one thereby has immediate prima facie justification for believing p.

Let dogmatism about intuitive justification be the thesis that, for a certain class of non-empirical propositions p, whenever one has an intuition as of p’s being the case, one thereby has immediate prima facie justification for believing p.

It strikes me that Jim Pryor’s discussion of the former thesis in “The Skeptic and the Dogmatist” reveals that these two forms of dogmatism are related in quite interesting ways.

First, Pryor’s main argument for dogmatism about perceptual justification evidently presupposes a form of dogmatism about intuitive justification. In response to the question why we should believe dogmatism about perceptual justification, Pryor writes (p. 536, boldface added):

For a large class of propositions, like the proposition that there are hands, it’s intuitively very natural to think that having an experience as of that proposition justifies one in believing that proposition to be true. …An experience as of there being hands seems to justify one in believing there are hands in a perfectly straightforward and immediate way. …[I]t seems like the mere fact that one has a visual experience of that phenomenological sort is enough to make it reasonable for one to believe that there are hands. No premises about the character of one’s experience—or any other sophisticated assumptions—seem to be needed.

Pryor then recommends that we “take these intuitive appearances at face value,” concluding that we therefore ought to accept dogmatism about perceptual justification.

Curiously, Pryor denies that this argument for dogmatism is itself dogmatic. Rather, he claims that the argument simply “proceeds via standard philosophical methodology” (p. 538). Presumably, Pryor believes that the relevant methodology is epistemically secure. Why? Presumably, because it provides justification: it’s safe to rely on intuitive appearances, as we do when we proceed via standard philosophical methodology, because intuitive appearances justify the corresponding beliefs. In effect, to allow that it is epistemically secure to “take these intuitive appearances at face value” -- i.e., that these intuitive appearances suffice to justify us in accepting dogmatism about perceptual justification -- is to assume that these intuitive appearances provide justification for the corresponding beliefs. This justification is, by all lights, immediate (and prima facie). The argument thus appears to presuppose a form of dogmatism about intuitive justification.

The point, in short, is that while it is probably true that reliance on intuitive appearances is standard philosophical methodology, this alone cannot prevent Pryor's argument for dogmatism about perceptual justification from being dogmatic. For standard philosophical methodology may itself be dogmatic (i.e., may rely on dogmatism about intuitive justification).

Second, Pryor (in note 37) observes that it would be nice to have an answer to the question of why perceptual experiences have the justificatory status that dogmatism about perceptual justification says they do. Many answers suggest themselves. Pryor briefly notes three:

[1] Perceptual beliefs are irresistible in that perceptual experiences involuntarily compel belief in the corresponding contents.

[2] It is constitutive of our concept of justification, or of our perceptual concepts, that perceptual experiences have this justificatory status.

[3] Perceptual experiences have “phenomenal force”: they present their contents as true. (As it turns out, this is the answer Pryor endorses.)

When reflecting on dogmatism about intuitive justification, one might wonder why intuitions have the justificatory status that dogmatism about intuitive justification says they do. Again, many answers, including analogues to those noted by Pryor, suggest themselves:

[1'] Intuitive beliefs are irresistible in that intuitions involuntarily compel belief in the corresponding contents.

[2'] It is constitutive of our concept of justification, or of some other concepts, that intuitions have this justificatory status.

[3'] Intuitions have “phenomenal force”: they present their contents as true. (In a previous post, written in ignorance of Pryor’s discussion of the phenomenal force of perceptual experience, I maintained that intuitions, much as perceptions, have precisely this property, which in my post I called the property of being presentational.)

Apart from the question of whether the answer that the dogmatist about intuitive justification should prefer is just the analogue of the answer that the dogmatist about perceptual justification should prefer, I think it would be interesting to explore other relations between these two forms of dogmatism as well. For instance, do objections to dogmatism about perceptual justification have equal force against dogmatism about intuitive justification? Are there objections to the latter dogmatism that are not objections to the former? And so on. But I'll leave these explorations for another day.

Comments

[Dan Korman]

It seems to me (and I thereby have immediate prima facie justification for believing) that Pryor's remarks don't yet commit him to a dogmatism about intuitive justification. Here, I take it, is an alternative to dogmatism: the property of beliefs based on intuitions in virtue of which they are justified is the property of being the outcome of a reliable belief-forming method. This is not dogmatism because dogmatism takes the justification-conferring property to be the property to seeming true to the believer. Proceeding via the reliable standard philosophical belief-forming method of believing what seems (intuitively) true results in justified beliefs, not because the beliefs we form seem (intuitively) true, but because standard philosophical method is a reliable belief-forming method.

Is there anything to prevent the dogmatist about perceptual justification from taking this alternative, reliabilist line on intuitive justification? (Or am I wrong to think that this is an alternative to dogmatism?)

[John Bengson]

Hi Dan,

Good question. I probably should have said something about that alternative in the post. Pryor says (p. 538) that his appeal to standard philosophical methodology is just a piece of "sensible philosophical conservatism": "we start with what it seems intuitively natural to say about perception, and we retain that natural view until we find objections that require us to abandon it." I find this hard to square with the suggestion that Pryor could avoid accepting dogmatism about intuitive justification by adopting a reliabilist line.

In any case, I'm tempted to think that a standard reliabilist line is not a genuine alternative to dogmatism. The reliability of x might explain why, or support the claim that, dogmatism about x is true. (Pryor, on p. 536, explicitly resists this option in the case of dogmatism about perceptual justification.) But it's not obvious that a standard reliabilist line could avoid dogmatism, as I've formulated it. But I'm open to suggestions to the contrary.