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Ideas of Laurence Bonjour, by Text

[American, b.1943, Professor at the University of Washington, at Seattle.]

1980 Externalist Theories of Empirical Knowledge
Intro p.10 Externalist theories of knowledge are one species of foundationalism
§5 p.27 The Lottery Paradox says each ticket is likely to lose, so there probably won't be a winner [PG]
§I p.11 The big problem for foundationalism is to explain how basic beliefs are possible
§I p.11 The main argument for foundationalism is that all other theories involve a regress leading to scepticism
§II p.15 Extreme externalism says no more justification is required than the truth of the belief
§IV p.20 External reliability is not enough, if the internal state of the believer is known to be irrational
§IV p.20 Even if there is no obvious irrationality, it may be irrational to base knowledge entirely on external criteria
1985 The Structure of Empirical Knowledge
5.1 p.88 A coherence theory of justification can combine with a correspondence theory of truth
5.3 p.99 Anomalies challenge the claim that the basic explanations are actually basic
5.5 p.107 There will always be a vast number of equally coherent but rival systems
5.5 p.107 The objection that a negated system is equally coherent assume that coherence is consistency
5.5 p.107 A well written novel cannot possibly match a real belief system for coherence
7.1 p.141 Empirical coherence must attribute reliability to spontaneous experience
7.2 p.147 A coherent system can be justified with initial beliefs lacking all credibility
8.3 p.171 The best explanation of coherent observations is they are caused by and correspond to reality
1998 In Defence of Pure Reason
Pref p.-4 Philosophy is a priori if it is anything
§1.2 p.10 A priori justification requires understanding but no experience
§1.3 p.12 The concept of possibility is prior to that of necessity
§3.5 p.79 Indeterminacy of translation is actually indeterminacy of meaning and belief
§3.6 p.84 The induction problem blocks any attempted proof of physical statements
§3.7 p.96 Externalism means we have no reason to believe, which is strong scepticism
§3.7 p.96 Externalist theories of justification don't require believers to have reasons for their beliefs
§3.7 n50 p.92 Coherence can't be validated by appeal to coherence
§4.1 p.98 You can't explain away a priori justification as analyticity, and you can't totally give it up
§4.1 p.99 Moderate rationalists believe in fallible a priori justification
§4.3 p.110 Perceiving necessary connections is the essence of reasoning
§4.5 p.119 A priori justification can vary in degree
§5.2 p.131 Our rules of thought can only be judged by pure rational insight
§6.7 p.180 All thought represents either properties or indexicals
§7.7 p.214 Induction must go beyond the evidence, in order to explain why the evidence occurred
2003 A Version of Internalist Foundationalism
1.4 p.16 It is hard to give the concept of 'self-evident' a clear and defensible characterization
1.5 p.21 The concept of knowledge is so confused that it is best avoided
2.1 p.25 Reliabilists disagree over whether some further requirement is needed to produce knowledge
2.2 p.27 If the reliable facts producing a belief are unknown to me, my belief is not rational or responsible
3.1 p.45 My incoherent beliefs about art should not undermine my very coherent beliefs about physics
3.2 p.53 Coherence seems to justify empirical beliefs about externals when there is no external input
3.2 p.54 Coherentists must give a reason why coherent justification is likely to lead to the truth
3.2 p.54 For any given area, there seem to be a huge number of possible coherent systems of beliefs
4.2 p.67 If neither the first-level nor the second-level is itself conscious, there seems to be no consciousness present
4.3 p.73 Conscious states have built-in awareness of content, so we know if a conceptual description of it is correct
5.1 n3 p.78 The adverbial account will still be needed when a mind apprehends its sense-data