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Aiming at Truth: Doxastic vs. Epistemic Goals

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Abstract

Belief is generally thought to be the primary cognitive state representing the world as being a certain way, regulating our behavior and guiding us around the world. It is thus regarded as being constitutively linked with the truth of its content. This feature of belief has been famously captured in the thesis that believing is a purposive state aiming at truth. It has however proved to be notoriously difficult to explain what the thesis really involves. In this paper, I begin by critically examining a number of recent attempts to unpack the metaphor. I shall then proceed to highlight an error that seems to cripple most of these attempts. This involves the confusion between, what I call, doxastic and epistemic goals. Finally, having offered my own positive account of the aim-of-belief thesis, I shall underline its deflationary nature by distinguishing between aiming at truth and hitting that target (truth). I end by comparing the account with certain prominent inflationary theories of the nature of belief.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Analytic Philosophy Faculty, IPM, P.O. Box 19395-5746, Tehran, Iran

    Hamid Vahid

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  1. Hamid Vahid
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Correspondence to Hamid Vahid.

Additional information

I am grateful to Muhammed Legenhausen, David Velleman and an anonymous referee of this journal for helpful comments on earlier drafts of this paper.

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Vahid, H. Aiming at Truth: Doxastic vs. Epistemic Goals. Philos Stud 131, 303–335 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-004-7481-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-004-7481-2

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