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supported. In particular, the following principle seems sound:

The ClosureKPrinciple

If Sknows thatp, and S competently deduces frompthat q, thereby coming to believe that qon thisbasis while retaining her knowledge thatp, then Sknows that q.1

Moreover, more strongly still, though nonetheless just as superficially plausible, there is this

principle:

The ClosureKRPrinciple

If Shas rationally supported knowledge that p, and S competently deduces from p that q, therebycoming to believe that qon this basis while retaining her rationally supported knowledge that p, then

Salso has rationally supported knowledge that q.

Whereas the first principle just demands, roughly, that one can extend ones knowledge via

competent deductions, the second principle demands, more specifically, that where suchcompetent deductions concern ones rationally supported knowledge, then the knowledge that

results will also be itself rationally supported. While these principles looks plausible, however, the

problem is that with them in play!and in particular with the closureKRprinciple in play!we can

generate sceptical problems of both a global and local nature.

Imagine an agent, who we will call Zula, who is at a zoo in normal circumstances and who

is presented (in good light, at close quarters, and so forth) with a pen containing what seems to be

zebras. Zula now forms the true belief that the creature that she is looking at is a zebra (z).

Seemingly, Zula has an excellent rational basis for her belief that z, not least that the creature

before her looks just like a zebra and she has no good reason for thinking that it is not a zebra.

Intuitively, then, Zula knows that z, where this knowledge is rationally supported.

Suppose now that Zula finds herself considering the possibility (which we will refer to as

cdm) that the creature before her is not a zebra at all but rather a cleverly disguised mule, where

the deception is sophisticated enough that it could only be spotted through making special checks

(e.g., for paint) or by employing special expertise (e.g., of a sort that might be possessed by a

zoologist). Let us stipulate that Zula doesnt have any particular reason for thinking that this error-

possibility obtains. Given that Zula is now aware of this error-possibility (and aware that it is an

error-possibility that is inconsistent with her belief that z), and given also that Zula has an excellent

rational basis for her belief that zbut no rational basis at all for taking this error-possibility

seriously, we would expect Zula to competently deduce on the basis of her belief that zthat the

creature before her is not a cleverly disguised mule (and hence that the error-possibility in question

is false). That is, from zshe will competently deduce that not-cdm.

Indeed, were Zula not to undertake this deduction then we would almost certainly regardher as being irrational in this respect. For she would then be in a situation in which she has a


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rational basis for her belief that z, a rational basis which is ex hypothesiunaffected by this error-

possibility (since it is, she recognizes, ungrounded), and where she knows that this error-possibility

is inconsistent with her belief that z, and yet she continues to form no belief about whether this

error-possibility obtains. Clearly, this is a rationally unstable position to be in. Thus, from a

rational point of view, Zula oughtin these circumstances to deduce that not-cdmand hence believe

this proposition on this basis.

Here is the problem. Given the closureKRprinciple, it follows that Zula must have rationally

supported knowledge of the deduced proposition, not-cdm. Zula now has good reason not only for

believing that the creature before her is a zebra, but also more specifically for thinking that it is a

zebra rather thana cleverly disguised mule. And yet, ex hypothesi, Zula has no rational basis for ruling

out the possibility that what she is looking at is a cleverly disguised mule. It is not as if, for

instance, she has special expertise that would enable her to detect this difference, or that she has

made special checks. Moreover, the rational support that Zula has for her belief that zdoesnt

seem to speak to the cleverly disguised mule error-possibility at all, so this cannot supply a rational

basis for excluding this error-possibility. For example, that it looks to Zulas untrained eye that the

creature before her is a zebra seems to offer no rational basis whatsoever for thinking that it is not

a cleverly disguised mule (a creature that would also look just like a zebra to the untrained eye).

Furthermore, once we notice that Zula has no rational basis for regarding not-cdmas true,

then it is hard to see how she could possibly know this proposition, and hence the closureKprinciple is also apparently called into question. For we now putatively have a case in which Zula

knows zand has competently deduced that not-cdmin a manner in keeping with the closureK

principle, and yet she does not appear to know not-cdm.

It should be easy to see how the argument just considered could be adapted to apply to any

number of beliefs which we currently think amount to knowledge (one would just need to vary the

error-possibility at issue). The sceptical import of this problem is thus that if we do not deny these

intuitive closure principles, then we seem forced to regard ourselves as knowing much less than we

previously thought. This sceptical difficulty is local in that it concerns an error-possibility which

only targets a small class of our beliefs. But we can just as easily formulate this difficulty along

global lines such that it concerns a radical sceptical error-possibility which calls a broad class of

our beliefs into question.

Consider, for example, what happens if the (ungrounded) error-possibility that Zula

considers is the radical sceptical hypothesis (which we will refer to as biv) that she might be a

brain-in-a-vat on Alpha Centauri who is being fed deceptive experiences. Given that Zula has a

rational basis for her knowledge that z, and given that she knows that this error-possibility is

inconsistent with z(brains-in-vats dont lookat anything after all), we can imagine Zula


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undertaking a competent deduction from her belief that zand inferring that not-biv. The problem,

of course, is that given the closureKRprinciple it follows that Zulas must now have rationally

supported knowledge that not-biv. Intuitively, however, Zula has norational basis at all for believing

that not-biv. Indeed, thats the whole point of radical sceptical hypotheses!viz., they are in their

nature error-possibilities which we have no rational basis for thinking are false. Moreover, given

that Zula has no rational basis for her belief that not-biv, it is hard to understand how, in keeping

with the closureKprinciple, she could know this proposition at all.

As with the local closure-based problem, then, the difficulty is to see how we can maintain

our rationally supported knowledge of the antecedent proposition while also staying true to the

two plausible closure principles we have outlined. As before, this problem ramifies once we

recognise that this line of reasoning can be adapted to challenge just about any belief that one

holds.

2. THE ENTITLEMENT STRATEGY

Various proposals have been put forward to deal with the difficulty outlined in 1. My interest

here, however, is in a specific proposal!due to Crispin Wright (e.g., 2004)!which has been

particularly influential. In broad outline, the idea is that the closureKRprinciple needs to go, but

that there is a way of rejecting this principle which leaves its sister principle, closureK, intact. In

particular, the thought is that in the cases described above we can concede that Zula does not have

a rational basis for believing the entailed proposition, even though she does have rationally

grounded knowledge of the entailing proposition. This means that the closureKRprinciple needs to

go. But proponents of this strategy nonetheless argue that there is an epistemic basis for Zulas

belief in the entailed proposition, and one that can suffice for knowledge of this proposition, and

thus that that we can retain the closureKprinciple. The epistemic basis that they have in mind is

entitlement.2

The basic thinking behind the entitlement strategy is that the sceptical problems described

above teach us something important about the limits of rational support. The shift towards

conceiving of certain beliefs as being known in virtue of our epistemic entitlement to believe them,

rather than in terms of having a rational basis for thinking those propositions true, is meant to

constitute a more realistic conception of the nature of rational support. Here is Wright:

This strategy [] concedes that the best sceptical arguments have something to teach us!

that thelimits of justification they bring out are genuine and essential!but then replies that, just for that


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preserves the agents knowledge, it is still in another sense a sceptical solution in that it concedes

something important to the sceptic (as Wright (2004, 206) fully admits). That is, the entitlement

strategy explicitly grants the sceptics main point that the rational support we are able to offer for

our beliefs in effect presupposes that certain conditions obtain which we do not have!and could

never have!a rational basis for supposing have obtained. In this sense, then, our beliefs are

ultimately groundless.6

Wright takes himself to be following Wittgensteins lead in this regard. In particular, in his

final notebooks, published as On Certainty[OC], Wittgenstein sets out a picture of the structure of

reasons such that the rational support that we are able to offer for our beliefs necessarily

presupposes hinge commitments which cannot themselves ever be rationally supported. As he

writes:

[... T]he questions that we raise and our doubts depend upon the fact that some propositions areexempt from doubt, are as it were like hinges on which those turn. That is to say, it belongs to thelogic of our scientific investigations that certain things are in deed not doubted.

But it isnt that the situation is like this: We just cant investigate everything, and for thatreason we are forced to rest content with assumption. If I want the door to turn, the hinges muststay put. (OC, 341-3)

The similarity to Wrights entitlement strategy is clear: the sceptic is demanding an unrealisable

goal, and hence we need to embrace the essential limitations on our rational position. In particular,

we need to accept that the rational support we can offer for our beliefs is essentially local, in that itpresupposes commitments that cannot be rationally discharged. In short, as Wittgenstein (OC,

166) puts it, we need to realise the groundlessness of our believing, no matter how difficult that

might be.

We will be returning to the question of just how similar Wrights sceptical solution to the

closure-based sceptical problem is to Wittgensteins account of our hinge commitments. First, I

want to consider a core problem facing the entitlement strategy.

3. THE CORE PROBLEM FOR THE ENTITLEMENT STRATEGY

To begin with, we need to note a crucial caveatthat must be added to the entitlement strategy. For

as Wright fully recognises, it simply isnt plausible to suppose that an agent could become aware

that she has no good reason for thinking a proposition to be true and yet believeit nonetheless on

account of her recognition that such a belief would promote the epistemic good by enabling her to

avoid cognitive paralysis. Believing, after all, is believing a proposition to be true, and ex hypothesi

the agent has no grounds for thinking the target proposition true.


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And yet on the standard view of knowledge, knowledge entails belief, and hence if we are

unable to properly believe the target propositions in this case then we are also unable to know

them.7The upshot is that even if it is true that Zula has an entitlement to believe that not-biv, once

she has reflected that she lacks a rational basis for thinking this proposition true, and so ceases to

believe it, it follows that she ceases to know it either. But then we are back with the tension with

closureKthat the entitlement strategy was meant to evade, since it seems now that Zula has

knowledge of the entailing proposition while lacking knowledge of the entailed proposition. We

are thus reunited with the problem of explaining why embracing the failure of the closureKR

principle in order to deal with the local and global closure-based problems wont lead one to reject

the closureKprinciple as well.

Wrights way of dealing with this problem is to argue that while the agent in this case cannot

adopt the propositional attitude of belief, there is a sufficiently belief-like propositional attitude

that she can adopt, and which is consistent with the possession of knowledge. There are some

subtleties here, but in essence the propositional attitude that Wright settles on in this regard is

what he terms rational trust (Wright 2004, 194) where this is explicitly understood in such a way

that it excludes agnosticism regarding the target proposition.

A useful comparison in this respect would be the propositional attitude of acceptance. If

one were aware of the rational basis that the entitlement strategy offers for endorsing the target

propositions, then one could reasonably accept those propositions on this basis. Of course, sinceone recognises that one has no rational basis for thinking the target propositions to be true, then

one is now agnostic about their truth. Nonetheless, ones recognition of the epistemic utility of

endorsing these propositions makes accepting them the rational thing to do. Precisely because

acceptance is compatible with agnosticism about the truth of the target proposition, however, it is

not a suitable propositional attitude for the purposes of the entitlement strategy. Even if one

doesnt hold that knowledge entails belief, one surely would want to insist that knowledge entails

the absence of agnosticism about the truth of the target proposition.8

Similarly, a mere(or blind) trusting of the target proposition is not going to be enough either,

since this is also a propositional attitude which is compatible with agnosticism about the truth of

the target proposition. If the only information source available to me is someone who I have no

reason at all for thinking is reliable, then while I might well opt to trust what she tells me and act

accordingly, I will surely at the same time be agnostic about the truth of those propositions which

I endorse on the basis of her testimony.

Wright is thus looking for a propositional attitude which has the following characteristics:

(i) Like mere trusting and acceptance, but unlike belief, it is compatible with the agent being


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aware that she has no rational basis for regarding the target proposition as true;(ii) Like acceptance, but unlike mere trusting, it can be rationally grounded nonetheless;

(iii) Like belief, but unlike acceptance or mere trusting, it is incompatible with agnosticism aboutthe truth of the target proposition.

On the face of it at least, a rational trust which explicitly excludes agnosticism about the truth of

the target proposition seems to fit the bill. It meets the third constraint by definition, it appears to

meet the first constraint by being a variety of trust, and it meets the second constraint by being a

propositional attitude that is rationally grounded by the epistemological story told by the

entitlement strategy.

If this works, then the entitlement strategy is back up and running, since it can now be

feasibly argued that an agent like Zula might be in a position to know the entailed proposition

even while lacking any rational basis for thinking this proposition true and even while, for that

reason, failing to believe it. For if she is aware of the rational basis for endorsing these

propositions that the entitlement strategy offers, then she arguably does have a basis on which she

can adopt a stance of rational trust towards these propositions, and hence can have knowledge of

them. The entitlement strategys denial of the closureKRprinciple thus need not lead to the denial

of the closureKprinciple. Is the entitlement strategy back in the running?

Im afraid not. The issue is whether the rational trust in question really could legitimately

exclude agnosticism about the truth of the target proposition. The reason why this is problematic

is that it is hard to see how an agent who is fully aware that she has no rational basis for regardingthe target proposition as true could be anything but agnostic about that proposition. After all, isnt

the recognition that this rational basis is lacking simply tantamount to being agnostic about the

truth of this proposition? How could it be otherwise?

In order to see this point, consider again the example of mere trust that we gave a moment

ago!viz., a case where the only available informant is someone who the agent has no reason at all

for thinking is reliable, such that she can at best only blindly trust what the informant tells her. We

noted earlier that in such a case our agent would inevitably be agnostic about the truth of the

target propositions. But now suppose that we adapt the case such that the agent is fully aware that

if she doesnt trust this informant, then cognitive paralysis will ensure. The trust should now

become a rational trust, in Wrights sense. Here is the crux: for while there is something more

rational about the agent opting to trust the informant in the adapted case (because cognitive

paralysis is clearly something to be avoided), it remains the case that the agents attitude toward the

truth of the propositions she endorses on this basis will (if she is rational anyway) be one of

agnosticism. In short, being aware that cognitive paralysis will ensue if she doesnt trust this

informant has no bearing on this issue at all.


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Of course, Wright could respond to this by saying that insofar as the agent is agnostic about

the truth of the target propositions then this would not be a case of rational trust in his sense by

definition. But that would be to miss the point, which is that the kind of trust that is in play here

should be exactly akin to the type of rational trust alleged to be available as a propositional attitude

when it comes to the propositions that Wright is targeting with his entitlement strategy. That it is

unavailable should tell us something troubling about Wrights notion of rational trust as it is meant

to apply to these propositions. Basically, we have a dilemma in play. Either Wright sticks to his

claim that rational trust excludes agnosticism about the truth of the relevant propositions, in which

case one cannot coherently adopt a stance of rational trust towards the propositions in question.

Or one can make sense of a notion of rational trust which can be applied to these propositions,

but at the cost of conceding that such trust is compatible with agnosticism about the truth of these

propositions. Either way, Wrights solution to the problem in hand is untenable.

I think we can diagnose where Wright went wrong in terms of an ambiguity in the very

notion of a rational trust. The natural way to understand this phrase, I take it, is that one has some

reason to believe the target propositions to be true, but that one at the same time is also to a

significant extent trusting that these propositions are true. An analogy might be the testimonial

case just given with the modification that one has some reason for believing what the informant

says, where this rational basis is rather weak (e.g., just a short track-record of reliable testimony).

Ones trusting what one is told by this informant is rational to the extent that there is some reasonavailable, however slender, for treating what she says as true. Depending on the degree of rational

support in play, rational trusting of this sort may well exclude agnosticism about the truth of the

target propositions.

But rational trusting as it is used by Wright clearly does not mean this at all, since it remains

that for him ones trust is supposed to be compatible with one being aware that one possesses no

rational basis whatsoever for regarding the target propositions as true. Rather, the rational basis

one has for engaging in this trust is entirely disconnected from being a rational basis for regarding

the target propositions as true. But this is precisely why rational trust in Wrights sense doesnt

exclude agnosticism (or at least, in view of the dilemma just posed for his view, it doesnt exclude

agnosticism insofar as it is meant to be available as a propositional attitude that one can coherently

adopt with regard to the presuppositional propositions in question). That there is a sense of

rational trusting that might exclude agnosticism can explain why we might find Wrights appeal to

rational trust superficially appealing. But once we make explicit what this notion actually involves,

then it becomes clear that it cannot offer the advertised solution.

The problem, of course, is that any form of trust in the target proposition which is

compatible with agnosticism about the truth of that proposition is not a plausible candidate for


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being a propositional attitude that could act as proxy for belief in an instance of knowledge, as

Wright recognises. We are thus back with the original problem that the appeal to rational trusting

was supposed to help us avoid!viz., that the entitlement strategy is forced to deny the closureK

principle as well as the closureKRprinciple, on pain of endorsing radical scepticism.

This problem is so fundamental that it raises the prospect of completely undermining the

entitlement strategy. I will be arguing that there is a way of reconfiguring the entitlement strategy

such that it can avoid this problem while also playing a very important anti-sceptical role (albeit a

very different one to that which Wright envisaged). In order to see this, however, we first need to

think more about both the local and global closure problems and the nature of our hinge,

commitments.

4. RE-EXAMINING LOCAL CLOSURE-BASED SCEPTICISM

The first point I want to make is that the local closure-based sceptical problem is on closer

inspection entirely illusory, and hence that we do not need to appeal to the entitlement strategy (or

indeed anyrevisionist strategy) in order to resolve it. In particular, I will be arguing that once we

understand Zulas rational position correctly then she doeshave an adequate rational basis available

to her for dismissing the ungrounded local error-possibility that she is presented with.Let us look again at the Zula case. Suppose we treat Zula as a normal member of the public,

with the kind of cognitive abilities and, crucially, background knowledge, that we would normally

expect a member of the public to have. If Zula, so conceived, is asked what her rational basis is for

believing that zis, then we would typically expect her to appeal to the evidence of her senses!viz.,

that theres a creature, over there in the pen marked zebra, in clear daylight and so forth, which

looks just like a zebra. Certainly, a rational basis of this sort would normally be thought sufficient

to ground an agents knowledge that z, and hence we wouldnt normally require anything further

from Zula on this score.

Now imagine that Zula is presented with the ungrounded error-possibility that what she is

looking at is in fact a cleverly disguised mule. Given that she recognises that this error-possibility is

incompatible with her belief that z, she now needs to decide whether to continue believing that z,

and so believe, via a competent deduction from z, that not-cdm, or to abandon her belief that z.

Given that the (very specific) error-possibility in play is (she recognizes) ungrounded, the latter

option does not look very plausible.9But as we saw above, the alternative of believing not-cdmfaces

problems too, given the closureKRprinciple, since Zula doesnt appear to have any rational basis


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for believing that not-cdm. That said, I want to suggest that this alternative in fact has far more

going for it than first meets the eye.

For notice that while the rational basis that Zula might normally offer in support of her

belief that zmay well be restricted just to the sensory evidence described above, if Zula is an

ordinary member of the public then one would expect her to be able to offer additional supporting

grounds for this belief if pressed to do so, especially in light of being presented with a specific

error-possibility. In particular, she will have all sorts of background knowledge that is relevant

here, both in support of her belief that zand which can also lend support to her prospective belief

that not-cdm. For example, amongst other things, she will have background information about zoos

and the likelihood that they would undertake a deception of this sort, she will have background

information about the costs involved in setting up such a deception, and the penalties involved

were such a deception to be noticed, and she would also have background information about how

very likely it is that such a deception would be spotted eventually. Given that the sensory evidence

she has suffices to rationally support her belief that zin normal circumstances, it is only natural

that she will normally restrict her attention to this evidence. But that doesnt mean that it is the

only evidence available to her, and if called upon to do so we would expect her to be able to cite

additional evidence like the foregoing in support of her belief. Crucially, though, this background

evidence offers not just further reasons in favour of her belief that z, but also provides a rational

basis for dismissing the ungrounded error-possibility in question.So provided that Zula is indeed a normal member of the public, then we would expect her

to be able to respond to the challenge posed by this error-possibility by offering the required

rational basis for dismissing it. Accordingly, in imagining that she undertakes the relevant

competent deduction, and so on this basis believes that not-cdm, we would expect her to have a

rational basis for believing that not-cdm. Of course, she might not be explicitly aware of such a

rational basis when she forms her belief that z, and there seems no reason why she should be, so

long as this local error-possibility is not on the table. What is important, however, is just that such

rational support is reflectively available to her, such that she needs to make no additional empirical

inquiries in order to make this tacit rational support explicit. Cases like this therefore pose no

problem for the closureKRprinciple, since the rational support that is reflectively accessible to the

agent with regard to her belief in the antecedent proposition is also able to support her belief in

the consequent proposition.

Of course, Zula might not be a normal member of the public who has the usual salient

background knowledge, and if thats right then the foregoing wont apply here. Suppose, for

example (though in practice this is probably unlikely), that the only rational basis available to this

particular Zula (even tacitly) is that the creature looks like a zebra (from a decent distance, say).


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Clearly, that the creature looks like a zebra is not by itself any reason at all for thinking that it is

not a cleverly disguised mule, and so unsophisticated Zula lacks a rational basis for believing not-

cdm.

But if this Zula really does confront the local error-possibility in play and finds that she can

offer no independent rational basis at all for dismissing it, then the upshot will be not that the

rational support she has for believing that zis rational support for believing that not-cdm, but that

she no longer has adequate rational support for believing that z. That is, in such cases even

ungrounded error-possibilities can undermine the rational status of your beliefs, and hence prevent

you from having knowledge of what you believe. But this result is entirely compatible with the

closureKRprinciple (in that the relevant instance of the antecedent is not satisfied). Moreover, I

dont think there is anything counterintuitive about this way of thinking about unsophisticated

Zula, since in effect all we have here is the familiar phenomenon of someone confronting a

defeater which they cannot in turn defeat. Certainly, there is no spur to scepticism in this

concession, since we have already seen that the normal situation will be one in which agents can

offer the independent rational basis for dismissing the ungrounded error-possibility. In any case,

what is crucial for our purposes is that even on this reading of the case there is still no

counterexample to the closureKRprinciple on offer.

Given the foregoing, it is an interesting question why so many epistemologists think that

there is a local closure-based sceptical problem, and I have speculated elsewhere at some length inthis regard.10One obvious reason why people take the local closure-based sceptical problem so

seriously is that these cases tend to be discussed with one eye on the radical sceptical problem.

Crucially, however, the global closure-based sceptical problem is much more serious, and certainly

cant be dealt with in the straightforward way just suggested. For notice that while Zula can

legitimately cite her background beliefs about, say, how zoos are normally run in defence of her

belief that not-cdm, it would be highly problematic for her to make use of her background beliefs

about, say, the technological likelihood of there being brains in vats in defence of her belief that

not-biv. The reason for this is that the radical error-possibility in the latter case calls into question

not just the rational basis for Zulas belief that z, but also the rational basis she has for many of her

other beliefs as well, including background beliefs about the technological likelihood of there

being brains in vats. It is only because the local error-possibility in the former case doesnt do this

that we can unproblematically appeal to background beliefs in the way that we did above.11

This is not to say that the global closure-based sceptical problem is bona fide, since as we will

see in a moment this is illusory as well. The point is rather that it is illusory in a different way, in

that while the local closure-based sceptical problem is simply a non-problem, there isa genuine

sceptical difficulty lurking beneath the discussion of the global closure-based sceptical problem, it


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is just that this difficulty is not well expressed in terms of the closure principles we are considering.

Before we can make this point explicit, however, we first need to look again at Wittgensteins

remarks on hinge propositions.

5. WITTGENSTEIN ON HINGE PROPOSITIONS

Part of the problem facing the entitlement strategy is the idea that our commitments to the target

presuppositional propositions are optional, in the sense that one is confronted with a decisionabout

whether to adopt a positive propositional attitude in light of the presentation of the target

ungrounded error-possibility. This is problematic on two levels. First, it leads to the wrong sort of

propositional attitude, since (except in some very unusual cases) beliefs are by their very nature not

the kind of propositional attitude which can be acquired in response to making a decision

regarding what it is (in this case epistemically) best to believe, but are rather meant to be a

spontaneous intellectual response to the (perceived) weight of evidence in support of the target

proposition. Second, it conveys the idea that one could, if one wished, opt to simply not take on

the target propositional commitment, as if it were entirely within ones will to do so. But it is far

from clear that this is the case when it comes to our hinge commitments, particularly when it

comes to those hinge commitments in play in the global closure-based sceptical problem.On the surface of things, Wittgensteins remarks on hinge propositions would seem to

suggest that there is a great deal of variability in each persons hinge commitments, with these

commitments changingpossibly quite dramaticallyas we move from person to person, culture

to culture, epoch to epoch, and so on. Wittgenstein writes, for example, about hinges concerning

the fact that one has never been to the moon (e.g., OC, 106) or that ones name is such-and-such

(e.g., OC, 425). But in each case the hinge in question seems very relative to the particular

circumstances of the person in question: what age they live in, who they are, and where they were

raised. For example, someone in the future might not have a hinge commitment that they had

never been moon (perhaps going to the moon as a child is so commonplace that it is sometimes

not remarked upon), and someone with a different name will presumably take it as a hinge

commitment that that their particular name is the name they think it is.

The foregoing suggests a highly context-sensitive account of hinge commitments, and one

might be tempted on this basis to regard ones hinge commitments as being entirely context-

bound. But this would be an unduly quick way of reading Wittgensteins remarks on hinge

propositions. For closer inspection of this apparently heterogeneous class of hinge commitments

reveals that they all in effect codify, for that particular person, the entirely general hinge


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commitment (call this the ber hinge commitment) that one is not radically and fundamentally

mistaken in ones beliefs.12

If one were to be wrong about ones name, for example, then ones beliefs would be

radically and fundamentally mistaken. Imagine, for instance, that you go out into the world one

morning and find that everyone you know is calling you by an unfamiliar name and telling you that

you have had this name all along. Worse, everything you call upon to back up your storybank

statements, further testimony from friends, the electoral register, and so forthin fact supports

the opposing story. Although this commitment of yours is quite specific, its apparent falsity reveals

a radical and fundamental error in your beliefs. Indeed, in all likelihood those around you in this

case will think that you are losing (have already lost?) your marbles.13The particular hinge

commitment to this proposition is thus simply a reflection of the fact that, in your particular

circumstances, to be wrong about something like this would reflect radical and fundamental error.

In short, this particular hinge commitment is just a consequence of your more general berhinge

commitment that you are not radically and fundamentally mistaken.

The importance of this observation is that it highlights that we shouldnt invest too much

importance in the fact that people from different cultures, ages, and so forth, have different overall

hinge commitments, since the differences merely reflect the way in which different people will

codify their ber hinge commitment. That is, we can distinguish, on the one hand, between the

ber hinge commitment that everyone holds and, on the other hand, the very different ways inwhich this ber hinge commitment manifests itself in a hinge commitment to specific propositions

when it comes to particular people (within specific cultures, epochs, and so on).

One advantage of this way of thinking about our hinge commitments is that it explains how

they can change over time, something that would be puzzling if we thought that even these

personal hinge commitments were on a par with the ber hinge commitment. The latter clearly is

not something that can change over time, since to lose this commitment is to have no hinge

commitments at all, and yet the former personal hinge commitments clearly canchange over time,

as the example of having never been to the moon illustrates. Once we see that they are simply

codifying the ber hinge commitment then there is no puzzle here. As ones personal

circumstances change, so ones beliefs change with them and hence something that used to codify

ones ber hinge commitment now no longer plays this role.

This way of thinking about Wittgensteins account of hinge propositions also accords with a

key metaphor that he uses to describe our hinge commitments. Consider the following passage:

It might be imagined that some propositions, of the form of empirical propositions, were hardened

and functioned as channels for such empirical propositions as were not hardened but fluid; andthat this relation altered with time, in that fluid propositions hardened, and hard ones became fluid.


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The mythology may change back into a state of flux, the river-bed of thoughts may shift. But Idistinguish between the movement of the waters on the river-bed and the shift of the bed itself;

though there is not a sharp division of the one from the other. []And the bank of that river consists partly of hard rock, subject to no alteration or to only an

imperceptible one, partly of sand, which now in one place now in another gets washed away, ordeposited. (OC, 96-99)

This way of describing our hinge commitments accords with the idea that while such

commitments might change over time, the changes are entirely at the periphery and the rate of

change is inevitably slow. This is entirely in keeping with the picture of our hinge commitments

just outlined, since on this view while the personal hinge commitments can change over time, they

clearly cant change en massewithout this endangering the ber hinge commitment.

There is a third category of hinge commitment that we need to demarcate, between personal

hinge commitments and ber hinge commitments, which concerns our attitude to radical sceptical

scenarios. Clearly, in virtue having the ber hinge commitment one is thereby committed to

regarding these scenarios as false. But these explicitly anti-sceptical hinge commitments are unlike

the personal hinge commitments in that most people, prior to being introduced to sceptical

scenarios anyway, will have no particular view about them (indeed, in all likelihood they wont

even have ever considered them). But they are also unlike the ber hinge commitment in that they

are quite specific about the nature of the error in question.

I think we can explain what is going on here by noting that such scenarios are explicitly

designedto call the ber hinge commitment into question. Accordingly, such sceptical scenarios are

simply very direct ways in which we could be radically and fundamentally in error, and hence our

commitment to their denial is an immediate consequence of our commitment to the ber hinge.

Indeed, we are able to straightforwardly recognise their connection. In contrast, because of their

apparent logical distance from the ber hinge commitment it comes as a surprise to discover that

our personal hinge commitments in effect codify our ber hinge commitment, and hence that they

share similar epistemic properties, such as being rationally groundless.

We noted earlier the main point which Wright extracts from Wittgensteins remarks on

hinge propositions!viz., that there is something unrealisable about the sceptics desire for a fully

general rational evaluation, and hence that we should accept a more limited conception of the

rational basis of our beliefs. It is important to note how strong Wittgensteins point in this regard

is, for he claims that the very idea of a fully general rational evaluation, whether negative (such as

in the form of a variety of radical scepticism), or positive (such as in the form of a Moorean anti-

sceptical view), is simply incoherent. This because it is a truth of logic (OC, 142) that all

rational evaluations presuppose hinge commitments which cannot themselves be rationally

discharged. That is, the fact that all rational evaluation presupposes such hinge commitments is


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not merely due to some practical limitation on our part, such that if only we were more careful or

cleverer, or had more time, then we could rationally discharge the hinge commitments.

Accordingly, all rational evaluation is necessarilylocal.14

By focussing on the ber hinge commitment we can see why rational evaluation must be

essentially local. For what possible reason could we have for holding the ber hinge commitment?

Whatever grounds we cited would already presuppose the truth of this commitment after all.

Moreover, once we see that the other hinge commitments we have!to personal hinges and to

explicitly anti-sceptical hinges!are simply a consequence of our ber hinge commitment, then it

becomes clear that the extent to which our system of rational support presupposes essentially

groundless commitments is quite considerable. Notice, too, that there is nothing contingent about

this limitation on our reasons. It is not as though, for example, if we had been more careful or

thorough in how we acquired rational support for our beliefs then we could have avoided this fate;

rather, it is in the very nature of rational support that it be local in this way. We thus get the

Wittgensteinian conclusion: since all rational evaluation necessarily takes place relative to

groundless hinge commitments, hence the very idea of a fully general rational evaluation!i.e., one

which does not presuppose any hinge commitments!is incoherent, whether that evaluation is

positive (i.e., anti-sceptical) or negative (i.e., sceptical).15

The foregoing should give us a sense of where Wrights conception of hinge propositions

departs from Wittgensteins. In particular, for Wittgenstein the kind of commitment that we have

to hinge propositions is in its nature both not a form of belief but also (like a belief) completely

incompatible with agnosticism about the truth of the target proposition. Moreover, unlike a belief,

such a commitment, due to its visceral nature, such that it is insensitive to the kind of rational

considerations that would influence a belief, will remain even once one has recognised that it is a

commitment that is entirely without rational support. Wittgensteins conception of our hinge

commitments thus excludes the kind of pragmatic-cum-quasi-epistemic commitment that we are

meant to imagine is the product of the entitlement strategy. The Wittgensteinian approach to thestructure of reasons is thus in tension with the entitlement strategy.

6. FOUR STAGES OF EPISTEMIC DEVELOPMENT:

INNOCENCE, VERTIGO,ANGST, ACCEPTANCE

Given the foregoing, can Wrights entitlement strategy play an anti-sceptical role within the wider

Wittgensteinian anti-sceptical strategy we have just set out? I believe that it can, but that it is not


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quite the role that Wright had in mind. In particular, I think its sceptical import becomes apparent

afterwe have embraced the Wittgensteinian anti-sceptical strategy. In order to see this, it is useful

to break down our engagement with the sceptical problem into four distinct stages.

Call stage one epistemic innocence!viz., a state prior to engaging with the sceptical problem,

much less possible anti-sceptical responses. The epistemically innocent are for the most part

perfectly happy with the reasons that they can offer for their beliefs, and are insensible to the fact

that such rational evaluations are essentially local. Although they will necessarily have hinge

commitments, including a commitment to the ber hinge, they will for the most part at least be

completely oblivious to these commitments, since in ordinary life there is no stimulus to become

aware of them.16Indeed, although we can express the content of these hinge commitments in

terms of particular propositions, the agent herself might have never so much as entertained these

propositions; in fact, she might lack the conceptual resources for even having thoughts about

these propositions, particularly when it comes to a commitment to the denials of sceptical

hypotheses. For these reasons, I dont think we can plausibly think of these commitments as being

even in the ballpark of being a beliefin the specific proposition which expresses the content of the

commitment, even though they do share one key element with belief, in that the commitment in

play is fully-fledged, and not tentative or provisional in the way that some positive propositional

attitudes!like accepting and trusting!are.17

Call stage two epistemic vertigo. This is the stage where subjects are made aware of the sceptical

problem, and thereby come to discover the essential locality of reasons. This is usually achieved by

using sceptical hypotheses to expose the subjects hinge commitments, and in particular the

groundless nature of these commitments. To keep matters simple, lets focus specifically on the

ber hinge commitment in this regard.

As we noted above, ones reasons for holding ones everyday beliefs are not good reasons

for holding the ber hinge commitment at all, and yet those reasons only offer rational support for

ones everyday beliefs provided this ber hinge commitment is true. That is, I have all sorts of

reasons for holding that particular beliefs are true, but these are only good reasons for holding the

target propositions provided that my beliefs taken as a whole are notradically and fundamentally in

error. So, for example, my rational basis for believing that z(e.g., it looks like a zebra, the sign

above the enclosure says that the animal is zebra, Ive no specific grounds to doubt that it is a

zebra, and so on) effectively presupposes that Im not radically and fundamentally in error in my

beliefs, since if I were so in error then these grounds would offer no rational support for the target

belief. By the same token, the rational support that I can offer for belief in a specific proposition

can never be such as to provide me with rational support for holding that I am not radically and


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fundamentally in error in my beliefs.

Now this might look like a variant of the global closure-based sceptical problem, in that if

the closureKRprinciple holds, then there is a sound basis on which one can use an observation like

this to motivate radical scepticism (i.e., one can use this observation to make a case for thinking

that one has no rational basis for holding most!all?!of ones everyday beliefs). But that would

be too quick. Indeed, once we recognise that our hinge commitments are non-optional then it

turns out that there is no global closure-based sceptical problem at all (though there is a genuine

sceptical problem in play here).

Recall how we formulated the closureKRprinciple above:

The ClosureKRPrinciple

If Shas rationally supported knowledge that p, and S competently deduces from p that q, thereby

coming to believe that qon this basis while retaining her rationally supported knowledge that p, thenSalso has rationally supported knowledge that q.

The requirement that interests us in this formulation is that the beliefin the consequent proposition

should be acquiredon the basis of the relevant competent deduction. This requirement is not incidental

to the principle, since if it is not met then it is hard to see why we would think there is even aprima

faciecase for supposing that the agents belief in the consequent proposition should be rationally

supported. It is, after all, this requirement which ensures that the agents belief in the inferred

proposition is the result of a rational process which is rooted in her rationally supported

knowledge. But with this requirement in play there is no tension generated by holding: (i) that

ones commitment to the ber hinge is groundless, (ii) the closureKRprinciple, and (iii) that one

does have a (local) rational basis for ones ordinary beliefs.

One immediate reason for this is that ones ordinary beliefs are unlikely to entail the

propositioncall this the ber hinge propositionwhich expresses the ber hinge commitment

anyway. Take an ordinary belief that z, for example. Clearly, this does not entail the ber hinge

proposition: one might be radically and fundamentally mistaken in ones beliefs and yet this

particular belief be true. Rather than the relation in play here being one of entailment, it is instead

more specifically epistemic, in that the ber hinge proposition needs to be true in order for one to

be in a position to know an ordinary proposition like zin the first place.

But even if one did have an ordinary belief which entailed the ber hinge proposition, one

still wouldnt be able to generate the required tension with the closureKRprinciple. This is because,

as we saw above, it is simply not possible to acquire a belief in a ber hinge proposition, whether

via such a competent deduction or indeed any other belief-forming process. For one thing, ones

commitment to the ber hinge proposition is not strictly speaking a kind of belief at all, onaccount of how it is a commitment which is necessarily immune to rational considerations. For


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another, ones hinge commitments cannot be acquired via a rational belief-forming process

(indeed, ones ber hinge commitment cannot be acquired via anybelief-forming process, since it

is a commitment one is bound to have anyway). Hence, there is no tension between the closureKR

principle, our groundless hinge commitments, and our grounded everyday knowledge.

What goes for our ber hinge commitments will also apply, mutatis mutandis, for our personal

and anti-sceptical hinge commitments, the only complication being that, at least as regards the

anti-sceptical hinge commitments anyway, there will be an entailment from our everyday beliefs to

the denial of the proposition which expresses this hinge commitment. But even with the

entailment in play, it remains that the closureKRprinciple, our groundless hinge commitments, and

our grounded everyday knowledge are not collectively in tension. There is thus no global closure-

based sceptical problem which trades on the closureKRprinciple.Indeed, once we recognise this point then we also see that there is no sceptical problem

lurking in the background regarding the closureKprinciple either. Recall how we formulated this

principle above:

The ClosureKPrinciple

If Sknows thatp, and S competently deduces frompthat q, thereby coming to believe that qon thisbasis while retaining her knowledge thatp, then Sknows that q.

As with the closureKRprinciple, the requirement that interests us in this formulation is that the

beliefin the consequent proposition should be acquiredon the basis of the relevant competentdeduction. Just as with the closureKRprinciple, it is not an incidental feature of this principle that it

imposes this requirement, since without it it is hard to see why we would find the principle so

compelling. But with this principle in play it should be apparent that one doesnt need to appeal to

the notion of entitlement in order to explain how our knowledge of ordinary propositions is

compatible with our groundless hinge commitments (where we can competently deduce the latter

from the former). For if we cannot acquire a belief in a hinge proposition on the basis of a belief-

forming process like competent deduction, much less base our beliefs on the evidential outcome

of such a process, then we can fail to know the propositions that express our hinge commitments

and yet still not contravene the closureKprinciple.18

Thus far, our observations have run counter to the entitlement strategy, in that this strategy

was built around the failure of the closureKRprinciple and the potential failure (without

entitlement) of the closureKprinciple (at least so long as scepticism was avoided). The notion of

entitlement was meant to come into play to make the failure of the closureKRprinciple palatable by

showing how it did not lead to the failure of the closureKprinciple. It now turns out that not only

is there no closure-based sceptical problem (local or global) which the entitlement strategy was

designed to solve, but that our inability to know the propositions which express our hinge


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commitments is in fact entirely compatible with the closureKprinciple anyway, and hence that this

principle is not under threat in virtue of this epistemic lack on our part.

So is the entitlement strategy as an anti-sceptical strategy completely defunct? I think not. In

order to see this, consider the stage that will follow epistemic vertigo, which I call epistemic angst.

Recall that the epistemic vertigo is brought on by the recognition that our most fundamental hinge

commitments are entirely groundless, and hence that our reasons are essentially local. This is a

recognition which radically undermines our conception of the epistemic standing of our beliefs.

What prevents such vertigo degenerating into scepticism is the further recognition that the natural

way to flesh-out the sceptical problem in play here!via an appeal to the closureKRand closureK

principles!in fact fails once we properly characterise the nature of our hinge commitments. But

while this staves off the immediate impetus towards radical scepticism, it also leaves us in unstable

intellectual position, and this is where the epistemic angstcomes into the picture. For it is one thing

to recognise that we musthave these hinge commitments, and thus that our reasons are by necessity

essentially local, and quite another to get a reflective grip on how we are to embrace this fact about

our epistemic position given that we are now fully aware of it. In short, how are we as reflective

rational creatures to live with (our awareness of) the fact that our rational system is limited in this

way?19

It is precisely at this juncture that a reconfigured version of the entitlement strategy can

come to the rescue, and lead us to a fourth stage where a kind of intellectual equilibrium is

restored. This is the stage of epistemic acceptance. Given the recognition that these hinge

commitments are not beliefs, and certainly not propositional attitudes which can be acquired or

undermined via a rational process, there is no question while in the stage of epistemic angstthat

one could reason ones way out of the predicament that one is faced with. Instead, one needs to

find some rationally acceptable way to accept this predicament.

Here is where the entitlement strategy can offer some degree of intellectual peace, since it

presents us with a rational story about why these commitments are good from an epistemic point

of view (albeit not of course a rational story that gives us reason for thinking that the propositions

in question are true). The epistemically rational agent can now move from the stage of epistemic

angstto the stage of epistemic acceptance, confident that these commitments are rationally

held!viz., we have an entitlementto them!even if not rationally grounded. The rational agent can

now reconcile herself with her epistemic position, even while recognising its essential limitations.

Notice, however, that epistemic acceptance does not constitute a return to epistemic innocence,

for the latter does not involve recognition of the essentially limited nature of our reasons. We are

older and wiser after engaging with the sceptical problem, and cannot return to our innocent


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selves (epistemic peace is not to be equated with epistemic innocence).

7. CONCLUDING REMARKS

What I am proposing is thus a complete recasting of the entitlement strategy. Instead of offering

us a way of retaining the closureKprinciple (thereby avoiding scepticism) while rejecting the

closureKRprinciple, this strategy instead gives us a means of making that crucial move from the

stage of epistemic angstto the stage of epistemic acceptance. The closure-based sceptical problem,

both local and global, is illusory. But that doesnt mean that there isnt a genuine sceptical

difficulty in play here, which concerns the essential locality of our reasons. The challenge is to find

a way of rationally living with the recognition, in light of engaging with the sceptical problem, that

our reasons are local in this way, and here is where the entitlement strategy does offer some

promise.

Of course, everything hangs on the success of the entitlement strategys claim that retaining

ones hinge commitments does serve ones epistemic goals, something that I havent explicitly

argued for here, except to note itsprima facieplausibility. On this point, however, it is interesting to

note that while Wright was treating a wide class of presuppositional commitments as being such as

to serve our epistemic goods, the presuppositional commitments in play in this recasting of theentitlement strategy are a far more restricted class and, more importantly, far more plausibly

thought of as serving our epistemic goals. Indeed, it is surely veryplausible that the ber hinge

commitment serves our epistemic goals in the relevant sense: how could a failure to have such a

commitment notresult in cognitive paralysis? There is thus every reason to think that this recasting

of the entitlement strategy could genuinely serve its intended anti-sceptical purpose.20


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REFERENCES

Austin, J. L. (1961). Other Minds, in his Philosophical Papers, (eds.) J. O. Urmson &G. J. Warnock,Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Burge, T. (1993). Content Preservation, Philosophical Review102, 457-88.

!!

(2003). Perceptual Entitlement, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research67, 503-48.David, M. &Warfield, T. (2008). Knowledge-Closure and Skepticism, Epistemology: New Essays,(ed.) Q. Smith, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Davies, M. (2004). Epistemic Entitlement, Warrant Transmission and Easy Knowledge,Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society78 (supp. vol.), 213-45.

Dretske, F. (1970). Epistemic Operators, The Journal of Philosophy67, 1007-23.

!! (1971). Conclusive Reasons,Australasian Journal of Philosophy49, 1-22.

!! (2005a). The Case Against Closure, Contemporary Debates in Epistemology, (eds.) E. Sosa &M. Steup, 13-26, Oxford: Blackwell.

!! (2005b). Reply to Hawthorne, Contemporary Debates in Epistemology, (eds.) E. Sosa & M.Steup, 43-6, Oxford: Blackwell.

Hawthorne, J. (2005). The Case for Closure, Contemporary Debates in Epistemology, (eds.) E. Sosa &M. Steup, 26-43, Oxford: Blackwell.

Jenkins, C. (2007). Entitlement and Rationality, Synthese157, 25-45.McDowell, J. (1995). Knowledge and the Internal, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research55, 877-

93.Moyal-Sharrock, D. (2004). Understanding Wittgensteins On Certainty, London: Macmillan.Nozick, R. (1981). Philosophical Explanations,Oxford: Oxford University Press.Peacocke, C. (2003). The Realm of Reason, Oxford: Oxford University Press.Pedersen, N. J. (2009). Entitlement, Value and Rationality, Synthese171, 443-57.Pritchard, D. H. (2003). McDowell on Reasons, Externalism and Scepticism,European Journal of

Philosophy11, 273-94.

!! (2005). Wittgensteins On Certaintyand Contemporary Anti-Scepticism, Investigating On

Certainty: Essays on Wittgensteins Last Work, (eds.) D. Moyal-Sharrock &W. H. Brenner,189-224, London: Palgrave Macmillan.

!! (2008). McDowellian Neo-Mooreanism, Disjunctivism: Perception, Action, Knowledge, (eds.) A.Haddock &F. Macpherson, 283-310, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

!! (2009a). Defusing Epistemic Relativism, Synthese166, 397-412.

!! (2009b). Wright ContraMcDowell on Perceptual Knowledge and Scepticism, Synthese171,467-79.

!! (2010a). Epistemic Relativism, Epistemic Incommensurability and WittgensteinianEpistemology, The Blackwell Companion to Relativism, (ed.) S. Hales, 266-85, Oxford:

Blackwell. (2010b). Relevant Alternatives and Perceptual Knowledge,Nos44, 245-68.

!! (2011a). Anti-Luck Virtue Epistemology,Journal of Philosophy108, ??-??

!! (2011b). Evidentialism, Internalism, Disjunctivism,Evidentialism and its Discontents, (ed.) T.Dougherty, 362-92, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

!! (2011c). Wittgensteinian Quasi-Fideism, Oxford Studies in the Philosophy of Religion4, 145-59.

!! (2011d). Wittgenstein on Scepticism, The Oxford Handbook on Wittgenstein, (eds.) O.Kuusela&M. McGinn, 521-47, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

!! (2012).Epistemological Disjunctivism, Oxford: Oxford University Press.!! (Forthcoming). Wittgenstein and the Groundlessness of Our Believing, Synthese.

Radford, C. (1966). Knowledge!

By Examples,Analysis27, 1-11.Strawson, P. F. (1985). Skepticism and Naturalism: Some Varieties, London: Methuen.Stroud, B. (1984). The Significance of Philosophical Scepticism, Oxford: Oxford University Press.


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Williamson, T. (2000). Knowledge and its Limits, Oxford: Oxford University Press.Williams, M. (1991). Unnatural Doubts: Epistemological Realism and the Basis of Scepticism, Oxford:

Blackwell.

!! (2007). Why (Wittgensteinian) Contextualism Is Not Relativism,Episteme4, 93-114.Wittgenstein, L. (1969). On Certainty[OC], (eds.) G. E. M. Anscombe &G. H. von Wright, (tr.) D.

Paul &G. E. M. Anscombe, Oxford: Blackwell.Wright, C. J. G. (2004). Warrant for Nothing (and Foundations for Free)?,Proceedings of theAristotelian Society(suppl. vol.), 78, 167-212.


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NOTES

1 This is essentially the formulation of the closure principle defended by Williamson (2000, 117) and Hawthorne

(2005, 29). This principle!or variants of it at any rate!has been denied of course, most notably by Dretske (1970;1971) and Nozick (1981), but I think it is safe to say that the option of denying it has never been a popular one. For arecent discussion of whether or not one can motivate the denial of this principle, see the exchange between Dretske

(2005a; 2005b) and Hawthorne (2005).2 Not to be confused with the different notions of epistemic entitlement defended by Burge (1993; 2003) andPeacocke (2003).3 I took this critical line with Wrights approach in Pritchard (2005b). In later work, however, such as Pritchard(2011d), I offer a more sympathetic reading which is in line with what I say here (and which I think more accuratelyreflects what Wright has in mind).4 Some have disputed this claim and argued that there isnt a clear epistemic advantage to holding these propositions,but we will be granting Wright this point for the purposes of this paper. For further discussion of this issue, see

Jenkins (2007) and Pedersen (2009).5 Note that my presentation of the entitlement strategy is different in at least one key respect from the standard waythat it is expressed. Proponents of this strategy typically claim to be denying a more specific principle than closureKRcalled the transmission principle, where this explicitly demands that the rational support that the agent has for believingthe entailing proposition should transmit across the competent deduction to be rational support for believing the

entailed proposition. Nothing is lost by focusing on closureKR, however, and since expressing the entitlement strategyin terms of this principle simplifies the discussion, I have elected to take this route here. For more on the transmissionprinciple, see the exchange between Wright (2004) and Davies (2004).6 One consequence of this, for Wright, is that we cant legitimately claimto possess the contested knowledge, eventhough on this view we do indeed possess it. See Wright (2004, 206).7 Even someone like Williamson, who holds that knowledge cannot be decomposed into belief plus a set of furtherconditions, holds that knowledge entails belief. See Williamson (2000, 1.5).8 Consider, for example, Radfords (1966) famous example of the diffident schoolboy who knows the answer to thequestion he is asked, but who, it is claimed, doesnt believe it because he doesnt think he knows it. Even if we grantthat there is knowledge in the absence of belief here (which is of course contentious), it remains that the schoolboy is

not at all agnostic about the truth of the target proposition!of all the options available, it is explicit to the examplethat he is inclined towards regarding a very specific answer as being the correct one. The point of the case is not thatthe schoolboy is agnostic about whether the answer he gives is correct, but rather that he doesnt have the kind of

rationally grounded confidence in this regard that we would usually associate with having knowledge. I am grateful toElia Zardini for pressing me on this point.9 As well see below, when radical sceptical error-possibilities are presented they raise complications that such localerror-possibilities dont raise. In particular, even ungrounded radical sceptical error-possibilities raise aprima faciechallenge to ones belief in the target proposition.10 See Pritchard (2010b, 5). This paper also includes a much more expansive discussion of the claim that the localclosure-based sceptical problem is illusory. See also Pritchard (2012, part 2).11 One dialectical possibility that I am setting to one side here is whether the rational support Zula has for her beliefthat zcould be factive, and hence such that it entails both zand not-cdm. If that were the case, then one might be ableto argue that Zula doesnt need to appeal to additional background evidence in order to appropriately rationallybelieve that not-cdm. Instead, all she needs to do is recognise that she is in possession of such factive rational supportand on this basis undertake the appropriate competent deduction. Clearly such a proposal is very controversial, and it

would certainly take us too far afield to consider it in detail here. I discuss the viability of such a proposal!often

identified with the work of McDowell (e.g., 1995)!

in Pritchard (2008; 2009b; 2011b; 2012; cf. Pritchard 2003).12 I say radically andfundamentally here to emphasise both the extentand the depthof the error involved.13 This is a point that Wittgenstein emphasises on a number of occasions. Consider, for example, this passage:

If my friend were to imagine one day that he had been living for a long time past in such and such a place, etc.etc., I should not call this a mistake, but rather a mental disturbance, perhaps a transient one.

Not every false belief of this sort is a mistake. (OC, 71-2; cf. OC, 54; 155-8)14 It is useful in this regard to compare Wittgensteins approach to the structure of reasons with the ordinary languageapproach to the sceptical problem exemplified in the work of someone like Austin (1961). On the surface, they are

very similar approaches, in that both parties emphasise how our ordinary practices of rational evaluation are essential lylocal, contrary to the very general kind of rational evaluation demanded by the radical sceptic. Where Wittgensteinstreatment departs from the ordinary language account is in his insistence that it is a truth of logic that all rationalevaluation is local. This is important because it closes off one type of sceptical counter-response to the ordinarylanguage treatment of scepticism which concedes that our ordinary practices do not licence fully general rational

evaluations of the sort the sceptic requires, but which argues nonetheless that a purified version of such ordinarypractices!where those practices are liberated from, for example, all practical constraints!wouldlicence the requiredgenerality of rational evaluation. (For more on this point, see Stroud 1984, ch. 2). If Wittgensteins account of hinge


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propositions is right, however, then even if ordinary practices were purged of all practical constraints, our system ofrational evaluation would still be essentially local. The seminal discussion of Wittgensteins account of hingepropositions in this regard is Williams (1991). For more discussion of the contrast between Wittgenstein and Austinsapproaches to the problem of radical scepticism, see Pritchard (2011d).15 One might worry that such a localized conception of rational evaluation would open the door to epistemic

relativism, such that people can have very different hinge commitments and hence radically different ways of rationallyevaluating beliefs. There are certainly passages in On Certaintywhich might thought to suggest that Wittgenstein waswilling to embrace this possibility (e.g., 611-12). And yet elsewhere in the text it seems clear that Wittgenstein seemsto have a conception of our hinge commitments such that there cant be a wide divergence in peoples hingecommitments (e.g., 96-99; 156; 440). I discuss this anti-relativistic reading of Wittgenstein on hinge propositionsin more detail in Pritchard (2010a; cf. Pritchard 2009a). See also Williams (2007). For a more developed discussion ofthe exegetical issues with regard to On Certaintywhich are raised in this section, see Pritchard (forthcoming). For adiscussion of how this interpretation of On Certainty bears on the specific issue of the epistemology of religious belief,see Pritchard (2011c).16 As Wittgenstein (OC, 88) puts it, they lie apart from the route taken by enquiry.17 Indeed, impressed by considerations like this one might be tempted to conclude that our hinge commitments can

neverbe understood in terms of a propositional attitude. Such a temptation might be reinforced by focussing on certainpassages in On Certaintywhere Wittgenstein emphases the animal (e.g., 359) nature of these commitments, suchthat they are more a way of acting (e.g., 204) rather than thinking. See especially Moyal-Sharrock (2004) for a goodexample of a view which takes this interpretative route, broadly conceived. I think it is a mistake to think of our hingecommitments in this way. For while they are certainly not beliefs, and while it is undeniable that they are visceral in a

way that other propositional mental pro-attitudes often arent, in agents who are suitably reflective and who have theright conceptual resources available to them it is hard to see why we shouldnt straightforwardly characterise thiscommitment in terms of a mental pro-attitude to a specific proposition. Indeed, the proof is in the pudding, for nowthat we have reflected on this matter isnt it clear that our most fundamental hinge commitment is to the ber hinge,

where this can manifestly be formulated in terms of a specific proposition? For more on this point, see Pritchard(forthcoming).18 I realize that there might be a residual resistance to this claim, for surely there must be a closure-type principle inthe vicinity that can be utilised to put the radical sceptical problem back in the running? While I can see thetemptation to go in this direction, it should be clear to see that its prospects are pretty dim. I take it the idea would beto weaken the epistemic standing at issue with regard to the belief in the consequent proposition. So, for example,instead of rationally grounded knowledge in the consequent proposition, how about the competent deduction in play

merely putting one in a position to having such knowledge? Now that we have a concrete proposal in play, however,the difficulty becomes obvious. For however we spell out the difference between knowledge and merely being in aposition to know, the considerations raised to block the sceptical implications of the closureKRprinciple will gain apurchase. Suppose, for example, that being in a position to know means roughly that if one did form a belief on thisbasis then it would amount to knowledge. But so construed this sister closure principle is no more threatened by theexistence of hinge commitments than the closureKRprinciple, since we have already seen that one cant form a beliefin a hinge proposition on any rational basis. What goes for the closureKRprinciple on this score also applies, mutatismutandis, to any analogous defence of the closureKprinciple. I am grateful to Dylan Dodd and Elia Zardini forpressing me on this issue. For more on the issue of how the closure principle (and related principles) is, once properlyformulated, not obviously in the service of the radical sceptic, see David &Warfield (2008).19 Notice that,paceStrawson (1985), the mere fact that one is bound to have these (anti-sceptical) hinge commitmentsdoes nothing in itself to remove the impetus towards radical scepticism. All this demonstrates is that one cannot in

practice be a sceptic, but there is a great deal of logical distance between this claim and the thesis that radical scepticism

is false (scepticism can be both true and unliveable, after all).20 An earlier version of this paper was presented at a workshop on entitlement at theNorthern Institute of Philosophyatthe University of Aberdeen in 2009, and elements of this paper have been presented at the Universities of Bologna,Edinburgh, Vienna, and Glasgow between 2010 and 2012. Thanks to David Bloor, Cameron Boult, Annalisa Coliva,Hans-Johan Glock, Peter Graham, Allan Hazlett, Jesper Kallestrup, Martin Kusch, Marie McGinn, Danile Moyal-Sharrock, Bob Plant, Raban Reichmann, Christopher Ranalli, Claudio Salvatore, Genia Schnbaumsfeld, Michael

Williams, and Crispin Wright for helpful discussion on related topics. Special thanks to Dylan Dodd, Allan Hazlett,Elia Zardini, and an anonymous reviewer for very detailed comments on an earlier version. This paper was written

while I was in receipt of a Phillip Leverhulme Prize.

entitlement paper final

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