The Reliability of Reason:What the Skeptics Point Out
Skepticism about the compatibility of naturalism and reason reliable at producing true beliefs has taken a number of forms. Some skeptics attack the reliability of all aspects of reason, while others focus on particular human cognitive faculties that are components of reason. I focus in this article on the foundation of that combined philosophical challenge. It consists of the assertion that naturalism considers the objective conditional probability that humans have reliable cognitive faculties to be low or inscrutable. Methodological naturalism demanding justification for beliefs that is truth indicative overcomes the skeptics’ arguments. However, the required analysis of those arguments reveals important aspects of assessing human cognitive faculties that naturalist epistemology must ensure are elucidated sufficiently and rigorously incorporated into its explanation of the capability and reliability of those faculties at producing truth.