Truth and Skepticism

Robert Almeder was professor of philosophy at Georgia State University until his retirement in 2005. He is the former editor of The American Philosophical Quarterly and has served on the editorial boards of numerous scholarly journals.

Few philosophers have thought as long and as hard about the issues of the truth and our knowledge of it as Robert Almeder. And as so often in philosophy, they way to insight proceeds most smoothly along the path of criticism. By critiquing virtually all of the influential present-day opponents of his views, Almder manages to provide a firm footing for his own persuasive and eminently instructive position.

• PrefacePart 1: Rejecting Correspondence and All Non-Epistemic Theories of TruthChapter 1: IntroductionChapter 2: Minimal Requirements for an Adequate Theory of TruthChapter 3: Justification for Non-Vacuity and Reliability PrinciplesChapter 4: The Core of Correspondence and Other Non-Epistemic Theories of TruthChapter 5: The Main Argument Against Correspondence and Other Non-Epistemic Theories of TruthChapter 6: How the Main Argument Differs From Other Similar ArgumentsChapter 7: Forestalling Three Predictable Objections to the Main ArgumentChapter 8: Does the Main Argument ConfuseChapter 9: Does the Main Argument Require Abandoning Truth as a Goal?Chapter 10: An Objection from Common SenseChapter 11: The Objection from the Paradox of AnalysisChapter 12: A Proposed Reduction of the Main ArgumentPart 2: In Defense of the Epistemic Theory of TruthChapter 1: Preliminary Objections to the Epistemic Theory of TruthChapter 2: Other Objections to the Epistemic Theory of TruthChapter 3: ConclusionPart 3: Defeating SkepticismChapter 1: IntroductionChapter 2: The Moral of the Above TaxonomyChapter 3: Self-Defeating Skepticisms and the Strength of Global Weak SkepticismChapter 4: The Canonical Argument for Global Weak Skepticism and the Contextualist ResponseChapter 5: Other Critiques of ContextualismChapter 6: The Asymmetry Objection to the Argument from IgnoranceChapter 7: Global Weak Skepticism as an Inference to the Best ExplanationChapter 8: Is the Global Skepticism here Refuted Implied by the Main Argument?Part 4:ConclusionsChapter 1: The Main Problem and Future ProspectsChapter 2: Blind realism and the Non-Vacuity ObjectionChapter 3: Does Blind Realism Presuppose Non-Epistemic Truth?Chapter 4: The Fitch ObjectionBibliographyIndex