4/13 -- Applying James' Pragmatism to the Problem of Other Minds and Cartesian Skepticism
William James, in The Will to Believe, thinks that if the truth of a proposition cannot be decided by epistemic means alone, then we should decide based on our passions. What do we mean by a proposition that cannot be decided by epistemic means alone? Consider the possibility that I am a brain in a vat. Epistemically, I cannot prove or disprove the case, and no evidence can be found such that epistemic needle moves in either direction (of believing that I am a real person, or that I am a brain in a vat). But pragmatically, I might come to some conclusions about the possibility that I am a brain in a vat -- namely, the conclusion that I am not a brain in a vat. I don't act in a way such that others don't exist, or that the external world is just simulated. In fact, I have real goals that I pursue, which mimic what would happen if I were to live in the real world, rather than one that is simulated. Can pragmatic considerations alter epistemic commitments? The evide...