Friday, April 16, 2021

Fiducialist Epistemology

In fiducialism, it is important for us to trust more and more. A reason that could be given for this (which is at least basically stated in this booklet) is that personal being itself is trust. Personal beings are persons experiencing, and all personal experience is a trusting of reality. It could be said that all that exists are personal beings experiencing, which is trust, and thus that all that exists is trust. I wouldn't tie being (the act of being, existence) down to one definition too readily, but we could say that at least from one angle, being is trust.

If we accept this idea, then in order to be, trust is always what comes first, and we only restrict trust in order to keep from being betrayed. In that case, to the extent that we have a choice, we should believe everything, unless there is a reason not to (a defeater). Believing a proposition is a form of trusting it, so all propositions should be believed by default. Defeaters, from a fiducialist point of view, are things which inhibit trust. Trust can be inhibited by betrayal, dulling, quenching, or "easing", or perhaps other mechanisms. The rule could be "don't believe things that lead to betrayal, dulling, quenching, or 'easing', or other inhibitors of trust." Also, don't believe things that inhibit other people's trust, even if they are a form of you trusting, since their trust matters as well.

This could be (at least the beginnings of) a basic fiducialist epistemology. Actually applying this theory would take more thought than is given here, but at least we can see this as biasing us toward trusting, in our practical epistemology.

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