Resumen de Voluntary Belief on a Strictly Epistemic Basis?
This paper discusses a recent proposal by Philip Nickel [2010], according to which we believe voluntarily— in cases of non-conclusive but adequate evidence—when the conditions of reason-responsiveness, alternative possibilities and self-expression are satisfied. I counter-argue, on the one hand, that Nickel’s argument unjustifiedly conflates two different issues—the rationality of belief and the voluntariness of belief—of a quite distinct nature. Moreover, Nickel’s interpretation of these cases is ad hoc, insofar as he assigns a role to epistemic character only for that kind of cases. Instead, I propose an alternative integrated explanation for those cases in the context of a general account of belief, which I sketch, which denies the possibility of voluntary belief of any sort.
