Intemalist and Extemalist Foundationalism

The traditional debate over skepticism has largely presupposed the framework of foundationalism. With the rise of the intemalism/externalism debate in epistemology, however, it is apparent that there are radically different ways to understand foundational justification. In this chapter we begin by examining the traditional epistemic regress argument for foundationalism. Before presenting what I take to be the most important traditional conception of foundational justification, I examine the internalism/externalism controversy, or more appropriately, controversies, so that we may better understand the sense in which traditional foundational ism is (and is not) committed to internalism. This paves the way for a detailed examination in the next chapter of paradigm externalist versions of foundationalism. Having distinguished importantly different senses in which views about justification may be internalist or externalist, I examine in some detail what I take to be the most plausible traditional account of foundationalism, an account that is standardly regarded as internalist. As we shan see, however, one must be very careful to distinguish the senses in which this view is and is not committed to internalism. I conclude by distinguishing a conceptual from an epistemic regress argument for foundationalism.