This article considers the question whether belief ascriptions exhibit context dependence. I first distinguish two potential forms of context dependence in belief ascription. Propositional context dependence (PCD) concerns what the subject believes, whereas attitudinal context dependence (ACD) concerns what it is to believe a proposition. I then discuss three potential sources of PCD and two po...

How much should your confidence in your beliefs be shaken when you learn that others – perhaps ‘epistemic peers’ who seem as well-qualified as you are – hold beliefs contrary to yours? This article describes motivations that push different philosophers towards opposite answers to this question. It identifies a key theoretical principle that divides current writers on the epistemology of disagre...

Differences among people in the actions they take or the opinions they express do not always reflect differences in underlying attitudes, preferences, or motivations. When people differ in the extent to which they are psychologically licensed (i.e., feel able to act without discrediting themselves), they will act differently despite having similar attitudes, preferences, and motivations. Wantin...

This article is an attempt at analysing several aspects of Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove from a point of view which includes concepts of both narratology and post-structuralist analysis. I study the level of the fábula and the characters (at the level of the story) in order to prove the existence in the film of a tendency to discard its apparently satiric aim and privilege a logic of spectacle. The...

Moral conflicts pose a serious challenge to the field of conflict resolution. When they turn destructive, they can pull thoughts, feelings, and actions toward a narrow, negative state that becomes self-organizing and self-perpetuating, thus trapping the dynamics of the conflict. On the other hand, constructive conflict dynamics over difficult issues are thought to be characterized by more compl...

How can one verify the accuracy of recorded information (e.g., information found in books, newspapers, and on Web sites)? In this paper, I argue that work in the epistemology of testimony (especially that of philosophers David Hume and Alvin Goldman) can help with this important practical problem in library and information science. This work suggests that there are four important areas to consi...