Testimonial Justice and the Voluntarism Problem: the virtue of just acceptance

Ben Kotzee, Kunimasa Sato*

*Corresponding author for this work

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    Abstract

    This paper examines the ‘voluntarism’ challenge for achieving testimonial justice and advocates the virtue of just acceptance of testimony as the right target for efforts to alleviate testimonial injustice. First, we review the credibility deficit case of interpersonal testimonial injustice and explain how the doxastic voluntarism problem poses a challenge to redressing such testimonial injustice. Specifically, the voluntarism problem seems to rule out straightforward control over what and whom people believe; thus, the solution to the problem of testimonial injustice cannot lie in voluntarily self-correcting unjust credibility judgements and replacing them with just testimonial beliefs. Second, we identify three distinctive characteristics of acceptance of testimony, as distinct from belief, and argue that, while it might be difficult to form credibility judgements completely voluntarily, it is easier to control one’s attitude of acceptance towards a speaker’s testimony. We hold that shifting focus from testimonial belief to acceptance can overcome the problem of (synchronic) involuntarism about testimonial belief. Third, we articulate a vision of a virtue of just acceptance of testimony that can move a hearer to collect the right evidence to reliably find the answer to whether a speaker’s testimony is true. Finally, we demonstrate that encouraging people to take a virtuous attitude of just acceptance towards a speaker’s testimony forms the basis of a remedial vision of education that can play a distinctive role in fostering the virtue of just acceptance aimed at testimonial justice.
    Original languageEnglish
    Article numberqhad063
    JournalJournal of Philosophy of Education
    Early online date9 Oct 2023
    DOIs
    Publication statusE-pub ahead of print - 9 Oct 2023

    Bibliographical note

    Funding:
    Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (19K12926 and 23K00004).

    Keywords

    • doxastic voluntarism
    • testimonial injustice
    • testimonial belief formation
    • epistemic acceptance
    • the virtue of just acceptance

    Fingerprint

    Dive into the research topics of 'Testimonial Justice and the Voluntarism Problem: the virtue of just acceptance'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

    Cite this