Abstract

How should we understand good philosophical inquiry? Ernest Sosa has argued that the key to answering this question lies with virtue-based epistemology. According to virtue-based epistemology, competences are prior to epistemic justification. Virtue epistemology is well positioned to explain why, in forming false philosophical beliefs, agents are often less rational than it is possible to be. False philosophical beliefs are often unjustified—and the agent is thereby less rational for having them—precisely because these beliefs could not be formed by exercising competences. But standard virtue epistemology fails to explain cases where agents fall short by _failing_ to believe philosophical truths. This chapter argues that Timothy Williamson’s recent critique of the a priori/a posteriori distinction falls prey to similar problem cases. A proposition might be a priori justified if and only if, even without any special confirming experiences, agents fall short by failing to have this type of belief. The chapter concludes that there are types of beliefs that are deeply a priori justified for any agent, regardless of what epistemic competences the agent has. However, it also points out that this view has a problem of its own: it appears to make the acquisition of a priori knowledge too easy. The chapter ends by suggesting that a move back towards virtue-based epistemology is necessary. But in order for this move to be effective, epistemic competences will have to be understood very differently than in the reliabilist tradition.