According to the regress argument, any proposition requires a justification. However, any justification itself requires support. This means that any proposition whatsoever can be infinitely questioned.

N (Regress) → C → B → A

Chisholm, as an internalist and a foundationalist, claims that there are some foundational propositions that are self-justified.

C (Foundation) → B → A

The foundation provides a stopping place for a chain of justification which is non-inferentially justified. Upon this foundation is built a superstructure which is consisted of inferentially justified beliefs.

Self-justified statements can be statements about one’s beliefs “I believe that Socrates is mortal” or statements about our own psychological states such as thinking, desiring, wondering, loving, hating “I think I remember”, “I seem to remember”, “I do believe that Socrates is mortal”, “I am hungry”.

Another type of self-justifying statements relates to ways in which we are “appeared to”. For instance, the statement “I am appeared to bluely” is self-justified. I am not saying that it is blue. It is just the nature of my own experience which indicates my subjective mental state. That is why the statement is used in adverbial mode and passive voice. So we do not need other propositions to support my statement.

To conclude, Chisholm argues that there are some sort of foundational beliefs that are self-justified and cannot be attacked. There are no way to object them.

Arguments against foundationalism

Opponents judge that foundationalism accepts some beliefs as true for no reasons, that is epistemically arbitrary beliefs. Stopping the regress with one’s sense of experience is arbitrary, as there are scenarios in which this experience is misleading.

Coherentism is an alternative solution for the regress problem. It denies the 2-tiered structure and affirms that all propositions are inferently justified. The argument is circular.

← C → B → A ←
→ → → → → →

Infinitism argues that the chain can go on forever, so we need to stop somewhere like a guess. We don’t have a special epistemic category.

D → [C] → B → A

Another argument against foundationalism is based on a pseudo question. It is not a legitimate question “What is the nature of justification we have?” since foundationalist presupposes that the belief is justified. So, the question should never arrive.

Finaly, scepticism states that there is no justification for the proposition at all.

Bibliography:

  • Roderick M. Chisholm, The Foundations of Knowing, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1982.