ABSTRACTS - PANEL 6
RESUMOS - PAINEL 6

Believing in others. Phenomenology and epistemology of testimony

Federico Boccaccini

University of Brasília

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Why should we believe in science? Why should we believe in history? Why should we believe in religion? Much of our knowledge is based on indirect experience. This means that we believe P not because we have had some form of direct knowledge of P but rather because an external authority tells us that P is true. We believe that P because we recognize the authority of this indirect source and base our beliefs on experience of others. Much of what we believe in our lives is based on books written by other people or on their experience or report to whom we acknowledge the role of reliable testimony. In fact, much of what we believe is justified (or we claim to justify it) on what others tell us. Religious and historical knowledge are such examples. But even medical knowledge, which used to be based on the third-person perspective, seems today to be reduced to a matter of opinion that can be accepted or rejected as any opinion – oddly many people today wonder why we should believe in medical science. 
How does our testimony-based belief work? Why do we believe in the second-person epistemological authority? And what arguments are used against that authority? Starting from Reid's testimonial fundamentalism and his remarks on veracity and credulity, my paper will first explore the phenomenological (or psychological) basis of second-person experience as the basis of some our beliefs (why to believe in other people?), then survey arguments related to the epistemological implications of a belief based on another person's testimony (how do you know your/their experience is true?).

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Meeting the Second Person

André Leclerc

University of Brasília

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How can I know that I am interacting with another person and not with a technologically advanced automaton? Descartes’ test is still interesting for us, but I believe it is incomplete. A res extensa would be, also, a res cogitans if it/she can answer appropriately to the sense of the words used in an infinite variety of contexts. An automaton cannot do that; it is “morally impossible”, Descartes says. All right. Sooner or later, the machine will “betray itself” and say something silly. But what happens in the case of a real person? Real people too speak nonsense, but we do not conclude that they are machines!  So, how do we meet our fellows? How do we get genuine intersubjectivity? Language is still important, but meanings do not travel on sound waves. We do not hear meanings. What we hear is a human voice. I will describe what I believe to be the mechanism of human communication and explore the role of spontaneous linguistic understanding  as a key in the constitution of intersubjectivity. 

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A segunda pessoa e as condições para a responsabilidade moral

Beatriz Sorrentino Marques

Federal University of Mato Grosso

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As condições para a que um agente seja moralmente responsável por sua ação suscitam preocupações epistêmicas, como, por exemplo, se o agente precisa saber o que faz e se ele precisa saber o significado moral do que faz para ser responsável. Veremos que essas preocupações epistêmicas estão presentes em teorias com enfoque na perspectiva de segunda-pessoa. A preocupação com se o agente sabe o que faz é menos controversa, já a preocupação com se ele sabe o significado moral da ação veremos que gera respostas diferentes, de acordo com cada teoria. Além disso, é importante examinar se alguma preocupação epistêmica constitui uma condição independente de outras condições sobre a produção da ação para ser moralmente responsável, ou se as preocupações epistêmicas já são endereçadas pelas condições sobre a produção da ação. A independência é defendida por Mele, com quem concordamos a esse respeito.

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Palavras-chave: segunda-pessoa, responsabilidade moral, condição epistêmica

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