Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Date of Degree

2-2026

Document Type

Doctoral Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Program

Philosophy

Advisor

Muhammad Ali Khalidi

Committee Members

Stephen Hetherington

Graham Priest

Lisa Warenski

Subject Categories

Epistemology | Metaphysics

Keywords

structure of knowledge, truth-conducive justification, virtuous epistemic regress

Abstract

This dissertation develops a new kind of theory of knowledge, which I call Systems Epistemology (SE). Currently available theories tend to follow the TB+ format according to which knowledge is a true belief plus certain additional properties. Insofar as these theories offer a conceptual gap between the additional properties and truth, however, they are vulnerable to intuitive counterexamples. Building on work by Richard Foley and Stephen Hetherington, SE focuses not on a target belief and the properties it must have to count as knowledge, but rather on the beliefs that surround it and hold it in place. This shift in focus, further, makes SE immune to the usual counterexamples.

SE’s core claim is that S knows that p just in case S’s true belief that p is embedded in a system of true beliefs (STB). Though the claim appears facially similar to old TB+ theories, its structure is different in at least two key respects. First, the property of being embedded in an STB does not depend on characteristics of the target belief. It depends, instead, on features of its doxastic neighborhood, which must amount to an STB. Second, while this property is distinct from the target belief’s truth, it emerges from a truth requirement because, as long as beliefs are interconnected, their being true entails their systematic organization. SE thus offers no conceptual gap separating the additional property and truth. While more than true belief is needed for knowledge, the additional requirement depends squarely on truth—the truth of other beliefs.

The dissertation develops SE’s key terms and applies it to the regress problem. In the first chapter, I explain what an STB looks like and argue that the structure of an STB must match the structure of the system of facts it corresponds with. This goes against the widespread notion that the structure of knowledge is inferential. So I explain why, while inference links some beliefs to each other, it cannot underlie the structure that characterizes bodies of knowledge. In the second chapter, I show that embedment amounts to the kind of justification that exists in our heads regardless of whether the believer has been called on to justify a belief. I argue that taking justification as embedment is more explanatorily powerful than either foundationalism or coherentism. Its key advantages are that it rests on fit with truths, not merely with other beliefs, and that it attaches directly to individual beliefs within a system of beliefs. That is, it need not be transmitted from a foundation or from the system. Finally, chapter 3 applies SE to the regress problem. We endeavor to stop regress because we think that this stopping point is the source of justification for all of our beliefs. Embedment, however, does not have a source. It emerges, rather, when a set of beliefs amounts to an STB, and it attaches directly to the target belief without having to be transmitted from somewhere else. If justification does not have a source, as I argue, then it makes little sense to go looking for one. In other words, there is no need or incentive to stop regress.

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