Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2008. / Title from title screen (site viewed Nov. 20, 2008). PDF text: viii, 198 p. ; 2 Mb. UMI publication number: AAT 3315204. Includes bibliographical references. Also available in microfilm and microfiche formats.

I develop and argue for a version of epistemic contextualism - the view that the truth-values of ‘knowledge’ ascriptions depend upon and vary with the context in which they are uttered - that emphasises the roles played by both the practical interests of those in the context and the epistemic practices of the community of which they are part in determining the truth-values of their ‘knowledge’ ascriptions (the ‘basic contextualist thesis’). My favoured way of putting it is that the truth of a ‘knowledge’ ascription of the form ‘S knows that p’ requires that the subject of the ascription can rule out the relevant alternatives in which not-p, where the relevant alternatives are the ones that those in the ascriber’s context have a reason to consider. What alternatives those in the context have a reason to consider depends on their practical situation and on what alternatives are generally considered relevant within their community. I call this ‘interests contextualism’. The thesis splits into three parts. First, I deal with what I call ‘linguistic objections’, which purport to show that there’s no linguistic evidence that the expression ‘knows’ is context-sensitive (Hawthorne 2004; Stanley 2005a), and objections concerning the way ‘knows’ behaves in intra- and inter-contextual disagreement reports (Cappelen & Hawthorne 2009; MacFarlane 2005). I argue that there are a number of ways in which contextualists can deal with these objections. Consequently, they provide no reason to reject contextualism. Second, there are a number of ways of going beyond the basic contextualist thesis, and I argue that the best way is along the lines indicated above, viz. interests contextualism. In the process I articulate a number of desiderata for a contextualist account of the features of context that are responsible for contextual variation in the truth-values of ‘knowledge’ ascriptions. I argue that, unlike its main rival - which I call ‘conversational contextualism’ (Blome-Tillmann 2009a; Cohen 1999; DeRose 2009; Lewis 1996) - interests contextualism can satisfy all of the desiderata. Consequently, interests contextualism is preferable to conversational contextualism. Third, I argue that there is good reason to prefer interests contextualism to its noncontextualist rivals, strict invariantism (Brown 2006; Hazlett 2009; Pritchard 2010; Rysiew 2001), sensitive invariantism (Fantl & McGrath 2009; Hawthorne 2004; Stanley 2005a) and relativism (MacFarlane 2005; Richard 2004). The objections dealt with in the first part are meant to provide the main reason to prefer a sort of relativism to interests contextualism. Consequently, the upshot of the first part is that relativism is off the table. The considerations that tell in favour of interests contextualism and against sensitive invariantism are of two types. First, I argue that interests contextualism can deal with a wider range of cases than sensitive invariantism. Second, I argue that the influential account of the function of ‘knowledge’ ascriptions developed in Edward Craig (1990) tells against sensitive invariantism and in favour of interests contextualism. I also argue that the second consideration tells against strict invariantism as much as sensitive invariantism. Consequently, I conclude that interests contextualism is preferable to all of its rivals.

A widely discussed philosophical puzzle in contemporary epistemology is the so-called sceptical paradox. Ascriber contextualism has taken centre stage as the anti-sceptical theory that purportedly offers the best solution to the sceptical paradox. Ascriber contextualists Stewart Cohen (1988, 1999) and Keith DeRose (1995) advertise their anti-sceptical theory as the one that exclusively explains and solves it. This is false advertising, however. My thesis, which has been greatly influenced by the critical work of Michael Williams (1991) and Duncan Pritchard (2005), is that the generation of the sceptical paradox depends on whether the epistemologist is an internalist or externalist about knowledge, and that the ascriber contextualist attempt to solve the sceptical paradox rests on a long history of mistakes concerning internalist assumptions made by externalists Fred Dretske (1970) and Robert Nozick (1981). By applying the semantic thesis of ascriber contextualism to epistemology, ascriber contextualists seek to emend the rejection of the closure principle made by these externalists. This rejection came from these externalists mistakenly making internalist assumptions when facing sceptical hypotheses. Unfortunately, ascriber contextualists leave much unfixed, and end up inheriting and suffering from the serious mistake about internalist assumptions that had plagued the epistemologies of these externalists and now infects the ascriber contextualist solution to the sceptical paradox. With the help of hindsight to examine this history and an appreciation of how the adoption of one of these respective views about knowledge makes all the difference for whether the sceptical paradox arises, we come to see that the contextualist solution to the sceptical paradox is unnecessary.

A widely discussed philosophical puzzle in contemporary epistemology is the so-called sceptical paradox. Ascriber contextualism has taken centre stage as the anti-sceptical theory that purportedly offers the best solution to the sceptical paradox. Ascriber contextualists Stewart Cohen (1988, 1999) and Keith DeRose (1995) advertise their anti-sceptical theory as the one that exclusively explains and solves it. This is false advertising, however. My thesis, which has been greatly influenced by the critical work of Michael Williams (1991) and Duncan Pritchard (2005), is that the generation of the sceptical paradox depends on whether the epistemologist is an internalist or externalist about knowledge, and that the ascriber contextualist attempt to solve the sceptical paradox rests on a long history of mistakes concerning internalist assumptions made by externalists Fred Dretske (1970) and Robert Nozick (1981). By applying the semantic thesis of ascriber contextualism to epistemology, ascriber contextualists seek to emend the rejection of the closure principle made by these externalists. This rejection came from these externalists mistakenly making internalist assumptions when facing sceptical hypotheses. Unfortunately, ascriber contextualists leave much unfixed, and end up inheriting and suffering from the serious mistake about internalist assumptions that had plagued the epistemologies of these externalists and now infects the ascriber contextualist solution to the sceptical paradox. With the help of hindsight to examine this history and an appreciation of how the adoption of one of these respective views about knowledge makes all the difference for whether the sceptical paradox arises, we come to see that the contextualist solution to the sceptical paradox is unnecessary.

Towards developing an applied behavioral technology that treats altruism as the dependent variable of interest, there is a necessity for understanding the contextual conditions under which altruistic behavior is most likely to occur. The purpose of the study was to evaluate how relative contextual conditions affected social discounting. Thirty-six participants were given three social discounting surveys, each survey preceded by a different contextual scenario. In each scenario, either the participant, a hypothetical other, or both the participant and the hypothetical other were in need of money to avoid a negative outcome. The results suggest that there was a significant difference in social discounting across the three contextual conditions F (2, 35) = 34.28., p < 0.0001), where the greatest discounting occurred when participants were exclusively in need. Hyperbolic functions provided a strong fit for each of the conditions (R² = 0.98, R² = 0.98, R² = 0.84, respectively), and the relationships between participant scores in each of the condition was evaluated.

In this paper I pair a contextualist theory of knowledge ascriptions with a non-contextual definition of knowledge, specifically the principle that knowledge is infallible belief. This combination is unusual because proponents of contextualism, understood as a semantic thesis, either do not engage epistemology or suggest that the criteria for knowledge are also context sensitive. In order to sustain the pairing that I suggest, the truth conditions of a knowledge ascription must be distinct from the criteria for knowledge. I believe that this distinction is important and fruitful for two reasons: 1) the distinction allows us to preserve both the principle that knowledge is infallible belief and the conviction that we know a lot; 2) the distinction explains the paradox that certain skeptical arguments are not obviously unsound even though their conclusion does seem absurd. Since I uphold a definition of knowledge that is not context sensitive, my treatment of skepticism is unlike prominent contextualist treatments. / Master of Arts

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Youth unemployment is a critical issue in Southern Africa, exacerbating poverty, crime, violence, food insecurity, and rural-urban migration. In Botswana, the Young Farmers Fund (YFF) was established to cultivate youth entrepreneurship in agriculture to mitigate these issues. The aim of this research is to explore and explain the experiences, circumstances and knowledge of youth participants and assess the extent to which the program succeeds as a development strategy. To do so, the research establishes a conceptual framework investigating how contextual and individual variables influence the outcomes of participants’ projects. Interviews with program participants and key informants and review of relevant literature expose critical themes. These are examined through content analysis and inform research conclusions. Findings reveal why the program is facing a number of challenges. The research is thus valuable for informing policy and program (re)development and affirms the value and adaptability of the conceptual framework across multiple development contexts. / SSHRC

This thesis explores the merits and limits of John Hawthorne’s contextualist analysis of free will. First, I argue that contextualism does better at capturing the ordinary understanding of ‘free will’ than competing views because it best accounts for the way in which our willingness to attribute free will ordinarily varies with context. Then I consider whether this is enough to conclude that the contextualist has won the free will debate. I argue that this would be hasty, because the contextualist, unlike her competitors, cannot tell us whether any particular agent is definitively free, and therefore cannot inform any practices that are premised on whether a particular agent is morally responsible. As such, I argue that whether the contextualist “wins the free will debate” depends on whether it is more important to capture the ordinary understanding of ‘free will’ or more important to inform our practices of ascribing moral responsibility.

Title from title page of PDF (University of Missouri--St. Louis, viewed February 17, 2010). Includes bibliographical references (p. 32-33).