Rationalization, Evidence, and Pretense

Abstract

In this paper I distinguish the category of “rationalization” from various forms of epistemic irrationality. I maintain that only if we model rationalizers as pretenders can we make sense of the rationalizer's distinctive relationship to the evidence in her possession. I contrast the cognitive attitude of the rationalizer with that of believers whose relationship to the evidence I describe as “waffling” or “intransigent”. In the final section of the paper, I compare the rationalizer to the Frankfurtian bullshitter.

Motivated Reasoning and Research Ethics Guidelines

“…In epistemology, such reasoners are described as 'motivationally biased doxastic deliberators'. 7 These are individuals who are deliberating about what to believe is true, yet who have clear biases in one direction or another, perhaps because they want to believe certain fictions about themselves, such that a particular decision is based on an altruistic intention and not a self-serving one. Self-deception occurs when an agent encounters evidence that a proposition is true, but the agent's desire that the proposition be false leads them to unevenly evaluate the evidence so as to arrive at their desired belief.…”

Confabulating Reasons

“…On one possible reading of the standard view, confabulations are there to provide the reasons for which we made a choice 3 Confabulations of this kind are very similar to rationalizations (Audi 1985;D'Cruz 2015; Schwitzgebel and Jonathan 2017), although later I will argue that confabulations are not merely forms of rationalization. 4 This tripartite way of classifying reasons is widely used in the metaethical literature on reasons for action, but also transferable to mental attitudes more generally.…”

Post hoc ergo propter hoc: some benefits of rationalization

“…If we are to take rationalization seriously, though, we won't get much guidance from philosophical literature, which has very little explicit discussion of what rationalization is (Audi 1985;D'Cruz 2015aD'Cruz , 2015bGreenspan 2015;Kornblith 1999;Schwitzgebel and Ellis 2017). 6 Nevertheless, I have elsewhere argued that the following is a good general account of rationalization:…”

“…For example, a narrower account of rationalization would hold that the offered explanations are those that the rationalizer also wants to be true. The justifications in such cases of so-called motivated reasoning are guided by the rationalizer's wanting something to be true (D'Cruz 2015a(D'Cruz , 2015bSchwitzgebel and Ellis 2017).…”