Reasons for Asking

Why ask? In this dissertation, I use asking to refer to the event in which an agent engages in inquiry by opening a question for investigation. Drawing on insights from action theory, I approach the why-question in terms of reasons. I argue that existing work in the epistemology of inquiry has placed too much normative weight on aims such as truth or knowledge, which cannot by themselves explain how inquiry is instantiated. Instead, I show that the reasons for asking lie in two components: inquiring attitudes, such as wonder and curiosity, and the contents of those attitudes, namely the questions themselves.

Current debates in the epistemology of inquiry focus on identifying the norms that govern inquiry, asking what makes inquiry genuine, appropriate, or rational. In much of this work, these norms are framed in terms of aims such as truth, knowledge, or understanding. My dissertation takes a step back from these debates to ask about the source of normativity in inquiry. Much as in action, I take the reasons for asking to explain and justify inquiry, and they are what exert normative force. If reasons are to play this role, we must ask what gives them their normative force in the first place. In answering this question, I aim to provide an answer to the central question this dissertation aims to answer. That is, why ask in the first place? I test three candidates in turn: aims, attitudes, and contents. I show what work each can and cannot do if taken as a reason for asking.

I begin with the aims of inquiry. In the literature, aims are made to carry much of the normative weight: norms are defined through them and the structure of rationality is assumed to rest on them. In effect, the aims of inquiry are treated as the reasons that justify why one asks. This parallels consequentialist views in ethics, where the justification of an action depends on its outcomes. Although appealing, this approach faces challenges. I offer a version of Meno’s Paradox of Inquiry to illustrate these challenges. The key premises of the paradox can be stated as: (a) if one does not know, inquiry is impossible; (b)  if one already knows, inquiry is unnecessary. In conjunction, these premises imply that inquiry is impossible. Recasted in normative terms, however, they yield two independent challenges to aims-based accounts: one concerning the initiation of inquiry, and the other concerning its termination, respectively. The aims of inquiry may describe what inquiry seeks, but they cannot be reasons for asking.

I next turn to inquiring attitudes, which underlie familiar phenomena like curiosity, wonder, and the felt tension of not yet knowing. My discussion of these attitudes can be situated in parallel with causal-psychological accounts in action theory, such as Davidson’s treatment of reasons as belief–desire pairs and Setiya’s account of reasons as desire-like beliefs. On these views, reasons are psychological states that are taken to motivate and explain, and in some accounts justify, an action. In a similar way, inquiring attitudes can serve as reasons for asking: they motivate inquiry, explain why an agent asks in a particular case, and, in the right context, can justify asking. Still, an inquiring attitude cannot, by itself, instantiate an asking; a question is needed to fix its content and direction.

This leads to the contents of inquiring attitudes. When one asks, the content is a question, and it has three functions. First, it determines the satisfaction condition of inquiry: what would count as an adequate answer. Second, it structures how the inquiry should proceed by fixing what kinds of answers or evidence are relevant, and by ruling out lines of investigation that fall outside the scope of the question. Third, it bears on the appropriateness of asking itself. A question can be inappropriate because it is irrelevant, because it is ill-posed, or because it violates the social norms that govern what it is permissible to ask in a given context. In these ways, content provides the normative structure that attitudes alone cannot supply.

In conclusion, I argue that the reasons for asking consist in both inquiring attitudes and their contents. Attitudes move an agent to inquire, while contents supply the normative structure that directs and constrains this activity. Together, they motivate, explain, and justify why an agent asks.

A paper on Meno's Paradox

This paper reinterprets Meno’s Paradox as raising challenges about when and why inquiry is justified. It explores structural tensions in how inquiry starts and ends, questioning the role of epistemic aims in justifying inquiry.

A paper on Non-human Doxastic Wronging (w/ Nick Cisneros)

This paper explores how moral considerations about belief might extend beyond humans. It examines whether certain beliefs about animals could be morally problematic in ways similar to beliefs that wrong people. 

What Justifies Asking?

Agency in Asking