A eudaimonist approach to the problem of significance

Acta Analytica 25 (2):215-241 (2010)
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Abstract

Some beliefs seem more significant than others. This paper suggests an approach to explaining this apparent fact. As there are multiple senses in which one belief may be more significant than another, multiple possible sources of such significance, and, moreover, no prima facie reason to expect a single, unified account under which all these senses and sources can be subsumed, I propose the modest approach of articulating just one feature in virtue of which a belief may fairly be called significant: that of bearing a certain relation to human flourishing, a relation that more trivial truths do not bear. From such modest projects can a complete solution to the problem (or, more accurately, problems) of significance emerge.

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Anne Baril
Washington University in St. Louis

Citations of this work

Understanding and Structure.Allan Hazlett - 2017 - In Stephen R. Grimm (ed.), Making Sense of the World: New Essays on the Philosophy of Understanding. New York, NY, United States of America: Oxford University Press.
Expressivism and Convention-Relativism about Epistemic Discourse.Allan Hazlett - forthcoming - In A. Fairweather & O. Flanagan (eds.), Naturalizing Epistemic Virtue. Cambridge University Press.
The value of common knowledge.Allan Hazlett - 2022 - Synthese 200 (1):1-18.

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References found in this work

Knowledge in a social world.Alvin I. Goldman - 1991 - New York: Oxford University Press.
A virtue epistemology.Ernest Sosa - 2007 - New York: Oxford University Press.
Science, truth, and democracy.Philip Kitcher - 2001 - New York: Oxford University Press.
Internal and External Reasons.Bernard Williams - 1979 - In Ross Harrison (ed.), Rational action: studies in philosophy and social science. New York: Cambridge University Press. pp. 101-113.

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