Is Thinking a Matter of Knowing?

Abstract

Are possession conditions of concepts epistemologically constrained? Although intuition strongly recommends a very close link between possession conditions of concepts and certain kinds of knowledge (mainly, knowledge of the content of the relevant concepts), naturalizing trends in philosophy —such as the one defended by Jerry Fodor— bring with it a view according to which what concepts someone has is conceptually and metaphysically independent of what epistemic capacities she has. In the present paper I shall argue that, as an analysis of Pryor’s dogmatism can show, theories of epistemic warrant generally provide independent support to the intuitive conception of possession conditions as epistemologically constrained. Naturalizing approaches to concepts are then well advised to avoid epistemologically free possession conditions.