“Success is better than failure; an attempt is a better attempt, it is better as an attempt, if competent than if incompetent; and it is better to succeed through competence - aptly - than through sheer luck.” IfsSucceedLuckSheerCompetenceCompetentIncompetent Author:Ernest Sosa
“Attempts are found in domains of human performance, such as sports, games, artistic domains, professional domains like medicine and the law, and so on. These feature distinctive aims, and corresponding competences. Archery, with its distinctive arrows and targets, divides into subdomains. Thus, competitive archery differs importantly from archery hunting.” HumansLawFoundGamesSportsPerformancesAimMedicineArtisticFeaturesTargetDividesHuntingDomainCompetenceArrowsDistinctiveCorrespondingArchery Author:Ernest Sosa
“If a shot aimed at aptness succeeds aptly, it is then fully apt, since it is not only apt but also aptly apt. But the full aptness of such an attempt is entirely compatible with its being a horrible murder, if the "hunter" is an assassin and the prey his victim. That hunter's shot may still be outstandingly, fully apt, if it manifests the agent's competence in both archery dexterity and shot selection.” IfsMayStillsSucceedShotsMurderVictimHorribleAgentsHuntersSelectionPreyCompetenceAssassinsCompatibleArcheryDexterity Author:Ernest Sosa
“In order to qualify as a judgment, an affirmation must aim at getting it right aptly, through competence, and not just through a lucky guess.” OrderLuckyJudgmentAimAffirmationCompetence Author:Ernest Sosa
“Given its more substantial aim, a judgment is apt only if its constitutive alethic affirmation is not only apt but aptly apt. The subject must attain aptly not only the truth of his affirmation but also its aptness. And that in turn requires not only the proper operation of one's perception, memory, inference, etc., but also that one deploy such competences through competent epistemic risk assessment.” IfsTurnsGivenMemoriesRiskSubjectsJudgmentPerceptionAimOperationsEtcAffirmationCompetenceCompetentAssessmentInference Author:Ernest Sosa
“One does not avoid incompetence if one makes an attempt whose likelihood of success is too low. This seems little more than analytic: when the performance is in a domain that imposes standards of risk, attempts may or may not meet such standards. And the relevant competence of agents then includes reliably enough meeting those standards.” IfsMayLittlesDoeEnoughSeemsRiskLowsStandardsPerformancesMeetingsAgentsRelevantDomainCompetenceIncompetenceLikelihoodAnalytics Author:Ernest Sosa
“Lowered reliability obviously yields a lesser competence. But lowered breadth does so as well.” WellsDoeYieldCompetenceBreadthReliability Author:Ernest Sosa
“When you dream, your perceptual (and other) competence is affected. You are then unable to get it right competently with the beliefs in your dream.” DreamBeliefYour DreamsAffectedCompetence Author:Ernest Sosa
“You attain aptness by judging while in good shape and in a good situation (good light, good distance, etc.), through the exercise of good barn-sorting epistemic competence.” LightSituationJudgingExerciseShapesDistanceEtcCompetenceBarnsSorting Author:Ernest Sosa
“Suppose we wonder whether we should trust the deliverances of our basic epistemic competences. If those are indeed our basic competences, then in order properly to satisfy our curiosity we will inevitably rely on one or more of them. So, either we squelch our curiosity or we will have to fall into the circularity or regress to which the skeptic objects.” IfsShouldOrderFallWonderObjectsCuriosityRelyCompetenceSkepticDeliveranceCircularity Author:Ernest Sosa
“If we have a better understanding of knowledge than we do of such justification or competence, then we can explain the latter through the former.” IfsUnderstandingFormerLatterJustificationCompetence Author:Ernest Sosa
“Epistemic competence might be posterior to knowledge conceptually, however, while still prior metaphysically.” StillsMightCompetence Author:Ernest Sosa
“Animal knowledge is metaphysically constituted by apt belief, by belief whose correctness manifests the believer's epistemic competence, a relevant disposition to get it right on the matter at hand when one tries to do so.” TryingMatterHandsBeliefAnimalBelieverRelevantDispositionCompetenceCorrectness Author:Ernest Sosa
“In my view (animal) knowledge is apt belief, where not only the belief (its existence and content) but also its correctness is creditable to the subject's competence.” BeliefAnimalViewsExistenceSubjectsCompetenceCorrectness Author:Ernest Sosa
“When I accept someone's testimony, I am thus only a small part of the full seat of epistemic competence, which might include many others in a long chain. My own contribution might then be slight, just through the perceptual and linguistic competence involved in knowing what someone is saying or writing, etc.” WritingLongMightMy OwnAcceptingKnowingInvolvedChainsContributionSeatsEtcTestimonyCompetenceSmall Parts Author:Ernest Sosa
“We can pursue the Cartesian project without restricting ourselves to theology and a priori faculties. A better, broader perspective is properly sought if we pursue the project with reliance on science broadly and on our full span of epistemic competences, including the empirical as well as the a priori.” IfsWellsPerspectiveProjectsIncludingTheologyPursueFacultyRelianceCompetence Author:Ernest Sosa
