Research Projects

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• "Damming the swamping problem, reliably" (longer piece in draft; shorter piece to be presented at the 2009 APA-Pacific Mtg).
  This article defends a reliabilist account of the value-difference between knowledge and mere true belief against the "swamping problem" (due to Jones, Swinburne, Zagzebski, Kvanvig).

• "A problem with Kim's qualia-epiphenomenalism" (under review).
  This article presents a problem for Kim's (2005) attempt to hold that while qualia are irreducibly nonphysical, qualia "similarities and differences" are physically reducible.

• "A defense of the explanatory argument for physicalism," Philosophical Quarterly (forthcoming).
  This article defends the explanatory argument for physicalism from Kim's (2005) objections. I show why none of the objections works and this shows that the explanatory argument is a formidable argument for physicalism.

• "The old problem of induction and the new reflective equilibrium," dialectica 59 (2005): 347-356.
  This article shows how naturalistic views about the nature and status of appeals to intuition (reflective equilibrium) undermines Goodman's attempt to use such intuitions to justify the principle of induction and thereby dissolve the problem of induction. The argument suggests that the problem of induction cannot be solved "analytically".

• "Reflective equilibrium and underdetermination in epistemology," Acta Analytica 19/32 (2004): 45-64.
  This article argues that intuitions underdetermine theory-choice in epistemology, in much the way that observation underdetermines theory-choice in natural science. The argument is intended to undermine the method of appeals to intuition (reflective equilibrium) in analytic epistemology.

• "Comments on Foster's 'On Tarski's theory of logical consequence -- a reply to Bates,'" Southwest Philosophy Review 16 (2000): 191-194.
  A defense of the below article from a criticism by Chris Foster.

• "Etchemendy, Tarski, and logical consequence," Southwest Philosophy Review 15 (1999): 47-54.
  This article presents a conditional defense of Etchemendy's argument that the Tarskian definition of consequence gets the right results for the wrong reasons.

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Copyright: 2008 Jared Bates
Last Modified: 29 September 2008
Page Author: Jared Bates