Suspending Judgment: A Corrective

Philosophy Society week 10, Alexander Geddes 

• Speaker: Dr Alex Geddes (University of Southampton)
• Title: Suspending Judgment: A Corrective

It is common to think of what is going on when we suspend judgment primarily in terms of a kind of doxastic state or condition, variously called ‘suspended judgment’, ‘suspension’ or ‘agnosticism’. On this way of thinking, substantive questions arise concerning the nature of states of this kind and the role that they play in our cognitive lives. In this paper, I argue that these questions rest on a mistake. Suspending judgment ought to be understood, not as a matter of being in, nor as a way of coming to be in, any particular kind of doxastic state, but simply as refraining from judging. It follows that, in the relevant sense, there simply are no states of suspended judgment.

All welcome!