Title: Purely perspectival ignorance and purely perspectival differences

Abstract: One might hold that de se and self-locating beliefs associated to ‘I’ and ‘now’ are philosophically significant but disagree with Lewis and Perry that this requires taking them to be relative or private. However, a quick look at the recent literature – including surveys by Titelbaum & Egan (2022) and Torre & Weber (2021) – might give one a different impression, for most who think that there’s something special about these beliefs overall agree with that it can be illustrated by the Lewis-Perry “either relative or private” dilemma. Indeed, I’ll argue that, deep down, this applies even to authors like Stalnaker 2008 and Prosser 2005, 2015 who otherwise are critical of Lewis and Perry. As far as I can see, the ubiquity of the Lewis-Perry dilemma can only be justified, if at all, by two kinds of arguments: arguments from purely perspectival ignorance (PPI) and from purely perspectival differences (PPD). Let’s evaluate these arguments taking recent contributions into account. Like Kwon (2017), I’m sceptical about arguments from PPI. The issue is I find it impossible to conceive of a rational subject (like you and me) who is objectively omniscient but harbours a purely perspectival doubt, as Lewis’ (1979) gods and, more recently, Shaw’s (2019) forgetful god are supposed to be. In any case, I still think that Shaw’s discussion shows something important: de nunc ignorance can arise in a peculiar way, we need only stop tracking time for a second. But I don’t think this needs to lead us to anything like the Lewis-Perry dilemma, for there’s promise in an alternative approach, the Frege-Evans view (the name comes from Prosser 2005 but the view is inspired by Evans 1982). In the end of the day, whether the Frege-Evans view is ultimately tenable depends on the soundness of the argument from PPD, which I see as the strongest and most resilient reason to hold on to the orthodoxy. Few people ever dare challenge this compelling argument, but the last months have seen two exceptions: Lin (2022) and Hunter (2023). Let’s then look at their arguments against the entrenched assumption that purely perspectival differences give rise to belief differences. I’m sympathetic to Lin and Hunter’s ambitions but I think their arguments require improvement. I’ll do my best for this. One key idea is that, from the perspective of rational explanation and belief individuation, we can distinguish which action subjects perform from how they perform it. If so, then hopefully your eyebrows won’t be raised too high when I say that a subject’s curling up into a ball and another’s running to get help are the same action performed in distinct ways. 

Lin, Lixiao (forthcoming). ‘Attitudes and action: against de se exceptionalism’. Inquiry.

Prosser, Simon (2005). ‘Cognitive dynamics and indexicals’. Mind and Language 20 (4):369–391.

Prosser, Simon (2015). ‘Why Are Indexicals Essential?’. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 115 (3pt3):211-233.

Stalnaker, Robert (2008). Our Knowledge of the Internal World. OUP.

Shaw, James R. (2019). ‘De Se Exceptionalism and Frege Puzzles’. Ergo 6:1057-1086.

Titelbaum, Michael & Egan, Andy (2022). ‘Self-Locating Beliefs’, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.