Patrick Greenough Abstract

Perhaps the most important distinction in contemporary philosophy is the Internalism-Externalism distinction. The distinction is central to key debates in epistemology, the philosophy of mind, the philosophy of language, ethics, the philosophy of action, and beyond. However, there are myriad ways in which the distinction can be formulated and employed. Very roughly, the internalist idea is that mental states or processes, consciousness, meaning and mental content, justification, reasons to believe or act, the rightness or wrongness of an act, are ‘in the head’—that is, determined by what is going on internally within the relevant subject or subjects. In this introductory talk, we shall be looking at a selection of ways in which one can and should draw and motivate the distinction. In doing so, I’ll offer some novel (and useful) ways to draw the distinction in the case of knowledge. Hitherto, I’ll allege, the distinction has been poorly drawn in epistemology. We’ll conclude by considering whether there is a third-way between Internalism and Externalism, and whether the distinction is very deep or even at all useful.