Jonathan Adler argues that the ‘Moorean’ sentence that is the title of this discussion note is heardas odd and even as contradictory for conceptual reasons:asserting p one expresses one’s belief in p, and the conceptof belief does not allow one to believe anything in the absence of sufficient evidence for it. [1] Igor Douven provides for another possible explanation of our negative intuitive responses to sentences like the one above. [2] It could be that we hear these sentences as odd, because we are not regularly exposed to them. And, this is because of pragmatic reasons. In asserting p, one typically tries to convince some audience of p, even if one recognizes that one’s evidence for p leaves open the possibility that ¬p.

The lack of exposure to ‘Moorean’ sentences may explain the experience of hearing such sentences as odd, says Douven. Therefore, ‘there is a prima facie not implausible rival explanation to the one Adler offers.’

It is my contention that this rival explanation is implausible, and this can be argued for within the confines of Adler’s normative epistemology. In order to see the implausibility of the lack-of-exposure explanation, we need to make a distinction between (1) the possibility of error of what we believe and assert, (2) doubts we may have about what we believe and assert, and (3) a lack of sufficient evidence for what we believe and assert.

(1) We may believe p and assert that p, even if we are aware of the possibility that we might be erring. This awareness need not undermine our full belief that p. A full belief is a belief that is not qualified by expressions like ‘I am pretty sure that…’, or ‘I am inclined to believe that…’. [3] The mere epistemic possibility that p might be false need not undermine my full belief that p given the evidence I have, just as the mere possibility that q might be true – though evidence is lacking – is no reason for believing q. Mere epistemic possibilities hardly ever count as evidence for or against a belief. This is the reason why in asserting our beliefs we do not point to the mere possibility of error left open. It is not that we deem it rhetorically unwise to point out such a possibility. We simply think that it is irrelevant, and we usually expect our audience to acknowledge that irrelevance.

(2) Not only counter-possibilities, but even serious doubts need not count as evidence against one’s belief. Adler argues – convincingly I think – that we may have the full belief that p, while still having doubts about p being the case. [4] Full belief needs evidence above a particular threshold. Where the threshold is, is strongly context dependent. Most of my perceptual beliefs are based on just one observation: I see a car turning the corner of the street, so I believe that a car is turning the corner of the street. Other beliefs will require a more complex body of evidence. Or, they may be the outcome of a deliberation process in which evidence pro- en con is weighed. Doubts we may have concerning one of our full beliefs need not count as counterevidence, however. One can be entitled to a full belief, without having unqualified confidence in that belief. The rarity of an experimental outcome may diminish a scientist’s confidence, without undermining his belief that the outcome is sound. His lack of confidence may lead him not to make the result immediately public, though he fully believes that the outcome is correct, rare as it may be. Montesquieu came to believe that slavery is wrong, because he found that every individual human deserves equal concern and respect, and slaves are human individuals just like us. In Montesquieu’s time, such a stance was highly controversial. Nowadays, it is not. This shows that the controversy over a belief as such exposes no failing in either the content of the belief or the argument supporting it. Similarly, the strong confidence in a belief as such is no evidence for that belief. Confidence, or the lack of it, is simply not to be counted as evidence for or against a belief. We can only judge whether p is true or false, upon the evidence we have, and than it hardly matters whether the balance in favour of a belief is heavily tilted or not, nor whether the direction of the balancing is controversial. A belief does not become ‘more true’ thanks to a greater weight of evidence or lack of controversy. Only our confidence in that belief may grow. Similarly a full belief that p may be maintained in the face of doubts. The claim to full belief requires that we have reached the threshold of adequate reasons for that belief, not that we are void of doubt. I believe that Paris is the largest capital in Europe, because I once saw figures about the amount of inhabitants of major European capitals with Paris on the lead. Someone may strongly disagree with me, which may make me less confident about whether Paris indeed is the largest capital, without giving me reason to think otherwise.

In asserting our beliefs and defending them, we usually do not point out the level of confidence we have in what we believe. Rather we point out the evidence we have for our beliefs. We don’t want others to believe that p, because we are so sure that p. We want them to belief that p, upon the evidence for p. Only if we give testimony as an expert, we may refer to our confidence that p is the case as a reason for others to believe that p. But in regular cases, we will not refer to our level of confidence. We will refer to the evidence we have for our belief. In regular cases it may even be rhetorically wise to express one’s doubts (rather than one’s confidence) as this may encourage others to reflect on the evidence themselves and be convinced accordingly. Assertions of full belief may go along with an expression of doubt showing one’s epistemic modesty, without putting oneself in a rhetorically disadvantageous position.

(3) However, assertions are subject to a sincerity condition that rules out the possibility of asserting something for which we believe to lack sufficient evidence. This sincerity condition is analogous to the transparency upon which belief is conditional. If I believe that Holland has a lousy national football team and if I express that belief, I am saying something about the Dutch national football team, and not about my pessimistic state of mind with regard to Dutch football. I claim to know something about the qualities of the national team. It is this claim that is of interest, not my state of mind that brought me to that claim. As Adler says: ‘What we assert when we express our belief that p, is simply p not our attitude toward it.’ [5] The case of partial belief is different. If I say that I am pretty sure that Holland has a lousy team, I do not only express my belief about the qualities of the team, I say something of my state of mind too. I tell you that I am not fully convinced that the team really is lousy. It may be that I lack sufficient evidence for my belief that the team is lousy, or it may be that the body of evidence I have seems to be rebutted by one instance of clear counterevidence (Don’t you remember that Holland did beat Scotland six to null!).

In case of full belief, however, my assertions give expression to what I believe to be the case. Assertion is a speech act in which the speaker presents the hearer with the content of her belief, and it counts as an assertion precisely because the hearer justifiably expects that the content is held as true by speaker. The hearer takes it that this is what the speaker believes. But if so, then it is not just rhetorically unwise to assert something and subsequently say ‘…but I lack sufficient evidence for what I have just asserted’. It is impossible or very difficult to do so. You would not be asserting anything, if your so-called assertion ‘that p’ is accompanied with ‘but, I lack sufficient evidence that p’. What you say would not be heard as an assertion of your belief, but as the expression of a troubled mind.

The assertion ‘P, but I lack sufficient evidence for p’ sounds contradictory, because the two parts of the assertion refuse combination on conceptual grounds. We are not regularly exposed to such assertions, because people normally find that a speaker can only be taken to assert p, if she beliefs that p. And people normally find that if one believes that p, then this is because, by one’s own lights, one has sufficient evidence for p. One may not be fully aware of this evidence. But it would certainly be contradictory to believe sincerely that p, while also believing that one lacks sufficient evidence for p.