Forming Concepts and Doing it Well: A Theory and Epistemology for Empirical Concepts

In this dissertation, I argue that we need an epistemology of empirical concept formation in order to explain the epistemic continuity from perceiving the world to achieving empirical knowledge.I situate empirical concept formation within the greater epistemic endeavor I call “empirical discovery.” The aim of empirical discovery is to form warranted empirical beliefs—and ultimately—to achieve knowledge and understanding of the nature and structure of the empirical world. The challenge of discovery is that to learn and understand empirical truths is not merely to compose and confirm a list of hypotheses and attendant theories. Discovery requires creating the representational tools from which such hypotheses and theories are composed. Empirical concepts are some of these representational tools. Thus, forming empirical concepts is part of the greater epistemic endeavor of empirical discovery.My account explains how forming concepts on the basis of perceptual experience can yield prima facie warrant to employ such concepts, even in cases where one knows nearly nothing about the properties indicated by such concepts. I call that prima facie warrant “concept formation entitlement.” According to my theory, our warrant for forming beliefs about empirical subject matter of which we know nearly nothing, is inextricably linked to the process by which we form new ways of representing the world. Drawing on research in cognitive, developmental, and perceptual psychology, I offer an empirically plausible model of how we form a wide range of general empirical concepts. I explain the connection between the model and the fulfillment of epistemic norms that govern empirical belief revision on route to discovery.As a prelude to my positive proposal, I trace Jerry Fodor’s path to what I call his “new radical conclusion.” His new radical conclusion is that concept acquisition is not a cognitive process, does not admit of psychological explanation, and cannot be explained at the intentional level. I reconstruct six variants of Fodor’s argument, and argue that all of them fail. I use the epistemic underdetermination variant of his argument as a springboard for the thesis that concept acquisition is epistemically evaluable