1 Internalist Foundationalism and the Sellarsian Dilemma

Abstract: According to foundationalism, some beliefs are justified but do not depend for their justification on any other beliefs. According to access internalism, a subject is justified in believing some proposition only if that subject is aware of or has access to some reason to think that the proposition is true or probable. In this paper I discusses a fundamental challenge to internalist foundationalism often referred to as the Sellarsian dilemma. I consider three attempts to respond to the dilemma – phenomenal conservatism, BonJour’s classical foundationalism, and Fumerton’s classical foundationalism. I argue that, of these three, only the last seems to avoid getting impaled on one or the other horn of the dilemma. I end by responding to some concerns with Fumerton’s account. According to foundationalism, some empirical beliefs are noninferentially justified or foundational: they are justified but do not depend for their justification on any other empirical beliefs. According to access internalism (simply “internalism ” in what follows), a subject is justified in believing some proposition only if that subject is aware of or has access to some reason to think that the proposition is true or probable.1 The internalis