Reliabilism - Philosophical Concept | Alexandria
Reliabilism, a theory in epistemology, proposes that a belief is justified if and only if it is produced by a reliable belief-forming process. This process, whether perception, memory, or reasoning, must generally yield a high proportion of true beliefs. Often mistaken for a simple justification of true belief, Reliabilism seeks not simply to define knowledge but to understand the conditions under which our beliefs are likely to be true, opening the door to a deeper understanding of how we connect with reality.
While the formal articulation of Reliabilism is relatively recent, its roots can be traced to ancient philosophical inquiries concerning the nature of knowledge and justification. Though no specific document proclaims its birth, seeds of the concept are found intertwined within early epistemology.
The formal rise of reliabilism as a distinct epistemological theory began in the late 20th century with the work of philosophers like Alvin Goldman and Robert Nozick. Goldman's "What is Justified Belief?" (1979) is a landmark, explicitly advocating for a process-based account of justification. Since then, interpretations have diversified, with debates emerging around the precise definition of "reliability" and how to address challenges like the generality problem – the difficulty of specifying which process a belief results from. One intriguing application lies in artificial intelligence, where the design of reliable AI belief-forming systems raises questions about machine knowledge and the nature of consciousness itself.
Today, Reliabilism continues to shape debates about the structure of knowledge; its strengths and weaknesses are dissected in countless scholarly articles. Although the theory offers what seems to be a straightforward perspective on how beliefs become justified, it leads to difficult questions about external justification: if our beliefs are reliably formed, does that automatically make them justified, even if one doesn't know that the belief-forming mechanism is reliable? Can we be justified in our beliefs despite lacking any awareness of the reliability of their sources? Reliabilism demands that we further explore the very nature of knowledge itself.