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13. Knowledge Criteria / B. Internal Justification / 4. Foundationalism / b. Basic beliefs

[contents and origin of foundational beliefs]

15 ideas
When you understand basics, you can't be persuaded to change your mind [Aristotle]
Some things are their own criterion, such as straightness, a set of scales, or light [Sext.Empiricus]
We can know basic Principles without further knowledge, but not the other way round [Descartes]
Knowledge can't be its own foundation; there has to be regress of higher and higher authorities [Fichte]
Demonstration does not rest on first principles of reason or sensation, but on freedom from actual doubt [Peirce]
The big problem for foundationalism is to explain how basic beliefs are possible [Bonjour]
If basic beliefs can be false, falsehood in non-basic beliefs might by a symptom [Dancy,J]
Conscious states have built-in awareness of content, so we know if a conceptual description of it is correct [Bonjour]
Basic judgements are immune from error because they have no content [Williams,M]
Experience must be meaningful to act as foundations [Williams,M]
People rarely have any basic beliefs, and never enough for good foundations [Pollock/Cruz]
Foundationalism requires self-justification, not incorrigibility [Pollock/Cruz]
Basic beliefs are self-evident, or sensual, or intuitive, or revealed, or guaranteed [Baggini /Fosl]
An experience's having propositional content doesn't make it a belief [Pryor]
'Moderate' foundationalism has basic justification which is defeasible [Grundmann]