China Social Science Review

No.1, 2021

Critique of Contemporary Epistemology’s Dogma of Degrees of Belief

(Abstract)

Zheng Weiping

People’s confidence differs with different propositions, and this constitutes the basis of the concept of degrees of belief; that is, belief is a matter of degree. The reasoning behind degrees of belief is obscure, and both its commonsense and its verbal reasoning confuse belief and trust. The idea of priority in degrees of belief holds that degrees of belief occur above a certain threshold value, which is contradicted by the lottery paradox and the language paradox. If we distinguish between the noumenon and its properties, the noumenon of belief cannot itself have degrees； the confidence as a property of belief does have degrees that express the level of firmness of the belief. Belief takes priority in the relationship with confidence, because degree of confidence is a modal proposition belief.