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This chapter examines a further objection that has been raised to the view defended in this book — an objection that is grounded in a widely accepted thesis about the norm governing proper assertion. According to the Knowledge Norm of Assertion, or the KNA, a speaker should assert that p only if she knows that p. Given that the counterexamples to the Belief View of Testimony in Chapter 2 rely on speakers who offer assertions in the absence of knowledge, it has been argued that such examples fail because the speakers in question violate the KNA. This chapter argues, however, that the KNA is false. An alternative norm of assertion is then developed — the Reasonable to Believe Norm of Assertion, or the RTBNA — that not only avoids the problems afflicting the KNA, but also more fully and coherently accommodates our general intuitions about both asserters and their assertions.

One of the central claims of Williamson's ground-breaking epistemology is the claim that knowledge is the norm of assertion. This chapter contends that this viewpoint is mistaken. It first explains Williamson's path to the conclusion he holds, identifying the two major arguments that he uses to support his claim that knowledge is the norm of assertion. It summarizes the prima facie case for an alternative view, and then addresses the tension between this prima facie case and Williamson's arguments. The chapter argues that a proper resolution of the conflict results in a denial of the idea that knowledge is the norm of assertion. Instead, to the extent that appropriate assertion is subject to epistemic constraints, those constraints have to do with justification rather than knowledge.

In this chapter argues that the norm of assertion can be used to give an account of two features of the testimonial exchange, pertaining to the epistemic entitlements and responsibilities of parties to such an exchange. Accounting for these features in terms of the norm of assertion has two selling points: in doing so we make do with claims we need anyway, independent of issues of testimony, and in this sense have an account that is simpler than its rivals; and we can be neutral with respect to the two topics standardly addressed in connection with the epistemology of testimony, and so have an account that is ideologically less costly than rival accounts (which are not neutral in this way). The chapter also argues that the rival accounts themselves face serious difficulties. It is thus time to put the norm of assertion to work.

Recent times have seen an explosion of interest in the question of what conditions need to be satisfied by an assertion for it to pass scrutiny from a purely cognitive or intellectual point of view. This level of interest is due primary to Timothy Williamson's defense of the knowledge norm, according to which one shouldn't say what one doesn't know to be true. Williamson's position has been endorsed by a number of important epistemologists, but remains controversial. All parties to this controversy recognize the defeasible character of norms of assertion: if someone's life is at stake, violating a norm of assertion is a legitimate cost to be born. The implications of such defeasibility, however, are deeper than the literature acknowledges. The chapter argues that a proper appreciation of the defeasible character of norms of assertion, together with an adequate account of the fundamental questions regarding action and belief, place constraints on the kinds of arguments that can be used to argue in favor of one view over the others. The favored considerations are just those Williamson cites in favor the knowledge norm, but the chapter argues that these considerations, viewed through the lens of the fundamental questions regarding action and belief, favor a justification norm instead.

The speech act of assertion is introduced and its core features are described. Four accounts of assertion are presented: the attitudinal account (associated with Bach and Harnish), the common ground account (associated with Stalnaker), the commitment account (associated with Brandom), and the constitutive rule account (associated with Williamson). Virtues and drawbacks of each are discussed, with special attention paid to their ability to account for assertion’s core features. Of these accounts, the constitutive account appears to stand the best chance of explaining assertion’s core features. Key objections to the constitutive norm account are presented and discussed.

After arguing that the connection between assertion and belief is systematic and non-contingent, it is argued that the nature of this connection is best explained in terms of the hypothesis that assertion is answerable to an epistemic norm. Such a view is to be preferred to a Grice-inspired view, according to which assertion is the speech act through which one intends one’s audience to regard oneself as believing the content in question, by way of the audience’s recognition of this very intention. The account appealing to the norm of assertion can be used to address the phenomenon of Moore-paradoxicality. At the same time, reasons are presented in defense of the idea that the standard provided by assertion’s norm will be different from that provided by belief’s norm. Consequently, the Moore’s paradox is not likely to enable us to discern very much about the standard for assertion’s norm.

This chapter discusses the viability of knowledge-first epistemology. The chapter has two parts. The first part presents several big-picture objections to knowledge-first epistemology and argues that while these considerations are pressing, they are not conclusive. The second part focuses on a specific thesis endorsed by many knowledge-first epistemologists—the knowledge norm of assertion. The chapter considers a familiar concern with this norm: It can be appropriate for someone who has a justified belief that p, but doesn’t know that p, to assert that p. Proponents of the knowledge norm typically explain away such judgments by claiming that the assertion is improper but the subject has an excuse for making it. The chapter argues against this response. The chapter concludes by briefly considering whether we should replace the knowledge norm with an alternative. It argues that that there is no norm specifically tied to assertion.

This chapter takes up the knowledge norm of assertion, according to which assertion is governed by the constitutive norm that one may assert only what one knows. The relationship between such norms and contextualism is controversial—some philosophers have argued that there is a special problem for this combination of views, and others have argued that the knowledge norm provides direct support for contextualism. This chapter rejects both kinds of simple connections. The book's relevant alternatives approach to knowledge, however, combined with Stalnakerian approaches to assertions and conversational contexts, is suggestive of an underexplored interpretation of the knowledge norm—the incremental knowledge norm of assertion, according to which what is required for proper assertion depends on its incremental conversational effect.

In this chapter, the norm of assertion is used to account for another feature of assertion’s epistemic significance, having to do with the epistemic entitlements and responsibilities that arise in certain speech exchanges involving information exchange. Although these entitlements and responsibilities are typically presented (when they are presented at all) in terms of the speech act of telling (rather than in terms of assertion), it is argued that it is better to consider the phenomena in question as deriving from assertion: if this is done, they can be accounted for in terms of assertion’s norm. Doing so has two selling points. First, necessary claims are used, independent of issues of testimony and telling, resulting, in this sense, with an account that is simpler than its rivals. And second, it avoids other difficulties to which the rival accounts (which trace these phenomena to interpersonal features of tellings) are susceptible.

The thesis is that the hypothesis that assertion is answerable to an epistemic norm can be used to establish two claims in the domain of ethics: first, that there is such a thing as an “ethics of assertion,” and second, that, given the connection between assertion and belief, the “ethics of assertion” can be used to provide motivation for some (interpersonal) constraints bearing on what might go under the label “the ethics of belief.” The argument that is developed explores both what speakers owe to their audience, and what an audience owes to the speaker. What speakers owe to their audience is explored through the ethics of helping those in need; and what an audience owes to the speaker is explored through development of ideas first developed in Fricker (2007).

Chapter 7 extends the discussion of epistemic norms to the linguistic realm. Again, it is argued that a Knowledge Norm of Assertion (KNAS) is inadequate and should be replaced with a Warrant-Assertive Speech Act norm (WASA). According to WASA, S must be adequately warranted in believing that p relative to her conversational context in order to meet the epistemic requirements for asserting that p. This epistemic norm is developed and extended to assertive speech acts that carry implicatures or illocutionary forces. Particular attention is given to the development of a species of WASA that accounts for assertive speech acts having a directive force, such as a recommendation. Thus, Chapter 7 contributes to the debates concerning epistemic norms of assertions.

The aim of this chapter is to argue that the hypothesis that assertion is answerable to a robustly epistemic norm has implications for the nature and method of what Donald Davidson called “the task of radical interpretation.” This is the task of interpreting another’s speech contributions, and thereby solving for their “beliefs and meanings” without assuming prior knowledge of either. It is argued that the resulting norm-of-assertion-based account of the nature and method of interpretation, which differs from that offered by Davidson himself, is to be preferred to Davidson’s own account. The resulting account is contrasted with the knowledge-maximizing account presented by Tim Williamson (2000).

This chapter addresses the problem of the persistence of assertion in the face of systematic peer disagreement. This problem can be resolved by appeal to the hypothesis that the standard set by assertion’s norm is fixed in part in terms of what is mutually believed by the speaker and her audience in the context in which the assertion is made. What is more, such a “context-sensitive” account of the norm of assertion enjoys strong independent support: it can be motivated by appeal to Grice’s guiding idea that conversation is a cooperative and rational activity between agents, where the rationality of speech contributions is to be understood by reference to how they contribute to the mutually acknowledged aims.

This chapter argues for a distinctive kind of conversational pressure bearing distinctly on audiences to a mutually observed statement or assertion: the normative pressure to signal when one disagrees. The argument for this conclusion appeals to two main claims: first, that conversational participants are entitled to expect cooperation from other participants; and second, that silent rejection of a public statement is marked as uncooperative. The result is that conversational participants are (presumptively but defeasibly) entitled to expect no silent rejection of a mutually observed statement, and this expectation gives participants a (practical) reason to indicate any disagreement or doubts when they observe such a statement. This argument avoids objections levelled against Pettit’s account of the significance of conversational silence. The chapter concludes by addressing the variety of contexts in which the entitlement to expect no silent rejection is itself defeated (including but not limited to conditions of oppression or ‘silencing’).

This chapter teases out the implications of the hypothesis that assertion’s epistemic norm is set in a context-sensitive fashion, by appeal to what is mutually believed in context. In particular, it is argued that while these implications are substantial, they can be made to square with the main contention in the first eight chapters of the book. That is, they cohere with the norm-based account offered for what is called assertion’s philosophical significance. The process of bringing this out incorporates a response to various objections to the context-sensitivity of the standard of assertion’s norm. One key implication is that standard accounts of sincerity in assertion, as requiring belief in what was asserted, are false.

This chapter sets out an account of assertion—or telling—which is suitable for a unified account of trustworthiness in both speech and action, and which centrally involves commitment. On this picture, assertion involves simultaneously promising to speak truthfully on a given matter, and either keeping or breaking that promise. The promise is to utter the truth, not merely to be sincere or do one’s best to utter the truth. This account shows how assertion and promising are importantly similar, without implausibly identifying asserting that p with promising that p. The account is distinguished from the so-called ‘commitment account’ of assertion and also from the ‘assurance’ account of the epistemic significance of testimony, though it is compatible with such accounts. Finally, the chapter draws on chapter 2’s discussions of norms on promising, to explore possible norms of assertion; there is also discussion of the constitutive (or not) nature of such norms.

This chapter attacks, on several fronts, what is often cited as a theoretical advantage to regarding knowledge as a theoretical primitive—namely, that knowledge can be used to reductively analyse other epistemic phenomena. It suggests that proponents of such an approach commit a similar mistake to the one that they charge their opponents with—viz., the mistake of seeking to reductively analyse basic epistemic phenomena in terms of other allegedly more basic or fundamental phenomena. After leveling this charge against reductionist brands of knowledge-first epistemology, the chapter takes the knowledge norm of assertion as its critical focus and challenges non-reductionist brands of knowledge-first epistemology. It concludes by articulating an alternative to knowledge-first methodology: that is labeled ‘equilibristic epistemology’. According to equilibristic epistemology there isn’t a single epistemic phenomenon or concept that is ‘first’. Rather, there are a number of basic epistemic phenomena that are not reductively analysable although they may be co-elucidated in a non-reductive manner.

In this chapter, the hypothesis that assertion is answerable to an epistemic norm is used to illuminate the public nature of assertion. In particular, the aim is to address how the absence of a certain kind of publicness affects assertoric practice. The result is an account of how the anonymity of an assertion affects the epistemological dimension of their production by speakers, and their reception by hearers. At least some of these effects derive from a warranted diminishment in speakers’ and hearers’ mutual expectations of one another when there are few mechanisms for enforcing the responsibilities attendant to speech. In this way, the norm of assertion can be used to illustrate the sense in which anonymous assertions do not carry the same “promise” of the speaker’s relevant epistemic authoritativeness that ordinary assertions do.

In this paper Sanford Goldberg argues that the sort of systematic disagreements we encounter in philosophy presents us with a problem regarding assertoric practice in philosophy. The argument aims to show that acknowledged systematic disagreement generates a defeater, with the result that beliefs in propositions under conditions of acknowledged systematic disagreement are not doxastically justified; so if the norm of assertion requires anything as strong as justification, we are not warranted in making assertions under such conditions. After developing the nature of this problem, Goldberg concludes with a brief suggestion as to how we might respond to it.