Volume V (2022) (2015)
considered justified. They argue this is similar to reliabilism because they see the reliable belief- forming process as a means of grounding a belief in the proper way. 10 They even later point out
that one could argue that the condition could be that a process which produces beliefs that properly
fit the evidence are reliable, and ones that do not produce beliefs that properly fit the evidence are
not reliable. I nearly agree with this, but I wish to tweak the idea a bit. Instead of thinking of it as a
way of determining whether a process is reliable, we can think of it as a reliable process itself;
properly fitti ng one’s belief to the evidence is a reliable belief -forming process. Since we are
allowing for multiple reliable belief-forming processes per belief, it makes sense to assume that
some process that performs this function (that is, fitting the belief to the evidence) is present in the
formation of any applicable beliefs. If nothing else, involving some sort of process like this would
greatly increase the overall reliability and thus increase the degree to which the belief is justified.
With this in mind, we can see that reliabilism, so long as multiple processes per belief are
warranted, can do more than WF can since it accounts for having fitting beliefs and the justifying
power (whereas WF is only made to account for the former). More than that, I argue that my
account of reliabilism can do more than evidentialism can. Feldman and Conee introduce WF as an
addition to their main thesis of evidentialism, which is that a belief is justified when it fits the evidence, a premise they call EJ. 11 WF only adds that the belief must also be based on the evidence,
in addition to fitting evidence. Here, it becomes unclear to me what EJ and WF together are
accomplishing that the form of reliabilism I am arguing for is not. My form of reliabilism requires
evidence; it can account for how well the belief fits the evidence because processes which fit belief
to evidence well are reliable; it can account for basing the beliefs on the evidence because it is the
process by which the belief holder uses the evidence that is important, not merely their having the
evidence.
With my strong insistence on evidence being a necessary role in justification, it may seem I
have created a form of reliabilism that differs from evidentialism only in terminology. They say the
evidence justifies; I say using the evidence well justifies, but both come to largely the same
consequences. While I admit it can seem to be merely a disagreement of terms, I do believe that the
reliabilist account is truer to the actuality of the situation, and if the two theories turn out to be
equivalent in all other ways, that will be enough for me to prefer reliabilism. I am unconvinced that
simply having evidence that fits the belief is enough to justify it. Feldman and Conee knew this too,
10 Feldman and Conee, “Evidentialism,” 25. 11 Feldman and Conee, “Evidentialism,” 15.
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