Rationally unresolvable disagreements and rational dilemma Event as iCalendar

Conor Leisky | University of Auckland

It’s clear that reason will not resolve every disagreement. Sometimes people (me) are too stubborn or closed-minded to properly assess and respond to the evidence. Even so, there is often a rational response to the disagreement which would result in resolution. Reason gives a way to resolve disagreements, but people might not follow the path laid out.

I will argue that there are some disagreements for which reason does not even provide a path to resolution. Not only will the parties to the disagreement fail to come to agree, but if they did come to agree, at least one of them must have done so irrationally.

The conditions for rational unresolvability are seldom laid out. When they are, there is a tendency to claim that rational unresolvability can only occur when there are multiple rational responses available. A major aim in this talk is to establish that rational unresolvability can occur even when there is a single rational response to the disagreement on the relevant evidence.

I do this through the idea of rational dilemma. A rational dilemma occurs where any doxastic response will contravene some relevant rational rule or principle. If such a position is plausible, we must grapple with the possibility that not only might people be irrational to disagree with us, but they would be irrational to agree with us as well.