Belief and evidence

This chapter continues our attempt to develop a model that will explain the ethical difference between interaction inside and outside cyberspace captured in the basic premise ([TBP]). In the previous two chapters we introduced and investigated three hypotheses linking an agent's conviction concerning the reality of a particular agent to certain other beliefs and to the availability of evidence in support of these other beliefs. That is, we covered the first stage (see the first section of Chapter 5) of our attempt to explain the basic premise: we showed how agent A's belief that p is dependent upon the conditions C.

In this chapter the second stage is covered. Here it will be shown how the conditions of interaction in cyberspace limit the availability of evidence in support of the beliefs underlying the belief in the reality of a particular agent. In the terminology used above, it will be shown that the conditions C are not satisfied in particular kinds of interaction in cyberspace.

The chapter is crucial for our attempt to provide an alternative account to that given by Levinas of the role played in ethics by the face of another person. Thus by showing how the evidence needed for the formation of certain beliefs is lost in cyberspace, we will have taken a crucial step in clarifying the role for ethics of the face of another person.