The Ultrasystem and the Conditional Fallacy

Abstract

Keith Lehrer’s account of justification and knowledge is unique and brilliant. Lehrer’s notion of justification in terms of coherence can be construed as a matter of beating or neutralizing competitors’, and his account of knowledge can be construed as a matter of undefeated justification.’ And competition and defeat can, in turn, be understood via the rubric of the justification game. This is a picture that has persisted throughout Lehrer’s epistemological writings—from his earliest efforts to respond to the Gettier problem to his current works-in-progress—although it has evolved over the years.