ABSTRACT
If some political beliefs are morally good and some beliefs are evil, perhaps we shouldn’t be doing epistemology to determine how to form our political beliefs at all; perhaps we should just believe in line with our moral sense. This chapter examines the ethics of belief, beginning with a “big argument”: our beliefs aren’t under our control; we’re not morally responsible for anything outside our control; therefore we’re not morally responsible for our beliefs. After evaluating the premises of this argument, we also consider some odd consequences of it: first, that we might not be morally blameworthy for anything at all; and second, that we might not be epistemically blameworthy for our beliefs. We close by considering some technical notions in the vicinity, including right and wrong kinds of reasons and theories of pragmatic and moral encroachment.
