This book is focused on a problem that has aroused the most controversy in recent epistemological debate, which is whether the truth can or cannot be the fundamental epistemic goal. Traditional epistemology has presupposed the centrality of truth without giving a deeper analysis. To epistemic value pluralists, the claim that truth is the fundamental value seems unjustified. Their central judgement is that we can be in a situation where we do not attain truth but something else that is also epistemically valuable. In contrast, epistemic value monists are committed to the view that one can only attain something of epistemic value by attaining truth. It was necessary to rethink the long-accepted platitude that truth is our primary epistemic goal, once several objections about epistemic value were formulated. The whole debate is instructive for understanding how the epistemic value domain is structured.
After graduating 2004 from the University of Constance (Germany) with a master degree in Philosophy, History and German Literature, Markus Hess wrote his dissertation from 2004 until 2008 at the Unversity of Constance. From 2006 until 2008 he had a research stipend from the state of Baden Württemberg. In 2007 he spent the winter term at the philosophy department of the Unversity of Edinburgh (UK). His specializations are epistemology and the history of Logical Positivism (and related areas of the philosophy of science).
