Non-Linguistic Arguments for Intellectualism

Intellectualism about knowledge-how is the view that, in short, an agent’s knowing how to φ is grounded that agent’s propositional attitudes vis-à-vis φ-ing. Themost popular andwell-developed contemporary strategy for defending this position appeals, in the main, to linguistic considerations (e.g. Stanley &Williamson 2001; Stanley 2011), and consequently, the plausibility of intellectualism in the recent literature has been debated primarily with reference to whether linguistic arguments for intellectualism are successful. In this talk, I want to explore the viability of the comparatively less discussed ‘non-linguistic’ case for intellectualism. In doing so, what I take to be the three most important recent and broadly non-linguistic strands of argument claimed to favour intellectualism will be evaluated. The first two strategies, advanced by Bengson & Moffett (2011a; 2011b) are negative; these arguments attempt to show that the primary strategy for denying intellectualism, anti-intellectualism, is fundamentally unworkable. The third non-linguistic argument for intellectualism considered is Stanley & Krakauer’s (2013) recent attempt to support intellectualism via cognitive scientific evidence of the sort that is usually claimed as an advantage by anti-intellectualists. The conclusion I draw is that that none of these arguments in support of intellectualism is successful.