ABSTRACT
The Confucian idea on “the rectification of names” can be reconstructed as a novel theory of epistemic justification, according to which a subject is justified in holding a belief like “Arthur is a good king.” if and only if descriptions of Arthur actually acquired by that subject are instantiations of pre-fixed norms encapsulated in the predicate “good king”. More complicated forms of beliefs including negations can also be handled accordingly. And the whole model is more preferable to mainstream coherentism in the sense that it is easier for the former to account for why tasks of epistemic justification can be efficiently executed by human minds.
