ABSTRACT
This chapter takes some initial steps toward the development and defense of a quite traditional foundationalist view of the justification of empirical beliefs and in particular of beliefs about physical objects: the view that such justification depends ultimately on basic or foundational beliefs about the contents of sensory experience. Until roughly forty years ago, such a foundationalist view was generally acknowledged as obviously correct and indeed as more or less the only serious epistemological alternative to a pervasive skepticism. In the intervening period, however, empirical foundationalism of this sort, or indeed of any sort, has been subjected to incessant attack and has come to be widely regarded as an obviously untenable and even hopeless view. A basic belief cannot literally be: self-justifying unless the foundationalist accepts circular reasoning as a source of justification, a view that seems obviously unacceptable.
