Perception, History and Benefit

In recent literature, several authors attempt to naturalize epistemic normativity by employing an etiological account of functions. The thought is that epistemic entitlement consists in the normal functioning of our belief-acquisition systems, where the latter acquire the function to reliably deliver true beliefs through a history of biological benefit. This paper's aim is twofold. First, it puts pressure on the main proper functionalist claim; it is argued that a history of positive biological feedback is neither necessary nor sufficient for epistemic justification. Second, I suggest that this problem is sourced in a defect of application of functionalist accounts to epistemic normativity, and I offer a fix.