Veritism and Epistemic Value

It is widely held that reliabilism—a proposal which is closely associated with the
work of Alvin Goldman—faces a problem accounting for the greater value of knowledge relative to true belief. In this paper I set out what this problem—which is known as the swamping problem—involves and critically consider the two responses that Goldman has offered for dealing with this problem. I argue that the real target of the swamping problem is not reliabilism specifically, but rather a view about epistemic value—known as veritism—which Goldman also endorses. Moreover, while I argue that Goldman’s own responses to the swamping problem are unsatisfactory, I claim that he is in a position to offer a compelling response to this problem once that problem is properly understood.