The tapestry of reason : an inquiry into the nature of coherence and its role in legal argument

AMAYA NAVARRO, Amalia

2015

Oxford : Hart Publishing, 2015, European academy of legal theory series ; 12

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AMAYA NAVARRO, Amalia, The tapestry of reason : an inquiry into the nature of coherence and its role in legal argument, Oxford : Hart Publishing, 2015, European academy of legal theory series ; 12 - https://hdl.handle.net/1814/35221

Retrieved from Cadmus, EUI Research Repository

Recently legal scholarship has been heavily influenced by coherence theories of law and adjudication. These theories significantly advance the case for coherentism in law, yet a number of problems remain. This ambitious new work is the first to develop a coherence-based theory of legal reasoning, and in so doing address, or at least mitigate, these problems. The book is organised in three parts. Part one critically analyses the main coherentist approaches to both normative and factual reasoning in law. Part two investigates coherence theory in a number of fields that are relevant to law: coherence theories of epistemic justification, coherentist approaches to belief revision and theory-choice, coherence theories of practical and moral reasoning and coherence-based approaches to discourse interpretation. Taking this interdisciplinary analysis as a starting point, part three develops a coherence-based model of legal reasoning, building upon the standard theory of legal reasoning, leading to a reconsideration of some of the basic assumptions that characterise this theory and suggesting some lines along which it may be further developed. Thus, the book not only improves upon the current state of coherence theory in law, but also helps to articulate a theory of legal reasoning that results in better decision-making.

Table of Contents:

-- Acknowledgements -- Introduction -- Part I. Legal Coherentism -- 1. Normative Coherence, Justification and Interpretation -- I. Coherence and Rationality in Legal Reasoning -- II. A Weigh and Balance Model for Legal Coherence -- III. Integrity, Holism and Interpretation -- IV. Objections Against Coherence Theories of Legal -- Reasoning about Norms -- V. Conclusions -- 2. Coherence, Evidence and Proof -- I. Probabilism and Evidential Reasoning in Law -- II. Holistic Theories of Evidence and Legal Proof -- III. Coherence and the Psychology of Legal -- Decision-Making -- IV. Narrative Coherence in Legal Reasoning about Facts -- V. Critiques to Coherence Theories of Fact-Reasoning in Law -- VI. Conclusions -- Part II. Interdisciplinary Perspectives -- 3. Coherence, Knowledge and Justification -- I. Coherence, Foundations and the Structure of Epistemic -- Justification -- II. BonJour’s Epistemic Coherentism -- III. Lehrer’s Coherence Theory of Knowledge -- IV. The Current State of the Coherence Theory of Epistemic Justification -- V. Contextualism, Coherence and Epistemic Justification -- VI. Conclusions -- 4. Explanatory Coherentism -- I. Explanationism -- II. Coherence as Constraint Satisfaction -- III. The Theory of Explanatory Coherence -- IV. Non-Explanatory Kinds of Coherence -- xii Contents -- V. A Unified Account of Coherence-based Inference -- VI. Challenges to Explanatory Coherentism -- VII. Conclusions -- 5. Coherence and Belief Dynamics -- I. The AGM Model -- II. AGM as a Coherence Theory of Belief Revision -- III. Hansson’s Theory of Semi-Revision -- IV. Olsson on Coherence and Belief Revision -- V. Belief Revision and Coherentist Epistemology -- VI. Conclusions -- 6. Is Coherence Truth-Conducive? -- I. Coherence, Realism and Anti-Realism -- II. Coherence, Truth and Interpretation -- III. Probability, Coherence and Truth -- IV. The Problem of Metajustification -- V. Conclusions -- 7. Practical Coherence -- I. Specificationism -- II. Coherentist Case-based Deliberation -- III. Inference to the Most Coherent Plan -- IV. Conclusions -- 8. Beyond Reflective Equilibrium -- I. The Method of Reflective Equilibrium -- II. Balance and Refinement -- III. Reasoning from Analogy and Difference -- IV. Ethical Coherence as Constraint Satisfaction -- V. Coherence, Truth and Objectivity in Ethics -- VI. Conclusions -- 9. Discourse Coherence -- I. The Notion of Coherence in Discourse Theory -- II. Theories of Discourse Coherence -- III. Coherence, Knowledge and Inference -- IV. A Relevance Critique to Coherence Theories of Discourse -- V. Coherence, Context and Rationality -- VI. Conclusions -- Part III. Coherence and Reason in Law -- 10. A Coherence Theory of Legal Reasoning -- I. Redrawing a Map of Problems -- II. The Building Blocks of the Coherence Theory -- III. Legal Coherence as Constraint Satisfaction -- IV. Inference to the Best Legal Explanation -- V. Legal Justification by Optimal Coherence -- VI. Coherence in Context -- VII The Problems of Coherentism Revisited -- VIII. The Reasons for Coherence -- IX. Coherence, Legal Reasoning and Legal Theory -- X. Conclusions -- References -- Index

Cadmus permanent link: https://hdl.handle.net/1814/35221

ISBN: 9781849460705

Publisher: Hart Publishing

Initial version: http://hdl.handle.net/1814/6365

Version: Published version of EUI PhD thesis, 2006

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