BonJour specializes in epistemology, Kant, and British empiricism, but is best-known for his contributions to epistemology. Initially defending coherentism in his anti-foundationalist critique The Structure of Empirical Knowledge, BonJour subsequently moved to defend Cartesianfoundationalism in later work such as 1998's In Defense of Pure Reason. The latter book is a sustained defense of a priori justification, strongly criticizing empiricists and pragmatists who dismiss it.
Publications
Books
The Structure of Empirical Knowledge, pp. xiii, 258.
In Defense of Pure Reason, pp. xiv, 232.
Epistemology: Classic Problems and Contemporary Responses, pp. viii, 283.
Epistemic Justification: Internalism vs. Externalism, Foundations vs. Virtues. , pp. vii, 240.
Philosophical Problems: An Annotated Anthology , pp. xvi, 876.
"The Coherence Theory of Empirical Knowledge", Philosophical Studies, vol. 30, pp. 281-312; reprinted in Paul Moser Empirical Knowledge, in Louis Pojman, The Theory of Knowledge, and in Michael Goodman and Robert A. Snyder Contemporary Readings in Epistemology.
"Can Empirical Knowledge Have a Foundation?"American Philosophical Quarterly, vol. 15, pp. 1-14; reprinted in Paul Moser, Empirical Knowledge and in Louis Pojman, The Theory of Knowledge.
"Rescher's Philosophical System", in E. Sosa, The Philosophy of Nicholas Rescher, pp. 157-72.
"A Reconsideration of the Problem of Induction", Philosophical Topics, vol. 14, pp. 93-124.
"Nozick, Externalism, and Skepticism", in S. Luper-Foy, The Possibility of Knowledge: Nozick and His Critics, pp. 297-313.
"Reply to Steup", Philosophical Studies, vol.
"Reply to Moser", Analysis, vol. 48, pp. 164-65.
"Replies and Clarifications", in J. W. Bender, The Current State of the Coherence Theory: Essays on the Epistemic Theories of Keith Lehrer and Laurence BonJour, pp. 276-92.
"Against Naturalized Epistemology", Midwest Studies in Philosophy, vol. 19, pp. 283-300.
"Sosa on Knowledge, Justification, and 'Aptness'", Philosophical Studies, vol. 78, pp. 207-220.
"Toward a Moderate Rationalism", Philosophical Topics, vol. 23, pp. 47-78.
"Plantinga on Knowledge and Proper Function", in Jonathan Kvanvig, Warrant in Contemporary Epistemology, pp. 47-71.
"Haack on Justification and Experience", Synthese.
"The Dialectic of Foundationalism and Coherentism", in the Blackwell Guide to Epistemology, ed. John Greco and Ernest Sosa, Blackwell.
"Toward a Defense of Empirical Foundationalism", in Michael DePaul, Resurrecting Old-Fashioned Foundationalism. With a reply to criticisms by John Pollock and Alvin Plantinga.
"Foundationalism and the External World", in James Tomberlin, Philosophical Perspectives, vol. 13.
Critical study of Evan Fales, A Defense of the Given, Nous.
"The Indispensability of Internalism", Philosophical Topics.
"Internalism and Externalism", in the Oxford Handbook of Epistemology, ed. Paul Moser.
Encyclopedia and dictionary articles
"Externalism/Internalism" and "Problems of Induction", in E. Sosa & J. Dancy, A Companion To Epistemology.
"A Priori/A Posteriori", "Coherence Theory of Truth" and "Broad, Charlie Dunbar" in The Cambridge Dictionary Of Philosophy, ed. Robert Audi, Cambridge University Press, 1995.
