Tentativity

Tentativity is the stance that all knowledge — including conclusions we are confident in and criticisms we accept — is held provisionally, open to revision when we think of new ideas or get new evidence. It is a core Critical Rationalist inheritance: because fallibilism says any idea could contain an undetected error, no idea ever earns final, perfect, or guaranteed status. CR therefore calls all knowledge “conjectural knowledge” — tentative guesses with no special authority.

CF’s specific contribution is to show that tentativity does not entail indecision or chronic doubt. The mistake CF targets is treating fallibility as a universal solvent for confidence: doubting whether your door exists because you “might be confused.” Fallibility says you are capable of error; it does not imply any particular claim is an error, so it is not itself a criticism of anything except a claim to infallibility. Absent an actual criticism, you should act on your best idea seriously and confidently.

This is how CF reconciles fallibilism with decisive action. Rather than weighing rival ideas by degree of belief, you accept a single non-refuted idea — one with no known error — and act on it, while remaining ready to reconsider. Tentativity opposes infallibilism and certainty as the resting state of knowledge, and rejects justificationism‘s demand that ideas be propped up with positive support before use. Doubt should be appropriate to context, not selectively or universally applied.