Nondoxasticism about Self-Deception

The philosophical difficulties presented by self-deception are vexed and multifaceted. One such difficulty is what I call the doxastic problem' of self-deception. Solving the doxastic problem involves determining whether someone in a state of self-deception that approximate to p both believes that p and believes that approximate to p, simply holds one or the other belief, or, as I will argue, holds neither. This final option, which has been almost entirely overlooked to-date, is what I call nondoxasticism' about self-deception. In this article, I present a negative case for nondoxasticism according to which, in the paradigm case of self-deception, there is no explanatory need to attribute the self-deceived person either their undesired belief that p, or their desired belief that approximate to p. Folk psychology is replete with concepts other than belief, and if we bear this in mind, it becomes clear that the explanatory roles for which the self-deceived person's purported beliefs have traditionally been enlisted can be comfortably filled without recourse to belief.