Critical Examination of Epistemological Theories of Coherence

Prepositional knowledge has three necessary and sufficient components: justification, truth and belief. On this view, prepositional knowledge is, by definition (analysis) of knowledge. There are different kinds of theories of justification. One of them is coherence, according to which, a belief is justified if, and only if, it hast reciprocal relations to a system of beliefs. The theory employs the metaphor of a spider web: each intersection in the web has reciprocal relations to the others.There are four kinds of theories of coherence: necessary implication, consistency, explanation and beating or neutralizing.This article discuss critically the different kinds of theories of coherence and shows none of them is sufficient in explaining justification.