Mesbah Yazdi and Laurence BonJour on the Infallibility of Intuitive Beliefs

foundationalists divide beliefs into two basic and non-basic groups and view the former as those not in need to other believes to be justified. Among the basic beliefs, intuitive beliefs have a very stable position and are known as one of the valid principles of knowledge. While maximal rationalists like Descartes consider intuitive beliefs as infallible, moderate rationalists such as Laurence BonJor have viewed them as fallibale. In his explanation of how to justify this type of beliefs, BonJour presents his theory of constitutive awareness. As viewed by him, constitutive awareness is a non-conceptual state which turn into intuitive belief through a descriptive process. Among contemporary Muslim philosophers, Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi has viewed intuitive beliefs as being directly perceived and, therefore, infallible. This paper, with an analytical approach, attempts to explain the viewpoint of Ayatullah Mesbah Yazdi, as a Muslim foundationalist, and Bunjur, as a Western foundationalist, in the field, and answer the objections proposed by western philosophers against infallibility of intuitive beliefs on the basis of Islamic philosophy.