Abstract
This paper is motivated by the need to respond to the spread of influential misinformation and manufactured ignorance, which places pressure on the work of experts in various sectors. To meet this need, the paper discusses the conditions required for expert testimony to evolve a reconceptualisation of negative capability as a new form of epistemic humility. In this regard, professional knowledge formation is not considered to be separate from the institutional and social processes and values that uphold its production. Drawing attention to the structural and relational aspects of ignorance, as opposed to the individualistic and internal aspects, we rely on the sociology of knowledge, the social epistemologies and the feminist epistemologies that have played a fundamental role in the development of the investigation of ignorance. First, we analyse the criteria for epistemic humility based on prior theoretical discussions concerning negative knowledge as a form of reflective practice. Then, we seek to determine what kinds of strategies, virtues and skills experts need to have so as to ‘manage ignorance’ in socially complex situations. Finally, we suggest the reformulation of negative expertise as a phronetic skill for navigating through situations of ignorance and uncertainty in an epistemically and socially responsible manner.
Highlights
The global trends of economic insecurity, educational inequality, democratic deficits and socio-economic exclusion have intensified the epistemic tensions between author-Synthese (2021) 198:3873–3891 ities and citizens in recent years
Our approach to the epistemic humility of expertise reconsiders the notion of negative expertise when trying to capture the ‘external’ condition of reflective practice and discussing the role played by ignorance, insecurity and disinformation in the context of professional knowledge
We draw on the sociology of knowledge (Knorr Cetina 1999), feminist epistemologies (Townley 2011) and virtue epistemology (Levy 2019), and we suggest that a focus on negative expertise can supplement them all, negative expertise as such need not be limited to any individual epistemological approach
Summary
The global trends of economic insecurity, educational inequality, democratic deficits and socio-economic exclusion have intensified the epistemic tensions between author-. Our approach to the epistemic humility of expertise reconsiders the notion of negative expertise when trying to capture the ‘external’ condition of reflective practice and discussing the role played by ignorance, insecurity and disinformation in the context of professional knowledge. By focusing on the external pressures on both the formation of expert knowledge and the conditions of expert testimony, our study evolves a novel epistemological approach to the epistemic humility of expertise, thereby identifying the role played by disinformation in the knowledge-intensive work of professionals. Relying on social and feminist epistemological considerations of knowledge, we move on to discuss the asymmetrical epistemic relations between experts and laypeople so as to understand the micro- and macro-level relationality inherent in manufactured ignorance. We draw on the sociology of knowledge (Knorr Cetina 1999), feminist epistemologies (Townley 2011) and virtue epistemology (Levy 2019), and we suggest that a focus on negative expertise can supplement them all, negative expertise as such need not be limited to any individual epistemological approach
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