Epistemic Benefits Research Articles

The Epistemic Benefits of Diversifying the Philosophy of Religion

There have been recent calls to expand contemporary analytic philosophy of religion beyond the oft implicitly assumed Christian tradition. Instead of exploring moral reasons to expand the discipline, I argue that there are strong epistemic reasons to favour diversifying the philosophy of religion. Increasing diversity is likely to increase disagreement, and there are epistemic benefits to be gained from the existence of disagreement. I argue that such considerations quite clearly apply to the philosophy of religion, and as such that there are epistemic reasons to diversify the field. I conclude by offering a number of practical steps we can take towards achieving this end which are relatively easy to implement.

Shopping with perceived benefits of sustainable consumption in online resale platforms

PurposeInterest is increasing in sustainable consumption, including the purchase of used products instead of new ones. This study aims to examine customer behaviors in the context of resale websites. Specifically, it aims to identify the relative role of multidimensional perceived benefits associated with customer attitudes.Design/methodology/approachData are derived from a survey conducted among 169 resale website customers in the USA. Structural equation modeling (using SmartPLS software) is used to examine the hypothesized relationships.FindingsResults show that epistemic benefits mostly serve to create positive attitudes, followed by economic and functional benefits. However, emotional and social benefits from purchase experience with resale websites fail to influence customers' positive attitudes.Research limitations/implicationsThe main limitation of the study lies in the generalizability of findings given that the results and conclusions are based on the study of a single industry. More studies would help to provide a deeper understanding of sustainable consumption across different types of product categories.Originality/valueThis study shows that customers' positive attitudes increase their intention to repurchase from resale websites, suggesting an area of opportunity for resale service providers to design websites to facilitate customer self-expression, to reinforce economic efficiency and to highlight the performance of products and services.

The epistemic benefits of generalisation in modelling II: expressive power and abstraction.

This paper contributes to the philosophical accounts of generalisation in formal modelling by introducing a conceptual framework that allows for recognising generalisations that are epistemically beneficial in the sense of contributing to the truth of a model result or component. The framework is useful for modellers themselves because it is shown how to recognise different kinds of generalisation on the basis of changes in model descriptions. Since epistemically beneficial generalisations usually de-idealise the model, the paper proposes a reformulation of the well-known distinction between abstraction and idealisation. A reformulated notion of abstraction is needed because the extant accounts yield wrong judgments when model-modifications introduce implicit assumptions.

The Epistemic Innocence of Irrational Beliefs, by Lisa Bortolotti

I have long been struck by the fact that we do not simply survive but navigate this world quite successfully despite all the irrational beliefs we are inclined to adopt and hang on to. This book is an attempt to make sense of the idea that our undesirable and at times cringeworthy irrationality may support our way to succeed as imperfect agents. (Bortolotti 2020, p. 1) So begins Dr Lisa Bortolotti’s excellent new book, The Epistemic Innocence of Irrational Beliefs (henceforth TEIIB). Of course, the observation that irrational beliefs can bring practical benefits is not an original one. Philosophers and psychologists, including Bortolotti herself (2014), have long drawn attention to the role that irrational beliefs can play in promoting various kinds of practical success, delivering psychological (Taylor and Brown 1988), social (Williams 2020), and biological benefits for their believers (McKay and Dennett 2009). TEIIB breaks genuinely new ground in this area, however. According to Bortolotti, epistemically irrational beliefs can—in fact, frequently do—promote not just practical success but epistemic success. Specifically, such beliefs often promote our epistemic functionality, our ability to pursue and attain epistemic goals, producing significant epistemic benefits that could not—or at least could not as easily—be attained by more rational beliefs. To capture such cases, Bortolotti argues that we need a new concept: epistemic innocence.

The epistemic benefits of generalisation in modelling I: Systems and applicability

The epistemic benefits of generalisation in modelling I: Systems and applicability

The Epistemic Value of Testimony

AbstractThis article brings together two sets of insights about deliberative democracy and uses them to develop a novel epistemic justification for the importance of testimony. Some democratic theorists have argued persuasively that a deliberative process limited to formal argumentation is exclusionary and thus undermines democratic legitimacy; they have made a compelling case for testimony on grounds of democratic inclusion. Others have made the case that deliberation has important epistemic benefits. Those theorists emphasize the give and take of reasons as a means to arrive at well-informed collective decisions. The author’s central claim is that there is an important epistemic value to the inclusion of testimony. It can introduce new information into the deliberative process. It can enable deliberators to grasp connections between the particular and the general. And it can invite them to imaginatively engage with the experiences of others. These epistemic benefits provide a new set of reasons for including testimony in democratic deliberation.

Replications in Comparative Psychology

In order to assess the status of replications in comparative psychology, it is important to clarify what constitutes a replicated experiment. In this paper, I adopt the Resampling Account of replication recently advanced by the philosopher Edouard Machery. I apply this account to a particular area of comparative psychology: nonhuman primate theory of mind research. Two key findings emerge from this analysis. First, under the account of replication advanced here, genuine replications are common in comparative psychology. Second, different types of replications offer different epistemic benefits to researchers. This second finding diverges from Machery’s view, but provides insight into how the Resampling Account works in practice. I conclude that community-level change is needed in order to promote a wide range of replications and their associated diversity of epistemic benefits.

Is the biological adaptiveness of delusions doomed?

Delusions are usually considered as harmful and dysfunctional beliefs, one of the primary symptoms of a psychiatric illness and the mark of madness in popular culture. However, in recent times a much more positive role has been advocated for delusions. More specifically, it has been argued that delusions might be an (imperfect) answer to a problem rather than problems in themselves. By delivering psychological and epistemic benefits, delusions would allow people who face severe biological or psychological difficulties to survive in their environment - although this has obvious epistemic costs, as the delusion is fixed and irresponsive to compelling counterevidence. In other words, it has been argued that delusions are biologically adaptive. The adaptiveness of delusions has been compared by Ryan McKay and Daniel Dennett to a shear pin, a mechanism installed in the drive engine of some machines which is designed to shear whenever the machine is about to break down. By breaking, shear pins prevent the machine from collapsing and allow it to keep functioning, although in an impaired manner. Similarly, when delusions form, they would allow a cognitive or psychological system which is about to collapse to continue its functioning, although in an impaired manner. However, this optimistic picture of delusions risks being undermined by both theoretical and empirical considerations. Using Sarah Fineberg and Philip Corlett’s recent predictive coding account as a paradigmatic model of the biological adaptiveness of delusions, I develop two objections to it: (1) principles of parsimony and simplicity suggest that maladaptive models of delusions have an upper hand over adaptive models; and (2) the available empirical evidence suggests that at least some delusions stand good chances of being psychologically adaptive, but it is unlikely that they also qualify as biologically adaptive.

Hidden figures: epistemic costs and benefits of detecting (invisible) diversity in science

Demographic diversity might often be present in a group without group members noticing it. What are the epistemic effects if they do? Several philosophers and social scientists have recently argued that when individuals detect demographic diversity in their group, this can result in epistemic benefits even if that diversity doesn’t involve cognitive differences. Here I critically discuss research advocating this proposal, introduce a distinction between two types of detection of demographic diversity, and apply this distinction to the theorizing on diversity in science. Focusing on ‘invisible’ diversity (i.e., differences in, e.g., LGBTQ+, religious, or political orientation), I argue that in one common kind of group in science, if group members have full insight into their group’s diversity, this is likely to create epistemic costs. These costs can be avoided and epistemic benefits gained if group members only partly detect their group’s diversity. There is thus an epistemic reason for context-dependent limitations on scientists’ insight into the diversity of their group.

Shared Belief and the Limits of Empathy

AbstractTo show affective empathy is to share in another person's experiences, including her emotions. Most philosophers who write about emotions accept the broadly cognitivist view that emotions are rationally connected with beliefs. We argue that affective empathy is also rationally connected with belief; you can only share in another's emotions insofar as you can share certain of her beliefs. In light of that claim, we argue that affective empathy brings both epistemic dangers and epistemic benefits, that the ideal of universal empathy cannot be built upon affective empathy, and that affective empathy cannot be the basis of morality.

Kirk Lougheed, The Epistemic Benefits of Disagreement

Kirk Lougheed, The Epistemic Benefits of Disagreement

The Epistemic Value of Civil Disagreement

In this article, I argue that the practice of civil disagreement has robust epistemic benefits and that these benefits enable meaningful forms of reconciliation—across worldview lines and amid the challenging information environment of our age. I then engage two broad groups of objections: either that civil disagreement opposes, rather than promotes, clarity, or else that it does little to help it. If successful, my account gives us reason to include civil disagreement among what Mill calls “the real morality of public discussion,” a fact that should stir us to take more seriously the decline of civility in contemporary life.

Artificial life and ‘nature’s purposes’: The question of behavioral autonomy

AbstractThis paper investigates the concept of behavioral autonomy in Artificial Life by drawing a parallel to the use of teleological notions in the study of biological life. Contrary to one of the leading assumptions in Artificial Life research, I argue that there is a significant difference in how autonomous behavior is understood in artificial and biological life forms: the former is underlain by human goals in a way that the latter is not. While behavioral traits can be explained in relation to evolutionary history in biological organisms, in synthetic life forms behavior depends on a design driven by a research agenda, further shaped by broader human goals. This point will be illustrated with a case study on a synthetic life form. Consequently, the putative epistemic benefit of reaching a better understanding of behavioral autonomy in biological organisms by synthesizing artificial life forms is subject to doubt: the autonomy observed in such artificial organisms may be a mere projection of human agency. Further questions arise in relation to the need to spell out the relevant human aims when addressing potential social or ethical implications of synthesizing artificial life forms.

Epistemic benefits of the material theory of induction

C. D. Broad famously labelled the problem of providing our inductive practices with a proper justification “the scandal of philosophy” (Broad, 1952). Recently, John Norton has provided a dissolution of this problem (2014). According to Norton, inductive inference is grounded in particular facts obtaining within particular domains (J. Norton, 2003b, 2010, 2014). Because the material theory does not involve a universal schema of induction, Norton claims it dissolves the problem of induction (which implies that such universal schemas cannot be justified).In this paper, I critically evaluate Norton's dissolution. In particular, I argue that the problem of induction is an epistemological problem, that Norton's material theory entails an externalist epistemology, and that it is a common feature of such epistemologies that they dissolve the problem of induction. The upshot is that the material theory is not unique in its ability to reap the specifically epistemic benefits of dissolving the problem of induction, and thus that the epistemic advantages of the material theory over extant alternatives in this regard are fewer than it may appear at first sight.

Argumentative Deliberation and the Development of Intellectual Humility and Autonomy in the Classroom

It is argued that argumentative deliberation, which involves the interpersonal exchange and evaluation of reasons and counter-reasons, is crucial for the generation of epistemic goods given that it helps us eradicate errors and neutralise biases. However, to reap argumentative deliberation’s epistemic benefits, the deliberators need to instantiate a certain intellectual character: in particular, they need to be intellectually humble and autonomous. Given that, it is argued that the educational system should foster the development of the intellectual virtues of humility and autonomy. Moreover, some pedagogical strategies and practices as to how this can be achieved in the classroom are offered.

Epistemological Disjunctivism and the Value of Presence

AbstractEpistemological disjunctivists make two strong claims about perceptual experience's epistemic value: (1) experience guarantees the knowledgeable character of perceptual beliefs; (2) experience's epistemic value is “reflectively accessible”. In this paper I develop a form of disjunctivism grounded in a presentational view of experience, on which the epistemic benefits of experience consist in the way perception presents the subject with aspects of her environment. I show that presentational disjunctivism has both dialectical and philosophically fundamental advantages over more traditional expositions. Dialectically, presentational disjunctivism resolves a puzzle disjunctivists face in their posture vis-à-vis skeptical scenarios. More systematically, presentational disjunctivism provides an especially compelling view of disjunctivism as an internalist view of perceptual consciousness by explaining the way perceptual presence manifests the subject's rationality in a distinct way.

Respectful operationalism

I first argue that there are three major currents in the contemporary debate on operationalism. These are: (a) methodologists who criticize operationalism qua philosophy, (b) psychologists who practice operationalization that is allegedly philosophically noncommittal, and (c) critics who claim that psychologists’ validation practices commit them to stronger operationalism than psychologists realize. I then outline respectful operationalism and argue that it avoids the main criticisms of operationalism while incorporating some of the epistemic benefits of operational definitions. I show how respectful operationalism aligns with other operationalism-friendly theories, such as generalizability theory and Michael T. Kane’s argument-based approach to validity.

Is There a Role for Adversariality in Teaching Critical Thinking?

There has been considerable recent debate regarding the possible epistemic benefits versus the potential risks of adversariality in argumentation. Nonetheless, this debate has rarely found its way into work on critical thinking theory and instruction. This paper focuses on the implications of the adversariality debate for teaching critical thinking. Is there a way to incorporate the benefits of adversarial argumentation while mitigating the problems? Our response is an approach based on dialectical inquiry which focuses on a confrontation of opposing views within a collaborative framework.

A Causal Mechanistic Perspective on Micro-Foundations in Family Business: The Case of CE

This paper is a conceptual contribution to the debate on micro- foundations in family business research. We advocate a causal- mechanistic approach to micro-foundations which is centered on the notion of causal mechanisms as responsible for the emergence of phenomena at the organizational level, such as corporate entrepreneurship in family firms. We distinguish two alternative purposes of the research process that can take advantage from it: prediction and explanation. First, we argue that knowledge of causal mechanisms can be exploited when testing hypothesis that draw on the mechanistic potential of dominant theories in family business research thus leading to better predictions. Second, we show how the mechanistic reasoning is a natural ally of major forms of explanation in the field thus improving current explanatory accounts in terms of internal validity, completeness and accuracy. The paper concludes by summarizing the epistemic benefits of the causal-mechanistic approach and offering suggestions for future research.

The Epistemic Benefits of Worldview Disagreement

ABSTRACT In my recent book, The Epistemic Benefits of Disagreement, I develop a defense of non-conciliationism, but one that only applies in research contexts: Epistemic benefits are more likely in the offing if inquirers stick to their guns in the face of disagreement. I aim to expand my original account by examining its implications for non-inquiry beliefs. I’m particularly interested in broader worldview disagreements. I want to examine how inquirers should react upon discovering that they disagree about the truth value of a particular proposition because they disagree about a whole host of related propositions. I argue that in many ways, worldview disagreements are easier to work with than disagreement over isolated propositions, in part because it is easier to provide a set of criteria by which to evaluate worldviews. I conclude that my original argument can, at least in part, be successfully expanded to include worldview disagreement.