Questions tagged [social-epistemology]
The social-epistemology tag has no usage guidance.
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Is the response (in the mathematics community) to Wiles' proof of Fermat's Last Theorem, evidence for social constructivism about math?
Wiles' proof initially involved reference to functional equivalents of inaccessible cardinals (here, Grothendieck universes). Rather than take this as evidence for the meaningfulness and usefulness of ...
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Looking for theories/references about how social conventions are formed and followed
Social changes happen all the time. Sometimes changes lead to conventions. Certain ways of living, certain lifestyles, certain regulations become conventional. People follow them without questioning ...
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Philosophy of social media
I recently came across this Instagram post: https://www.instagram.com/p/Ckv00Fuo7po/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
A person says, "thank you for ruining my life" and Instagram replies, "I'...
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How do fact and belief relate to each other?
So I understand the main differences between facts and beliefs, but is there a part where they overlap? Is it possible that there is a point where one can find similarities between both concepts?
How ...
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Linguistic meaning among evolved artificial agents [closed]
Suppose we have used an evolutionary algorithm to produce a community of artificial agents. These agents navigate a virtual environment, seeking food and avoiding predators. No one designed these ...
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Impersonally-accountable communities
I'd like to lay out a few thoughts about how ideas rise and fall within communities. Is there a philosopher I can read that expresses these kinds of ideas better?
Some communities adopt ideas more as ...
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Which philosophers and philosophies discuss "worldview epistemologies"?
A lot of theologians and religious thinkers advance the idea that in order for any position to have meaning in epistemology or ethics or metaphysics it is necessary to interpret reality through some ...
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Are different conception of morality just new terms for science-friendly versions of religions?
Note: religion is herein defined as "a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith".
Given that there are multiple mutually exclusive conceptions of morality, both ...
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Need help with this paper on epistemic justice
What form must a theory of epistemic injustice take in order to successfully illuminate the epistemic dimensions of struggles that are primarily political? How can such struggles be understood as ...
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Name for believing reality cannot be modeled?
What is the name for the belief that truth and reality cannot be modeled or represented logically, intellectually, nor linguistically and hence cannot actually be discussed?
Do any philosophers say ...
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Is there a reason that utilitarianism is the "default" moral system of thinking for many humans, and if so, why?
Over the past few centuries a shift has been seen, from the likes of strict adherence to Christianity (at least, in Europe) to greater reliance on science, etc. as observed by Friedrich Nietzsche. ...
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Is Durkheimian critique of Kantian understanding of space and time valid?
In one chapter in The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life and in paper Primitive classification (Mauss also), Durkheim critiques Kantian a priori pure forms of sensibility: space and time; on basis,...
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References Request about Social Networks
I want to explore what paradigms underlie social networks (especially online networks as twitter, Instagram, Facebook, etc.) with respect to several aspects. For example, regarding knowledge: do ...
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How does one distinguish fact and belief?
I have seen a similar question, but I am looking for the distinction between fact and belief, and not knowledge and belief. Also, I do not seek, necessarily, Plato's view.
In order to distinguish fact ...
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Should an ethical system aspire to rigorous epistemological justification, and is it possible to attain?
There seems to be no ethical system which does not rely on either the generalization of the mind (ie, arguments reliant upon compassion or empathy) or the assumption of some starting value (ie, "...
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Is there a philosophical model of sensations-emotions-thoughts?
Ten years ago, I read Vankatesh Rao's blog post The Gervais Principle. It blew my mind, as it did the minds of many other people. It quickly became Rao's most popular blog post entry, prompting a ...
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Is there consensus on the framework of truth one should use when talking about moral statements?
My understanding is that for a moral realist, moral statements are propositions that have a true/false property that can guide reasoning. However, most articles I have read do not talk about what ...
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Language and Sociology [closed]
Could someone systematically, methodologically, organisedly research Sociology, Civilisation, Culture through Language?
I.e The state of Language would be the observation and one would give a ...
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What is structural power in Miranda Fricker's Epistemic Injustice?
I'm reading Epistemic Injustice by Miranda Fricker (looking at pages 10 and 11 here) and she starts out by defining power. One of the things she says is
[...] power can operate purely structurally.
...
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Why should/can politics concern aspects of social life?
Why should/can politics concern aspects of social life?
Such as those pertraining to relationships or labour rights. Why can one claim that "there exists a right social life model", which is what the ...
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Is there anything in epistemology beyond exploration+reinforcement learning (RL)? [closed]
I am trying to build consciousness in artificial intelligence. The general mechanism is that agent (randomly or based on some preexisting knowledge) performs some actions (gets some knowledge, makes ...
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Social theory of science?
A lot of philosophers of science try to explain what science is through a normative approach. That it, they try to show what are norms and standards the satisfaction of which make a theory or practice ...
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Is there any study about how half-baked philosophies encourage maladaptive thoughts? [closed]
There are many schools of philosophy that advocate refuting perceived phenomena, for example:
Taoism: the bad equals the good, why be afraid or avoid the bad ones?
Science: before proving it ...
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Authors that wrote on how to look for the truth efficiently?
The human mind is perhaps not efficient when it comes to looking for the truth, specially when you are emotionally attached to an idea about any subject such us close relatives, God, your government, "...
user22051
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How can social philosophy deviate from mere opinions/views?
How can social philosophy deviate from mere opinions/views?
Can one prove/demonstrate social philosophies somehow?
What about, are social philosophies also supposed to exist as "social truths", not ...
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Functionalism, its key concepts and social phenomena
I have a class test and have been instructed to find the following information and I have chosen the functionalism perspective and in particular Emile Durkheim as one of its key thinkers.
State the ...
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Is evolutionary "morality" really the same thing as human morality?
In a different question I asked, Chris Johns' answer pinpointed exactly why all of the answers didn't satisfy me, so I'd like to ask a follow-up question which will further focus my question - would ...
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Evolution - how (epistemologically) an instinctive moral is possible?
I've asked a question about how evolution would explain morality, which lead me to a more basic question - if an instinct would tell the group members to act altruistically, where would that instinct ...
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Axiomatic politics
Is there a formalized version of politics out there? I think political debates on TV today are just like spewing junk. We really need to formalize and logically analyze politics (in my opinion). ...
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What is the consensus on metaphysical innocence of social construction (2N2C)?
What is the consensus about 2N2C? Is there any broad consensus on its truth, or utility?
That's the fun abbreviated title of Boyd's No Non Causal Contribution (double N, double C) thesis, see ...
user25714
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Is it morally wrong to deny friendship with nice people? [closed]
If someone you got to know who always has been polite to you tells you honestly that he likes you, is it morally wrong to tell him that you don't want to spend time with him?
On one hand, one could ...
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Does culture bias weaken the argument that modern science and a religious world view are compatible?
A typical argument between an atheist and a theist goes along the following lines:
ATH: "Modern science and reason are incompatible with a religious world view."
TH: "That's not true, many scientists,...
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Is there a conflict between upholding rational justification and seeing societal norms as its ultimate source?
Societal norms in many philosophical schools has come to be seen as the end-all determinant of rational life.
This attitude is displayed by Richard Rorty when he says "truth is simply a compliment ...
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How can one objectivley measure the nobility or value of a given pursuit?
John Stuart Mill famously said:
It is quite compatible with the principle of utility to recognise the fact, that some kinds of pleasure are more desirable and more valuable than others. It would ...
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If everything is theory laden, how can one argue against climate change deniers?
Per Quine's results from "Two Dogmas of Empiricism", the Duhem-Quine thesis, and later results such as those of Kuhn and Feyerabend, all empirical observations are theory laden. Even widely accepted ...
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Is Logic Pre-Human?
It was German philosopher Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) who famously said, "animals are poor in world." Although this may be true, I do not see them as being poor in logic. Paleontologists have ...
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(How) Does philosophy make you a better moral agent?
Where (literature) would you recommend I start if I wanted to explore the intuition that the practice of philosophy makes/could (if proper) make philosophers better moral agents? Thanks.
user19606
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What is the difference between explanatory, descriptive, and predictive analysis?
What is the difference between explanatory, descriptive, and predictive analysis? If one accepts the argument that we cannot hope to explain why/how someone from another culture acts, then how can we ...
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Are there any critical responses to Peter Winch?
In The Idea of a Social Science, Winch takes a hard stance against naturalistic and positive accounts of social phenomena. In fact, he argues that we cannot understand the meaning of social action ...
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Can one argue against the objectivity of Social Media and TV sources as compared to more traditional bibliographical sources? [closed]
People often present fallacious statements based on erroneous facts from social media, blogposts and biased/low quality TV documentaries. How can one argue against such statements by referring to ...
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What is Wittgenstein's "criterial solution" to the problem of other minds?
I'm having difficulty with the language in this article on the Problem of Other Minds. It provides 3 solutions to the epistemological problem of other minds in section 1.1 - "The Epistemological ...
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Are Methodological Assumptions of StackExchange Fundamentally Flawed?
I looked here for an answer while writing a paper on evidence and scientific inference. I then saw the bold claims made by the website that the process goes as follows:
Anybody can ask a question
...
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Systems of Merits and inclusive Participation... Has this Utopian social system already a name?
First of all... no professional philosophers on this side... Just stepping inside this Philosophy platform... That said...
For some years already some friends and I have been dealing with a utopia of ...
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Why should we believe other people, or scientists?
Looking for sourced answers or article references for this question, please.
Why should someone believe another person's assertions? I would imagine that the answer is because most of the times when ...
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Unconscious Mental States and the Ontological Subjectivity of Reality
Searle claims that social reality is ontologically subjective. By this, should one interpret him as meaning that our perception of reality is ontologically subjective since perception requires ...
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What is the relationship between the rhizome and the body without organs?
I am in the middle of A Thousand Plateaus and considering the relationship between rhizome and body without organs.
One thought I had is that they both take part in the constitution of relationships ...
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Philosophy of Synergy and Collaboration [closed]
So I'm trying to study sociology and the science of human collaboration. Are there particularly throrogh books on this topic that anyone knows of? And indeed I am looking mainly at the philosophy ...
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How to spread the philosophical word? [closed]
I personally think, thinking about philosophy is a very good mean to keep calm when it comes to stressful times. I know some people that don't care about philosophy at all. It's too esoteric for them, ...
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Why is philosophy viewed as unnecessary, extra, by the common man?
This may be more of a sociology or psychology question as
I do not mean "What is the point of philosophy today?" (You can find many related questions at my favorites.)
Then what I mean is, how does ...
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Is Culture a Subset of Nature or Vice Versa?
We have often heard that human history compared to the geological or biological historical record is merely just a blip on the map of time. Compared with cultural agencies, processes, and aims, ...
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