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DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20240520
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20240523
DTSTAMP:20260615T054013
CREATED:20231109T140737Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240520T055346Z
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SUMMARY:The Epistemology of Inquiry
DESCRIPTION:The event is hybrid and open to philosophy faculty and students outside 58łÔąĎ. Remote participants can access the teams link by requesting it from Patrick Winther-Larsen (pjwl@st-andrews.ac.uk) or Jessica Brown (jab30@st-andrews.ac.uk). \nSpeakers: \nEndre Begby (Simon Fraser University)\nSanford Goldberg (Northwestern/58łÔąĎ)\nJoshua Habgood-Coote (Leeds)\nChris Kelp (Glasgow)\nJulia Staffel (Colorado)\nElise Woodard (KCL\, London) \nProgramme: \nMay 20th:  \n11:30AM — 1PM: Sanford Goldberg; \n1PM — 2PM: Lunch; \n2PM — 3:30PM: Joshua Habgood-Coote; \n3:30PM — 4PM: afternoon coffee/tea plus biscuits; \n4PM — 5:30PM: Elise Woodard; \nDinner: 6:30 at Forgans \nMay 21st:  \n9:30AM — 11AM: Chris Kelp; \n11AM — 11:30AM: morning tea/coffee; \n11:30AM — 1PM: Julia Staffel; \n1PM — 2PM: lunch; \n2PM — 3:30PM: Endre Begby. \nAbstracts\nEndre Begby. Doxastic and zetetic norms: mutually dependent and equally fundamental \nThe recent resurgence of interest in the epistemology of inquiry has produced a discussion that is generally structured around the following types of questions: (i) granted that in addition to norms governing how we should form our beliefs in light of our evidence (“doxastic norms”) there also exist norms governing what we should do to provide ourselves with evidence in the first place (“zetetic norms”). But are these latter norms properly construed as epistemic norms\, as opposed to belonging to some broader category of prudential norms? (ii) If doxastic norms and zetetic norms are both epistemic norms\, which is more fundamental? Can we derive one set of norms from the other? Or (iii) should we be open to the possibility that they might be mutually irreducible and independent\, so that they might well generate incompatible obligations in context? \nIn this talk\, I offer some reasons to think that this dialectic is misguided. It is true that we sometimes criticize epistemic agents for the inferences they draw from the evidence currently at their disposal. Likewise\, it is true that we sometimes criticize them for their failure to gather more evidence\, where such evidence is there to be had. What doesn’t follow is that we are always (or even typically) invoking distinct norms in articulating these criticisms. \nTo support this claim\, I will present examples suggesting that in a large (and representative) range of cases — spanning science\, policy decisions\, and everyday life –\, what we should believe on our current evidence is importantly indeterminate: in order to settle which hypothesis our current evidence supports we require more evidence\, evidence which we could only gain by engaging in further inquiry. But on the other hand\, we could never know what sort of inquiry we thereby ought to engage in unless we also had a reasonably clear sense of what epistemic possibilities our current evidence leaves open and what it forecloses. I conclude that from the point of view of epistemic normativity\, the doxastic and zetetic perspectives are complementary\, mutually dependent\, and equally fundamental. \nSanford Goldberg. The norms of inquiry and the demands of conversation \nIn this paper I want to revisit Stalnaker’s (1978; 2002) Common Ground (CG) model as a way of thinking about inquiry.  While the CG is standardly used to model information updates in the course of (conversations about) inquiry\, my aim is to show how we can use the CG to model how the norms of inquiry bear on epistemic assessment.  I pursue this aim by developing several ideas regarding the CG.  Among these ideas I highlight the following: (1) there are types of conversation (Green 2017) which are such that participants are properly expected to presuppose certain things throughout the conversation (I call these the conversation’s “normative presuppositions”); (2) some inquiries are such that there is a corresponding conversation-type associated with them (throughout the period of inquiring); (3) for some social (or institutional) roles\, subjects who occupy these roles are properly expected to participate in certain conversations (including some associated with inquiries); (4) assertions made in the context of inquiry answer to an epistemic standard; and (5) assertions that contradict\, or are in tension with\, the conversation’s normative presuppositions are presumptively criticizable.  In this way\, I hope to show that there are types of inquiry for which the CG model enables us to capture our answerability to the norms of inquiry themselves and to the widely-accepted results thereby attained. \nJoshua Habgood-Coote. Bad Questions.  \nThis paper is about questions which are bad as questions\, in the sense that pursuing them will impede progress in inquiry. It seeks to do three things. First\, to gather examples of question critique: criticisms of views based not on their claims or arguments\, but the questions they ask. Second to give an account of the function of questions which sheds light on the varieties of bad question. And thirdly\, to provide us with a sound normative basis on which to undertake question critique.  \nChris Kelp. Inquiry and Epistemic Psychology \nThis paper proposes an account of epistemic psychological attitudes (such as belief\, credences\, suspension\, etc.) according to which they are types of moves in inquiry that have their own constitutive aims. I zoom in on belief and show how the account I developed in Inquiry\, Knowledge\, and Understanding can deal with a range of objections that have been raised in recent literature. The remainder of the paper takes a closer look at an alternative view of the relation between inquiry and epistemic psychology\, developed in recent work by Jane Friedman and provides reason to think that my account compares favourably with Friedman’s. \nJulia Staffel. Are there transitional beliefs? – I think so? \nA question that has gathered much interest in epistemology recently is whether it can ever be rational to keep inquiring into a question once one has adopted a belief that answers it. Friedman (2019) has prominently argued for a negative answer to this question. \nI am interested in a related\, but slightly different question here\, which has not gathered any attention\, but will help us better understand the nature of belief and its relation to inquiry and deliberation: Is it ever rationally permissible to believe something prior to concluding one’s deliberation? My question differs from the more commonly discussed one\, insofar as it asks about the rationality of believing that p before settling on p as the answer to some question Q\, while the commonly discussed one asks about the rationality of continuing to inquire into Q after coming to believe that p is the answer to Q. \nI will argue that it is possible for rational agents to hold beliefs of a certain kind\, which I call transitional beliefs\, prior to settling on an answer to a question. Further\, I will show that many common claims about what beliefs are don’t identify important features of belief itself\, but of attitudes that are held as conclusions of deliberations more generally. \nElise Woodard. How to Change Your Mind \nIf realists are more likely to become anti-realists than vice versa\, is that evidence that anti-realism is true? I argue that the answer is yes. When more people move from view A to B than B to A\, this is defeasible evidence that B is more likely correct than A. This idea\, which I refer to as “Migration as Evidence\,” suggests that widespread changes in belief could be meaningful indicators of truth. This approach has two main benefits. First\, it provides an additional tool for forming opinions on complex and controversial issues in areas like philosophy\, politics\, and religion\, where even experts disagree. Second\, it encourages a culture where changing one’s mind is more openly shared and less socially penalized\, fostering an environment where the pursuit of truth is prioritized over consistency. If correct\, “Migration as Evidence” highlights a valuable yet overlooked source of information when inquiring about complex and contentious issues. \n  \n 
URL:/philevents/event/the-epistemology-of-inquiry/
LOCATION:Edgecliffe 104\, University of 58łÔąĎ\, 58łÔąĎ\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:Workshops
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20240530
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20240601
DTSTAMP:20260615T054013
CREATED:20240430T043846Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20240530T062311Z
UID:10002052-1717027200-1717199999@www.st-andrews.ac.uk
SUMMARY:Metaphysical Explanation Workshop
DESCRIPTION:The University of 58łÔąĎ ArchĂ© Philosophical Research Centre for Logic\, Language\, Metaphysics and Epistemology will be hosting a workshop on Metaphysical Explanation.\n \nDescription: The purpose of the workshop is to bring together and promote research in the nature of metaphysical explanation\, exploring what it is and how it works. In addition\, the workshop seeks to explore the applications of metaphysical explanation to issues in metaphysics and related issues in analytic philosophy.\n \nSpeakers: Naomi Thompson (University of Bristol)\, Jessica Wilson (University of Toronto)\, Boris Kment (Princeton University)\, and Ross Cameron (University of Virginia).\n \nDATE AND VENUE: 30 May 2024\, Online on Teams.\n \nREGISTER HERE: https://forms.gle/JoSwMCx1edkzPW7N9\n \nPROVISIONAL SCHEDULE (Note: All times are in British Summer Time):\nEvery time slot includes: the main talk (45 mins)\, a commentary and reply (15 mins) and Q&A (15 mins).\n\n \n\n11:55 – 12:00 Preliminary Remarks \n12:00 – 13:15 Naomi Thompson: “Social Metaphysical Explanation” \n13:15 – 13:30 Break \n13:30 – 14:45 Boris Kment: “Ground and Paradox” \n14:45 – 15:00 Break \n15:00 – 16:15 Ross Cameron: “Explanation and Plenitude in Non-Well-Founded Set Theories” \n16:15 – 16:30 Break \n16:30 – 17:45 Jessica Wilson: “Metaphysical Skepticism\, Relativized Metaphysical Modality\, and Moderate Modal Naturalism” \n\n\n \nTITLES AND ABSTRACTS\n\n \nTitle: Social Metaphysical Explanation (Naomi Thompson)\nAbstract: This paper argues that grounding and metaphysical explanation as they are ordinarily conceived are ill-suited to modelling the social world. Social facts are neither necessitated nor generated by their full grounds\, and there are good reasons to think of social metaphysical explanations as non-factive. Where grounding and metaphysical explanation are generally taken to form strict partial orders\, social metaphysical explanations are plausibly holistic. Social metaphysical explanation occurs in a context\, and it requires that in that context\, a social fact be represented as being determined on the basis of further facts\, and that concepts corresponding to social kinds featuring in the social fact to be explained are salient in that context\n\n \n\n\nTitle: Ground and Paradox (Boris Kment)\nAbstract: At the beginning of the 20th century\, Betrand Russell discovered a cluster of paradoxes that showed that certain initially very appealing principles of plenitude and individuation for sets\, properties\, and propositions are classically inconsistent. The search for a plausible\, unified\, and independently motivated solution has met with only limited success. I argue that recent ideas in the theory of grounding yield a new and promising approach. A ground-theoretic analysis of the Russellian paradoxes shows that they rest on assumptions that should be rejected because they violate a plausible non-circularity constraint on grounding. In some of the paradoxes\, the problematic assumption is a principle of plenitude. These paradoxes should be resolved by restrictions on our ontology. In the remaining paradoxes\, the assumption to be abandoned is an instance of the Law of Excluded Middle. The failure of Excluded Middle reflects the fact that reality is incomplete\, in the sense that some questions cannot be answered. We can settle such questions only by ruling out every possible answer.\n\n \n\n\nTitle: Explanation and Plenitude in Non-Well-Founded Set Theories (Ross Cameron)\nAbstract: Non-well-founded set theories allow set-theoretic exotica that standard ZFC will not allow\, such as a set that has itself as its sole member. We can distinguish plenitudinous non-well-founded set theories\, such as Boffa set theory\, that allow infinitely many such sets\, from restrictive theories\, such as Finsler-Aczel or AFA\, that allow exactly one. Plenitudinous non-well-founded set theories face a puzzle: nothing seems to explain the identity or distinctness of various of the sets they countenance. In this paper I aim to sharpen this puzzle\, make clear who it does and does not apply to and\, ultimately\, to argue in favor of a plenitudinous theory like Boffa.\n\n\n \n\nTitle: Metaphysical Skepticism\, Relativized Metaphysical Modality\, and Moderate Modal Naturalism (Jessica Wilson)\nAbstract: One route to skepticism about metaphysics (drawing on Rosen 2006\, Chalmers 2009\, Clarke-Doane 2019) proceeds by observing the following tension. On the one hand\, metaphysical claims are supposed to be metaphysically necessary; for example\, if Platonic universals are the metaphysical basis for resemblance between objects\, then this is supposed to be necessarily so. But on the other hand\, the operative modal epistemologies seem to offer support for the possibility of incompatible metaphysical claims; for example\, it seems conceivable both that Platonic universals might be the basis for resemblance between objects\, and also conceivable that tropes might be such a basis. Here I consider two strategies of response. The first—resistance—maintains that a better modal epistemology\, based in abduction (IBE) as opposed to conceiving and the like\, might justify one metaphysical claim over others (per Biggs and Wilson 2018\, 2020). The second strategy — accommodation — appeals to Relativized Metaphysical Modality\, or RMM (Murray and Wilson 2012; Hellie\, Murray\, and Wilson 2020)\, according to which what is possible or necessary may depend on facts about how the world actually is. RMM makes room for just one of a set of competing metaphysical claims to be true and hence metaphysically necessary\, while at the same time explaining intuitions that competing metaphysical claims are possible\, as reflecting (mere) speculative consideration of what would be possible or necessary against the backdrop assumption that a different world is actual. This strategy can be seen as expanding the application of Kripke’s notion of necessary a posteriori truths beyond the standard natural kind expressions to general metaphysical claims.
URL:/philevents/event/metaphysical-explanation-workshop/
CATEGORIES:Workshops
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