Epistemology Commons^™

Skepticism As Epistemic Naturalization, Dylan Vallance

2016 Undergraduate Awards

Responses to radical philosophical skepticism often interpret skeptical arguments as conceptual challenges that must be overcome if common epistemic practices are to remain justifiably practicable. Such responses treat skeptical arguments as attacks on our ability to justifiably make knowledge claims, wherein the skeptic attempts to isolate conceptual problems embedded in common epistemic processes that debar those processes from the potential to produce knowledge. In this framework, the successful skeptic reveals our constitutional epistemic blindness while the successful response defangs the skeptic’s attack on our capacity for knowledge.

This paper argues that this interpretation is predicated on a fundamental misunderstanding of …

Evidence For Anti-Intellectualism About Know-How From A Sentence Recognition Task, Ian Harmon, Zachary Horne

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

An emerging trend in cognitive science is to explore central epistemological questions using psychological methods. Early work in this growing area of research has revealed that epistemologists' theories of knowledge diverge in various ways from the ways in which ordinary people think of knowledge. Reflecting the practices of epistemology as a whole, the vast majority of these studies have focused on the concept of propositional knowledge, or knowledge-that. Many philosophers, however, have argued that knowing how to do something is importantly different from knowing that something is the case. Hence, in this paper we turn our attention to people's concept …

Forget Not The Whip! Nietzsche, Perspectivism, And Feminism: A Non-Apologist Interpretation Of Nietzsche’S Polemical Axiology, Jennifer L. Hudgens

Theses and Dissertations--Philosophy

The nineteenth-century German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche is notoriously a misogynist according to many feminists. In parallel, Nietzsche’s theory of value, perspectivism, is relativist according to many philosophers. However, I propose a counter-reading of both Nietzsche’s comments regarding women and his comments regarding perspective in which I interpret Nietzsche as neither misogynistic nor relativistic. I adopt a stance which is non-apologist, in that I do not merely wash my hands of Nietzsche’s apparently sexist remarks about women as Walter Kaufmann does, for example. Rather I demonstrate that Nietzsche is performing a polemical attack on a particular kind of naïve feminism which …

Evil And Evidence, Matthew A. Benton, John Hawthorne, Yoaav Isaacs

SPU Works

The problem of evil is the most prominent argument against the existence of God. Skeptical theists contend that it is not a good argument. Their reasons for this contention vary widely, involving such notions as CORNEA, epistemic appearances, 'gratuitous' evils, 'levering' evidence, and the representativeness of goods. We aim to dispel some confusions about these notions, in particular by clarifying their roles within a probabilistic epistemology. In addition, we develop new responses to the problem of evil from both the phenomenal conception of evidence and the 'knowledge-first' view of evidence.

Expert Opinion And Second-Hand Knowledge, Matthew A. Benton

SPU Works

Expert testimony figures in recent debates over how best to understand the norm of assertion and the domain-specific epistemic expectations placed on testifiers. Cases of experts asserting with only isolated second-hand knowledge Jennifer (Lackey 2011, 2013) have been used to shed light on whether knowledge is sufficient for epistemically permissible assertion. I argue that relying on such cases of expert testimony introduces several problems concerning how we understand expert knowledge, and the sharing of such knowledge through testimony. Refinements are needed to clarify exactly what principles are being tested by such cases; but once refined, such cases raise more questions …

Cultivating Well-Being And Contemplative Ways Of Knowing Through Connection: One Woman's Journey From Monastic Living To Mainstream Academia, Krista Hamel

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

This thesis examines how different types of connection – intimacy, community, and compassion – can positively impact the cultivation of well-being and ways of knowing. Using Scholarly Personal Narrative methodology (narrative storytelling supported by scholarship) I describe my journey from the 15-years I lived as a monastic yogic nun, followed by a period of heartbreak, to my recent experience as a tip-toeing Buddhist and mid-life graduate student who yearned for community, a place to belong, and an opportunity to be heard, seen and valued. I explore how the pain and suffering of loneliness, grief, loss, and change, when met by …

Epistemic Skills Deficiency In The Project Management Body Of Knowledge, Alex Hosch

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Information Technology (IT) projects continue to fail despite being managed by certified Project Management Professionals (PMP) and professionally trained non-certified Project Managers (PM). This study addressed PMPs and qualified PMs who continue to experience IT project failure at a high rate. The purpose of this qualitative multiple case study was to explore perspectives of PMs and their understanding of project management best practices in the Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK). There were 5 research questions focused on IT project failures, lessons learned, trends, deficiencies in project management framework, and adherence to standard PM practices. This study …

Scientific Fictionalism And The Problem Of Inconsistency In Nietzsche, Justin Remhof

Philosophy Faculty Publications

In this article, I begin to develop Nietzsche’s scientific fictionalism in order to make headway toward resolving a central interpretive issue in his epistemology. For Nietzsche knowledge claims are falsifications. Presumably, this is a result of his puzzling view that truths are somehow false. I argue that Nietzsche thinks knowledge claims are falsifications because he embraces a scientific fictionalist view according to which inexact representations, which are false, can also be accurate, or true, and that this position is not inconsistent.

Book Review: Reason And Faith: Themes From Richard Swinburne, Isaac Choi

Faculty Publications - George Fox School of Theology

A review of Reason and Faith: Themes from Richard Swinburne: Michael Bergmann and Jeffrey E. Brower(Eds.): Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016

ISBN: 978-0198732648

Excerpt: "The papers in this volume were originally presented at a conference at Purdue University, organized by the volume’s editors, in honor of Swinburne’s eightieth birthday. The contributors are all prominent and senior scholars in the field, and several begin with personal reminiscences and tributes to how Swinburne’s work inspired and even helped to initiate their interest in philosophy of religion."

The Importance Of Heidegger’S Question, Surya Sendyl

CMC Senior Theses

In this thesis I present a strong and universally compelling case for the importance of Heidegger’s question, namely, the question of the meaning of being. I show how the being-question has been obscured and forgotten over the past two millennia of western philosophy. I attempt to raise this question again, and elucidate why it is an important one to examine, not only for philosophy as a discipline, but for any human endeavor. My aim is to reach those of you who would normally not come across, or might even dismiss, Heidegger’s work. I hope the arguments I make will convince …

Responsibilist Virtues And The ‘Charmed Inner Circle’ Of Traditional Epistemology, Jason Baehr

Philosophy Faculty Works

In Judgment and Agency, Ernest Sosa takes “reliabilist” virtue epistemology deep into “responsibilist” territory, arguing that “a true epistemology” will assign “responsibilist-cum-reliabilist intellectual virtue the main role in addressing concerns at the center of the tradition.” However, Sosa stops short of granting this status to familiar responsibilist virtues like open-mindedness, intellectual courage, and intellectual humility. He cites three reasons for doing so: responsibilist virtues involve excessive motivational demands; they are quasi-ethical; and they are best understood, not as constituting knowledge, but rather as putting one “in a position” to know. I elaborate on and respond to each of these …

Is Intellectual Character Growth A Realistic Educational Aim?, Jason Baehr

Philosophy Faculty Works

No abstract provided.

08j3c71v17y, Margot Kalach Hanono

Senior Projects Spring 2016

Human consciousness seems uniquely constituted. We add, subtract, divide, link, memorize, imitate, transform, reform, measure, categorize, analyze, predict, deconstruct, and rebuild the world around us as a way of understanding. These structures are ingrained in our everyday life. What does it mean that we know through these illuminating boundaries? And how does knowledge build up on itself on the basis of their entwined systems?

The making of this work consists of a questioning of our constant desire to make sense of things, and the criteria that we build in order to satisfy this desire; in other words, the thought-spheres that …

Comparative Philosophy: Reviewing The State Of The Art, Stephen C. Angle

Stephen C. Angle

Book Review On The Philosophical Challenge From China (Edited By Brian Bruya), Hans Van Eyghen

Comparative Philosophy

In this paper, I review the book The Philosophical Challenge from China, edited by Brian Bruya. I critically discuss each of the 13 contributions.

Vol 7 No 1 Contents Page

Comparative Philosophy

No abstract provided.

Vol 7 No 1 Information Page

Comparative Philosophy

No abstract provided.

Vol 7 No 1 Cover Page

Comparative Philosophy

No abstract provided.

Factors Associated With Treatment Seeking In Automotive Manufacturing, Khin Thingyan Chit

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Introduction

The prevalence of work-related musculoskeletal disorders is very common. The main objective of the study was to identify any association between the severity of musculoskeletal symptoms and treatment choice by workers in automobile manufacturing plants.

Methods

A cross-sectional study of 1017 production workers in six automobile manufacturing plants was performed. The study included the structured interviews to determine symptoms, preexisting personal risk factors, treatment choices (health care provider or no treatment sought), job strain, and job satisfaction. Nordic style questionnaire for symptoms, Karasek’s Demand Control Model and three job satisfaction questions were used to assign symptom severity, job strain, …

“The Researcher’S Challenge: Entertainment Or Epistemology?”, Mary Ann Bolger, Clare Bell

Mary Ann Bolger

The number of journals dedicated solely to the publishing of research in the fields of typography and visual communication is slowly growing. However, very little of this material finds its way back into the studio at undergraduate level. Further, research published in discipline-focussed peer-reviewed journals does ‘not tend to be highly valued by those engaged in practice.’ As a result of this, as Robin Kinross has written, ‘the academic discussion of typography, and design in general, is too often hermetic and unreal: in unholy partnership with the proud anti-intellectualism of many practicing designers’. This has a variety of consequences. In …