Social Epistemology

References

• Wikipedia Article on Social Epistemology

Notes

Social Epistemology refers to a broad set of approaches that can betaken in epistemology (the study of knowledge) that construes human knowledge as a collective achievement. Another way of characterizing social epistemology is the evaluation of the social dimensions of knowledge or information.

• As a field of inquiry in analytic philosophy, social epistemology deals with questions about knowledge in social contexts, meaning those in which knowledge attributions cannot be explained by examining individuals in isolation from one another.
• The most common topics discussed in contemporary social epistemology are:
• • testimony
  • • When does a belief that x is true which resulted from being told 'x is true' constitute knowledge?
  • peer disagreement
  • • When and how should I revise my beliefs in light of other people holding beliefs that contract mine?
  • group epistemology
  • • What does it mean to attribute knowledge top groups rather than individuals, and when are such knowledge attributed appropriate?
• Much of the work in social epistemology is in defining knowledge and social
• Social epistemologists may exist working in many of the disciplines of the humanities and social sciences, most commonly in philosophy and sociology. In addition to marking a distinct movement in traditional and analytic epistemology, social epistemology is associated with the interdisciplinary field of science and technology studies (STS).

History of the Term

• The consideration of social dimensions of knowledge in relation to philosophy started in 380 BC with Plato's dialogue: Charmides.
• • This dialogue included Socrates' argument about whether anyone is capable of examining if another man's claim that je knows something, is true or not. In it he questions the degree of certainty an unprofessional in a field can have towards a person's claim to be a specialist in that same field.
  • Charmides also explored the tendency of the utopian vision of social relations to degenerate into dystopian fantasy.
• The term social epistemology was first coined by the library scientists Margaret Egan and Jesse Shera in a Library Quarterly paper at the University of Chicago Library School in the 1950s.
• It was not until the 1980s that the current sense of social epistemology began to emerge.

The Rise of Social Epistemology

In the 1980s, there was a powerful growth of interest amongst philosophers in topis such as epistemic value of testimony, the nature and function of expertise, proper distribution of cognitive labor and resources among individuals in the communities and the status of group reasoning and knowledge.

• In 1987, the philosophical journal Synthese published a special issue on social epistemology which included two authors that have taken the branch of epistemology in two different directions:
• • Alvin Goldman
  • • Goldman advocated for a type of epistemology which is sometimes called veristic epistemology because of its large emphasis on truth.
    • He describes Social Epistemology as knowledge derived from one's interactions with another person, group, or society.
    • This type of epistemology is sometimes seen to side with essentialism as opposed to multiculturalism.
    • On strategy on the socialization of epistemology: he looks at the social factors that influence knowledge formed on true belief.
  • Steve Fuller
  • • Fuller takes preference for the strategy on the socialization of epistemology that defines knowledge influenced by social factors as collectively accepted belief.
    • Fuller's position supports the conceptualization that social epistemology is a critique of context.

Kuhn, Foucault, and the Sociology of Scientific Knowledge

• The basic view of knowledge that motivated the emergence of social epistemology as it is perceived today can be traced to the work of Thomas Kuhn and Michael Foucault, which gained acknowledgement at the end of the 1960s.
• Both Kuhn and Foucault describe truth as a relative and contingent notion.

Social Epistemology

• In the standard sense of the term today, social epistemology is a field within analytic philosophy. It focuses on the social aspects of how knowledge is created and disseminated.
• What precisely these social aspects are, and whether they have beneficial or detrimental effects upon the possibilities to create, acquire or spread knowledge isa subject of continuous debate.
• the social character of knowledge can either be approached through inquiries in inter-individual epistemic relations or through inquiries focusing on epistemic communities.
• Social epistemology as a field within analytic philosophy has close ties to, and often overlaps with, the philosophy of science. While parts of the field engage in abstract, normative considerations of knowledge creation and dissemination, other parts of the field are naturalized epistemology in the sense that they draw on empirically gained insights - which could mean natural science research from, e.g., cognitive psychology, be that qualitative of quantitative social science research.

Major Philosophers who influenced Social epistemology

1. Plato in Charmides Dialogue
2. John Locke in Problem of Testimony
3. David Hume in Problem of Testimony
4. Thomas Reid in Problem of Testimony
5. Karl Marx in interrelating Ideology and Knowledge
6. Miranda Fricker in Problem of Testimony

Present and Future Concerns

• Practical applications of social epistemology can be found in the areas of library science, academic publishing, guidelines for scientific authorship and collaboration, knowledge policy and debates over the role of the Internet in knowledge transmission and creation.