phil 140 unc final

knowledge

A true belief with some sort of justification. Plausibly, for you to know a proposition, at least the following two things need to be the case: (1) the proposition is true, (2) you believe the proposition.

"Markets Maximize Utility"

A widespread (though not uncontroversial) view in economics (relatively) free, unregulated markets maximize aggregate utility (i.e. satisfaction of preferences)

testimonia

hypothetical democratic society where an oracle tells people what the right thing to do is and they all vote for that thing and there is no democratic legitimacy Because everyone defers to the benefactor, these votes always produce an outcome in line with the benefactor's views

skeptical scenarios

hypothetical situations in which appearances and reality are very generally radically out of whack ex: Descartes' dream scenario; Descartes' evil demon scenario; Brain in a vat scenario; Computer simulation/Matrix scenario

A principle that seems like it might be behind both kinds of skepticism

if there are two hypotheses that can both equally predict the evidence, they are on a par

the argument from mosdesty

if you both have the same evidence you should think they are just as likely to come to a correct conclusion as you (think agent-neutral) so you should both suspend judgement because either of you could be right

The SKEPTICAL Argument from Possibility

(1) It's possible that you're a brain in a vat (that isn't in North Carolina). (Premise) (2) It's possible that you're not in North Carolina. (From 1) (3) If it's possible that you're not in North Carolina, then you don't know that you're in North Carolina. (Premise) So, (C) You don't know that you're in North Carolina. (From 2, 3) ...and similarly for every other proposition about the external world.

Sources of Denial and Skepticism

(1) Mistaken beliefs about what the expert consensus is. (2) Distrust of experts.

Why is it hard to rationally persuade this idealized climate change skeptic to change their mind and to explain where the argument from ignorance goes wrong?

(1) There have been numerous cases in the past where the scientific consensus turned out to be wrong. (2) There are ways in which political, financial and prestige-related incentives affect academic and scientific research. (3) To some extent, both sides in the climate change debate allege a kind of conspiracy on the other side. As a lay person, it is hard to evaluate such claims without antecedently trusting one side more.

The Argument from Ignorance (Adapted to Climate Change)

(1) You don't know that the Conspiracy scenario isn't actually the case. (Premise) (2) If you don't know that the Conspiracy scenario isn't actually the case, then you don't know that anthropogenic climate change is occurring. (Premise) So, (C) You don't know that anthropogenic climate change is occurring. (From 1, 2)

The SKEPTICAL Argument from Ignorance

(1) You don't know that you're not a brain in a vat. (Premise) (2) If you don't know that you're not a brain in a vat, then you don't know that you're in North Carolina. (Premise) So, (C) You don't know that you're in North Carolina. (From 1, 2)

Phenomena that involve being (somewhat) indifferent to the truth of what you're saying, without bullshitting

(1) storytelling (2) the "bull session" According to Frankfurt, these kinds of examples are not bullshit because in these cases there is no pretense that speakers are trying to state the truth, or convey what they genuinely believe. It's understood by all, hearers included, that we're playing a different game.

"FACT-OPINION DISTINCTION"

-Certainly, there is a difference between a proposition being a fact (i.e. its being true) and it being an opinion (i.e. its being believed to be true). -But the two are not mutually exclusive. Something can be both a fact and an opinion.

bullshitter may not be fully aware that they don't believe what they're saying

-In this sense they are bullshitting themselves. -They might even think they believe what they're saying. -But they don't count as believing it if they're not at least somewhat sensitive to whether it's true or false.

Our culture encourages us to bullshit (Frankfurt)

-Politicians: their job requires them to bullshit -Citizens, insofar as norms of full opinionation are active --> "you should have opinions about everything" ; leads to bias

rowland's narrow moral right to believe

-You have a moral right to believe p if (and only if) it's morally wrong for others to interfere with your belief. -you have the right to not have your rights forcibly taken from you. For instance, no one has the right to give you a lobotomy so you stop believing p

epistemic right to believe

-a right to believe p because there is sound justification to believe p -You have an epistemic right to believe p if (and only if) you have sufficient justification for believing p. -In this sense, to say that everyone has a right to their own opinions is to say that all possible beliefs/opinions are justified.

rowland's broad moral right to believe

-there is no broad moral right to believe and so, no moral right not to be criticized. -you do not have the right to hold belief p without p being criticized. If other people could not criticize you they would not be able to freely speak their own beliefs and it would be contradictory.

The "Idealized" Climate Change Skeptic

...is a skeptic, not a denier ****its very hard to see what one could even take to justify outright denial ...is a skeptic due to distrust of experts, rather than due to mistaken beliefs about what the expert consensus is. ...has a skeptical scenario that, if true, would explain away the expert consensus. ***ex: Climate change is an elaborate scientific conspiracy to suggest that there is, motivated by factors like scientists' political leanings and desire to advance their careers. = PLAYS THE SAME ROLE FOR THE CLIMATE CHANGE SKEPTIC THAT THE BRAIN IN A VAT SCENARIO PLAYED FOR THE EXTERNAL WORLD SKEPTIC --> both scenarios explain away themselves; our idealized skeptic won't assert that the Conspiracy scenario is actual, but merely that it's possible, or that we can't rule it out - and, as such, that we can't know that anthropogenic climate change is occurring.

reasons for inaccurate factualbeliefs

1. exposure to misleading evidence (not irrational) 2.misevaluation of the evidence (cold irrationality) 3.ones desires influencing their beliefs (motivated reasoning or hot irrationality)

three views of partisan

1. it is epistemically responsible for people on either political side to be epistemically partisan because they think people who shares their views are more reliable 2. it is seen as reasonable if they are for your side but not if its on another side 3. it isn't reasonable for anyone to be epistemically partisan

rinis arguemtn

1. it is reasonable to be epistemically partisan 2. if 1 then it can be reasonable to believe fake news if it is shared by your partisan of choice who shares

Bullshitting vs Lying

Frankfurt notes that bullshit is in one respect easier than lying. Lying requires knowing what the truth is and figuring out how to effectively deceive people about it. Bullshit doesn't require these things. ---The bullshitter "does not limit himself to inserting a certain falsehood at a specific point, and thus he is not constrained by the truths surrounding that point or intersecting it. He is prepared to fake the context as well, so far as need requires." (13) In fact, Frankfurt even suggests that in one way bullshit may be worse than lies. Because bullshit involves disregard for what's true in a way that lies don't, "bullshit is a greater enemy of the truth than lies are." (15)

The Argument from Uniqueness

If the Uniqueness Thesis is true, it follows straight away that there cannot be reasonable disagreements between epistemic peers. In support of the Uniqueness Thesis: the case of Lefty and Righty.

"THE EPISTEMOLOGICAL PROJECT"

Involves subjecting our beliefs to critical scrutiny by asking 3 questions: -Do these beliefs amount to knowledge? -Are these beliefs (epistemically) justified/rational? -If not - what should we believe?

Argument by Cases

Method when Mills then subdivides dissenting speech into three categories/cases, and argues that for each category/case, it is (epistemically) beneficial to permit dissenting speech.

Wittgenstein's friend

NOT bullshitting

Post-Truth

OED Definition: "relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief."

base rates

background statistic information about probabilities (Non case specific)

Possible examples of bullshit

The Fourth of July orator The student "bullshitting his way through" Cases from politics Cases from advertising Some kinds of nonsense or mumbo-jumbo

the market for ideas

product is ideas. producers are speakers. consumers are hearers. to consume an idea one must believe it. to be a free market there must be limited restrictions.

the uniqueness thesis

a body of evidence justifies at most on proposition out of a competing set of propositions, and it justifies at most one attitude towards any particular proposition. Case of righty and lefty.

descriptive claim

a claim about the way that things are

normative claim

a claim about the way things ought to be

truths

a claim that matches how things are

market macimizes truth possession

a free, unregulated market for ideas will maximize aggregate truth possession

hummer's expert

a person who is intelligent and well informed about the issue and has spent considerable time studying it status and reliability conception of expertise

Media Bias Chart

an illustration of confusion about what media bias is

desiderata

answer to "what is media bias". should pick up on at least some of what we mean to be accusing media outlets when we say they are biased, it should explain why media bias is a bad thing, and should be, as far as possible, non-partisan

Pseudo-Parity Sites

assumed to be fake news; is a difficult case

Huemer thinks if there is consensus among the experts

credulity. Much better change of all the experts arriving at the same truth than you using critical thinking.

mill's argument for the epistemic benefits of free speech

dissenting opinion is false- received opinion will be justified during argument dissenting opinion is correct- correct false received opinion both options are partially true- dissenting opinion will supply the remainder of the truth

agent-neutral

does not matter who has engaged in critical thinking

example of regulations in the market helping

education, academic journals, libel laws, fad regulations, speech in the classroom

Reasonable

epistemically justified/adequately supported by the evidence

individualized evidence

evidence that at least might have evidence that relates the base rates to the specific case

what is not fake news

false reports due to mistaken beliefs, selectively biased, news coverage based on normative values that people disagree with, ?pseudo-parody sites?

hummer's credulity/deference

figure out what the experts think (on a widely discussed claim), and believe what they believe

the selectivity conception of bias

for a media outlet to be biased is for it to be selective in what it chooses to cover. the problem is that all outlets must be selective and they will select based on their views

the non-neutrality conception of bias

for a media source to be biased is for it to fail to be neutral to all political sides. an unbiased source is one that, when it come to contested matter, simply reports the different views, without trying to arbitrate between them.

directional goals

goal to come to a particular answer for a question regardless of whether that answer is true or not

accuracy goals

goal to come to the true answer of a question

righty and lefty / incoherence

its incoherent and doesn't make sense to believe both. - If lefty is guilty (and righty is not) -its reasonable for someone with the same evidence as me to believe righty is guilt

epistemic justification

justification based on good reasons.

pragmatic justification

justification not based on good reasons but rather reason like "it makes me happy to believe p"

cultural cognition (Kahan and Braman)

letting your normative moral and political beliefs determine you beliefs about descriptive and empirical questions ex. if you believe the death penalty is just will effect whether you think it is effective deterrent examples: (1) The death penalty: belief as to whether the death penalty is just/unjust influences belief as to whether the death penalty is an effective deterrent (2) Gun control: belief as to whether there's a right to own a gun influences belief as to whether gun control would be effective in preventing homicides (3) Climate change: belief as to whether environmental regulations inhibit freedom influences belief as to whether anthropogenic climate change is occurring seems to be irrational because in each case, the relevant normative belief, even if true, does not seem to actually bear on the descriptive question Can be thought of as an instance of motivated reasoning: People with prior normative beliefs are motivated to arrive at empirical beliefs that (i) will further support their normative beliefs, and (ii) won't give rise to any psychologically uncomfortable tradeoffs.

mill's view of liberty

liberty of discussion leads to roust disagreement and debate which leads to collective epistemic benefits, which leads to greater social utility

Liberty of Thought and of Discussion

liberty of thought (freedom of conscience) and of discussion (freedom of speech) 1) Liberty of discussion leads to robust disagreement and debate 2) Robust disagreement and debate leads to collective epistemic benefits ---roughly, as a group/society, we will possess more true beliefs and/or knowledge if we have robust disagreement and debate. 3) [Mostly assumed without argument:] Collective epistemic benefits lead to greater social utility.

Epistemic Non-Consequentialism

long-run/indirect/collective epistemic benefits of holding a belief don't justify holding that belief now.

"Cold" Irrationality

misevaluation of the evidence (an explanation of inaccurate factual beliefs)

A "Free" Market for Ideas

one that is free from interference or regulation, and that involves robust competition between ideas (through debate)

rini's fake news story

one that purports to describe events int he real world, typically by mimicking the conventions of traditional media reportage, yet is known by its creators to be significantly false, and is transmitted with the two goals of being widely re-transmitted and of deceiving at least some of tis audience.

Motivated Reasoning/"Hot" Irrationality (Kunda)

one's desires influences ones beliefs (an explanation of inaccurate factual beliefs) motivated reasoning: when directional goals overcome accuracy goals -involves bias: your beliefs are biased by your directional goals/desires -Typically, directional goals don't impact belief directly or consciously. They do so indirectly and subconsciously by causing us to engage in selective filtering and processing of evidence. -Some examples: -Biased evaluations of one's own abilities and traits -Smokers vs. non-smokers on the health risks of smoking

Irrelevant Influences of Belief

our beliefs are influenced by factors that do not seem to be relevant to their truth it's not only moral/political/religious beliefs that are affected by irrelevant influences. cohens grad school example

media bias

people think other partisan is more bias.

collective reliability

robust deliberation and debate help us collectively to figure out what is true more effectively if were more than fifty percent reliable, independence between voters will increase their collective reliability the CHANCE that the majority of the group will come to the truth so 'collective reliability' in this sense plausibly matters more when a decision is being made by a winner-takes-all, majority vote

Epistemic Peers

roughly equal in intelligence, powers of reasoning, etc 1) Can epistemic peers who have shared their evidence have reasonable disagreements? 2) Can epistemic peers who have shared their evidence reasonably maintain their own beliefs yet also think that the other party to the disagreement is also reasonable? ----> Feldman: NO

skeptical arguments

roughly speaking, try to argue from the (apparent) possibility of such scenarios, or the (apparent) fact that you can't rule them out, to the conclusion that you know nothing, or almost nothing, about the external world Not presupposing that you're actually in a skeptical scenario Supposed to show that you don't know anything about the external world, whether or not you're actually in the skeptical scenario

According to Frankfurt another source of bullshit is:

skepticism and/or relativism ---If we think there's no truth, how can we have any regard for it? ---(Compare those who blame the climate of "post-truth" and "alternative facts" on postmodernism.) ---Correctness vs. sincerity

if there is controversy on a topic

skepticism. If experts can't agree why would you be able to figure out the truth answer.

belief

something someone holds to be true

exceptions to bullshit

storytelling and bull session because people do not take what you are saying to be true

bent form of testimony

the instability of norms of social media makes it unclear whether sharing news articles means that the sharers actually believe what they are reposting as true, so we do not know if sharing things are meant to be portrayed as true. also people do not check for facts when they share but they read other peoples shares as if they are true

climate change denial

the view that anthropogenic climate change is not happening

climate change skepticism

the view that we do not know that anthropogenic climate change is happening, follows the same premises as external world skepticism. comes from mistaken beliefs about what the expert consensus is or from distrust of experts

Cohen's grad school example

there were two grad schools he was accepted into. One of them held one belief the other held another belief. He believed he would adopt the belief of the grad school he went to

inaccuracy conception of bias

to be bis is to deviate for an unequivocal statement of the truth. the problem is at least as applied to controversial topics, this conception of bias totally fails to be non-partisan. On this conception of bias, it will always seem to each person that they are unbiased and that all those who disagree with them are biased.

huemers skepticism

to suspend judgement

epistemic partisanship

trusting people's shares to be true when you have similar views on normative issues within them on partisan issues

huemers critical thinking

try to think through the arguments and evidence for yourself, and form a belief on the basis

arm-chair psychological hypothesis

using the phrase beyond a reasonable doubt is a way to make ourselves feel like were not just dealing in probabilities and not to acknowledge that it still leaves a possibility of false conviction

bias as non-neutrality about normative

very few media outlets are entirely neutral about normative claims, we don't seem to think they are all bias. whose normative views the media must be neutral between?

Utility

well-being

kunda's motivated reasoning

when directional goals overcome accuracy goals. accuracy goals are when you want to reach the true answer to a question whereas directional goals are when you want to reach a particular answer to that question regardless of truth (Think confirmation bias)

democratic legitimacy

when its reasonable for people to accept the outcome of a democratic process this process must involve some deliberation, debate and reasoning this requirement is the "ideal of public reason"

cynical view of media bias

when people say that media outlets is bias they mean that it doesn't match their views

agent-centered

when the person who has engaged in critical thinking is important to your trust of the outcome. I trust my critical thinking but I do not trust another random individual who has the same abilities as me and has also engaged in critical thinking.

if you realize you belief is based on irrelevant influences, is it irrational to hold on to the belief?

yes- first pass: if influence is irrelevant then why would you? second pass: your logical reasons are no more valid than the logical reasons of people of the other belief third pass: reasons you find compelling are influenced by your background

bullshit

you are completely indifferent to whether what you're saying is true or false. you just say it because it is convenient to say or it makes you look smart. Important to note that they do not actually believe what they are saying to be true. skepticism is too because if we hold no believes to be true we are never truth sensitive

skepticism in the philosophical sense

you cannot know much or perhaps anything about p ex: Skepticism about morality: you cannot know what morality requires of you. Skepticism about the future: you cannot know what is going to happen in the future. Skepticism about (man-made) climate change: you cannot know whether (man-made) climate change is occurring.

lie

you deliberately say something that you believe to be false possibly with the aim of deceiving

Extreme Case of Bullshit

you don't even have a belief about whether what you're saying is true

Less Extreme Case of Bullshit

you happen to believe what you're saying is false (or perhaps even true?), but this is irrelevant to what you're trying to accomplish