Social Epistemology: Essential Readings

by Alvin I. Goldman (Editor), Dennis Whitcomb (Editor)

What if anything justifies us in believing the testimony of others? How should we react to disagreement between ourselves and our peers, and to disagreement among the experts when we ourselves are novices? Can beliefs be held by groups of people in addition to the people composing those groups? And if so, how should groups go about forming their beliefs? How should we design social systems, such as legal juries and scientific research-sharing schemes, to promote knowledge among the people who engage in them? When different groups of people judge different beliefs to be justified, how can we tell which groups are correct? These questions are at the heart of the vital discipline of social epistemology. The classic articles in this volume address these questions in ways that are both cutting-edge and easy to understand. This volume will be of great interest to scholars and students in epistemology.

Genres: Philosophy

368 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2011

About the author

Alvin Ira Goldman was an American philosopher who was emeritus Board of Governors Professor of Philosophy and Cognitive Science at Rutgers University in New Jersey and a leading figure in epistemology.

Reviews

[Maryam · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is a good reading selection for those who want to have a general idea of social epistemology; specifically, I recommend the paper by Miranda Fricker on 'Rational Authority and Social Power'.

[Jarred · Rating 4 out of 5]

As far as I can tell—as someone new to social epistemology—this book provides a great survey of the field (up until the time it was written at least) with essays representing important areas of interest (e.g. testimony, the problem of identifying experts as a novice, epistemic systems, etc.) that present challenges to each other. The structure of the book is such that the various essays transition really well into each other, building off and reacting to material covered earlier. I only took off a star because not every paper is equally as intriguing or persuasive. However, I would not want a book like this to perfectly conform to my interests and it is a virtue of the book that it challenges my currently held beliefs in many places.

A great introduction to social epistemology that has revealed many different avenues that I am now in a position to explore in more depth.

[Cheng Wen Cheong · Rating 2 out of 5]

Except for two or three articles, the rest of them didn't really interest me. The field appears to be more analytical than I expect, and involves an intermediate level of probabilistic logic that I'm not acquainted with. With exception of the article on testimony, the rest of the writings were really dry and surprisingly cursory.