Naturalized Epistemology and Experimental Philosophy

Hi everyone,

I am working on a paper concerning the Quine/Kim debate and trying to figure out a way incorporate experimental philosophy into the mix.  Does anyone have any suggestions?  Are there any papers on the topic?  Any assertions that experimental philosophy is participating in the Quinean project?  I appreciate you thoughts, ideas, and comments.

UPDATE:  See final comment!

Wes

Comments

[Benoit Hardy-Vallée]

Hi Wes,

I don't know if this view is common, but I always thought of X-phi as "naturalizing intension" and naturalistic philosophy (Kornblith, Griffiths, etc.) as "naturalizing extension". Of course, it is a crude simplification, but in in the case of the concept of intentional action, X-philies are more interested in a scientifically sound account of the folk concept of intentional action, while other naturalistically-oriented philosophers might be more interested in a a scientifically sound account of intentional actions, their causes, properties, etc. (neural mechanisms and behavioral patterns).

Best,
b.

[Wes Anderson]

Benoit Hardy-Vallee,

Thank you for your response! Maybe I am not fully grasping your distinction, but it seems to me that there are psychologists and cognitive scientists who work toward scientifically sound accounts of folk concepts and folk theories (folk physics, folk mathematics, ToM) as well. I hate to steal good ideas but, why not settle for cognitive science? Is experimental philosophy a chapter of cognitive science? Or is it trying to do anything like cognitive science/psychology? It strikes me as likely that, at least, some think they are developing some sort of Quinean project. I have just never seen it explicitly stated.

Thanks again,
Wes

[Chris Hallquist]

Why would you think experimental philosophy would be relevant? Sure it's an interesting tool, but I don't assumption that it just has to be relevant to your paper.

[Wes Anderson]

Chris Hallquist,

I just think that there may be some interesting parallels to be drawn between naturalized epistemology and experimental philosophy. Quine wanted epistemology to be a chapter in psychology, experimental philosophy is attempting to use methods of experimental psychology in order to shed light on philosophically relevant concepts. Was experimental philosophy inspired by Quine? Can experimental philosophy participate in the Quinean project? Is it? Does it want to? These are interesting questions, at least to me.

Thanks,
Wes

[Ben Bayer]

I don't know too much about the experimental philosophy angle, but I have a new paper coming out in the Southern Journal Philosophy that evaluates the Kim/Quine debate. So if you'll give me the opportunity to do some (relevant) plugging:

http://www.benbayer.com/wholequine.pdf

As you'll see from this paper, I agree with the first commenter that naturalized epistemologists are not much interested in folk concepts. To whatever extent they are, it's mostly for the purpose of refashioning folk concepts, and "explicating" them (a la Carnap) to serve their own, pragmatically-oriented purposes.

At the same time, there may be data out there of interest to X-philes that is relevant to evaluating naturalized epistemology. I pursue one of these leads in chapter 5 my dissertation (and in a paper derived therefrom), where I argue that Quine's own explication of intentional idioms can find a home in current "simulation theory" accounts of folk psychology. But I argue that the problems with simulation theory--some traditional ones, some of my own devising--are even bigger problems for naturalism than they are for ST.

http://www.benbayer.com/dissertation.pdf
http://www.benbayer.com/simulationtheory.pdf

Good luck with your work.

Ben Bayer

[Wes]

Ben Bayer,

Thank you very much.

Wes

[jonathan weinberg]

Beyond the basic rejection of a sharp philosophy/science distinction, I'm having trouble seeing any interesting or non-cosmetic connections between Quinean naturalized epistemology & x-phi.

Or, in considering these questions, "Was experimental philosophy inspired by Quine? Can experimental philosophy participate in the Quinean project? Is it? Does it want to?" the answers seem to me to be:

1. Not particularly, though of course Quine is profoundly important to any story about science/philosophy relations in the last century.
2. Um, I guess so, but not in any special way (i.e., no more so than in most any other philosophical project).
3. I don't know of any x-phi work that is currently engaged in doing so.
4. Well... why should 'it' want to? (And it doesn't seem to me that x-phi is usefully reified as a unitary 'it' here. There's a number of different people with a number of very different projects out there.)

[Wes Anderson]

Jonathan Weinberg,

Your comments are respected and taken. I think that I will do some reading on these issues and then get back to you (or this blog). We'll see what form my paper takes.

Thanks,
Wes

[Wes]

Does anyone know of someone who has argued that science is normative, or that science has a normative aspect? I'd appreciate articles from philosophers of science, experimental philosophers, psychologists, cognitive scientists, or any other scientists.