Horvath on Meta-epistemic Instrumentalism

Last week, one of the organizers of the workshop on experimental philosophy in Koln (namely, Joachim Horvath) gave an interesting presentation about meta-epistemological instrumentalism.  The main targets of the talk are (a) the work being done by experimental philosophers such as Weinberg, Nichols, Alexander, Stich, and others on epistemic intuitions, and (b) the kinds of criticisms of experimental restrictionism that have been proferred in response to this work.  I am curious to see what the readers of this blog think about Horvath's take on these issues!

Download experimental_philosophy_and_metaepistemology_3.pdf

Comments

[Joachim Horvath]

If you don't feel like reading my whole presentation, then you could just pick the part that is most interesting to you. Here are some suggestions:

In a first part, I discuss the challenge that X-Phi poses to intuition-based philosophy (until slide 6), discuss some possible reactions (until slide 9) and then reply to some of the standard objections to X-Phi (until slide 17).
In the second part, I first argue against meta-epistemic quietism (until slide 20), and then introduce a meta-epistemic framework that I call "meta-epistemic instrumentalism" (until slide 37).
In the third and final part, I apply this framework to some of the results of X-Phi and argue that the discovered cultural and social variation of e.g. the Gettier intuitions may actually be epistemologically relevant - contrary to the routine assumption by experimental restrictionists.

So, if you are mainly interested in the anti-traditional implications of X-Phi, then you could confine yourself to the first part. If you are particularly interested in meta-epistemology, then you should focus on part two, and if you delight in philosophical speculation, then you may enjoy part three as well.

[Paul Torek]

Thanks for that very powerful paper. I'd like to ask how you see your proposal about the thin core of epistemic concepts, in comparison to the family resemblance view of concepts. Why not attribute also some (albeit lesser) weight to less-central qualities often taken as crucial for knowledge? Or are these views not in conflict: rather, the proposal is that the thin core vindicates most of the less-central qualities' importance, and thereby your proposal gains credibility?