{"title":"Through Virtues to Knowledge","authors":"A. Karimov","doi":"10.5840/eps202158455","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5840/eps202158455","url":null,"abstract":"By all accounts, virtue epistemology is making a value turn in contemporary analytic epistemology. In this article, this twist is explicated through the transformation of the understanding of epistemic values and the value of the epistemic. In the first sense, we are talking about how the view has changed on what determines the epistemic value of such categories as truth, knowledge, understanding, etc. In the second sense, we are talking about the value of our epistemic concepts (the value of the epistemic): what is true belief, knowledge, etc. for? It is shown how the causal link between our beliefs and intellectual virtues allows us to explain the nature and value of knowledge as a central category of epistemology. The author reveals the difference between the main types of virtue epistemology through the prism of two different approaches to the justification of values: value internalism and value externalism. Value externalism assumes that a state/motive/action gains value from something outside of a person's consciousness. In contrast, value internalism holds that the conditions that determine value are internal to consciousness. For reliabilism, the value of cognitive success lies in its causal connection with the reliable competences of the subject, for responsibilism – with virtuous motives of cognitive activity. Common to reliabilism and responsibilism is that they shift the focus from the value of an effect (truth) to its relationship with the value of a cause – an ability or excellent trait of intellectual character. The main approaches to substantiating the fundamental value of knowledge in virtue epistemology are analyzed. If for reliabilism the highest epistemic value is truth as cognitive achievement, then for responsibilism the value of epistemic categories is primarily in their moral significance – the achievement of a good life and happiness (eudaimonia). In conclusion, the problematic aspects of virtue epistemology are formulated and promising directions for its further development are shown.","PeriodicalId":44031,"journal":{"name":"Epistemology & Philosophy of Science-Epistemologiya i Filosofiya Nauki","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"71005161","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Contextualism and the Problem of Knowledge Ascription","authors":"E. Vostrikova, P. Kusliy","doi":"10.5840/eps202158464","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5840/eps202158464","url":null,"abstract":"The paper explores the contextualist approach towards the semantics of knowledge ascriptions. The authors discuss the relevance of these studies in semantics for the major issues in virtue epistemology. It is argued that despite the advantages that contextualism has over its alternatives (in particular, relativism and subject sensitive invariablisism), it still requires a more elaborated compositional semantics that it currently has. We review several concrete contextualsit proposals to the semantics of the verb know in light of their applicability to the well-known type of examples known as the fake barn example, point out some of their particular shortcomings, and propose a revision, which represents a variant of D. Lewis’s general approach to the semantics of know.","PeriodicalId":44031,"journal":{"name":"Epistemology & Philosophy of Science-Epistemologiya i Filosofiya Nauki","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"71005429","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The New Evil Devil Problem and Deontological Internalism","authors":"M. Khort","doi":"10.5840/eps202158463","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5840/eps202158463","url":null,"abstract":"The article defends an internalist version of the virtue epistemology. This point contradicts many contemporary theories of epistemic virtues, as they are mostly externalistic. This is partly due to the fact that externalism is more consistent with cognitive science, situationism and the social epistemology. Another reason is that it was the externalists who revived interest in the aretic approach within the framework of modern epistemology. Nevertheless, the author shows that it is internalism that offers the best answer to the question about the essence of epistemic virtues. In the introductory part of the article, the classical definitions of internalism and externalism are given. It is explained that the author use an extended definition of internalism, which is characterized by the inclusion epistemic virtues in the structure of justification. The second part is devoted to critic of externalism. The New Evil Demon Problem is the instrument of analysis. The author shows that there are scenarios in which the function of justification as a reliable “guide” to truth cannot serve as a criterion for epistemic evaluation. Situations are possible in which the subject has a false but justified belief. Externalism cannot explain such scenarios, which motivates to abandon this approach. The third part of the article discusses internalism as a possible response to The New Evil Demon Problem. The author believes that justification should be considered as a deontological concept. The condition of reliability, which is an important element of externalism, must be replaced by the condition of correct motivation and epistemic debt. This means that the assessment of beliefs and subjects should be based on what motives they have and how they manifest them in cognition.","PeriodicalId":44031,"journal":{"name":"Epistemology & Philosophy of Science-Epistemologiya i Filosofiya Nauki","volume":"8 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"71005607","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Games With Space","authors":"O. Lavrenova","doi":"10.5840/EPS202158117","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5840/EPS202158117","url":null,"abstract":"The culture beeing in the geographical space is one of the important problem fields of ontology. The process of understanding the environment has many levels and characteristics. Culture is an universal object of semiotics, in this case it is considered as a subject of the semioticization of geographical space, the formation of the image of the world. Culture inherits and constantly renews the main discourses associated with this ongoing process, the origins of which lie in the deep archaic. As a result, stable representations of geographical objects and/or permanent culturally significant symbols with different degrees of spatial connotations are formed. Much more interesting than the already formed images and symbols is the process of their creation and the patterns and frames that can be traced in it. The meanings created by culture are involved in the process of secondary interpretation. The most common are several areas of interpretation that play an active role in structuring our ideas about the geocultural space. They can be conventionally referred to as “games with space”, because they have a certain amount of arbitrariness, but also have established rules. This article discusses a few of them – games of range, games of geographical modeling, games of structures, of time, of significations, of emotions and institutionalization.","PeriodicalId":44031,"journal":{"name":"Epistemology & Philosophy of Science-Epistemologiya i Filosofiya Nauki","volume":"58 1","pages":"178-196"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"71003930","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Pritchard’s Case for Veritism","authors":"J. Greco","doi":"10.5840/eps202158458","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5840/eps202158458","url":null,"abstract":"In his “In Defense of Veritism”, Duncan Pritchard reconsiders the case for epistemic value truth monism, or the thesis that truth is the sole fundamental epistemic good. I begin by clarifying Pritchard’s thesis, and then turn to an evaluation of Pritchard’s defense. By way of clarification, Pritchard understands “fundamental” value to be non-instrumental value. Accordingly, Pritchard’s veritism turns out to be the thesis that truth is the sole epistemic good with non-instrumental epistemic value, all other epistemic goods being valuable in virtue of their instrumental relation to truth. By way of evaluation, I argue that the case for veritism has not been made. The central point is this: Even if all epistemic value involves some or other relation to the truth, there are multiple relations to truth in addition to instrumental relations. Moreover, some of these seem capable of grounding further, fundamental (i.e., non-instrumental) epistemic goods. For example, knowledge has a constitutive relation to truth, and knowledge seems to be epistemically valuable for its own sake. Likewise, justified belief has an intentional relation to truth, and justified belief seems to be epistemically valuable for its own sake. Finally, I argue that, contra Pritchard, this central point seems confirmed rather than undermined by looking to the notion of an intellectually virtuous inquirer. Plausibly, a virtuous inquirer values such goods as justified belief and knowledge for their own sake qua epistemic goods, and not merely for their instrumental value for attaining truth.","PeriodicalId":44031,"journal":{"name":"Epistemology & Philosophy of Science-Epistemologiya i Filosofiya Nauki","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"71005313","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Sergei G. Sekundant","authors":"","doi":"10.5840/eps202158471","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5840/eps202158471","url":null,"abstract":"<jats:p />","PeriodicalId":44031,"journal":{"name":"Epistemology & Philosophy of Science-Epistemologiya i Filosofiya Nauki","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"71006082","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Extended Mind and Epistemic Responsibility in a Digital Society","authors":"S. Shevchenko","doi":"10.5840/eps202158470","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5840/eps202158470","url":null,"abstract":"The article deals with the problem of compatibility of the extended mind thesis with the concept of epistemic responsibility. This compatibility problem lies at the intersection of two current trends in Virtue Epistemology (VE): the study of extended cognition, and the return of VE to the topic of epistemic responsibility. I give objections to two seemingly independent positions; their acceptance makes it difficult or even impossible to make the concept of epistemic responsibility applicable to the agents of digital society whose cognition is extended. The core of both positions can be illustrated by the following thesis: “Since the subject cannot voluntarily change his/her beliefs, we cannot ascribe to him/her either epistemic responsibility or intellectual virtues that allow him/her to take responsibility”. The counter-arguments to this thesis are based on the distinction between the causal (responsibility-in) and normative (responsibility-for) components of responsibility. The absence of the former allows us to characterize the subject as not responsible, the absence of the latter as irresponsible. I propose two conceptual foundations that can make possible the consistent talk about the epistemic responsibility of an extended subject. 1) The subject may not be responsible for the beliefs taken from the epistemic environment, but the subject bears significant responsibility for what environment he finds himself in. 2) Being epistemically responsible means deliberately reducing the number of possible causal excuses – excuses based on agent’s unresponsibiity due to his causal dependence on his epistemic environment (‘cognitive extensions’).","PeriodicalId":44031,"journal":{"name":"Epistemology & Philosophy of Science-Epistemologiya i Filosofiya Nauki","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"71006146","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Conceptualizing Computer Simulations in Philosophy of Science","authors":"T. Khamdamov, M. Voloshin","doi":"10.5840/EPS202158234","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5840/EPS202158234","url":null,"abstract":"In the modern Russian philosophy, discussions about the phenomenon of computer simulations in the scientific research practice of conducting experiments are just beginning to pass the stage of initiation in small interdisciplinary groups studying this new direction for the philosophy of science. At the same time, in Western philosophy by the current moment there have been formed entire directions for the study of computer simulations. Different groups of researchers in different ways form ideas about the basic characteristics of simulations: from skeptical views on their nature, which are of no philosophical interest, to extremely revolutionary attitudes that assign simulations to the main role in the next expected turn of philosophy, comparable in its power to the linguistic turn in early XX century. One of the main controversial issues in Western philosophical thought was the search for relevant criteria and signs of simulations that could create a solid basis for formulating a rigorous definition of this phenomenon. Thus, through the definition, researchers first of all try, on the one hand, to solve the taxonomic problem of the correlation and interconnection of simulations with other types of experiment: natural, laboratory, mental, mathematical. On the other hand, to reveal for philosophy ontological and epistemological foundations of simulations, which carry the potential of new philosophical knowledge. This article is devoted to a brief review of the existing concepts of representatives of Western schools of thought on the phenomenon of computer simulations in the context of the philosophy of science. The structure of the review is built on three basic conceptual directions: 1) definition of the term \"computer simulation\"; 2) computer simulations as an experiment; 3) the epistemic value of simulations. Such a review can become the subject of discussion for Russian researchers interested in the impact of computer simulations on science and philosophy.","PeriodicalId":44031,"journal":{"name":"Epistemology & Philosophy of Science-Epistemologiya i Filosofiya Nauki","volume":"58 1","pages":"151-169"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"71004255","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Bacon’s Anthropocene","authors":"P. Omodeo","doi":"10.5840/eps202158350","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5840/eps202158350","url":null,"abstract":"The current predicament, marked by an unprecedented environmental crisis and novel debates on the anthropic-technological transformation of the earth-system, calls for a reassessment of the historical-epistemological question of the entanglement between power, knowledge, and nature. Francis Bacon is the classical reference point for this thematic cluster – a focal point for both historical reconstructions and epistemological reflections, for both those who extol the merits of scientific progress and those who criticize the risks posed by its abuse. I begin this essay by considering Merchant’s eco-feminist interpretation of Bacon. Additionally, I briefly recount how Bacon is envisaged as a symbol of science as domination within the critique of capitalism provided in another classic, Adorno and Horkheimer’s Dialectic of Enlightenment. I also consider the flipside of the reception of Bacon in assessments of our modern scientific world, namely the empowerment-and-emancipation discourse on technology, typical of much of Marxism. In this respect, I deem it expedient to mention the knowledge-power problem in relation to the Anthropocene debate, and in particular in relation to the theme of the transformation of the world in praxeological terms. These considerations, which deal with various assessments of techno-scientific capitalist modernity, are at the basis of my final remarks on the most urgent Anthropocene dilemma, namely, whether we need more or less technoscience. This concerns the historico-political question of whether the ecological limits of growth are an intrinsic limit of capitalism.","PeriodicalId":44031,"journal":{"name":"Epistemology & Philosophy of Science-Epistemologiya i Filosofiya Nauki","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"71004758","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"A Baconian historiola mentis in Spinoza’s Method","authors":"Omar Del Nonno","doi":"10.5840/eps202158352","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5840/eps202158352","url":null,"abstract":"Bacon’s influence on Spinoza’s thought is controversial, since this latter seems to underestimate the role of experience in achieving true knowledge. In this paper, I will investigate Spinoza’s reference in Letter 37** to a historiola mentis (little history of mind) a la Bacon as an empirical-historical method to distinguish between different kinds of perceptions. My aim is to explain why Spinoza considers Bacon’s little history of mind a useful tool to proceed towards the knowledge of the excellent things [praestantissimae res]. I will suggest that Spinoza could have been inspired by Bacon’s theory of idols and his historical method, since they help distinguish between different kinds of ideas with no previous knowledge of the first causes. Moreover, Spinoza’s method for interpreting the Scripture in his Tractatus Theologicopoliticus seems to be partially indebted to Bacon’s account of natural and civil history and aims to clarify the practical meaning of the Scripture. According to Spinoza, a historical and empirical method might play a pivotal role by transforming human praxis and behavior according to the order of the intellect. This method has in a strictly practical function and cannot be compared to the true knowledge of things through their first causes. However, it is a fundamental part of the process directing human beings to the knowledge of the most fundamental things.","PeriodicalId":44031,"journal":{"name":"Epistemology & Philosophy of Science-Epistemologiya i Filosofiya Nauki","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"71004898","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}