This paper employs tools and critiques from analytic feminist scholarship in order to show how particular values commonly on display in analytic theology have served both to marginalize certain voices from the realm of analytic theological debate and to reinforce a particular conception of the divine—one which, despite its historical roots, is not inevitable. I claim that a particular conception of what constitutes a “rational, objective, analytic thinker” often displays certain affinities with those infinite or maximal properties that analytic theologians (...) have taken to be most relevant or essential to their theological conceptions of the divine, and I explore what thinking differently about the former might mean for how we think about the latter and vice versa. (shrink)

One of the central questions in the metaphysics of pregnancy is this: Is the foetus a part of the mother? In this paper I aim not to answer this question, but rather to raise methodological concerns regarding how to approach answering it. I will outline how various areas attempt to answer whether the foetus is a part of the mother so as to demonstrate the methodological problems that each faces. My positive suggestion will be to adopt a method of reflective (...) equilibrium. The aim of this is to ensure that pregnancy be included in the tribunal of experience that our theories are held up against such that our theories can accommodate what we say about pregnancy, whilst also ensuring that what we say about pregnancy be theoretically informed. That way, we rethink pregnancy in light of our theories as well as rethinking our theories in light of pregnancy. (shrink)

The Anthropocene confronts environmental philosophy with one of the most urgent questions of the 21st century: How to maintain the earth’s condition in a way that allows current and future human generations to thrive? By asking such a question, ethical thought ceases to be solely a matter of individuality or morality. Instead, it raises a political issue: How can or should environmental philosophy relate to society in the Anthropocene? This article argues for a critical perspective that draws on contemporary historic (...) materialist scholars and politicises societal power relations. It exemplifies this approach by discussing key-terms of the Anthropocene discourse, like planetary boundaries, tipping points, and space-ship earth. The article concludes that the idea that “we have to act fast now” would be dangerously too easy because it ignores the ambivalent character of human-nature relations. (shrink)

There is ongoing philosophical debate about the kinds of properties that are represented in visual perception. Both “rich” and “thin” accounts of perceptual content are concerned with how prior assumptions about the world influence the construction of perceptual representations. However, the idea that biased assumptions resulting from oppressive social structures contribute to the contents of perception has been largely neglected historically in this debate in the philosophy of perception. I draw on neurobiological evidence of the role of the amygdala in (...) visual processing to show that the influence of biased assumptions on visual perception gives us a unique path to rich evaluative content that does not require an appeal to controversial mechanisms like top-down modulation. (shrink)

The 2005 International Consensus Conference on Intersex resulted in a substantive revision of the lexicon and guidelines for treating intersex conditions. The speed with which the new treatment protocol has been adopted by healthcare practitioners and providers is considered unprecedented. However, a number of intersex people and advocacy groups have complained that the recommended revisions are inadequately informed by the testimony of intersex people. In this paper, I argue that such complaints are valid and that, despite the conference conveners stated (...) intention, the revisions perpetuate the epistemic injustice long endured by intersex people. By analyzing the Consensus Conference and its results as a failed attempt to redress the epistemic marginalization of intersex patients and advocacy groups, I am able to identify lingering institutional hurdles to cultivating the virtue of epistemic justice in biomedical practice. (shrink)

In this paper I focus on the connection between some of Stanley’s claims about propaganda and flawed ideologies, and the idea of the social situatedness or perspective-relativity of knowledge. More precisely, I will try to show how Stanley’s reflections on the nature of propaganda and its relationship with flawed ideologies push us towards the empiricists’ characterisation of the social situatedness of knowledge. Not only do these reflections reveal some important weaknesses of standpoint theories (that is, the claim of epistemic asymmetry (...) between advantaged and negatively advantaged groups, and the necessity of actively achieving a standpoint), but they also support the request for the pluralism, rational critique, cooperation, fair discussion and epistemic integration fostered by social empiricism. This means that the broad idea of the social situatedness of knowledge should be defended and further developed along the lines sketched by social empiricism. (shrink)

While some form of evaluation has always been employed in science (e.g. peer review, hiring), formal systems of evaluation of research and researchers have recently come to play a more prominent role in many countries because of the adoption of new models of governance. According to such models, the quality of the output of both researchers and their institutions is measured, and issues such as eligibility for tenure or the allocation of public funding to research institutions crucially depends on the (...) outcomes of such measures. However, concerns have been raised over the risk that such evaluation may be threatening epistemic pluralism by penalizing the existent heterodox schools of thought and discouraging the pursuit of new ones. It has been proposed that this may happen because of epistemic bias favouring mainstream research programmes. In this paper, I claim that (1) epistemic pluralism is desirable and should be preserved; (2) formal evaluation exercises may threaten epistemic pluralism because they may be affected by some form of epistemic bias; therefore, (3) to preserve epistemic pluralism, we need some strategy to actively dampen epistemic bias. (shrink)

Current inquiries into the meaning of feminist concepts, such as the third world woman worker, seek to explain contemporary social relations of global capitalism within the context of the legacy of post-colonialist structures. At the same time, these very concepts draw attention to the limitations of language to adequately approximate the world as it is in order to capture some truth about its categorical entities, in particular, about the embodied experiences of the third world women worker. Through a comparative analysis (...) of critical and postpositivist realisms that highlights feminist interventions in the context of standpoint epistemology, and the evolution in both towards dialectics, I argue that feminist dialectical realism offers an alternative to feminist poststructuralist materialisms as well as addresses limitations in prevailing standards for truth in social theory and philosophy. (shrink)

This paper motivates an account of knowledge as a social kind, following a cue by Edward Craig, which captures two major insights behind social and feminist epistemologies, in particular our epistemic interdependence concerning knowledge and the role of social regulative practices in understanding knowledge.

This Thesis reconsiders the prospects for an approach to global justice centring on the proposal that every human being should possess a certain bundle of goods, which would include certain members of a distinctive category: the category of capabilities. My overall aim is to present a clarified and well-developed framework, within which such claims can be made. To do this, I visit a number of regions of normative and metanormative theorising. I begin by introducing the motivations for the capability approach, (...) and clarifying some of its most distinctive features. Next, I focus on Martha Nussbaum's version of the approach, and identify several problems therein. The most important concerns epistemology, and especially the challenges that constructivist theories pose. The middle part of the Thesis presents an alternative, based on the work of John McDowell, which I argue has superior prospects. Then, I turn to two further problems: that of making sense of the universalistic aspirations of cosmopolitanism, and that of integrating the microscopic prescriptions of ethics with the macroscopic analyses of political philosophy. Using the Aristotelian interpretation of its core framework that I have developed, I conclude that the capability approach can provide compelling answers to important questions about global justice. (shrink)

I argue that Kotzee’s model of meta- debate succeeds in identifying illegitimate or fallacious charges of bias but has the unintended consequence of classifying some legitimate and non-fallacious charges as fallacious. This makes the model, in some important cases, counter-productive. In particular, cases where the call for a meta- debate is prompted by the participant with epistemic privilege and a charge of bias is denied by the participant with social advantage, the impasse will put the epistemically advantaged at far greater (...) risk. Therefore, I propose treating epistemic privilege as a variety of expert opinion specifically in cases where meta- debate participants come to an impasse in deliberation. My proposal exposes the problem of interpreting debate contexts as both adversarial and free from social power differentials. (shrink)

In this paper, a challenge is outlined for Walton’s recent analysis of the fallacy of poisoning the well. An example of the fallacy in action during a debate on affirmative action on a South African campus is taken to raise the question of how Walton’s analysis squares with the idea that disadvantaged parties in debates about race may be epistemically privileged . It is asked when the background of a participant is relevant to a debate and it is proposed that (...) a proper analysis of the poisoning the well will outline conditions under which making one participant’s background an issue in a debate would be legitimate and illegitimate. Expanding Walton’s analysis to deal with the challenge, it is concluded that calling into question a participant’s suitability to take part in a debate is never legitimate when it is based simply on a broad fact about their background (like their race or gender). (shrink)

Este artículo tiene como objetivo mostrar que la obra de Judith Butler ofrece un conjunto de estrategias de lectura que no se reducen a principios o leyes. Por el contrario, son contingentes sin ser azarosas o arbitrarias. Los resultados de esta estrategia, que consideramos metodológica, se conforman gracias a una práctica de lectura que constituye un ejercicio crítico constante. Esta práctica adopta diversas estrategias que se condensan a partir de los aportes de diversos filósofos. Butler convierte entonces esa estrategia de (...) lectura en un acto político, enraizado en una ética que le permite hacer visibles a quienes están en situación de máxima vulnerabilidad, insinuando, al mismo tiempo, caminos para transformar la sociedad y ampliar los espacios de libertad. (shrink)

A critical and creative reconstruction of Adorno's conception of truth that shows its relevance for comtemporary philosophy, art, and politics.

This dissertation considers the “strategic naturalism” of Sandra Harding’s standpoint theory in the philosophy of science, and it should be applied to epistemology. Strategic naturalism stipulates that all elements of inquiry are historically and culturally situated, and thereby subject to critical reflection, analysis, and revision. Allegiance to naturalism is de rigueur, yet there is no clear agreement on the term’s meaning. Harding’s standpoint theory reads the lack of definition as indicative of its generative possibilities for epistemic progress. The driving question (...) is why Harding’s approach has not been considered a viable candidate for determining progress in epistemology. Beyond the fact that epistemic labor, in its scientific and non-scientific forms, is a social activity, Harding’s approach recognizes that it is situated in and reinforced by a broader network of social institutions, beliefs, and practices. Harding’s strategic naturalism would invigorate epistemology by increasing the awareness, acceptance, and respect for epistemic difference and drive epistemic progress that not only acknowledges pluralistic ways of knowing but also gives a more accurate account of the knowing subject. Chapter one is a discussion of non-naturalized epistemology and Quinean Naturalized Epistemology (QNE), framed by Harding’s historical account of the related projects of modern epistemology and science. This chapter highlights two important issues. The first issue is that epistemology is more complex than the story Quine offers. The second, and decisive issue is that the shared history of modern epistemology and science demonstrates the influence of social and cultural values on that history, and the long shadows they cast on naturalism debates in epistemology, science, and philosophy of science. Chapter two is an exegetical account of the origins of and motivations for critical feminist responses to both the received epistemological theory and QNE discussed in chapter one. The justifications for the feminist critiques and the problematic issues that motivate these critiques provide the backdrop for the initial, positive response to QNE, as well as their disenchantment with Quine’s influential proposal. Ultimately, feminist epistemologists and philosophers of science assess QNE as not naturalized enough to address their concerns. Chapter three considers several feminist standpoint theories to show that they are more naturalistic and better at providing a multi-faceted theory that is based on actual scientific practice, and re-introduces social values and interests as having a positive influence on epistemology and philosophies of science. This chapter shows that given the closely shared histories and assumptions of modern epistemology and science, FSE would be a viable resource for a more naturalistic epistemology. The final chapter argues that the project of naturalizing epistemology could incorporate FSE insights and the positive role FSE’s controversiality would play in naturalizing epistemology and philosophies of science. If we are to take seriously the concept of situatedness and what that entails, then naturalism must also be situated, and revisited with a critical and reflective eye. The implications on both our epistemic theories and our accounts of what kinds of knowing subject we are would foster epistemic progress. (shrink)

Journal of Philosophy of Education, EarlyView.

This article compares knowledge claims within critical realism and the situated knowledges approach, and will discuss the implications of adopting these two perspectives in research on inequity in health care. The concept of medical gender bias, as well as two empirical studies on inequity among patients waiting for cataract extractions in Sweden, will be used in order to illustrate the different implications of adopting a critical realist or a situated knowledges perspective. The article suggests that the latter of these two (...) perspectives is compatible with critical realist claims about epistemic relativism, but that it is much harder to combine with the concept of judgmental rationality, at least in so far as this rationality is not treated as being situated itself. The article will also claim that critical realism and the situated knowledges approach emphasize different implications concerning responsibility during processes of knowledge production. Finally, it will suggest that the adoption of a critical realist-based intersectional ontology, in combination with a greater emphasis on the fact that researchers are always situated in various ways, is a fruitful starting point for grounding studies on inequity in health care. (shrink)

The histories of philosophy in Mexico published between 1943 and 2016 display gender inequality, as they include many more male than female authors. But are they a true and objective portrayal of women’s participation in, and contribution to, Mexican philosophy? In this essay I discuss why we should perform an ethical revision of the selection criteria used in the histories of philosophy in Mexico, and I will present some proposals that I believe could help repair the epistemic injustice that women (...) have been historically subjected to in this field. (shrink)

Surgery is an important part of contemporary health care, but currently much of surgery lacks a strong evidence base. Uptake of evidence-based medicine (EBM) methods within surgical research and among practitioners has been slow compared with other areas of medicine. Although this is often viewed as arising from practical and cultural barriers, it also reflects a lack of epistemic fit between EBM research methods and surgical practice. In this paper we discuss some epistemic challenges in surgery relating to this lack (...) of fit, and investigate how resources from feminist epistemology can help to characterize them. We point to ways in which these epistemic challenges may be addressed by gathering and disseminating evidence about what works in surgery using methods that are contextual, pluralistic, and sensitive to hierarchies. (shrink)