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Do epistemic requirements vary along with facts about what promotes agents' well-being? Epistemic instrumentalists say 'yes', and thereby earn a lot of contempt. This contempt is a mistake on two counts. First, it is incorrectly based: the reasons typically given for it are misguided. Second, it fails to distinguish between first- and second-order epistemic instrumentalism; and, it happens, only the former is contemptible.
In this book, Nathaniel P. Sharadin argues for rejecting epistemic instrumentalism as a first-order view not because it suffers extensional failures, but because it suffers explanatory ones. By contrast, he argues that epistemic instrumentalism offers a natural, straightforward explanation of why being epistemically correct matters. What emerges is a second-order instrumentalist explanation for¿epistemic authority that is neutral between competing first-order epistemic theories. This neutrality is an advantage. But, drawing on work from cognitive science and psychology, Sharadin argues that instrumentalists can abandon that neutrality in order to adopt a view he calls epistemic ecologism.
Epistemic Instrumentalism Explained will be of interest to researchers and advanced students working in epistemology, ethics, and philosophy of mind.
List of contents
1. Introduction
2. Preliminaries
3. First-Order Epistemic Theory
4. Epistemic Correctness and the Minimal Functional Criterion
5. First-Order Epistemic Instrumentalism
6. The Functionalist Challenge
7. Second-Order Epistemic Theory
8. Second-Order Epistemic Instrumentalism
9. The Content Constraint
10. Bespoke Explanations
11. New View Old Problems
12. Going Further
About the author
Nathaniel P. Sharadin is an Assistant Professor of Philosophy at The University of Hong Kong. He is the author of numerous articles on epistemology and ethics.
Summary
This book argues for rejecting epistemic instrumentalism as a first-order view not because it suffers extensional failures, but because it suffers explanatory ones. By contrast, it argues that epistemic instrumentalism offers a natural, straightforward explanation of why being epistemically correct matters.
