Questions tagged [epistemology]
Epistemology is the study of knowledge, acquisition thereof, and the justification of belief in a given claim.
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Emergent Behavior: Observer-Constructed or Intrinsic?
Is there a theoretical perspective that argues emergent behavior is not an intrinsic property of the phenomenon being studied, but rather a construction of the observer's perception? This view would ...
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How can we describe intellect in a way that relates to philosophical knowledge?
Is there any writing by philosophers specifically about the nature of intelligence/intellect and the way it relates to epistemology? For example, is someone who's 'smarter' more likely to have true ...
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How well does the following argument work as a counter towards unfalsifiable supernatural claims?
Human perception is solely naturalistic; as such, empiricism and logic generated by human perception and interpretation of reality is strictly naturalistic as well.
Absence of evidence is not evidence ...
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How to engage in radical skeptical pondering for hours on a daily basis and maintain psychological well being?
I often have heard the sentiment most famously expressed by Russell that whilst practically all flavors of radical skepticism are unassailable, they are psychologically impossible to hold.
Recently, I ...
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Mechanistic view of the universe
I was chatgpting and found Encouragement of the Mechanistic View The mechanistic view in physics is driven by several key principles:
Determinism: The idea that the future behavior of a system can be ...
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Do epistemic oughts exist?
Are there any notions of what one should or ought to believe given a certain piece of evidence?
For example, if I hear a noise outside the window, should I now update my credence in there being a ...
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Is it ever rational or justified to believe in a claim X based on eyewitness accounts if X seems to contradict mainstream scientific theories? [duplicate]
Can the testimony of multiple credible witnesses challenge the conventional understanding of the laws of physics? If several trustworthy individuals report events that appear to contradict well-...
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Differences in the epistemological description and meaning of Plank length & Plank time and the discretization of spacetime
Why does there seem to be a schism between discreteness and continuity of space and time and even in the scientific setting why isn't there a clear explanation as to what the Planck length and time ...
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Is it a "shifting of the burden of proof" if I show evidence in favor of a position, and ask the audience to debate that evidence if they disagree?
As far as I know, the "fallacy of shifting the burden of proof" is to refuse to show any evidence for my position, demanding the opponent to show evidence against my position, and claiming ...
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Is it epistemologically self-consistent to use the scientific method to justify some beliefs and non-scientific justifications for others?
Let’s call B(p) the set of all beliefs a person p holds. We can denote S(B(p)) as the subset of beliefs held by p for which they can provide a scientific justification, and NS(B(p)) as the set B(p) ...
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If the supernatural were real, would we be able to study it scientifically?
Hypothetically, if there were a supernatural realm, would it be reasonable to expect that we would be able to study it using the scientific method? On the other hand, is it possible that the ...
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What is the most accurate definition of logic? [closed]
Suppose you are writing a book on logic, and you want to define 'logic'. What is the best choice of words for the definition? If your definition is different from the accepted definition, please ...
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Can probability amplitudes be used as credences?
Probability amplitudes in quantum mechanics are sometimes called a "generalization" of probabilities. They are complex numbers a + bi. The probability associated with the probability ...
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How do ethical intuitionists avoid relativism?
Why doesn't ethical intuitionism (the form which actually uses intuition as the foundation of morality rather than some other non-inferential method) fall into relativism? It seems that different ...
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Metaphysical (Hard) Solipsism vs Epistemological (Soft) Solipsism
I’ve seen these terms tossed around as if they are actually different things but it does not appear to me that they are different philosophical positions/beliefs.
Perhaps I am wrong, but here is my ...
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