5th Nagoya Meta-Philosophy Workshop 2.0
Date: 14:45 to 16:15pm, Dec 15, 2025; 2025年12月15日(月) 14:45~16:15pm
Venue: SIS5, 3rd Floor of ILAS Main Building; 全学教育棟本館3階SIS5号室
Improving Our Epistemic Environments
Shane Ryan (City University of Hong Kong)
Abstract: Epistemic environmentalism lies at the intersection ofepistemology, ethics, and value theory. Epistemic environmentalism is a project in applied epistemology and requires research in epistemic value theory and social epistemology, as well as areas that traditionally fall outside of the domain of epistemology, such as trust. The case is made that an engaged and applied social epistemology examines interventions in epistemic environments to promote the attainment of valuable epistemic goods. I consider the example of logic-checking as a contribution to improving epistemic environments related to public discourse. The epistemic environmentalist, however, faces difficult questions about the approach to be taken and priorities for improving epistemic environments.This paper investigates whether the priority for epistemic environmentalist interventions should be determined by a concern to facilitate the attainment of the goods sought by the users and potential users of an epistemic environment. In some cases, I argue that we may judge that that such an approach should be rejected on the basis of a concern for, say, privacy. Similarly, interventions to promote the attainment of epistemic goods may involve attempts at maximising attainment or prioritise epistemically disadvantaged groups in particular environments. This paper makes the case, that applied epistemologists can draw on debates in ethics concerning distribution to inform a better epistemic environmentalism.