Below are courses I have taught at Harvard. For up-to-date syllabi, please visit the course canvas site.
We are finite and fallible beings with limited cognitive resources, and we must rely on others to help manage our beliefs, understanding, knowledge, and other aspects of our epistemic lives. This course examines how our beliefs are shaped by the people around us and the communities we inhabit. In the first part of the course, we will ask what to do when we encounter someone just as smart and informed as we are who nonetheless disagrees with us: should we change our minds, hold our ground, or take a middle path? The second part of the course combines two themes. First, we will explore how our opinions (or lack thereof) are shaped by identity, power, and social position. Second, we will reflect on whether these social forces—and other causal influences—can provide reasons for or against our beliefs and other epistemic states.
Your daily writing plan gives you pain, and you are about to sit down and push through it. You are more likely to make it if you believe you can. Should you believe that? Your friend invites you to her poetry reading event. She runs mediocre poetry nights—at least according to your standard—but she promises you that you will really enjoy this one. Should you trust your friend against the odds? Suppose that during the event your friend reads her own piece. Should you try harder to appreciate your friend’s writing, just in virtue of her being your friend?
On the one hand, it seems that you should form a belief only when there is sufficient evidence that guarantees the truth of that belief. On the other hand, our temptation to answer “yes” to some of the questions above suggests that we can stand in an epistemic relationship with ourselves and with others on grounds that are not merely evidential. This course aims to survey some possible epistemic relationships that have their grounds in something other than, or more than, evidence.