By the end of this module, students will have a better understanding of the political and social role of knowledge, belief and ignorance. Students will also become familiar with recent developments in social epistemology, where philosophical methods are used for analysing and understanding social and political issues such as fake news, conspiracy theories, and breakdown of trust in experts.

In this course, we will consider how we can build communities, both specialised and general, that produce knowledge and that combat misinformation, propaganda, and practices that serve agendas that are either indifferent to or actively harm the pursuit of knowledge. We will do so by examining a series of specific, ongoing cases of communities directly confronting this problem: the spread of conspiracy theories, the phenomenon of ‘fake news’, the role of social media in disseminating mis- and disinformation, the marginalisation and silencing of the testimony and views of minority groups, and communication of expert inquiry and research in cases where experts disagree.

Topics and Guidelines for additional reading: :

Conspiracy Theories:

- Quassim Cassam, Conspiracy Theories (Polity Press: 2019)
- David Coady, “Are Conspiracy Theories Irrational?” Episteme 4 (2): 193-204, 2007.
- Rachel Fraser, “Epistemic FOMO”, The Cambridge Humanities Review 16, 2021.
- M. Giulia Napolitano, “Conspiracy Theories and Evidential Self-Insulation” in The Epistemology of Fake News (Oxford University Press: 2021).
- Juha Räikkä, “Conspiracies and Conspiracy Theories: An Introduction”, Argumenta 3 no (2): 205-216, 2018.
- Matthew Dentith, “Conspiracy theories on the basis of the evidence”, Synthese, 196 (6): 2243-2261, 2019.

Fake News:

- Jessica Pepp, Eliot Michaelson, and Rachel Katharine Sterken, “What’s New About Fake News?” Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy 16 (2): 67-94, 2019.
- Regina Rini, “Deepfakes and the Epistemic Backstop”, Philosophers’ Imprint 20 (24): 1-16, 2020.
- Megan Fritts and Frank Cabrera, “Fake News and Epistemic Vice: Combating a Uniquely Noxious Market”, Journal of the American Philosophical Association, forthcoming.
- Filippo Ferrari & Sebastiano Moruzzi, “Enquiry and Normative Deviance: The Role of Fake News in Science Denialism” in The Epistemology of Fake News (Oxford University Press: 2021).
- Catarina Dutilh Novaes and Jeroen de Ridder, “Is Fake News Old News?” in The Epistemology of Fake News (Oxford University Press: 2021).
- Jennifer Lackey, “Echo Chambers, Fake News, and Social Epistemology” in The Epistemology of Fake News (Oxford University Press: 2021).

Social Media, Misinformation, and Disinformation:

- C. Thi Nguyen, “Echo Chambers and Epistemic Bubbles” Episteme 17 (2): 141-161, 2020.
- Étienne Brown, “Regulating the Spread of Online Misinformation” in The Routledge Handbook of Political Epistemology (Routledge: 2021).
- Heather Battaly, “Engaging Closed-mindedly with your Polluted Media Feed” in The Routledge Handbook of Political Epistemology (Routledge: 2021).
- Alessandra Tanesini, “Virtues and Vices in Public and Political Debate” in The Routledge Handbook of Political Epistemology (Routledge: 2021)
- Hanna Gunn and Michael Patrick Lynch, “The Internet and Epistemic Agency” in Applied Epistemology (Oxford University Press: 2021).
- C. Thi Nguyen, “How Twitter Gamifies Communication” in Applied Epistemology (Oxford University Press: 2021).
- Karen Frost-Arnold, “The Epistemic Dangers of Context Collapse Online” in Applied Epistemology (Oxford University Press: 2021).

Epistemic Injustice:

- Miranda Fricker, Chapters 1 and 7 of Epistemic Injustice: Power & the Ethics of Knowing (Oxford University Press: 2007).
- José Medina, “Vices of the Privileged and Virtues of the Oppressed in Epistemic Group Dynamics” in The Routledge Handbook of Political Epistemology (Routledge: 2021).
- Heidi Grasswick, “Epistemic Injustice in Science” in The Routledge Handbook of Epistemic Injustice (Routledge: 2019).
- Havi Carel and Ian James Kidd, “Epistemic Injustice in Medicine and Healthcare” in The Routledge Handbook of Epistemic Injustice (Routledge: 2019).

Expert Disagreement:

- Robert Fogelin, “The Logic of Deep Disagreements”, Informal Logic 7 (1): 3-11, 1985.
- Thomas Kuhn, “Postscript – 1969” in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (The University of Chicago Press: 1970/2012).
- Helen Longino, Studying Human Behavior: How Scientists Investigate Aggression and Sexuality (The University of Chicago Press, 2013).
- David Coady, “When Experts Disagree”, Episteme 3 (1-2): 68-79, 2006.
- Heather Douglas, “The Role of Scientific Expertise in Democracy” in The Routledge Handbook of Political Epistemology (Routledge: 2021).
- Maria Baghramian and Michel Croce, “Experts, Public Policy and the Question of Trust” in The Routledge Handbook of Political Epistemology (Routledge: 2021).


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Not applicable to this module.

• Feedback individually to students, post-assessment

The essays will be graded and written feedback provided within two-weeks of the submission date.