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The Problem of Unwelcome Epistemic Company

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 August 2020

Joshua Blanchard Open the ORCID record for Joshua Blanchard [Opens in a new window]
Joshua Blanchard*
Affiliation:
Oakland University, MI, USA
*
Email: jblanchard@oakland.edu
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Abstract

Many of us are unmoved when it is objected that some morally or intellectually suspect source agrees with our belief. While we may tend to find this kind of guilt by epistemic association unproblematic, I argue that this tendency is a mistake. We sometimes face what I call the problem of unwelcome epistemic company. This is the problem of encountering agreement about the content of your belief from a source whose faults give you reason to worry about the belief's truth, normative status, etiology, or implications. On the basis of an array of cases, I elaborate four distinct kinds of problems that unwelcome epistemic company poses. Two of these are distinctly epistemic, and two are moral. I canvass possible responses, ranging from stubbornness to an epistemic prudishness that avoids unwelcome company at all costs. Finally, I offer preliminary lessons of the problem and distinguish it from the problem of peer disagreement.

Keywords

social epistemologypeer disagreementunwelcome epistemic companyunwelcome agreement
Type
Article
Information
Episteme , Volume 20 , Issue 3 , September 2023 , pp. 529 - 541
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press

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