scholarly journals Thought Experiments and Experimental Philosophy

2017 ◽  
pp. 385-405 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kirk Ludwig
Keyword(s):  
Experimental Philosophy ◽  
Thought Experiments

Further Insights on Fake-Barn Cases and Intuition Variation

Episteme ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Carsten Bergenholtz ◽  
Jacob Busch ◽  
Sara Kier Praëm
Keyword(s):  
Experimental Philosophy ◽  
Thought Experiment ◽  
Thought Experiments ◽  
Risk Attitude ◽  
Knowledge Ascription ◽  
Underlying Factor ◽  
Demographic Group ◽  
Knowledge Ascriptions ◽  
Group Variation ◽  
Fake Barn

Abstract Studies in experimental philosophy claim to document intuition variation. Some studies focus on demographic group-variation; Colaço et al., for example, claim that age generates intuition variation regarding knowledge attribution in a fake-barn scenario. Other studies claim to show intuition variation when comparing the intuition of philosophers to that of non-philosophers. The main focus has been on documenting intuition variation rather than uncovering what underlying factor(s) may prompt such a phenomenon. We explore a number of suggested explanatory hypotheses put forth by Colaço et al., as well as an attempt to test Sosa's claim that intuition variance is a result of people ‘filling in the details’ of a thought experiment differently from one another. We show (i) that people respond consistently across conditions aimed at ‘filling in the details’ of thought experiments, (ii) that risk attitude does not seem relevant to knowledge ascription, (iii) that people's knowledge ascriptions do not vary due to views about defeasibility of knowledge. Yet, (iv) we find no grounds to reject that a large proportion of people appear to adhere to so-called subjectivism about knowledge, which may explain why they generally have intuitions about the fake-barn scenario that vary from those of philosophers.

scholarly journals Are thought experiments “disturbing”? The case of armchair physics

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Samuel Schindler ◽  
Pierre Saint-Germier
Keyword(s):  
Experimental Philosophy ◽  
Thought Experiments ◽  
Method Of Cases

Proponents of the “negative program” in experimental philosophy have argued that judgements in philosophical cases, also known as case judgements, are unreliable and that the method of cases should be either strongly constrained or even given up. Here we put one of the main proponent’s account of why philosophical cases may cause the unreliability of case judgements to the test. We conducted our test with thought experiments from physics, which exhibit the exact same supposedly “disturbing characteristics” of philosophical cases.

scholarly journals Analiza empirycznych argumentów na rzecz tezy o zróżnicowaniu kulturowym intuicji epistemicznych

2019 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 75-102
Author(s):  
Krzysztof Sękowski
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Diversity ◽  
Modern Philosophy ◽  
Cultural Differences ◽  
Crucial Role ◽  
Experimental Philosophy ◽  
Thought Experiments ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Philosophical Methodology ◽  
Cross Cultural Differences ◽  
Folk Epistemology

An analysis of empirical arguments for the thesis on cultural diversity of epistemic intuitionsThe founding text for the new current in modern philosophy—experimental philosophy—can be seen in Jonathan Weinberg, Shaun Nichols and Stephen Stich’s “Normativity and Epistemic Intuitions” 2001. The authors describe in this article a study to prove cross-cultural differences in epistemic intuitions. On the basis of their results, they argue that since epistemic intuitions seem to serve a crucial role in the use of thought experiments, contemporary philosophical methodology is highly unjustified.That study has brought about at least three replication attempts Seyedsayamdost 2015; Kim, Yuan 2015; Nagel, San Juan, Mar 2013. None of them confirmed the original results.The aim of this article is to critically analyze in detail Weinberg, Nichols and Stich’s methodology and the three replications mentioned. Regarding the results of my analysis, I will try to examine what conclusions can be drawn with regard to the outcomes of analized studies. In particular I will refer to far-reaching conclusions about the universality of epistemic intuitions or universality of folk epistemology, which are sometimes—hastily, as I will argue—extrapolated from the results of such kind of studies e.g., Kim, Yuan 2015; Kim Yuan 2016.

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