Disinformation has become a pressing problem in today’s society, yet efforts to counter it risk cementing epistemic injustice, whereby laypeople with legitimate local knowledge are wrongly dismissed by experts as ignorant or misinformed. This talk examines how philosophers can potentially help to mitigate epistemic injustice by drawing on the literature on science and values, which highlights scientific decisions that experts and members of the community may reasonably handle differently. The talk focuses on several specific types of scientific decisions and illustrates these using examples from environmental and medical research. Finally, it is argued that philosophers should carefully consider whether certain forms of engaged science, in collaboration with scientists and/or members of the community, would enable them to utilise these insights from the literature on science and values in the most effective and ethically responsible manner.
Kevin Elliott is the Red Cedar Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at Michigan State University.
A video recording of the lecture can be found here.