The Yeoh Tiong Lay Centre for Politics, Philosophy and Law is delighted to host Professor Paulina Sliwa for the fifth workshop of the 2024/25 KJuris programme.

Title

Bad Perspectives

Abstract

What are epistemic echo chambers? Why are they epistemically problematic? In an influential paper, Nguyen has argued that echo chambers are belief systems that are characterised by distrust of outsiders. Because of this feature, echo chambers entrap believers – the only way out is through a complete epistemic reboot of one's belief system. I argue that such a doxastic account does not do justice to the nature of echo chambers, which are constitued not just by beliefs but also by affective attitudes, associations, and narratives. Instead, we should take echo chambers to be characterised by perspectives, where a perspective is constituted by an interconnected set of doxastic, conative, affective, and evaluative dispositions. I argue that the perspectives that function as echo chambers have particular features, which explains both their epistemic defectiveness as well as how they entrap believers: they inhibit the virtue of perspectival flexibility.

Author Bio

Paulina Sliwa is Professor of Moral and Political Philosophy at the University of Vienna. She is on the Board of Directors of the FWF-funded Cluster of Excellence "Knowledge in Crisis".