Also, I mean this is a serious question, in particular here in Candian research context where ALL research should be applied and useful. So, what a philosopher does should be of use for, say, at least social scientists. But how do you make philosophy relevant without actually doing empirical stuff? - ThreadSky

alogins.bsky.social • 95 days ago

Also, I mean this is a serious question, in particular here in Candian research context where ALL research should be applied and useful. So, what a philosopher does should be of use for, say, at least social scientists. But how do you make philosophy relevant without actually doing empirical stuff?

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rbnmckenna.bsky.social•95 days ago

I have no idea how to answer that Q in the way that funding bodies seem to like. But you do the sort of interesting work people like @danwphilosophy.bsky.social, @cdutilhnovaes.bsky.social and @nathanballantyne.bsky.social do (I'd tag Neil Levy but for some reason I can't).

alogins.bsky.social•95 days ago

Thanks! I guess talking to people in other disciplines is the first step. 🤷

nathanballantyne.bsky.social•95 days ago

Thank you, Robin. Here’s a starting point for answering your question, Arturs. In my view, there’s no shortage of opportunities for epistemologists to collaborate with social scientists. https://global.oup.com/academic/product/reason-bias-and-inquiry-9780197636916?cc=us&lang=en&

alogins.bsky.social•95 days ago

Thanks!! I still have to read it! But you are in a way lucky to have already interlocutors and collaborators in social sciences. Do you think that in general people in social sciences are interested in what philosophers have to say? And how do you start taking with them?

nathanballantyne.bsky.social•95 days ago

@daviddunning6.bsky.social might have thoughts about what type of philosophical projects might pique social scientists’ interest.

My $0.02. (1) Read social science and think about how philosophical perspectives might connect, raise new questions, etc. (2) Attend a lab group at your university.

alogins.bsky.social•95 days ago

Thanks! Sounds right. That's why interdisciplinary centers have common meetings involving everyone I think

cdutilhnovaes.bsky.social•95 days ago

So one way in which philosophers and social scientists can collaborate is when philosophers do work of *synthesis*. Precisely because so much of the social sciences now are organized in terms of testing hypotheses, experiments etc., they can benefit from our help in seeing the forest for the trees.

alogins.bsky.social•95 days ago

I really like this! My hope is also that by training philosophers are well placed to do synthesis of this sort - overviewing massive amounts of work and identify some fundamentals

cdutilhnovaes.bsky.social•95 days ago

Another way is in terms of conceptual clarity and conceptual engineering, for example to develop a new conceptual framework that brings together research from different fields (thus back to synthetic philosophy 🙃 @nescio13.bsky.social )

milkos.bsky.social•94 days ago

Doing things that impact empirical research!

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