I think there is a myriad of ways philosophers and behavioral scientists can benefit from crosstalk. A wealth of opportunities are simply being missed. First, take philosophical contributions to science. A 🧵1/n @nathanballantyne.bsky.social‬ - ThreadSky

daviddunning6.bsky.social • 95 days ago

I think there is a myriad of ways philosophers and behavioral scientists can benefit from crosstalk. A wealth of opportunities are simply being missed. First, take philosophical contributions to science. A 🧵1/n

@nathanballantyne.bsky.social‬

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Ok, I need to know. How do you see the good collaboration between philosophy and social sciences? Philosophers won't test claims about the causal relation between an A and a B. So, what's our impact? Where should we invest our forces if we want to be relevant for social sciences?

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daviddunning6.bsky.social•95 days ago

Philosophy can provide concepts and analyses that enlighten work in the behavioral sciences. Laypeople and nonphilosophers often have undeveloped or imprecise conceptions of problems they face and notions they use. 2/n

daviddunning6.bsky.social•95 days ago

Two examples from my lab. What is knowledge? People have an idea—having the right answers—but philosophers articulate, and haggle over, a much richer view of it takes to be knowledgeable: To be knowledgeable at least requires identifying where your right answers end and your ignorance begins. 3/n

daviddunning6.bsky.social•95 days ago

In a recent paper, Yuyan Han and I showed that experts produced more correct answers but weren’t necessarily more knowledgeable: They were confident in their wrong answers and thus had trouble with that second criterion of knowledge. 4/n
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/bdm.2375

daviddunning6.bsky.social•95 days ago

In a 2nd paper (I’ll talk about it more when the journal posts it), Clint McKenna (@clintmckenna.bsky.social) and I asked whether cognitive ability promotes or inhibits motivated reasoning, dipping into a rather feverish recent debate over the matter, featuring work by the lawyer Dan Kahan. 5/n

daviddunning6.bsky.social•95 days ago

Our analysis featured Pritchard’s “epistemic luck,” the notion that people often blunder into right answers via fallacious reasoning, and its role in reaching motivated conclusions. Again, our analysis was clarified by philosophical work already laid out for us. More TK when paper is posted. 6/n

daviddunning6.bsky.social•95 days ago

On the flip side, philosophers can learn from behavioral science, as Tamar Gendler’s belief/alief philosophical distinction falls out from the distinction between system 2 and 1 thought. It’s also terrific that philosophers are collecting empirical data to test their intuitions, but… 7/n

damcotto.bsky.social•94 days ago

📌

alogins.bsky.social•95 days ago

Thanks for such a great thread in response! This is super helpful and great to see the concrete examples! I very much like the idea that learning goes both ways!

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