Zoom Talk: Thomas Grundmann (Köln)

Title:

Epistemic Authority and Thinking for Oneself

Abstract:

In the paper, I argue that two claims, both of which have a lot going for them, cannot easily be reconciled. On the one hand, experts possess the normative status of epistemic authorities for laypeople, i.e. the latter should simply defer to expert testimony and ignore their own evidence regarding the subject matter. I defend this Preemption View of epistemic authority by introducing a novel argument from higher-order defeat. On the other hand, thinking for themselves is epistemically highly valuable or even indispensable for laypeople. It would be an epistemic catastrophe, if laypeople stopped thinking for themselves altogether. In the paper, I explore the question of how the two claims can be reconciled. I suggest that, despite the initial tension, laypeople can simultaneously follow epistemic authorities and think for themselves, as long as the latter happens off-line. I will explain the idea of thinking for oneself off-line in more detail and defend it against some standard objections.