Trusting Knowledge: Agency, Dependence, and Responsible Knowing in a Scientific World (Scholars Award)

Middlebury College, Middlebury VT

Investigators

Abstract

Introduction This is a project to develop a normative account of the role of trust in responsible scientific knowing. It is informed by the literature of sociology of scientific knowledge, science studies, and philosophy of science. The researcher will use a situated approach that is derived from feminist studies of science; in that approach, science and technology experts are modeled as occupying different social locations that can shape their possibilities for knowledge. The project develops the concept of responsible trust in science and outlines several of its conditions. The project examines challenges to and strategies for achieving this trust using several case studies including forms of indigenous knowledge, gender-differences research, and climate research. The result will be a normative account of the dimensions and degrees of trust in science that are required for sound and effective knowing. Intellectual Merit The concept of responsible trust in science has significant implications for understanding both the relationship between individual knowers and their communities, and the importance of cross-community engagement if we are to succeed in generating sound and effective knowledge that is meaningful for society. The analysis generated will bridge the fields of philosophy and science studies by integrating philosophical concerns about how we justify our reliance on the testimony of others with concerns raised in science studies regarding the varying degrees of trust that specific lay communities place in scientific institutions. Potential Broader Impacts The project will result in a book aimed at a broad interdisciplinary audience of science studies scholars, philosophers of science, educators, and policy makers. It will contribute to science policy discussions by analyzing the importance of trusting relations across communities and considering strategies to develop this trust. A website of curricular resources for courses on science and democracy will also be developed. By increasing our understanding of the relationship between scientific and lay communities, and offering strategies for developing responsible trust, this project has the potential to offer policy insights regarding best institutional practices for interacting across scientific and lay communities. The work is important because the results of science will be maximally useful to society only when they are produced and implemented within a sufficient climate of trust.