Abstract
This paper argues that the problem of expertise calls for a rapprochement between social epistemology and argumentation theory. Social epistemology has tended to emphasise the role of expert testimony, neglecting the argumentative function of appeals to expert opinion by non-experts. The first half of the paper discusses parallels and contrasts between the two cases of direct expert testimony and appeals to expert opinion by our epistemic peers, respectively. Importantly, appeals to expert opinion need to be advertised as such, if they are to sway an epistemic peer. The second half of the paper sketches a theoretical framework for thinking about assessments of expertise in a unified way, via a ‘default and challenge’ model that emphasises the need for a version of conversational scorekeeping. It is through such scorekeeping that interlocutors can track and coordinate their differences in epistemic outlook. The paper concludes with a genealogical perspective on the function of (attributions of) expertise: acceptance of another’s appeal to expert opinion may be construed as tacit agreement that inquiry, for now, has been taken far enough.
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Notes
While spatio-temporal location is of paramount importance in eyewitness testimony, for second-hand reports or hearsay, what matters may be the recipient’s location in the social network across which a report is spreading.
Matheson (2005: 152) suggests that interpretative charity, while also making a contribution to a speaker’s “dialectical performance”, should be considered an indicator of “moral superiority”, not (mere) “rhetorical superiority”.
On this point, see also (Scholz 2009: 199).
For a detailed discussion of Walton’s six main questions, see Wagemans (2011, this issue).
This is Brandom’s (accurate) summary of Lewis’s approach; see Brandom (1994: 182).
It is, of course, entirely possible that B wrongly attributed certain commitments to A earlier, but even then it should be possible for A to contribute to the resolution of such misunderstandings, for example by clarifying her position.
Recall Hardwig’s contention that, if I do not have access to both, a putative expert’s reasons and a justification of why these are good reasons, then “I am in no position to determine whether the person really is an expert” (Hardwig 1985: 340).
For an argument that the success of our testimony-based collective projects can abductively sustain a stance of default acceptance of testimony, to be counterbalanced by specific instances of rejection ‘whenever the best explanation of the circumstances of its production (including the fact that it has been produced) casts doubt on the reliability of what we are told’, see Gelfert (2010: 395).
For a broader, multicausal analysis of the concept of knowledge as an adaptive response to a combination of selective pressures and conceptual needs, see Gelfert (2011).
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Acknowledgments
I am grateful to Boaz Miller and the participants of the March 2011 workshop ‘Epistemic Practices: Knowing through Testimony’, held at the Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, University of Edinburgh, for valuable comments on an earlier draft of this paper.
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Gelfert, A. Expertise, Argumentation, and the End of Inquiry. Argumentation 25, 297–312 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10503-011-9218-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10503-011-9218-7