Justified Belief in a Digital Age: On the Epistemic Implications of Secret Internet Technologies

Episteme 10 (2):117 - 134 (2013)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

People increasingly form beliefs based on information gained from automatically filtered Internet ‎sources such as search engines. However, the workings of such sources are often opaque, preventing ‎subjects from knowing whether the information provided is biased or incomplete. Users’ reliance on ‎Internet technologies whose modes of operation are concealed from them raises serious concerns about ‎the justificatory status of the beliefs they end up forming. Yet it is unclear how to address these concerns ‎within standard theories of knowledge and justification. To shed light on the problem, we introduce a ‎novel conceptual framework that clarifies the relations between justified belief, epistemic responsibility, ‎action, and the technological resources available to a subject. We argue that justified belief is subject to ‎certain epistemic responsibilities that accompany the subject’s particular decision-taking circumstances, ‎and that one typical responsibility is to ascertain, so far as one can, whether the information upon which ‎the judgment will rest is biased or incomplete. What this responsibility comprises is partly determined by ‎the inquiry-enabling technologies available to the subject. We argue that a subject’s beliefs that are ‎formed based on Internet-filtered information are less justified than they would be if she either knew how ‎filtering worked or relied on additional sources, and that the subject may have the epistemic ‎responsibility to take measures to enhance the justificatory status of such beliefs.‎.

Similar books and articles

Epistemic responsibility.J. Angelo Corlett - 2008 - International Journal of Philosophical Studies 16 (2):179 – 200.
Truth as the aim of epistemic justification.Asbjørn Steglich-Petersen - 2013 - In Timothy Chan (ed.), The Aim of Belief. Oxford University Press.
A paradox of justified believing.Colin Cheyne - 2009 - Ratio 22 (3):278-290.
A puzzle about epistemic akrasia.Daniel Greco - 2014 - Philosophical Studies 167 (2):201-219.
Is Justification Knowledge?Brent J. C. Madison - 2010 - Journal of Philosophical Research 35:173-191.
Epistemic Entitlement.Jon Altschul - 2011 - Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Trustworthiness.Catherine Z. Elgin - 2008 - Philosophical Papers 37 (3):371-387.
An argument that internalism requires infallibility.Alan Sidelle - 2001 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 63 (1):163-179.
Epistemic responsibility without epistemic agency.Pascal Engel - 2009 - Philosophical Explorations 12 (2):205 – 219.

Analytics

Added to PP
2012-12-26

Downloads
3,485 (#1,383)

6 months
190 (#5,482)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author Profiles

Isaac Record
Michigan State University
Boaz Miller
Zefat Academic College

References found in this work

The extended mind.Andy Clark & David J. Chalmers - 1998 - Analysis 58 (1):7-19.
Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to the Actor-Network Theory.Bruno Latour - 2005 - Oxford, England and New York, NY, USA: Oxford University Press.
Knowledge and practical interests.Jason Stanley - 2005 - New York: Oxford University Press.
Science, Policy, and the Value-Free Ideal.Heather Douglas - 2009 - University of Pittsburgh Press.

View all 46 references / Add more references