TY - JOUR

T1 - Challenges and suggestions for a social account of testimonial sensitivity

AU - Smith, Leonie

PY - 2016/6/12

Y1 - 2016/6/12

N2 - Recent work on epistemic injustice has re-ignited the importance of sensitivity-analyses of knowledge, via the possibility of audiences being insufficiently sensitive to the testimonial credibility of prejudiced-against speakers.[1] The focus of this work has quite rightly been on demonstrating the epistemic harms to potential testifiers when sensitivity fails to apply. However there is clearly a corollary impact on audiences, and their ability to achieve knowledge from testimonial sources, when they fail to apply appropriate conditions of sensitivity with regard to the testimony of others. The notion of being appropriately-sensitive, implicitly assumes that we can make sense of what these sensitivity conditions on testimonial-knowledge formation might be. In this paper, I therefore go back to basics, and put the claim that sensitivity is a necessary condition for knowledge under pressure, by considering its applicability with regard to testimonially-formed beliefs. Building on, and departing from, Goldberg, I positively draw out how we might understand the required sensitivity as a social interaction between speaker and hearer in testimonial cases. In doing so however, I identify a concern which places the whole notion of testimonial sensitivity in potential jeopardy. I find an apparently paradoxical inverse relationship between better-differentiating methods that fulfil sensitivity conditions, and being able to have sensitive beliefs with regard to specific instances of testimony. After examining potential resolutions, I conclude that only a focus on minimally realising the problem, rather than “solving” it, will enable us to retain sensitivity as a necessary condition for testimonial-knowledge.

AB - Recent work on epistemic injustice has re-ignited the importance of sensitivity-analyses of knowledge, via the possibility of audiences being insufficiently sensitive to the testimonial credibility of prejudiced-against speakers.[1] The focus of this work has quite rightly been on demonstrating the epistemic harms to potential testifiers when sensitivity fails to apply. However there is clearly a corollary impact on audiences, and their ability to achieve knowledge from testimonial sources, when they fail to apply appropriate conditions of sensitivity with regard to the testimony of others. The notion of being appropriately-sensitive, implicitly assumes that we can make sense of what these sensitivity conditions on testimonial-knowledge formation might be. In this paper, I therefore go back to basics, and put the claim that sensitivity is a necessary condition for knowledge under pressure, by considering its applicability with regard to testimonially-formed beliefs. Building on, and departing from, Goldberg, I positively draw out how we might understand the required sensitivity as a social interaction between speaker and hearer in testimonial cases. In doing so however, I identify a concern which places the whole notion of testimonial sensitivity in potential jeopardy. I find an apparently paradoxical inverse relationship between better-differentiating methods that fulfil sensitivity conditions, and being able to have sensitive beliefs with regard to specific instances of testimony. After examining potential resolutions, I conclude that only a focus on minimally realising the problem, rather than “solving” it, will enable us to retain sensitivity as a necessary condition for testimonial-knowledge.

KW - Testimonial sensitivity

KW - Analysis of knowledge

KW - Epistemic injustice

KW - Knowledge

KW - Justified Belief

KW - Testimonial trust

M3 - Journal article

VL - 6

SP - 18

EP - 26

JO - Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective

JF - Social Epistemology Review and Reply Collective

SN - 2471-9560

ER -