Philosophy of Science 17 - Feminist Approaches

Feminist epistemology urges that science should be reformed so as to incorporate feminist values. I begin by outlining some case studies of male bias in science. I then discuss three approaches to feminist epistemology: feminist empiricism, standpoint epistemology, and feminist postmodernism.

[@arcanewonders9641]

I like this video. It’s so concise and analytical.

[@thehairblairbunchjones6209]

Aaaaaaa

[@thehairblairbunchjones6209]

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

[@arcanewonders9641]

Aaaaaaaa

[@thehairblairbunchjones6209]

I’m very disappointed this video included none of the criticisms made by the great philosopher of our time, Ben Shapiro

[@steveclark8538]

Excellent!

[@phreindlyphreind9856]

"feminist bias"?? The point is that the hypotheses are at high risk of being faulty when conforming to the male bias. the feminist "bias" is the effort to eliminate the male bias, not to redirect the hypotheses exclusively through a 'female lense', but dismiss the male one. the equivalence is between "bourgeois science" and "male science", not between bourgeois and feminist. im suprised there is a confusion here between feminist bias and female bias... odd critique

[@ignotumperignotius630]

Grief I suppose this'll be my introductory dose to a sexualistic science.

[@RockRadioBlog]

I wouldn't really call these "feminist approaches", rather "epistemological approaches that just so happened to have come out of the thought and works of some feminist philosophers". I know this message sounds like a meme, or a dull pun, but the point is that I think there is a difference between 1) critiquing the sciences as in "the systems and academic bodies of scientists/researchers and their power structures", and 2) critiquing the sciences as in "the methodologies through which we ought to _do science_ and study its epistemological limits". I would go as far as to say that, maybe, these approaches are not even epistemological, for they seem not to provide any kind of technical detail that would help us improve the way in which we think, and work through, science as in 2).

[@orelazarevic2796]

Can you make a video/series on free will?

[@Ansatz66]

36:35 "The dominant do not understand the marginalized, but the marginalized do understand the dominant, and that makes the marginalized epistemically privileged. Or at least, the people who fight on behalf of the marginalized." This conflation of the marginalized with the people who fight on behalf of the marginalized seems to happen many times through this video. A feminist doesn't have to be black in order to fight on behalf of black women, nor does a person need to be a neo-Nazi in order to fight on behalf of neo-Nazis. Standpoint epistemology does not commit a person to supposing that neo-Nazis have a superior epistemology merely due to being oppressed, since it is entirely possible that neo-Nazis may have a very biased and warped perspective that limits their ability to view the world clearly. The standpoint epistemologist might say that fighting on behalf of the neo-Nazis grants a person a better perspective, even if actually being a neo-Nazi would totally counter-act that benefit. 40:57 "I suppose, to be fair, the idea that particular perspectives are epistemically privileged, that's not in itself controversial. Indeed we generally think that science is epistemically privileged about many matters. Astronomers are in a better position to understand the structure of stars than are other people." That sort of epistemic privilege should surely be meaningless in science. It would be a shocking dereliction of duty for astronomers to take the word of other astronomers on astronomical matters due to supposed epistemic privilege. The whole point of being a scientist in that field is to study the sky for oneself. There's no proper place for trust in science; trust is an invitation for bias to come in unchecked, and if we cannot trust then we cannot grant anyone's epistemic privilege. We have to do the experiments for ourselves and gather our own evidence. In other words, scientists have to keep doing science regardless of whoever may have whatever epistemic privilege. The situation is much the same for laypeople. We could suppose that scientists and plumbers have epistemic privilege in their fields, but to do so would be pointless. We hire a plumber to fix our pipes because we don't have the time or the desire to learn about pipes for ourselves, not because we recognize a supposed epistemic privilege. On the contrary, we would be foolish to trust plumbers merely on the basis of them being plumbers. Plumbers make mistakes. Plumbers can be terrible with pipes. When we hire a plumber we're making a bet and taking a risk. We aim for the best bet that we can get by hiring a plumber to do the work rather than hiring a gardener, but it is still just a bet. Trust need not enter into such a transaction. When a gambler bets on a horse to win, the gambler need not trust that the horse will win. Most gamblers go into any bet with full awareness that they may lose. In the context of feminist epistemology, the idea of epistemic privilege is worse than merely giving astronomers epistemic privilege in astronomy. Here we are being invited to trust a particular group by philosophers who are themselves members of that group. Trust is of dubious value at the best of times, but is it especially suspect when we're giving trust at the recommendation of the people we're trusting. It is to be expected that the members of any group will be biased toward trusting other members of the same group, so if they reach conclusions that just happen to align with that bias, we have good reason to be suspicious of that conclusion. In the same way, if a Christian scientist were to claim to have used radiometric dating to determine that the earth is actually 6 thousand years old, we would be fools to trust that scientist's conclusion even if the scientist has extensive experience with radiometric dating and we have no experience at all.

[@davez5201]

Interestingly enough, in reply to your first line, that is actually straight out of Machiavelli's The Prince. No feminist would ever admit they agree with Machiavelli though lol.