Course Descriptions

In the first half of the seminar, we will explore a number of philosophical questions about the nature of bias and our practices of attributing it. We will be especially concerned with the connections between bias and some of the central topics of epistemology, including the following: knowledge, rationality, reliability, epistemic norms, introspection, skepticism, disagreement, the underdetermination of theory by data, and the contrast between internalism and externalism. (But no prior knowledge of any of these topics will be presupposed.) The
primary reading for these sessions will be drawn from TK’s forthcoming book, Bias: A Philosophical Study (OUP 2022).

The later, Sosa half of the seminar will mainly take up chapters of Mark Schroeder’s Reasons First (OUP, 2021), and also some work in progress on closely related issues.