- 69 Oakfield Avenue G12 0SB Glasgow UK
Mona Simion
University of Glasgow, Cogito Epistemology Research Centre, Faculty Member
- I am Professor of Philosophy and Director of the COGITO Epistemology Research Centre at the University of Glasgow. I ... moreI am Professor of Philosophy and Director of the COGITO Epistemology Research Centre at the University of Glasgow. I am Associate Editor at Philosophical Studies, area editor for epistemology at Ergo, and I sit on the Editorial Board of the Philosophical Quarterly. I also sit on the Executive Committee of the Aristotelian Society, the Advisory Council of the Institute of Philosophy, the Management Committee of the British Society for Theory of Knowledge, and the Steering Committee of the Social Epistemology Network. I sit on the Board of the Young Academy of Europe and I am a fellow of the RSE Young Academy of Scotland.
I am the winner of the Young Epistemologist Prize 2021.
I care about all things normative. My research is in epistemology (epistemic normativity, justification, evidence, social epistemology, knowledge-first epistemology), philosophy of language (assertion, conceptual engineering, contextualism), moral & political philosophy (wellbeing, blame, trust, distributive justice, voting, media ethics), philosophy of AI (trustworthy & explainable AI, communication with AI, value-sensitive design) and philosophy of gender & race (epistemic injustice, gender concepts, social kinds).
I am the author of two monographs - 'Shifty Speech and Independent Thought;' (Oxford University Press 2021) and 'Sharing Knowledge' (Cambridge University Press, 2021, with C. Kelp). I am currently working on a third monograph entitled 'Resistance to Evidence' (for CUP).
I am Principal Investigator on a major 5-year research project - KnowledgeLab: Knowledge-First Social Epistemology - funded by a 1.5 million Euro grant from the European Research Council (2021-2026). I am also Co-Investigator on the Leverhulme Trust-funded 'Virtue Epistemology of Trust' project (GBP 254,871; 2020-2023) and Principal Investigator on the 'Dimensions of Wellbeing' industry-funded project (GBP 680,031; 2021-2026). Before this I held a Mind Fellowship for my 'Epistemic Norms and Epistemic Functions' project. edit
This paper develops a novel account of the nature of disinformation that challenges several widely spread theoretical assumptions, such as that disinformation is a species of information, a species of misinformation, essentially false or... more
This paper develops a novel account of the nature of disinformation that challenges several widely spread theoretical assumptions, such as that disinformation is a species of information, a species of misinformation, essentially false or misleading, essentially intended/aimed/having the function of generating false beliefs in/misleading hearers. The paper defends a view of disinformation as ignorance generating content: on this account, X is disinformation in a context C iff X is a content unit communicated at C that has a disposition to generate ignorance at C in normal conditions. I also offer a taxonomy of disinformation, and a view of what it is for a signal to constitute disinformation for a particular agent in a particular context. The account, if correct, carries high stakes upshots, both theoretically and practically: disinformation tracking will need to go well beyond mere fact checking.
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This chapter looks into the feasibility of preserving the independence of epistemically proper thought from practical considerations via the second horn of the Shiftiness Dilemma. For people who like Classical Invariantism about knowledge... more
This chapter looks into the feasibility of preserving the independence of epistemically proper thought from practical considerations via the second horn of the Shiftiness Dilemma. For people who like Classical Invariantism about knowledge attributions, the jump from variation in assertability with stakes to contextualism or pragmatic encroachment seemed rushed. As such, these authors venture to account for the Shiftiness Intuition under a Classical Invariantist umbrella by arguing for context sensitivity of proper assertability. This chapter argues that the view fails on prior plausibility due to being incompatible with the following highly uncontroversial value-theoretic claim: norms of type X are associated with values of type X.
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Traditionally, the notion of defeat has been central to epistemology, practical reasoning, and ethics. Within epistemology, it is standardly assumed that a subject who knows that p, or justifiably believes that p, can lose this knowledge... more
Traditionally, the notion of defeat has been central to epistemology, practical reasoning, and ethics. Within epistemology, it is standardly assumed that a subject who knows that p, or justifiably believes that p, can lose this knowledge or justified belief by acquiring a so-called ‘defeater’, whether evidence that not-p, evidence that the process which produced her belief is unreliable, or evidence that she has likely misevaluated her evidence. Within ethics and practical reasoning, it is widely accepted that a subject may initially have a reason to do something although this reason is later defeated by her acquisition of further information. However, the traditional conception of defeat has recently come under attack. Some have argued that the notion of defeat is problematically motivated; others that defeat is hard to accommodate within externalist or naturalistic accounts of knowledge or justification; others that the intuitions which support defeat can be explained in other way...
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While recent years have featured a vast amount of literature concerned with the epistemic norm for assertion, comparatively little attention has been paid to the corresponding norm governing acts of telling. One plausible explanation of... more
While recent years have featured a vast amount of literature concerned with the epistemic norm for assertion, comparatively little attention has been paid to the corresponding norm governing acts of telling. One plausible explanation of this is that people have generally taken assertion and telling to fall under the same normative constraints. Recent work, however, ventures to show (i) that this assumption is false and (ii) that the epistemic propriety of instances of telling partly depends on what’s at stake for the hearer. This chapter argues that the case against normative commonality for assertion and telling fails due to speech act-theoretic and value-theoretic inaccuracies. In a nutshell, the chapter argues that there’s nothing special about the epistemic normativity of telling.
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This chapter is up to an ambitious task: it develops the first integrated account of the epistemic normativity of constatives. In order to do that, it argues for a generalized knowledge-based account of the epistemic normativity of... more
This chapter is up to an ambitious task: it develops the first integrated account of the epistemic normativity of constatives. In order to do that, it argues for a generalized knowledge-based account of the epistemic normativity of constative speech, and it develops the corresponding accounts for, respectively, assertives, predictives, retrodictives, descriptives, ascriptives, informatives, confirmatives, concessives, retractives, assentives, dissentives, disputatives, responsives, suggestives, and suppositives. The chapter argues for a knowledge account from three different angles: (1) the nature of communicative speech acts, (2) the relation between assertion and other constatives, and (3) the normativity of belief together with constatives’ epistemic function.
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This chapter is concerned with moral assertion. In recent years, much attention has been given to the epistemic credentials of belief based on moral testimony. Some people think pure moral deference is wrong, others disagree. It comes as... more
This chapter is concerned with moral assertion. In recent years, much attention has been given to the epistemic credentials of belief based on moral testimony. Some people think pure moral deference is wrong, others disagree. It comes as a surprise, however, that while the epistemic responsibilities of the receiver of moral testimony have been closely scrutinized, little discussion has focused on the epistemic duties of the speaker. This chapter defends a functionalist account of the normativity of moral assertion. According to this view, in virtue of its function of reliably generating moral understanding in the audience, a moral assertion that p needs be knowledgeable and accompanied by a contextually appropriate explanation why p.
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This chapter argues that the Shiftiness Dilemma is a false dilemma: KNA is perfectly compatible with Classical Invariantism. Furthermore, it offers independent reason to believe that if KNA and Classical Invariantism are true, variation... more
This chapter argues that the Shiftiness Dilemma is a false dilemma: KNA is perfectly compatible with Classical Invariantism. Furthermore, it offers independent reason to believe that if KNA and Classical Invariantism are true, variation in proper assertability is exactly what we may expect. More precisely, the chapter advances the debate in two important ways: (1) it identifies a widely held assumption concerning epistemic norm individuation (Content Individuation), which gets the Shiftiness Dilemma off the ground; (2) it argues that Content Individuation is false, and that therefore the norm at stake in the debate need not be epistemic.
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Most actors in the debate assume that the intuitive variability of proper assertion with practical stakes (the Shiftiness Intuition) motivates the following dilemma: either 1) we embrace a knowledge norm of assertion, and are forced into... more
Most actors in the debate assume that the intuitive variability of proper assertion with practical stakes (the Shiftiness Intuition) motivates the following dilemma: either 1) we embrace a knowledge norm of assertion, and are forced into a view that takes knowledge, or ‘knowledge’, to be sensitive to practical stakes, or 2) we stick to our Classical Invariantist guns, but then the knowledge norm goes out the window and we get practical sensitivity in the normativity of assertion (the Shiftiness Dilemma). This chapter brings this dilemma to centre stage and argues that it threatens to generalize in three ways: to all context-invariant norms of proper assertoric speech, to all constative speech acts, and to all epistemic normative constraints. If this is right, we should be more worried about this dilemma than we’ve been so far.
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According to KK Compatibilism, the unassertability in the high-stakes contextualist cases can be explained in terms of the subjects lack of higher-order knowledge: although, strictly speaking, all that is needed for proper... more
According to KK Compatibilism, the unassertability in the high-stakes contextualist cases can be explained in terms of the subjects lack of higher-order knowledge: although, strictly speaking, all that is needed for proper action—assertion included—is first-order knowledge, when the stakes are high, we tend to find people who act without knowing that they meet the condition for proper action blameworthy for so doing. This chapter argues that (1) the view misidentifies the epistemic deficit that is explanatorily salient in contextualist cases, in that the absence of second-order knowledge is not a difference maker, and (2) on closer look, the account requires normative finessing for extensional adequacy.
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This paper defends a novel view of hermeneutical epistemic injustice (HEI). To this effect, it starts by arguing that Miranda Fricker’s account is too restrictive: hermeneutical epistemic injustice is more ubiquitous than her account... more
This paper defends a novel view of hermeneutical epistemic injustice (HEI). To this effect, it starts by arguing that Miranda Fricker’s account is too restrictive: hermeneutical epistemic injustice is more ubiquitous than her account allows. That is because, contra Fricker, conceptual ignorance is not necessary for HEI: hermeneutical epistemic injustice essentially involves a failure in concept application rather than in concept possession. Further on, I unpack hermeneutical epistemic injustice as unjustly brought about basing failure. Last, I show that, if this view right, HEI is a form of distributive injustice, and affords the corresponding traditional normative theorising.
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Several prominent philosophers assume that the so-called ‘Belief–Assertion Parallel’ warrants epistemic norm correspondence; as such, they argue from the epistemic norm governing one to the epistemic norm governing the other. This paper... more
Several prominent philosophers assume that the so-called ‘Belief–Assertion Parallel’ warrants epistemic norm correspondence; as such, they argue from the epistemic norm governing one to the epistemic norm governing the other. This paper argues that, in all its readings, the belief–assertion parallel lacks the desired normative import.
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This chapter shows how to reconcile Classical Invariantism with the Knowledge Norm of Assertion. My basic proposal is that we can combine invariantism with a functionalist account of assertion: according to the account I favour, assertion... more
This chapter shows how to reconcile Classical Invariantism with the Knowledge Norm of Assertion. My basic proposal is that we can combine invariantism with a functionalist account of assertion: according to the account I favour, assertion is governed by a knowledge norm in virtue of its epistemic function of generating testimonial knowledge. Requirements generated by other functions of assertion, though, such as its prudential function, can override the constraints imposed by the epistemic function, and render the knowledge requirement either too strong or too weak for all-things-considered permissible assertion. All-things-considered permissible assertion can vary with practical stakes; epistemically permissible assertion does not.
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This paper develops an account of trustworthy AI. Its central idea is that whether AIs are trustworthy is a matter of whether they live up to their function-based obligations. We argue that this account serves to advance the literature in... more
This paper develops an account of trustworthy AI. Its central idea is that whether AIs are trustworthy is a matter of whether they live up to their function-based obligations. We argue that this account serves to advance the literature in a couple of important ways. First, it serves to provide a rationale for why a range of properties that are widely assumed in the scientific literature, as well as in policy, to be required of trustworthy AI, such as safety, justice, and explainability, are properties (often) instantiated by trustworthy AI. Second, we connect the discussion on trustworthy AI in policy, industry, and the sciences with the philosophical discussion of trustworthiness. We argue that extant accounts of trustworthiness in the philosophy literature cannot make proper sense of trustworthy AI and that our account compares favourably with its competitors on this front.
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This paper develops a novel, functionalist, unified account of the epistemic normativity of reasoning. On this view, epistemic norms drop out of epistemic functions. I argue that practical reasoning serves a prudential function of... more
This paper develops a novel, functionalist, unified account of the epistemic normativity of reasoning. On this view, epistemic norms drop out of epistemic functions. I argue that practical reasoning serves a prudential function of generating prudentially permissible action, and the epistemic function of generating knowledge of what one ought to do. This picture, if right, goes a long way towards normatively divorcing action and practical reasoning. At the same time, it unifies reasoning epistemically: practical and theoretical reasoning will turn out to be governed by the same epistemic norm—knowledge—in virtue of serving the same epistemic function: generating knowledge of the conclusion.
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This paper proposes a methodological turn for the epistemology of disagreement, away from focusing on highly idealized cases of peer disagreement and towards an increased focus on disagreement simpliciter. We propose and develop a... more
This paper proposes a methodological turn for the epistemology of disagreement, away from focusing on highly idealized cases of peer disagreement and towards an increased focus on disagreement simpliciter. We propose and develop a normative framework for evaluating all cases of disagreement as to whether something is the case independently of their composition—i.e., independently of whether they are between peers or not. The upshot will be a norm of disagreement on which what one should do when faced with a disagreeing party is to improve the epistemic properties of one’s doxastic attitude or, alternatively, hold steadfast.
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One central debate in recent literature on epistemic normativity concerns the epistemic norm for action. This paper argues that this debate is afflicted by a category mistake: strictly speaking, there is no such thing as an epistemic norm... more
One central debate in recent literature on epistemic normativity concerns the epistemic norm for action. This paper argues that this debate is afflicted by a category mistake: strictly speaking, there is no such thing as an epistemic norm for action. To this effect, I introduce a distinction between epistemic norms and norms with epistemic content; I argue that while it is plausible that norms of the latter type will govern action in general, epistemic norms will only govern actions characteristically associated with delivering epistemic goods.
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This paper develops a novel account of the nature of blame: on this account, blame is a species of performance with a constitutive aim. The argument for the claim that blame is an action is speech-act theoretic: it relies on the nature of... more
This paper develops a novel account of the nature of blame: on this account, blame is a species of performance with a constitutive aim. The argument for the claim that blame is an action is speech-act theoretic: it relies on the nature of performatives and the parallelism between mental and spoken blame. I argue that the view scores well on prior plausibility and theoretical fruitfulness, in that: it rests on claims that are widely accepted across sub-disciplines, it explains the normativity of blaming and it accounts for associated psychological phenomena.
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This chapter looks more closely into the epistemic normativity of a particular constative—conjecture—and examines and accounts for the contextual variation of its propriety. The chapter has two aims: (1) it breaks new ground in that it... more
This chapter looks more closely into the epistemic normativity of a particular constative—conjecture—and examines and accounts for the contextual variation of its propriety. The chapter has two aims: (1) it breaks new ground in that it develops the first fully fledged account of the epistemic normativity of conjecture in the literature; (2) it goes sharply against orthodoxy, in arguing that the epistemic requirements placed on us by conjecture are stronger than those governing assertion. According to the view developed here, one’s conjecture that p is permissible only if one knows that one has warrant, but not sufficient warrant, to believe that p.
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This is an essay in epistemology and the philosophy of language. It concerns epistemology in that it is a manifesto for epistemic independence: the independence of good thinking from practical considerations. It concerns philosophy of... more
This is an essay in epistemology and the philosophy of language. It concerns epistemology in that it is a manifesto for epistemic independence: the independence of good thinking from practical considerations. It concerns philosophy of language in that it defends a functionalist account of the normativity of assertion in conjunction with an integrated view of the normativity of constative speech acts. The book defends the independence of thought from the most prominent threat that has surfaced in the last twenty years of epistemological theorizing: the phenomenon of shiftiness of proper assertoric speech with practical context. It does four things: first, it shows that, against orthodoxy, the argument from practical shiftiness of proper assertoric speech against the independence of proper thought from the practical does not go through, for it rests on normative ambiguation. Second, it defends a proper functionalist knowledge account of the epistemic normativity of assertion, in conju...
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Recent views in hinge epistemology rely on doxastic normativism to argue that our attitudes towards hinge propositions are not beliefs. This paper has two aims; the first is positive: it discusses the general normative credentials of this... more
Recent views in hinge epistemology rely on doxastic normativism to argue that our attitudes towards hinge propositions are not beliefs. This paper has two aims; the first is positive: it discusses the general normative credentials of this move. The second is negative: it delivers two negative results for No-Belief hinge epistemology such construed. The first concerns the motivation for the view: if we’re right, doxastic normativism offers little in the way of theoretical support for the claim that our attitudes towards hinge propositions are anything but garden-variety beliefs. The second concerns theoretical fruitfulness: we show that embracing a No-Belief view will either get us in serious theoretical trouble, or loose all anti-sceptical appeal.
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ABSTRACTThis paper discusses the permissibility of exclusively relying on a procedural objectivity model for news reporting, from the perspective of the normativity of informative speech acts. It is argued that, with the exception of... more
ABSTRACTThis paper discusses the permissibility of exclusively relying on a procedural objectivity model for news reporting, from the perspective of the normativity of informative speech acts. It is argued that, with the exception of urgency situations, the paradigmatic application of procedural objectivity is in breach of the relevant norms.
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In recent literature, several authors attempt to naturalize epistemic normativity by employing an etiological account of functions. The thought is that epistemic entitlement consists in the normal functioning of our belief-acquisition... more
In recent literature, several authors attempt to naturalize epistemic normativity by employing an etiological account of functions. The thought is that epistemic entitlement consists in the normal functioning of our belief-acquisition systems, where the latter acquire the function to reliably deliver true beliefs through a history of biological benefit.This paper's aim is twofold. First, it puts pressure on the main proper functionalist claim; it is argued that a history of positive biological feedback is neither necessary nor sufficient for epistemic justification. Second, I suggest that this problem is sourced in a defect of application of functionalist accounts to epistemic normativity, and I offer a fix.
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Trust is a topic of longstanding philosophical interest. It is indispensable to every kind of coordinated human activity, from sport to scientific research. Even more, trust is necessary for the successful dissemination of knowledge, and... more
Trust is a topic of longstanding philosophical interest. It is indispensable to every kind of coordinated human activity, from sport to scientific research. Even more, trust is necessary for the successful dissemination of knowledge, and by extension, for nearly any form of practical deliberation and planning. Without trust, we could achieve few of our goals and would know very little. Despite trust’s fundamental importance in human life, there is substantial philosophical disagreement about what trust is, and further, how trusting is normatively constrained and best theorized about in relation to other things we value. This entry is divided into three sections, which explore key (and sometimes interconnected) ethical and epistemological themes in the philosophy of trust: (1) The Nature of Trust; (2) The Normativity of Trust, and (3) The Value of Trust.
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Assertion is the central vehicle for the sharing of knowledge. Whether knowledge is shared successfully often depends on the quality of assertions: good assertions lead to successful knowledge sharing, while bad ones don't. In Sharing... more
Assertion is the central vehicle for the sharing of knowledge. Whether knowledge is shared successfully often depends on the quality of assertions: good assertions lead to successful knowledge sharing, while bad ones don't. In Sharing Knowledge, Christoph Kelp and Mona Simion investigate the relation between knowledge sharing and assertion, and develop an account of what it is to assert well. More specifically, they argue that the function of assertion is to share knowledge with others. It is this function that supports a central norm of assertion according to which a good assertion is one that has the disposition to generate knowledge in others. The book uses this functionalist approach to motivate further norms of assertion on both the speaker and the hearer side and investigates ramifications of this view for other questions about assertion