We often evaluate belief-forming processes, agents, or entire belief states for reliability. This is normally done with the assumption that beliefs are all-or-nothing. How does such evaluation go when we’re considering beliefs that come in degrees? I consider a natural answer to this question that focuses on the degree of truth-possession had by a set of beliefs. I argue that this natural proposal is inadequate, but for an interesting reason. When we are dealing with all-or-nothing belief, high reliability (...) leads to high levels of truth-possession. However, when it comes to degrees of belief, reliability and truth-possession part ways. The natural answer thus fails to be a good way to evaluate degrees of belief for reliability. I propose and develop an alternative method based on the notion of calibration, suggested by Frank Ramsey, which does not have this problem and consider why we should care about such assessments of reliability even if they are not tied directly to truth-possession. (shrink)

In _Reliable Reasoning_, Gilbert Harman and Sanjeev Kulkarni -- a philosopher and an engineer -- argue that philosophy and cognitive science can benefit from statistical learning theory, the theory that lies behind recent advances in machine learning. The philosophical problem of induction, for example, is in part about the reliability of inductive reasoning, where the reliability of a method is measured by its statistically expected percentage of errors -- a central topic in SLT. After discussing philosophical attempts to (...) evade the problem of induction, Harman and Kulkarni provide an admirably clear account of the basic framework of SLT and its implications for inductive reasoning. They explain the Vapnik-Chervonenkis dimension of a set of hypotheses and distinguish two kinds of inductive reasoning. The authors discuss various topics in machine learning, including nearest-neighbor methods, neural networks, and support vector machines. Finally, they describe transductive reasoning and suggest possible new models of human reasoning suggested by developments in SLT. (shrink)

Information generally comes from less than fully reliable sources. Rationality, it seems, requires that one take source reliability into account when reasoning on the basis of such information. Recently, Bovens and Hartmann (2003) proposed an account of the conjunction fallacy based on this idea. They show that, when statements in conjunction fallacy scenarios are perceived as coming from such sources, probability theory prescribes that the “fallacy” be committed in certain situations. Here, the empirical validity of their model was assessed. (...) The model predicts that statements added to standard conjunction problems will change the incidence of the fallacy. It also predicts that statements from reliable sources should yield an increase in fallacy rates (relative to unreliable sources). Neither the former (Experiment 1) nor the latter prediction (Experiment 3) was confirmed, although Experiment 2 showed that people can derive source reliability estimates from the likelihood of statements in a manner consistent with the tested model. In line with the experimental results, model fits and sensitivity analyses also provided very little evidence in favor of the model. This suggests that Bovens and Hartmann’s present model fails to explain fully people’s judgements in standard conjunction fallacy tasks. (shrink)

Issues of reliability are claiming center-stage in the epistemology of machine learning. This paper unifies different branches in the literature and points to promising research directions, whilst also providing an accessible introduction to key concepts in statistics and machine learning – as far as they are concerned with reliability.

Reliabilism has come under recent attack for its alleged inability to account for the value we typically ascribe to knowledge. It is charged that a reliably-produced true belief has no more value than does the true belief alone. I reply to these charges on behalf of reliabilism; not because I think reliabilism is the correct theory of knowledge, but rather because being reliably-produced does add value of a sort to true beliefs. The added value stems from the fact that a (...) reliably-held belief is non-accidental in a particular way. While it is widely acknowledged that accidentally true beliefs cannot count as knowledge, it is rarely questioned why this should be so. An answer to this question emerges from the discussion of the value of reliability; an answer that holds interesting implications for the value and nature of knowledge. (shrink)

A tempting argument for human rationality goes like this: it is more conducive to survival to have true beliefs than false beliefs, so it is more conducive to survival to use reliable belief-forming strategies than unreliable ones. But reliable strategies are rational strategies, so there is a selective advantage to using rational strategies. Since we have evolved, we must use rational strategies. In this paper I argue that some criticisms of this argument offered by Stephen Stich fail because they rely (...) on unsubstantiated interpretations of some results from experimental psychology. I raise two objections to the argument: (i) even if it is advantageous to use rational strategies, it does not follow that we actually use them; and (ii) natural selection need not favor only or even primarily reliable belief-forming strategies. (shrink)

According to Alvin Goldman, reliabilists need to distinguish between unconditionally and conditionally reliable processes. The latter category is used to account for processes such as reasoning or memory. In this paper, I will argue that Goldman’s account of conditional reliability needs substantial revision in two respects. First, conditional reliability must be reinterpreted in terms of dependent reliability to avoid serious problems. Second, we need a more liberal account that allows dependently reliable processes to operate not only on (...) doxastic but also on non-doxastic input. Thinking this way advances the explanatory power of reliabilism significantly. (shrink)

The aim of the present paper is to argue that robust virtue epistemology is correct. That is, a complete account of knowledge is not in need for an additional modal criterion in order to account for knowledge-undermining epistemic luck. I begin by presenting the problems facing robust virtue epistemology by examining two prominent counterexamples—the Barney and ‘epistemic twin earth’ cases. After proposing a way in which virtue epistemology can explain away these two problematic cases, thereby, implying that cognitive abilities are (...) also safe, I offer a naturalistic explanation in support of this last claim, inspired by evolutionary epistemology. Finally, I argue that naturalized epistemology should not be thought of as being exclusively descriptive. On the contrary, the evolutionary story I offer in support of the claim that reliability implies safety can provide us with a plausible epistemic norm. (shrink)

Reliabilists hold that a belief is doxastically justified if and only if it is caused by a reliable process. But since such a process is one that tends to produce a high ratio of true to false beliefs, reliabilism is on the face of it applicable to binary beliefs, but not to degrees of confidence or credences. For while beliefs admit of truth or falsity, the same cannot be said of credences in general. A natural question now arises: Can (...) class='Hi'>reliability theories of justified belief be extended or modified to account for justified credence? In this paper, I address this question. I begin by showing that, as it stands, reliabilism cannot account for justified credence. I then consider three ways in which the reliabilist may try to do so by extending or modifying her theory, but I argue that such attempts face certain problems. After that, I turn to a version of reliabilism that incorporates evidentialist elements and argue that it allows us to avoid the problems that the other theories face. If I am right, this gives reliabilists a reason, aside from those given recently by Comesaña and Goldman, to move towards such a kind of hybrid theory. (shrink)

Standard characterizations of virtue epistemology divide the field into two camps: virtue reliabilism and virtue responsibilism. Virtue reliabilists think of intellectual virtues as reliable cognitive faculties or abilities, while virtue responsibilists conceive of them as good intellectual character traits. I argue that responsibilist character virtues sometimes satisfy the conditions of a reliabilist conception of intellectual virtue, and that consequently virtue reliabilists, and reliabilists in general, must pay closer attention to matters of intellectual character. This leads to several new questions and (...) (...) challenges for any reliabilist epistemology. (shrink)

Reliability in Cognitive Neuroscience: A Meta-Meta Analysis. . ???aop.label???. doi: 10.1080/09515089.2013.838818.

The coherentist theory of justification provides a response to the sceptical challenge: even though the independent processes by which we gather information about the world may be of dubious quality, the internal coherence of the information provides the justification for our empirical beliefs. This central canon of the coherence theory of justification is tested within the framework of Bayesian networks, which is a theory of probabilistic reasoning in artificial intelligence. We interpret the independence of the information gathering processes (IGPs) in (...) terms of conditional independences, construct a minimal sufficient condition for a coherence ranking of information sets and assess whether the confidence boost that results from receiving information through independent IGPs is indeed a positive function of the coherence of the information set. There are multiple interpretations of what constitute IGPs of dubious quality. Do we know our IGPs to be no better than randomization processes? Or, do we know them to be better than randomization processes but not quite fully reliable, and if so, what is the nature of this lack of full reliability? Or, do we not know whether they are fully reliable or not? Within the latter interpretation, does learning something about the quality of some IGPs teach us anything about the quality of the other IGPs? The Bayesian-network models demonstrate that the success of the coherentist canon is contingent on what interpretation one endorses of the claim that our IGPs are of dubious quality. (shrink)

Reliability and external validity are two fundamental values that pose incompatible constraints on neurobiological experiments. The more reliability an experimental result achieves, the less external validity it earns, and vice versa. In this article, I propose an externalist interpretation of external validity: the external validity of an experimental result depends not only on how much complexity is built into an experimental design, but also on the relationship between the experimental result and other related experiments. This externalist interpretation, which (...) explains how a neurobiological experiment can be reliable and externally valid simultaneously, suggests a new way to understand the epistemology of neurobiological experimentation. (shrink)

This paper explores what constitutes reliability in persons, particularly intellectual reliability. It considers global reliability , the overall reliability of persons, encompassing both the theoretical and practical realms; sectorial reliability , that of a person in a subject-matter (or behavioral) domain; and focal reliability , that of a particular element, such as a belief. The paper compares reliability with predictability of the kind most akin to it and distinguishes reliability as an intellectual (...) virtue from reliability as an intellectual power. The paper also connects reliability with insight, reasoning, knowledge, and trust. It is argued that insofar as reliability is an intellectual virtue, it must meet both external standards of correctitude and internal standards of justification. (shrink)

The Reliability Challenge to moral non-naturalism has received substantial attention recently in the literature on moral epistemology. While the popularity of this particular challenge is a recent development, the challenge has a long history, as the form of this challenge can be traced back to a skeptical challenge in the philosophy of mathematics raised by Paul Benacerraf. The current Reliability Challenge is widely regarded as the most sophisticated way to develop this skeptical line of thinking, making the (...) class='Hi'>Reliability Challenge the strongest epistemic challenge to normative nonnaturalism. In this paper, I argue that the innovations that have occurred since Benacerraf’s statement of the challenge are misconceived and confused in a number of ways. The Reliability Challenge is not the most potent epistemic challenge to moral non-naturalism. The most potent challenge comes from the fact that there is a causal condition on knowledge – or, more precisely, a becaual condition – that non-natural moral facts cannot satisfy. (shrink)

A measure of coherence is said to be truth conducive if and only if a higher degree of coherence (as measured) results in a higher likelihood of truth. Recent impossibility results strongly indicate that there are no (non-trivial) probabilistic coherence measures that are truth conducive. Indeed, this holds even if truth conduciveness is understood in a weak ceteris paribus sense (Bovens & Hartmann, 2003, Bayesian epistemology. New York, Oxford: Oxford University Press; Olsson, 2005, Against coherence: Truth probability and justification. Oxford: (...) Oxford University Press). This raises the problem of how coherence could nonetheless be an epistemically important property. Our proposal is that coherence may be linked in a certain way to reliability. We define a measure of coherence to be reliability conducive if and only if a higher degree of coherence (as measured) results in a higher probability that the information sources are reliable. Restricting ourselves to the most basic case, we investigate which coherence measures in the literature are reliability conducive. It turns out that, while a number of measures fail to be reliability conducive, except possibly in a trivial and uninteresting sense, Shogenji’s measure and several measures generated by Douven and Meijs’s recipe are notable exceptions to this rule. (shrink)

A measure of coherence is said to be reliability conducive if and only if a higher degree of coherence (asmeasured) of a set of testimonies implies a higher probability that the witnesses are reliable. Recently, it has been proved that the Shogenji measure of coherence is reliability conducive in restricted scenarios (e.g., Olsson and Schubert, Synthese, 157:297–308, 2007). In this article, I investigate whether the Shogenji measure, or any other coherence measure, is reliability conducive in general. An (...) impossibility theorem is proved to the effect that this is not the case. I conclude that coherence is not reliability conducive. (shrink)

The use of multiple means of determination to “triangulate” on the existence and character of a common phenomenon, object, or result has had a long tradition in science but has seldom been a matter of primary focus. As with many traditions, it is traceable to Aristotle, who valued having multiple explanations of a phenomenon, and it may also be involved in his distinction between special objects of sense and common sensibles. It is implicit though not emphasized in the distinction between (...) primary and secondary qualities from Galileo onward. It is arguably one of several conceptions involved in Whewell’s method of the “consilience of inductions” (Laudan 1971) and is to be found in several places in Peirce. (From M. Brewer and B. Collins, eds., (1981); Scientific Inquiry in the Social Sciences (a festschrift for Donald T. Campbell), San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, pp. 123–162.). (shrink)

It is a live possibility that certain of our experiences reliably misrepresent the world around us. I argue that tracking theories of mental representation have difficulty allowing for this possibility, and that this is a major consideration against them.

Many now countenance the idea that certain groups can have beliefs, or at least belief-like states. If groups can have beliefs like these, the question of whether such beliefs are justified immediately arises. Recently, Goldman Essays in collective epistemology, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2014) has considered what a reliability-based account of justified group belief might look like. In this paper I consider his account and find it wanting, and so propose a modified reliability-based account of justified group belief. (...) Lackey :341–396, 2016) has also criticized Goldman’s proposal, but for very different reasons than I do. Some of her objections, however, can be lodged against the modified account that I propose here. I also respond to these objections. Finally, I note how some formal and experimental work is relevant to those who are attracted to the kind of reliability-based account of justified group belief I develop here. (shrink)

Originally published in 1990. Examining epistemic justification, truth and logic, this book works towards a holistic theory of knowledge. It discusses evidence, belief, reliability and many philosophical theories surrounding the nature of true knowledge. A thorough Preface updates the main work from when it was written in 1976 to include theories ascendant in the ‘80s.

This book considers how observations about the past influence future behaviour, as expressed in language. Focusing on information gathered from speech and other evidence sources, the author offers a model of how judgements about reliability can be made, and how such judgements factor into how people treat information they acquire via those sources.

Instead of arguing about whether moral judgments are based on emotion or reason, moral psychologists should investigate the reliability of moral judgments by checking rates of framing effects in different kinds of moral judgments under different conditions by different people.

According to process reliabilism, a belief produced by a reliable belief-forming process is justified. I introduce problems for this theory on any account of reliability. Does the performance of a process in some domain of worlds settle its reliability? The theories that answer “Yes” typically fail to state the temporal parameters of this performance. I argue that any theory paired with any plausible parameters has implausible implications. The theories that answer “No,” I argue, thereby lack essential support and (...) exacerbate familiar problems. There are new reasons to avoid any reliability conditions on justification. (shrink)

Reliabilist theories propose to analyse epistemic justification in terms of reliability. This paper argues that if we pay attention to the details of probability theory we find that there is no concept of reliability that can possibly play the role required by reliabilist theories. A distinction is drawn between the general reliability of a process and the single case reliability of an individual belief, And it is argued that neither notion can serve the reliabilist adequately.

This paper discusses the reliability of the criteria for determining Śaṅkara’s authorship established by Paul Hacker. His analysis of terminological peculiarities is based on only one of Śaṅkara’s works—the commentary on the Brahma-Sūtras. Therefore, doubt arises as to whether these criteria also apply to other works that we can claim to be authentic. First, it will be argued that the commentaries on the Bṛhadāraṇyaka- and Taittirīya-Upaniṣad are works that can be—with reasonable certainty—considered authentic. When applied to these two works, (...) Hacker’s criteria work remarkably well, and the commentaries on the Taittirīya- and Bṛhadāraṇyaka-Upaniṣad share the same terminological and conceptual features with the Brahma-Sūtra-Bhāṣya. Moreover, in most cases, it is possible to distinguish the usage of some terms and concepts from Sureśvara and Padmapāda. On the other hand, Sureśvara and Padmapāda use some of these terms in a quite similar way as Śaṅkara, but differently than the later Advaitins, indicating that a sharp line between Śaṅkara on the one hand and Sureśvara and Padmapāda on the other cannot be drawn in many cases. Also, the writings of these authors—especially Padmapāda—represent a transitional phase in the development of certain Advaita Vedānta concepts although the outlines of some peculiarities by which the later Advaita Vedānta differs from Śaṅkara can already be found sketched by Śaṅkara himself. (shrink)

Recently John Turri (2015b) has argued, contra the orthodoxy amongst epistemologists, that reliability is not a necessary condition for knowledge. From this result, Turri (2015a, 2017, 2016a, 2019) defends a new account of knowledge - called abilism - that allows for unreliable knowledge. I argue that Turri's arguments fail to establish that unreliable knowledge is possible and argue that Turri's account of knowledge is false because reliability must be a necessary condition for knowledge.

In this paper, I shall present the theoretical view on the reliability democracy as presented in Prijić Samaržija’s book Democracy and Truth, and examine its validity through the case of the division of epistemic labour in the process of deliberation on autism treatment policies. It may appear that because of their strong demands, namely, the demand for rejection of medical authority and for exclusive expertise on autism, autistic individuals gathered around the neurodiversity movement present a threat to the (...) class='Hi'>reliability democracy. (shrink)

Striving for a probabilistic explication of coherence, scholars proposed a distinction between agreement and striking agreement. In this paper I argue that only the former should be considered a genuine concept of coherence. In a second step the relation between coherence and reliability is assessed. I show that it is possible to concur with common intuitions regarding the impact of coherence on reliability in various types of witness scenarios by means of an agreement measure of coherence. Highlighting the (...) need to separate the impact of coherence and specificity on reliability it is finally shown that a recently proposed vindication of the Shogenji measure qua measure of coherence vanishes. (shrink)

Rumors, for better or worse, are an important element of public discourse. The present paper focuses on rumors as an epistemic phenomenon rather than as a social or political problem. In particular, it investigates the relation between the mode of transmission and the reliability, if any, of rumors as a source of knowledge. It does so by comparing rumor with two forms of epistemic dependence that have recently received attention in the philosophical literature: our dependence on the testimony of (...) others, and our dependence on what has been called the ‘coverage-reliability’ of our social environment (Goldberg 2010). According to the latter, an environment is ‘coverage-reliable’ if, across a wide range of beliefs and given certain conditions, it supports the following conditional: If ~p were true I would have heard about it by now. However, in information-deprived social environments with little coverage-reliability, rumors may transmit information that could not otherwise be had. This suggests that a trade-off exists between levels of trust in the coverage-reliability of official sources and (warranted) trust in rumor as a source of information. (shrink)

How we can reliably draw inferences from data, evidence and/or experience has been and continues to be a pressing question in everyday life, the sciences, politics and a number of branches in philosophy (traditional epistemology, social epistemology, formal epistemology, logic and philosophy of the sciences). In a world in which we can now longer fully rely on our experiences, interlocutors, measurement instruments, data collection and storage systems and even news outlets to draw reliable inferences, the issue becomes even more pressing. (...) While we were working on this question using a formal epistemology approach Landes and Osimani (2020); De Pretis et al. (2019); Osimani and Landes (2020); Osimani (2020), we realised that the width of current active interests in the notion of reliability was much broader than we initially thought. Given the breadth of approaches and angles present in philosophy (even in this journal Schubert 2012; Avigad 2021; Claveau and Grenier 2019; Kummerfeld and Danks 2014; Landes 2021; Trpin et al. 2021; Schippers 2014; Schindler 2011; Kelly et al. 2016; Mayo-Wilson 2014; Olsson and Schubert 2007; Pittard 2017), we thought that it would be beneficial to provide a forum for an open exchange of ideas, in which philosophers working in different paradigms could come together. Our call for expression of interest received a great variety of promised manuscripts, the variety is reflected in the published papers. They range from fields far away from our own interests such as quantum probabilities de Ronde et al. (2021), evolvable software systems Primiero et al. (2021), to topics closer to our own research in the philosophy of medicine Lalumera et al. (2020), psychology Dutilh et al. (2021), traditional epistemology Dunn (2021); Tolly (2021) to finally close shared interests in formal epistemology Romero and Sprenger (2021) even within our own department Merdes et al. (2021). Our job is now to reliably inform you about all the contributions in the papers in this special issue. Unfortunately, that task is beyond our capabilities. What we can and instead do is to summarise the contributed papers to inform your reliable inference to read them all in great detail. (shrink)

There are many theories surrounding infant imitation; however, there is no research to our knowledge evaluating the reliability of listener perception of vocal imitation in prelinguistic infants. This paper evaluates intra- and inter-rater judgments on the degree of “imitativeness” in utterances of infants below 12 months of age. 18 listeners were presented audio segments selected from naturalistic recordings to represent in each case a parent vocal model followed by an infant utterance ranging from low to high degrees of imitativeness. (...) The naturalistic data suggested vocal imitation occurred rarely across the first year, but strong intra- and inter-rater correlations were found for judgments of imitativeness. Our results suggest salience of the infant’s vocal imitation despite its rare occurrence as well as active perception by listeners of the imitative signal. We discuss infant vocal imitation as a potential signal of well-being and as an indicator of language learning and vocal communication skills as perceived by caregivers. (shrink)

A Benacerraf–Field challenge is an argument intended to show that common realist theories of a given domain are untenable: such theories make it impossible to explain how we’ve arrived at the truth in that domain, and insofar as a theory makes our reliability in a domain inexplicable, we must either reject that theory or give up the relevant beliefs. But there’s no consensus about what would count here as a satisfactory explanation of our reliability. It’s sometimes suggested that (...) giving such an explanation would involve showing that our beliefs meet some modal condition, but realists have claimed that this sort of modal interpretation of the challenge deprives it of any force: since the facts in question are metaphysically necessary and so obtain in all possible worlds, it’s trivially easy, even given realism, to show that our beliefs have the relevant modal features. Here I show that this claim is mistaken—what motivates a modal interpretation of the challenge in the first place also motivates an understanding of the relevant features in terms of epistemic possibilities rather than metaphysical possibilities, and there are indeed epistemically possible worlds where the facts in question don’t obtain. (shrink)

In this paper I argue three things: (1) that the interactionist view underlying Benacerraf's (1973) challenge to mathematical beliefs renders inexplicable the reliability of most of our beliefs in physics; (2) that examples from mathematical physics suggest that we should view reliability differently; and (3) that abstract mathematical considerations are indispensable to explanations of the reliability of our beliefs.

Impaired hand proprioception can lead to difficulties in performing fine motor tasks, thereby affecting activities of daily living. The majority of children with unilateral cerebral palsy experience proprioceptive deficits, but accurately quantifying these deficits is challenging due to the lack of sensitive measurement methods. Robot-assisted assessments provide a promising alternative, however, there is a need for solutions that specifically target children and their needs. We propose two novel robotics-based assessments to sensitively evaluate active and passive position sense of the index (...) finger metacarpophalangeal joint in children. We then investigate test-retest reliability and discriminant validity of these assessments in uCP and typically developing children, and further use the robotic platform to gain first insights into fundamentals of hand proprioception. Both robotic assessments were performed in two sessions with 1-h break in between. In the passive position sense assessment, participant's finger is passively moved by the robot to a randomly selected position, and she/he needs to indicate the perceived finger position on a tablet screen located directly above the hand, so that the vision of the hand is blocked. Active position sense is assessed by asking participants to accurately move their finger to a target position shown on the tablet screen, without visual feedback of the finger position. Ten children with uCP and 10 age-matched TDC were recruited in this study. Test-retest reliability in both populations was good >0.79). Proprioceptive error was larger for children with uCP than TDC, indicating discriminant validity. The active position sense was more accurate than passive, and the scores were not correlated, underlining the need for targeted assessments to comprehensively evaluate proprioception. There was a significant effect of age on passive position sense in TDC but not uCP, possibly linked to disturbed development of proprioceptive acuity in uCP. Overall, the proposed robot-assisted assessments are reliable, valid and a promising alternative to commonly used clinical methods, which could help gain a better understanding of proprioceptive impairments in uCP, facilitating the design of novel therapies. (shrink)

Many philosophers believe that when a theory is committed to an apparently unexplainable massive correlation, that fact counts significantly against the theory. Philosophical theories that imply that we have knowledge of non-causal mind-independent facts are especially prone to this objection. Prominent examples of such theories are mathematical Platonism, robust normative realism and modal realism. It is sometimes thought that theists can easily respond to this sort of challenge and that theism therefore has an epistemic advantage over atheism. In this paper, (...) I will argue that, contrary to widespread thought, some versions of theism only push the challenge one step further and thus are in no better position than atheism. (shrink)

The availability of medical and health information on the world wide web has led to a long discussion about the reliability of that information. Various medical, political, and independent organizations have created user-friendly tools for finding reliable medical/health information on the web and have been faced with the challenge of defining what it means for information to be reliable. Little attention has been given to the work of reviewing web-based information and applying selection criteria to individual sites. In this (...) article, the authors examine how guidelines are applied in practice and discuss how the selection criteria and the practices of applying them reinforce distinctions that current medical sociology and informatics literature suggests have been broken down by internet technologies and the availability of web-based medical information. (shrink)

Knowledge seems to need the admixture of de facto reliability and epistemic responsibility. But philosophers have had a hard time in attempting to combine them in order to achieve a satisfactory account of knowledge. In this paper I attempt to find a solution by capitalizing on the real and ubiquitous human phenomenon that is the social dispersal of epistemic labour through time. More precisely, the central objective of the paper is to deliver a novel and plausible social account of (...) knowledge-relevant responsibility and to consider the merits of the proposed combination of reliability and responsibility with respect to certain cases of unreflective epistemic subjects. O conhecimento parece precisar de uma combinação de confiabilidade de facto e responsabilidade epistêmica. Mas os filósofos têm tido grande dificuldade tentar combiná-las para alcançar uma teoria satisfatória do conhecimento. Este trabalho tenta encontrar uma solução baseada no fenômeno humano real e onipresente que é a dispersão social do trabalho epistêmico através do tempo. Mais precisamente, o objetivo central deste artigo é entregar uma teoria social de responsabilidade epistêmica nova e plausível e considerar os méritos de a combinação de confiabilidade e responsabilidade proposta relativas a certos casos de indivíduos epistemológicos não reflexivos. (shrink)

Advanced medical imaging, such as CT, fMRI and PET, has undergone enormous progress in recent years, both in accuracy and utilization. Such techniques often bring with them an illusion of immediacy, the idea that the body and its diseases can be directly inspected. In this paper we target this illusion and address the issue of the reliability of advanced imaging tests as knowledge procedures, taking positron emission tomography in oncology as paradigmatic case study. After individuating a suitable notion of (...) reliability, we argue that PET is a highly theory-laden and non-immediate knowledge procedure, in spite of the photographic-like quality of the images it delivers; the diagnostic conclusions based on the interpretation of PET images are population-dependent; PET images require interpretation, which is inherently observer-dependent and therefore variable. We conclude with a three-step methodological proposal for enhancing the reliability of advanced medical imaging. (shrink)

The coefficients of internal consistency and retest reliability had been rarely investigated within the methodology of dream content analysis. Analyzing a dream series of elderly, healthy persons obtained from weekly telephone interviews, the internal consistency of a series of 20 dreams and retests after 4 or 22 weeks, respectively, had been computed. The findings indicate that dream recall and dream length are quite stable, but dream characteristics such as bizarreness and emotional tone underlie large intraindividual fluctuations. In order to (...) obtain reliable measures for these variables which will be important for correlational studies, including waking-life trait measures, one has to obtain as many dreams as possible (about 20) in a very short time period. Further research is needed to extend the present findings to diary dreams and laboratory dreams. (shrink)

BackgroundThe triangle completion test has been used to assess egocentric wayfinding for decades, yet there is little information on its reliability. We developed a virtual reality based test and investigated whether either test of spatial navigation was reliable.ObjectiveTo examine test-retest reliability of the real-world and VR triangle completion tests. A secondary objective was to examine the usability of the VR based test.Materials and methodsThirty healthy adults aged 18–45 years were recruited to this block randomized study. Participants completed two (...) sessions of triangle completion tests in the real-world and VR on the same day with a break between sessions.ResultsIn both test versions distance from the endpoint and angle of deviation showed poor test-retest reliability. Distance traveled had moderate reliability in both the real-world and VR tests. The VR triangle test showed poor correlation with the real-world test.ConclusionThe triangle completion test has poor test-retest reliability and demonstrates poor concurrent validity between the real-world and VR. Nevertheless, it was feasible to translate a real-world test of spatial navigation into VR. VR provides opportunities for development of clinically relevant spatial navigation tests in the future. (shrink)

Experimental data are often acclaimed on the grounds that they can be consistently generated. They are, it is said, reproducible. In this paper I describe how this feature of experimental-data (their pragmatic reliability) leads to their epistemic worth (their epistemic reliability). An important part of my description is the supposition that experimental procedures are to certain extent fixed and stable. Various illustrations from the actual practice of science are introduced, the most important coming at the end of the (...) paper with a discussion of Ray Davis' 1967 solar-neutrino detection experiment (as it is portrayed in Pinch, 1980). (shrink)

The formal representation of the strength of witness testimony has been historically tied to a formula — proposed by Condorcet — that uses a factor representing the reliability of an individual witness. This approach encourages a false dilemma between hyper-scepticism about testimony, especially to extraordinary events such as miracles, and an overly sanguine estimate of reliability based on insufficiently detailed evidence. Because Condorcet’s formula does not have the resources for representing numerous epistemically relevant details in the unique situation (...) in which testimony is given, many late 19th century thinkers like Venn turned away from the probabilistic analysis of testimony altogether. But a more nuanced approach using Bayes factors provides a better, more flexible, formalism for representing the evidential force of testimony. (shrink)

This article investigates whether investors consider the reliability of companies’ sustainability information when determining the companies’ market value. Specifically, we examine market reactions (in terms of abnormal returns) to events that increase the reliability of companies’ sustainability information but do not provide markets with additional sustainability information. Controlling for competing effects, we regard companies’ additions to an internationally important sustainability index as such events and consider possible determinants for market reactions. Our results suggest that first, investors take into (...) account the reliability of sustainability information when determining the market value of a company and second, the benefits of increased reliability of sustainability information vary cross-sectionally. More specifically, companies that carry higher risks for investors (e.g., higher systematic investment risk, higher financial leverage, and higher levels of opportunistic management behavior) react more strongly to an increase in the reliability of sustainability information. Finally, we show that the benefits of an increase in the reliability of sustainability information are higher in times of economic uncertainty (e.g., during economic downturns and generally high stock price volatilities). (shrink)