This study sought to determine the practicality and effectiveness of an alternate instructional approach referred to as epistemic learning – a low structured, high functioning environment where students learn the principles of practice (i.e., the epistemic frame) of a profession through role-play. This research on epistemic learning is integral in assisting educators to enhance learning and accomplish instructional goals in computer science by having students acquire the epistemic frame of a computer game programmer. Currently, literature on epistemic learning is sparse due to its nascent nature. An action research design with mixed-methods analysis was utilized to assess students’ responsiveness to epistemic learning through an examination of their personal epistemological growth, epistemic frame construction, and programming skill set development. Personal epistemological growth was assessed through a self-reporting epistemic beliefs survey that established students’ attitudes about knowledge and learning. Epistemic frame construction was established using epistemic network analysis in determining the specific epistemic frame characteristics students had acquired. Teacher observations and students’ reflections provided insight regarding programming skill development. Findings revealed the following: 1) each student’s personal epistemology was positively influenced through epistemic learning; 2) most students successfully acquired the complete epistemic frame of a game programmer; and 3) students’ computer programming skills were enhanced through epistemic learning. Although a statistically significant correlational relationship was not established, the results had practical importance as they indicated that students were prepared to participate and succeed in an environment that emulates professional practices. Future research should include longitudinal studies that implement epistemic learning.

Thesis advisor: Richard Atkins / The topic of this thesis is testimonial epistemic injustice in the courtroom context. Testimonial epistemic injustice occurs when someone’s testimony is unduly downgraded (credibility deficit) or unduly upgraded (credibility excess) due to a structural social prejudice held by the listener. Examples of structural social prejudices are prejudices concerning race, gender, class, and degree of education obtained by the testifier. Credibility assessments are influenced by listeners’ biases, the social context of the interaction, and the perceived disposition of the testifier. In this paper, I intend to examine (1) what testimonial epistemic injustice is and (2) what can be done to address testimonial epistemic injustice in courtrooms. / Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2022. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Scholar of the College. / Discipline: Philosophy.

This thesis examines the ‘evaluation culture’ of derivatives ‘quants’ working in the over-the-counter markets for interest rate derivatives tied to Libor. Drawing on data from interviews with quants, financial mathematicians, and economists conducted primarily in the United Kingdom and the United States, combined with fieldwork at derivatives ‘quant’ conferences and an extensive set of technical sources, this thesis explores the historical development and contemporary patterning of modelling practices that are used within derivatives dealer banks to price and hedge Libor-based interest rate derivatives. Moreover, this thesis uses the historical development of interest-rate modelling techniques, beginning in the late 1970s, as a lens through which to understand the establishment, differentiation and separation of this ‘derivatives quant’ evaluation culture as a body of knowledge and practice distinct from financial economics. The analysis is carried out in nine chapters. The thesis begins with an introductory chapter, a chapter reviewing the relevant sociological and historical literature on economic and financial modelling, and a chapter covering the research methodology employed in the thesis. In Chapters 4-5, I provide background on the mathematical techniques used by derivatives quants and financial economists, the social and institutional structure of the Libor derivatives markets, and the instruments that are traded in these markets. In Chapter 6, I explore the organisational patterning of modelling practices in these markets and highlight the tacit and experiential nature of quant expertise. In Chapters 7-8, I investigate the ‘social shaping’ of models that are currently used to price so-called ‘exotic’ Libor derivatives. These models originated within the discipline of economics and were designed for a set of purposes different from models currently used by derivatives quants. By tracing out how these models were adapted to serve as derivatives pricing ‘engines’ within banks, I highlight how modelling practices are shaped by the organisational contexts in which they are used.

When interpretations vary for the same set of evidence, what should be done? Options include just agreeing to disagree, maintaining one’s initial beliefs, or going all the way to completely suspending judgment. Taking this final option binds an agent to some interesting views, including an acceptance of epistemic dilemmas. However, the kind of total skepticism some philosophers want out of disagreement is probably a pipe dream – if there is no best option, no option can be eliminated.

This thesis has two aims. One is to motivate the claim that challenging what I call a “sameness of evidence thesis” is a particularly promising approach to external world scepticism. The other is to sharpen an underexplored issue that arises when challenging the sameness of evidence thesis. The second aim is the primary aim of the thesis. Pursuing the first aim, I start by examining a predominant formulation of external world scepticism known as the “closure argument” for knowledge. I examine three main strategies for responding to external world scepticism and highlight their major challenges (DeRose 1995; Dretske 1979; Nozick 1981; Sosa 1999). The goal is not to demonstrate that these challenges cannot be met, but rather to highlight a deeper issue that arises when responding to the closure problem for knowledge. In particular, I take the discussion to motivate looking at what I will call “scepticism about evidential justification” (Feldman 2000; Kornblith 2001; Pritchard forthcoming). The general argument in favour of a shift to scepticism about evidential justification is based on considerations about what an adequate response to external world scepticism should hope to achieve. I argue that one condition of adequacy is being able to account for radical forms of scepticism that challenge not only that our beliefs enjoy the epistemic status of knowledge (however that status is conceived) but also that our ordinary empirical beliefs are justified, or that we are reasonable in holding them. There are different varieties of scepticism about evidential justification. I focus in some detail on the anti-sceptical strategies of Pryor (2000; 2004) and Wright (2004) as examples of strategies that engage with scepticism about evidential justification. But I argue that one form of evidential scepticism known as the “underdetermination argument”—which Pryor and Wright do not directly engage with—is of particular importance. The main assumption in the underdetermination argument I focus on is about the nature of evidence. More specifically, the underdetermination argument presupposes that one’s evidence is the same in so-called “bad” and “good” cases in which an agent forms an empirical belief. This is the “sameness of evidence thesis.” Pursuing the main aim of the thesis, I introduce two forms an anti-sceptical strategy that involves challenging the sameness of evidence thesis. The two forms I consider differ in their commitments concerning a condition of accessibility on our evidence. Pritchard (2006; 2007; 2012; forthcoming) maintains that one’s evidence is “reflectively accessible.” Williamson (2000; 2009) rejects this claim. The central issue I aim to sharpen is that while accepting the condition of accessibility leads to serious challenges in rejecting the sameness of evidence thesis, rejecting it leads to counterintuitive consequences if we grant that there is a normative principle that requires us to proportion our beliefs to the evidence. A central part of the thesis involves examining these counterintuitive consequences and showing what accounting for them requires. This is an underexplored project in the context of external world scepticism. I look at three different approaches to spelling out the counterintuitive consequences. My preferred account turns on a distinction between three different kinds of responsibility (Shoemaker 2011). I claim that there is a notion of responsibility – “attributability” – that is centrally connected to normative judgments. I argue for a “condition of accessibility” on attributability. Taken together, these two claims comprise an account of what is problematic about rejecting an access condition on our evidence. I then claim that there are two ways forward. One is to accept the condition of accessibility on our evidence that my account implies; the other is to challenge my claims about the connection between attributability and normative judgments, or the accessibility condition on attributability, or both. Although I claim that the prospects look better for taking the second option when it comes to rejecting the sameness of evidence thesis, drawing on recent work from Gibbons (2006; 2013) and Daniel Greco (2013), I argue that the first option is still a live possibility. The main aim in this part of the thesis is not to decide what the best way of rejecting the sameness of evidence thesis is, but rather to examine the challenges that arise when we reject it in one way or another. The question of what sort of access we have to our normative requirements is the focus of an increasingly sophisticated discussion in contemporary epistemology. An important upshot of this thesis is that it brings the problem of external world scepticism directly within the scope of that debate.

In this essay I investigate whether political deliberation in an assembly of 300 people that is randomly selected from the entire population (democratic deliberation) is epistemically superior to political deliberation in an assembly of the same size where individuals have been selected based on certain criteria (non-democratic deliberation). I present Helene Landemore’s argument in favor of the epistemic superiority of democratic deliberation and consider Aaron Ancell’s critique of this argument. I argue the point that Ancell’s critique fails but that a conclusive result on whether democratic deliberation is epistemically superior to non-democratic deliberation has to await further investigations, some of which I take to be empirical in nature. / I denna essä undersöker jag huruvida politiskt problemlösande i en grupp av 300 slumpmässig utvalda personer från hela befolkningen befolkningen (demokratiskt problemlösande) är epistemiskt överlägsen politisk problemlösande i en grupp av samma storlek där individer har blivit utvalda baserat på vissa kriterier (icke-demokratiskt problemlösande). Jag presenterar Helene Landemores argument som visar på den epistemiska överlägsenheten av demokratiskt problemlösande och undersöker sedan Aaron Ancells kritik av detta argument. Jag argumenterar för att Ancells kritik misslyckas men att ett slutgiltigt resultat om huruvida demokratisk problemlösning är epistemiskt överlägsen icke-demokratisk problemlösning behöver invänta vidare undersökningar, däribland empiriska sådana.

The purpose of this study was to examine teachers’ availing and nonavailing epistemic beliefs about teaching and learning, with particular focus on beliefs about visual, auditory, and kinesthetic (VAK) learning styles; the study investigated VAK belief sources and justification, and the ways those beliefs were enacted in classroom practice. 660 teachers in Mississippi were surveyed, with the large majority (94.5%) reporting they believed that students’ learning styles are important for learning. Most teachers had been introduced to the idea in teacher preparation coursework, and few had heard about information suggesting learning styles were not supported by research. Teachers reported that they considered learning styles to be useful for student grouping, assessments, and instructional delivery. Implications for bridging educational psychology research and teacher practices are discussed in light of findings.

It has been more than seven years since the events of the September 11 terrorist attacks have changed the way in which American citizens live on a daily basis. Some of us have become anxious while traveling, some more guarded in what we choose to discuss in public and with whom we associate, some more suspicious of other races and religions, some more suspicious of our own government. All American citizens-whether or not they were victims of racial profiling post September I I-have had to change the way in which they obtain information and understand their rights to privacy and knowledge. In my thesis, I explore how the enactment of the Patriot Act and the affiliated surveillance of American citizens (as well as foreign nationals) have not only violated our constitutional rights to free expression, but have also violated our intellectual and privacy rights. Specifically, I am concerned with the negative impact of the Patriot Act on the ability and willingness of American citizens to obtain information and to express their opinions about politically sensitive topics. This fear of being labeled a threat to national security or a potential terrorist has created a nation in which many citizens are increasingly complacent about violations of their intellectual rights, negligent about upholding their epistemic responsibilities, and increasingly ignorant about their own nation's policies, as well as global events In order to eradicate the negative influence of the Patriot Act on the epistemic rights and responsibilities of American citizens, I propose that the American public cultivate the epistemological virtues necessary to educate themselves on domestic as well as global matters. I suggest that this would enhance our national security, in addition to preserving our civil liberties and enlarging our intellectual understanding of global events and relationships.

Recent literature in religious epistemology has overlooked a significant debate in mainstream epistemology. In short, theories in religious epistemology have failed to consider the value problem. This essay, then, hopes to rectify this omission by arguing that one of the most influential accounts of religious epistemology - reformed epistemology - fails to adequately account for the value of knowledge. I argue, however, that a reasonable way out for the reformed epistemologist comes by way of endorsing the achievement thesis. The achievement thesis, put simply, states that knowledge is valuable because it is a cognitive achievement - unlike, for example, mere true belief. The central question of this essay, then, is this: Is Knowledge of God a Cognitive Achievement? In order to better answer this question I highlight two different ways in which one can understand the nature of cognitive achievements. First, a cognitive achievement can be understood as success from ability that is always primarily creditable to the agent. Or, second, a cognitive achievement can be understood as success from ability that is jointly creditable to the agent. Both, I argue, are compatible with knowledge and the achievement thesis. Whether knowledge of God is primarily or jointly creditable, however, will depend on the way in which one understands the role the agent plays in the belief forming process. Given the nature of reformed epistemology, I argue that knowledge of God is the kind of achievement that is jointly creditable. Further, and central to the argument, I argue that the reformed epistemologist is in a good position to meet the requirements for the strong achievement thesis. The strong achievement thesis argues that an achievement should be understood in terms of overcoming some obstacle whereby the agent's belief is the result of some ability that can be credited to the agent. The account I propose not only meets the requirements of the strong achievement thesis, but also retains a distinctive feature of reformed epistemology - namely, that the belief in God can be said to overcome the obstacle of cognitive malfunction that, as the reformed epistemologist argues, is brought about by sin. It's an achievement becasue it overcomes an excessively hostile environment (what I call the maxi-environment) that is not conducive to belief in God given the cognitive consequence of sin. In the end, it is possible to provide an account of reformed epistemology where the value of knowledge (over and above mere true belief) is adequately demonstrated.

We know things about the world in spite of our cognitive limitations and imperfections. Occasions of stress impact memory retrieval, resources for attention can be depleted by non-epistemic factors, and our visual system has limited resolution and discriminatory ability. Yet we know many propositions, ranging from the mundane to the arcane, and we often are able to know that we know these things. In this dissertation I explore the relationship between our cognitive limitations and the limits to what we know, and what we know that we know. I begin by considering a simple model of knowledge. Because it is difficult (perhaps impossible) to have intuitions about many higher-order or iterative knowledge claims ("I know that you know that she knows that I know that ..."), a modeling approach can help clarify and explain how various cognitive limitations impact knowledge and higher-order knowledge. In Chapter 2 I discuss the epistemic requirements for the rational coordination of our actions. While it may seem that coordination is rational only if each coordinating member has what may be called "common knowledge" of some relevant proposition, the model of knowledge I employ helps show the informational complexity of common knowledge. I argue that common knowledge is unattainable. In Chapter 3 I discuss epistemic closure. Perfectly ideal agents may know every deductive consequence of what they know, but if the aim is to understand how deduction extends human knowledge then it is necessary to model our cognitive access to information. In Chapter 4 I turn to the issue of higher-order or iterative knowledge. I argue that memory limitations and various information processing errors all result in failures of higher-order knowledge. The argument I give does not require epistemic closure or a principle of self-knowledge. I conclude, in Chapter 5, by discussing interpretive issues for models of knowledge and I discuss our awareness of what we know and what we do not know.