IISER MOHALI

Abstract: Collaborative projects involving academic and local knowledge experts are viewed as desirable. In addition to insights possibly missed by standard scientific approaches, the inclusion of local knowledge, which is based on cultural practices and everyday experiences, and backed by effective expertise, supports scientific pluralism. Such collaborative projects, while they offer unique opportunities, are beset with some specific challenges. This presentation acknowledges the opportunities and describes challenges that could arise due to non-epistemic encroachment in distinctly epistemic concerns.
Traditional philosophical analyses take the epistemic standing of theories to depend on truth-conducive factors. These include the quality and quantity of evidence, reliability of the belief forming process, adherence to norms of rationality, among others. The debate on values in science, by contrast, highlights the epistemically significant role of non-epistemic values (like social and moral values) in the pursuit and evaluation of theories. This presentation highlights the influence values can and, in some contexts, should have on the prospects of collaborations involving local knowledge and academic knowledge. Such encroachment of values in collaboration projects could pose challenges, including raising the possibility of epistemic injustice, as this presentation attempts to argue.

Speaker Bio: Abhishek Kashyap is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Guwahati. His research spans topics in philosophy of science and social epistemology of science. He teaches, in addition to topics related to his research interests, courses that cover critical reasoning, metaphysics, and epistemology. Further details can be found here: https://www.iitg.ac.in/hss/faculty_page_profile.php?name=cHZzTUR5QnhOSmN5TEZjZitVMkltQT09