Erin Nash

One way to understand Vincent’s argument is as a critique of the way non-epistemic values shape sex/gender-related medicine and healthcare. Vincent reveals how the non-epistemic values embedded within the Incongruence Thesis privilege some transgender people over other transgender people. I build on Vincent’s account to argue that the non-epistemic values embedded in the terminology, categories and framing of the Incongruence Thesis also better serve transgender people in general, rather than other gender diverse people, some of whom are perhaps best understood as neither transgender nor cisgender. I support Vincent’s call for the Incongruence Thesis to be significantly revised.

Marine ecosystems are under increasing pressure from human activity, yet successful management relies on knowledge. The evidence-based policy (EBP) approach has been promoted on the grounds that it provides greater transparency and consistency by relying on ‘high quality’ information. However, EBP also creates epistemic responsibilities. Decision-making where limited or no empirical evidence exists, such as is often the case in marine systems, creates epistemic obligations for new information acquisition. We argue that philosophical approaches can inform the science-policy interface. Using marine biosecurity examples, we specifically examine the epistemic challenges in the acquisition and acceptance of evidence to inform policy, discussing epistemic due care and biases in consideration of evidence.

That we have recently transitioned into a post-truth political era is a common refrain. But the influence of false, inaccurate, and misleading claims on politics in western liberal democracies isn't novel. In their book, Merchants of Doubt, Oreskes and Conway expose the "Tobacco Strategy": the methods various actors have deployed, increasingly since the mid-twentieth century, to obscure the truth about scientific issues from the public, induce widespread ignorance and unwarranted doubt, and stall public responses to issues that can have significant consequences for people's lives. One aspect of the Tobacco Strategy involves the propagation of falsehoods by actors dissenting from an expert consensus (Oreskes...