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1103A Multidisciplinary Understanding of PolarizationAmerican Psychologist 74 301-314. 2019.This article aims to describe the last 10 years of the collaborative scientific endeavors on polarization in particular and collective problem-solving in general by our multidisciplinary research team. We describe the team’s disciplinary composition—social psychology, political science, social philosophy/epistemology, and complex systems science— highlighting the shared and unique skill sets of our group members and how each discipline contributes to studying polarization and collective problem-…Read more
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1044Rational social and political polarizationPhilosophical Studies 176 (9): 2243-2267. 2019.Public discussions of political and social issues are often characterized by deep and persistent polarization. In social psychology, it’s standard to treat belief polarization as the product of epistemic irrationality. In contrast, we argue that the persistent disagreement that grounds political and social polarization can be produced by epistemically rational agents, when those agents have limited cognitive resources. Using an agent-based model of group deliberation, we show that groups of deli…Read more
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95Don’t forget forgetting: the social epistemic importance of how we forgetSynthese 198 (6): 5373-5394. 2019.We motivate a picture of social epistemology that sees forgetting as subject to epistemic evaluation. Using computer simulations of a simple agent-based model, we show that how agents forget can have as large an impact on group epistemic outcomes as how they share information. But, how we forget, unlike how we form beliefs, isn’t typically taken to be the sort of thing that can be epistemically rational or justified. We consider what we take to be the most promising argument for this claim and f…Read more
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44Correction to: Rational social and political polarizationPhilosophical Studies 176 (9): 2269-2269. 2019.In the original publication of the article, the Acknowledgement section was inadvertently not included. The Acknowledgement is given in this Correction.
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98A New Heuristic for Climate AdaptationPhilosophy of Science 1-11. 2023.An influential heuristic for thinking about climate adaptation asserts that “natural” adaptation strategies are the best ones. This heuristic has been roundly criticized but is difficult to dislodge in the absence of an alternative. We introduce a new heuristic that assesses adaptation strategies by looking at their maturity, power, and commitment. Maturity is the extent to which we understand an adaptation strategy’s effects. Power is the size of the effect an adaptation strategy will have. Com…Read more
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11Evaluating community scienceStudies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 88 (C): 102-109. 2021.
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25Meta-Analysis and Conservation SciencePhilosophy of Science 89 (5): 980-990. 2022.Philosophical work on meta-analysis focuses on biomedical research and revolves around the question: Is meta-analytic evidence the best kind of evidence? By focusing on conservation science rather than biomedical science, I identify further questions and puzzles for meta-analysis and show their importance for the epistemology of meta-analysis.
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15Correction to: Fighting About FrequencySynthese 199 (3): 7799-7799. 2021.A correction to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-021-03194-5.
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22Fighting about frequencySynthese 199 (3-4): 7777-7797. 2021.Scientific disputes about how often different processes or patterns occur are relative frequency controversies. These controversies occur across the sciences. In some areas—especially biology—they are even the dominant mode of dispute. Yet they depart from the standard picture of what a scientific controversy is like. In fact, standard philosophical accounts of scientific controversies suggest that relative frequency controversies are irrational or lacking in epistemic value. This is because sta…Read more
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579Don’t forget forgetting: the social epistemic importance of how we forgetSynthese 198 (6): 5373-5394. 2019.We motivate a picture of social epistemology that sees forgetting as subject to epistemic evaluation. Using computer simulations of a simple agent-based model, we show that how agents forget can have as large an impact on group epistemic outcomes as how they share information. But, how we forget, unlike how we form beliefs, isn’t typically taken to be the sort of thing that can be epistemically rational or justified. We consider what we take to be the most promising argument for this claim …Read more
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21Mate Choice and Null ModelsPhilosophy of Science 87 (5): 1096-1106. 2020.Biologists have proposed a variety of explanations for extravagant sexual displays, and controversies over explanations define the history of sexual selection research. Recently, Richard Prum has d...
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171Climate change denial and beliefs about scienceSynthese 198 (3): 2355-2374. 2019.Social scientists have offered a number of explanations for why Americans commonly deny that human-caused climate change is real. In this paper, I argue that these explanations neglect an important group of climate change deniers: those who say they are on the side of science while also rejecting what they know most climate scientists accept. I then develop a “nature of science” hypothesis that does account for this group of deniers. According to this hypothesis, people have serious misconceptio…Read more
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22Different research projects require their own individuality conceptsStudies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 61 50-53. 2017.
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108Underdetermination and Evidence in the Developmental Plasticity DebateBritish Journal for the Philosophy of Science 70 (1): 127-152. 2019.I identify a controversial hypothesis in evolutionary biology called the plasticity-first hypothesis. I argue that the plasticity-first hypothesis is underdetermined and that the most popular means of studying the plasticity-first hypothesis are insufficient to confirm or disconfirm it. I offer a strategy for overcoming this problem. Researchers need to develop a richer middle range theory of plasticity-first evolution that allows them to identify distinctive empirical traces of the hypothesis. …Read more
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93Biological Individuality and Scientific PracticePhilosophy of Science 82 (5): 1092-1103. 2015.I consider the relationship between scientific practice and the philosophical debate surrounding biological individuality. I argue for the sensitivity account, on which biologists do not require a resolution to the individuality debate. This view puts me in disagreement with much of the literature on biological individuality, where it has become common to claim that there is a relationship of dependence between biologists’ conceptions of individuality and the quality of their empirical work
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States of America
Areas of Specialization
Applied Ethics |
Philosophy of Biology |
General Philosophy of Science |
Areas of Interest
Epistemology |
Applied Ethics |
Social and Political Philosophy |