Nathan Lackey

Since the 1990s, psychologists have developed multiple models of prejudicial attitudes. I argue that these models generally fall into one of two categories: individualistic or situationist. The former abstract away (or omit) environmental features from the system of interest and locate the phenomenon in the mind of the individual. However, new models of prejudicial attitudes have foregrounded just those features abstracted away in preceding models. These conceptualizations of attitudes foreground situations. The scientists that posit them claim that measures of implicit bias are better understood as measures of places as opposed to people, for example. These categories of models have very different implications for intervention strategies aimed at reducing the impact of implicit biases. In this paper, I draw on philosophical insights from the philosophy of science to advocate for an integration of these models. The desiderata I provide asks researchers to clarify how citizens and policymakers ought to proceed given the plurality of diverse models. Should interventions at the individual level or structural level be prioritized? This issue has important consequences for achieving egalitarian goals in contemporary society.

Both early analytic philosophy and the branch of mathematics now known as topology were gestated and born in the early part of the 20th century. It is not well recognized that there was early interaction between the communities practicing and developing these fields. We trace the history of how topological ideas entered into analytic philosophy through two migrations, an earlier one conceiving of topology geometrically and a later one conceiving of topology algebraically. This allows us to reassess the influence and significance of topological methods for philosophy, including the possible fruitfulness of a third conception of topology as a structure determining similarity.