REFF - Faculty of Philosophy Repository
University of Belgrade - Faculty of Philosophy
    • English
    • Српски
    • Српски (Serbia)
  • English 
    • English
    • Serbian (Cyrillic)
    • Serbian (Latin)
  • Login
View Item 
  •   REFF
  • Filozofija / Philosophy
  • Radovi istraživača / Researcher's publications - Odeljenje za filozofiju
  • View Item
  •   REFF
  • Filozofija / Philosophy
  • Radovi istraživača / Researcher's publications - Odeljenje za filozofiju
  • View Item
JavaScript is disabled for your browser. Some features of this site may not work without it.

Do Political Attitudes Matter for Epistemic Decisions of Scientists?

Authorized Users Only
2021
Authors
Sikimić, Vlasta
Nikitović, Tijana
Vasić, Miljan
Subotić, Vanja
Article (Published version)
Metadata
Show full item record
Abstract
The epistemic attitudes of scientists, such as epistemic tolerance and authoritarianism, play important roles in the discourse about rivaling theories. Epistemic tolerance stands for the mental attitude of an epistemic agent, e.g., a scientist, who is open to opposing views, while epistemic authoritarianism represents the tendency to uncritically accept views of authorities. Another relevant epistemic factor when it comes to the epistemic decisions of scientists is the skepticism towards the scientific method. However, the question is whether these epistemic attitudes are influenced by their sociopolitical counterparts, such as the researcher's degree of conservatism. To empirically investigate the interplay between epistemic and sociopolitical attitudes of scientists, we conducted a survey with researchers (N = 655) across different disciplines. We propose scales for measuring epistemic tolerance and epistemic authoritarianism, as well as a scale for detecting the participants' readin...ess to question the scientific method. Furthermore, we investigate the relationship between epistemic tolerance and epistemic authoritarianism on the one hand, and career stage and sociopolitical views on the other hand. Interestingly, our study found only small correlations between the participants' degree of conservatism and their epistemic attitudes. This suggests that political views, against common argumentation, actually do not play an important role in one's scientific decisions. Moreover, social scientists scored higher on the epistemic tolerance and lower on the epistemic authoritarianism scale than natural scientists. Finally, the results indicate that natural scientists question the scientific method less than social scientists.

Source:
Review of Philosophy and Psychology, 2021
Publisher:
  • Springer, Dordrecht
Funding / projects:
  • Projekt DEAL

DOI: 10.1007/s13164-020-00504-7

ISSN: 1878-5158

WoS: 000563028000001

Scopus: 2-s2.0-85089866440
[ Google Scholar ]
3
1
URI
http://reff.f.bg.ac.rs/handle/123456789/3319
Collections
  • Radovi istraživača / Researcher's publications - Odeljenje za filozofiju
  • Radovi istraživača / Researcher's publications - Odeljenje za psihologiju
Institution/Community
Filozofija / Philosophy
TY  - JOUR
AU  - Sikimić, Vlasta
AU  - Nikitović, Tijana
AU  - Vasić, Miljan
AU  - Subotić, Vanja
PY  - 2021
UR  - http://reff.f.bg.ac.rs/handle/123456789/3319
AB  - The epistemic attitudes of scientists, such as epistemic tolerance and authoritarianism, play important roles in the discourse about rivaling theories. Epistemic tolerance stands for the mental attitude of an epistemic agent, e.g., a scientist, who is open to opposing views, while epistemic authoritarianism represents the tendency to uncritically accept views of authorities. Another relevant epistemic factor when it comes to the epistemic decisions of scientists is the skepticism towards the scientific method. However, the question is whether these epistemic attitudes are influenced by their sociopolitical counterparts, such as the researcher's degree of conservatism. To empirically investigate the interplay between epistemic and sociopolitical attitudes of scientists, we conducted a survey with researchers (N = 655) across different disciplines. We propose scales for measuring epistemic tolerance and epistemic authoritarianism, as well as a scale for detecting the participants' readiness to question the scientific method. Furthermore, we investigate the relationship between epistemic tolerance and epistemic authoritarianism on the one hand, and career stage and sociopolitical views on the other hand. Interestingly, our study found only small correlations between the participants' degree of conservatism and their epistemic attitudes. This suggests that political views, against common argumentation, actually do not play an important role in one's scientific decisions. Moreover, social scientists scored higher on the epistemic tolerance and lower on the epistemic authoritarianism scale than natural scientists. Finally, the results indicate that natural scientists question the scientific method less than social scientists.
PB  - Springer, Dordrecht
T2  - Review of Philosophy and Psychology
T1  - Do Political Attitudes Matter for Epistemic Decisions of Scientists?
DO  - 10.1007/s13164-020-00504-7
ER  - 
@article{
author = "Sikimić, Vlasta and Nikitović, Tijana and Vasić, Miljan and Subotić, Vanja",
year = "2021",
abstract = "The epistemic attitudes of scientists, such as epistemic tolerance and authoritarianism, play important roles in the discourse about rivaling theories. Epistemic tolerance stands for the mental attitude of an epistemic agent, e.g., a scientist, who is open to opposing views, while epistemic authoritarianism represents the tendency to uncritically accept views of authorities. Another relevant epistemic factor when it comes to the epistemic decisions of scientists is the skepticism towards the scientific method. However, the question is whether these epistemic attitudes are influenced by their sociopolitical counterparts, such as the researcher's degree of conservatism. To empirically investigate the interplay between epistemic and sociopolitical attitudes of scientists, we conducted a survey with researchers (N = 655) across different disciplines. We propose scales for measuring epistemic tolerance and epistemic authoritarianism, as well as a scale for detecting the participants' readiness to question the scientific method. Furthermore, we investigate the relationship between epistemic tolerance and epistemic authoritarianism on the one hand, and career stage and sociopolitical views on the other hand. Interestingly, our study found only small correlations between the participants' degree of conservatism and their epistemic attitudes. This suggests that political views, against common argumentation, actually do not play an important role in one's scientific decisions. Moreover, social scientists scored higher on the epistemic tolerance and lower on the epistemic authoritarianism scale than natural scientists. Finally, the results indicate that natural scientists question the scientific method less than social scientists.",
publisher = "Springer, Dordrecht",
journal = "Review of Philosophy and Psychology",
title = "Do Political Attitudes Matter for Epistemic Decisions of Scientists?",
doi = "10.1007/s13164-020-00504-7"
}
Sikimić, V., Nikitović, T., Vasić, M.,& Subotić, V.. (2021). Do Political Attitudes Matter for Epistemic Decisions of Scientists?. in Review of Philosophy and Psychology
Springer, Dordrecht..
https://doi.org/10.1007/s13164-020-00504-7
Sikimić V, Nikitović T, Vasić M, Subotić V. Do Political Attitudes Matter for Epistemic Decisions of Scientists?. in Review of Philosophy and Psychology. 2021;.
doi:10.1007/s13164-020-00504-7 .
Sikimić, Vlasta, Nikitović, Tijana, Vasić, Miljan, Subotić, Vanja, "Do Political Attitudes Matter for Epistemic Decisions of Scientists?" in Review of Philosophy and Psychology (2021),
https://doi.org/10.1007/s13164-020-00504-7 . .

DSpace software copyright © 2002-2015  DuraSpace
About REFF | Send Feedback

OpenAIRERCUB
 

 

All of DSpaceInstitutions/communitiesAuthorsTitlesSubjectsThis institutionAuthorsTitlesSubjects

Statistics

View Usage Statistics

DSpace software copyright © 2002-2015  DuraSpace
About REFF | Send Feedback

OpenAIRERCUB