Philosophy 303 - Principles of Inquiry: Ways of Knowing

 

Assignment #3:  Tools for inquiry: evidence, reasoning, bias, propaganda

 

Reading for this assignment:

 

1)      Chapters 3 and 4 of How to Think About Weird Things (pp. 35-100).

2)      “Recognizing Propaganda” available online at http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media_control_propaganda/Recognizing_Propaganda.html and/or the somewhat more extensive presentation of the same material at http://www.propagandacritic.com. 

3)      a set of readings on ‘media bias’

a)      “Media Bias Basics” at http://www.mediaresearch.org/biasbasics/biasbasics1.asp

b)      the introduction to “What Liberal Media” by Eric Alterman at http://www.whatliberalmedia.com/intro.pdf

c)      “Media/Political Bias” by Andrew R. Cline at http://rhetorica.net/bias.htm

d)       “A Propaganda Model” from Manufacturing Consent by Noam Chomsky and Edward Herman at http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Herman%20/Manufac_Consent_Prop_Model.html

 

 

 

Writing Assignment:

 

1. Write out brief answers to the study questions for Chapters 3 and 4 of How to Think About Weird Things. (Again, I do not mean to include the “discussion questions” or the exercises headed “Evaluate These Claims…” or “Field Problem” or “Critical Reading and Writing”.)
2. For Chapter 3 only, write out answers to the even numbered exercises headed “Evaluate these claims.  Are They Reasonable or Not?” on pp. 58-59.  (To be hyper-clear: just the even numbered ones, so five out of the ten.)  Don’t neglect to explain (briefly) why you think the claim (or argument) is reasonable or not. 
3. The view of knowledge and inquiry that is developed in How to Think about Weird Things is what is sometimes called an 'evidentialist' account of knowledge. It is well summed up by David Hume's statement, "A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence." The basic idea is that we need evidence for our beliefs. It follows, as W. K. Clifford insists, that to believe without good evidence is wrong. (See the box on page 71.) Here are the first two paragraphs of Clifford's famous essay "The Ethics of Belief":

   A shipowner was about to send to sea an emigrant-ship. He knew that she was old, and not overwell built at the first; that she had seen many seas and climes, and often had needed repairs. Doubts had been suggested to him that possibly she was not seaworthy. These doubts preyed upon his mind, and made him unhappy; he thought that perhaps he ought to have her thoroughly overhauled and and refitted, even though this should put him at great expense. Before the ship sailed, however, he succeeded in overcoming these melancholy reflections. He said to himself that she had gone safely through so many voyages and weathered so many storms that it was idle to suppose she would not come safely home from this trip also. He would put his trust in Providence, which could hardly fail to protect all these unhappy families that were leaving their fatherland to seek for better times elsewhere. He would dismiss from his mind all ungenerous suspicions about the honesty of builders and contractors. In such ways he acquired a sincere and comfortable conviction that his vessel was thoroughly safe and seaworthy; he watched her departure with a light heart, and benevolent wishes for the success of the exiles in their strange new home that was to be; and he got his insurance-money when she went down in mid-ocean and told no tales.

   What shall we say of him? Surely this, that he was verily guilty of the death of those men. It is admitted that he did sincerely believe in the soundness of his ship; but the sincerity of his conviction can in no wise help him, because he had no right to believe on such evidence as was before him. He had acquired his belief not by honestly earning it in patient investigation, but by stifling his doubts. And although in the end he may have felt so sure about it that he could not think otherwise, yet inasmuch as he had knowingly and willingly worked himself into that frame of mind, he must be held responsible for it.

   In Clifford's view (and he is far from alone in this), we have no right to believe unless we have good evidence for our beliefs. And when we act on unjustified beliefs we can rightly be blamed for the bad consequences. Is it fair to hold people to these standards? How many of our beliefs (religious, political, 'common sense', and otherwise) are we entitled to hold, if we adopt this standard? (Write a page or two.)

4. The other readings for this assignment (all on-line) are intended to begin our investigation of “citizen’s epistemology.”  I think of citizen’s epistemology as the effort to address the practical problems that citizens have in learning what they need to know to be good citizens.  The readings address two concepts important to this subject: ‘propaganda’ and ‘media bias’.  All of them, in one way or another, attempt to identify forms of bias or distortion.  But there is disagreement about what sort of bias, if any, is present in the mainstream US media.  Conservatives (like those at the Media Research Council) see a liberal bias.  Liberals (Like Eric Alterman) and those even farther to the left (like Noam Chomsky and Ed Herman) see a conservative bias – or perhaps it would be better to say: a bias in favor of the existing power structures. Mainstream journalists themselves and some academic students of the media (like Andrew Cline) tend not to see a consistent political bias, but do see biases that arise from the nature of the news business – like the bias in favor of stories with conflict and drama.  (“If it bleeds, it leads.”)  So, after you have read these materials, pay attention to some mainstream media source (or sources) for a week.  If you regularly watch the evening news on a particular network or read a daily newspaper, that’s enough.  If you don’t normally pay much attention to the news, then (at least for this week) find some source to follow.  Virtually every newspaper and broadcast news service in the world is on line now, so it’s easy to follow one or more from your computer.  So pick (at least) one and spend (at least) 20 minutes every day for a week seeing what it tells you about what’s going on in the world.  Look for examples of any of the sorts of bias and/or propaganda identified in the reading.  Look also for examples of fallacious reasoning.  Write two or three pages about what you find.

[ I’ll post some of my own observations on the blog.  Perhaps you’d like to post your ‘findings’ there as well.  If we could get some conversations going about some concrete examples that would be great.]