Bad beliefs: why they happen to highly intelligent, vigilant, devious, self-deceiving, coalitional apes. (19th May 2023)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Williams, Daniel
• Is Part Of: Philosophical psychology. Volume 36:Number 4(2023)
• Page Start: 819
• Page End: 833
• Publication Date: 2023-05-19
• Subjects: Bad beliefs -- rationality -- motivated reasoning -- cultural evolution -- conformity; Psychology -- Philosophy -- Periodicals; Philosophy -- Periodicals; Psychology -- Methodology -- Periodicals; 150.1
• DOI: 10.1080/09515089.2023.2186844
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0951-5089

Abstract

ABSTRACT: Neil Levy argues that the importance of acquiring cultural knowledge in our evolutionary past selected for conformist and deferential social learning, and that contemporary bad beliefs – roughly, popular beliefs at odds with expert consensus – result primarily from the rational deployment of such conformity and deference in epistemically polluted modern environments. I raise several objections to this perspective. First, against the cultural evolutionary theory from which Levy draws, I argue that humans evolved to be highly sophisticated and vigilant social learners. Given this, the ubiquity of bad beliefs in the modern world is puzzling: if humans are so smart and suspicious, why do these characteristics seem so rare in domains such as politics? I argue that the answer rests on the incentives that underlie bad beliefs, and I favorably contrast this explanation with Levy's appeal to epistemic pollution.