Uh, make that 2026. Apologies!

We're delighted to announce the fourth (and final!) Applied Epistemology Project workshop, on Applied Epistemology in Times of Political Crisis, here at UNC on March 6-7, 2025. (1/3)

AEP research getting out there! 👏👏👏

I wrote about epistemic trespassing and why it is bad for my Substack. Tl;dr: it is tempting to talk about it as a moral failing but I think it is often more helpful to view trespassing behaviour as a rational response to bad incentives. rbnmckenna86.substack.com/p/what-is-wr...

New blog post! AEP postdoc Will Conner discusses recent news that Meta has been accused of cheating on AI benchmark tests, leading to a broader discussion of the value of such tests drawing on Thi Nguyen's work on gamification and value capture. Check it out! aep.unc.edu/2025/07/09/g...

Good Plain English pod featuring @holdenthorp.bsky.social. I appreciated Holden’s candor regarding scientists’ attempts to influence politics and when such attempts might edge into epistemic trespassing, which is an idea addressed in our recent paper (1/2) open.spotify.com/episode/4Pee...

Very excited to share our third "explainer video". (Refresher: these are ~5 min animations introducing applied epistemology concepts for a wide audience.) This one's on epist of free speech, featuring a script by Rob Simpson! Please share & consider using in teaching! www.youtube.com/watch?v=hMgb...

Many (applied) epistemologists think that when you know that there's expert consensus about something, you should defer to the expert consensus. And many of them also think that when you know the experts disagree, you should suspend judgment. (1/2)

Reminder: tomorrow is the deadline to apply for this! It's a chance to get expert instruction in public writing on applied epistemology, feedback from peers, and to enjoy an in-person workshop here at UNC

🥁🎉It's time again! My colleague Thomas Grundmann is organising the Cologne Summer School in Philosophy. This year's star is @aworsnip.bsky.social (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill). 🎊📢 You can find more information on the following website: cssip.uni-koeln.de Spread the word and repost!

Interested in writing applied epistemology for a public-facing audience? Apply to be part of our new working group! It'll meet four times over the summer, followed by a capstone in-person event here at UNC in September facilitated by Eleanor Gordon-Smith. Details here: philevents.org/event/show/1...

Very excited to share our second "explainer video". (Refresher: these are ~5 min animations introducing applied epistemology concepts for a wide audience.) This one's on polarization, featuring a script by Kevin Dorst! Please share, consider using in teaching, etc! www.youtube.com/watch?v=h9nd...

Fascinating new post on our blog by Emily McWilliams, discussing the denial and undertreatment of women's pain in medical procedures through the lens of applied epistemological work on testimonial injustice, manufactured ignorance, and motivated reasoning: aep.unc.edu/2025/03/17/t...

New Paper in Philosophical Psychology: Trust in experts is low. Why? How bad is it? And what should we do? To answer these questions, we reviewed philosophy (when *ought* we defer to the experts) and psychology (when *do* people defer to the experts). Link in comments!

i'm taking part in this philosophy panel on the future of social media next month, with @geneickers.bsky.social, @joe-saunders.bsky.social, and organiser @annabortolan.bsky.social. it's online and open to the public, so sign up if you want to hear some hot takes!

I wrote a blog post about Samuel Alito as a case study in the ethics of suspicion and psychologizing blogs.cardiff.ac.uk/openfordebat...

Check out this interdisciplinary review paper on deference to experts by a team of AEP Fellows (current and past)!

Consider applying to be part of this summer school (aimed at researchers of all career stages) on applied epistemology featuring AEP Director @aworsnip.bsky.social!

New from me @theconversation.com We're witnessing a celebration of "common sense" among the new admin & their allies. But remember: celebrating common sense and denigrating expertise/evidence IS ideological. And is NOT a reliable path to truth. theconversation.com/how-populist...

I’ve been studying this problem since 2015. Obviously the nature of this changed with the birth of X. It’s gone from over-indexed on the political nerds & activists to over-indexed on Nazis & fascists. It’s no good.

I started a Political Epistemology substack, and I decided to begin with an uncontroversial topic. I currently have 3 followers, but I welcome more!

On Saturday, K-12 educators from across the Triangle joined us on UNC's campus for "The Art of Inquiry: Promoting Responsible Belief in the Classroom." With guidance from @jeffgreene.bsky.social (UNC) and Paula McAvoy (NCState), participants learned strategies for fostering critical thinking...(1/2)

New blog post! AEP Postdoctoral Fellow Will Conner evaluates Meta's change in fact-checking policy in light of recent applied epistemology scholarship by @danwphilosophy.bsky.social and others, and concludes that the sky is probably not falling. Check it out: aep.unc.edu/2025/01/20/i...

Here's the background and syllabus (including 'core readings') for a seven-week philosophy module I'm teaching on 'Politics, truth, and ideology'. Feedback welcome: www.conspicuouscognition.com/p/politics-t...

So fun talking to teachers about "Educating for Responsible Belief" at the “The Art of Inquiry: Promoting Responsible Belief in the Classroom” event hosted by the Applied Epistemology Project at UNC-CH (@unc-aep.bsky.social). Slides available if you're curious: https://buff.ly/4jeXJhr

Excited to introduce a new series of explainer videos--5 min videos explaining concepts and debates in applied epist w/scripts written by experts and animations by the super-talented Ripley Stroud. The 1st features a script by Giulia Napolitano on conspiracy theories: www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtWA...

David Brooks gave my essay 'Why do people believe true things?' a 'Sidney Award' in his column at the NYT: www.nytimes.com/2024/12/26/o...

“The Constitution of Knowledge” (2021) by @jonrauch.bsky.social is by far the best book I have read on the epistemic crisis we are currently experiencing, with objectivity and reason being challenged in the context of political polarisation. I highly recommend it.

Check out AEP Fellow Devin Lane's terrific paper on expert disagreement and the duty to vote, now forthcoming in Philosophers' Imprint: philpapers.org/rec/LANEDA

Wrote a big hot take for Nieman’s 2025 predictions & managed to shoehorn in a lot of pet peeves while using “epistemic” sparingly www.niemanlab.org/2024/12/the-...

OUP doing a nice spotlight on political epistemology, including work by Tom Kelly, Regina Rini, and lottocracy! Lottocracy, now by Paul Guyer (with 100% more Kantianism)! academic.oup.com/journals/pag...

File under "It's evangelicals, stupid!": Trump won the overall working-class vote only because 86% of non-college evangelicals supported him. NON-evangelicals without college went for Harris! www.brookings.edu/articles/the...

This has got me thinking. The ‘echo chamber’ criticism assumes that social media is only about politics. But it’s also about literature, art, science, nature, ecology etc and we’re all learning from each other here all the time (if we engage that way).

After a review process so long and intensive that the title changed twice, I'm excited/relieved that "How to Distinguish Motivated Reasoning from Bayesian Updating" is accepted at @polbehavior.bsky.social. osf.io/preprints/os... Here is how it's relevant for your Thanksgiving dinner 🦃👇

Hello, philosophy BSKY! I'm organizing a conference on the Philosophy of Content Moderation. Check it out: www.philmod.org/conference Abstracts due December 15

Characteristically great review by Carolina Flores: philarchive.org/rec/FLORTE

For our first post on BlueSky, here's an applied epistemology starter pack! go.bsky.app/2mvWKgk