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A review by nghia
Epistemic Injustice: Power and the Ethics of Knowing by Miranda Fricker
1.0
This review is from the perspective of someone who is not deeply read in philosophy. Maybe someone who actually studied philosophy in university would come to a different conclusion.
I found it extremely challenging -- and usually quite frustrating and unsatisfying -- to force myself to read through this. It is only 188 pages but it doesn't exactly fly by. In part that is because this is full of philosophical jargon. The author has no problem dropping sentences like
But the larger problem I had is that I often struggled to see what the point was during long sections and (sometimes) entire chapters.
Fricker starts from an interesting position (which is what drew me to the book).
Fricker focuses on a specific kind of injustice, "epistemic injustice", the key form of which is "testimonial injustice" and that important kind of that is "negative identity prejudice testimonial injustice". Which is to say, when someone discounts what someones says because of their group identity. When you ignore what Mary says because she's a woman and all women are hysterical and irrational. When you ignore what Tom says because he's black and black people are all thieves and liars.
It's a bit....underwhelming, somehow? Fricker lays a lot of groundwork (persistent versus non-persistent, systematic versus non-systematic, culpable versus non-culpable) to get this point and you're mostly left feeling what's the big deal...obviously those are bad things.
But, in the strongest section of the book ("Prejudice in the Credibility Economy"), Fricker explains the practical and the epistemic harm of this, as well as why she thinks it is important to have a framework for talking about the problem explicitly. A practical harm would be something like "in meetings men don't listen to my ideas so my career has become stuck". An epistemic harm would be something like "in meetings men don't listen to my ideas, so now I've lost confidence in my own beliefs and general intelligence".
Set against this great section are the many less than great sections. The worst example is the entirety of chapter 3, where Fricker spends 20+ pages building a framework for how people actually receive testimony. If I tell you "the sky is blue" -- how exactly do you go about deciding that something like that is true or not? Do you actually apply fully logical thinking to every statement you hear? Do you just accept what everyone tells you uncritically?
It is a good and interesting question but what is ridiculous about this chapter is that this is an entirely empirical question. And Fricker spends 20 pages in purely philosophical arguments without mention of a single MRI test or scientific experiment. Contrast this chapter to [b:Thinking, Fast and Slow|11468377|Thinking, Fast and Slow|Daniel Kahneman|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1317793965l/11468377._SX50_.jpg|16402639]. One is the work of science and one is not. They actually come to similar conclusions but Fricker's is a waste of time, nothing but intellectual theorizing and the reason why philosophers have a bad name.
Get out of your office and do some damn experiments!
What is the solution to "negative identity prejudice testimonial injustice"? Again, after spending dozens of pages building up dense theories of epistemical virtue...Fricker's answer is to (somehow) know that you are prejudiced in a certain area. And then once you know you are prejudiced, you should pause and evaluate whether you are letting your prejudices color your perception of testimony you receive.
As an example, imagine you grew up in a deeply patriarchal society but then study abroad in a more egalitarian society. When you return home after your studies you've realized you have lots of built-in biases about the testimony of women. So the next time a woman says something you should pause and think to yourself, "Am I discounting this simply because a woman is saying it, or are there actually solid, non-prejudiced reasons for discounting it?"
Again...it all feels a bit....underwhelming somehow? Leaving me feeling that this is a book better left to professional philosophers who care deeply about the tiny nuances and dense theorizing that Fricker is doing.
I found it extremely challenging -- and usually quite frustrating and unsatisfying -- to force myself to read through this. It is only 188 pages but it doesn't exactly fly by. In part that is because this is full of philosophical jargon. The author has no problem dropping sentences like
It draws the subject away from assertoric caprice and towards doxastic stability.
But the larger problem I had is that I often struggled to see what the point was during long sections and (sometimes) entire chapters.
Fricker starts from an interesting position (which is what drew me to the book).
The exploration is orientated not to justice, but rather to injustice. As Judith Shklar points out, philosophy talks a lot about justice, and very little about injustice....The focus on justice creates an impression that justice is the norm and injustice the unfortunate aberration. But, obviously, this may be quite false. It also creates the impression that we should always understand injustice negatively by way of a prior grasp of justice....My interest here is in injustice specifically in the sphere of epistemic activity, and certainly in this sphere I believe that there are areas where injustice is normal, and that the only way to reveal what is involved in epistemic justice (indeed, even to see that there is such a thing as epistemic justice) is by looking at the negative space that is epistemic injustice.
Fricker focuses on a specific kind of injustice, "epistemic injustice", the key form of which is "testimonial injustice" and that important kind of that is "negative identity prejudice testimonial injustice". Which is to say, when someone discounts what someones says because of their group identity. When you ignore what Mary says because she's a woman and all women are hysterical and irrational. When you ignore what Tom says because he's black and black people are all thieves and liars.
It's a bit....underwhelming, somehow? Fricker lays a lot of groundwork (persistent versus non-persistent, systematic versus non-systematic, culpable versus non-culpable) to get this point and you're mostly left feeling what's the big deal...obviously those are bad things.
But, in the strongest section of the book ("Prejudice in the Credibility Economy"), Fricker explains the practical and the epistemic harm of this, as well as why she thinks it is important to have a framework for talking about the problem explicitly. A practical harm would be something like "in meetings men don't listen to my ideas so my career has become stuck". An epistemic harm would be something like "in meetings men don't listen to my ideas, so now I've lost confidence in my own beliefs and general intelligence".
Set against this great section are the many less than great sections. The worst example is the entirety of chapter 3, where Fricker spends 20+ pages building a framework for how people actually receive testimony. If I tell you "the sky is blue" -- how exactly do you go about deciding that something like that is true or not? Do you actually apply fully logical thinking to every statement you hear? Do you just accept what everyone tells you uncritically?
It is a good and interesting question but what is ridiculous about this chapter is that this is an entirely empirical question. And Fricker spends 20 pages in purely philosophical arguments without mention of a single MRI test or scientific experiment. Contrast this chapter to [b:Thinking, Fast and Slow|11468377|Thinking, Fast and Slow|Daniel Kahneman|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1317793965l/11468377._SX50_.jpg|16402639]. One is the work of science and one is not. They actually come to similar conclusions but Fricker's is a waste of time, nothing but intellectual theorizing and the reason why philosophers have a bad name.
Get out of your office and do some damn experiments!
What is the solution to "negative identity prejudice testimonial injustice"? Again, after spending dozens of pages building up dense theories of epistemical virtue...Fricker's answer is to (somehow) know that you are prejudiced in a certain area. And then once you know you are prejudiced, you should pause and evaluate whether you are letting your prejudices color your perception of testimony you receive.
As an example, imagine you grew up in a deeply patriarchal society but then study abroad in a more egalitarian society. When you return home after your studies you've realized you have lots of built-in biases about the testimony of women. So the next time a woman says something you should pause and think to yourself, "Am I discounting this simply because a woman is saying it, or are there actually solid, non-prejudiced reasons for discounting it?"
Again...it all feels a bit....underwhelming somehow? Leaving me feeling that this is a book better left to professional philosophers who care deeply about the tiny nuances and dense theorizing that Fricker is doing.