Martin Kusch

First published in 1995. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

The Sociology of Philosophical Knowledge

Psychologism

Knowledge by Agreement defends the ideas that knowledge is a social status (like money, or marriage), and that knowledge is primarily the possession of groups rather than individuals. Part I develops a new theory of testimony. It breaks with the traditional view according to which testimony is not, except accidentally, a generative source of knowledge. One important consequence of the new theory is a rejection of attempts to globally justify trust in the words of others. Part II proposes a communitarian theory of empirical knowledge. Martin Kusch argues that empirical belief can acquire the status of knowledge only by being shared with others, and that all empirical beliefs presuppose social institutions. As a result all knowledge is essentially political. Part III defends some of the controversial premises and consequences of Parts I and II: the community-dependence of normativity, epistemological and semantic relativism, anti-realism, and a social conception of objectivity. Martin Kusch's bold approach to epistemology is a challenge to philosophy and will arouse interest in the wider academic world.

The Programme of Communitarian Epistemology

Knowledge by Agreement

Alexandra Schantl

Christiane Krejs

Ruth Schnell

The exhibition #fuckreality opens doors to virtual worlds.The image is omnipresent: entranced people staring at displays on their televisions, smartphones, tablets, or computers.The launch into a new era of virtuality is in full swing, and innovations in virtual reality technologies are pushing forward in great strides.Featuring the work of over 20 artists, #fuckreality focuses on a topic that the art world often neglects because it is stigmatised by associations with Hollywood productions and the globalised taste of the masses.Is it even possible to counter the commercial interests of Google & Co and reveal new modes of perception?#fuckreality presents artistic positions that explore and question the promise of the digital world.Published on the occasion of the exhibition, #fuckreality at Kunstraum Niederoesterreich, Vienna (4 October - 17 November 2018).English and German text.

#fuckreality

Reader in History and Philosophy of Science Martin Kusch

Psychologists and philosophers have assumed that psychological knowledge is knowledge about, and held by, the individual mind. Psychological Knowledge challenges these views. It argues that bodies of psychological knowledge are social institutions like money or the monarchy, and that mental states are social artefacts like coins or crowns. Martin Kusch takes on arguments of alternative proposals, shows what is wrong with them, and demonstrates how his own social-philosophical approach constitutes an advance. We see that exists a substantial natural amount of philosophical theorising, a body of work that tries to determine the nature and structure of folk psychology. An introduction to the workings of constuctivism, Psychological Knowledge is an insightful introduction to the history of psychology and the recent philosophy of mind.

A Social History and Philosophy

Psychological Knowledge

Relativism can be found in all philosophical traditions and subfields of philosophy. It is also a central idea in the social sciences, the humanities, religion and politics. This is the first volume to map relativistic motifs in all areas of philosophy, synchronically and diachronically. It thereby provides essential intellectual tools for thinking about contemporary issues like cultural diversity, the plurality of the sciences, or the scope of moral values. The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Relativism is an outstanding major reference source on this fundamental topic. The 57 chapters by a team of international contributors are divided into nine parts: Relativism in non-Western philosophical traditions Relativism in Western philosophical traditions Relativism in ethics Relativism in political and legal philosophy Relativism in epistemology Relativism in metaphysics Relativism in philosophy of science Relativism in philosophy of language and mind Relativism in other areas of philosophy. Essential reading for students and researchers in all branches of philosophy, this handbook will also be of interest to those in related subjects such as politics, religion, sociology, cultural studies and literature.

The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Relativism

Robin McKenna

Natalie Alana Ashton

Katharina Anna Sodoma

This is the first book to explore the connections and interactions between social epistemology and epistemic relativism. The essays in the volume are organized around three distinct philosophical approaches to this topic: 1) foundational questions concerning deep disagreement, the variability of epistemic norms, and the relationship between relativism and reliabilism; 2) the role of relativistic themes in feminist social epistemology; and 3) the relationship between the sociology of knowledge, philosophy of science, and social epistemology. Recent trends in social epistemology seek to rectify earlier work that conceptualized cognitive achievements primarily on the level of isolated individuals. Relativism insists that epistemic judgements or beliefs are justified or unjustified only relative to systems of standards—there is not neutral way of adjudicating between them. By bringing together these two strands of epistemology, this volume offers unique perspectives on a number of central epistemological questions. Social Epistemology and Relativism will be of interest to researchers working in epistemology, feminist philosophy, and the sociology of knowledge.

Social Epistemology and Relativism

Harry Collins

What can humans do? What can machines do? How do humans delegate actions to machines? In this book, Harry Collins and Martin Kusch combine insights from sociology and philosophy to provide a novel answer to these increasingly important questions.The authors begin by distinguishing between two basic types of intentional behavior, which they call polimorphic actions and mimeomorphic actions. Polimorphic actions (such as writing a love letter) are ones that community members expect to vary with social context. Mimeomorphic actions (such a swinging a golf club) do not vary. Although machines cannot act, they can mimic mimeomorphic actions. Mimeomorphic actions are thus the crucial link between what humans can do and what machines can do. Following a presentation of their detailed categorization of actions, the authors apply their approach to a broad range of human-machine interactions and to learning. Key examples include bicycle riding and the many varieties of writing machines. They also show how their theory can be used to explain the operation of organizations such as restaurants and armies. Finally, they look at a historical case—the technological development of the air pump—applying their categorization of actions to the processes of mechanization and automation. Automation, they argue, can occur only where what we want to bring about can be brought about through mimeomorphic action.

Martin Kusch

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