CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 11Epistemology, Ethics, and MetaphysicsFeminist Epistemology and Gender StudiesEducational Strategies and Epistemologies

The Epistemic Value of Deep Disagreements

Open access
Lougheed, Kirk·2018·Informal Logic
DOI 10.22329/il.v38i2.4966
Open this paper in CoChat — free accountOpen PDF

Abstract

In the epistemology of disagreement literature an underdeveloped argument defending the claim that an agent need not conciliate when she becomes aware of epistemic peer disagreement is based on the idea that there are epistemic benefits to be gained from disagreement. Such benefits are unobtainable if an agent conciliates in the face of peer disagreement. I argue that there are good reasons to embrace this line of argument at least in inquiry-related contexts. In argumentation theory a deep disagreement occurs when there is a disagreement between fundamental frameworks. According to Robert J. Fogelin disagreements between fundamental frameworks are not susceptible to rational resolution. Instead of evaluating this claim I argue that deep disagreements can lead to epistemic benefits, at least when inquiry is in view. Whether rational resolution is possible in cases of deep disagreements, their existence turns out to be epistemically beneficial. I conclude by examining whether this line of argument can be taken beyond research-related contexts.Dans la littérature sur l'épistémologie du désaccord, un argument sous-développé pour une approche non conciliatoire se fonde sur l'idée qu'il y a des bénéfices épistémiques à tirer du désaccord. De tels bénéfices sont impossibles à obtenir si un agent se concilie face au désaccord avec ses pairs, du moins dans les contextes liés à la recherche. Dans la théorie de l'argumentation, un désaccord profond se produit lorsqu'il y a un désaccord entre des propositions cadres. Je soutiens que des désaccords profonds peuvent mener à des avantages épistémiques, du moins dans le contexte de la recherche. Que la résolution rationnelle soit ou non possible en cas de désaccord profond, leur existence s'avère être bénéfique sur le plan épistémologique.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.22329/il.v38i2.4966

Cites

3 of 3 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • Conciliationism negatively affects research processes.

    “Similarly, Kirk Lougheed argues that conciliationism negatively affects research processes and maintains that an argument against conciliationism is necessary to prevent harm to scientific practices:”

    From Conciliationism as Epistemic Concession in Religious Peer Disagreement (2025) · cites this paper as [20]

    Section 2.1 argues that remaining steadfast in some research contexts can yield epistemic benefits, and section 3.4 says researchers who fail to remain steadfast may lose those benefits. This supports the concern about conciliationism’s effects on inquiry, but the paper defends a limited form of non-conciliationism; it does not say that an argument against conciliationism is necessary to prevent harm to scientific practices generally. Page numbers were not provided in our copy. (LLM, conf=0.84)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

  • If agent S reasonably believes that there are future epistemic benefits to be gained from continuing to believe proposition p in the face of epistemic peer disagreement within a research context R, then S is rational to be a non-conciliationist about p in the context of R.

    “(1) If agent S reasonably believes that there are future epistemic benefits to be gained from continuing to believe proposition p in the face of epistemic peer disagreement within a research context R, then S is rational to be a non-conciliationist about p in the context of R.”

    From Conciliationism as Epistemic Concession in Religious Peer Disagreement (2025) · cites this paper as [20]

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Research works printed but not linked: 40

  1. Adams, David M. 2005. "Knowing when disagreements are deep" Infor- mal Logic 25(1): 65-77.
  2. Ballantyne, Nathan. 2014. "Counterfactual philosophers." Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 88(2): 368-387.
  3. Behe J. Michael. 2006. Darwin's black box: The biochemical challenge to evolution. New York: Free Press.
  4. Behe J. Michael. 2008. The edge of evolution: The search for the of limits of darwinism. New York: Free Press.
  5. Bergmann, Michael. 2009. "Rational disagreement after full disclosure." Episteme: A Journal of Social Epistemology 6: 336-353.
  6. Billig, M. 1996. Arguing and thinking: A rhetorical approach to social psychology. Cambridge U.P.
  7. Blinder, A.S. & J. Morgan. 2000. "Are two heads better than one? An experimental analysis of group vs. Individual decision making." Working Paper 2909, National Bureau of Economic Research. Prince- ton, N.J. Christensen, David. 2007. "Epistemology of disagreement: The good news." Philosophical Review 116(2): 187-217.
  8. Christensen, David. 2014. "Disagreement and public controversy." In Essays in Collective Epistemology, eds. Jennifer Lackey, 142-162. Ox- ford U.P. Crisp, R.J. & R.N. Turner. 2011. "Cognitive adaptation to the experience of social and cultural diversity." Psychological bulletin, 137:2.
  9. Davson-Galle, Peter. 1992. "Arguments, arguing, and deep disagree- ments" Informal Logic 14(2): 147-156.
  10. Dessalles, J-L. 2007. Why we talk: The evolutionary origins of language. Oxford U.P. Downs, Robert B. 1982. Landmarks in Science: Hippocrates to Carson.
  11. Elga, A. 2007. "Reflection and disagreement." Noûs, 41(3): 478-502.
  12. Richard Feldman & Ted A. Warfield, 53-68. Oxford U.P. Feldman, R. 2005. "Deep disagreement, rational resolutions, and critical thinking" Informal Logic 25(1): 13-23.
  13. Feldman, R. 2007. "Reasonable religious disagreements." In Philoso- phers Without Gods, eds. Louise Antony, 194-214. Oxford U.P. Fiske, S.T., Harris, L.T., and A.J.C. Cuddy. 2004. "Why ordinary people torture enemy prisoners." Science, 1482-1483.
  14. Friemann, R. 2005. "Emotional backing the feeling of deep disagree- ment" Informal Logic 25(1): 51-63.
  15. Fogelin, R. J. 1985 [2005]. "The logic of deep disagreements" Informal Logic. 7(1): 1-8
  16. Kelly, T. 2005. "The epistemic significance of disagreement." In Oxford Studies in Epistemology, eds. John Hawthorne and Tamar Szabó Gen- dler, 167-196. Oxford University Press.
  17. Kelly, T. 2010. "Peer disagreement and higher order evidence." In Disa- greement, eds. Richard Feldman and Ted A. Warfield, 111-174. Ox- ford U.P. King, Nathan L. (2012). "Disagreement: What's the problem? or A good peer is hard to find." Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 85(2): 249-272.
  18. Kuhn, Thomas. 2013. The structure of scientific revolutions. University of Chicago Press.
  19. Laughlin, P.R., Zander, M.L., Knievel, E.M. & Tan, T.S. 2003. "Groups perform better than the best individuals on letter-to-numbers problems: Informative equations and effective reasoning." Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 85(4): 684-694.
  20. Lombardelli, C., Proudman, J. & Talbot, J. 2005. "Committees versus individuals: An experimental analysis of monetary policy decision- making." International Journal of Central Banking, 1(1): 181-205.
  21. Lougheed, K. 2017. "The Role of Idealized Cases in the Epistemology of Disagreement." Southwest Philosophy Review, 33(2): 251-270.
  22. Lougheed, K. & R.M. Simpson. 2017. "Indirect Epistemic Reasons and Religious Belief. Religious Studies, 53(2): 151-169.
  23. Lugg, Andrew. 1986. "Disagreement and informal logic: No cause for alarm" Informal Logic 8(1): 47-51.
  24. Matheson, J. 2015a. The Epistemic Significance of Disagreement. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
  25. Memedi, V. 2007. Resolving deep disagreement. In H.V. Hansen, et. al. (Eds.), Dissensus and the Search for Common Ground, CD-ROM (pp. 1-10). Windsor, ON: OSSA.
  26. Mercier, H., & Sperber, D. 2011. Why do humans reason? Arguments for an argumentative theory. Behavioral and brain sciences, 34(2): 57-74.
  27. Mercer, H., Sperber, D. 2017. The Enigma of Reason. Harvard U.P. Michaelsen, L.K., Watson, W.E. & Black, R.H. (1989). "A realistic test of individual versus group consensus decision making." Journal of Applied Psychology 74(5): 834-839.
  28. Moscovici, C & Personnaz, B. 1980. "Studies in social influence: V. Mi- nority influence and conversion behavior in a perceptual task." Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 16(3): 270-282.
  29. Nemeth, C.M. 1995. "Dissent as driving cognition, attitudes, and Nemeth, C., Brown, K. & Rogers, J. 2001. "Devil's advocate versus au- thentic dissent: Stimulating quantity and quality." European Journal of Social Psychology, 31(6): 707-720.
  30. Page, S. 2007. The difference: How the power of diversity creates better groups, firms, and societies. USA: Princeton U.P. Perelman, C. & Olbrechts-Tyteca, L. 1969. The new rhetoric: A treatise on argumentation. University of Notre Dame Press.
  31. Phillips, D. 2008. "Investigating the shared background requirement for argument: A critique of Fogelin's thesis on deep disagreement" Infor- mal Logic 28(2): 86-101.
  32. Siegel, Harvey (2013). Argumentation and the epistemology of disa- greement. In Virtues of Argumentation. Proceedings of the 10th Inter- national Conference of the Ontario Society for the Study of Argumenta- tion (OSSA), eds.
  33. Mohammed, D., & Lewiński, M., 22-26 May 2013. Windsor, ON: OSSA, pp. 1-22.
  34. Sniezek, J.A. & Henry, R.A. 1989. "Accuracy and confidence in group judgment." Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 43(1): 1-28.
  35. Sperber, D. 2000. "Metarepresentations in an evolutionary perspective." In Metarepresentations: A multidisciplinary perspective, eds. Dan Sperber, 117-137. Oxford U.P. Sperber, D. 2001. "An evolutionary perspective on testimony and argu- mentation." Philosophical Topics 29: 401-413.
  36. Sosa, E. 2010. "The epistemology of disagreement." In Social Epistemol- ogy, eds. Alan Haddock, Adrian Millar & Duncan Pritchard, 278-297. Oxford University Press. [First published in 2009. Episteme 6(3): 269-279.
  37. Stasson, M.F., Kameda, T., Parks, C.D., Zimmerman, S.K. & Davis, J.H. 1991. "Effects of assigned group consensus requirement on group problem solving and group members' learning." Social Psychology Quarterly 54(1): 25-35.
  38. Tindale, R.S. & Sheffey, S. 2002. "Shared information, cognitive load, and group memory." Group Processes & Intergroup Relations 5(1): 5- 18.
  39. Turner, Dale & Larry Wright. (2005). "Revisiting deep disagreement" Informal Logic 25(1): 25-35.
  40. Zoltán, Imre. (Accessed August 21, 2014). "Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis," in Encyclopaedia Britannica Online Academic Edition.

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Lougheed, K.
Affiliations
McMaster University (CA)
Corresponding author
Lougheed, Kirk
ORCID
Lougheed, Kirk
Venue
Informal Logic
Publisher
University of Windsor Leddy Library
Published
2018-06-01
Volume
38
Issue
2
Pages
263-292
ISSN
  • 0824-2577 (ISSN-L)
  • 2293-734X
DOI
10.22329/il.v38i2.4966
OpenAlex
W2811066564
Cited by
11
References
3
Citations by year
2026: 1 · 2025: 1 · 2022: 2 · 2021: 1 · 2019: 5 · 2018: 1
FWCI
12.00
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Informal Logic (publishedVersion)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
  • Érudit (Université de Montréal) (submittedVersion)
Funders
  • Monash University
  • Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Philosophy › Epistemology, Ethics, and Metaphysics
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Feminist Epistemology and Gender Studies
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Educational Strategies and Epistemologies
Keywords
epistemic disagreement, deep disagreement, peer disagreement, conciliation, argumentation theory, inquiry

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review