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The Power of Ignorance

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Towards a Liberatory Epistemology

Part of the book series: Palgrave Innovations in Philosophy ((PIIP))

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Abstract

Socially constructed ignorance hides important features of the social world. It also has roots in a modernism that willfully and purposively overlooks the epistemic and moral agency of those neither male nor white. Such overlooking has consequences for how power is distributed in our world. We often invisibly retain an unwillingness to see the structural inequalities that make knowledge white and male. Opening the circle of epistemic authority to wider groups of epistemic agents requires, first, understanding the requirements of knowledge-sharing and, second, coming to terms with the situatedness of our knowledge practices. It also requires a means of opening our ears to hear what less advantaged groups are saying. This cannot be had without genuinely understanding the social reality of those different from ourselves.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    See, in particular, Peels and Blaauw (2016) and Sullivan and Tuana (2007).

  2. 2.

    As Medina argues, “actively meta-ignorant individuals by themselves are unable to detect their blind-spots and recognize their insensitivities, and therefore they are incapable of becoming epistemically responsible agents” (2016, 195).

  3. 3.

    Philosophers of race, in particular, “have developed robust discussions of social facts, experiences, and meanings that, as a result of racial oppression , become invisible, inaudible, or simply unintelligible in certain social locations and for certain perspectives that protect themselves from facing their involvement in racial oppression with a shield of active ignorance” (Medina 2018, 247).

  4. 4.

    See Kant (1960, 76–81).

  5. 5.

    As I will discuss very shortly, Mills argues that historically non-whites are actually non-human. While I am sympathetic to his claim and largely agree with the idea of linking rationality to humanity, I believe it is not humanity that “savages” are denied as much as it is personhood .

  6. 6.

    See Proctor and Schiebinger (2008). Also see Peels and Blaauw (2016).

  7. 7.

    I will discuss this later, but see Kant (2013, 174–175).

  8. 8.

    See Mills (2007, 20).

  9. 9.

    Something very similar could be said for males: they don’t see their own maleness; they don’t see how maleness is constructed.

  10. 10.

    The inequality of women actually goes back much further, at least to the time of the Greeks.

  11. 11.

    In the case of Kant particularly, I think Mills overstates the case. Kant holds to Buffon’s rule, which states that the mark of a species is the ability to reproduce. In this way, Kant does not deny the humanity of non-whites, although he does deny their personhood .

  12. 12.

    See Kant (2013, 173).

  13. 13.

    Kant , of course, places a great deal more transcendental significance on this point than any modern day epistemologists.

  14. 14.

    For the same point repeated, see Outlaw (2007, 197).

  15. 15.

    See the discussion of Rawls in Chapter 4.

  16. 16.

    See Spelman (2007, 127–129).

  17. 17.

    See Foucault (2003, 29–30).

  18. 18.

    See Mills ’ discussion of mainstream social epistemology (2007, 14–17).

  19. 19.

    In case one wants a review, Alcoff and Potter (1993) is an excellent starting point.

  20. 20.

    This was true in the earliest work of feminist epistemology as well.

  21. 21.

    Medina reminds us, “racially oppressed subjects have no option but to master the dominant perspectives of privileged groups that shape the social world” (2018, 251).

  22. 22.

    A similar case of discounting knowing in hip hop is discussed in Debes (2018, 55–56).

  23. 23.

    See Heldke (2006, 156–157).

  24. 24.

    See in particular, Hoagland (2007, 95–97).

  25. 25.

    This case may not be one of white ignorance simpliciter, but because Alpine is relatively close to Mexico, there is a great deal of racial diversity in the town and, as Heldke notes, a racial component to the professor’s accusations.

  26. 26.

    As Pritchard (2016) and Fricker (2016) each point out, there are times when ignorance is an epistemically good thing, for example, when we avoid accumulating trivial truths in favor of my substantive claims to knowledge.

  27. 27.

    For more on when knowledge should and should not be shared, see Grasswick (2010, 2011).

  28. 28.

    Other cases exist of philosophers who argue that ignorance has an epistemic value . For example, Duncan Pritchard (2016) argues that in the case of misleading defeaters, epistemic goals are actually better served by ignorance. Much more poetically, Fricker claims, “massive ignorance is a precondition of having an epistemically functional life” (2016, 160).

  29. 29.

    See Tuana (2004, 195–196).

  30. 30.

    For more on the types of knowledge that get shared see Schiebinger (2008).

  31. 31.

    See Williams (1986).

  32. 32.

    See Coady (2004).

  33. 33.

    There is relationality in Cartesian accounts. It’s just that this relationality is overlooked, ignored, and suppressed.

  34. 34.

    Also see Coady (2004).

  35. 35.

    See Williams (1994).

  36. 36.

    See Quijano (2007, 169–170).

  37. 37.

    This is obviously reflective of John Stuart Mill’s argument concerning truth in On Liberty.

  38. 38.

    See Code (1991, 117).

  39. 39.

    This issue is also taken up by Mills (2007, 14–15).

  40. 40.

    The obvious problem of relativism that emerges in this sort of discussion of truth . I will return to this topic in Chapter 4. I argue that “reasonableness” can allow diversity while still allowing for a substantive notion of truth.

  41. 41.

    See Longino (2002, 103–104).

  42. 42.

    See Bailey (2007, 77).

  43. 43.

    See Grier and Cobbs (1968), especially 1–38.

  44. 44.

    For a general summary of the role of tobacco companies in generating ignorance, see Proctor (2008, 11–18).

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  1. University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, AL, USA

    Deborah K. Heikes

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Heikes, D.K. (2019). The Power of Ignorance. In: Towards a Liberatory Epistemology. Palgrave Innovations in Philosophy. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-16485-0_2

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