Abstract
During emerging public health crises, both policymakers and members of the public are looking to scientific experts to provide guidance. Even in cases where there are significant uncertainties, there is pressure for experts to “speak with one voice” to avoid confusion, allow officials to make evidence-based decisions rapidly, and encourage public support for such decisions. This can lead experts to engage in masking of information about the state of the science or regarding assumptions involved in policy recommendations. Although experts might have good reasons for masking disagreements, uncertainties, or assumptions when offering policy advice, we argue that this strategy can result in epistemic harms. Using the case of the COVID-19 pandemic, we show that public health authorities masked two types of information necessary for laypersons to evaluate public health recommendations: (1) experts’ disagreements about the scientific evidence and (2) the role of values in making inferences from the science to policy positions. We contend that this resulted in epistemic harms against laypeople that provide a pro tanto case against masking information. We further argue that when the science is in flux and policies need to be implemented despite significant uncertainties, there is an all-things-considered case against masking the types of information discussed.
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Notes
Quite likely at least some of the disagreements about evidence were the result of different value judgments (which were also masked). Some of them were likely related to differences in inductive risk assessments, others to diverse conceptions of safety or of what risks were thought to take precedence. There is a large body of literature on science and values that discusses the unavoidable and desirable role of values not just on questions about what projects to fund, or how to apply scientific results, but also on decisions regarding experimental design, choice of methodologies, characterization of the data, and interpretation of results (e.g., Anderson, 2004; Brown, 2014; Douglas, 2000; Dupré, 2007; Elliott, 2017; Intemann and de Melo-Martin, 2010; Kourany, 2010; Lacey, 2005; Longino, 1990; Wylie and Nelson, 2007). However, our concern here regarding evidentiary disagreements is centered on the existence of such disagreements—and their being masked—rather than on the reasons for the disagreements and the masking of such reasons (likely involving value judgments).
Undermining trust could also constitute an epistemic harm to the scientists if mistrust or distrust of their testimony is unwarranted (Grasswick, 2014). Our concern here is with epistemic harms that accrue to laypeople.
This does not mean, of course, that science is value-free. As we indicated earlier, contextual values play roles in all aspects of the scientific process. Our discussion here, however, is focused not on the influence of values in science production, but on their role in guiding scientifically informed public policy. Thus, although non-epistemic values have effects on, for instance, how data regarding the safety of vaccines has been interpreted, that the vaccines are considered safe does not entail that they should be mandated. The recommendation to mandate vaccines is grounded also on various ethical, social, or political values and not just on the, also value-laden, scientific information.
John’s claims about transparency and openness presuppose the existence of a scientific consensus, whether natural or artificial (John 2018).
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We are grateful to Miriam Solomon for comments on an earlier version of this paper as well as to an anonymous reviewer whose comments forced us to clarify our claims.
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Intemann, K., de Melo-Martín, I. On masks and masking: epistemic harms and science communication. Synthese 202, 93 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-023-04322-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-023-04322-z