Imbalance and the State of Research Emergent Challenges to Scientific Independence & Objectivity Von der Philosophischen Fakultät der Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Universität Hannover zur Erlangung des Grades Doktor der PHILOSOPHIE Dr. phil. genehmigte Dissertation von David Hopf Erscheinungsjahr 2020 Referent: Prof. Dr. Torsten Wilholt Korreferentin: Prof. Dr. Anke Büter Tag der Promotion: 11.06.2020 Acknowledgments This dissertation owes its existence not just to me, but to a great many people to which I am greatly indebted: First of all, I want to sincerely thank my first supervisor Dr. Torsten Wilholt, especially for our many and regular meetings both in his office and in his home; not only for his support and advice concerning philosophy and career but also for the coffee. A great many thanks also to my second supervisor Dr. Anke Büter, who offered many insightful comments and criticisms on the dissertation. I was lucky to have been made associate member of the DFG research training group GRK 2073; without this opportunity, work and life during this project would have been greatly impoverished in every respect. First, let me thank the many senior members of the group, who commented on my project at the colloquia and other events. I want to give special thanks to Dr. Saana Jukola, Dr. Anna Leuschner, and Dr. Dietmar Hübner, all three of whom gave me additional feedback and advice in individual meetings. But I am also hugely indebted to my fellow PhD students working with me in the GRK offices in Hannover, who—be it during coffee breaks, in talks over lunch or really at any time of the day—have persistently contributed their insights to my work, but also generally made this PhD project a less solitary and thus much more enjoyable affair. From this group, Daria Jadreškić and Julia Pfeiff deserve special mention as fellow comrades who fought with me through the last months of finishing our respective dissertations. I also want to give additional thanks to Dr. Stefano Canali, who, with his frequent advice on both form and content, helped carve this project at its joints. Special thanks also to Enno Fischer, with whom I shared an 3 office—or rather, two of them in sequence—and many an afternoon discussion. Similarly, I am very grateful to all my other fellow GRK members working at the institute building in Hannover—but also to all the other colleagues I encountered there—and at Bielefeld University, who I regret to have met less frequently, but who offered no less help or camaraderie when I did. Not only I but all members of the group can count themselves lucky for the constant support in all matters by our coordinator Dr. Rafael Ugarte Chacón, who made sure that all aspects of work at the GRK smoothly ran together. I also want to give thanks to the people who offered very helpful feedback on the penultimate draft of this dissertation: First, to my mother, who did not only help with proof-reading but had an open ear to all my worries throughout the last three years. At this point, I also want to thank the rest of my family—my father, my brothers, my niece, my aunt, my uncles, and my dear grandmother—for their patience during a time where I was not always as available as they deserve. Second, to Dr. Tanja Rechnitzer, who always has been a great friend but also a mentor in all things philosophical since my very first days at university. Third, to Christoph Schmidt, who offered to read this text of his own accord, and who shall also have to stand in for all the other friends that helped maintain a balance between work and life after hours. Last but not least, I am also very grateful to the Volkswagen Foundation, which provided the funding for the collaborative project “The Independence of Research as a Multilevel Problem: Interdisciplinary and Methodological Challenges” in which I was employed and thus enabled work on this dissertation in the first place. My thanks also go out to the other researchers involved in that research group, who, with their very interesting empirical projects, heavily influenced my initial ideas and continuously provided an important perspective beyond philosophical thought. 4 Zusammenfassung In dieser Dissertation entwickle ich einen konzeptionellen Rahmen für die Analyse von Problemen mit der Unabhängigkeit und Objektivität des Forschungsstandes. Ich vertrete die These, dass wir einen neuen Ansatz brauchen, der über die bestehenden Vorstellungen von wissenschaftlicher Objektivität hinausgeht. Denn wenn wir uns mit dem Stand der Forschung befassen, müssen wir nicht nur die Qualität einzelner Ergebnisse berücksichti- gen, sondern auch das Problem der Unausgewogenheit, d.h. die Vernachlässigung oder das Überangebot bestimmter Arten von Forschung im Vergleich zu anderen. Im ersten der drei Teile der Dissertation definiere ich den Begriff ”Forschungsstand” und stelle die Idee von Unausgewogenheiten im Forschungsstand vor. Letzteres Konzept geht auf die Diskus- sion verschiedener Beispiele aus der Literatur zurück. Im zweiten Teil analysiere ich drei zentrale Begriffe, die helfen können, zu erklären, warum diese Fälle als Probleme für die Unabhängigkeit und Objektivität der Wissenschaft angesehen werden können und sollten: epistemische Vertrauenswürdigkeit, Produktivität und Gerechtigkeit. Diese drei normativen Kriterien und ihre Wechselbeziehungen bilden die allgemeine Struktur des konzeptuellen Rahmens. Im dritten Teil operationalisiere ich die Kriterien, um zu zeigen, dass und wie sie auf die im ersten Teil diskutierten Fälle angewendet werden können und diskutiere die Ergeb- nisse. Ich schließe mit einer Erörterung der Implikationen für Konzepte höherer Ordnung wie Bias, der Unabhängigkeit der Wissenschaft und Objektivität. Ich lege dar, dass wir, wenn wir die Anwendung dieser Konzepte auf den Stand der Forschung betrachten, neben rein epistemischen Erwägungen insbesondere auch die soziale Verantwortung der Wissenschaft berücksichtigen müssen. Schlagworte: Wissenschaftliche Objektivität; epistemisches Vertrauen; soziale Verantwor- tung der Wissenschaft 5 6 Abstract In this dissertation, I provide a conceptual framework for the analysis of impediments to the independence and objectivity of the overall state of research. I argue that we need a new approach beyond existing conceptions of scientific objectivity. This is because—when con- cerned with states of research—not only do we have to account for problems with individual findings but also with imbalance, that is the neglect or overabundance of specific types of research relative to others. In the first of the three parts of the dissertation, I define the concept “state of research”, and introduce the idea of its imbalance. The latter concept is based on a discussion of various examples from the literature. In the second part, I analyze three major concepts that can help explain why these cases can and should be considered problems for the independence and objectivity of science: epistemic trustworthiness, productiveness, and justice. These three normative criteria and their interrelations form the general structure of the conceptual framework. In the third part, I operationalize the criteria to show that and how they can be applied to the cases introduced in the first part, and present the results. I conclude with a discussion of the implications for higher-order concepts such as bias, the independence of science, and objectivity. I argue that when we look at the application of these concepts to the state of research, in addition to purely epistemic considerations, we also have to emphasize the social responsibility of science. Keywords: scientific objectivity; epistemic trust; social responsibility of science 7 8 Contents 1 Introduction 13 1.1 Overview . 15 1.2 Research Questions & Approach . 18 Part I Imbalance in the State of Research (SoR) 23 2 What is the SoR? 25 2.1 The SoR and its Reconstruction . 27 2.2 Aspects of SoRs . 36 2.3 Relevance . 43 3 What is Imbalance? 59 3.1 Imbalance of the SoR in the Literature . 62 3.1.1 Lacunae in the SoR . 62 3.1.2 Overabundance in the SoR . 68 3.1.3 Categories of Imbalance . 72 3.2 The Concept of Imbalance . 75 3.2.1 A Balanced SoR? . 77 3.2.2 Conflicts of Interest, Bias & Objectivity . 80 Part II The Normative Background 87 4 Imbalance and Trustworthiness 89 4.1 A Definition of Trustworthiness . 91 9 4.2 The Trustworthiness of Science . 94 4.2.1 Requirements on the Public Epistemic Trustworthiness of Science . 94 4.2.2 x: The Object of Trust & Trust in Objects . 102 4.2.3 A: The Trusting Party—Who is “the Public”? . 105 4.2.4 B: The Trusted Party—Scientists & “Science” as an Institution 109 4.3 Summary . 113 5 Imbalance and Productiveness 117 5.1 Imbalance & Misleading Claims . 118 5.1.1 Imbalance as Miscommunication . 122 5.1.2 Imbalance as Alethic Risk . 125 5.2 Towards the Framework . 135 5.2.1 Challenges . 135 5.2.2 The Criterion of Productiveness . 146 5.2.3 The Alethic, the Practical and the Ethical . 149 6 Imbalance and Injustice 153 6.1 Neglected Diseases & Justice . 154 6.2 Imbalance as Epistemic Injustice . 162 6.2.1 Distributive Epistemic Injustice . 162 6.2.2 Participatory Epistemic Injustice . 172 6.3 The Criterion of Epistemic Injustice . 181 Part III Results 187 7 Explaining Imbalance in the SoR 189 7.1 Application of the Framework . 189 7.1.1 Relations between the Criteria . 191 7.1.2 Argument Templates . 195 7.1.3 Application to the Examples . 203 7.2 Discussion . 225 10 CONTENTS 7.2.1 Evaluation of the Results . 225 7.2.2 Imbalance and Higher-Order Concepts . 227 7.2.3 Outlook . 233 11 12 Chapter 1 Introduction In many contexts, when we want to express that some advice, examination or judg- ment is dependable, we might refer to such information as independent: if there is suspicion that some organization—be it a firm, a part of the government or maybe the church—suffers from bad practice, we call for an independent inquiry.