Epistemic priority

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When a man throws a ball high in the air and catches it again, he behaves as if he had solved a set of differential equations in predicting the trajectory of the ball. He may neither know nor care what a differential equation is, but this does not affect his skill with the ball. At some subconscious level, something functionally equivalent to the mathematical calculations is going on.

—Richard Dawkins

{{|Epistemic priority|ˈɛpɪˈstiːmɪk praɪˈɒrɪti|n}}When two competing models appear to explain, account for or manage some phenomenon equally well, a means of deciding, which is the “proper” one.

For example, the trajectory of a missile may be accounted equally well, in theory, for by special relativity, Newtonian mechanics, or the “gaze heuristic”.

Which, all other things being equal, should we prefer? Does one have, as a piece of credentialised technical knowledge about the world, “epistemic priority” over the others?

You may not be surprised to hear opinions tend to be divided with experts in competing magisteria tending to talk their own book.

Some will appeal to the related concept of Occam’s razor — a heuristic to determine which explanation to go with — but it is a rule of thumb, not scientific discourse: it is a lazy, nut useful, fudge. It has no epistemic priority either.

Why does it matter? If it works, it works, doesn’t it? Some — your correspondent included, would say quite so.

But there is a strand of scientism that sees science as an enterprise converging on “reality”, or “the truth” to whose program progress, and betterment, is an important quality. If we cannot be sure our theories are ascending a grand epistemic priority, they are worthless to us — diverting but, well, literally, diverting.

On this theory there is at the top of that grand staircase (often the metaphor is literally inverted, and the progress described as a descent to fundamental structural engineering in the basement, but a stairway to heaven seems to us a much better image) a grand unifying theory of everything. when we have that, then — well, supporters of the grand unifying theory haven't carried on that thought experiment. But notice how it cleaves to the idea the universe is a bounded, time-bound, finite system.

If this is right, then epistemic priority is important for the second order connections it vouches safe. Rather like a crossword solution that looks right, but isn't, and thereby buggers up the rest of the grid, a valuable but wrong theory will lead to trouble down the line if it isn’t rooted out pronto.

So to reductionists, epistemic priority is important. Critical to the mission.

But, problem: on what grounds can we award such priority? If we find that broken second order link, then the competing models no longer have the same explanatory power. This is how paradigms degenerate.

To pluralists, pragmatists answer is “no.” Horses for courses. If your models works, use it.

We know our view of the world does not accord to scientific facts. Atomic structures of granite blocks feel hard and impermeable, but atomic models tell is they are mostly comprised of space: an atom is a walnut on the centre circle being orbited by peas at the edge of a football stadium. But that is no more true an image of an atom than a granite block. These are all just models to help us comprehend.

(It is no little irony that the “gaze heuristic” works worst in theory — I just “kind of keep my eye on the ball and keep running” might struggle to get past peer review — but best in practice: there’s a reason not many astrophysicists play cricket for England.)

See also

• Occam’s razor