Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-xbtfd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T14:12:43.218Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Wishful Thinking and Values in Science

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Daniel Steel
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article examines the concept of wishful thinking in philosophical literature on science and values. It suggests that this term tends to be used in an overly broad manner that fails to distinguish between separate types of bias, mechanisms that generate biases, and general theories that might explain those mechanisms. I explain how confirmation bias is distinct from wishful thinking and why it is more useful for examining the relationship between cognitive bias and beliefs about the existence of injustices.

Type
Explanation
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 85 , Issue 5 , December 2018 , pp. 895 - 905
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anderson, E. 2004. “Uses of Value Judgments in Science: A General Argument, with Lessons from a Case Study of Feminist Research on Divorce.” Hypatia 19:1–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boyd, S., and NPA (NAOMI Patients Association). 2013. “Yet They Failed to Do So: Recommendations Based on the Experiences of NAOMI Research Survivors and a Call for Action.” Harm Reduction Journal 10 (6).Google Scholar
Brown, M. 2013. “Values in Science beyond Underdetermination and Inductive Risk.” Philosophy of Science 80:829–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Campbell, R. 1998. The Illusions of a Paradox: A Feminist Epistemology Naturalized. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.Google Scholar
Carter, A., and Hall, W.. 2008. “Informed Consent to Opioid Agonist Maintenance Treatment: Recommended Ethical Guidelines.” International Journal of Drug Policy 19:79–89.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Charland, C. 2002. “Cynthia’s Dilemma: Consenting to Heroin Prescription.” American Journal of Bioethics 2 (2): 37–47..CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
De Melo-Martín, I., and Intemann, K.. 2016. “The Risk of Using Inductive Risk to Challenge the Value-Free Ideal.” Philosophy of Science 83:500–520.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Douglas, H. 2009. Science and the Value-Free Ideal. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Elliott, K. 2017. A Tapestry of Values: An Introduction to Values in Science. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ferri, M., Davoli, M., and Perucci, C. A.. 2011. “Heroin Maintenance for Chronic Heroin-Dependent Individuals.” Cochrane Database Systematic Reviews 12:CD003410.Google Scholar
Festinger, L. 1957. A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance. Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Gartry, C., Oviedo-Joekes, E., Laliberté, N., and Schechter, M.. 2009. “NAOMI: The Trials and Tribulations of Implementing a Heroin Assisted Treatment Study in North America.” Harm Reduction Journal 6 (2).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gilovitch, T., Medvec, V., and Savitsky, K.. 2000. “The Spotlight Effect in Social Judgment: An Egocentric Bias in Estimates of the Salience of One’s Own Actions and Appearance.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 78 (2): 211–22..Google Scholar
Gross, P., and Levitt, N.. 1994. Higher Superstition: The Academic Left and Its Quarrels with Science. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Haack, S. 1993. “Epistemological Reflections of an Old Feminist.” Reason Papers 18:31–43.Google Scholar
Haack, S. 2003. Defending Science—within Reason: Between Scientism and Cynicism. Amherst, NY: Prometheus.Google Scholar
Harding, S. 1986. The Science Question in Feminism. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Harding, S. 2015. Objectivity and Diversity: Another Logic of Scientific Discovery. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Henden, E. 2013. “Heroin Addiction and Voluntary Choice: The Case of Informed Consent.” Bioethics 27 (7): 395–401..CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hernandez, I., and Preston, J.. 2013. “Disfluency Disrupts the Confirmation Bias.” Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 49 (1): 178–82..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hyman, I., Roundhill, R., Werner, K., and Rabiroff, C.. 2014. “Collaboration Inflation: Egocentric Source Monitoring Errors following Collaborative Remembering.” Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition 3:293–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maller, M. 2013. “The Best Essay Ever: The Fallacy of Wishful Thinking.” Review of Contemporary Philosophy 12:30–42.Google Scholar
Metzger, M., Hartsell, E., and Flanagin, A.. 2015. “Cognitive Dissonance or Credibility? A Comparison of Two Theoretical Explanations for Selective Exposure to Partisan News.” Communication Research 1–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nickerson, R. 1998. “Confirmation Bias: A Ubiquitous Phenomenon in Many Guises.” Review of General Psychology 2 (2): 175–220..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Oviedo-Joekes, E., Brissette, S., Marsh, D., Lauzon, P., Guh, D., Anis, A., and Schechter, M.. 2009. “Diacetylmorphine versus Methadone for the Treatment of Opioid Addiction.” New England Journal of Medicine 361:777–86.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Oviedo-Joekes, E., Nosyk, B., Marsh, D., Guh, D., Brissette, S., Gartry, C., Anis, A., and Schechter, M. T.. 2009. “Scientific and Political Challenges in North America’s First Randomized Controlled Trial of Heroin-Assisted Treatment for Severe Heroin Addiction: Rationale and Design of the NAOMI Study.” Clinical Trials 6 (3): 261–71..CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Quattrone, G., and Jones, E.. 1980. “The Perception of Variability within In-Groups and Out-Groups: Implications for the Law of Small Numbers.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 38 (1): 141–52..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schiebinger, L. 1999. Has Feminism Changed Science? Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steel, D., Marchand, K., and Oviedo-Joekes, E.. 2017. “Our Lives Depend on This Drug: Competence, Inequity, and Voluntary Consent in Clinical Trials on Supervised Injectable Opioid Assisted Treatment.” American Journal of Bioethics 17 (12): 32–40..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Uusitalo, S., and Broers, B.. 2015. “Rethinking Informed Consent in Research on Heroin-Assisted Treatment.” Bioethics 29 (7): 462–69..CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed