From your last line, I think its unlikely that unlikely that this is going to be productive. It sounds like you think that epistemology is simply erudite nonsense and philosophers need to just accept probably Bayesianism or the scientific method or something. I think this is quite disappointing, mathematicians could have similarly dismissed attempts to ground calculus in something other than loose arguments of the form “well it works what more do you want” but we would have a much less rich and stable field as a result. But if this is a mischaracterization of your view of epistemology then please let me know.
It sounds like you think that epistemology is simply erudite nonsense
Much of it is, yes.
philosophers need to just accept probably Bayesianism or the scientific method or something.
This would require that “Bayesianism” or “the scientific method” or “or something” actually be a full, formalized solution to How to Reason Inductively. We currently possess no such solution; this does not, by any means, mean that no such solution can exist and we all have to resort to throwing intuitions at each-other or adopt broad skepticism about the existence and contents of reality.
What I recommend is to move past the trivialities, having accepted that the eventual solution will be abductive (in the sense required to dismiss skepticism about the external world or the consciousness of others as silly, which it is), and set to work on the actual details and formalizations, which are of course where all the hard work remains to be done.
(By the way, the reference to philosophy-woo is because professional epistemologists tend not to be radical skeptics. The idea that there just isn’t an external reality is mainly only taken seriously by undergrads first learning the subject.)
From your last line, I think its unlikely that unlikely that this is going to be productive. It sounds like you think that epistemology is simply erudite nonsense and philosophers need to just accept probably Bayesianism or the scientific method or something. I think this is quite disappointing, mathematicians could have similarly dismissed attempts to ground calculus in something other than loose arguments of the form “well it works what more do you want” but we would have a much less rich and stable field as a result. But if this is a mischaracterization of your view of epistemology then please let me know.
Much of it is, yes.
This would require that “Bayesianism” or “the scientific method” or “or something” actually be a full, formalized solution to How to Reason Inductively. We currently possess no such solution; this does not, by any means, mean that no such solution can exist and we all have to resort to throwing intuitions at each-other or adopt broad skepticism about the existence and contents of reality.
What I recommend is to move past the trivialities, having accepted that the eventual solution will be abductive (in the sense required to dismiss skepticism about the external world or the consciousness of others as silly, which it is), and set to work on the actual details and formalizations, which are of course where all the hard work remains to be done.
(By the way, the reference to philosophy-woo is because professional epistemologists tend not to be radical skeptics. The idea that there just isn’t an external reality is mainly only taken seriously by undergrads first learning the subject.)