Teemu Lari will advance a project exploring the justification of trust in economic experts in policymaking and the appropriate role of economists and economics in democratic politics. His forthcoming papers examine the concept of scientific consensus in economics and the disciplinary identity of the field.
Rawad El Skaf will focus on climate change scenarios, analyzing how the scientific community explores mitigation scenarios and how these are later presented as plausible options to policymakers through the IPCC. Specifically, he will investigate how these options are selected, which options are excluded, what non-epistemic values influence the selection process, and how this process impacts trust in science.
Quill Kukla will continue their research on the ethics and pragmatics of scientific communication, the representation and communication of risk and uncertainty, and the social epistemology of maps and other visual representations of information. Additionally, they will develop a new collaborative research program exploring how speaker authority—particularly that of scientists, citizens, and science policymakers—is shaped by the contexts in which speech occurs, whether on campuses, in academic journals or newspapers, or at protests.
Justin Biddle will conduct research on AI governance, focusing on the ethical and epistemological implications of emerging frameworks for responsible and trustworthy AI.
Joyce Havstad’s recent work focuses on attitudinal norms in science, emphasizing openness to the possibility of reform. Traditional norms typically define good science in terms of individual character, emphasizing intent, integrity, and temperament. However, an evolutionary perspective on norms highlights the limitations of this approach, shedding light on instances of scientific nonideality and dysfunction. As a result, alternative scientific norms require further research and development—a project in which Prof. Havstad is currently engaged.
