Daniel Steel
Biographic Data
| ID | 3874199 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Daniel Steel |
| GIVEN NAMES | Daniel |
| FAMILY NAME | Steel |
| SIGNATURE | STEEL D |
| AFFILIATIONS | Michigan State University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-9367-7568 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 36 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 162 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 36 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1996 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
Unilateral Action on Climate Change and the Moral Obligation to Take Leadership
We claim that a moral obligation to take climate leadership by means of unilateral mitigation depends on the existence of a plausible follow‐the‐leader mechanism whereby unilateral mitigation by some increases the probability of sufficient mitigation by others to avert catastrophic climate impacts. By understanding these mechanisms, we can better articulate the obligation for climate leadership across various sectors, from government to individua…
A Dynamic Collapse Concept for Climate Change
Despite growing interest in risks of societal collapse due to anthropogenic climate change, there exists no consensus about how collapse should be understood. In this article, we critically examine existing definitions and argue that none adequately address the challenges for conceptualizing collapse that climate change presents. We therefore propose an alternative conception, which regards collapse as a reduction of collective capacity resulting…
A forward-looking approach to climate change and the risk of societal collapse
This article proposes a forward-looking approach to studying societal collapse risks related to climate change. Such an approach should indicate how to study emerging collapse risks and suggest strategies for adapting to them. Our approach is based on three postulates that facilitate a forward-looking approach: (1) collapse, if it occurred, would be a lengthy process rather than an abrupt event; (2) significant collapse risks already exist in som…
Diverse Discussion in Public Deliberation on Cancer Drug Funding
Structured deliberations among members of the public are increasingly viewed as useful inputs to health policy decisions that also rely on scientific evidence and expertise. Such deliberations typically aim for discussions that explore a diversity of ideas and perspectives. However, the concept of a diverse discussion has not been thoroughly examined and methods for measuring the extent to which a discussion actually was diverse are lacking. In t…
Maybe We Should Try the Precautionary Principle
How do policy‐makers call shots on major decisions—such as putting a country into lockdown to mitigate the risk of Covid‐19—when they don't have all the scientific facts about how the virus spreads? And to which moral values do they appeal when weighing the health and economic risks involved? David B. Resnik addresses such questions in his book Precautionary Reasoning in Environmental and Public Health Policy (Springer, 2021), which provides a fr…
Pro-Diversity Beliefs and the Diverse Person’s Burden
Pro-diversity beliefs hold that greater diversity leads to better results in academia, business, politics and a variety of other contexts. This paper explores the possibility that pro-diversity beliefs can generate unfair expectations that marginalized people produce distinctive bonuses, a phenomenon we refer to as the “diverse person’s burden”. We suggest that a normic conception of diversity, according to which non-diversity entails social priv…
Diversity, Trust, and Conformity
Previous simulation models have found positive effects of cognitive diversity on group performance, but have not explored effects of diversity in demographics (e.g., gender, ethnicity). In this paper, we present an agent-based model that captures two empirically supported hypotheses about how demographic diversity can improve group performance. The results of our simulations suggest that, even when social identities are not associated with distin…
Diverse Discussion in Public Deliberation on Cancer Drug Funding
Structured deliberations among members of the public are increasingly viewed as useful inputs to health policy decisions that also rely on scientific evidence and expertise. Such deliberations typically aim for discussions that explore a diversity of ideas and perspectives. However, the concept of a diverse discussion has not been thoroughly examined and methods for measuring the extent to which a discussion actually was diverse are lacking. In t…
Information elaboration and epistemic effects of diversity
We suggest that philosophical accounts of epistemic effects of diversity have given insufficient attention to the relationship between demographic diversity and information elaboration (IE), the process whereby knowledge dispersed in a group is elicited and examined. We propose an analysis of IE that clarifies hypotheses proposed in the empirical literature and their relationship to philosophical accounts of diversity effects. Philosophical accou…
Genocide and the 'clean-fighting Turk' in First World War Britain and Ireland
British and Irish attitudes towards their Turkish enemy during the First World War have rarely been explored. Unlike the German 'Hun', Turks were praised as 'clean fighters', despite overwhelming evidence of the Armenian Genocide. Using largely unexamined press material, this article attributes the 'clean-fighting Turk's' longevity to the sanctity of soldier testimony, where it originated, and the preoccupation with Germany. Both Turkish chivalry…
Rethinking Representation and Diversity in Deliberative Minipublics
Deliberative minipublics often seek to recruit participants who are representative and diverse. This raises theoretical and practical challenges, because representativeness and diversity can be interpreted in multiple ways and can conflict with one another. We address this issue by proposing a purposive design approach, according to which the appropriate conceptualisations of representativeness and diversity, and thereby recruitment strategies, d…
Adjusting Inferential Thresholds to Reflect Nonepistemic Values
Many philosophers have challenged the ideal of value-free science on the grounds that social or moral values are relevant to inferential thresholds. But given this view, how precisely and to what extent should scientists adjust their inferential thresholds in light of nonepistemic values? We suggest that signal detection theory provides a useful framework for addressing this question. Moreover, this approach opens up further avenues for philosoph…
A combined theoretical and empirical approach to evidence quality evaluation
Wishful Thinking and Values in Science
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 bet…
Scientists’ attitudes on science and values
Human values and the value of humanities in interdisciplinary research
Research integrating the perspectives of different disciplines, or interdisciplinary research, has become increasingly common in academia and is considered important for its ability to address complex questions and problems. This mode of research aims to leverage differences among disciplines in generating a more complex understanding of the research landscape. To interact successfully with other disciplines, researchers must appreciate their dif…
Accepting an Epistemically Inferior Alternative? A Comment on Elliott and McKaughan
Kevin Elliott and Dan McKaughan argue that, in some cases, nonepistemic values provide legitimate reasons for scientists to accept an epistemically inferior option, a claim that they support with two case studies. This essay argues that Elliott and McKaughan have not shown that their case studies are indeed ones in which an epistemically inferior option was accepted. Specifically, their interpretation of these cases depends on problematic premise…
Acceptance, values, and probability
Philosophy and the Precautionary Principle
Scholars in philosophy, law, economics and other fields have widely debated how science, environmental precaution, and economic interests should be balanced in urgent contemporary problems, such as climate change. One controversial focus of these discussions is the precautionary principle, according to which scientific uncertainty should not be a reason for delay in the face of serious threats to the environment or health. While the precautionary…
Acceptance, Values, and Inductive Risk
The argument from inductive risk attempts to show that practical and ethical costs of errors should influence standards of evidence for accepting scientific claims. A common objection charges that this argument presupposes a behavioral theory of acceptance that is inappropriate for science. I respond by showing that the argument from inductive risk is supported by a nonbehavioral theory of acceptance developed by Cohen, which defines acceptance i…
Federica Russo Causality and Causal Modelling in the Social Sciences
Epistemic Values and the Argument from Inductive Risk
Critics of the ideal of value-free science often assume that they must reject the distinction between epistemic and nonepistemic values. I argue that this assumption is mistaken and that the distinction can be used to clarify and defend the argument from inductive risk, which challenges the value-free ideal. I develop the idea that the characteristic feature of epistemic values is that they promote, either intrinsically or extrinsically, the atta…
A New Approach to Argument by Analogy
This essay sketches an account of extrapolation in terms of analogical reasoning that generalizes the notion of comparative process tracing. The account offered here relies on something known as chain graphs, which are used to explicate the role of “fingerprints,” or distinctive markers, as a strategy for avoiding an underdetermination problem having to do with spurious analogies. Moreover, I show how the extrapolator's circle, one of the central…
With or Without Mechanisms
This reply to Erik Weber's commentary agrees that mechanisms are important for causal inference in social science, but argues that Weber makes the mistake that was the main focus of my original essay: inferring that since a problem cannot be solved without mechanisms, it can be solved with them. As it stands, this inference is invalid since the problem might be unsolvable with or without mechanisms. Any claim about the usefulness of mechanisms fo…
Bayesian Confirmation Theory and The Likelihood Principle
Epistemic Values and the Argument from Inductive Risk
Critics of the ideal of value-free science often assume that they must reject the distinction between epistemic and nonepistemic values. I argue that this assumption is mistaken and that the distinction can be used to clarify and defend the argument from inductive risk, which challenges the value-free ideal. I develop the idea that the characteristic feature of epistemic values is that they promote, either intrinsically or extrinsically, the atta…
Social Mechanisms and Causal Inference
Several authors have claimed that mechanisms play a vital role in distinguishing between causation and mere correlation in the social sciences. Such claims are sometimes interpreted to mean that without mechanisms, causal inference in social science is impossible. The author agrees with critics of this proposition but explains how the account of how mechanisms aid causal inference can be interpreted in a way that does not depend on it. Neverthele…
Diversity, Trust, and Conformity
Previous simulation models have found positive effects of cognitive diversity on group performance, but have not explored effects of diversity in demographics (e.g., gender, ethnicity). In this paper, we present an agent-based model that captures two empirically supported hypotheses about how demographic diversity can improve group performance. The results of our simulations suggest that, even when social identities are not associated with distin…
Indeterminism and the Causal Markov Condition
The causal Markov condition (CMC) plays an important role in much recent work on the problem of causal inference from statistical data. It is commonly thought that the CMC is a more problematic assumption for genuinely indeterministic systems than for deterministic ones. In this essay, I critically examine this proposition. I show how the usual motivation for the CMC—that it is true of any acyclic, deterministic causal system in which the exogeno…
Information elaboration and epistemic effects of diversity
We suggest that philosophical accounts of epistemic effects of diversity have given insufficient attention to the relationship between demographic diversity and information elaboration (IE), the process whereby knowledge dispersed in a group is elicited and examined. We propose an analysis of IE that clarifies hypotheses proposed in the empirical literature and their relationship to philosophical accounts of diversity effects. Philosophical accou…
Acceptance, Values, and Inductive Risk
The argument from inductive risk attempts to show that practical and ethical costs of errors should influence standards of evidence for accepting scientific claims. A common objection charges that this argument presupposes a behavioral theory of acceptance that is inappropriate for science. I respond by showing that the argument from inductive risk is supported by a nonbehavioral theory of acceptance developed by Cohen, which defines acceptance i…
Scientists’ attitudes on science and values
Acceptance, values, and probability
A New Approach to Argument by Analogy
This essay sketches an account of extrapolation in terms of analogical reasoning that generalizes the notion of comparative process tracing. The account offered here relies on something known as chain graphs, which are used to explicate the role of “fingerprints,” or distinctive markers, as a strategy for avoiding an underdetermination problem having to do with spurious analogies. Moreover, I show how the extrapolator's circle, one of the central…
Methodological Individualism, Explanation, and Invariance
This article examines methodological individualism in terms of the theory that invariance under intervention is the signal feature of generalizations that serve as a basis for causal explanation. This theory supports the holist contention that macro-level generalizations can explain, but it also suggests a defense of methodological individualism on the grounds that greater range of invariance under intervention entails deeper explanation. Althoug…
Bayesian Statistics in Radiocarbon Calibration
Critics of Bayesianism often assert that scientists are not Bayesians. The widespread use of Bayesian statistics in the field of radiocarbon calibration is discussed in relation to this charge. This case study illustrates the willingness of scientists to use Bayesian statistics when the approach offers some advantage, while continuing to use orthodox methods in other contexts. The case of radiocarbon calibration, therefore, suggests a picture of …
Bayesian Confirmation Theory and The Likelihood Principle
Making Time Stand Still
In a recent article, Elliot Sober responds to challenges to a counter‐example that he posed some years earlier to the Principle of the Common Cause (PCC). I agree that Sober has indeed produced a genuine counter‐example to the PCC, but argue against the methodological moral that Sober wishes to draw from it. Contrary to Sober, I argue that the possibility of exceptions to the PCC does not undermine its status as a central assumption for methods t…
A forward-looking approach to climate change and the risk of societal collapse
This article proposes a forward-looking approach to studying societal collapse risks related to climate change. Such an approach should indicate how to study emerging collapse risks and suggest strategies for adapting to them. Our approach is based on three postulates that facilitate a forward-looking approach: (1) collapse, if it occurred, would be a lengthy process rather than an abrupt event; (2) significant collapse risks already exist in som…
Mechanisms and Functional Hypotheses in Social Science
Critics of functional explanations in social science maintain that such explanations are illegitimate unless a mechanism is specified. Others argue that mechanisms are not necessary for causal inference and that functional explanations are a type of causal claim that raise no special difficulties for testing. I show that there is indeed a special problem that confronts testing functional explanations resulting from their connection to second-orde…
Pro-Diversity Beliefs and the Diverse Person’s Burden
Pro-diversity beliefs hold that greater diversity leads to better results in academia, business, politics and a variety of other contexts. This paper explores the possibility that pro-diversity beliefs can generate unfair expectations that marginalized people produce distinctive bonuses, a phenomenon we refer to as the “diverse person’s burden”. We suggest that a normic conception of diversity, according to which non-diversity entails social priv…
Wishful Thinking and Values in Science
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 bet…
With or Without Mechanisms
This reply to Erik Weber's commentary agrees that mechanisms are important for causal inference in social science, but argues that Weber makes the mistake that was the main focus of my original essay: inferring that since a problem cannot be solved without mechanisms, it can be solved with them. As it stands, this inference is invalid since the problem might be unsolvable with or without mechanisms. Any claim about the usefulness of mechanisms fo…
The Facts of the Matter
In a recent essay, John Norton proposes a material theory of induction, according to which all justification for inductive inference ultimately stems from the particular facts of the case at hand. Despite being sympathetic to the pluralistic spirit of this proposal, I argue that central controversies among leading theories of inductive inference turn not on material facts but upon normative judgments regarding the proper standards and aims of ind…
Warfare and Western Manufactures
I use an explanation of Yanomami warfare given by the anthropologist Brian Ferguson as a case study to compare the merits of the causal and unification approaches to explanation. I argue that Ferguson's insistence on explaining actual occurrences and patterns of Yanomami warfare together with his claim that all of his generalizations are statistical raises difficulties for the unification approach, because of its commitment to “deductive chauvini…
Bayesianism and the Value of Diverse Evidence
In a recent essay (1995), Andrew Wayne charges that Bayesian attempts to account for the rule that, ceteris paribus , diverse evidence confirms better than narrow evidence are inadequate. I reply to these criticisms and argue that, on the contrary, one of the Bayesian approaches considered by Wayne does an excellent job of explaining why, and under what circumstances, diverse evidence is valuable
A Reply to Jones
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Warfare and Western Manufactures
I use an explanation of Yanomami warfare given by the anthropologist Brian Ferguson as a case study to compare the merits of the causal and unification approaches to explanation. I argue that Ferguson's insistence on explaining actual occurrences and patterns of Yanomami warfare together with his claim that all of his generalizations are statistical raises difficulties for the unification approach, because of its commitment to “deductive chauvini…
Bayesian Statistics in Radiocarbon Calibration
Critics of Bayesianism often assert that scientists are not Bayesians. The widespread use of Bayesian statistics in the field of radiocarbon calibration is discussed in relation to this charge. This case study illustrates the willingness of scientists to use Bayesian statistics when the approach offers some advantage, while continuing to use orthodox methods in other contexts. The case of radiocarbon calibration, therefore, suggests a picture of …
Making Time Stand Still
In a recent article, Elliot Sober responds to challenges to a counter‐example that he posed some years earlier to the Principle of the Common Cause (PCC). I agree that Sober has indeed produced a genuine counter‐example to the PCC, but argue against the methodological moral that Sober wishes to draw from it. Contrary to Sober, I argue that the possibility of exceptions to the PCC does not undermine its status as a central assumption for methods t…
Social Mechanisms and Causal Inference
Several authors have claimed that mechanisms play a vital role in distinguishing between causation and mere correlation in the social sciences. Such claims are sometimes interpreted to mean that without mechanisms, causal inference in social science is impossible. The author agrees with critics of this proposition but explains how the account of how mechanisms aid causal inference can be interpreted in a way that does not depend on it. Neverthele…
Mechanisms and Functional Hypotheses in Social Science
Critics of functional explanations in social science maintain that such explanations are illegitimate unless a mechanism is specified. Others argue that mechanisms are not necessary for causal inference and that functional explanations are a type of causal claim that raise no special difficulties for testing. I show that there is indeed a special problem that confronts testing functional explanations resulting from their connection to second-orde…
The Facts of the Matter
In a recent essay, John Norton proposes a material theory of induction, according to which all justification for inductive inference ultimately stems from the particular facts of the case at hand. Despite being sympathetic to the pluralistic spirit of this proposal, I argue that central controversies among leading theories of inductive inference turn not on material facts but upon normative judgments regarding the proper standards and aims of ind…
Indeterminism and the Causal Markov Condition
The causal Markov condition (CMC) plays an important role in much recent work on the problem of causal inference from statistical data. It is commonly thought that the CMC is a more problematic assumption for genuinely indeterministic systems than for deterministic ones. In this essay, I critically examine this proposition. I show how the usual motivation for the CMC—that it is true of any acyclic, deterministic causal system in which the exogeno…
Comment On Hausman & Woodward On The Causal Markov Condition
Hausman & Woodward present an argument for the Causal Markov Condition (CMC) on the basis of a principle they dub ‘modularity’ ([1999, 2004]). I show that the conclusion of their argument is not in fact the CMC but a substantially weaker proposition. In addition, I show that their argument is invalid and trace this invalidity to two features of modularity, namely, that it is stated in terms of pairwise independence and ‘arrow-breaking’ interventi…
Methodological Individualism, Explanation, and Invariance
This article examines methodological individualism in terms of the theory that invariance under intervention is the signal feature of generalizations that serve as a basis for causal explanation. This theory supports the holist contention that macro-level generalizations can explain, but it also suggests a defense of methodological individualism on the grounds that greater range of invariance under intervention entails deeper explanation. Althoug…
With or Without Mechanisms
This reply to Erik Weber's commentary agrees that mechanisms are important for causal inference in social science, but argues that Weber makes the mistake that was the main focus of my original essay: inferring that since a problem cannot be solved without mechanisms, it can be solved with them. As it stands, this inference is invalid since the problem might be unsolvable with or without mechanisms. Any claim about the usefulness of mechanisms fo…
Bayesian Confirmation Theory and The Likelihood Principle
Epistemic Values and the Argument from Inductive Risk
Critics of the ideal of value-free science often assume that they must reject the distinction between epistemic and nonepistemic values. I argue that this assumption is mistaken and that the distinction can be used to clarify and defend the argument from inductive risk, which challenges the value-free ideal. I develop the idea that the characteristic feature of epistemic values is that they promote, either intrinsically or extrinsically, the atta…
A New Approach to Argument by Analogy
This essay sketches an account of extrapolation in terms of analogical reasoning that generalizes the notion of comparative process tracing. The account offered here relies on something known as chain graphs, which are used to explicate the role of “fingerprints,” or distinctive markers, as a strategy for avoiding an underdetermination problem having to do with spurious analogies. Moreover, I show how the extrapolator's circle, one of the central…
Federica Russo Causality and Causal Modelling in the Social Sciences
Acceptance, Values, and Inductive Risk
The argument from inductive risk attempts to show that practical and ethical costs of errors should influence standards of evidence for accepting scientific claims. A common objection charges that this argument presupposes a behavioral theory of acceptance that is inappropriate for science. I respond by showing that the argument from inductive risk is supported by a nonbehavioral theory of acceptance developed by Cohen, which defines acceptance i…
Philosophy and the Precautionary Principle
Scholars in philosophy, law, economics and other fields have widely debated how science, environmental precaution, and economic interests should be balanced in urgent contemporary problems, such as climate change. One controversial focus of these discussions is the precautionary principle, according to which scientific uncertainty should not be a reason for delay in the face of serious threats to the environment or health. While the precautionary…
Acceptance, values, and probability
Human values and the value of humanities in interdisciplinary research
Research integrating the perspectives of different disciplines, or interdisciplinary research, has become increasingly common in academia and is considered important for its ability to address complex questions and problems. This mode of research aims to leverage differences among disciplines in generating a more complex understanding of the research landscape. To interact successfully with other disciplines, researchers must appreciate their dif…
Accepting an Epistemically Inferior Alternative? A Comment on Elliott and McKaughan
Kevin Elliott and Dan McKaughan argue that, in some cases, nonepistemic values provide legitimate reasons for scientists to accept an epistemically inferior option, a claim that they support with two case studies. This essay argues that Elliott and McKaughan have not shown that their case studies are indeed ones in which an epistemically inferior option was accepted. Specifically, their interpretation of these cases depends on problematic premise…
Scientists’ attitudes on science and values
A combined theoretical and empirical approach to evidence quality evaluation
Wishful Thinking and Values in Science
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 bet…
Adjusting Inferential Thresholds to Reflect Nonepistemic Values
Many philosophers have challenged the ideal of value-free science on the grounds that social or moral values are relevant to inferential thresholds. But given this view, how precisely and to what extent should scientists adjust their inferential thresholds in light of nonepistemic values? We suggest that signal detection theory provides a useful framework for addressing this question. Moreover, this approach opens up further avenues for philosoph…
Epistemology (29 works) · Philosophy (25 works) · Philosophy and History of Science (17 works) · Computer Science (14 works) · Mathematics (14 works) · Sociology (14 works) · Economics (12 works) · Political science (12 works) · Psychology (12 works) · Philosophy of science (11 works)