| dc.description.abstract | n Bad Beliefs, Levy presents a picture of belief-forming pro cesses according to which, on most matters of significance,
we defer to reliable sources by relying extensively on cultural
and social cues. Levy conceptualizes the kind of evidence
provided by socio-cultural environments as higher-order evi dence. But his notion of higher-order evidence seems to differ
from those available in the epistemological literature on
higher-order evidence, and this calls for a reflection on how
exactly social and cultural cues are/count as/provide higher order evidence. In this paper, I draw on the three-tiered
model of epistemic exchange that I have been developing
recently, which highlights the centrality of relations of atten tion and trust in belief-forming processes, to explicate how
social and cultural cues provide higher-order evidence. I also
argue that Levy’s account fails to sufficiently address the
issue of strategic actors who have incentives to pollute epis temic environments for their benefit, and more generally the
power struggles, incentives, and competing interests that
characterize human sociality. Levy’s attempted reduction of
the political to the epistemic ultimately fails, but his account
of social and cultural cues as higher-order evidence offers an
insightful perspective on epistemic social structures | vi |
