The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science | Vol 75, No 4

British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 71 (4):1157-1186 (2018)
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Abstract

In their recent book, Oreskes and Conway ([ 2010 ]) describe the ‘tobacco strategy’, which was used by the tobacco industry to influence policymakers regarding the health risks of tobacco products. The strategy involved two parts, consisting of (i) promoting and sharing independent research supporting the industry’s preferred position and (ii) funding additional research, but selectively publishing the results. We introduce a model of the tobacco strategy, and use it to argue that both prongs of the strategy can be extremely effective—even when policymakers rationally update on all evidence available to them. As we elaborate, this model helps illustrate the conditions under which the tobacco strategy is particularly successful. In addition, we show how journalists engaged in ‘fair’ reporting can inadvertently mimic the effects of industry on public belief. 1Introduction 2Epistemic Network Models 3Selective Sharing 4Biased Production 5Journalists as Unwitting Propagandists 6Conclusion Appendix.

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James Weatherall
University of California, Irvine

Citations of this work

Distributive Epistemic Justice in Science.Gürol Irzik & Faik Kurtulmus - 2024 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 75 (2):325–345.
Agent‐based models of scientific interaction.Dunja Šešelja - 2022 - Philosophy Compass 17 (7):e12855.
Formal Models of Scientific Inquiry in a Social Context: An Introduction.Dunja Šešelja, Christian Straßer & AnneMarie Borg - 2020 - Journal for General Philosophy of Science / Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 51 (2):211-217.

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