Modification:Sciento-2019-0016

Accept the definition of epistemic tool, stating that a physical object or system is an epistemic tool for an epistemic agent, when there is a procedure by which the tool can provide an acceptable source of knowledge for answering some question under the employed method of that agent.

The modification was suggested to Scientonomy community by Paul Patton on 26 December 2019.1 The modification was accepted on 23 February 2024.

Preamble

Tools and instruments, from a thermometer or a ruler to the Large Hadron Collider or the Hubble Space Telescope clearly play a central role in the process of scientific change. 1 However, the role of tools and instruments within scientonomy has not been defined. Existing roles available within scientonomic theory do not seem appropriate. It does not seem plausible, for example, to treat tools and instruments as subjects of authority delegation. This is because scientific data is itself a kind of theory, and therefore requires assessment under the employed method of the time. A tool or instrument is not capable of assessing its own data under the employed method, since that would require cognitive abilities, such as the ability to semantically understand propositions, which are still beyond the bounds of current artificial intelligence. Such an assessment requires an epistemic agent intimately familiar with theories specifying the conditions under which the tool is a reliable source of knowledge. 1 A new role for tools and instruments within scientonomy thus needs to be defined. The new role posited has to do with the role of epistemic tools in the concrete requirements of the employed method of an epistemic agent.

Modification

Accept that the following symbol is to be used in scientonomic diagrams to depict epistemic tools:

Theories To Accept

• Epistemic Tool (Patton-2019): A physical object or system is an epistemic tool for an epistemic agent iff there is a procedure by which the tool can provide an acceptable source of knowledge for answering some question under the employed method of that agent.

• Epistemic Tool Exists: There is such a thing as an epistemic tool.

Questions Answered

This modification attempts to answer the following question(s):

• Epistemic Tool: What is epistemic tool? How should it be defined?
• Existence of Epistemic Tool: Does an epistemic tool exist?

Verdict

The modification was accepted on 23 February 2024. At the 2024 workshop, there was minimal discussion of this modification, as workshop participants were generally in favor of its acceptance. Jamie Shaw and Hakob Barseghyan expressed some misgivings about the definition and hoped that it could be made more succinct in the future. Specifically, it was noted that this formulation might in fact be a theorem or a law explaining how tools become epistemic tools rather than a definition. Yet, given this was the community’s only proposed definition of epistemic tool, they saw it as worth accepting with that caveat. Rebecca Muscant’s comment about what happens with systems of tools, as well as specifications that the definition only applies to physical tools (in the case of AI, only the hardware, not the software is a tool), further highlighted the need for the community to clarify the dynamics content implied by the definition in the future. At this point, the modification was accepted unanimously.

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