Talk:List of epistemologists

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Philosophy: Philosophers / Epistemology Mid‑importance

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This is not verifiable[edit]

Who has decided that these people are "epistemologist"? Dominic Mayers (talk) 08:53, 10 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Removals[edit]

I've removed several entries from the list due to a lack of reliable sources on their pages specifying their notable contributions to epistemology or theories of knowledge. I erred on the side of removal especially for living philosophers - ideally the linked articles would be fixed before re-adding but I don't plan to push back too hard on some individual readditions, especially if it's just an issue of sourcing rather than their page not talking about theories of knowledge. I've also removed entries that were primarily notable for their contributions to Philosophy of mind - there is certainly some overlap and many people belong on both lists, but there's already List of philosophers of mind, I think if we have two separate lists we shouldn't include people in both.

The inclusion criteria I think we should use here (since it does not appear to be well-defined) is that a philosopher or similar thinker would be notable enough for a wikipedia page based on their contributions to epistemology alone. This was part of the rationale for removing pages that lacked citations to secondary reliable sources, if someone has published a paper on epistemology but they're notable only for other philosophical work I would think they belong on those lists but not this one. If other people feel differently I'm open to other suggestions though. - car chasm (talk) 19:54, 16 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I've also split chronologically by era but it may make more sense to do based on century of birth. I've added most of the earlier philosophers I could find from the category, but there are certainly plenty more who could be added - probably makes sense to split by birth year, sililar to List of metaphysicians if too many more are added - car chasm (talk) 05:11, 17 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I'm fine with chronological by era or birth year – by birth year is probably slightly better simply to avoid the ambiguity of using eras that are not cleanly demarked. It does have its own issue with a few figures whose birth dates are not known, but this is not a big problem when large ranges are used, as in List of metaphysicians.

Regarding inclusion criteria, the requirement you suggest seems atypical for these types of pages. For example, List of political philosophers explicitly says it includes "some who may be better known for their work in other areas of philosophy" and the "List of philosophers" articles have "a minimal criterion for inclusion". It also seems hard to adjudicate, since it poses a counterfactual situation. The easier and more typical approach is to include figures who have articles where there is sufficient evidence therein of their work in the topic: sources saying they are epistemologists and/or works that are about epistemology. Whether they are notable enough in general to have an article is something that can be argued at WP:AFD.

As to philosophers of mind vs. epistemologists, I agree that if they have work only about philosophy of mind with no mention of them being epistemologists or works about epistemology, then they shouldn't be on this list. But I don't see a problem with someone being on both. Lots of people do work in more than one specific field. That's especially true for older figures who pre-date modern specializations, but also for for more recent ones – look at Noam Chomsky for example. --RL0919 (talk) 14:33, 19 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]