Disagreements are an everyday part of our lives. They are also an everyday part of scientific inquiry. Given the undeniable epistemic and practical importance of science, scientific disagreements present an interesting philosophical problem: how should individual scientists respond to disagreements with their peers? Two ways of answering this question have been suggested. One, from social epistemology, focuses on the rationality of individual scientists’ beliefs and states that when disagreeing with an epistemic peer (i.e., someone who is in an equally good epistemic position), they should conciliate: that is, move their beliefs closer to the belief of the peer. The other, from philosophy of science, says that scientists should remain steadfast in their beliefs, since epistemic diversity (i.e., diversity in beliefs of scientists in a community) helps scientific inquiry. Since resolving a group disagreement by moving the beliefs of group members closer together can negatively affect the epistemic diversity of the group, these two answers seem to be in conflict. I call this The Dilemma of Scientific Disagreement. The thesis examines this Dilemma in more detail. It does so by simulating the effects of different responses to peer disagreement on the inquiry of agents using an agent-based model of scientific interaction. It concludes that, although conciliation can affect the success of scientific inquiry, how it does so crucially depends on the way scientists conduct their inquiry.
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