Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies

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Implicitly racist epistemology: recent philosophical appeals to the neurophysiology of tacit prejudice
(Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group., 2019) Lauer, Helen
This essay explores why examples of mainstream philosophy of cognition and applied phenomenology demonstrate the implicit bias that they treat as their subject matter, whether the authors of these works intend or approve of their doing so. It is shown why egalitarian intuitions, which form the basis for ideal models of justice appealing to elites in racially stratified societies, provide an inadequate framework for illuminating and dismantling the mechanics of racial discrimination. Recently developed results in social choice theory are applied here to cases where racial bias is perpetuated through institutionally orchestrated collective decision making. The “discursive dilemma” theorem suggests why the analysis of subliminal attitudes is irrelevant to correcting the racial injustices presumed to follow from implicit bias in societies where negative racial stereotypes, ostensibly and explicitly deplored, are covertly and illicitly reinforced. Keywords colour-blind racist ideology; implicit bias; laissez-faire racism; racial oppression; whiteness; black self-identity