During the COVID-19 pandemic, I wrote three smaller pieces on philosophical questions raised by the pandemic, focusing on critical thinking and reasoning about uncertainty. They address different questions, from how people interpreted their own risk status to the role of philosophy in a health crisis and the possibility that critical thinking itself can become excessive. I did not develop an overarching philosophical position on the pandemic, nor was that my aim.
“Risikogruppenstatusleugnung und Normalgruppenstatusbekräftigung während der COVID-19-Pandemie” (2020). Written in the first days of the pandemic in Germany, this short blog post looks at how people interpreted their own membership in risk groups. I distinguish between denying one’s risk-group status and affirming one’s membership in the supposedly “normal” group, and use these reactions as examples of how people reason about uncertain and unwelcome information.
Review of Mukerji and Mannino, Covid-19: Was in der Krise zählt (2020). The review discusses their concept of “philosophy in real time”: doing applied philosophy while the empirical situation is still rapidly changing. I ask how well philosophical arguments survive that pressure, especially when they are meant to contribute directly to debate and practical decision-making.
“Der Fluch kritischen Denkens in Zeiten der Pandemie” (2023). This paper argues that failures of reasoning cannot always be explained by a lack of critical thinking. In some cases, an excess of critical thinking can be equally damaging: if every error, uncertainty or imperfection is treated as a reason for distrust, critical thinking can end in epistemic mistrust and cognitive paralysis rather than better judgement.
My papers
- “Risikogruppenstatusleugnung und Normalgruppenstatusbekräftigung während der COVID-19-Pandemie.” praefaktisch, 2020.
- Review of Nikil Mukerji & Adriano Mannino, Covid-19: Was in der Krise zählt. Zeitschrift für Ethik und Moralphilosophie 3(2) (2020), pp. 353–361. DOI · PhilPapers · PDF
- “Der Fluch kritischen Denkens in Zeiten der Pandemie.” In Rico Hauswald & Pedro Schmechtig (eds.), Wissensproduktion und Wissenstransfer unter erschwerten Bedingungen: Der Einfluss der Corona-Krise auf die Erzeugung und Vermittlung von Wissen im öffentlichen Diskurs. Baden-Baden: Karl Alber, 2023, pp. 341–368. DOI · PDF
