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בטלה דעתו אצל כל אדם— His Discernment is Nullified per All People—Obliteration of Personhood as Epistemic Injustice

Sun, December 16, 12:30 to 2:00pm, Seaport Hotel & World Trade Center, Waterfront 3 Ballroom

Abstract

In this paper, I unpack the Rabbinic maxim, "בטלה דעתו אצל כל אדם"--whereby an individual’s discernment is deemed null by all people--through Miranda Fricker’s lens of "Epistemic Injustice." This study involves three stages. I begin by closely examining particular Rabbinic cases in which this maxim is invoked. I then probe the cluster of cases analyzed through careful casuistic comparison, as contextual stakes yield principles and concepts, emerging from their juxtaposed reading. I conclude by applying Miranda Fricker's lens of "Epistemic Injustice" to each of the cases studied, to the cluster of cases comparatively read, and to the principles and concepts, having emerged. This investigative process will problematize systemic presumptions and mechanisms by which an individual may be stripped of "knower" status, and thus, subject to the powerful harm of epistemic injustice, and demonstrate antidotes, inherent within the Rabbinic system, to avoid such wronging.

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