On the Ontological and Epistemological Dimensions of Expertise: Why “Reality” and “Truth” Matter and How We Might Find Them

Abstract

This essay expands Johanna Hartelius’ rhetorical understanding of expertise by probing the concept’s ontological and epistemological grounds. Viewed through the lens of a realist-based theory of rhetoric, we contend that notions of being, consciousness, meaning, and knowing are essential to understanding expertise. Applying our theory of rhetorical perspectivism to link these concepts to expertise permits coherent distinctions between genuine expertise and faux expertise. The theory also suggests a philosophy of education centered on the preparation of experts who are “intellectual entrepreneurs.” With a diversified yet integrated portfolio of theoretical and practical knowledge, these citizen-scholars discover solutions to challenges affecting communities and stakeholders, transcending traditional disciplinary boundaries.

Keywords:

• Expertise
• Rhetorical Perspectivism
• Intellectual Entrepreneurship
• Engagement
• Transdisciplinarity

Notes

1. In his translation and commentary on Aristotle’s Rhetoric, George Kennedy associates ethos with “credence” and credence with “thought and contents”; that is, with truth claims about the world. In other words, according to Aristotle, one’s credibility is a function of the perceived truth or falsity of the rhetor’s description of reality (Aristotle 1991, 38, and notes 41, 42, and 43).

2. We use the term “faux” in contrast to “real” expertise to underscore the fact that in contemporary life the notion of expert is often compromised by those who profess knowledge in some domain when, in fact, they possess little or no such knowledge. The prevalence of “hucksters” or “quacks” in virtually every enterprise has always underscored the importance of defining the genuine expert in more than rhetorical terms. We would also apply the phrase “faux expertise” to an individual who actually regarded himself or herself an expert but who actually was more or less incompetent. Just as faux diamonds have deceived the unwary jewelry purchaser, so too have various stakeholders been deceived by faux expertise, as our examples in this essay illustrate.

3. We use the term “fact” to mean a state of affairs obtaining in the world. Most facts in the cosmos are at any given time largely irrelevant to human attitudes, beliefs, values, and communication, and would exist even if no humans existed (e.g. the number of craters on the dark side of the moon). Other facts are more bound up with humans and human interests (e.g. 21st-century carbon monoxide levels in large cities). In the language of our relational ontology, a fact is a context of particulars embedded in a larger context of particulars. Space and time (and, thus, history) are two constituents in the very large context of particulars comprising the cosmos.

4. Although the possibility of cold fusion continues to spark interest, it is still regarded by most nuclear physicists as unattainable. In any case, we contend that its attainability in reality per se must be a function of the real-world relational processes relevant to generating nuclear and chemical energy. These are largely independent of human attitudes, beliefs, values, or rhetorical reality construction. The question of the possibility of cold fusion will ultimately be decided by scientific discovery of real-world processes, not social reality construction (Rousseau 1992).

5. Even the most cursory reading of the other essays in this issue of Social Epistemology reveals that their authors tacitly accept realism as the ontological and epistemological context for their scholarship. They all, for example, assume a real world in which expertise functions, as one essay puts it, “against the intractable characteristics of a particular situation” (Majdik and Keith 2011, p. 275 in the present issue]). Agreeing with John Searle’s (1995) contention that realism is a “background condition” for intelligible discourse, we suggest that even those who explicitly argue anti-realist and pro-skeptical positions all, in one way or another, commit the “self exempting fallacy” (Waddell 1988), offering a compendium of truth-claims directed against competing authors, engaging arguments and authors who are part of a shared real world. Indeed, such examples only make sense on the assumption that real communicators reside among real furnishings of the real world.

6. This requirement is consistent with our definition of rhetoric as “the art of describing reality through language” (Cherwitz and Hikins 1986, 62).

7. Subsequent to our discussion of the topic in the rhetorical theory literature (Cherwitz and Hikins 1983, 1986), there has emerged a robust discussion of the relational nature of perception in the philosophical literature. While some of this scholarship has attempted to link a relational theory of perception with both propositions and intentionality (Stoljar 2004), none has explored relationality as a fundamental ontological principle undergirding existence, perceptual consciousness, meaning, and communication. For a recent exploration of the relational theory of perception and associated issues, see Crane (2006).