Trust without Shared Belief: Pluralist Realism and Polar Bear Conservation

Trust-building has implicitly been characterized in epistemology as necessitating the adoption of shared belief. If this is so, such models of trust-building appear at odds with a metaphysical commitment to pluralist realism. In this article I offer the first steps in modeling how a pluralist realist might understand trust building. I argue that entertaining pluralist realism as a possibility may actually be more fruitful for trust building than a monist conception because each side is given an important concession: the possibility that their knowledge claims might be correct. The case of polar bear conservation in the Canadian arctic illustrates that trust-building without shared belief is possible. I wish the members of these round-table discussions success in the future.

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