Cognitive Peerhood, Epistemic Disdain, and Affective Polarisation: The Perils of Disagreeing Deeply

Abstract Is it possible to disagree with someone without considering them cognitively flawed? The answer seems be a resounding yes : disagreeing doesn't entail thinking less of them. You can and not think that they are unreasonable. Deep disagreements, however, may challenge this assumption. A disagreement is deep when involves many interrelated issues, including the proper way resolve disagreement, resulting in its persistence. parties hold neutral or even positive judgements each other's epistemic character, as parties’ judging character negatively (i.e., disdain ) defining feature disagreements. When analysing real-life cases, we find typical In article, I analyse why case. Given undermines cognitive peerhood, prospects disagreements between peers seem bleak. Finally, discussed how phenomenon disdain, relates increase affective polarisation.