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Michael Prinzing

@mprinzing.bsky.social
116 followers 61 following 45 posts
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
Didn't they find no difference on autism? I remember the philosophers scoring lower on ADHD, higher on inner verbalization, etc. but a null on ASD (which was surprising, honestly)
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
Do you have a take on which is the best approach?
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
Oh, sorry, I didn't mean to say that the all of OSF is disappearing. It's just that the repository (i.e., where people post data, materials, and code) seems to have been the main purpose of the thing for most people. I'll keep using OSF for preregistrations—and I'm glad that's not going away!
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
Now that my startle response has subsided, I think shutting down the OSF repository is a good thing. The site has been very buggy and slow recently. There are better places to collaborate (e.g., GitHub) and host files. Nonetheless, it's the end of an era.
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Reposted by Michael Prinzing
Brian D. Earp, PhD @briandavidearp.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
Friends! Josh Knobe & Ivar Hannikainen, dear colleagues & mentors to many of us, are running a v. short study seeking *philosophers* as participants, to see about your intuitions about various famous cases. If you are a philosopher, please take their 5 min survey! moralsciencelab.com/intuitions/
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 15/07/2026
I haven't used it myself, but I saved this link for the next time I have such a need: github.com/giladfeldman...
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 11/07/2026
You're right! That was super confusing, sorry! It should have said that the social thing is associated with better well-being, and the self-focused thing is associated with worse.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 11/07/2026
My coauthors and I argue that this highlights the importance of the distinction between these two forms of IH and has important implications for its status as an intellectual virtue as well as for efforts to encourage people to cultivate IH. doi.org/10.1177/0146...
doi.org
Metacognitive and Interpersonal Intellectual Humility Are Asymmetrically Associated with Well-Being - Michael M. Prinzing, Shauna M. Bowes, Karen Melton, Perry Glanzer, Sarah Schnitker, 2026
Intellectual humility, lauded as an important intellectual virtue, is theorized to encompass metacognitive tendencies (i.e., appreciation of the limits of one’s...
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 11/07/2026
It turns out that the latter is consistently associated with better well-being (cross-sectionally, within and between persons, and in longitudinal changes over 2 years), whereas the latter is not. In fact, it's actually associated with *worse* well-being.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 11/07/2026
IH can refer to something self-focused—awareness of one's fallibility and the limits of one's knowledge. But it can also refer to something social, a tendency to take other's ideas seriously and assume that they have good reasons for their beliefs.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 11/07/2026
People are really excited about the benefits of intellectual humility. But, even if IH leads to good thinking, is it good *for* you? After all, an inflated sense of self feels good! It turns out that the answer may depend on what precisely "intellectual humility" refers to.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 04/07/2026
This seems related to @xphilosopher.bsky.social's idea that philosophers (a highly reflective bunch) focus on cases where people usually have conflicting intuitions.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 04/05/2026
The official version is now up on the journal's website: doi.org/10.1007/s112...
doi.org
The role of empirical evidence in philosophy - Synthese
Synthese - Some argue that philosophical inquiry is an a priori affair that can be pursued “from the armchair,” whereas others argue that empirical evidence plays an important role as...
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 31/03/2026
Second, I manually classified the most commonly cited sources in the whole corpus (any cited ≥50 times), looking them up as necessary to confirm that they met the definition. The results were identical regardless of method.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 31/03/2026
Great question! I used 2 methods. First, an LLM counted the empirical sources cited (defined as sources that primarily report the results of scientific research or analyses of quantitative data). Its counts were highly consistent with mine in a random subset of cases.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 31/03/2026
The paper (forthcoming in Synthese) is available on PhilPapers! philpapers.org/rec/PRITRO-23
philpapers.org
Michael Prinzing, The Role of Empirical Evidence in Philosophy - PhilPapers
Some argue that philosophical inquiry is an a priori affair that can be pursued “from the armchair,” whereas others argue that empirical evidence plays an important role as well. One way ...
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 31/03/2026
I suspect this has to do with the demise of the "linguistic turn," which in my view was a deviation from the mainstream of philosophical tradition. But, whatever explains the historical trend, clearly these days philosophy is *not* a purely a priori discipline.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 31/03/2026
Philosophy was mostly "armchair" in the mid-20th century—but it's not anymore! Philosophers have increasingly cited empirical sources and discussed empirical data and evidence. In fact, as of the 2020s, non-empirical philosophy has become the minority.
A graph showing the percentage of philosophy articles that cited empirical sources each year between 1970 and 2024. That proportion has increased from approximately 10% in the 1970s to over 50% in the 2020s.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 31/03/2026
Lots of people think philosophy is an "armchair" discipline in which empirical evidence is largely irrelevant. But, humorously, this idea is contradicted by the empirical data. Looking at records from prestigous, generalist philosophy journals, I found something striking.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 25/03/2026
This IHE article discusses my recent work with @mvazquez.bsky.social about how students' politics change during college. Simply put, independently of political *beliefs* students seem to adopt an "educated liberal" *identity.*
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 23/03/2026
Interesting point! But it sure seems like there's an important difference between writing in cursive, or doing math with a slide rule, and verbally articulating and conveying thoughts. If that's what an LLM automates, then it seems like it will deskill in a much more important way.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 18/03/2026
We think these results, now published in American Psychologist, highlight a need for more theorizing and tests of popular claims about how to cultivate this much-needed trait. psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?d...
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 18/03/2026
@mvazquez.bsky.social and I tested this "collaborative dialogue hypothesis." But the results of quasi-experiments and a randomized experiment (and using self-reports, behavioral indicators, and text-analytic measures) consistently contradicted the hypothesis.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 18/03/2026
Intuitively, it seems like bringing people together to discuss complex ethical and political issues should help them to be more intellectually humble about those issues—at least if the conversations are rigorous yet respectful. But, empirically, doesn't seem to work that way.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 08/02/2026
That would be awesome! Though, could the effect of higher ed on such students be different from the effect on students with more options? E.g., the latter are probably stronger students, which could moderate the effect (consistent with our SAT findings).
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 24/01/2026
Check out the full paper, coauthored with @mvazquez.bsky.social, now in JPSP! psycnet.apa.org/record/2027-... Or on OSF: osf.io/preprints/ps...
psycnet.apa.org
APA PsycNet
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 24/01/2026
That said, there are major differences in these within-person changes across majors (e.g., English & arts move most to the left, while business and engineering actually shift right), as well as demographics (e.g., women move leftward more than men), and other individual characteristics
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 24/01/2026
Since around 2012, grads have increasingly identified as liberal, while non-grads remained steady. And this diploma divide in political ID emerges during college. In the mid-1990s, students did not change their ID during college, but they increasingly have done so since.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 24/01/2026
Does going to college make people more liberal? Probably yes, but it’s complicated… For decades, US adults with degrees have held more left-leaning views on social issues, but not on economic ones. And, until the 2010s, grads did not *identify* as more liberal than non-grads.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 23/12/2025
The GOAT of journal submission sites...
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 19/12/2025
Full paper is open access at Journal of Personality: doi.org/10.1111/jopy...
doi.org
Is Virtue Good for You?
Introduction Does virtue benefit its possessor, or is it beneficial for others but not the self? We tested two highly influential theories that offer contradictory answers. In particular, we focused...
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 19/12/2025
Indeed, we found situations affording opportunities for these virtues are unpleasant. But virtues seem to buffer these situational influences. Compassion, patience, and self-control all showed positive within- and between-person links with (especially eudaimonic aspects of) well-being.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 19/12/2025
Prior studies have found that kindness and generosity increase well-being. But other virtues seem less enjoyable. E.g., compassion is like kindness but involves awareness of suffering/misfortune. Patience requires barriers or frustrations. Self-control involves foregoing present desires.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 19/12/2025
Is virtue good for you? Or is it just good for others or society at large? Theories as old as Plato make opposing claims. My coauthors and I tested their predictions in two intensive, longitudinal studies (N = 43,164 obs. from 1,218 participants), focusing on 3 seemingly unpleasant virtues.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 17/12/2025
Hilarious! How about "God be with you"?
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 17/12/2025
I've seen many criticisms of "silicon samples," but always thought it was a bogeyman—like, nobody actually thinks AI participants are a good idea. But now Qualtrics offers "synthetic samples," so at least some people must think this is a reasonable approach. What are the arguments in its favor?
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 29/08/2025
I had a great chat about how studying philosophy can make people better thinkers with @mvazquez.bsky.social, @markalfano.bsky.social, Deborah Mower, and Heather Battaly. Thanks to @apaphilosophy.bsky.social for hosting and making the recording available! www.apaonline.org/mpage/benefi...
apaonline.org
Benefits of Studying Philosophy | APA On DemandAPA Mission - The American Philosophical Association
To activate captions, click on the CC icon at the bottom of the video, then select English from the menu.
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Reposted by Michael Prinzing
The Conversation U.S. @us.theconversation.com · 21/08/2025
Turns out studying philosophy is actually valuable. Philosophy majors don’t just argue well, they actually become better thinkers and do better on tests. Data from 600k students shows they outscore every other major on reasoning, curiosity and open-mindedness.
buff.ly
Studying philosophy does make people better thinkers, according to new research on more than 600,000 college grads
Philosophers are fond of saying that their field boosts critical thinking. Two of them decided to put that claim to the test.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 09/08/2025
I don't know of any, but that's a great question! There's tons of data on college students because institutions collect them. Maybe there's a philosophy for fun organization that could be persuaded to collect data? That would be awesome!
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 07/08/2025
Experiments find effects on PEB on well-being too! They may reflect low impact behaviors, though. That's a nice contribution, consistent with other work on well-being (major life events matter less than daily lifestyle) journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1... onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 29/07/2025
I think you're right! Check it out! In "Leiterific" journals there's been really dramatic growth in citations of empirical sources and references to empirical data, evidence, research, etc. Also, articles citing more empirical sources receive more citations (i.e., are more influential).
Two figures showing growth in the percentage of philosophy articles citing empirical sources and the mean number of empirical sources cited per articleTwo figures showing growth in the percentage of philosophy articles using "empirical" phrases and the mean number of occurrences of such phrases
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Reposted by Michael Prinzing
Journal of the American Philosophical Association @apa-journal.bsky.social · 14/07/2025
Join us for an APA Live event: The Benefits of Studying Philosophy Wednesday, August 27, 2025 6 p.m Eastern / 3 p.m. Pacific Register here: tinyurl.com/4773k45a
apaonline.org
American Philosophical Association
The panelists for this event are as follows:
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 13/07/2025
Thanks for the suggestions! I'll take a look at the Nisbett chapter. @mvazquez.bsky.social and I reviewed a bunch of older work (going back to the 70s) in another paper, but we may have missed some of this stuff.
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 13/07/2025
Same here! In fact, in a prior paper we concluded that there was basically no evidence for anything but self-selection. But these results totally changed my mind!
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 12/07/2025
Of course it's not as strong as a randomized experiment, but we think this is really striking evidence that philosophy does make people better thinkers! The open-access paper is now available in the @apa-journal.bsky.social doi.org/10.1017/apa.... 4/4
doi.org
Studying Philosophy Does Make People Better Thinkers | Journal of the American Philosophical Association | Cambridge Core
Studying Philosophy Does Make People Better Thinkers
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 12/07/2025
We found that philosophy students outperformed all others on verbal and logical reasoning as well as habits of mind, when controlling for baseline differences (i.e., when students were freshman). 3/4
doi.org
Studying Philosophy Does Make People Better Thinkers | Journal of the American Philosophical Association | Cambridge Core
Studying Philosophy Does Make People Better Thinkers
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 12/07/2025
@mvazquez.bsky.social and I analyzed data from over half a million college students, looking at tests of verbal, logical, and mathematical reasoning, plus self-report measures of valuable habits of mind (a mix of curiosity, open-mindedness, intellectual rigor, etc.) 2/4
doi.org
Studying Philosophy Does Make People Better Thinkers | Journal of the American Philosophical Association | Cambridge Core
Studying Philosophy Does Make People Better Thinkers
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Michael Prinzing @mprinzing.bsky.social · 12/07/2025
A popular and very old argument for the value of philosophy claims that studying philosophy cultivates important intellectual abilities and dispositions. But empirical evidence for that claim has been hard to come by. Until now! 1/4
doi.org
Studying Philosophy Does Make People Better Thinkers | Journal of the American Philosophical Association | Cambridge Core
Studying Philosophy Does Make People Better Thinkers
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