Epistemological Puritanism

A purity culture centered on correct ways of knowing—insisting that there is one right method for acquiring knowledge, and that any departure from this method is not just mistaken but corrupt. Epistemological puritanism polices not just what people believe but how they claim to know it, treating different epistemic practices as moral failings. It's the philosopher who dismisses all non-Western epistemologies as irrational; the scientist who treats personal experience as inherently suspect; the rationalist who thinks intuition is always error. Epistemological puritanism mistakes one culture's way of knowing for universal reason, and treats all others as not just different but deficient.

Example: "He dismissed her embodied knowledge as 'mere anecdote'—Epistemological Puritanism, treating one way of knowing as the only way, and all others as contamination."

Epistemological Puritanism by Dumu The Void March 14, 2026