Me: There is a clichéd question about which comes first: the chicken or the egg. In the philosophical world there is a similar question about which comes first: epistemology or ontology? How does contemporary thinking deal with this question?
ChatGPT: The “epistemology vs. ontology” question is indeed philosophy’s version of the chicken-and-egg problem: do we first need an account of what exists (ontology) in order to know anything, or do we first need an account of how we know (epistemology) in order to justify claims about what exists?
Contemporary philosophy largely avoids treating this as a simple priority dispute and instead reframes the relationship in more relational, circular, or practice-based ways. Here are the main contemporary strategies.
- The Rejection of Linear Priority
Many contemporary philosophers reject the idea that one strictly comes before the other. Instead, they argue for mutual dependence:
Ontological commitments shape what counts as knowledge.
Epistemic practices shape what we take to exist.
This view treats the relationship as co-constitutive rather than hierarchical.
Example:
In philosophy of science, scientific realism debates show this clearly: what entities we believe exist (electrons, fields, dark matter) depends on epistemic criteria (inference, experiment, models), while those criteria themselves presuppose assumptions about the world’s structure.
- The “Epistemology-First” Tradition (Still Influential, but Modified)
Modern philosophy after Descartes tended to prioritize epistemology:
First secure certainty about knowledge, then build ontology on top.
This survives today in forms such as:
Analytic epistemology and philosophy of language
Truth, reference, justification, and representation are analyzed before metaphysical commitments.
Example: Quine and Sellars challenged “given” foundations but still framed ontology as answerable to epistemic practices.
However, contemporary versions are naturalized:
Knowledge is studied as a biological, social, and cognitive phenomenon.
Ontology becomes constrained by empirical science rather than pure reason.
So epistemology-first is no longer foundationalist; it is pragmatic and fallibilist.
- The “Ontology-First” Turn (Speculative Realism, New Materialism)
In the last two decades there has been an explicit reaction against epistemological dominance, especially in continental-inspired theory.
Speculative Realism / New Materialism (e.g., Meillassoux, Harman, Barad)
They argue:
Philosophy has been trapped in “correlationism”: only studying the relation between mind and world.
We must think about being independent of human access.
Key ideas:
Reality exceeds human knowledge.
Ontology should not be reduced to epistemic conditions.
However, even these approaches rarely deny epistemology entirely; they attempt to de-center the human knower rather than eliminate knowing.
- Phenomenology and the Co-Origination Model
Phenomenology (Husserl → Heidegger → Merleau-Ponty) dissolves the priority question in a different way.
Heidegger’s move (especially influential today):
He argues that:
Traditional epistemology already presupposes an ontological structure of being-in-the-world.
We are not first “knowers” who then encounter objects — we are always already practically involved.
Thus:
Ontology is not abstract metaphysics.
Epistemology is grounded in lived engagement.
This produces a primacy of practice and world-involvement, not a simple ontology-first position.
- Pragmatism and Practice-Based Approaches
American pragmatism and contemporary social epistemology take another route.
Dewey, Rorty, Brandom, contemporary pragmatists:
They argue:
The question of “which comes first” is misguided.
What matters is what works in inquiry and practice.
Truth and reality are treated as:
Outcomes of successful inquiry
Stabilized through communal practices
This replaces metaphysical priority with functional priority: what helps us cope, explain, predict, and coordinate action.
- Science Studies and Posthuman Approaches
In science and technology studies (STS) and posthuman theory (e.g., Karen Barad):
Knowing and being are treated as inseparable processes.
Barad uses the term:
“Onto-epistemology”
Meaning:
Practices of knowing are themselves material processes that help constitute reality.
Measurement does not just observe the world; it participates in making phenomena.
Here the chicken-and-egg distinction collapses entirely.
- Summary: How Contemporary Thought Handles the Question
Instead of choosing one side, most contemporary approaches do one of four things:
- Mutual dependence
Ontology and epistemology shape each other.
- Practice-first
Focus on embodied, social, and scientific practices rather than abstract priority.
- De-centering the subject
Shift away from human-centered epistemology toward realist or materialist ontologies.
- Hybrid concepts
Use terms like “onto-epistemology” to explicitly reject separation.
In One Sentence
Contemporary philosophy mostly treats the epistemology–ontology problem not as “which comes first,” but as a dynamic entanglement between how we know and what there is, mediated by practice, embodiment, and material engagement with the world.
If you’d like, I can map this debate onto specific thinkers you already work with (Heidegger, Rosa, Dewey, phenomenology, STS) or compare analytic vs continental treatments in more detail.
