Conclusion
This chapter makes a plea both for intellectual humility, which cautions against overconfidence in one’s opinions, and for deference to experts when one is not well positioned to reach an opinion on one’s own. The chapter also discusses how Descartes’s efforts to find a method that would inoculate inquirers against error encountered problems with the Cartesian Circle. The chapter concludes that intellectual humility and openness to new ideas are appropriate even for those who have immense expertise in their fields. All the more so, they are the appropriate attitudes for nonexperts to have; and since no one has expertise in all fields, they are the attitudes that specialists in one field should have when considering issues in other fields. The chapter concludes by pointing out, in particular, they are the attitudes those in the humanities ought to have toward work in the sciences, and vice versa.