Virtue

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jason Baehr
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Virtue ◽  
Character Traits ◽  
Intellectual Virtues ◽  
Intellectual Humility ◽  
Human Psychology ◽  
Knowledge Of God ◽  
Transmission Of Knowledge

Intellectual virtues are character traits that facilitate the acquisition and transmission of knowledge and related epistemic goods. This chapter takes up the question of which traits are intellectual virtues in relation to a particular variety of knowledge; namely, knowledge of God. It is argued that moral humility (as distinct from intellectual humility) is an intellectual virtue in this context. This account of moral humility and its epistemically salutary effects is sketched against the backdrop of an account of human pride and the obstacles such pride poses to the acquisition of theistic knowledge. Finally, an objection is considered according to which, owing to other features of human psychology, moral humility may in fact be an intellectual vice in this context.

Intellectual virtue

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Heather Battaly
Keyword(s):  
Role Models ◽  
Contemporary Literature ◽  
Bird Species ◽  
Intellectual Virtue ◽  
Character Traits ◽  
Theoretic Approach ◽  
Intellectual Virtues ◽  
Intellectual Humility ◽  
Virtue Reliabilism ◽  
Open Question

Intellectual virtues are qualities that make one an excellent thinker. The contemporary literature offers two different analyses of intellectual virtues: virtue reliabilism and virtue responsibilism. Virtue reliabilism argues that intellectual virtues are stable dispositions that reliably produce true beliefs. For reliabilists, any stable reliable disposition will do. Hard-wired faculties like reliable vision, acquired skills like the ability to identify bird species, and acquired character traits like open-mindedness all count as intellectual virtues. In contrast, responsibilists restrict intellectual virtues to acquired character traits, like open-mindedness, intellectual humility, and intellectual courage, over which the agent has some control and for which she is to some degree responsible. What can these analyses of intellectual virtue do for us? Reliabilists and responsibilists have used their respective analyses of intellectual virtue to ground new accounts of knowledge. Though the details of their accounts differ, both camps define knowledge in terms of intellectual virtues. They take intellectual virtues, which are evaluations of agents, to be more theoretically fundamental than knowledge and justification, which are evaluations of beliefs. It is an open question as to whether their accounts of knowledge succeed. But even if they fail, their virtue theoretic approach to knowledge has already had a significant impact on analytic epistemology – it has put active knowledge back on the map. Responsibilists have also begun to apply their analysis of intellectual virtue to classroom education and curricula. They argue that virtues like intellectual humility, intellectual perseverance, and open-mindedness are developed over time, via practice and the imitation of role models. There are several educational projects underway that aim to facilitate the development of these virtues in students.

Intellectual Virtues

Philosophy ◽  
2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charlie Crerar ◽  
Teresa Allen ◽  
Heather Battaly
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Virtue Epistemology ◽  
Intellectual Virtue ◽  
Philosophical Work ◽  
Intellectual Virtues ◽  
Historical Sources ◽  
Intellectual Humility ◽  
Professional Fields ◽  
Aristotelian Tradition

Intellectual virtues are qualities that make us excellent thinkers. There are different analyses of exactly which qualities count as intellectual virtues: virtue responsibilists have emphasized praiseworthy character traits, such as open-mindedness and intellectual humility, while virtue reliabilists have emphasized reliable skills and faculties, such as vision, memory, and skills of logic. Importantly, all agree that intellectual virtues are (i) excellences, as opposed to defects; and (ii) distinctively intellectual and not, or not simply, moral. In other words, intellectual virtues are qualities that make us excellent (and not defective) as thinkers, not (or not simply) as people in general. This bibliography provides an overview of philosophical work on the intellectual virtues. It includes articles and books addressing responsibilist and reliabilist analyses of the structure of intellectual virtue; analyses of individual intellectual virtues; the application of intellectual virtue to education and other professional fields; the role of intellectual virtues in epistemology; and, finally, the structure of intellectual vice. It also includes some historical sources on intellectual virtue, though its focus is contemporary. Analyses of intellectual virtue (and of individual intellectual virtues) have developed in tandem with the epistemological subfield of virtue epistemology, which employs the notion of intellectual virtue in an account of knowledge. These analyses also frequently draw on virtue ethics, especially in the Aristotelian tradition. Some of the sources cited touch upon connections between intellectual virtue and these fields, though a fuller treatment of these topics can be found in the corresponding bibliographies on Virtue Epistemology and Virtue Ethics.

Intellectual Virtues and Truth, Understanding, and Wisdom

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jason Baehr
Keyword(s):  
True Belief ◽  
Intellectual Virtue ◽  
Intellectual Virtues ◽  
Intellectual Humility ◽  
Cognitive Error ◽  
Intellectual Courage ◽  
Personal Character ◽  
Theoretical Wisdom

This chapter addresses the proper end or aim of intellectual virtues. After distinguishing between two fundamentally different conceptions of intellectual virtue, the author considers the plausibility, with respect to each conception, of the “binary thesis,” according to which the proper aim of intellectual virtues is true belief and the avoidance of cognitive error. The author goes on to argue that if one understands intellectual virtues (as many virtue epistemologists do) as admirable traits of personal character—for example, as traits like curiosity, open-mindedness, intellectual courage, and intellectual humility—then sophia or theoretical wisdom presents itself as a plausible way of understanding their aim.

Intellectual Humility, Proper Pride, and Proper Concern with Others’ Esteem

2021 ◽  
pp. 73-95
Author(s):  
Alessandra Tanesini
Keyword(s):  
Social Comparisons ◽  
The Other ◽  
Character Traits ◽  
Intellectual Virtues ◽  
Intellectual Humility ◽  
Overlapping Clusters ◽  
The One ◽  
Intellectual Limitations

This chapter provides accounts of four character traits: intellectual modesty and acceptance of intellectual limitations (which together constitute intellectual humility); proper pride in one’s epistemic achievements and proper concern for one’s intellectual reputation. It argues that these are intellectual virtues. The main difference between humility (as comprising of modesty and of acceptance of limitations) on the one hand, and pride and concern for esteem on the other, lies in the nature of social comparisons on which they are based. Humility relies on appraisals of the worth of one’s qualities that might be gauged by comparing oneself to other people and which are driven by a concern for accuracy. The chapter also makes a case that overlapping clusters of attitudes serving knowledge and value expressive functions are the causal bases of these character traits.

How to Distinguish Aristotle's Virtues

Phronesis ◽  
2002 ◽  
Vol 47 (2) ◽  
pp. 101-126 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marguerite Deslauriers
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Virtue ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Art ◽  
Intellectual Virtues ◽  
Moral Virtues ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Way

AbstractThis paper considers the distinctions Aristotle draws (1) between the intellectual virtue of phronêsis and the moral virtues and (2) among the moral virtues, in light of his commitment to the reciprocity of the virtues. I argue that Aristotle takes the intellectual virtues to be numerically distinct hexeis from the moral virtues. By contrast, I argue, he treats the moral virtues as numerically one hexis, although he allows that they are many hexeis 'in being'. The paper has three parts. In the first, I set out Aristotle's account of the structure of the faculties of the soul, and determine that desire is a distinct faculty. The rationality of a desire is not then a question of whether or not the faculty that produces that desire is rational, but rather a question of whether or not the object of the desire is good. In the second section I show that the reciprocity of phronêsis and the moral virtues requires this structure of the faculties. In the third section I show that the way in which Aristotle distinguishes the faculties requires that we individuate moral virtues according to the objects of the desires that enter into a given virtue, and with reference to the circumstances in which these desires are generated. I then explore what it might mean for the moral virtues to be different in being but not in number, given the way in which the moral virtues are individuated. I argue that Aristotle takes phronêsis and the political art to be a numerical unity in a particular way, and that he suggests that the moral virtues are, by analogy, the same kind of unity.

scholarly journals Intellectual Humility, Spirituality, and Counselling

2018 ◽  
Vol 46 (4) ◽  
pp. 279-291 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emma C. Gordon
Keyword(s):  
Specific Area ◽  
Intellectual Virtue ◽  
Intellectual Humility ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Contemporary Epistemology

Although therapists often work with clients with whom they share a great many beliefs, there remain many cases where the therapist and client have very little in common. Spirituality is, especially in the latter kind of case, one specific area in which clashes and similarities may be important. However, recent evidence suggests spirituality is to a surprising extent ignored in therapy when exploring it would be therapeutically relevant and, even more, that counsellors often struggle when training to more effectively engage with client spirituality. These results are problematic, especially when taken together. In this article, I attempt to address this vexing issue in a way that brings together work on counselling and spirituality with recent discussions of intellectual virtue in contemporary epistemology. In particular, I show why it is important for the therapist to cultivate and maintain the virtue of intellectual humility with respect to spirituality in a counselling context. To this end, I explore, with reference to a particularly promising model of intellectual humility, how the therapist can be attentive to—and own—their limitations in a productive way when dealing with a wide range of spiritual backgrounds.

scholarly journals ARE INTELLECTUAL VIRTUES TRUTH-RELEVANT?

Episteme ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 381-392
Author(s):  
Blake Roeber
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Epistemology ◽  
True Belief ◽  
Intellectual Virtue ◽  
Narrow Sense ◽  
Pragmatic Encroachment ◽  
Intellectual Virtues ◽  
Ernest Sosa ◽  
Value Of Knowledge ◽  
Wide Range

ABSTRACTAccording to attributor virtue epistemology (the view defended by Ernest Sosa, John Greco, and others), S knows that p only if her true belief that p is attributable to some intellectual virtue, competence, or ability that she possesses. Attributor virtue epistemology captures a wide range of our intuitions about the nature and value of knowledge, and it has many able defenders. Unfortunately, it has an unrecognized consequence that many epistemologists will think is sufficient for rejecting it: namely, it makes knowledge depend on factors that aren't truth-relevant, even in the broadest sense of this term, and it also makes knowledge depend in counterintuitive ways on factors that are truth-relevant in the more common narrow sense of this term. As I show in this paper, the primary objection to interest-relative views in the pragmatic encroachment debate can be raised even more effectively against attributor virtue epistemology.

Intellectual Virtues and Vices

2021 ◽  
pp. 21-47
Author(s):  
Alessandra Tanesini
Keyword(s):  
Impression Management ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Character Traits ◽  
Thinking Styles ◽  
Intellectual Virtues ◽  
Epistemic Agency ◽  
Philosophical Foundations

This chapter sets out the philosophical foundations of the proposed account of virtues and vices of intellectual self-appraisal. It explains the nature of intellectual vices in general by distinguishing between sensibilities, thinking styles, and character traits. Subsequently, it describes the specific features of the epistemic vices of self-appraisal. The chapter supplies an account of what makes epistemic vices vicious, and argues in favour of a motivational view. In the author’s view the vices of intellectual self-appraisal are impairments of epistemic agency caused by motivations, such as those of self-enhancement or impression management, that also bring other epistemically bad motives in their trail. Such motivations bias epistemic evaluations of one’s cognitive abilities, processes, and states. These appraisals, in turn, have widespread negative influences on agents’ epistemic conduct as a whole.

Intellectual Virtues

2020 ◽  
pp. 93-107
Author(s):  
Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski
Keyword(s):  
Moral Theory ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Moral Virtue ◽  
Intellectual Virtue ◽  
Intellectual Virtues ◽  
Long Period

This chapter defends the view that intellectual virtues are deep and enduring acquired intellectual excellences, supported by the underlying idea in Exemplarist Moral Theory that excellences are admirable traits, and admirable traits are those that people admire on reflection and that have features identified in empirical studies. The intellectual virtues require both admirable intellectual motivations and reliable success in reaching the truth, and the defense of this claim is that that is what people admire on reflection. The connection of intellectual virtue with moral virtue also explains admirable states like wisdom that are recently getting attention in philosophy and psychology after a long period of neglect.

scholarly journals Educating for Intellectual Virtue: A Critique from Action Guidance

Episteme ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 1-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ben Kotzee ◽  
J. Adam Carter ◽  
Harvey Siegel
Keyword(s):  
Critical Thinking ◽  
Virtue Epistemology ◽  
Philosophy Of Education ◽  
Intellectual Virtue ◽  
Primary Role ◽  
Intellectual Virtues ◽  
Effective Pedagogy ◽  
Further Development ◽  
Action Guidance ◽  
Pedagogical Challenge

Abstract Virtue epistemology is among the dominant influences in mainstream epistemology today. An important commitment of one strand of virtue epistemology – responsibilist virtue epistemology – is that it must provide regulative normative guidance for good thinking. Recently, a number of virtue epistemologists (most notably Baehr) have held that virtue epistemology not only can provide regulative normative guidance, but moreover that we should reconceive the primary epistemic aim of all education as the inculcation of the intellectual virtues. Baehr's picture contrasts with another well-known position – that the primary aim of education is the promotion of critical thinking. In this paper – that we hold makes a contribution to both philosophy of education and epistemology and, a fortiori, epistemology of education – we challenge this picture. We outline three criteria that any putative aim of education must meet and hold that it is the aim of critical thinking, rather than the aim of instilling intellectual virtue, that best meets these criteria. On this basis, we propose a new challenge for intellectual virtue epistemology, next to the well-known empirically driven ‘situationist challenge’. What we call the ‘pedagogical challenge’ maintains that the intellectual virtues approach does not have available a suitably effective pedagogy to qualify the acquisition of intellectual virtue as the primary aim of education. This is because the pedagogic model of the intellectual virtues approach (borrowed largely from exemplarist thinking) is not properly action-guiding. Instead, we hold that, without much further development in virtue-based theory, logic and critical thinking must still play the primary role in the epistemology of education.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document