This chapter explores a species of false modesty, false intellectual humility, which is defined as affected or pretended intellectual humility concealing intellectual arrogance. False intellectual humility is situated in a virtue epistemological framework, where it is contrasted with intellectual humility, understood as excellence in self-attribution of intellectual weakness. False intellectual humility characteristically takes the form of insincere expressions of ignorance or uncertainty – as when dogmatically committed conspiracy theorists insist that they just want to know what’s going on – and, (...) in such cases, false intellectual humility is a kind of false skepticism or false fallibilism. In connection with this, the chapter further explores the relationship between the concepts of intellectual humility, skepticism, and fallibilism. A distinction can be drawn between the virtues of intellectual humility, skepticism, and fallibilism, but the traditional association of skepticism and fallibilism with intellectual humility is vindicated by the fact that the virtues of intellectual humility, skepticism, and fallibilism overlap. (shrink)

Some of the students in our classrooms doubt their intellectual strengths—their knowledge, abilities, and skills. They may be unaware of the intellectual strengths they have, or may ignore, lack confidence in, or under-estimate them. They may even incorrectly judge themselves to be intellectually inferior to their peers. Students who do such things consistently are deficient in the virtue of intellectual pride—in appropriately ‘owning’ their intellectual strengths—and are on their way to developing a form of intellectual servility. Can the ‘standard approach’ (...) to intellectual character education help these students make progress toward intellectual pride? This article argues that there are two limitations in its ability to help. First, the standard approach isn’t likely to help unless it is combined with classroom strategies for ameliorating servility. Second, even when it is combined with ameliorative strategies, any progress it might make in the classroom is likely to be fleeting when a student’s servility is caused by systemic epistemic injustice. This article suggests that rather than prioritize the standard approach, we prioritize strategies that aim at systemic change and amelioration. (shrink)

Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, EarlyView.

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 paper, 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. (shrink)