Epistemic Courage is a timely and thought-provoking exploration of the ethics of belief, which shows why epistemology is no mere academic abstraction - the question of what to believe couldn't be more urgent. Jonathan Ichikawa argues that a skeptical, negative bias about belief is connected to a conservative bias that reinforces the status quo.

According to virtue epistemology, the main aim of education is the development of the cognitive character of students (Pritchard, 2014, 2016). Given the proliferation of technological tools such as ChatGPT and other LLMs for solving cognitive tasks, how should educational practices incorporate the use of such tools without undermining the cognitive character of students? Pritchard (2014, 2016) argues that it is possible to properly solve this ‘technology-education tension’ (TET) by combining the virtue epistemology framework with the theory of extended cognition (...) (EXT) (Clark and Chalmers, 1998). He argues that EXT enables us to consider tools as constitutive parts of the students’ cognitive system, thus preserving their cognitive character from technologically induced cognitive diminishment. The first aim of this paper is to show that this solution is not sufficient to solve the TET. Second, I aim to offer a complementary and more encompassing framework of tool-use to address the TET. Then, I apply it to the educational uses of ChatGPT as the most notable example of LLM, although my arguments can be extended to other generative AI systems. To do so, in Sect. 1.1, I present Pritchard’s framework of cognitive character and virtue epistemology applied in education, to which I am committed in this treatment. In Sects. 2 and 3, I respectively illustrate Pritchard’s (2014) solution to the TET, and I highlight the general limitations of his proposal. Thus, in Sect. 4.1 I characterize ChatGPT as a computational cognitive artifact using Fasoli’s (2017, 2018) taxonomy of cognitive artifacts. In Sect. 4.2, I introduce my proposal, which combines Pritchard’s account of virtue epistemology with Fasoli’s (2017, 2018) taxonomy of cognitive artifacts to address the TET. Finally, in Sect. 5.1, I present some epistemically virtuous uses of ChatGPT in educational contexts. To conclude, I argue in favor of a multidisciplinary approach for analyzing educational activities involving AI technologies such as ChatGPT. (shrink)

Virtue epistemologies about knowledge have traditionally been divided into two camps: virtue reliabilism and virtue responsibilism. Initially, what set them apart was that virtue responsibilism took intellectual character virtues and responsible agency to be necessary to knowledge acquisition, whereas virtue reliabilism took reliable cognitive faculties to be constitutive of it instead. Despite recent concessions between these camps, there are residual disagreements. Chapter 8 focuses primarily on Linda Zagzebski’s account of virtue responsibilism and John Greco’s and Ernest Sosa’s defenses of virtue (...) reliabilism. It argues that despite their misgivings about virtue responsibilism, Greco and Sosa are ultimately required to accept that intellectual character virtues involve a substantial truth-motivational component, and that knowledge requires a kind of epistemic responsibility that is far more substantive than a causal, naturalistic notion of attribution. (shrink)

Virtue signaling—using public moral discourse to enhance one’s moral reputation—is a familiar concept. But, what about profile pictures framed by “Vaccines work!”? Or memes posted to anti-vaccine groups echoing the group’s view that “Only sheep believe Big Pharma!”? These actions don’t express moral views—both claims are empirical (if imprecise). Nevertheless, they serve a similar purpose: to influence the judgments of their audience. But, where rainbow profiles guide their audience to view the agent as morally good, these acts guide their audience (...) to view the agent as epistemically good. They are instances of epistemic virtue signaling. The first goal of this paper is to offer an account of epistemic virtue signaling. I argue that epistemic virtue signaling occurs through both behavioral and propositional signals, and serves purposes similar to those of moral virtue signaling across a wide variety of discourses. The second is to show that there is much work for this concept to do. In particular, this concept illuminates a double bind faced by those who suffer from and seek to overcome testimonial injustice. I close by demonstrating how this double bind arises in the dissolution of medical autonomy, focusing on the care gap faced by pregnant women of color in the United States today, as compared with their white counterparts. (shrink)

A cognitive ethnography of how bioengineering scientists create innovative modeling methods. In this first full-scale, long-term cognitive ethnography by a philosopher of science, Nancy J. Nersessian offers an account of how scientists at the interdisciplinary frontiers of bioengineering create novel problem-solving methods. Bioengineering scientists model complex dynamical biological systems using concepts, methods, materials, and other resources drawn primarily from engineering. They aim to understand these systems sufficiently to control or intervene in them. What Nersessian examines here is how cutting-edge bioengineering (...) scientists integrate the cognitive, social, material, and cultural dimensions of practice. Her findings and conclusions have broad implications for researchers in philosophy, science studies, cognitive science, and interdisciplinary studies, as well as scientists, educators, policy makers, and funding agencies. In studying the epistemic practices of scientists, Nersessian pushes the boundaries of the philosophy of science and cognitive science into areas not ventured before. She recounts a decades-long, wide-ranging, and richly detailed investigation of the innovative interdisciplinary modeling practices of bioengineering researchers in four university laboratories. She argues and demonstrates that the methods of cognitive ethnography and qualitative data analysis, placed in the framework of distributed cognition, provide the tools for a philosophical analysis of how scientific discoveries arise from complex systems in which the cognitive, social, material, and cultural dimensions of problem-solving are integrated into the epistemic practices of scientists. Specifically, she looks at how interdisciplinary environments shape problem-solving. Although Nersessian’s case material is drawn from the bioengineering sciences, her analytic framework and methodological approach are directly applicable to scientific research in a broader, more general sense, as well. (shrink)

Are extreme beliefs constitutive of echo chambers, or only typically caused by them? Or are many echo chambers unproblematic, amplifying relatively benign beliefs? This paper details the conceptual relations between echo chambers and extreme beliefs, showing how different conceptual choice-points in how we understand both echo chambers and extreme beliefs affects how we should evaluate, study, and engage with echo chambering groups. We also explore how our theories of extreme beliefs and echo chambers shape social scientific research and contribute in (...) a practical way when treating these phenomena, focusing on examples of climate change scepticism. (shrink)

This article is an exercise in the virtue epistemology of the internet, an area of applied virtue epistemology that investigates how online environments impact the development of intellectual virtues, and how intellectual virtues manifest within online environments. I examine online echo chambers and epistemic bubbles (Nguyen 2020, Episteme 17(2), 141–61), exploring the conceptual relationship between these online environments and the virtue of open-mindedness (Battaly 2018b, Episteme 15(3), 261–82). The article answers two key individual-level, virtue epistemic questions: (Q1) How does immersion (...) in online echo chambers and epistemic bubbles affect the cultivation and preservation of open-mindedness, and (Q2) Is it always intellectually virtuous to exhibit open-mindedness in the context of online echo chambers and epistemic bubbles? In response to Q1, I contend that both online echo chambers and online epistemic bubbles threaten to undermine the cultivation and preservation of open-mindedness, albeit via different mechanisms and to different degrees. In response to Q2, I affirm that both a deficiency and an excess of open-mindedness can be virtuous in these online environments, depending on the epistemic orientation of the digital user. (shrink)

Philosophers and psychologists sometimes categorize emotions like surprise and curiosity as specifically epistemic. Is there some reasonably unified and interesting class of emotions here? If so, what unifies it? This paper proposes and defends an evaluative account of epistemic emotions: What it is to be an epistemic emotion is to have fittingness conditions that distinctively involve some epistemic evaluation. We argue that this view has significant advantages over alternative proposals and is a promising way to identify a limited and interesting (...) class of emotions. (shrink)

This paper seeks to answer the question: Can contemporary forms of artificial intelligence be creative? To answer this question, I consider three conditions that are commonly taken to be necessary for creativity. These are novelty, value, and agency. I argue that while contemporary AI models may have a claim to novelty and value, they cannot satisfy the kind of agency condition required for creativity. From this discussion, a new condition for creativity emerges. Creativity requires curiosity, a motivation to pursue epistemic (...) goods. I argue that contemporary AI models do not satisfy this new condition. Because they lack both agency and curiosity, it is a mistake to attribute the same sort of creativity to AI that we prize in humans. Finally, I consider the question of whether these AI models stand to make human creativity in the arts and sciences obsolete, despite not being creative themselves. I argue, optimistically, that this is unlikely. (shrink)

In this essay, I reflect on the implications of intellectual virtues in scientific endeavor. To this end, I first offer a depiction of scientific endeavor by resorting to the notion of academic attitude, which involves aspects concerning the generation and possession of knowledge. Although there are differences between these activities, they have in common the engagement of diverse intellectual agents (scientists). In this sense, I analyze how intellectual virtues are linked to 1) scientific research tasks, such as theory appraisal, and (...) 2) those tasks of vigilance and intervention in the uses of scientific knowledge. I conclude that intellectual virtues play a leading role in achieving higher quality scientific research and adequate foresight on the uses and impacts of scientific findings. In this order of ideas, I propose an agenda for further inquiries on these matters, highlighting the relevance of reflecting and empirically researching the relationship between intellectual virtues and science, as well as cultivating intellectual virtues in various stages of scientific training. (shrink)

This paper offers an account of collective epistemic vices, which we call the “group identification account”. The group identification account attributes collective epistemic vices to the groups that are constituted by “group identification”, which is a primitive and non-doxastic self-understanding as a group member (Turner, 1982; Brewer, 1991; Brewer & Gardner, 1996; Pacherie, 2013; Salice & Miyazono, 2020). The distinctive feature of the group identification account is that it enables us to attribute epistemic vices not just to established social groups (...) (e.g. committees, research teams, juries) but also to loose social groups (e.g. loosely connected people in an echo chamber) when they are constituted by group identification. The group identification account is contrasted with Fricker’s (2010, 2020) influential account, the “joint commitment account”, which focuses on established social groups, and has difficulty in making sense of collective epistemic vices of loose social groups. The group identification account is motivated by the fact that collective epistemic vices can be useful to diagnose not only the epistemic performance of established groups but also that of loose groups in real-life cases, such as echo chamber (Nguyen, 2020), implicit bias (Holroyd, 2020), group polarization (Broncano-Berrocal & Carter, 2021), etc. (shrink)

Do epistemic and aesthetic values ever conflict? The answer might appear to be no, given that background knowledge generally enhances aesthetic experience, and aesthetic experience in turn generates new knowledge. As Keats writes, ‘Beauty is truth, truth beauty’ (Keats, 1996). Contra this line of thought, I argue that epistemic and aesthetic values can conflict when we over-rely on aesthetically enhancing background beliefs. The true and the beautiful can pull in different directions, forcing us to choose between flavours of normativity.

This paper aims to solve a puzzle for instrumental conceptions of epistemic normativity. The puzzle is this: if the usefulness of epistemic norms explains their normative grip on us, why does it seem improper to violate these norms even when doing so would benefit us? To solve this puzzle, we argue that epistemic instrumentalists must adopt a more social approach to normativity. In particular, they should not account for the nature of epistemic normativity by appealing to the goals of individual (...) agents. Rather, they should appeal to norms or rules of inquiry that serve our collective goals. We argue that epistemic normativity grows out of our need to promote a deep kind of coordination in our basic epistemic practices. By subscribing to an appropriate system of norms, we can coordinate epistemic rule-following across the community. This makes testimony more trustworthy and reliable. This account not only solves a puzzle about epistemic instrumentalism but also sheds new light on the foundations of normativity and emphasizes the need for a truly social epistemology. (shrink)

Recently, I have proposed an extension of the framework of the ethics of collegiality (Berber & Subotić, forthcoming). By incorporating an anti-individual perspective and the notion of epistemic competence, this framework can reveal the epistemic virtue/vice relativism, which, in turn, charts the tension between being a good colleague and an efficient, loyal employee. In this paper, however, I want to sketch how the ethics of collegiality could be applied to practical domains, such as the historical accountability and atonement of corporations (...) that participated in the anti-Semitic policies of the Third Reich and contributed to the Holocaust by using slave or forced labor. New studies suggest that corporations ought to engage in deeper historical reflection and ethical dialogue between Shoah survivors and top managers to address the issue of industrial compliance (Federman 2021), whereas most of the work on this topic traditionally focused on the issue of reparations litigation (Kelly 2016, Neuborne 2003). Through the notions of collective institutional epistemic vice and institutional ethos (Fricker 2021), the upshot is to assess whether it is feasible for corporations to be genuinely repentant regarding their role in the Holocaust thanks to the ethics of collegiality instead of merely offering compensation. I will argue that instead of emphasizing ethical leadership and the top-down approach to the (re-)implementation of values in corporate conduct, the spotlights should be on the bottom-up approach grounded in collegial solidarity among all employees. (shrink)

Vice epistemology studies the qualities of individuals and collectives that undermine the creation, sharing, and storing of knowledge. There is no settled understanding of which epistemic vices exist at the collective level. Yet understanding which collective epistemic vices exist is important, both to facilitate research on the antecedents and effects of collective epistemic vice, and to advance philosophical discussions such as whether some collective epistemic vices are genuinely collective. I propose an empirical approach to identifying epistemic vices in corporations, analyzing (...) a large dataset of online employee reviews. The approach has parallels to the methodology for identifying the big-five personality traits. It surfaces epistemic vices that are attributed to corporations by its own members and reduces the number of vices to the minimum required to describe differences between corporations. This approach yields a new taxonomy of epistemic vices for corporations. While two vices identified have close correlates in the existing literature, four others have not been identified at all or only in aspects. Two of these vices are ‘genuinely’ collective in the sense that they can only be attributed to collectives. (shrink)

Intellectual courage requires acting to promote epistemic goods despite significant risk of harm. Courage is distinguished from recklessness and cowardice because the expected epistemic benefit of a courageous action outweighs (in some sense) the threatened harm. Sometimes, however, inquirers pursue theories that are not best supported by their current evidence. For these inquirers, the expected epistemic benefit of their actions cannot be explained by appeal to their evidence alone. The probability of pursuing the true theory cannot contribute enough to the (...) expected epistemic benefit for the action to count as courageous rather than reckless. Thus, there must be some other epistemic consideration which favors their action, besides evidence for their theory. I argue that the proper account of intellectual courage requires recognition of inquisitive reasons: a distinct category of epistemic reasons which concern successful inquiry. This category includes reasons to think a theory itself is promising, e.g., that the theory suggests potentially fruitful new research. It also includes social epistemic reasons, e.g., that pursuing a theory will improve the distribution of cognitive labor. Inquisitive reasons help explain why researchers who pursue improbable theories count as intellectually courageous, rather than reckless. The expected epistemic benefit of an action is partially determined by the inquisitive reasons in its favor. On my account, intellectually courageous inquiry requires acting in a way that is sensitive to inquisitive reasons. (shrink)

Groups can be epistemically vicious just like individuals. And just like individuals, groups sometimes want to do something about their vices. They want to change. However, intentionally combating one’s own vices seems impossible without detecting those vices first. Self-knowledge seems to provide a first step towards changing one’s own epistemic vices. I argue that groups can acquire self-knowledge about their epistemic vices and I propose an account of such collective self-knowledge. I suggest that collective self-knowledge of vices is partially based (...) on evidence that a group can generate by performing internal promptings. Whereas these promptings are done mentally in individual self-knowledge, these promptings are done by interactions of group members in the collective case. The group can then acquire inferential self-knowledge of their vices based on the evidence generated by the interactions within the group. Groups thereby bring themselves into a position from which they can combat and change those vices intentionally. (shrink)

Gettier cases are used to show that having a justified true belief is not sufficient for knowledge. They are cases in which an epistemic agent has a belief that is both justified and true, but intuitively cannot be taken to count as knowledge. Modal epistemology is the field of philosophy that tackles questions regarding the sources of our knowledge of modalities (possibility and necessity) and what offers justification for beliefs about what is possible or necessary. Part of the tradition in (...) modal epistemology is to consider conceivability as a guide to metaphysical possibility. As such, if an agent can conceive that P, then the agent is justified to believe that P is metaphysically possible. In this paper I will discuss the possibility of constructing Gettier cases for a tripartite, conceivability-based, definition of modal knowledge. (shrink)

Recent develops in AI technology have led to increasingly sophisticated forms of video manipulation. One such form has been the advent of deepfakes. Deepfakes are AI-generated videos that typically depict people doing and saying things they never did. In this paper, I demonstrate that there is a close structural relationship between deepfakes and more traditional fake barn cases in epistemology. Specifically, I argue that deepfakes generate an analogous degree of epistemic risk to that which is found in traditional cases. Given (...) that barn cases have posed a long-standing challenge for virtue-theoretic accounts of knowledge, I consider whether a similar challenge extends to deepfakes. In doing so, I consider how Duncan Pritchard’s recent anti-risk virtue epistemology meets the challenge. While Pritchard’s account avoids problems in traditional barn cases, I claim that it leads to local scepticism about knowledge from online videos in the case of deepfakes. I end by considering how two alternative virtue-theoretic approaches might vindicate our epistemic dependence on videos in an increasingly digital world. (shrink)

The epistemic virtues and vices are typically defined in terms of effects or motivations related to the epistemic states of their possessors. However, philosophers have recently begun to consider _other-regarding_ epistemic virtues, traits oriented toward the epistemic flourishing of others. In a similar vein, this paper discusses _outward-facing_ epistemic vices, properties oriented toward the epistemic languishing of others. I argue for the existence of both reliabilist and responsibilist outward-facing vices, and illustrate how such vices negatively bear on the epistemic prospects (...) of others. I pay special attention to how outward-facing epistemic vices may manifest in online activities that promote the epistemic languishing of others by negatively influencing the online epistemic environment. (shrink)

Very plausibly, there is something important missing in our lives if we are thoroughly ignorant or misled about reality – even if, as in a kind of Truman Show scenario, intervention or fantastic luck prevents unhappiness and practical failure. But why? I argue that perfectionism about well-being offers the most promising explanation. My version says, roughly, that we flourish when we exercise our self-defining capacities successfully according to their constitutive standards. One of these self-defining capacities, or capacities whose exercise reveals (...) who we are, is Reason, our capacity for normative self-governance. I argue that in its practical use, Reason formally aims at competently realizing self-chosen valuable ends that are in harmony with each other, or valuable achievements. In its theoretical use, it formally aims at competently grasping fundamental enough subject matters, or a kind of understanding. Because success by reason’s own standards requires many things to go right, there are many different ways in which we can fall short. Some of them amount to partial success. But some, like incompetent inquiry that fails to yield understanding of its target, or taking inefficient means to a worthless end, are robust failures that amount to epistemic or agential unflourishing, and thus to a form of ill-being. (shrink)

Does utterance understanding require reliable (i.e. non-lucky) recovery of the speaker’s intended proposition? There are good reasons to answer in the affirmative: the role of understanding in supporting testimonial knowledge seemingly requires such reliability. Moreover, there seem to be communicative analogues of Gettier cases in which luck precludes the audience’s understanding an utterance despite recovering the intended proposition. Yet, there are some major problems with the view that understanding requires such reliability. Firstly, there are a number of cases in which (...) understanding seems to occur in a lucky way. In light of these cases I argue that we need to narrow down the precise sense in which understanding precludes luck – the anti-luck condition attached to linguistic understanding is importantly different to anti-luck conditions typically applied to knowledge. Secondly, Megan Hyska has recently argued that, assuming understanding precludes luck, we get a communicative analogue of the value problem for knowledge. i.e. why is it better to meet the other conditions for understanding in a reliable way than in a lucky way? It is natural to assume that we can simply port over our favoured responses to the epistemic value problem in response to Hyska’s challenge. I argue that, due to the difference between epistemic and communicative luck (discussed in response to the first problem), this cannot be done. The epistemic and communicative value problems will require different solutions. I close by sketching the beginnings of an alternative answer to the value problem for communication. (shrink)

According to metaphysical coherentism, grounding relations form an interconnected system in which things ground each other and nothing is ungrounded. This potentially viable view’s logical territory remains largely unexplored. In this paper, I describe that territory by articulating four varieties of metaphysical coherentism. I do not argue for any variety in particular. Rather, I aim to show that not all issues which might be raised against coherentism will be equally problematic for all the versions of that view, which features far (...) more nuance and diversity than is typically ascribed to it. (shrink)

A widespread assumption in debates about trust and trustworthiness is that the evaluative norms of principal interest on the trustor’s side of a cooperative exchange regulate trusting attitudes and performances whereas those on the trustee’s side regulate dispositions to respond to trust. The aim here will be to highlight some unnoticed problems with this asymmetrical picture – and in particular, how it elides certain key evaluative norms on both the trustor’s and trustee’s side the satisfaction of which are critical to (...) successful cooperative exchanges – and to show that a symmetrical, ‘achievement-first’ approach to theorising about trust and trustworthiness (and their relation to each other) has important advantages by comparison. The view I develop is guided by a structural analogy with practical reasoning. Just as practical reasoning is working as it should only when there is realisation (knowledge and action) of states (belief and intention) with reverse directions of fits (mind-to-world and world-to-mind), likewise, cooperation between trustor and trustee is functioning as it should only when there is an analogous kind of realisation on both sides of the cooperative exchange – viz., when the trustor ‘matches’ her achievement in trusting (an achievement in fitting reliance to reciprocity) with the trustee’s achievement in responding to trust (an achievement in fitting reciprocity to reliance). An upshot of viewing cooperation between trustor and trustee as exhibiting achievement-theoretic structure is that we will be better positioned to subsume trustworthiness (and its cognates on the trustee’s side), like trust, under a wider suite of evaluative norms that regulate attempts, dispositions, and achievements symmetrically on both sides of a cooperative exchange, with ‘matching achievements’ as the gold standard. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to explain why creativity is an artistic merit. Artworks and non-artworks can both be creative. But creativity does not help make many other creative things good of their kind. A creative explanation is not a better explanation in virtue of being creative. Why, then, is a creative artwork a better artwork in virtue of being creative? Understanding this will give us a better understanding of the nature of artistic merit. The approach adopted in this (...) paper is as follows. First, I say what creativity is and what an artistic merit is. Second, I identify reasons to doubt that creativity is an artistic merit. A good explanation of the merit of creativity should address these doubts. Third, I develop a theory of artistic merit that appeals to the final value of acting excellently – for example, virtuously or skilfully. Finally, I argue that this enables us to explain why creativity is an artistic merit. This account also enables us to argue that artistic merits give some things final value, and not merely instrumental value. It also provides reason to believe that ethical qualities of artworks enhance their artistic merit for the same reason creativity does. (shrink)

Are we being manipulated online? If so, is being manipulated by online technologies and algorithmic systems notably different from human forms of manipulation? And what is under threat exactly when people are manipulated online? This volume provides philosophical and conceptual depth to debates in digital ethics about online manipulation. The contributions explore the ramifications of our increasingly consequential interactions with online technologies such as online recommender systems, social media, user-friendly design, micro-targeting, default-settings, gamification, and real-time profiling. The authors in this (...) volume address four broad and interconnected themes: • What is the conceptual nature of online manipulation? And how, methodologically, should the concept be defined? • Does online manipulation threaten autonomy, freedom, and meaning in life, and if so, how? • What are the epistemic, affective, and political harms and risks associated with online manipulation? • What are legal and regulatory perspectives on online manipulation? The Philosophy of Online Manipulation brings these various considerations together to offer philosophically robust answers to critical questions concerning our online interactions with one another and with autonomous systems. It will be of interest to researchers and advanced students working in moral philosophy, digital ethics, philosophy of technology, and the ethics of manipulation. (shrink)

This chapter discusses a problematic relation between user-friendly design and manipulation. Some specific features of the design of a website can make it a more or less potent tool for manipulation. In particular, features that can be summed up as creating a user-friendly experience are also manipulation-friendly. The ease of using a website also makes it easier to be manipulated via the website. The chapter provides an argument that this can be explained as a less intellectually virtuous engagement with websites (...) that are more user-friendly. It is simply more difficult to mobilize suitable intellectual virtues when the website is quick and easy to use. For instance, when Google Search presents search results quickly and easily users become less intellectually cautious and independent than they ought to be. The chapter discusses a mechanism that links user-friendly design to an overly trusting attitude towards a website that leads to this intellectually careless behaviour. This link is support with empirical evidence based on processing fluency effects. (shrink)

An overview is presented of what I take to be the role of the intellectual virtues within the epistemological enterprise. Traditionally, the theory of knowledge has been thought to be central to the epistemological project, but since, as I explain, the intellectual virtues aren’t required for knowledge, this might suggest that they have only a marginal role to play in epistemological debates. I argue against this suggestion by showing how the intellectual virtues are in fact crucial to several core epistemological (...) topics, including the nature of inquiry, epistemic axiology and our understanding of ignorance. (shrink)

This study explores a liberatory epistemic virtue that is suitable for good learning as a form of liberating socially situated epistemic agents toward ideal virtuousness. First, I demonstrate that the weak neutralization of epistemically bad stereotypes is an end of good learning. Second, I argue that weak neutralization represents a liberatory epistemic virtue, the value of which derives from liberating us as socially situated learners from epistemic blindness to epistemic freedom. Third, I explicate two distinct forms of epistemic transformation: constitutive (...) and causal epistemic transformation. I argue that compared with the ideal conception of epistemic virtue, constitutive epistemic transformation that involves good learning has a transcendent value in light of agents constantly renewing their default epistemic status toward ideal virtuousness. (shrink)

How should we understand good philosophical inquiry? Ernest Sosa has argued that the key to answering this question lies with virtue-based epistemology. According to virtue-based epistemology, competences are prior to epistemic justification. More precisely, a subject is justified in having some type of belief only because she could have a belief of that type by exercising her competences. Virtue epistemology is well positioned to explain why, in forming false philosophical beliefs, agents are often less rational than it is possible to (...) be. False philosophical beliefs are often unjustified—and the agent is thereby less rational for having them—precisely because these beliefs could not be formed by exercising competences. But, virtue epistemology is not well positioned to explain why, in failing to form some true philosophical beliefs, agents are less rational than it is possible to be. In cases where agents fall short by failing to believe philosophical truths, the problem is not that they believe things they shouldn’t, but that they lack beliefs they ought to have. We argue that Timothy Williamson's recent critique of the a priori/a posteriori distinction falls prey to similar problem cases. Williamson fails to see that a type of belief might be a priori justified if and only if, even without any special confirming experiences, agents fall short by failing to have this type of belief. We conclude that there are types of beliefs that are deeply a priori justified for any agent regardless of what epistemic competences the agent has. However, we also point out that this view has a problem of its own: it appears to make the acquisition of a priori knowledge too easy. We end by suggesting that a move back towards virtue-based epistemology is necessary. But in order for this move to be effective, epistemic competences will have to be understood very differently than in the reliabilist tradition. (shrink)

Discussions of diversity tend to paint a mixed picture of the practical and epistemic value of diversity. While there are expansive and detailed accounts of the value of cognitive diversity, explorations of identity diversity typically focus on its value as a source or cause of cognitive diversity. The resulting picture on which identity diversity only possesses a derivative practical and epistemic value is unsatisfactory and fails to account for some of its central epistemic benefits. In response, I propose that collective (...) virtue epistemology offers theoretical models that can further our understanding of the benefits of diversity. And I offer a case study to illustrate how this approach could be used to explore the logic of the identity diversity bonus. (shrink)

How can we make businesspeople more concerned about the truth of the information they spread or allow to circulate? In this age of ‘fake news’, ‘business bullshit’ and ‘post-truth,’ the issue is of the utmost importance, especially for business trustworthiness in the internet economy. The issue is related to a kind of epistemic responsibility, that consists in accounting for one’s own epistemic wrongdoings, such as making a third party believe something false. Despite growing interest in epistemic misbehavior in the literature (...) of business ethics, the question of epistemic responsibility has been neglected. The aim of this paper is therefore to address this gap, by proposing a notion of epistemic responsibility for business, that may help regulate undesirable epistemic behavior, such as the spreading of false information. To define this notion of epistemic responsibility, I have introduced the concept of epistemic fault. Being epistemically responsible consists in being disposed to account for alleged epistemic faults. This notion of epistemic fault relies on a theoretical framework which combines a typology of eight ‘epistemic values’, a normative stance regarding these values, and a dispositional approach to epistemic virtues and vices. I use this theoretical framework to integrate the various accounts of epistemic virtues and vices found in the literature into a single explanatory scheme. Combined with the notion of epistemic responsibility itself, such an integrative framework should facilitate the practical application of an operational epistemic ethics in business, i.e., the development of virtuous epistemic practices. (shrink)

We examine the following consequentialist view of virtue: a trait is a virtue if and only if it has good consequences in some relevant way. We highlight some motivations for this basic account, and offer twelve choice points for filling it out. Next, we explicate Julia Driver’s consequentialist view of virtue in reference to these choice points, and we canvass its merits and demerits. Subsequently, we consider three suggestions that aim to increase the plausibility of her position, and critically analyze (...) them. We conclude that one of those proposed revisions would improve her account. (shrink)

This paper engages in what might be called anticipatory virtue epistemology, as it anticipates some virtue epistemological risks related to a near-future version of brain-computer interface technology that Michael Lynch (2014) calls 'neuromedia.' I analyze how neuromedia is poised to negatively affect the intellectual character of agents, focusing specifically on the virtue of intellectual perseverance, which involves a disposition to mentally persist in the face of challenges towards the realization of one’s intellectual goals. First, I present and motivate what I (...) call ‘the cognitive offloading argument’, which holds that excessive cognitive offloading of the sort incentivized by a device like neuromedia threatens to undermine intellectual virtue development from the standpoint of the theory of virtue responsibilism. Then, I examine the cognitive offloading argument as it applies to the virtue of intellectual perseverance, arguing that neuromedia may increase cognitive efficiency at the cost of intellectual perseverance. If used in an epistemically responsible manner, however, cognitive offloading devices may not undermine intellectual perseverance but instead allow us to persevere with respect to intellectual goals that we find more valuable by freeing us from different kinds of menial intellectual labor. (shrink)

Ascribing autonomous status to agents is a valuable practice. As such, we ought to care about how we engage in practices of autonomy ascription. However, disagreement between first-personal experiences of an agent's autonomy and third-personal determinations of their autonomy presents challenges of ethical and epistemic concern. My view is that insights from a dialogical rather than nondialogical account of autonomy give us the resources to combat the challenges associated with autonomy ascription. I draw on Andrea Westlund's account of dialogical autonomy—on (...) which autonomy requires a dialogical disposition to hold oneself answerable to external critical perspectives—to make my case. (shrink)

Which traits are beautiful? And is their beauty perceptual? It is argued that moral virtues are partly beautiful to the extent that they tend to give rise to a certain emotion— ecstasy—and that compassion tends to be more beautiful than fair-mindedness because it tends to give rise to this emotion to a greater extent. It is then argued, on the basis that emotions are best thought of as a special, evaluative, kind of perception, that this argument suggests that moral virtues (...) are partly beautiful to the extent that they tend to give rise to a certain kind of evaluative perceptual experience. (shrink)

My main aim in this paper is to examine whether gossip should be categorized as an epistemically valuable character trait. Gossip satisfies the necessary and jointly sufficient conditions for an acquired character trait to be classified as an intellectual virtue under the responsibilist understanding of the concept of virtue. The excellent gossiper is motivated to acquire epistemic goods through gossiping, reliably successful in acquiring epistemic goods through gossiping, competent at the activity of gossiping and good at judging when, with whom (...) and what to gossip. Nonetheless, I show that the excellent gossiper inflicts epistemic wrong on others. The excellent gossiper comes to intentionally acquire another person’s private information without their consent. This leaves virtue responsibilists with three options: resist my argument that gossip qualifies as a responsibilist virtue and/or that excellent gossiping inflicts epistemic wrong, bite the bullet and argue that the intellectually virtuous agent sometimes inflicts epistemic wrong on other agents intentionally, develop a no-wrong principle that disqualifies gossip from being categorized as an intellectual virtue. (shrink)

I argue that virtue reliabilism and virtue responsibilism are complementary. They do not give competing accounts of epistemic virtue. Rather they explain the excellent functioning of different parts of our cognitive apparatus. Reliabilist virtue designates the excellent functioning of fast and context-specific Type 1 cognitive processes, while responsibilist virtue means an excellent functioning of effortful and reflective Type 2 cognitive processes. This account unifies reliabilist and responsibilist virtue theory. But the virtues are not unified by designating some epistemic norm that (...) both aim at. Instead, I unify them through their cognitive foundations. Because Type 1 and Type 2 cognition are complementary, reliabilist and responsibilist virtues are complementary. Thereby, this dual-process theory of epistemic virtue gives a naturalised account of virtues as well as an explanation of how reliabilism and responsibilism relate. This approach offers a solution for both the generality problem and the situationist challenge to virtue epistemology; additionally it preserves the epistemological autonomy of each virtue type. (shrink)

Discussion of epistemic responsibility typically focuses on belief formation and actions leading to it. Similarly, accounts of collective epistemic responsibility have addressed the issue of collective belief formation and associated actions. However, there has been little discussion of collective responsibility for preventing epistemic harms, particularly those preventable only by the collective action of an unorganized group. We propose an account of collective epistemic responsibility which fills this gap. Building on Hindriks' (2019) account of collective moral responsibility, we introduce the Epistemic (...) Duty to Join Forces. Our theory provides an account of the responsibilities of scientists to prevent epistemic harms during inquiry. (shrink)

Whereas epistemology is the philosophical theory of knowledge, its nature and scope, metaepistemology takes a step back from particular substantive debates in epistemology in order to inquire into the assumptions and commitments made by those who engage in these debates. This entry will focus on a selection of these assumptions and commitments, including whether there are objective epistemic facts; and how to characterize the subject matter and the methodology of epistemology.

Although research on epistemic injustice has focused on the effects of prejudice in epistemic exchanges, the account of prejudice that emerges in Fricker’s (2007) view is not completely clear. In particular, I claim that the epistemic role of prejudice in the structure of testimonial justification is still in need of a satisfactory explanation. What special epistemic power does prejudice exercise that prevents the speaker’s words from constituting evidence for the hearer’s belief? By clarifying this point, it will be possible to (...) address two more general issues concerning the nature of prejudice: its resistance to counterevidence and the steps involved in overcoming prejudice. I propose a hinge account of prejudice, based on the recent perspective of hinge epistemology, to help clarify these aspects. According to the hinge account, prejudices share a fundamental feature with hinges: they work as norms of evidential significance, and as such, they determine what can and cannot count as evidence for belief. (shrink)

A vexing problem in contemporary epistemology—one with origins in Plato’s Meno—concerns the value of knowledge, and in particular, whether and how the value of knowledge exceeds the value of mere true opinion. The recent literature is deeply divided on the matter of how best to address the problem. One point, however, remains unquestioned: that if a solution is to be found, it will be at the personal level, the level at which states of subjects or agents, as such, appear. We (...) take exception to this orthodoxy, or at least to its unquestioned status. We argue that subpersonal states play a significant—arguably, primary—role in much epistemically relevant cognition and thus constitute a domain in which we might reasonably expect to locate the “missing source” of epistemic value, beyond the value attached to mere true belief. (shrink)

Recent discussions of cognitive enhancement often note that drugs and technologies that improve cognitive performance may do so at the risk of “cheapening” our resulting cognitive achievements Arguing about bioethics, Routledge, London, 2012; Harris in Bioethics 25:102–111, 2011). While there are several possible responses to this worry, we will highlight what we take to be one of the most promising—one which draws on a recent strand of thinking in social and virtue epistemology to construct an integrationist defence of cognitive enhancement.. (...) According to such a line, there is—despite initial appearances to the contrary—no genuine tension between using enhancements to attain our goals and achieving these goals in a valuable way provided the relevant enhancement is appropriately integrated into the agent’s cognitive architecture. In this paper, however, we show that the kind of integration recommended by such views will likely come at a high cost. More specifically, we highlight a dilemma for users of pharmacological cognitive enhancement: they can meet the conditions for cognitive integration at the significant risk of dangerous dependency, or remain free of such dependency while foregoing integration and the valuable achievements that such integration enables. After motivating and clarifying the import of this dilemma, we offer recommendations for how future cognitive enhancement research may offer potential routes for navigating past it. (shrink)

Editorial to the Special Issue "Critical Reflections on Philosophy, Education, and Prison Sociology". The Issue focuses on the intersection of philosophy with prisons, prisoners, and prison research, particularly in prison education and prison sociology. It takes in a broad range of topics, including the role of philosophy in prisons and prison research; the value of formal programmes of philosophical education in prisons; issues of trust, freedom, collaboration, and power in the prison classroom; and critical perspectives on the relationship between education (...) and ideas of rehabilitation and re-integration. (shrink)

Knowledge defeat occurs when a subject knows that _p_, gains a defeater for her belief, and thereby loses her knowledge without necessarily losing her belief. It’s far from obvious that externalists can accommodate putative cases of knowledge defeat since a belief that satisfies the externalist conditions for knowledge can satisfy those conditions even if the subject later gains a defeater for her belief. I’ll argue that virtue reliabilists can accommodate defeat intuitions via a new kind of error theory. I argue (...) that in cases where the subject holds dogmatically onto her belief in the face of an apparent defeater, her belief never qualified as knowledge, since the belief was not gained via an exercise of her epistemic virtues. In cases where the subject suspends her judgment upon receiving the putative defeater her original belief might have qualified as knowledge, but crucially, in such cases knowledge is lost due to loss of belief, rather than due to the epistemic force of the defeater. Therefore, knowledge defeat isn’t a genuine phenomenon even though there are no cases where a subject knows what she originally believed after receiving the putative defeater. (shrink)

In this paper, I discuss the ways in which epistemic anxiety promotes well-being, specifically by examining the positive contributions that feelings of epistemic anxiety make toward intellectually virtuous inquiry. While the prospects for connecting the concept of epistemic anxiety to the two most prominent accounts of intellectual virtue, i.e., “virtue-reliabilism” and “virtue-responsibilism”, are promising, I primarily focus on whether the capacity for epistemic anxiety counts as an intellectual virtue in the reliabilist sense. As I argue, there is a close yet (...) unexplored connection between feelings of epistemic anxiety and the form of inference commonly known as “Inference to the Best Explanation” (IBE). Specifically, I argue that both the recognition that some fact requires an explanation—a necessary first step in applying IBE—and the subsequent motivation to employ IBE are typically facilitated by feelings of epistemic anxiety. So, provided IBE is truth-conducive the capacity for epistemic anxiety should count as an intellectual virtue in the reliabilist sense. After outlining my main argument, I address the challenge that the capacity for epistemic anxiety has the potential to be misleading. To respond to this challenge, I discuss how our recognition that a fact requires an explanation must in part be a species of practical knowledge, rather than theoretical knowledge. For the agent to skillfully distinguish between facts that require an explanation and facts that do not, she must develop the virtuous disposition to feel the appropriate amount of epistemic anxiety. Despite the many negative aspects associated with anxiety, as I conclude, being disposed to feel the appropriate amount of epistemic anxiety is ultimately good for us. (shrink)