Virtues of the Mind - 2.1-5

(Originally written November 26, 2006 in Book 8)

Virtues of the Mind
Linda Zagzebski

2.1

Internists often try to relativize epistemic justification. A justification in internalism is one that justifies an individual's belief

2.2 The neglect of understanding and wisdom

Arguments against contemporary epistemology have shown that it is favorable to adapting a virtue epistemology.

Some philosophers have complained that contemporary epistemology is insufficiently attentive to the social aspects of cognitive activity.

Virtue is more adaptable to social context than reliabilist positions like reliable belief-forming mechanism (Goldman) or belief forming faculty (Sosa).

Aristotle understand the acquisition of virtue as fundamentally social.

Jonathon Kvanvig objects to the focus on one belief in one person in epistemology. If it is impossible to abstract a single belief from a core of beliefs, a belief-based epistemological theory appears less attractive.

Contemporary epistemology is concerned with amassing the most propositional knowledge as possible.

In post-Aristotelian ancient philosophy and modern philosophy certitude has been favored over wisdom. Wisdom was the focus of Plato, Aristotle, the Middle Age philosophies by the latter two, Spinoza and Locke.

Propositional knowledge was secondary to wisdom and understanding in Greek philosophy. Plato (according to Julius Moravcsik) sees propositional knowledge as a derivative of the process of understanding.

Moravcsik maintains that the increasing complexity of modern social and scientific theories has created a need to return to the concept of understanding in epistemology.

Gai Fine holds that Plato's focus on understanding in his epistemology leads to a less atomistic approach in epistemology.

Understanding ought to be a major point in epistemology. It has been ignored for too long

A belief-based epistemology is incapable of explaining the nature of understanding involving the comprehension of structures of reality, rather than its propositional structure.

Wisdom, like understanding has been neglected in modern epistemology.

Wisdom is tough to define, but whatever it is, it is qualitatively different than the accumulation of propositional knowledge.

Wisdom is not a property of propositional beliefs or a matter of relations between propositional beliefs.

Wisdom is concerned with grasping reality as a whole.

3. More reasons to try a virtue approach: the relations between believing and feeling

The advantages of virtue-based epistemology have been shown from:
1) Ethics and corresponding epistemic theories
2) Problems within epistemology
Now, 3) Philosophy of mind

"The treatment of belief as a psychic state independent of non-cognitive states is happily nearing its demise" (Zagzebski, 51).

Stephen Stich argues that the concept of belief is a useless figment of folk psychology.

Psychic states conventionally assigned to epistemologists are not that distinct from psychic states assigned to ethicists.

Many philosophers tend to think of the influence of feeling as an embarrassment, a defect, that needs to be eliminated.

William James held feelings in high regards, stating that belief is more allied to the emotions than anything else.

James defined belief as "the sense of reality". Hume defined belief as to believe is to have a vivid impression.

Without going as fas as James or Hume we can find supporting evidence that vividness of conception is causally connected with belief.

Belief comes in degrees. Belief is closely connected with states like wanting, hoping and expecting.

Wanting and hoping are emotive states, whereas belief and expecting are usually not considered emotive. But, are the emotive states truly distinguishable from cognitive states?

Emotion is either a component of belief or has a direct causal relationship with belief.

It is a widely held false notion that a belief influenced by desire makes it a belief acquired independent of facts.

If beliefs and emotions are intimately connected then we should be motivated to search for connections between moral and intellectual values.

4. An objection to modeling evaluation in epistemology on ethics: the dispute over the voluntariness of belief

The widespread assumption that human actions are voluntary, whereas cognitive activity is involuntary could completely undermine the connection of theoretical ethics and normative epistemology.

Believing is thought to be involuntary and this is the strongest argument against evaluating beliefs like moral evaluation.

Beliefs often seem to be the outcome of instinctive processes.

If beliefs are involuntary, then it is inappropriate to evaluate them from a moral standpoint.

It is wrong to blame a person for a belief if it is involuntary.

4.1 The irrelevance of the objection to virtue theory

Since belief is not the focal point of virtue epistemology, the voluntary or involuntary nature of a belief is less important than a person's disposition to virtue or vice.

The question is then: are our intellectual virtues and vices as voluntary as our moral virtues and vices?

Intellectual courage, perseverance, honesty and sincerity appear to be voluntary. But perceptiveness, insight and ability to form theories appear to be less voluntary and based on natural ability.

But, the intellectual virtues based on natural ability are at least as voluntary to the moral virtues of generosity or the vice of envy.

4.2 The voluntariness of belief

The difference between acts and beliefs is less great than what is thought.

Hume is one of the strongest adherents of involuntary belief. James and Descartes are voluntary belief supporters.

The Cartesian position is that the Will, not the intellect assists in one's belief.

Pascal held that the will is one of the chief organs in belief.

Modern cognitive voluntarism theories come from Murray Clarke, Christopher Hookway, Jonathon Cohen and Lorraine Code.

Zagzebski hold that beliefs are like acts in that they arrange themselves on a continuum of degrees of voluntariness.

Perceptual beliefs which are on the low end of the scale of voluntariness should not be used as paradigm cases for human rationality and justification any more than sneezing or scratching an itch should be used as paradigm cases for moral evaluation

4.3 Moral and Epistemic Luck

Sometimes we blame or praise a person more than is deserved because of moral luck or moral unluckiness.

The Kantian attempt to ground moral evaluation in something free of luck is problematic.

Moral luck is relevant to virtue-based epistemology in two ways:
1. It makes the attempt to model epistemology after ethics easier
2. The rejection of the Kantian position that our moral status is completely within our control takes away one of the motivations for wanting the Kantian theory in the first place

A virtue-based epistemology, because it focuses on inner traits, does not have to pay much attention to moral luck.

Even though few, if any, beliefs are objects of direct choice, they are as voluntary as many acts or omissions of acts for which we are responsible.

5. Conclusion to Part I: Why center epistemology on the virtues?

Be open-minded to see the outcome!

Virtues of the Mind - 1.1-2.1

(Originally written November 23, 2006 in Book 8)

Thanksgiving

Virtues of the Mind
Linda Zagzebski

1.1 Contemporary epistemic theories and their ethical models (continued)

Deontological and reliabilist theories of epistemology are structurally similar to act-based ethical theories.

Ernest Sosa proposed that by focusing on intellectual virtues we can bypass the struggle between foundationalist and coherentists and the whole problem of proper cognitive structure.

Sosa is not a virtue theorist. He speaks about intellectual virtues in a consequentialist backdrop.

The only intellectual virtue that really gets any attention is phronesis (tactical wisdom). Phronesis gets attention because Aristotle connects it to the distinctively moral virtues.

Since Sosa introduced the concept of intellectual virtue into epistemic literature, virtue epistemology has become another name for reliablism. Plantinga's theory of proper function and related theories are  prime examples.

Sosa and Greco define intellectual virtue in terms of its propensity to achieve a certain consequence.

Aristotle's intellectual virtues include: sophia (theoretical wisdom), phronesis (practical wisdom), and nous (insight or understanding). Hobbes includes good wit and discretion. Spinoza's primary intellectual virtue is understanding.

Zagzebski holds that virtue-based epistemology is well suited to analyze justification and knowledge.

Lorraine Code stresses a socialized approach to epistemology, connecting epistemology and moral theory. She shows an epistemological importance to human nature, not just a purely cognitive importance.

Code argues for a "responsiblist epistemology", emphasizing the active nature of the knower: A knower/believer has a choice of cognitive structuring, and is then accountable for these choices.

Code denounces reliabilism because she feels it makes knowers too passive. "A reliable knower could simply be an accurate, and relatively passive, recorder of experience" (Zagzebski, 12).

Code still only structures her epistemological theory on deontological and consequentialist ethics, not virtue-theory.

James Montmarquet takes epistemic virtue in the classical sense and connects epistemic works with moral virtue literature.

Montmarquet labels virtues of impartiality:
-openness to the ideas of others
-willingness to exchange ideas
-lack of jealousy
-lack of personal bias
-a lively sense of one's own fallibility

Montmarquet labels virtues of intellectual sobriety:
- sober-minded inquiry, not won't to embrace what is not really warranted.

Montmarquet labels virtues of intellectual courage:
-the willingness to conceive and examine alternatives to popularly held beliefs
-perseverance in the face of opposition from others
-determination to see a project through to completion

Montmarquet holds that any one desiring the truth must have these traits. But he holds that the intellectual virtues, even if they are not conductive and that some epistemic virtues function as regulators of the desire for truth.

Montmarquet's approach is vaguely Aristotelian. His epistemology is belief-based. Montmarquet does not connect his theory with aretaic moral theory.

Alvin Goldman accepts a form of virtue epistemology that is similar to Sosa. He explicitly links justification to intellectual virtue.

Zagzebski states that, while many epistemic theories recognize the desirability of an epistemological theory based on a carefully developed virtue theory, none have fully articulated a theory.

1.2 Some advantages of virtue-based theories

The mark of a virtue theory is that the primary object of evaluation is inner traits of a person, rather than acts of that person.

"To describe a good person is to describe that person's virtues, and it is maintained that a virtue is reducible neither to the performance of acts independently identified as right nor to a moral virtue than a disposition to act in the right way" (Zagzebski, 15).

There is more and less to a disposition to act in a right way to moral virtues.

A virtue includes a disposition to:
1) Characteristic emotions
2) Desires
3) Motives
4) Attitudes

There is less to moral virtues then the disposition to act right because a virtuous person does not invariably act in a way that can be fully captured by any independent set of normative criteria.

Agent-focused virtue theories focus on the agent and her traits as a way of determining what is right, but do not maintain that what is right is right because it is what a virtuous person would do. What a virtuous person would do is the best criterion for what is right. Zagzebski calls this weak virtue-theory.

Pure virtue-theory treats act-evaluation as a derivative from the character of an agent. An act is right because it is what a virtuous person might do.

Elizabeth Anscombe's "Modern Moral Philosophy" (1958) was probably the first major attempt in recent philosophy to show the advantages of virtue ethics over act-based ethics.

Anscombe argues that the principal notions of modern moral discourse (right, wrong, obligation and moral duty) lack content, but concepts of virtue (justice, chastity, courage and truth) are conceptually rich.

Anscombe also argues that right, wrong, obligation and duty are legal concepts and worthless without judge and jury. Since ethics is not rooted in theism (as it was when God was judge and jury) they are worthless terms.

Anscombe argues that we should return to Aristotelian virtue ethics, which doesn't hold to a blanket concept of wrong or a concept of duty.

The idea that there can be no exhaustive set of rules for how to act in every situation is showing more and more philosophers that a virtue-based theory of ethics is advantageous to cover all bases.

Virtue theory ethics can better explain the moral value of personal goods like love and friendship.

Duty-based ethics does not clearly show that their hierarchical approach is correct.

Another reason for favoring virtue-based ethics is that some virtues are not reducible to specific acts or disposition.

Modern epistemology is belief-based. A positively evaluated belief is called justified.

Legalistic language makes very little sense in epistemology. What does it mean to be epistemically guilty?

Linehan - does this notion give better fuel for virtue-based epistemology or does it glorify the ignorance of epistemology in ordinary people? One should not be swayed by the ignorance or fervor of the masses.

Wisdom is the unification of propositional and other types of knowledge. Knowledge can be misused but wisdom cannot be. Wisdom unifies knowledge and desires and values.

The focus on belief in epistemology has led to the neglect of wisdom. Also, a belief-based theory cannot explain the connection between wisdom and moral goodness.

Consequentialism is an externalist moral theory. A good is something that is produced.

Externalist moral theories face all sorts of problems. Reliabilism, which is structurally similar to consequentialism, faces similar problems.

Reliabilism's epistemic goal is to form true beliefs and not to form false ones. It is quantitative.

In Reliabilism, an accumulation of propositional knowledge is the goal, regardless of how that knowledge is gained. It can be done ignorantly or in a vicious manner.

Because of the difficulties faced by reliabilism and its basis of consequentialism, it is a good idea to search for an alternative ethical mode for epistemology.

Act-based ethics label right as merely not-wrong. Right means permissible. Virtue ethics focus on praiseworthiness.

Belief based epistemology see justification as analogous to epistemic blamelessness. It isn't really praiseworthy.

Virtue theory can evaluate virtue, vice and their intermediate states; whereas act-based/belief-based can only offer black and white cases

2. Difficulties in contemporary epistemology

Contemporary epistemology is too atomistic and the value of understanding has been neglected.

2.1 Problems in the notion of justification

For centuries, maybe as far back as Plato, knowledge has been considered to be a justified true belief. Then Gettier screwed everything up.

Justification has been the primary focus of Anlgo-American philosophers in epistemology.

Justification is a hot topic in epistemology, but it is a very vague and ambiguous term used in connection with countless theories.

Planting claims that:
1) The traditional view of justification originated with Locke and Descartes and identifies justification with a component of knowledge and to true belief and to performing one's epistemic duty.
2) The traditional view is incoherent equivocation and responsible for the externalist and internalist impasse
3) The remedy to the impasse is to dissolve the connections between justification and epistemic duty and justification and warrant.

Planting too readily connects moral and deontological concepts. Then by arguing against deontology he denounces internalism.

But, Zagzebski feels Plantinga's historical and conceptual points fail to make a convincing argument against internalism

William Alston goes further than Plantinga. He identifies six candidates for necessary conditions for justification:
1) Must be based on adequate ground
2) what justices a belief must probabalize it
3) a justification must be cognitively accessible to the subject
4) A justified belief must fit into a coherent system of beliefs
5) It must satisfy certain higher-level conditions
6) The believer must satisfy intellectual obligations in forming and maintaining the belief

Alston holds that justification cannot bear all the conceptual weight that has been given to it.

Alston points out that the issue between externalists and internists cannot be resolved because justification is in such different context in these two theories.

Internalism vs. Externalism

(Originally Written October 4, 2006 in Epistemology)

Internalism: one can only have knowledge if and only if one has solid evidence (justification). This is known as 'time slice' or synchronic

Externalism: the view that one has knowledge if one's beliefs are the result of a reliable process (reliabilism). This is known as 'genetic' or dischronic

Problems with the externalism approach arise from trying to give "reliable processes" and that it disregards all justification. It could lead to epistemological relativism. But, externalism escape the Gettier Problems altogether, which drive internalists to madness.

Goldman:

Belief forming process (functional operation)
-Reasoning
-Memory process
-perceptual processes

Qualifications:
1. Content neutrality
2. Conditional reliability

Objections:
1. Intuitions and phenomenal beliefs (response: there is a causal history, albeit brief)
2. Benevolent Demon and wishful thinking (responses: wishful thinking may not be true in this world, but it is in the made-up world)