Virtue Epistemology and Epistemic Luck

The recent movement towards virtue–theoretic treatments of epistemological concepts can be understood in terms of the desire to eliminate epistemic luck. Significantly, however, it is argued that the two main varieties of virtue epistemology are responding to different types of epistemic luck. In particular, whilst proponents of reliabilism–based virtue theories have been focusing on the problem of what I call "veritic" epistemic luck, non–reliabilism–based virtue theories have instead been concerned with a very different type of epistemic luck, what I call "reflective" epistemic luck. It is argued that, prima facie at least, both forms of epistemic luck need to be responded to by any adequate epistemological theory. The problem, however, is that one can best eliminate veritic epistemic luck by adducing a so–called safety–based epistemological theory that need not be allied to a virtue–based account, and there is no fully adequate way of eliminating reflective epistemic luck. I thus conclude that this raises a fundamental difficulty for virtue–based epistemological theories, on either construal.     

Virtue Epistemology and Epistemic Luck

The recent movement towards virtue–theoretic treatments of epistemological concepts can be understood in terms of the desire to eliminate epistemic luck. Significantly, however, it is argued that the two main varieties of virtue epistemology are responding to different types of epistemic luck. In particular, whilst proponents of reliabilism–based virtue theories have been focusing on the problem of what I call "veritic" epistemic luck, non–reliabilism–based virtue theories have instead been concerned with a very different type of epistemic luck, what I call "reflective" epistemic luck. It is argued that, prima facie at least, both forms of epistemic luck need to be responded to by any adequate epistemological theory. The problem, however, is that one can best eliminate veritic epistemic luck by adducing a so–called safety–based epistemological theory that need not be allied to a virtue–based account, and there is no fully adequate way of eliminating reflective epistemic luck. I thus conclude that this raises a fundamental difficulty for virtue–based epistemological theories, on either construal.     

Bad Luck for the Anti‐Luck Epistemologist

Anti‐luck epistemologists tell us that knowledge is incompatible with epistemic luck and that epistemic luck is just a special case of luck in general. Much work has been done on the intricacies of the first claim. In this paper, I scrutinize the second claim. I argue that it does not survive scrutiny. I then offer an analysis of luck that explains the relevant data and avoids the problems from which the current views of luck suffer. However, this analysis of luck is of no help to the anti‐luck epistemologist for it uses knowledge to explain luck, making this account of knowledge circular. The main lesson is that the only viable analysis of luck is not suited for the anti‐luck epistemologist's coveted noncircular analysis of knowledge.     

Virtue Epistemology: No New Cures

One version of virtue epistemology defines knowledge as belief whose truth arises from, or is explained by, the motives that produced it. This version is also intended to solve the Gettier problem, by shielding properly caused beliefs from double accidents. Unfortunately, there is no notion of "explains" or "arises from" which explains in the intended sense the truth of true beliefs.     

Four Varieties of Character‐Based Virtue Epistemology

The terrain of character‐based or “responsibilist” virtue epistemology has evolved dramatically over the last decade — so much so that it is far from clear what, if anything, unifies the various views put forth in this area. In an attempt to bring some clarity to the overall thrust and structure of this movement, I develop a fourfold classification of character‐based virtue epistemologies. I also offer a qualified assessment of each approach, defending a certain account of the probable future of this burgeoning subfield.     

Gratitude As A Virtue

In my view, gratitude is better understood as a virtue than as a source of duties. In addition to showing how virtue theory provides a better match for our moral phenomenology of gratitude, I argue that recent work in the area of the suberogatory, our considered judgments concerning the role of third parties, our reluctance to posit claim-rights to gratitude, and the observations of preceding studies of the subject all lend support to my contention that the language of duties is ill-suited to describe the moral dynamics of gratitude.     

Felix Culpa: Luck In Ethics And Epistemology

Luck threatens in similar ways our conceptions of both moral and epistemic evaluation. This essay examines the problem of luck as a metaphilosophical problem spanning the division between subfields in philosophy. I first explore the analogies between ethical and epistemic luck by comparing influential attempts to expunge luck from our conceptions of agency in these two subfields. I then focus upon Duncan Pritchard's challenge to the motivations underlying virtue epistemology, based specifically on its handling of the problem of epistemic luck. I argue that (1) consideration of the multifold nature of the problem of epistemic luck to an adequate account of human knowledge drives us to a mixed externalist epistemology; and (2) the virtue‐theoretical approach presents a particularly advantageous way of framing and developing a mixed externalist epistemology.     

Humility,Virtue Epistemology,and the New Atheism

Most criticisms of the New Atheism are attempts at traditional apologetics. However, Christians who wish to defend the faith against the onslaughts of these critics might appeal to virtue epistemology by showing that the New Atheists do not possess the necessary habits of thought that a person would need to make a careful and thoughtful consideration of the evidence. In fact, the New Atheists fail to practice intellectual humility and this prevents them from genuine engagement with the strengths religion offers.     

Subject‐Involving Luck

In recent years, philosophers have tended to think of luck as being a relation between an event (taken in the broadest sense of the term) and a subject; to give an account of luck is to fill in the right‐hand side of the following biconditional: an event e is lucky for a subject S if and only if ____. We can call such accounts of luck subject‐relative accounts of luck, since they attempt to spell out what it is for an event to be lucky relative to a subject. This essay argues that we should understand subject‐relative luck as a secondary phenomenon. What is of philosophical interest is giving an account of subject‐involving luck, i.e., filling in the right‐hand side of this biconditional: it is a matter of luck that S ?s iff ____. The essay argues that one of the upshots of focusing on subject‐involving luck is that lack of control accounts of luck (LCALs) become more attractive. In particular, a range of counterexamples to LCALs of subject‐relative luck do not apply to LCALs of subject‐involving luck.     

A Defense and Critical Appraisal of Sosaesque Virtue Epistemology

This paper attempts three things. The first is a defense and the rest is a critical appraisal of a crucial notion involved in the defense. First, it argues that John Turri’s criticisms of Ernest Sosa’s virtue epistemological account of knowledge that it fails to rule out Gettier cases rest on a misconstrual of the “because of clause” which Sosa employs. Turri overlooks the notion of “success manifests competence” which is central to understand the “because of” clause. Thus, the position of Sosa is defended from the criticisms of Turri. Secondly, it critically examines the notion of “success manifests competence” which is a crucial notion in Sosa’s account. It argues, unlike what Sosa seems to hold, some of the conditions which Sosa provides for “success manifests competence” are not necessary. It also clarifies, by agreeing with Sosa, that the conditions he provides are not sufficient for “success manifests competence.” Thirdly, it briefly argues that Sosa’s occasional insistence that complete competence should be present in the case of success manifests competence brings in certain internal tension in the account of Sosa. Thus, the paper defends Sosa’s position from the criticisms of Turri; but it also clarifies Sosa’s account as well as raises some criticisms to it.

     

The Solution to the Consequence Problem According to Anti‐Individualism

Abstract: For quite some time now there has been an ongoing debate whether authoritative self‐knowledge is compatible with anti‐individualism. 1 One influential line of argument against compatibilism is due to Paul Boghossian (1998) . I argue that Boghossian misconstrues what the anti‐individualist really is committed to. This defence of compatibilism is elaborated by showing how the Twin Earth thought experiment is meant to speak in favour of anti‐individualism. Partly this will show that Boghossian is wrong in his denial that empirical background knowledge is imported into the Twin Earth experiment. The main points argued are that Boghossian fails to realize, both, (1) that anti‐individualism does not involve concept‐individuation in terms of reference, and (2) that anti‐individualism assumes a core of representational success. In effect, these two points constitute an entirely new way to defend compatibilism, a way that seems to have gone unnoticed in the literature.     

Epistemology Factualized: New Contractarian Foundations for Epistemology

Many epistemologists are interested in offering a positive account of how it is that many of our common sense beliefs enjoy one or another positive epistemological status (e.g., how they are warranted, justified, reasonable, or what have you). A number of philosophers, under the influence of Wittgenstein and/or J. L. Austin, have argued that this enterprise is misconceived. The most effective version of this argument is to be found in Mark Kaplan’s paper “Epistemology on Holiday”. After explaining what this criticism amounts to and why it is important, I then respond to it. My response is based upon, and is intended to display the explanatory power of, a contractarian account of our practice of epistemic appraisal.     

Knowledge‐How and Epistemic Luck

Reductive intellectualists (e.g., Stanley & Williamson 2001; Stanley 2011a; 2011b; Brogaard 2008b; 2009; 2011) hold that knowledge‐how is a kind of knowledge‐that. For this thesis to hold water, it is obviously important that knowledge‐how and knowledge‐that have the same epistemic properties. In particular, knowledge‐how ought to be compatible with epistemic luck to the same extent as knowledge‐that. It is argued, contra reductive intellectualism, that knowledge‐how is compatible with a species of epistemic luck which is not compatible with knowledge‐that, and thus it is claimed that knowledge‐how and knowledge‐that come apart.