After a brief overview of what intellectual virtues are, I offer three arguments for the claim that education should aim at fostering ‘intellectual character virtues’ like curiosity, open‐mindedness, intellectual courage, and intellectual honesty. I then go on to discuss several pedagogical and related strategies for achieving this aim.

This book provides a reconstruction of Aristotelian character education, shedding new light on what moral character really is, and how it can be highlighted, measured, nurtured and taught in current schooling. Arguing that many recent approaches to character education understand character in exclusively amoral, instrumentalist terms, Kristjánsson proposes a coherent, plausible and up-to-date concept, retaining the overall structure of Aristotelian character education. After discussing and debunking popular myths about Aristotelian character education, subsequent chapters focus on the practical ramifications and methodologies (...) of character education. These include measuring virtue and morality, asking whether Aristotelian character education can salvage the effects of bad upbringing, and considering implications for teacher training and classroom practice. The book rejuvenates time-honoured principles of the development of virtues in young people, at a time when 'character' features prominently in educational agendas and parental concerns over school education systems. Offering an interdisciplinary perspective which draws from the disciplines of education, psychology, philosophy and sociology, this book will appeal to researchers, academics and students wanting a greater insight into character education. (shrink)

This paper explores the ambiguous impact of new information and communications technologies on the cultivation of moral skills in human beings. Just as twentieth century advances in machine automation resulted in the economic devaluation of practical knowledge and skillsets historically cultivated by machinists, artisans, and other highly trained workers , while also driving the cultivation of new skills in a variety of engineering and white collar occupations, ICTs are also recognized as potential causes of a complex pattern of economic deskilling, (...) reskilling, and upskilling. In this paper, I adapt the conceptual apparatus of sociological debates over economic deskilling to illuminate a different potential for technological deskilling/upskilling, namely the ability of ICTs to contribute to the moral deskilling of human users, a potential that exists alongside rich but currently underrealized possibilities for moral reskilling and/or upskilling. I flesh out this general hypothesis by means of examples involving automated weapons technology, new media practices, and social robotics. I conclude that since moral skills are essential prerequisites for the effective development of practical wisdom and virtuous character, and since market and cultural forces are not presently aligned to bring about the more salutary of the ambiguous potentials presented here, the future shape of these developments warrants our close attention—and perhaps active intervention. (shrink)

Ernest Sosa's A Virtue Epistemology, Vol. I is arguably the single-most important monograph to be published in analytic epistemology in the last ten years. Sosa, the first in the field to employ the notion of intellectual virtue – in his ground-breaking ‘The Raft and the Pyramid’– is the leading proponent of reliabilist versions of virtue epistemology. In A Virtue Epistemology, he deftly defends an externalist account of animal knowledge as apt belief, argues for a distinction between animal and reflective knowledge, (...) contends that rational intuition is an intellectual virtue ; and offers responses to dream scepticism, the problem of the criterion and the value problem. Nearly all of these arguments are new, albeit consistent with Sosa's earlier work; that is, consistent with two notable exceptions. First, c ontra Sosa's ‘Replies’ in Ernest Sosa and His Critics, A Virtue Epistemology explicitly contends that safety is not required for animal knowledge. Second, unlike Sosa's Knowledge in Perspective, which arguably construes the intellectual virtues as merely instrumentally valuable, A Virtue Epistemology explicitly contends that the intellectual virtues are instrumentally and constitutively valuable. Best read in conjunction with the above monographs and Epistemic Justification, A Virtue Epistemology is mandatory reading for epistemologists and graduate students in the field. It will rightly set the standard for debates in analytic epistemology for years to come.I will summarize and raise objections to two key conclusions that are unique to A Virtue Epistemology: the ‘kaleidoscope-perceiver’ has animal knowledge but lacks reflective knowledge; unlike the k-perceiver, the ordinary perceiver has reflective knowledge. My objections …. (shrink)

Full virtue and practical wisdom comprise the end of neo-Aristotelian moral development, but wisdom cannot be cultivated straight away through arguments and teaching. Wisdom is integrated with, and builds upon, habituation: the acquisition of virtuous character traits through the repeated practice of corresponding virtuous actions. Habit formation equips people with a taste for, and commitment to, the good life; furthermore it provides one with discriminatory and reflective capacities to know how to act in particular circumstances. Unfortunately, habituation is often understood (...) primarily as a method suitable only for children. This article examines whether Aristotle limited habituation to children and, if not, what the relationship between habituation and wisdom beyond childhood might look like. This article concludes that wisdom-guided habituation is also possible for adults who continue and confirm their already established virtuous habits. The implications of this for professional moral education are subsequently discussed. (shrink)

Abstract: Open-mindedness is typically at the top of any list of the intellectual or "epistemic" virtues. Yet, providing an account that simultaneously explains why open-mindedness is an epistemically valuable trait to have and how such a trait is compatible with full-blooded belief turns out to be a challenge. Building on the work of William Hare and Jonathan Adler, I defend a view of open-mindedness that meets this challenge. On this view, open-mindedness is primarily an attitude toward oneself as a believer, (...) rather than toward any particular belief. To be open-minded is to be aware of one's fallibility as a believer, and to acknowledge the possibility that anytime one believes something, one could be wrong. In order to see that such an attitude is epistemically valuable even to an already virtuous agent, some details of the skills and habits of the open-minded agent are elucidated. (shrink)

The recent literature on the theory of knowledge has taken a distinctive turn by focusing on the role of the cognitive and intellectual virtues in the acquisition of knowledge. The main contours and motivations for such virtue-theoretic accounts of knowledge are here sketched and it is argued that virtue epistemology in its most plausible form can be regarded as a refined form of reliabilism, and thus a variety of epistemic externalism. Moreover, it is claimed that there is strong empirical support (...) in favour of the virtue epistemic position so understood, and an empirical study regarding the cognitive processes employed by medical experts in their diagnosis and treatment of epilepsy is cited in this regard. In general, it is argued that one can best account for 'expert' knowledge in terms of a virtue-theoretic epistemology that retains key reliabilist features. It is thus shown that understanding knowledge along virtue-theoretic lines has important implications for our understanding of how knowledge is acquired, and thus for the philosophy of education. (shrink)

People increasingly form beliefs based on information gained from automatically filtered Internet ‎sources such as search engines. However, the workings of such sources are often opaque, preventing ‎subjects from knowing whether the information provided is biased or incomplete. Users’ reliance on ‎Internet technologies whose modes of operation are concealed from them raises serious concerns about ‎the justificatory status of the beliefs they end up forming. Yet it is unclear how to address these concerns ‎within standard theories of knowledge and justification. (...) To shed light on the problem, we introduce a ‎novel conceptual framework that clarifies the relations between justified belief, epistemic responsibility, ‎action, and the technological resources available to a subject. We argue that justified belief is subject to ‎certain epistemic responsibilities that accompany the subject’s particular decision-taking circumstances, ‎and that one typical responsibility is to ascertain, so far as one can, whether the information upon which ‎the judgment will rest is biased or incomplete. What this responsibility comprises is partly determined by ‎the inquiry-enabling technologies available to the subject. We argue that a subject’s beliefs that are ‎formed based on Internet-filtered information are less justified than they would be if she either knew how ‎filtering worked or relied on additional sources, and that the subject may have the epistemic ‎responsibility to take measures to enhance the justificatory status of such beliefs.‎. (shrink)

This article initially provides a brief overview of virtue epistemology; it thereafter considers some possible ramifications of this branch of the theory of knowledge for the philosophy of education. The main features of three different manifestations of virtue epistemology are first explained. Importantly, it is then maintained that developments in virtue epistemology may offer the resources to critique aspects of the debate between Hirst and Carr about how the philosophy of education ought to be carried out and by whom. Wilfred (...) Carr's position—that educational practitioners have privileged access to philosophical knowledge about teaching practice—will in particular be questioned. It will be argued that Carr's view rests on a form of epistemology, internalism, which places unreasonably narrow restrictions upon the range of actors and ways, in which philosophical knowledge of and/or for education might be achieved. In declaring that practical wisdom regarding teaching is ‘entirely dependent’ on practitioner reflection, Carr not only radically deviates from Aristotle's notion of practical wisdom, he also, in effect, renders redundant all philosophical research about education that is not initiated by teachers in this manner. It is concluded that Aristotle's general approach to acquiring information and knowledge about the world might yet still offer a foundation for a more comprehensive philosophy of education; one that makes clear that the professional testimony and reflection of teachers, observation of teaching practice, and already existing educational philosophy, theory and policy can all be perceived as potentially valuable sources of philosophical knowledge of and for education. (shrink)

Kristján Kristjánsson's aim in this article is to bury the old saw that dialogue is exclusively a Socratic but not an Aristotelian method of education for moral character. Although the truncated discussion in Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics of the character development of the young may indicate that it is merely the result of a mindless process of behavioral conditioning, Nancy Sherman has argued convincingly that such a process would never yield the end result that Aristotle deems all-important — a precondition for (...) the ascription of virtue — namely, reason-infused phronesis. Rather than having to rely on impressionistic Aristotelian reconstructions here, Kristjánsson observes, considerable enlightenment can be gleaned by studying Aristotle's account of friendship, especially his account of how character friends reciprocally construct each other's selfhoods through sustained, dialectical engagement. It is clear from this description that ideal character building essentially involves dialogue. If that is correct, however, in the case of character friendship, new light can be shed on other Aristotelian staples of character education, such as role modeling and the use of literature and music, as those will then also, by parity of reasoning, involve sustained use of a dialogical method. (shrink)

In the Republic, Plato developed an educational program through which he trained young Athenians in desiring truth, without offering them any knowledge-education. This is not because he refused to pass on knowledge but because he considered knowledge of the Good as an ongoing research program. I show this by tracing the steps of the education of the Philosopher-Kings in Plato’s ideal state, to establish that the decades-long educational regime aims at training them in three types of virtue: Moral Virtue; the (...) Cognitive Virtue of Abstraction; the Cognitive Virtue of Debate.Plato’s theory of education has much to teach us about intellectual character education today. The Platonic educational program does not advocate the direct transmission of knowledge from teacher to learner but rather focuses on building the learners’ epistemic dispositions. Building upon the Socratic Method, Plato’s educational program does not ‘spoon-feed’ knowledge to the learners but rather fosters the growth of intellectual virtues through problem-solving.I explain ways in which fostering intellectual virtues through problem-solving could be applied in classrooms today. I conclude that Plato’s rigorous educational program is of definite merit for contemporary virtue education, especially since Aristotle offers us surprisingly little on how to educate for intellectual virtues. (shrink)

I argue that, although education should have positive effects on students’ epistemic character, it is often actually damaging, having bad effects. Rather than cultivating virtues of the mind, certain forms of education lead to the development of the vices of the mind - it is therefore epistemically corrupting. After sketching an account of that concept, I offer three illustrative case studies.

This paper has two distinct but related goals: (1) to identify some of the potential consequences of the Internet for our cognitive abilities and (2) to suggest an approach to evaluate these consequences. I begin by outlining the Google effect, which (allegedly) shows that when we know information is available online, we put less effort into storing that information in the brain. Some argue that this strategy is adaptive because it frees up internal resources which can then be used for (...) other cognitive tasks, whereas others argue that this is maladaptive because it makes us less knowledgeable. I argue that the currently available empirical evidence in cognitive psychology does not support strong conclusions about the negative effects of the Internet on memory. Before we can make value-judgements about the cognitive effects of the Internet, we need more robust and ecologically-valid evidence. Having sketched a more nuanced picture of the Google effect, I then argue that the value of our cognitive abilities is in part intrinsic and in part instrumental, that is, they are both valuable in themselves and determined by the socio-cultural context in which these cognitive abilities are utilised. Focussing on instrumental value, I argue that, in an information society such as ours, having the skills to efficiently navigate, evaluate, compare, and synthesize online information are (under most circumstances) more valuable than having a lot of facts stored in biological memory. This is so, partly because using the Internet as an external memory system has overall benefits for education, navigation, journalism, and academic scholarship. (shrink)

This paper applies a virtue epistemology approach to using the Internet, as to improve our information-seeking behaviours. Virtue epistemology focusses on the cognitive character of agents and is less concerned with the nature of truth and epistemic justification as compared to traditional analytic epistemology. Due to this focus on cognitive character and agency, it is a fruitful but underexplored approach to using the Internet in an epistemically desirable way. Thus, the central question in this paper is: How to use the (...) Internet in an epistemically virtuous way? Using the work of Jason Baehr, it starts by outlining nine intellectual or epistemic virtues: curiosity, intellectual autonomy, intellectual humility, attentiveness, intellectual carefulness, intellectual thoroughness, open-mindedness, intellectual courage and intellectual tenacity. It then explores how we should deploy these virtues and avoid the corresponding vices when interacting with the Internet, particularly search engines. Whilst an epistemically virtuous use of the Internet will not guarantee that one will acquire true beliefs, understanding or even knowledge, it will strongly improve one’s information-seeking behaviours. The paper ends with arguing that teaching and assessing online intellectual virtues should be part of school and university curricula, perhaps embedded in critical thinking courses, or even better, as individual units. (shrink)

This paper reviews two skeptical arguments and argues that a reliabilist framework is necessary to avoid them. The paper also argues that agent reliabilism, which makes the knower the seat of reliability, is the most plausible version of reliabilism.

Ignorance of one’s privileges and prejudices is an epistemic problem. While the sources of ignorance of privilege and prejudice are increasingly understood, less clarity exists about how to remedy ignorance. In fact, the various causes of ignorance can seem so powerful, various, and mutually reinforcing that studying the epistemology of ignorance can inspire pessimism about combatting socially constructed ignorance. I argue that this pessimism is unwarranted. The testimony of members of oppressed groups can often help members of privileged groups overcome (...) their ignorance. This paper argues that a particular type of speaker’s trust—hopeful trust—can motivate hearers to become cognizant of their privilege and prejudice. I argue that hopeful trust is a powerful way of eliciting trust-responsiveness that can be an effective mechanism for challenging privilege and prejudice. To make this case, I draw on case studies of online attempts to challenge ignorance. While the problems of testimonial injustice, defensi... (shrink)

How can we cultivate intellectual virtues in our students? I provide an overview of virtue epistemology, explaining two types of intellectual virtues: reliabilist virtues and responsibilist virtues. I suggest that both types are acquired via some combination of practice on the part of the student and explanation on the part of the instructor. I describe strategies for teaching these two types of virtues in the classroom, including an activity for teaching the skill of using the square of opposition, and several (...) activities that encourage students to practice open-minded acts, intellectually courageous acts, and the motivation for truth. (shrink)

Is closed-mindedness always an intellectual vice? Are there conditions in which it might be an intellectual virtue? This paper adopts a working analysis of closed-mindedness as an unwillingness or inability to engage seriously with relevant intellectual options. In standard cases, closed-mindedness will be an intellectual vice. But, in epistemically hostile environments, closed-mindedness will be an intellectual virtue.

The primary goal of this paper is to propose a working analysis of the disposition of closed-mindedness. I argue that closed-mindedness (CM) is an unwillingness or inability to engage (seriously) with relevant intellectual options. Dogmatism (DG) is one kind of closed-mindedness: it is an unwillingness to engage seriously with relevant alternatives to the beliefs one already holds. I do not assume that the disposition of closed-mindedness is always an intellectual vice; rather I treat the analysis of the disposition, and its (...) status as an intellectual vice, as separate questions. The concluding section develops a framework for determining the conditions under which closed-mindedness will be an intellectual vice. (shrink)

This book is the first systematic treatment of 'responsibilist' or character-based virtue epistemology, an approach to epistemology that focuses on intellectual ...