Purifying Impure Virtue Epistemology
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Purifying Impure Virtue Epistemology. / Broncano-Berrocal, Fernando.
In: Philosophical Studies, Vol. 175, No. 2, 2018, p. 385-410.Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Purifying Impure Virtue Epistemology
AU - Broncano-Berrocal, Fernando
PY - 2018
Y1 - 2018
N2 - A notorious objection to robust virtue epistemology—the view that an agent knows a proposition if and only if her cognitive success is because of her intellectual virtues—is that it fails to eliminate knowledge-undermining luck. Modest virtue epistemologists agree with robust virtue epistemologists that if someone knows, then her cognitive success must be because of her intellectual virtues, but they think that more is needed for knowledge. More specifically, they introduce independently motivated modal anti-luck principles in their accounts to amend the problem of eliminating luck—this makes their views instances of impure virtue epistemology. The aim of the paper is to argue, firstly, that such a move lacks adequate motivation; secondly, that the resulting impure accounts equally fail to handle knowledge-undermining luck. On a more positive note, these results bolster a more orthodox virtue-theoretic approach to knowledge that assigns a fundamental explanatory role to the notion of ability. In this sense, the paper also sketches an account of ability and a corresponding account of knowledge that explains how success from ability (of the right kind) is incompatible with success from luck.
AB - A notorious objection to robust virtue epistemology—the view that an agent knows a proposition if and only if her cognitive success is because of her intellectual virtues—is that it fails to eliminate knowledge-undermining luck. Modest virtue epistemologists agree with robust virtue epistemologists that if someone knows, then her cognitive success must be because of her intellectual virtues, but they think that more is needed for knowledge. More specifically, they introduce independently motivated modal anti-luck principles in their accounts to amend the problem of eliminating luck—this makes their views instances of impure virtue epistemology. The aim of the paper is to argue, firstly, that such a move lacks adequate motivation; secondly, that the resulting impure accounts equally fail to handle knowledge-undermining luck. On a more positive note, these results bolster a more orthodox virtue-theoretic approach to knowledge that assigns a fundamental explanatory role to the notion of ability. In this sense, the paper also sketches an account of ability and a corresponding account of knowledge that explains how success from ability (of the right kind) is incompatible with success from luck.
KW - Faculty of Humanities
KW - Virtue epistemology
KW - Aptness
KW - Safety
KW - Luck
KW - Epistemic luck
U2 - 10.1007/s11098-017-0873-x
DO - 10.1007/s11098-017-0873-x
M3 - Journal article
VL - 175
SP - 385
EP - 410
JO - Philosophical Studies
JF - Philosophical Studies
SN - 0031-8116
IS - 2
ER -
ID: 172121548