Sharon's questions in class yesterday about the intellectual virtues ("Why these rather than some others?" and "Aren't the habits of highly reasonable people subjective?") got me thinking.
Suppose I gave you the periodic table of the elements, and you asked: Why these rather than some others? Naturally I would answer that these represent certain useful, regular features of the chemical world as we have discovered it. By analogy, I take this (abbreviated, summary) list of intellectual virtues to represent key objective features of an effective knowing process as we have collectively discovered it. (Refer to the toolkit for how to interpret the term ‘objective’ in this statement).
Of course, the toolkit does not give an argument for why these particular habits are effective means of refining knowledge and avoiding error, but then neither does the periodic table. Presumably some sense of why they make sense will emerge as we attempt to employ them.
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8 comments:
Habits are by definition subjective creatures (they are internal dispositions of individuals); but their status as virtues/vices is a separate question.
I don't think we can call the intellectual virtues in the toolkit objective unless the whole class has the same understanding of what "intellect" means, or as a class we determine a definition of intellect that we can all agree on. Additionally, we would all have to subscribe to the same universal morality.
I personally think these make good guidelines and that any reasonable person would agree with them as such, but when you call them virtues you imply moral judgement. Until someone persuades me otherwise, I don't see how that can be considered objective.
Btw, I think that the next version of A Philosophy Toolkit should include a definition of "virtues/vices".
The qualifier 'intellectual' is intended specifically to distinguish these from moral virtues. Whereas a moral virtue (say, kindness) is an element in a morally good character, an intellectual virtue (say, intellectual honesty) is a quality which contributes to the likelihood that one who has it will notice and correct erroneous views. This may or may not have direct relevance to morality.
Moreover, it's not clear to me why our collective agreement would be required for a designation of objectivity -- remember that we are using that term in a specifically epistemological sense: "A claim is (epistemologically) objective if there exists a public method for investigating whether or not the statement is true."
Good idea for another toolkit entry.
It is a virtue of the "toolkit," that it clearly distinguishes between the objectivity/ subjectivity and truth/falsity of virtue-claims.
Well, Lisa certainly dove into some thick business. Unfortunately,your call for a class agreement on the definition of the "intellect" is later canceled out by your concession that any "reasonable" person would agree with these virtues. Who is reasonable, and why would they agree?
At the end of the day, the list of Intellectual Virtues found in the toolkit use the term "virtue" just the same way Plato did. They are foundational aspects, not moral guidelines. Also, we are to take it on authority that these are indeed virtues to follow, because the authors of the Toolkit are philosophers. If philosophers are suggesting rules for proper though and discourse, I for one will take them at there word. They have proven authority by nature of their expertise.
As I understand it, a virtue is a quality that helps one who has it meet objectives. For moral virtues, these objectives are the goals of the society, or some abstract principles developed universally, but the virtues part remains the same.
So then, intellectual virtues are qualities that help one to meet the goals of "avoid error" and "refine knowledge". These two goals are distinct however, and things that accomplish one, do not necessarily accomplish the other.
For example, radical skepticism is a virtue of the first goal, "avoid error", but is entirely useless for "refining knowledge". Similarly, ockham's razor seems to fulfill the second goal, "refine knowledge" but doesn't seem to help avoid error at all, and could in fact cause it.
As such, we as thinkers seem to have a decision to make concerning where on the continuum we lie. Here I believe is what lisa (correct me if i'm wrong lisa) meant by agreeing on the definition of intellect.
Although, I wonder if someone could argue that the intellectual virtues presented as such in the toolkit work for any position on the continuum (possibly, but hopefully not excluding th endpoints).
See how much fun this is?
Michael: I'm flattered that you think my colleagues and I have earned our authority on these matters, but that would be at best a preliminary reason for accepting the list. Ultimately, of course, you would not be exercising these intellectual virtues if you did not subject them to critical analysis, and decide for yourself about their value.
Josh: Nice analysis of the distinction between avoiding error and refining knowledge, though surely the two are at least related. Radical skepticism, for example, is only effective at avoiding error if it is not itself an error (which I'm pretty sure it is). Likewise, Ockham's Razor succeeds in refining knowledge, if it does, only by reminding us to avoid errors of ontological excess.
I think that although Lisa may be searching for an impossible goal and that I agree with the view of virtues as being oddly subjective in accordance with what Josh was saying, I would say that there may be a deeper question to be asked from what Lisa was proposing. It almost seems as if peoples' individual experiences influence their perceptions in such a fundamental way that proving a set virtue to be "virtuous" by means of careful refinement of knowledge (to put in the way Josh would likely describe it) may be just as sound as receiving insight through a deity. Yet another way might be through emotional empathy. An example of this could be: A person some characteristic to be virtuous because this person sees how it has a universally positive effect on other's happiness. I don't really think that any of these would be more right, and thus I would like to pose the question: In a philosopher's toolkit, would the existence of a public method be enough to say it was objective, or is there a necessity for there to be a for all pertinent methods to be applicable. And to attempt to answer my own question, I think a way to bind these ideas together is for the public to understand logic in a publicly universal way.
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