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Skilful reflection as a master virtue

  • S.I.: Knowledge, Virtue and Action
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Abstract

This paper advances the claim that skilful reflection is a master virtue in that skilful reflection shapes and corrects the other epistemic and intellectual virtues. We make the case that skilful reflection does this with both competence-based epistemic virtues and character-based intellectual virtues. In making the case that skilful reflection is a master virtue, we identify the roots of ideas central to our thesis in Confucian philosophy. In particular, we discuss the Confucian conception of reflection, as well as different levels of epistemic virtue. Next we set out the Dual Process Hypothesis of Reflection, which provides an explanation of the workings of reflection in relation to Type 1 and Type 2 cognitive processes. In particular, we flag how repetition of Type 2 processes may eventually shape Type 1 processes and produce what we call downstream reflection. We distinguish competence-based epistemic virtues from character-based intellectual virtues. We also explain how our metacognition account of reflection, drawing on a Confucian conception of reflection and the Dual Process Hypothesis of Reflection, explains skilful reflection as a master virtue. Finally we outline an application of our metacognition account of reflection to a current debate in epistemology.

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Notes

  1. A notable exception to this is the work of Sosa (2011, (2012, (2014, (2015).

  2. Our discussion of metacognition is grounded in epistemological concerns. We’re not attempting to stake out a position in philosophy of mind. For the latter sort of position, see Proust (2013), who draws on psychology and neuroscience to develop an account of metacognition.

  3. This maps onto the faculty and trait distinction in the virtue epistemology literature, such as in Greco and Turri (2011).

  4. “Perspective” rather than “prospective” is chosen so as to indicate the progression from and completion of Sosa’s (1991) own position on reflection.

  5. In fact, it’s our position that the retrospective component provides for sensitive beliefs, while the perspective component provides for safe beliefs.

  6. All translations, except Analects (2016), are the authors’ own.

  7. We can imagine the agent who just learns from others without reflection on her learning to be unable to act independently and appropriately in novel situations. The agent who just thinks but doesn’t learn is in danger of missing out on the accumulated wisdom of others and is susceptible to going very wrong.

  8. The examples are as follows: “If you love being kind to others, but don’t like to study, then your kindness will be distorted into simplicity. If you love wisdom, but don’t like to study, then your wisdom will be distorted into aimlessness. If you love trustworthiness, but don’t like to study, then your trust will be distorted into harm. If you love candor, but don’t like to study, your candor will be distorted into rudeness. If you love boldness, but don’t like to study, your boldness will be distorted into unruliness. If you love persistence, but don’t like to study, your persistence will be distorted into rashness” (Analects 2016).

  9. Our aim in this paper is not to provide a definitive defence of these interpretations of the Analectsof Confucius or The Great Learning. Rather we’re providing background to the conception of skilful reflection as a master virtue. For further discussion of the interpretation of Analects of Confucius, see Mi (2015) and Mi and Ryan (2016, forthcoming), and for textual evidence in support of the interpretation, see Analects (2009, “Xue Er”: 4, “Gong Ye Chang”: 20, “Li Ren”:17).

  10. Sosa provided this taxonomy to Chienkuo Mi in personal communications.

  11. The following passage sets out the individual level of the four levels of virtue:

    figure c

    (Analects 2009).

  12. We take this to be a characterisation of refection: a set of jointly sufficient conditions for reflection.

  13. For a full examination of the dual process hypothesis of reflection, see Mi and Ryan (2016).

  14. Evans and Stanovich (2013, pp. 236–237) favour what they call “default interventionism”. According to the authors, the evidence supports the view that when an agent feels confident about an initial (Type 1) response, they’re less likely to reflect on that response. On their view, intervention (Type 2) will only occur “when difficulty, novelty, and motivation combine”.

  15. Later we discuss how downstream reflection plays a crucial role in our metacognition account of reflection.

  16. An exception to this taxonomy is provided by Battaly (2016), who includes personalism, alongside reliabilism and responsibilism as virtue approaches in epistemology.

  17. For discussion of the relationship between the two approaches, as well as how other philosophers have seen the relationship, see Sosa (2015).

  18. One way of thinking of the curiosity of young children is to see it as the manifestation of a natural desire for truth. For more on the natural desire for truth, as well as natural desires generally, see Zagzebski (2012).

  19. As a character-based virtue, skilful reflection is not merely a competence that may be employed. Rather, an agent with the virtue of skilful reflection is one who is disposed to reflect. As we shall see, skilful reflection as a master virtue is both competence-based and character-based.

  20. Note that we don’t use the term “the virtue of reflectiveness”. This seems appropriate as reflection is more abstract and allows for the possibility that an aspect of the virtue of skilful reflection is reflecting when appropriate and not reflecting when not appropriate.

  21. This is not to say that such processes cannot be honed without reflection. Reward and punishment regimes can be set up by others to train an agent’s cognitive responses without relying on that agent’s reflection.

  22. Similarly, the agent who has the virtue of skilful reflection will automatically engage in reflection given relevant cues.

  23. Sosa (2015, p. 72) distinguishes between first-order safety and second-order safety. Sosa’s (1991) work, Knowledge In Perspective, foreshadows this.

  24. Both conditions have been put forward as requirements for knowledge (Ichikawa and Steup 2014). We’re not arguing that the two conditions are necessary for knowledge.

  25. In fact, Palermos (2015) argues that reliability implies safety.

  26. These two cases are also respectively known as the Fake Barn County case and the Chicago Visitor case.

  27. For more on the ad hoc charge, see Greco (2011, p. 227). Pritchard (2012, p. 273) argues for a position whereby both safety and ability are required, though they shouldn’t be thought of as conditions that are separate from one another. Rather the view Pritchard offers is: “S knows that p if and only if S’s safe true belief that p is the product of her relevant cognitive abilities (such that her safe cognitive success is to a significant degree creditable to her cognitive agency).”

  28. For discussion on Sosa’s position, see Mi and Ryan (forthcoming).

  29. For a spelling out of what constitution, shape, and situation involve, see (Sosa 2012, p. 7).

  30. The original barn façade case first appeared in a paper by Goldman (1976). Goldman credits the example to Carl Ginet.

  31. This is owing to his situation. (Sosa 2012, p. 12).

  32. Greco (2010), by arguing that abilities are environment-relative, offers a different way for dealing with Barney-type cases. For criticism of this response, see Ryan (2014).

  33. Exercising the relevant metacognition in a given situation does not imply engaging in a lengthy process of reflection every time one forms a belief. As we have seen, reflection may lead to a metacognition that is immediate.

  34. We’re not saying that Barney is blameworthy. The point is purely the epistemic point as to what would need to happen in order for Barney to have knowledge. He’s not in an environment in which what look like barns are barns, rather he’s in an environment in which lots of things that look like barns are actually barn façades.

  35. This example is originally from Jennifer Lackey (2007, p. 352). She used the case to support her claim that we don’t deserve credit for everything we know and challenge Greco’s virtue epistemology.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Philosophy, Soochow University, Taipei, Taiwan

    Chienkuo Mi & Shane Ryan

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  1. Chienkuo Mi
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  2. Shane Ryan
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Correspondence to Chienkuo Mi.

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Mi, C., Ryan, S. Skilful reflection as a master virtue. Synthese 197, 2295–2308 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-016-1192-z

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