A Dilemma for Driver on Virtues of Ignorance

For Julia Driver, some virtues involve ignorance. Modesty, for example, is a disposition to underestimate self-worth, and blind charity is a disposition not to see others’ defects. Such “virtues of ignorance,” she argues, serve as counterexamples to the Aristotelian view that virtue requires intelle...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Dolin, Josh (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: Springer Science + Business Media B. V [2020]
In: Ethical theory and moral practice
Year: 2020, Volume: 23, Issue: 5, Pages: 889-898
Further subjects:B Aristotelian virtue theory
B Julia Driver
B Virtue
B Ignorance
B Virtues of ignorance
Online Access: Volltext (Resolving-System)
Description
Summary:For Julia Driver, some virtues involve ignorance. Modesty, for example, is a disposition to underestimate self-worth, and blind charity is a disposition not to see others’ defects. Such “virtues of ignorance,” she argues, serve as counterexamples to the Aristotelian view that virtue requires intellectual excellence. But Driver seems to face a dilemma: if virtues of ignorance involve ignorance of valuable knowledge, then they do not merit virtue status; but if they involve ignorance of trivial knowledge, then they do not preclude intellectual excellence. So, either there are no virtues of ignorance, or there are no virtues of ignorance - at least not the sort of ignorance that precludes intellectual excellence. Virtues of ignorance therefore fail as counterexamples to Aristotelian virtue theory.
ISSN:1572-8447
Contains:Enthalten in: Ethical theory and moral practice
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1007/s10677-020-10110-2