Read more
This volume collects the most influential essays of philosopher Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski, one of the most distinguished thinkers working in epistemology today, particularly where the theory of knowledge meets ethics and the philosophy of religion. The volume is organized into six key topics in epistemology: knowledge and understanding, intellectual virtue, epistemic value, virtue in religious epistemology, intellectual autonomy and authority, and skepticism and the Gettier problem.
List of contents
- Introduction
- I. Knowledge and understanding
- 1. What is Knowledge?
- 2. Must Knowers Be Agents?
- 3. Recovering Understanding
- 4. Towards a Theory of Understanding
- II. Intellectual Virtue
- 5. Intellectual Virtues: Admirable Traits of Character
- 6. Trust
- 7. Intellectual Virtue Terms and the Division of Linguistic Labor
- III. Epistemic Value
- 8. From Reliabilism to Virtue Epistemology
- 9. The Search for the Source of Epistemic Good
- 10. Intellectual Motivation and the Good of Truth
- 11. Epistemic Value and the Primacy of What We Care About
- IV. Virtue in Religious Epistemology
- 12. Religious Knowledge and the Virtues of the Mind
- 13. Phronesis and Religious Belief
- 14. Religious Trust, Anti-trust, and Reasons for Religious Belief
- V. Intellectual Autonomy and Authority
- 15. Ethical and Epistemic Egoism and the Ideal of Autonomy
- 16. A Defense of Epistemic Authority
- 17. Intellectual Autonomy
- VI. Skepticism and the Gettier Problem
- 18. The Inescapability of Gettier Problems
- 19. First Person and Third Person Reasons and the Regress Problem
- 20. The Moral Transcendental Argument Against Skepticism
About the author
Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski is Kingfisher College Chair of the Philosophy of Religion and Ethics and George Lynn Cross Research Professor at the University of Oklahoma. She has written seven previous books, including Virtues of the Mind (1996), a landmark in virtue epistemology, and more recently Epistemic Authority (2012) and Exemplarist Moral Theory (2017). She has held a Guggenheim fellowship and fellowships from the NEH, the Templeton Foundation, and the Lilly Foundation, and has given more than two dozen named lectures, including the Gifford Lectures (St. Andrews, Scotland), the Wilde Lectures (Oxford), the Soochow Lectures (Taiwan), the Romanell Lectures of Phi Beta Kappa, and the Dewey Lecture for the American Philosophical Association Central Division. She has authored over a hundred papers. Her works have been translated into 12 languages.
Summary
This collection showcases the most influential published essays by philosopher Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski. One of the most distinguished thinkers working in epistemology today, particularly where the theory of knowledge meets ethics and the philosophy of religion, Zagzebski is well-known for broadening epistemology and refocusing it on epistemic virtue and epistemic value. Her work has greatly influenced the trajectory of contemporary epistemology, opening up new fields in analytic epistemology.
The papers collected here are organized into six sections to underline the scope of her impact on six key subject areas of epistemology: (1) knowledge and understanding, (2) intellectual virtue, (3) epistemic value, (4) virtue in religious epistemology, (5) intellectual autonomy and authority, and (6) skepticism and the Gettier problem.
Additional text
This is an outstanding volume. Zagzebski's pioneering work has changed the face of epistemology as we know it, underscoring many long-neglected connections between epistemology and ethics. The volume showcases the extraordinary breadth and depth of her work, elucidating its structure and providing a broad sampling of her contributions. It is a must-read for anyone interested in virtue epistemology or in the wider intersections of epistemology and ethics.
