ABSTRACT
Until very recently (Sosa 2015), virtue epistemology has tended to divide itself along fairly definite party lines (Axtell 1997). 1 So-called ‘reliabilists’—see, e.g., Goldman (1992); Sosa (1980, 1991)—base this subject on such cognitive capacities as visual acuity and excellence of memory; so-called ‘responsibilists’—see, e.g., Montmarquet (1993); Zagzebski (1996); Baehr (2011)—base it on such ethical qualities as open-mindedness or intellectual courage. Reliabilists, let us allow, have the advantage of appealing to characteristics of undeniable centrality to cognition but whose status as ‘virtues’—in comparison to the kind of qualities studied since Aristotle—is uncertain. By contrast, responsibilists appeal to undeniable virtues, but qualities whose importance might easily appear secondary in cognition.
