Intellectual Humility and Owning One’s Limitations

Abstract

Intellectual humility is a worthwhile virtue. Whitcomb et al. (Philos Phenomenol Res 94(3):520, 2017) recently propose a novel account of intellectual humility. According to this account, intellectual humility consists of proper attentiveness to and owning of one’s intellectual limitations. We argue that this account is in accordance with empirical work on intellectual humility, but it has two problems. It leaves open the possibility that one can be both intellectually humble and arrogant and that it does not adequately explain the strangeness associated with self-attribution of intellectual humility. Subsequently, we explore an interesting connection between intellectual humility and ignorance. Our view is that intellectual humility can lead to ignorance in the internalist sense, but this is acceptable, in that intellectual humility also gives rise to valuable epistemic standings, such as understanding and wisdom.