The Measure and Mismeasure of the Self

Abstract

This chapter introduces the virtues and vices of intellectual self-evaluation that are the main topic of the book. It explains that humility consists in having the measure of one’s strengths and weaknesses, whilst arrogance, vanity, or servility are ways in which one fails to have such a measure because one’s self-appraisals are biased by needs for self-enhancement or for social acceptance. In addition, the chapter argues for thinking of vice epistemology as a form of social epistemology whose main aim is ameliorative because it offers concrete proposals to improve common epistemic predicaments. The chapter concludes with a summary of the book.