Epistemology is the branch of philosophy that examines the nature, origin, and limits of knowledge. Also called theory of knowledge, it explores different types of knowledge, such as propositional knowledge about facts, practical knowledge in the form of skills, and knowledge by acquaintance as a familiarity through experience. Epistemologists study the concepts of belief, truth, and justification to understand the nature of knowledge. To discover how knowledge arises, they investigate sources of justification, such as perception, introspection, memory, reason, and testimony.
The epistemic virtues, as identified by virtue epistemologists, reflect their contention that belief is an ethical process, and thus susceptible to intellectual virtue or vice. Some epistemic virtues have been identified by W. Jay Wood, based on research into the medieval tradition. Epistemic virtues are sometimes also called intellectual virtues.
Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski is an American philosopher. She is the Emerita George Lynn Cross Research Professor, as well as Emerita Kingfisher College Chair of the Philosophy of Religion and Ethics, at the University of Oklahoma. She writes in the areas of epistemology, philosophy of religion, and virtue theory.
Virtue epistemology is a current philosophical approach to epistemology that stresses the importance of intellectual and specifically epistemic virtues. Virtue epistemology evaluates knowledge according to the properties of the persons who hold beliefs in addition to or instead of the properties of the propositions and beliefs. Some advocates of virtue epistemology also adhere to theories of virtue ethics, while others see only loose analogy between virtue in ethics and virtue in epistemology.
Laurence BonJour is an American philosopher and Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Washington.
Ernest Sosa is an American philosopher primarily interested in epistemology. Since 2007 he has been Board of Governors Professor of Philosophy at Rutgers University, but he spent most of his career at Brown University.
Michael Devitt is an Australian philosopher currently teaching at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York in New York City. His primary interests include philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, metaphysics and epistemology. His current work involves the philosophy of linguistics, foundational issues in semantics, the semantics of definite descriptions and demonstratives, semantic externalism, and scientific realism.
Philosophy is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, value, mind, and language. It is a rational and critical inquiry that reflects on its methods and assumptions.
Jonathan Lee Kvanvig is Professor of Philosophy at Washington University in St. Louis.
John Early was an Irish-American Catholic priest and Jesuit educator who was the president of the College of the Holy Cross and Georgetown University, as well as the founder and first president of Loyola College in Maryland. Born in Ireland, he emigrated to the United States at the age of nineteen. Upon his arrival, he enrolled at Mount St. Mary's Seminary in Maryland and entered the Society of Jesus, completing his education at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C.
Indigenous American philosophy is the philosophy of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas. An Indigenous philosopher is an Indigenous American person who practices philosophy and draws upon the history, culture, language, and traditions of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas. Many different traditions of philosophy exist in the Americas, and have from Precolumbian times.
Intellectual humility is a metacognitive process characterized by recognizing the limits of one's knowledge and acknowledging one's fallibility. It involves several components, including not thinking too highly of oneself, refraining from believing one's own views are superior to others', lacking intellectual vanity, being open to new ideas, and acknowledging mistakes and shortcomings. It is positively associated with openness to new ideas, empathy, prosocial values, tolerance for diverse perspectives, and scrutiny of misinformation. Individuals with higher levels of intellectual humility experience benefits such as improved decision-making, positive social interactions, and the moderation of conflicts. There is a long history of philosophers considering the importance of intellectual humility as a 'virtue'. The modern study of this phenomenon began in the mid-2000s.
The Jesuit Community Cemetery on the campus of Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., is the final resting place for Jesuits who were affiliated with the university. It was first established in 1808 and was moved to its present location in 1854.
Joseph Anton Lopez was a Mexican Catholic priest and Jesuit. Born in Michoacán, he studied canon law at the Colegio de San Nicolás and the Royal and Pontifical University of Mexico. He became acquainted with the future Empress consort Ana María Huarte and was made chaplain to the future imperial family. He was later put in charge of the education of all the princes in Mexico. Lopez was a close ally of Emperor Agustín de Iturbide, residing in Madrid for four years as his attorney and political informant, and accompanying him during his exile to Italy and England.
John William Beschter was a Catholic priest and Jesuit from the Duchy of Luxembourg in the Austrian Netherlands. He emigrated to the United States as a missionary in 1807, where he ministered in rural Pennsylvania and Maryland. Beschter was the last Jesuit pastor of St. Mary's Church in Lancaster, as well as the pastor of St. John the Evangelist Church in Baltimore, Maryland. He was also a priest at several other German-speaking churches in Pennsylvania.
Intellectual courage falls under the philosophical family of intellectual virtues, which stem from a person's doxastic logic.
The Jesuits in the United States constitute the American branch of the Society of Jesus and are organized into four geographic provinces — East, Central and Southern, Midwest and West — each of which is headed by a provincial superior. The order is known, historically, for its missions to the Native Americans in the early 17th century, for owning and participating in the Atlantic slave trade, and, contemporarily, for its network of colleges and universities across the country.
Edward Ignatius Devitt was a Canadian American priest, Jesuit, and historian of the American Catholic Church. Born in Saint John, New Brunswick, he moved with his family to Boston, Massachusetts, at a young age. He studied in public schools in the city before enrolling at the College of the Holy Cross. Devitt spent two years there, and then entered the Society of Jesus in 1859. He studied at the novitiate in Frederick, Maryland, and at the newly opened Woodstock College. He briefly taught at the Washington Seminary during his studies, and after graduating, was a professor for the next thirty years at Holy Cross, Woodstock, and Georgetown University.
James Clark was an American Catholic priest and Jesuit who led the College of the Holy Cross during the American Civil War as president from 1861 to 1867. Born in Pennsylvania, he was educated at the United States Military Academy and served as an officer in the U.S. Army for one year, before converting to Catholicism and later entering the Society of Jesus.
Mark Alfano is an American philosopher and associate professor of Philosophy at Macquarie University. He is the editor of The Moral Psychology of the Emotions, a series of books published by Rowman & Littlefield. Alfano is known for his research on virtue ethics., virtue epistemology, social epistemology, and Friedrich Nietzsche.
