Valuable Intellectual
Traits
- Intellectual Humility:
Having a consciousness of the limits of one's knowledge, including a
sensitivity to circumstances in which one's native egocentrism is
likely to function self-deceptively; sensitivity to bias, prejudice and
limitations of one's viewpoint. Intellectual humility depends on
recognizing that one should not claim more than one actually knows. It
does not imply spinelessness or submissiveness. It implies the lack of
intellectual pretentiousness, boastfulness, or conceit, combined with
insight into the logical foundations, or lack of such foundations, of
one's beliefs.
- Intellectual Courage:
Having a consciousness of the need to face and fairly address ideas,
beliefs or viewpoints toward which we have strong negative emotions and
to which we have not given a serious hearing. This courage is connected
with the recognition that ideas considered dangerous or absurd are
sometimes rationally justified (in whole or in part) and that
conclusions and beliefs inculcated in us are sometimes false or
misleading. To determine for ourselves which is which, we must not
passively and uncritically " accept" what we have " learned."
Intellectual courage comes into play here, because inevitably we will
come to see some truth in some ideas considered dangerous and absurd,
and distortion or falsity in some ideas strongly held in our social
group. We need courage to be true to our own thinking in such
circumstances. The penalties for non-conformity can be severe.
- Intellectual Empathy:
Having a consciousness of the need to imaginatively put oneself in the
place of others in order to genuinely understand them, which requires
the consciousness of our egocentric tendency to identify truth with our
immediate perceptions of long-standing thought or belief. This trait
correlates with the ability to reconstruct accurately the viewpoints
and reasoning of others and to reason from premises, assumptions, and
ideas other than our own. This trait also correlates with the
willingness to remember occasions when we were wrong in the past
despite an intense conviction that we were right, and with the ability
to imagine our being similarly deceived in a case-at-hand.
- Intellectual Integrity:
Recognition of the need to be true to one's own thinking; to be
consistent in the intellectual standards one applies; to hold one's
self to the same rigorous standards of evidence and proof to which one
holds one's antagonists; to practice what one advocates for others; and
to honestly admit discrepancies and inconsistencies in one's own
thought and action.
- Intellectual Perseverance:
Having a consciousness of the need to use intellectual insights and
truths in spite of difficulties, obstacles, and frustrations; firm
adherence to rational principles despite the irrational opposition of
others; a sense of the need to struggle with confusion and unsettled
questions over an extended period of time to achieve deeper
understanding or insight.
- Faith In Reason:
Confidence that, in the long run, one's own higher interests and those
of humankind at large will be best served by giving the freest play to
reason, by encouraging people to come to their own conclusions by
developing their own rational faculties; faith that, with proper
encouragement and cultivation, people can learn to think for
themselves, to form rational viewpoints, draw reasonable conclusions,
think coherently and logically, persuade each other by reason and
become reasonable persons, despite the deep-seated obstacles in the
native character of the human mind and in society as we know it.
- Fairmindedness:
Having a consciousness of the need to treat all viewpoints alike,
without reference to one's own feelings or vested interests, or the
feelings or vested interests of one's friends, community or nation;
implies adherence to intellectual standards without reference to one's
own advantage or the advantage of one's group.
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