Abstract
As psychologists have emphasized, achieving difficult, long-term goals requires the capacity for perseverance, or “grit.” We argue that grit is distinct from familiar philosophical notions like willpower and continence. Specifically, grit has an important epistemic dimension: quitting is often caused by a loss of confidence that continued effort will result in success. Correspondingly, successful exercises of grit often involve “epistemic resilience” in the face of setbacks suggesting that success is not forthcoming. We argue that resilient reasoning can be epistemically rational to some extent, though it depends in part on whether the agent’s circumstances involve severe material scarcity or oppression.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 175-203 |
| Number of pages | 29 |
| Journal | Ethics |
| Volume | 129 |
| Issue number | 2 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jan 1 2019 |
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ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Philosophy
Cite this
}
TY - JOUR
T1 - Grit
AU - Morton, Jennifer M.
AU - Paul, Sarah
PY - 2019/1/1
Y1 - 2019/1/1
N2 - As psychologists have emphasized, achieving difficult, long-term goals requires the capacity for perseverance, or “grit.” We argue that grit is distinct from familiar philosophical notions like willpower and continence. Specifically, grit has an important epistemic dimension: quitting is often caused by a loss of confidence that continued effort will result in success. Correspondingly, successful exercises of grit often involve “epistemic resilience” in the face of setbacks suggesting that success is not forthcoming. We argue that resilient reasoning can be epistemically rational to some extent, though it depends in part on whether the agent’s circumstances involve severe material scarcity or oppression.
AB - As psychologists have emphasized, achieving difficult, long-term goals requires the capacity for perseverance, or “grit.” We argue that grit is distinct from familiar philosophical notions like willpower and continence. Specifically, grit has an important epistemic dimension: quitting is often caused by a loss of confidence that continued effort will result in success. Correspondingly, successful exercises of grit often involve “epistemic resilience” in the face of setbacks suggesting that success is not forthcoming. We argue that resilient reasoning can be epistemically rational to some extent, though it depends in part on whether the agent’s circumstances involve severe material scarcity or oppression.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85059059584&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=85059059584&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1086/700029
DO - 10.1086/700029
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85059059584
VL - 129
SP - 175
EP - 203
JO - Ethics
JF - Ethics
SN - 0014-1704
IS - 2
ER -