Corrupted: Investigating the relationship between intellectual vices and social practices

人们越来越担心，在政客和其他人的行为方式上，傲慢、封闭和教条主义的抬头。哲学家们把这种行为称为“智力恶习”：妨碍我们认识事物能力的性格特征和态度。我的论文调查了我们的社会环境在鼓励智力恶习方面所起的作用。这就是所谓的认知型腐败。我的项目着眼于三种社会实践--指责受害者、男子汉说教和歪曲历史--如何鼓励智力上的恶习，反过来，智力上的恶习如何维持这些邪恶的做法。智力上的恶习在一门新兴的哲学学科--副认识论(VE)中扮演着核心角色。到目前为止，VE只单独研究了这些恶习；我的项目是面向社会的，以提高我们对认知性腐败的理解，并找到集体识别腐败环境的方法。我的项目分为三个部分。第一部分通过查阅VE的最新文献，构建了一个关于认知腐败的工作分析，以设计一个理论框架。第二部分通过三个案例研究来考察生活经验如何帮助我们理解认知性腐败：受害者责备、男性说教和歪曲历史。我之所以选择这些例子，是因为它们说明了不同的社会条件如何助长了思想上的恶性思维。其次，亲身经历可以说明不同的腐败环境是如何产生的。第三部分评估了我们如何改善社会中的认识性腐败和腐败行为。我很适合从事这项研究。我获得了一流的本科学位，尤其专注于女权主义和道德哲学。我在硕士学位上取得了优异的成绩。在道德模块中，我获得了最高分(78分)。我的硕士论文(Difference)调查了“男性说教”的概念，这项研究直接进入了我项目的第二部分。在诺丁汉大学，我的导师是伊恩·基德博士、克里斯·伍达德博士和迈克尔·汉农。基德博士是英国一位研究智力缺陷的领先学者，他首先在这里提出了认识性腐败的概念，并与人共同编辑了致力于智力缺陷的研究合集《副认识论》。M4C基金将允许来自华威大学的夸西姆·卡萨姆教授共同监督我。他创立了哲学的这个子领域，写了第一本致力于VE的专著《心灵的邪恶》。他发表了大量关于职业/工作场所恶习的文章，他的监督将有助于我的项目的应用/改进方面。诺丁汉已经在支持我的研究了。我旁听了一个关于恶习、腐败和疾病的模块，并参加了三个关于智力恶习的学术研讨会。

There are increasing worries about the rise of arrogance, close-mindedness and dogmatism regarding how politicians and others conduct themselves. Philosophers call these kinds of behaviours 'intellectual vices': character traits and attitudes that hinder our abilities to know things. My thesis investigates the role our social environments play in encouraging intellectual vices. This is known as epistemic corruption. My project looks at how three social practices - victim-blaming, mansplaining, and distorted histories -encourage intellectual vices, and, conversely, how intellectual vices sustain these vicious practices. Intellectual vices play a central role in a newly-emergent philosophical discipline called vice epistemology(VE hereafter). Thus far, VE has only studied these vices individually; my project is socially oriented to improve our understanding of epistemic corruption and find ways of collectively identifying corrupting environments. My project has three parts. Part 1 constructs a working analysis of epistemic corruption by interrogating the most recent literature in VE in order to devise a theoretical framework. Part 2 looks at how lived-experiences can inform our understanding of epistemic corruption by drawing on three case studies: victim-blaming, mansplaining, and distorted histories. I chose these examples because they illustrate how different social conditions encourage intellectually vicious thinking. Second, lived-experiences can illuminate how different corrupting environments arise. Part 3 assesses how we might ameliorate epistemic corruption and corrupting practices in society. I am well-placed to undertake this research. I achieved a strong 1st class undergraduate degree, focusing particularly on feminist and moral philosophy. I achieved a distinction in my MA. I received the highest overall mark (78) in an ethics module. My MA dissertation (distinction) investigated the concept of 'mansplaining', and this research feeds directly into part 2 of my project. At Nottingham University, I am supervised by Dr Ian Kidd, Chris Woodard and Michael Hannon. Dr Kidd is a UK-leading scholar on intellectual vices, having first developed the concept of epistemic corruption here and is co-editing Vice Epistemology, a collection of research dedicated to intellectual vices. M4C funding will allow Professor Quassim Cassam from Warwick University to co-supervise me. He founded this sub-field of philosophy, writing the first monograph devoted to VE, Vices of the Mind. He has published extensively on professional/workplace vices, and his supervision will benefit the applied/ameliorative aspect of my project. Nottingham is already supporting my research. I audited a module on vices, corruption and illness and I have participated in three academic workshops on intellectual vices.