ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the nature and characteristic psychology of intellectual benevolence. Intellectual benevolence is conceptualized as a refined motivation to promote others’ epistemic goods as such for its own sake. It is a foundational virtue within the ideal of intellectual dependability, in that it structures all of the other virtues of intellectual dependability just as conscientiousness or the love of knowledge structures the self-regarding intellectual virtues. The chapter compares intellectual benevolence so understood to similar virtues such as truthfulness and intellectual generosity, maintaining that intellectual benevolence is distinct from these and is a more cardinal virtue than they are. It also contrasts intellectual benevolence with a wide range of opposing vices, including epistemic malevolence, intellectual haughtiness and vanity, social vigilantism, and intellectual subservience, thereby illuminating its distinctive characteristic psychology.
