2020/04/01 by WILL SMALL, Will Small
Arts and Humanities · Social Sciences · #Education and Critical Thinking Development #Epistemology, Ethics, and Metaphysics #Wittgensteinian philosophy and applications
paper · doi:10.1111/1467-9752.12423
openalex publication_date 2020/04/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30
Education aims not only at transmitting knowledge of facts, but also at the inculcation of abilities and propensities. We hope that students acquire not merely the ability to, e.g. think critically, but the propensity or habit of doing so—that critical thinking will be something they do do, not something they merely can do; that they will become, not merely capable of inquiry, but inquisitive; and so on. If education aims at more than the transmission of propositional knowledge, are these other aims non-cognitive, or non-epistemic? This essay aims to make progress on this question by critically examining Rylean conceptions of skill and habit, thereby making room for a neglected category, intelligent habit.