Individual and collective epistemic virtue in science

Abstract We investigate the explanatory role of epistemic virtue in accounting for the success of science as a social institution that is characterized by predominantly epistemic ends. We explore several structural explanations of the epistemic success of science that commonly rule out virtue attributions to scientists. These accounts underline the economic structure of science as the chief explanatory factor in its collective success, and endorse a common conclusion, namely that collective epistemic virtue can obtain in the absence of individual epistemic virtue. We call this position virtue radicalism. We analyze the credibility crisis in the social and behavioral sciences as an anomaly for the virtue radicalist position, as the same incentive structure is shared across all scientific fields but leads to different collective outcomes. We then argue for a stronger claim against virtue radicalism, namely that the collective success of science cannot be reduced to any social structure, because the presence of a significant proportion of epistemically virtuous scientists in a scientific community is a necessary condition for the establishment, maintenance, and reform of any social structure with a view to reliable and sustainable knowledge-production.