The Banality of Vice

Ian James Kidd investigates how social forces shape epistemic character. I outline his proposed 'critical character epistemology' and I critically assess his discussion of the roles of salience in sustaining epistemic vice. I emphasise how patterns of salience affect how social position—race, gender, class, and so on—shapes epistemic character. I dispute Kidd’s claim that all epistemic vices are salient. Instead, I argue, epistemic vice is camouflaged by ubiquity. Similarly, I dispute his claim that ‘normed-vices’ are particularly salient.