Emotions and the phenomenal grasping of epistemic blameworthiness

Abstract In this paper, I consider the potential implications of the observation that epistemic judgment seems to be less emotional than moral judgment. I argue that regardless of whether emotions are necessary for blame, blaming emotions do play an important epistemic role in the moral domain. They allow us to grasp propositions about moral blameworthiness and thereby to appreciate their significance in a special way. Further, I argue that if we generally lack blaming emotions in the epistemic domain, then we are unable to grasp propositions about epistemic blameworthiness. As a result, regardless of one's theory of epistemic blame, there emerges a tension between the claims that we are epistemically blameworthy for our epistemic failings and the claim that we do not feel epistemic blaming emotions.