Cannot but love a paper that brings together epistemic vigilance, Melville, Nietzsche, and The Elephant in the Brain! However, it seems to me that the argument for abandoning epistemic vigilance theory for machiavellian vigilance theory (instead of, perhaps, embracing both sets of mechanisms as interactive parts of our evolved endowments for navigating the complexities of social life) is predicated on neglecting the massive amount of evidence that Hugo Mercier masterfully synthesizes in his book Not Born Yesterday, which enjoys only a passing citation on p. 4. In the book, Mercier also sharpens the theoretical upderpinnings of epistemic vigilance.
Cannot but love a paper that brings together epistemic vigilance, Melville, Nietzsche, and The Elephant in the Brain! However, it seems to me that the argument for abandoning epistemic vigilance theory for machiavellian vigilance theory (instead of, perhaps, embracing both sets of mechanisms as interactive parts of our evolved endowments for navigating the complexities of social life) is predicated on neglecting the massive amount of evidence that Hugo Mercier masterfully synthesizes in his book Not Born Yesterday, which enjoys only a passing citation on p. 4. In the book, Mercier also sharpens the theoretical upderpinnings of epistemic vigilance.