Objectives
Plato and Aristotle
Key Terms
Virtue Ethics
Moral Exemplar
Eudemonia
Golden Mean
- Define and appropriately use important terms such as Eudaimonia and Golden Mean
- Demonstrate knowledge of major arguments for and problems with virtue ethics
- Apply ethical concepts and principles to address moral concerns.
I. Crito
- A. Socrates’ Last Days
- Imprisoned and sentenced to death
- Crito argues he should escape
- Socrates disagrees
- B. Socrates’ Argument
- I’d be breaking the law
- One must perform right actions. Wrong actions damage the soul, and the soul is the most valuable part of the self
- It is never right to do wrong, even if one has been wronged
II. Virtue Ethics
Crash Course
- A. Contextualizing Virtue Ethics
- Wide variety of ethical approaches
- Return to the classical approach in the mid 1900s
- B. What Sort of Person Should I Strive to Be?
- Virtue ethics is concerned with character
- A moral exemplar has to have good judgment, be able to contemplate and debate all sides of a moral issue, have the strength to act on knowledge of the right thing
- A virtuous person has prudence, the ability to choose wisely
- A person discovers virtue in childhood and develops virtue through a lifetime of training, experience and practice
- One becomes virtuous by being virtuous
- Moral virtue is a trait of character, performed habitually, that would be good for anyone to have
- The Teleology (or purpose) of Human Life
- Inevitably, all things are desired for something else
- Food for health, money for security and social opportunity...
- ...until you get to 'happiness'
- Eudemonia (Happiness/Human Flourishing) desired for its own sake
- This makes eudaimonia the highest good
- Happiness is a way of being in the world
- One seeks Happiness by being a virtuous person
- You reach your highest potential by seeking the moral Golden Mean
- Inevitably, all things are desired for something else
Crash Course
III. Moral Virtue and the Golden Mean
- Aristotle defines Virtue as the Golden Middle State between two moral extremes
- Greek emphasis on balance and proportion
- The virtuous person is one who has found balance
- The Golden Mean represents the highest quality of life and human flourishing
- Decoding what is virtuous is prudence
- How to Be a Moral Person
- Know what you’re doing
- Deliberately choose for its own sake
- Act consistently
IV. Advantages to Virtue Ethics
- Moral motivation
- Doubts the “ideal” of impartiality
V. Objections to Virtue Ethics
- Founded on a tautology
- Difficult to define character traits
- Does not consider overall consequences
- Difficult to choose between opposing virtues