Week 4 Instructor Guidance Virtue Ethics: Being a Good
Person
This week focuses on the third major ethical theory and how it
applies in the context of our responsibilities toward the
environment as well as within military contexts.
Let's once again review the broad spectrum of moral theories
that we saw in the guidance for weeks 1 - 3:
If we regard human actions as consisting of three parts, then
the main difference between these moral theories has to do with
which part they believe to be most important consideration when
thinking about ethics.
The three parts of human action are:
The nature and character of the
person performing the action.
The nature of the action
itself.
The consequences of the
action.
The three moral theories can be distinguished in this way:
Virtue
ethics focuses on the nature and
character of the person performing the action.
Deontological
ethics focuses on the action
itself.
Consequentialism focuses on
the consequences of the action.
Virtue ethics
focuses on the nature and character of the person
performing the action.
The most common forms of virtue ethics are modeled on the ideas
of the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle, and so we will read
portions of his text the Nicomachean Ethics.
What are our moral responsibilities toward the environment? We
will consider this question in a way that focuses on the virtues
and how they manifest themselves in particular ways in our
treatment of the environment by examining an article by the
contemporary philosopher Thomas Hill.
What virtues are needed to be a good soldier, and what kind of
behavior would a virtuous soldier exhibit? Paul Robinson's article
discusses this with respect to two virtues, integrity and
magnanimity.
There are two discussions this week. Please carefully read each
discussion prompt before you begin posting, and review them often
during the week.
Virtue Ethics
A Virtue Defined
A virtue, and the most basic level, is a quality
that enables the thing that has it to be in a good
condition. A good knife will have the virtue of
sharpness; a good football quarterback will have the
virtue of accuracy and quick thinking, and so on.
For humans in general, virtues are dispositions
to choose to do the right thing, at the right time, in
the right way, and for the right reasons.
Aristotle recognized 4 primary or
"cardinal" virtues: Courage, Justice,
Temperance, and Practical Wisdom
A Teleological Theory
The Aristotelian account of virtue ethics starts
with the idea that some things have a
"function", "purpose", or
"characteristic activity". The
virtues are those traits that enable it to perform
those characteristic activities well, and to fulfill
those purposes.
The Greek term for such purposes is the "telos", so
this account is called a teleological account of
ethics.
Happiness Reconsidered
Aristotle calls the telos, or
ultimate purpose of human life to be
"happiness". Thus the virtues are those qualities
necessary for happiness. But what he meant by happiness
is perhaps quite different than what we today mean. We
usually think of happiness as a certain kind of
positive inner feeling, while Aristotle thought of it
as a condition in which one's life is truly going
well.
When you see "happiness", perhaps replace that in
your mind with "fulfillment", "well-being", or
"flourishing", and you might be closer to the idea that
Aristotle called "eudaimonia".
Readings and Media on Aristotle and Virtue
Ethics
Required Resources
Aristotle. (350 B.C.E.). Nicomachean
ethics (W. D. Ross, Trans.). Retrieved from
http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/nicomachaen.html
The required portions of the text, with
annotations, can be found here.
Nussbaum, M. (n.d.). Virtue ethics
[Video file]. Retrieved from http://goo.gl/nLAsm3
Virtue Ethics maintains that the most important
consideration for morality is first and foremost
what it means to be a good person. To
be a good person is described in terms of possessing
certain character traits, ones that
enable us to live well. These
character traits are called
virtues.
A virtue is a certain
quality that is essential to living well.
Generally, when we say that someone or something is
"doing well", we have in mind some idea of
what that person or thing is supposed to do -
what it's function or purpose is. For instance, if a
car is "running well," we mean that the
engine is humming, it drives smoothly, it can reliably
get you from point A to point B, and so on. When we say
that a child is "doing well school," we mean
he or she is learning, earning good grades, and so on.
This is because the purpose of the car is to get one
from A to B (among other things, depending on the car),
and the purpose of being a student is to learn, which
is often measured by grades.
For a car to run well, it has to have its various
parts working in harmony, doing what they are supposed
to be doing, each contributing to the well-functioning
of the whole. If the tires aren't aligned, or the
radiator leaks, then the car as a whole won’t be
“running well,” and we won’t say that
it’s a “good” car.
For a child to be doing well at school, he or she
needs to be learning the things being taught, behaving
in appropriate ways, earning good grades, and so on. If
the child is learning but not getting good grades, or
getting good grades but misbehaving, or getting good
grades but not really learning anything, then we would
be reluctant to say that the child is "doing
well" in school.
What does any of this have to do with ethics?
Well, for a car to run well, it needs certain good
qualities that enable it to run well and fulfill its
purpose in the ways described. Similarly, for a student
to be doing well in school, it needs certain good
qualities that enable it to fulfill its goals and
flourish in the ways described.
In the same way, a person needs certain good
qualities that enable him or her to live well, fulfill
his or her purposes, and flourish.
So virtue ethics is concerned with two things: what
does it mean for a person to live well and flourish,
and what are the qualities (virtues) needed for
this?
Our source for these ideas is the Ancient Greek
philosopher Aristotle, who lived from 384-322 BCE.
Aristotle was a student of Plato (who we read in Week 1
when we encountered the Ring of Gyges story), and went
on to become along with Plato one of the most important
figures in Western history. He invented the study of
Logic, made contributions to the natural sciences,
especially physics and biology, that dominated
scientific studies for nearly two-thousand years, and
his metaphysical views had a tremendous impact on the
Jewish, Christian, and Islamic religions.
We are, of course, looking at his ethical writings,
most of which are contained in the book, Nicomachean
Ethics.
Before looking into all of this, let's first get a
sense of how virtue ethics differs from the other two
theories we've considered.
Virtue Ethics vs. Deontology vs.
Utilitarianism
Here are four scenarios, with two people doing the
same, or almost the same act. Is there an important
difference between the two people in each case?
Consider someone that, after a night of
drinking, stops a man from robbing an old lady on
his way home. Later he barely remembers doing that,
and admits that he would have never done such a
thing sober and that this must have been the
whiskey acting, not him.
Compare that with someone (perfectly sober) who
confronts the robber with little hesitation, and
would do it again in a heartbeat.
Consider a child that runs up to his great-aunt
Gertrude and brazenly volunteers his opinion that
her new hat looks hideous, because his parents had
taught him to be honest.
Compare that with the child's mother who
tactfully manages to say something evasive but
encouraging, and thus avoid lying to her aunt
while not hurting her feelings either. (For
instance, something like this.)
Lucy Tells the
Truth
Consider someone who gives to a relative in
need, but does so grudgingly, wishing instead that
he could keep it for himself (this could be money,
resources, time, manual labor, or anything
else).
Compare that with someone that gives to his
relative cheerfully, out of a sense of compassion,
sympathy, and familial loyalty, as well as a sense
of contentment with only a modest amount for
himself.
Or consider someone that risks danger to save
another person from drowning, but only because that
other person owes her money and she wants to make
sure she gets paid back.
Compare this case with someone that risks danger to
save the drowning person with absolutely no thought
of personal gain.
In each of these scenarios, the comparisons are
between people who, in some basic way, did almost the
same thing. But most of us sense that there is
something profoundly different about these actions.
This difference would have to do with the
character of the person performing the
act.
These kinds of examples elicit the intuition virtue
ethicists draw upon when distinguishing their approach
from a deontological or utilitarian one. The idea is
that more fundamental than the rules we follow, and
more fundamental than consequences we try to bring
about, is the question of what kind of people
we should to be. As we said above, the kind of
people we need to be is described in terms of
possessing certain character traits,
ones that enable us to live well.
These character traits are called
virtues.
Virtues are dispositions to
choose to do the right thing, at the
right time, in the right
way, and for the right
reasons.
In case number 1, we might hesitate to call what the
first person did an act of "choosing the
right thing" at all, since he was
acting under the influence of some other force.
In case number 2, there was a choice, and in some
sense it was for the right reasons (it's good to want
to be honest and not lie), but the child hasn't yet
learned the difference between being overly blunt and
being sensitive to another person's feelings while
remaining honest. So the child hasn't yet learned what
the right time is for telling the
absolute truth, as his parent has.
In the third case, the person did their
"duty", but the fact that he did so
grudgingly may lead us to say that that he didn't do it
in the right way, as opposed to the
other person who did so cheerfully.
Finally, in the fourth scenario both people bring
about the best outcome, but because the first is driven
by greed and selfishnesses, we might be inclined to
think he didn't do this for the right
reasons - not out of benevolence and valor
like the second person.
From a virtue ethics perspective, these kinds of
considerations suggest that ethical action is not
simply a matter of doing the right thing (as the
deontologist might say) or bringing about the right
results (as the utilitarian would insist), but will
involve a range of motivations, feelings, and reasons
that all fit together, linked by a general view of what
a good overall human life involves.
Sometimes people will be partly virtuous, as in the
example of a child or someone who does the right thing
only with difficulty; but sometimes people can go wrong
in more serious ways. Instead of possessing the
virtues, such people posses vices like greed, cowardice, or
dishonesty. We call such people vicious.
Virtues and Moral Reasoning
This theory is often more difficult for people to
understand because it doesn't involve the same kind of
straightforward application of an independent rule or a
principle to determine the right action in the
circumstances. Rather, it emphasizes that we have to
have the wisdom and good character to make the right
choices in each particular circumstance, and that this
process cannot be reduced to a procedure or program of
applying a rule or principle.
By contrast, both deontological and utilitarian
theories seem to fit neatly into a deductive argument. For
example:
A Simple Deontological Argument
Stealing is wrong.
X is stealing.
Therefore, X is wrong.
A Simple Utilitarian Argument
Do that which results in the greatest overall
happiness and the least unhappiness.
X would result in more unhappiness than not
doing X.
Therefore, X is wrong.
According to these views, as long as we have the
right rule or principle in place (#1 in the arguments
above), we can plug in the relevant features of the
situation (#2) and get our "right answer"
(#3).
Because virtue ethics doesn't have a straightforward
rule or principle that lets you determine exactly what
is to be done in a particular situation, some people
think it is not very helpful as a theory of how we
ought to live. From a virtue ethics perspective,
however, this is an advantage of the theory,
rather than a disadvantage.
First:
Is morality really a matter of finding
principles that tell us what to do in every
circumstance?
Many people, when they study theories like
utilitarianism or deontology, come away with the sense
that each of these theories seems right some
of the time, but not all the time.
Knowing what is right in a circumstance, including
whether to pursue the best outcome, or whether to
respect certain absolute limits or duties, requires
wisdom beyond the straightforward
application of a rule or principle: wisdom gained from
experience and a life in pursuit of the good.
Many people are attracted to the idea that morality
involves bringing about as much good as possible, as
the utilitarian would say. But often it seems that
there are things we should do or not do regardless of
the results, as the deontologist would say.
Moreover, both theories seem to demand that we
sacrifice, or at least disregard, our own happiness and
well-being for the sake of doing the morally right
thing.
Virtue ethics tries to make sense of these puzzles.
It maintains that sometimes the right thing to
do might involve bringing about the best results, and
sometimes it might involve sticking to one's
sense of the "absolute" right or wrong, but the people
most equipped to make that kind of judgment are those
who have good moral character, and can thus make the
"right call" in the situation.
Moreover, Aristotelian virtue ethics maintains that
this is all connected to a vision of what a
truly good or happy life is, a life that
Aristotle described by the term
"eudaimonia". So to act virtuously
is to live a flourishing,
happy life, rather than to sacrifice it.
Second:
It turns out that we use this kind of reasoning
all the time in our lives.
We often think that "ethics" encompasses only a
special domain of "right and wrong" action
that needs these clear rules or principles. Most
theories of virtue reject this idea, and insist that
"ethics" is concerned with how we
live our lives as a whole, not just with a
narrow set of actions. (Note, though, that some
deontological and utilitarian theories think this
too.)
But if we can make sense of a kind of
everyday reasoning that is neither strictly a
matter of maximizing positive outcomes, nor a matter of
strictly abiding by the rules, but requires a special
kind of "wisdom" informed by a well-developed
character, then that's pointing us to the way that
virtue ethics thinks about the ethical life (we will
have more to say about this below).
Third:
The rationality of virtue-based reasoning lies
in its teleological character.
The idea of the virtuous person, and the idea of
what a virtuous person would do, are both based in some
conception of what kind of person he or she should
be. This is rooted in a sense of the
"telos", or the end, purpose, or function of
the person's life. Some of that has to do with one's
social role. Some of that has to do with deeper ideas
about human nature. And some of it might be based on
the ideals and ends that a person has chosen for
himself or herself.
The idea is that when we look at how we reason
teleologically in everyday life, we will find
a certain kind of rationality to ideas about how one
should live and what one should do that are not
reducible to following rules or principles.
Virtue ethics tries to extend this form of reasoning
to the traditional "ethical" questions about
how anyone should live.
Virtue-based reasoning in everyday
life.
Think about the various features of your life. Many
of you are fathers, mothers, husbands,
wives. Some of you are in the
military. Maybe you work with
kids, or are in sales or
management, or work in something
hands-on like construction or
repair. And of course, all of you are
students.
What qualities do you need to be successful at each
of these activities?
For instance, to be a good soldier you need
courage, loyalty, and
integrity. To be a good parent you need
patience and
care. To be a good student you need
discipline and
open-mindedness. And the list could go
on.
All of those character traits in red are the
virtues needed
to be a good soldier, parent, etc. What kinds of
actions do these virtues call for in various
circumstances?
What does courage mean on the battlefield vs. in the
barracks? How do we balance loyalty and integrity when
they come into conflict?
Does having patience mean we never get angry at our
children, or are there appropriate times and ways to
express anger? Does caring for the child mean indulging
the child by giving it whatever it wants, or never
giving the child anything? If it's a balance between
the two, what is that balance?
How does the dedication and discipline you need to
be a good student weigh against the kinds of care and
thoughtfulness needed to be a good spouse, especially
when you don't have unlimited time?
Most people would agree that there are no hard and
fast rules or principles that can answer all of these
kinds of questions we encounter. Rather, making good
decisions in these kinds of matters requires a good
character, one that is able to discern
what it means to be a good soldier, parent, or
whatever, what is important, how to prioritize things,
and how to best attain what is important so that we can
flourish in whatever it is that we do.
The character traits that enable us to do all this
are the virtues.
But what are the virtues,
and what kinds of decisions would a virtuous person
make in particular circumstances?
As we said above, while there are no hard and fast
answers to these questions, there are ways in which
philosophers like Aristotle have tried to spell out
some of what is involved. We now turn to his text.
What Aristotle is talking about here is the way in
which the study of ethics has to be connected to a
conception of the telos of human life. This isn't
so strange: if I'm learning how to be a good cook, or
pilot, or nurse, or whatever, it's not simply about
learning good technique. A good technique is
good because it enables the cook to produce a good
meal, the pilot to fly the plane well, or the nurse to
help care for the patient. These are all part of what
it means to be a cook, pilot, or nurse: it's
their function, their purpose, what they
characteristically do - it's their
telos.
Similarly, to study what it means to act ethically,
we have to consider what it means to be a
human - what we characteristically do, what it is that
we all aim at insofar as we are humans. Only then can
we get a grip on the "good technique" (the
ethical standards) for fulfilling that.
And what is that?
Well, we’ve been looking at examples of the
functions and purposes associated with various
parts of human life, such as our occupation,
our family life, and so on. But is there
something that all people, no matter their differences,
all aim at?
Aristotle says yes: we all aim at
happiness.
But be careful here - we shouldn't simply take for
granted our initial assumptions about what
happiness means.
Many of us these days think of "happiness"
as a kind of good feeling, or a sense of satisfaction.
We are used to saying things like, "if it makes
her happy, then who am I to say there's anything wrong
with the way she lives her life?" In this sense,
there’s going to be a lot of different views
about what happiness is. And Aristotle
acknowledges this:
both the general run of men and people of
superior refinement say that it is happiness, and
identify living well and doing well with being
happy; but with regard to what happiness is they
differ, and the many do not give the same account as
the wise…
Book 4
But if we think deeply about this idea of the
“ultimate aim” of human life (or
“chief end” as the text calls it), we
realize that it has to be more than simply how someone
feels about their life.
What we all want, says Aristotle, is a life that is
going well. That’s what happiness really
means. The Greek word for this is
"eudaimonia," which means something more like
"flourishing" or "living
well".
And when it comes to any sort of flourishing or
doing well, we can be deluded. Think of something
that deeply, truly, and sincerely believes that they
are an incredible singer, but cannot carry a tune if
their life depended on it (one of those truly horrible
singers we sometimes see in the tryouts of
"American Idol", for example).
Can people be similarly mistaken about whether their
life is going well? Consider the following
scenario, from a movie called Brain
Candy. In the story some people have
invented a drug that finds your most blissful,
feel-goody moment, and rewires your brain so that
you’re permanently reliving that moment. Would we
really consider this person to be living a good
life? Is that permanent state of bliss what we
have in mind when we think of the overall aim of our
lives?
Instead, what Aristotle has in mind is the sort of
person about whom we’d say at their funeral,
“this person lived a good life.”
Maybe you have had a grandmother like that, or a
pastor, or it might be someone you read about.
Often in such cases the person has decidedly
not lived a life of “bliss”; in
fact, it’s often the way in which they endured
and overcame hardships that leads us to hold their
lives up as examples of a life lived well.
Instead, what Aristotle has in mind is the sort of
person about whom we’d say at their funeral,
“this person lived a good life.”
Maybe you have had a grandmother like that, or a
pastor, or it might be someone you read about.
Often in such cases the person has decidedly
not lived a life of “bliss”; in
fact, it’s often the way in which they endured
and overcame hardships that leads us to hold their
lives up as examples of a life lived well.
So he urges us to move beyond the immediate ideas we
might have about happiness and examine more deeply what
it means to talk about “a life lived
well”.
Here we can go back to the more familiar, everyday examples, and
think of what it means to talk about someone doing well
as a soldier, football player, student, parent, and so
on.
In each case I have to consider what it is that they
specificallydo. For example,
if I’m interested in what makes someone a good
football running back, I am talking
about a particular player on a football team.
This player has a particular function on the team, and
given this function, we might say that a particular
player is a good running back, or is
performing well as a running back.
Specifying this means I have to say more than
“he scores touchdowns” or “he runs
fast”. Other players on the team try to
score touchdowns, and other players need to run
fast. To flourish as a running back is
to perform well those activities
characteristic of a running back (as
distinguished from other positions on a football
team).
Similarly, to flourish – to be truly happy – as a
human being is to be performing well those
activities characteristic of a human (as
distinguished from other kinds of creatures).
So what is this “characteristic
activity” of human lives? What is it that
most deeply captures our “humanness”?
In previous weeks, we have seen a few proposals:
John Stuart Mill proposed that it’s the pursuit
of pleasure and avoidance of pain. Kant proposed that
it’s our capacity to make free, rational
choices.
Aristotle offers what might be considered a
combination of the two. Like Kant, he thinks that
choosing what to do on the basis of good
reasons (as opposed to blindly following what we happen
to feel like doing) is a core feature of our
humanity. But he also acknowledges the importance
of our feelings and desires, like Mill, as well as our
belonging to particular communities.
Let's look at the central passage, found on pages
4-5:
Life seems to be common even to plants, but we are
seeking what is peculiar to man. Let us
exclude, therefore, the life of nutrition and
growth. Next there would be a life of perception,
but it also seems to be common even to the horse,
the ox, and every animal. There remains,
then, an active life of the element that has a
rational principle...Now if the function
of man is an activity of soul which follows
or implies a rational principle, and if we
say 'so-and-so-and 'a good so-and-so' have a
function which is the same in kind, e.g. a lyre,
and a good lyre-player, and so without
qualification in all cases, eminence in respect of
goodness being added to the name of the function
(for the function of a lyre-player is to play the
lyre, and that of a good lyre-player is to do so
well): if this is the case, and we state the
function of man to be a certain kind of life, and
this to be an activity or actions of the soul
implying a rational principle, and the function of
a good man to be the good and noble performance of
these, and if any action is well performed when it
is performed in accordance with the appropriate
excellence: if this is the case, human good turns out to be activity of
soul in accordance with virtue, and if there are
more than one virtue, in accordance with the best
and most complete. But we must add
'in a complete life.'
For one swallow does not make a summer, nor does
one day; and so too one day, or a short time, does
not make a man blessed and happy.
This can seem vague and hard to understand, but
there are a few key points that we should take away
from it:
First, happiness is an
activity. Sometimes we like to think
that happiness is something like lounging on the beach
and doing nothing. And certainly periods of rest
and relaxation are important. But we
wouldn’t say a running back is
“flourishing” as a running back if he is
just sitting on the bench, or a musician is
“flourishing” as a musician if he never
picks up an instrument. Similarly, a flourishing, happy
life is one in which one is actively living in a way
that fulfills one’s potential.
Second, it’s an
activity of soul. For the
Greek philosophers the "soul" is what we call
the "psyche" - our psychological or conscious
life. And in humans the capacity to consciously reflect
on who one is and what one is doing, to take a stand on
what one believes to be good and true, and to base
one's life and decisions on that, is our unique gift.
So exercising that capacity by living a reflective life
that continually seeks to orient itself toward the good
is the best kind of life we can live.
Admittedly, this is still rather vague, since it
doesn’t tell us something specific and
concrete. But seen from a different point of
view, perhaps this is exactly as it should be.
Aristotle recognizes that because people are different
in all sorts of ways, it is impossible to give a
determinate, concrete account of the ultimate good that
would apply to everyone equally; the best we can do, as
he says repeatedly, is provide an account
“roughly and in outline.” Then
it’s up to us, together with others, to fill in
the details.
The bottom line is this: living a good, flourishing
life means that the whatever is essential to our
humanity is in good condition. As rational,
reflective beings, a good life involves living
reflectively rather than blindly following one’s
impulses and desires, or contenting oneself with
whatever one happens to prefer. But we can add
that as beings that live in community, form
relationships, depend on others and on whom others
depend, a flourishing life involves nurturing and
sustaining good relationships with others. And as
beings that feel, desire, and form habits, having
dispositions to feel and desire in the right ways will
also be part of a flourishing life.
Since this is all concerned not simply with
doing certain things, but being a certain
way, we need the kinds of traits characteristic of
such a life, which is what he means by living
“in accordance with
virtue.” So we now turn to look more
closely at the virtues themselves.
Early in Chapter 6, he gives an account of what a
virtue is in general that should be familiar to us by
now:
every virtue or excellence both brings into good
condition the thing of which it is the excellence
and makes the work of that thing be done
well...Therefore, if this is true in every case,
the virtue of man also will be the state of
character which makes a man good and which makes
him do his own work well.
As we said before, we can’t provide the kind
of specificity to the “characteristic work”
of a human life in general that we could give to
characteristic work of other things, and so there is a
limit to how much specificity we can give to the
virtues apart from looking at specific cases. But we
can still say a lot of things about those
virtues, even if we can’t precisely specify
them.
Let’s first look at how he defines virtue at
the end of chapter 6, and break it down:
Virtue, then, is a state of character concerned
with choice, lying in a mean, i.e. the mean
relative to us, this being determined by a
rational principle, and by that principle by
which the man of practical wisdom
would determine it.
A State of Character
The first thing to be said of a virtue is that
it’s a “state of character”, or as he
says in chapter 1, it’s a
habit. Let’s think for a
minute about what this means.
What do we usually mean when we call something a
habit? For example, we might think of habits like
smoking, overeating, procrastinating, or compulsively
checking one’s watch. These things are
acquired over time through repetition of similar kinds
of action (no one has ever become a habitual smoker
after trying one cigarette!). In doing something over
and over again, it sort of becomes ingrained in us, so
that we do it without thinking, or it’s just
“natural” for us.
And for this reason, when we have a habit,
we’re in some sense controlled by it – it
strongly effects our behavior. We feel almost as
if we have to do it, and breaking the habit
involves a great deal of effort and discomfort.
For this reason, we’re used to thinking of
habits as bad things. But they can also be good
things. Think of how we talk of wanting to
develop good study habits to be good
students. Athletes and musicians need to have certain
things ingrained in them to perform well, and would be
greatly hindered if they had to constantly struggle to
perform their characteristic actions.
Similarly, Aristotle says that not only can habits
be good things, he says that happiness and the good
life requires habits, since that’s what
virtues are. Honesty is a habit, just like lying
is. Generosity, courage, all those things that we
admire and praise in people, are habits. Think
back to the examples we gave earlier on, such as the
guy who only saved someone from attack because he was
drunk, or the person who only gives to someone in need
grudgingly. They did the right thing, but it
wasn’t natural for them – it
didn’t flow from a deeply-rooted character in the
way that it did for the counterpart
examples.
This points us to another important feature of the
virtues as habits, namely the way that they affect not
just what we do, but how we
feel.
When someone has a habit like smoking, it’s
discomforting when one cannot smoke, but satisfying and
pleasurable when one does. Could the same be true
of good habits? Think of what it’s like to
become really good at something, or to get in
shape. The process of getting there often
involves a lot of struggle and discomfort, but as we
develop the virtues associated with that activity we
come to really enjoy it. Similarly, the generous
person enjoys giving to others; the honest
person is pained at the thought of telling a
lie; the courageous person wants to aid her
fellow soldier in trouble.
The mark of a virtuous person is that their feelings
are in harmony with their actions, and they gain
pleasure through virtuous activity.
Developing Good Habits
So, how are virtues acquired? How do I come to
be a virtuous person? Is it enough for me to read
a lot of books or moral philosophy? Is it enough
for me to go to church every Sunday and pray? Is
it enough to just “try my best”?
Aristotle says no – none of these things is
sufficient for becoming virtuous. They
might help, but ultimately becoming virtuous requires,
in short, practice, just like with any
virtue. Even if we aren’t very honest
people, if we want to become honest people, we have to
do those sorts of things that honest people do.
Even if it isn’t easy, automatic or natural for
us to do what’s honest, if we do it enough, we
will develop the habit and the virtue of honesty.
And likewise with all the virtues.
But this brings up the question, how do I
know what’s honest, if I am not already
honest? Well one way is to just look and
see what honest people do, and to emulate
them, just as we do when we aspire to become a good
athlete or musician. Of course, this raises the
further question, how do we know who the honest
people are?
The difficulty in pinning down these questions, and
the reason that they rely so much on a kind of embedded
wisdom, is that the virtuous thing to do is going to
vary by circumstances. It’s like the good
football coach – there’s no formula to
play-calling – the good coach is going to know what the
right thing to do is in each circumstance, knowing your
players, knowing the other players, etc.
That’s why a computer could never be a good
coach.
But there are certain general characteristics of the
virtues that Aristotle points us to. The first,
and perhaps most important, is that a virtue lies in
the mean between excess and
defect.
The Golden Mean
Virtuous action is an intermediate between
two extremes - excess and defect. In other
words, it will avoid too much of some quality, as well
as too little of it, but get just the right amount.
The best way to see this is to consider some
examples.
Consider a quality like FEARLESSNESS on the
battlefield.
TOO
LITTLE fearlessness is COWERDICE. This is pretty familiar.
If a soldier runs away from battle and abandons his
comrades the moment he hears gunfire, he is a
coward.
TOO
MUCH fearlessness is RASHNESS. This is often less
familiar, but we can still recognize it. If a soldier
runs the middle of a firefight without any good reason,
and needlessly puts his life, and the life of his
comrades at risk, this isn't courage but something more
like rashness, stupidity, and overzealousness.
JUST THE
RIGHT AMOUNT is COURAGE. Knowing when to put
oneself at risk, and how much risk to take, is the
exercise of virtue.
Consider another quality like one's eating
habits.
Eating TOO
MUCH, especially of the kinds of things that
aren't good to eat, is what we sometimes call
GLUTTONY or OVER-INDULGENCE.
Eating TOO
LITTLE is less familiar and there isn't a proper
term for this, but it can occur when a person doesn't
get the amount of nutrition they need. This is often
the case with those who have anorexia, for example, or
those who neglect their health.
Eating JUST
THE RIGHT AMOUNT is what is sometimes called
TEMPERANCE or
MODERATION.
What is the "right amount"?
Is it exactly the same for all people in all
situations? Aristotle said "no". A virtue, according to
his definition, lies in a mean relative to
us.
In other words, what is "intermediate" between the
extremes will vary depending on the person and the
situation.
Let's go back to the example about eating. Take a
look at this meal plan, and think about whether it
would be the daily diet of someone who eats too much,
too little, or the right amount:
For most of us, this sort of diet would lead to
something like this:
However, that diet was part of the actual routine of
this person:
Clearly this diet was the "right amount"
for Michael Phelps during the Olympics, but would be
far too much for almost anyone else. What's more, a
diet that would be "temperate" for the rest
of us would have been deficient for Phelps.
How is that "right amount" determined?
Determined by a Rational Principle
Why is the diet above the "right amount"
for Michael Phelps? Because of who he is and
what he does: he is a swimmer, with a certain
body type, who competes in the Olympics (and we could
even specify what kind of a swimmer he is as
well). Swimmers have a certain kind of characteristic
activity, and to be successful in that kind of
activity, especially at the Olympic level, requires
certain kinds of nutrients and certain levels of energy
tailored to the individual's body type. A person who
was not a swimmer, or who had a different body type, or
who competed at a different level would need a
different kind of diet to flourish in their
kind of activity.
Similar kinds of considerations would apply to other
areas of life, like being a parent, a husband or wife,
a soldier, a carpenter, a teacher, a painter, a
software developer, a student. What is it that parents,
spouses, soldiers, carpenters, teachers, painters,
software developers, or students
do? What is their
characteristic activity? What
is it that they aim at,
characteristically? What would constitute
success or
flourishing in that kind of
activity?
Rationally determining the "right thing to
do," or more broadly, "what the virtuous
person would do," is a matter of asking these
kinds of questions and attempting to answer them.
So in short,
the "right amount"
that the virtues target is a function of who one is,
what one is doing, and what one is aiming for, given
the role in question and its characteristic
activity.
Practical Wisdom
For Michael Phelps and his coaches to know what just
the right amount is can't simply be discovered by
following a set guideline or principle, but requires
wisdom, experience, and skill. Moreover, they have to
take into account the answers that people have given in
the past, and they have to be open to the ideas and
critiques of others in the present. But they have to
also be open to new ideas, changing circumstances,
creative differences, and other factors that might call
into question the received wisdom.
This can make answering questions about the right
way to live and act daunting, frustrating, or even seem
impossible. But the fact that we feel this way is often
a sign that we do sense that there is
something real and true that we're striving after here.
This is what drives people to continue striving to be
better, more virtuous practitioners of the various
forms of life in which we engage.
The next task is to see how all of this discussion
of the virtues within particular areas of life extends
to human life as a whole, and especially the kinds of
broader moral questions we are often concerned
with.
From Everyday Life to Morals
We have been looking at particular areas everyday
life to get a sense of what Aristotle means by the
virtues. We have noticed a relation between the
meanings, purposes, and characteristic activities of
those areas, and the qualities needed to flourish in
them - qualities that enable one to make the right
choices and avoid extremes of excess and defect.
Let's go back now to the deeper question of what
qualities constitute a flourishing life
overall, and enable us to live out the human
telos.
We have indicated certain significant features of
human life that are common to all (or almost all)
people, regardless of our different backgrounds,
activities, and forms of life - things like living in
community with others (including families), forming and
sustaining friendships, and making rational
choices.
The qualities needed to make right
choices and live a successful human life
overall are what are often called the
moral virtues.
Moral reasoning, according to this view, might very
well consider consequences, or considerations like
fairness and rules, but the primary question would be
something like, "would this be courageous or cowardly?"
"would this be moderate or self-indulgent?" "would this
be honest or dishonest?"
And those kinds of questions will be considered in
light of the kind of life that those virtues enable us
to live. "Is this being a good soldier / parent /
citizen / friend / neighbor / human being?"
Do you think that we can give an account of a "good
human life" that applies to all people? If so, what are
the virtues that are needed to live out such a
life?
Going Deeper
Groundhog Day(1993)
In this classic comedy, Bill Murray plays someone
trapped in a loop of reliving the same day over and
over again. In this situation, he realizes that neither
the "rules" nor the consequences of his actions matter
anymore. Initially he finds this liberating, and enjoys
himself, seeming to confirm the claims of Glaukon that
we examined in Week 1. But that soon gives way to
depression and despair. Eventually, though, he seems to
find new reasons to be generous, helpful, caring, and
so forth, as he develops what we might consider to be a
virtuous character.
Can we find reasons for performing virtuous actions
that are not simply a matter of following society's
rules or trying to make the world a better place? How
might this support a virtue ethics account?
(Information on where to digitally stream the whole
movie can be found here. Below are a few clips from
the movie.)
One of the most significant attempts to revive
Aristotelian ethics in a way that is relevant to modern
times was undertaken by the philosopher
Alasdair MacIntyre in his book,
After Virtue. MacIntyre begins the book by
proposing that we moderns are in a situation in which
we have no way of rationally resolving moral disputes,
and that this situation is the result of a
"catastrophe" in which we lost the tools
needed to do so. We are left with the alternatives of
either accepting that morality, and indeed life itself,
is nothing more than a clash of wills, or trying to
identify and recover something of what was lost.
He argues that what was lost was the
"teleological" character of ethical reasoning
of the kind we find in Aristotle. The heart of the
book, chapters 14-15, are an attempt to recover
Aristotle's ideas and articulate them in a way that
makes them relevant to contemporary life. These
chapters can be found in the chapter 6 readings of your
textbook.
This first video provides the background to chapters
14-15, while the second video explains chapter 14
itself. This may help you gain greater clarity on what
virtue ethics is all about by seeing it spelled out in
somewhat different terms.
These two articles by excellent and well-respected
philosophers provide clear overviews of virtue ethics
that go a bit deeper than we have been able to go
here. Julia Annas’s
article, found here, goes into the views of
some of the other ancient philosophers, and discusses
how the disagreements about virtue among the ancient
philosophers can help us make sense of it
today.
You can also listen to a 20 minute interview with her
about virtue ethics here.
Rosalind Hursthouse’s
article, found here, raises some of the
common objections to virtue ethics and discusses how
defenders of that theory have responded to
them.
For clear and accessible examples of Aristotelian
reasoning applied to some of the most pressing
contemporary moral problems, the writings and lectures
of Michael Sandel are a great place to
look.
“The Case Against
Perfection” considers ways that various forms
of enhancement technology have entered our lives, such
as performing-enhancing drugs in sports, genetically
engineering the characteristics of our children before
they are born, ways of artificially enhancing our
cognitive abilities, and other such topics.
In “What Isn't For Sale”,
he argues that there are moral limits to the free
market that have been eroding in the past few
decades. Each of these articles is a condensed
version of books that treat these subjects in more
detail, while remaining clear and accessible works
intended to bring philosophical ideas to popular
audiences.
Sandel also has a video lecture that discusses the
Aristotelian conception of justice and its relevance to
contemporary moral, political, and social problems.
Watch or download the video here.
Even Further Inquiry
Hursthouse, R. (1999). On Virtue
Ethics, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
This is one of the most comprehensive and
authoritative recent accounts of contemporary
virtue ethics written in a clear and accessible
style.
Annas, J. (2011). Intelligent Virtue.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Annas provides an account of virtue that draws
upon an analogy with practical skills. She
maintains that the kind of reasoning we find in
someone exercising a practical skill can helpfully
illuminate the kind of reasoning involved in
exercising a virtue, especially the way that there
can be rational and intelligent reasoning without
presupposing a need for rules or principles of the
kind we find in other moral theories.
MacIntyre, A. (1999). Dependent Rational
Animals: Why Human Beings Need the Virtues.
Chicago: Open Court.
In his third follow-up to After
Virtue, MacIntyre provides his most
straightforward account of the basis and form of
the ethical life. Instead of beginning from
the notion of the full-fledged, independent
rational agent as most other theories do (including
Aristotle’s), he begins from the facts of
human vulnerability and dependence and proceeds to
argue for certain virtues and behaviors that
respond to this human condition. Includes a
fascinating discussion of dolphins as exhibiting a
kind of proto-rationality.
Virtue Ethics and the Environment
A Broader Community
The virtue ethical approach considers what qualities
we need to flourish given the kinds of beings that we
are. Since we are part of communities, virtues enable
us to live well in community, nurturing and
supporting those within it. We are also part of
the natural world, and so could living virtuously
involve nurturing and supporting our environmental
community as well?
Taking a Stand
The virtue ethical approach is concerned with more
than just actions or consequences, but with the shape
one’s life as a whole. How I live my life
expresses a stand on what is meaningful and
valuable. What stand are we taking in the way
that we treat the environment?
A Different Kind of Discussion
We hear a lot of talk concerning the environment,
especially when it comes to issues like global warming,
pollution, and the destruction of natural
habitats. But if you pay attention to how those
debates and discussions proceed, they tend to almost
always be framed in terms of how things impact
us, and so they take a utilitarian
approach. While impacts on the environment do
have an impact on us, is that the only reason we should
be concerned about it? Virtue ethics offers the
basis for a different kind of discussion.
Readings and Media on Virtue Ethics and the
Environment
Hursthouse, R. (2007). Environmental
Virtue Ethics. In Rebecca L. Walker and
Philip J. Ivanhoe (Eds.), Working
Virtue: Virtue Ethics and Contemporary
Moral Problems. Oxford: Oxford
University Press. Retrieved from the
ebrary database.
Sandler, R. (2007). Character
and Environment: A Virtue-Oriented Approach
to Environmental Ethics, New York:
Columbia University Press. Retrieved from
the ebrary database.
Cafaro, P. and R. Sandler (Eds.)
(2010). Virtue Ethics and the
Environment. Dordrecht; New
York: Springer. Retrieved from the ebrary
database.
Wirzba, N. (Ed.). (2010). Essential
agrarian reader: The future of culture,
community, and the land. Lexington,
KY: University Press of Kentucky. Retrieved
from the ebrary database.
Recap of the Consequentialist
Approach
In week 2, we looked at Peter Singer's utilitarian
argument for why we should care about animal welfare,
which focused primarily on the question of what kinds
of consequences result from the way we treat
animals, and primarily the issue that some ways of
treating them cause too much suffering and harm.
A similar utilitarian approach might be taken to the
environment in general: we might think about the harm
that our practices cause to the environment, and find
some way of measuring that harm and balancing it
against the goods that might result. One worry with
this, of course, is how do we measure and weigh the
goods and harms?
The "environment" doesn't have "experiences", such
as suffering or pleasure. We could try to weigh the
consequences in terms of the costs and benefits to
humans, and while that's important, it's not always
clear how to weigh different things. What is the value
to us of a beautiful landscape vs. the natural
resources that can be taken from it?
Moreover, is it adequate to say that the value of
the environment lies simply in its value to
us? We are often concerned to preserve certain
areas, animals that are in danger of extinction, and
other things that have no utility; we simply
think they are valuable and worth preserving in their
own sake.
The Virtue Ethical Approach
What if instead we considered questions about our
responsibility toward animals and the environment in
terms of cultivating virtues such as compassion, wonder
and appreciation, and humility, and avoiding vices such
as greed, arrogance, insensitivity, or
self-centeredness?
The impact of our activities on human life will be
important, but not necessarily the only thing that
matters. The virtuous person will recognize the fact
that our activities have a certain impact on the
environment to be, in itself, a reason for acting one
way or not acting another way. It might be that those
activities would be greedy, would
fail to appreciate the value and wonder of a
natural environment, would fail to
appreciate our inter-connectedness with the
environment.
Another feature of the virtue ethical approach that
bears on animal and environmental ethics is the way it
thinks about our responsibilities toward them in terms
of fulfilling one's telos:
We might think that part of our
function or purpose is to be good
stewards of the environment which calls for
nurture, care, and concern for the well-being of those
in our charge.
We might think of ourselves as
forming a kind of community with the
environment, and just like we need virtues to
be good citizens of a neighborhood, city, or country,
we need virtues to be good citizens of the
environmental (or "biotic") community.
We might also consider how we
are, by nature, dependent and vulnerable
creatures, and that this calls for moderation
and restraint in our attitudes and behavior toward the
environment.
We might think that a life
devoid of the enjoyment and appreciation of natural
beauty is a deficient life, and so certain
attitudes and behavior that seek to preserve and
cultivate such beauty is part of a flourishing human
life.
But in living out such a life, we
would also want to be concerned about the
telos of other beings as well, especially
other animals.
"Food With A
Face"
These are central features of the approach to
farming of people like Joel Salatin
and Wendell Berry. In the videos below
from the recommended media, Salatin discusses the way
he approaches pig farming by considering the
pig's natural function or telos (he
calls it the pig's "piggishness"), and
enabling the pig to live that out.
By doing so, he considers himself to be living out
his own telos as a farmer.
Salatin is pursuing goods that we might call
"internal" to the practice of farming - i.e.,
what farming is all about when we leave aside
things like making money, which isn't specific to
farming itself. These goods include special
understanding of the different animals, the land, and
how they can all relate together in such a way that
they are helping each other - and the farmer himself -
to flourish in their own characteristic way.
Compare Salatin's attitude toward animals with that
of someone like Singer or Regan. What might Salatin
say, for example, about the issue of speciesism?
For some thoughts on this, including a critique of
Singer, look at this piece by Michael
Pollan called
"An Animal's Place". In what way is
Pollan's piece an Aristotelian alternative to Singer's
utilitarian approach to animals and eating, and Regan's
deontological approach?
A similar kind of approach to farming that is
concerned more with crops than with animals can be
seen in the documentary "Under Cover
Farmers". This short film follows farmers as
they begin using cover crops in their
planting. Cover crops are offseason crops
that farmers plant that they then later plant
through when they plant their cash crops.
This video demonstrates new methods of farming that
enhance production through diversification and
conservation of the soil. As with Salatin,
these farmers are concerned with how to best enable
the plants under their care to flourish given their
natural characteristics, which in turn is a display
of the virtues of being a good farmer.
More Recommended Resources on
Environmental Ethics
If you are interested in pursuing these ideas
further, the article "Environmental Virtue
Ethics" by Rosalind
Hursthouse also takes a virtue ethical
approach to environmental issues, but is somewhat
different than Hill's, and includes some critiques
of Hill's view. It can be found in the book,
Working Virtue: Virtue Ethics and Contemporary
Moral Problems (edited by Rebecca L. Walker
and Philip J. Ivanhoe), which is available through
the Ashford Library's Ebook collection.
The highly influential article, "The Land Ethic" was
written not by a professional philosopher but by an
employee of the Forest Service, Aldo
Leopold, in 1949. Leopold proposes that
just as human societies have expanded the notion of
the “moral community” over time to
include other races and cultures, women and
children, etc., we are at a point where we must
recognize the land and environment as more than
just raw material for our own use. Notions of
community and belonging are central components of
an Aristotelian approach to ethics.
Wendell Berry is a writer and
farmer who also advocates for certain kinds of
attitudes toward the environment and toward animals
that could readily fall into a virtue ethics kind
of approach. In both his fiction and non-fiction
writings and in interviews, he expresses the
concern that vices like greed and pride have
displaced the virtues needed to sustain and nurture
our environment, and offers a different point of
view.
Click here to watch an
interview with him, and you can find some of his
best essays in the 2003 book Art of the
commonplace (Washington, D.C.: Counterpoint
Press), found in the Ashford Library's Ebook
collection (start with the essays “The
Unsettling of America,” “Agrarian
Economics,” and “The Body and the
Earth.”).
Web Resources
These are all excellent resources for
information, statistics, and further resources on
environmental philosophy and related
issues.
Sandler, R. (2007). Character and
Environment: A Virtue-Oriented Approach to
Environmental Ethics, New York: Columbia
University Press
Cafaro, P. and R. Sandler (Eds.)
(2010). Virtue Ethics and the
Environment. Dordrecht; New York:
Springer.
These are a book (2007) and anthology of
articles from various authors (2010) discussing
various aspects of how virtue ethics applies to
environmental concerns. Available in the
Ashford University Library Ebook
Collection.
Wirzba, N. (Ed.). (2010). Essential agrarian
reader: The future of culture, community, and the
land. Lexington, KY: University Press of
Kentucky.
This book can be found in the Ashford
University Library Ebook Collection. It
is a collection of classic essays in the
history of agrarianism. The
“Introduction” is a good place to
start here. These essays deal with the
place for humanity in the natural world while
also attempting to define an ethically virtuous
life within that world.
Virtue Ethics and the Military
Important point 1
Nascetur augue hac platea enim, egestas pulvinar
vut. Pulvinar cum, ac eu, tristie acus duis in dictumst
non integer! Elit, sed scelerisque odio tortor, sed
platea dis? Quis cursus parturient ac amet odio in?
Nunc Amet urna scelerisque eu lectus placerat.
Important point 2
Nascetur augue hac platea enim, egestas pulvinar
vut. Pulvinar cum, ac eu, tristie acus duis in dictumst
non integer! Elit, sed scelerisque odio tortor, sed
platea dis? Quis cursus parturient ac amet odio in?
Nunc Amet urna scelerisque eu lectus placerat.
Important point 3
Nascetur augue hac platea enim, egestas pulvinar
vut. Pulvinar cum, ac eu, tristie acus duis in dictumst
non integer! Elit, sed scelerisque odio tortor, sed
platea dis? Quis cursus parturient ac amet odio in?
Nunc Amet urna scelerisque eu lectus placerat.
Robinson, P. (2007). Magnanimity and
integrity as military virtues. Journal
of Military Ethics, 6(4), 259-269.
Recommended Resources on Virtues and
the Military
Robinson, P. (2009). “Integrity
and Selective Conscientious
Objection.” Journal of Military
Ethics, 8(1), 34-47.
Sherman, N. (2007). Virtue and a
Warrior’s Anger. In R. L. Walker
& P. J. Ivanhoe (Eds.), Working
Virtue: Virtue Ethics and Contemporary
Moral Problems (p. 262-277).
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Virtue Ethics and Military Ethics
(2007). Journal of Military
Ethics, 6(4).
The Virtues of a Soldier
In our discussion of Aristotle and virtue ethics
above, we often raised examples of soldiers and the
military to illustrate the notion of virtue. This
is because soldiers, sailors, airmen and other members
of the military exhibit certain key elements of the
notion of virtue:
The Teleological
Character:
Because of what it means to be a soldier and the
nature of what soldiers do, there is a strong
understanding of the need for them to have certain
qualities in order to perform their characteristic
activities well.
The Need for Practical
Wisdom:
The more experienced one is, and especially as one
ascends in rank, the more one requires that special
kind of “practical wisdom” that is
guided by reason but cannot be reduced to following
rules. Sometimes the wisdom of the
experienced person cannot be grasped by someone who
lacks their experience and character.
Virtues as Settled
Habits:
Soldiers go through intense training designed to
instill certain good habits and break the bad ones,
and good soldiers are ones in whom these character
traits are settled and steady, which means they
manifest themselves across every area of life.
These features of the virtues are expressed well in
the following clip, taken from the movie Bridge
Over the River Kwai (1957). In this film,
which is set during World War 2, a group of British
Army prisoners of war are building a bridge for their
Japanese captors. Rather than do a "shoddy"
job as the doctor in the clip suggests, the Colonel
(played by Alec Guinness) insists that the soldiers put
their finest efforts into the project:
Did the Colonel insist on the soldiers building the
best bridge they can in order to produce the best
overall consequences? Clearly not: this bridge was
intended to aid the Japanese military in their efforts,
and the British were opposing the Japanese. Nor did he
think that it would necessarily benefit them
(the British soldiers) in any way.
If all that mattered was the best consequences, that
would be produced by building a shoddy bridge, as the
doctor thought they should do. Was he simply
following orders, doing his duty? No, because his
orders were simply to build a bridge, and he could have
fulfilled them by building a shoddy one; and anyway
there certainly seems to be much more behind his words
than that.
Why, then, did he insist that the soldiers put in
such an effort?
Perhaps it had to do with his understanding of what
it means to be a soldier, or “a British
soldier” as he puts it. To be a solider is
to put one's best efforts into whatever one
does; it’s to exhibit honor and dignity in all
circumstances, because these are ingrained into the
soldier’s character. And people like the
doctor, who lack the experience and character of the
Colonel, might not be able to grasp this kind of
reasoning.
Examining the Military
Virtues
What other virtues are part of being a good
soldier?
Courage is an obvious one, as we have mentioned
several times. Loyalty, discipline, and many others
will also be an essential part of a good soldier's
character.
Virtue ethics is put into action when to try to
understand why, exactly, these things are valuable, and
what they mean in practical
circumstances.
For example, what happens when loyalty comes into
conflict with integrity, as when one finds oneself torn
between staying true to one’s team and doing
what’s honorable when the team is doing something
dishonorable?
Or what is it that we mean when we speak of
“honor” as a virtue? Is honor really
the kind of thing that we can cultivate as a character
trait? If not, what is it, and why does it
matter?
Our reading from Paul Robinson
entitled, “Magnanimity and Integrity as
Military Virtues” addresses these kinds of
questions, and also explores what implications they
have for both military policy and the decisions
soldiers make.
Recommended Resources on Virtues
and the Military
In required reading above, you may have noticed
Paul Robinson refer to cases in which
the ideal of "integrity" promoted by the
military comes into conflict with a soldier's orders.
He examines this problem in more detail in his 2009
article, “Integrity and Selective Conscientious
Objection.” Journal of Military Ethics,
8(1), 34-47. Retrieved through the Ashford Library
from the EBSCOhost database.
One of the most challenging aspects of human life
for ethics to consider is anger, and this is especially
challenging when we are interested in the
characteristics of a good soldier. The philosopher
Nancy Sherman (2007) looks deeply into
this issue in her article, "Virtue and a
Warrior’s Anger," found through the Ashford
University Library Ebook Collection in the book
Working Virtue: Virtue Ethics and Contemporary
Moral Problems (Oxford: Oxford University Press),
p. 262-277.
The Journal of Military Ethics devoted an
issue in 2007 (vol. 6, number 4) to the role of virtues
within the military, and contains numerous penetrating
and important discussions. This can be accessed
through the Ashford Library.
Discussions
There are two discussions this week. The requirements for
each of the discussions this week are a minimum of four posts
on four separate days. For each discussion, the total word
count on all of your posts combined should be over 600 words.
Be sure to answer all the questions in the prompt and to read
any resources that are required to complete the discussion
properly. In order to satisfy the posting requirements for the
week, the latest day you can post would be Friday (Friday,
Saturday, Sunday, Monday). However, we recommend that you get
into the discussion early and spread out your posts over the
course of the week.
Additional Information:
When posting an independent post (i.e., not replying to
your peer), please use the following heading (w/out the
quotes): "Your Name 1" (for your first such post), and
"Your Name 2", "Your Name 3"... for any subsequent
independent posts. That will help me keep track of
different threads.
Be sure you understand the general discussion
requirements stated above, and which are explained in more
detail in the Faculty Expectations (which includes video
guidance and a "Frequently Asked Questions"
section). If you have read that and are unclear about the
requirements, be sure to read the Frequently Asked
Questions section, and if you have questions not answered
there, please contact me.
Before composing your post, be sure to read and watch
the relevant text(s) and media, and be sure to also read
the instructor guidance and watch any associated lectures
on this topic.
Key Discussion Requirements to Remember:
Post at least once on four separate days during the
discussion week.
Total word count for all posts combined should be at
least 600 words.
Demonstrate a thoughtful engagement with the relevant
resources and the instructor guidance.
All posts should be on-topic and contribute to the
discussion topic in a meaningful and substantive way.
All posts should be carefully proofread for spelling,
grammatical, and mechanical errors, and should cite all
sources in APA format.
Discussion 1: The Experience Machine
Please carefully read and think about the entire prompt
before composing your first post. This discussion will require
you to have carefully read and thought about the excerpts from
Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, as well as the
instructor guidance and related material.
If you recall from Week 2, John Stuart Mill defines
happiness as the experience of pleasure and the avoidance of
pain. However, Aristotle holds a rather different view of
happiness.
One way that we think about this difference is to conduct a
“thought experiment” in which we imagine that we
have the same “inner” experiences, but outwardly
things are quite different. One such thought experiment
is provided by the philosopher Robert Nozick in his description
of the “experience machine”. After reading
about that in the instructor guidance, consider the following
questions:
If you had the chance to be permanently hooked up to the
experience machine, would you do it?
If you would hook up, think about the following questions as
you explain your choice:
What kind of “experience” would you have
them program?
When you think about what you aim at in the various
aspects of your life, is there something that would be lost
by being hooked up to the machine?
What does this imply about what ultimately matters
about human life?
Should we as individuals or as a society strive to
produce similar kinds of experiences in others, even if it
means manipulating or deluding them?
If you would not, think about the following questions as you
explain your choice:
Why wouldn’t you hook up?
What does your decision imply about what matters most
to human life?
When people live their lives in pursuit of some
kind of pre-determined inner feeling or experience, are
their lives missing out on something important? What
are some examples of what that might be?
Discussion 2: Virtue and Teleology
Aristotle’s account is “teleological”,
which means that our understanding of virtue and living well is
based on a sense of the “telos” (function, purpose,
or end) of something (see the text and the guidance for the
full account).
Focusing on either Hill’s article on environmental
ethics, or Robinson’s article on military ethics,
consider how that form of reasoning factors into their account
of the virtuous life. For example, you can consider what
they might have to do with the “place” of humans
within the environment or the “function” of a
soldier, and how that leads to an account of how one best
fulfills role.
Give examples from your own experience, or experiences you
have heard about, in which certain virtues are needed to
achieve the purposes of a role or activity.
Additional References
Nozick, R. (1974). Anarchy, state, and utopia. New
York: Basic Books.