Virtue ethics
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Virtue ethics (also aretaic ethics,
Virtue ethics is usually contrasted with two other major approaches in ethics, consequentialism and deontology, which make the goodness of outcomes of an action (consequentialism) and the concept of moral duty (deontology) central. While virtue ethics does not necessarily deny the importance to ethics of goodness of states of affairs or of moral duties, it emphasizes virtue, and sometimes other concepts, like eudaimonia, to an extent that other ethics theories do not.
Key concepts
Virtue and vice
In virtue ethics, a virtue is a characteristic disposition to think, feel, and act well in some domain of life.[3] In contrast, a vice is a characteristic disposition to think, feel, and act poorly. Virtues are not everyday habits; they are character traits, in the sense that they are central to someone’s personality and what they are like as a person.
In early versions and some modern versions of virtue ethics, a virtue is defined as a character trait that promotes or exhibits human excellence ("flourishing and wellbeing", eudaimonia) in the person who exhibits it.[4] Some modern versions of virtue ethics do not define virtues in terms of human excellence or flourishing, and some go so far as to define virtues as traits that tend to promote some other good that is defined independently of the virtues, thereby subsuming virtue ethics under (or somehow merging it with) consequentialist ethics.[5]
To Aristotle, a virtue was not a skill that made you better able to achieve eudaimonia but was itself an expression of eudaimonia—eudaimonia in activity.[6]
In contrast with consequentialist and deontological ethical systems, in which one may be called upon to do the right thing even though it is not in one's own interests (one is to do it instead for the greater good, or out of duty), in virtue ethics, one does the right thing because it is in one's own interests. Part of training in practical virtue ethics is to come to see the coincidence of one's enlightened self-interest and the practice of the virtues, so that one is virtuous willingly, gladly, and enthusiastically because one knows that being virtuous is the best thing one can do with oneself.[7]: I
Virtue and emotion
In ancient Greek and modern eudaimonic virtue ethics, virtues and vices are complex dispositions that involve both affective and intellectual components.[8] That is, they are dispositions that involve both being able to reason well about the right thing to do (see below on phronesis), and also to engage emotions and feelings correctly.
For example, a generous person can reason well about when and how to help people, and such a person also helps people with pleasure and without conflict. In this, virtuous people are contrasted not only with vicious people (who reason poorly about what to do and are emotionally attached to the wrong things) and with the
According to Rosalind Hursthouse, in Aristotelian virtue ethics, the emotions have moral significance because "virtues (and vices) are all dispositions not only to act, but to feel emotions, as reactions as well as impulses to action... [and] In the person with the virtues, these emotions will be felt on the right occasions, toward the right people or objects, for the right reasons, where 'right' means 'correct'..."[9]
Phronesis and eudaimonia
Phronesis (φρόνησις; prudence, practical virtue, or practical wisdom) is an acquired trait that enables its possessor to identify the best thing to do in any given situation.[10] Unlike theoretical wisdom, practical reason results in action or decision.[11] As John McDowell puts it, practical wisdom involves a "perceptual sensitivity" to what a situation requires.[12]
Eudaimonia (εὐδαιμονία) is a state variously translated from Greek as 'well-being', 'happiness', 'blessedness', and in the context of virtue ethics, 'human flourishing'.[13] Eudaimonia in this sense is not a subjective, but an objective, state.[citation needed] It characterizes the well-lived life.
According to Aristotle, the most prominent exponent of eudaimonia in the Western philosophical tradition, eudaimonia defines the goal of human life. It consists of exercising the characteristic human quality—reason—as the soul's most proper and nourishing activity. In his Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle, like Plato before him, argued that the pursuit of eudaimonia is an "activity of the soul in accordance with perfect virtue",[7]: I which further could only properly be exercised in the characteristic human community—the polis or city-state.[14]
Although eudaimonia was first popularized by Aristotle, it now belongs to the tradition of virtue theories generally.[15] For the virtue theorist, eudaimonia describes that state achieved by the person who lives the proper human life, an outcome that can be reached by practicing the virtues. A virtue is a habit or quality that allows the bearer to succeed at his, her, or its purpose. The virtue of a knife, for example, is sharpness; among the virtues of a racehorse is speed. Thus, to identify the virtues for human beings, one must have an account of what is the human purpose.
Not all modern virtue ethics theories are eudaimonic; some place another end in place of eudaimonia, while others are non-teleological: that is, they do not account for virtues in terms of the results that the practice of the virtues produce or tend to produce.[16]
History of virtue
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Like much of the Western tradition, virtue theory originated in ancient
Virtue ethics began with
Plato and Aristotle's treatments of virtues are not the same. Plato believes virtue is effectively an end to be sought, for which a friend might be a useful means. Aristotle states that the virtues function more as means to safeguard human relations, particularly authentic friendship, without which one's quest for happiness is frustrated.
Discussion of what were known as the four cardinal virtues—wisdom, justice, fortitude, and temperance—can be found in Plato's Republic. The virtues also figure prominently in Aristotle's ethical theory found in Nicomachean Ethics.[7]
Virtue theory was inserted into the study of history by moralistic historians such as Livy, Plutarch, and Tacitus. The Greek idea of the virtues was passed on in Roman philosophy through Cicero and later incorporated into Christian moral theology by Ambrose of Milan. During the scholastic period, the most comprehensive consideration of the virtues from a theological perspective was provided by Thomas Aquinas in his Summa Theologiae and his Commentaries on the Nicomachean Ethics.[18]
After the Reformation, Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics continued to be the main authority for the discipline of ethics at Protestant universities until the late seventeenth century, with over fifty Protestant commentaries published on the Nicomachean Ethics before 1682.[19]
Though the tradition receded into the background of European philosophical thought in the past few centuries, the term "virtue" remained current during this period, and in fact appears prominently in the tradition of
Contemporary "aretaic turn"
Although some
- In the 1976 paper "The Schizophrenia of Modern Ethical Theories", Michael Stocker summarises the main aretaic criticisms of deontological and consequentialist ethics.[21]
- Philosopher, psychologist, and encyclopedist Mortimer Adler appealed to Aristotelian ethics, and the virtue theory of happiness or eudaimoniathroughout his published work.
- Philippa Foot, published a collection of essays in 1978 entitled Virtues and Vices.[22]
- Alasdair MacIntyre made an effort to reconstruct a virtue-based theory in dialogue with the problems of modern and postmodern thought; his works include After Virtue and Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry.[23]
- hermeneutical phenomenology of the subject, most notably in his book Oneself as Another.[24]
- Theologian Stanley Hauerwas found the language of virtue helpful in his own project.
- Roger Crisp and Michael Slote edited a collection of important essays titled Virtue Ethics.[25]
- Martha Nussbaum and Amartya Sen employed virtue theory in theorising the capability approach to international development.
- Julia Annas wrote The Morality of Happiness (1993).[26]
- Lawrence C. Becker identified current virtue theory with Greek Stoicism in A New Stoicism. (1998).[27]
- Rosalind Hursthouse published On Virtue Ethics (1999).[28]
- Psychologist Martin Seligman drew on classical virtue ethics in conceptualizing positive psychology.
- Psychologist Daniel Goleman opens his book on Emotional Intelligence with a challenge from Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics.[29]
- Michael Sandel discusses Aristotelian ethics to support his ethical theory of justice in his book Justice: What's the Right Thing to Do?
The aretaic turn in moral philosophy is paralleled by analogous developments in other philosophical disciplines. One of these is
Aretaic approaches to morality, epistemology, and jurisprudence have been the subject of intense debates. One criticism focuses on the problem of guidance; opponents, such as Robert Louden in his article "Some Vices of Virtue Ethics", question whether the idea of a virtuous moral actor, believer, or judge can provide the guidance necessary for action, belief formation, or the resolution of legal disputes.[30]
Lists of virtues
There are several lists of virtues. Socrates argued that virtue is knowledge, which suggests that there is really only one virtue.[31] The Stoics identified four cardinal virtues: wisdom, justice, courage, and temperance. Wisdom is subdivided into good sense, good calculation, quick-wittedness, discretion, and resourcefulness. Justice is subdivided into piety, honesty, equity, and fair dealing. Courage is subdivided into endurance, confidence, high-mindedness, cheerfulness, and industriousness. Temperance or moderation is subdivided into good discipline, seemliness, modesty, and self-control.[32]
John McDowell argues that virtue is a "perceptual capacity" to identify how one ought to act, and that all particular virtues are merely "specialized sensitivities" to a range of reasons for acting.[33]
- Aristotle's list
Aristotle identifies approximately 18 virtues that demonstrate a person is performing their human function well.[7] He distinguished virtues pertaining to emotion and desire from those relating to the mind.[7]: II The first he calls moral virtues, and the second intellectual virtues (though both are "moral" in the modern sense of the word).
- Moral virtues
Aristotle suggested that each moral virtue was a mean (see golden mean) between two corresponding vices, one of excess and one of deficiency. Each intellectual virtue is a mental skill or habit by which the mind arrives at truth, affirming what is or denying what is not.[7]: VI In the Nicomachean Ethics he discusses about 11 moral virtues:
SPHERE OF ACTION OR FEELING | EXCESS | MEAN: MORAL VIRTUE | DEFICIENCY |
---|---|---|---|
Fear and confidence | Rashness | Courage in the face of fear[7]: III.6–9 | Cowardice |
Pleasure and pain | Licentiousness / self-indulgence | Temperance in the face of pleasure and pain[7]: III.10–12 | Insensibility |
Getting and spending (minor) | Prodigality | Liberality with wealth and possessions[7] : IV.1
|
Illiberality / meanness |
Getting and spending (major) | Vulgarity / tastelessness | Magnificence with great wealth and possessions[7]: IV.2 | Pettiness / stinginess |
Honour and dishonour (major) | Vanity | Magnanimity with great honors[7]: IV.3 | Pusillanimity |
Honour and dishonour (minor) | Ambition/empty vanity | Proper ambition with normal honors[7]: IV.4 | Unambitiousness / undue humility |
Anger | Irascibility | Patience/good temper[7]: IV.5 | Lack of spirit/unirascibility |
Self-expression | Boastfulness | Truthfulness with self-expression[7]: IV.7 | Understatement / mock modesty |
Conversation | Buffoonery | Wittiness in conversation[7]: IV.8 | Boorishness |
Social conduct | Obsequiousness | Friendliness in social conduct[7]: IV.6 | Cantankerousness |
Shame | Shyness | Modesty in the face of shame or shamelessness[7]: IV.9 | Shamelessness |
Indignation | Envy | Righteous indignation in the face of injury[7]: IV.5 | Malicious enjoyment / spitefulness |
- Intellectual virtues
- Nous (intelligence), which apprehends fundamental truths (such as definitions, self-evident principles)[7]: VI.11
- Episteme (science), which is skill with inferential reasoning (such as proofs, syllogisms, demonstrations)[7]: VI.6
- Sophia (theoretical wisdom), which combines fundamental truths with valid, necessary inferences to reason well about unchanging truths.[7]: VI.5
Aristotle also mentions several other traits:
- Gnome (good sense) – passing judgment, "sympathetic understanding"[7]: VI.11
- Synesis (understanding) – comprehending what others say, does not issue commands
- Phronesis (practical wisdom) – knowledge of what to do, knowledge of changing truths, issues commands[7]: VI.8
- Techne (art, craftsmanship)[7]: VI.4
Aristotle's list is not the only list, however. As Alasdair MacIntyre observed in After Virtue, thinkers as diverse as Homer, the authors of the New Testament, Thomas Aquinas, and Benjamin Franklin have all proposed lists.[34]
Criticisms
Regarding which are the most important virtues, Aristotle proposed the following nine: wisdom; prudence; justice; fortitude; courage; liberality; magnificence; magnanimity; temperance. In contrast, philosopher Walter Kaufmann proposed as the four cardinal virtues ambition/humility, love, courage, and honesty.[35][non sequitur]
Proponents of virtue theory sometimes argue that a central feature of a virtue is its universal applicability. In other words, any character trait defined as a virtue must reasonably be universally regarded as a virtue for all people. According to this view, it is inconsistent to claim, for example, servility as a female virtue, while at the same time not proposing it as a male one.[36]
Other proponents of virtue theory, notably Alasdair MacIntyre, respond to this objection by arguing that any account of the virtues must indeed be generated out of the community in which those virtues are to be practiced: the very word ethics implies ethos. That is to say that the virtues are, and necessarily must be, grounded in a particular time and place. What counts as a virtue in 4th-century BCE Athens would be a ludicrous guide to proper behaviour in 21st-century CE Toronto and vice versa. To take this view does not necessarily commit one to the argument that accounts of the virtues must therefore be static: moral activity—that is, attempts to contemplate and practice the virtues—can provide the cultural resources that allow people to change, albeit slowly, the ethos of their own societies.
MacIntyre appears to take this position in his seminal work on virtue ethics, After Virtue. One might cite (though MacIntyre does not) the rapid emergence of
Another objection to virtue theory is that virtue ethics does not focus on what sorts of actions are morally permitted and which ones are not, but rather on what sort of qualities someone ought to foster in order to become a good person. In other words, while some virtue theorists may not condemn, for example, murder as an inherently immoral or impermissible sort of action, they may argue that someone who commits a murder is severely lacking in several important virtues, such as compassion and fairness. Still, antagonists of the theory often object that this particular feature of the theory makes virtue ethics useless as a universal norm of acceptable conduct suitable as a base for legislation. Some virtue theorists concede this point, but respond by opposing the very notion of legitimate legislative authority instead, effectively advocating some form of anarchism as the political ideal.[citation needed] Others argue that laws should be made by virtuous legislators. Still, others argue that it is possible to base a judicial system on the moral notion of virtues rather than rules. Aristotle himself saw his Nicomachean Ethics as a prequel for his Politics and felt that the point of politics was to create the fertile soil for a virtuous citizenry to develop in, and that one purpose of virtue was that it helps you to contribute to a healthy polis.[7]: X.9 [14]
Some virtue theorists might respond to this overall objection with the notion of a "bad act" also being an act characteristic of vice.[citation needed] That is to say that those acts that do not aim at virtue, or that stray from virtue, would constitute our conception of "bad behavior". Although not all virtue ethicists agree to this notion, this is one way the virtue ethicist can re-introduce the concept of the "morally impermissible". One could raise an objection that he is committing an argument from ignorance by postulating that what is not virtuous is unvirtuous. In other words, just because an action or person 'lacks of evidence' for virtue does not, all else constant, imply that said action or person is unvirtuous.
Subsumed in deontology and utilitarianism
Nussbaum also points to considerations of virtue by utilitarians such as Henry Sidgwick (The Methods of Ethics), Jeremy Bentham (The Principles of Morals and Legislation), and John Stuart Mill, who writes of moral development as part of an argument for the moral equality of women (The Subjection of Women). She argues that contemporary virtue ethicists such as Alasdair MacIntyre, Bernard Williams, Philippa Foot, and John McDowell have few points of agreement and that the common core of their work does not represent a break from Kant.
Kantian critique
Immanuel Kant's position on virtue ethics is contested. Those who argue that Kantian deontology conflicts with virtue ethics include Alasdair MacIntyre, Philippa Foot, and Bernard Williams.[38] In the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals and the Critique of Practical Reason, Immanuel Kant offers many different criticisms of ethical frameworks and against moral theories before him.[citation needed] Kant rarely mentioned Aristotle by name but did not exclude his moral philosophy of virtue ethics from his critique. Many Kantian arguments against virtue ethics claim that virtue ethics is inconsistent, or sometimes that it is not a real moral theory at all.[39]
In "What Is Virtue Ethics All About?",[40] Gregory Velazco y Trianosky identified the key points of divergence between virtue ethicists and what he called "neo-Kantianism", in the form these nine neo-Kantian moral assertions:
- The crucial moral question is "what is it right/obligatory to do?"
- Moral judgments are those that concern the rightness of actions.
- Such judgments take the form of rules or principles.
- Such rules or principles are universal, not respecting persons.
- They are not based on some concept of human good that is independent of moral goodness.
- They take the form of categorical imperatives that can be justified independently of the desires of the person they apply to.
- They are motivating; they can compel action in an agent, also independently of that agent's desires.
- An action, in order to be morally virtuous, must be motivated by this sort of moral judgment (not, for example, merely coincidentally aligned with it).
- The virtuousness of a character trait, or virtue, derives from the relationship that trait has to moral judgments, rules, and principles.
Trianosky says that modern sympathizers with virtue ethics almost all reject neo-Kantian claim #1, and many of them also reject certain of the other claims.
Utopianism and pluralism
Robert B. Louden criticizes virtue ethics on the basis that it promotes a form of unsustainable
Topics in virtue ethics
Virtue ethics as a category
Virtue contrasts with
The next predominant school of thought in normative ethics is consequentialism. While deontology places the emphasis on doing one's duty, consequentialism bases the morality of an action upon its outcome. Instead of saying that one has a moral duty to abstain from murder, a consequentialist would say that we should abstain from murder because it causes undesirable effects. The main contention here is what outcomes should/can be identified as objectively desirable.
The
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A virtue ethicist identifies virtues, desirable characteristics, that an excellent person embodies. Exhibiting these virtues is the aim of ethics, and one's actions are a reflection of one's virtues. To the virtue philosopher, action cannot be used as a demarcation of morality, because a virtue encompasses more than just a simple selection of action. Instead, a virtue is a way of being that leads the person exhibiting the virtue to make certain "virtuous" types of choices consistently in each situation. There is a great deal of disagreement within virtue ethics over what are virtues and what are not. There are also difficulties in identifying what is the "virtuous" action to take in all circumstances, and how to define a virtue.
Consequentialist and deontological theories often still employ the term virtue, but in a restricted sense, namely as a tendency or disposition to adhere to the system's principles or rules. In other words, in those theories, virtue is secondary, and the principles or rules are primary. These very different senses of what constitutes virtue, hidden behind the same word, are a potential source of confusion.[42]
This disagreement over the meaning of virtue points to a larger conflict between virtue theory and its philosophical rivals. A system of virtue theory is only intelligible if it is
Virtue and politics
Virtue theory emphasises Aristotle's belief in the polis as the acme of political organisation,[citation needed] and the role of the virtues in enabling human beings to flourish in that environment. Classical republicanism in contrast emphasises Tacitus' concern that power and luxury can corrupt individuals and destroy liberty, as Tacitus perceived in the transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire; virtue for classical republicans is a shield against this sort of corruption and a means to preserve the good life one has, rather than a means by which to achieve the good life one does not yet have. Another way to put the distinction between the two traditions is that virtue ethics relies on Aristotle's fundamental distinction between the human-being-as-he-is from the human-being-as-he-should-be, while classical republicanism relies on the Tacitean distinction of the risk-of-becoming.[43]
Virtue ethics has a number of contemporary applications.
- Social and political philosophy
Within the field of social ethics, Deirdre McCloskey argues that virtue ethics can provide a basis for a balanced approach to understanding capitalism and capitalist societies.[44]
- Education
Within the field of philosophy of education, James Page argues that virtue ethics can provide a rationale and foundation for peace education.[45]
- Health care and medical ethics
Thomas Alured Faunce argued that whistleblowing in the healthcare setting would be more respected within clinical governance pathways if it had a firmer academic foundation in virtue ethics.[46] He called for whistleblowing to be expressly supported in the UNESCO Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights.[47] Barry Schwartz argues that "practical wisdom" is an antidote to much of the inefficient and inhumane bureaucracy of modern health care systems.[48]
- Technology and the virtues
In her book Technology and the Virtues,[49] Shannon Vallor proposed a series of 'technomoral' virtues that people need to cultivate in order to flourish in our socio-technological world: Honesty (Respecting Truth), Self-control (Becoming the Author of Our Desires), Humility (Knowing What We Do Not Know), Justice (Upholding Rightness), Courage (Intelligent Fear and Hope), Empathy (Compassionate Concern for Others), Care (Loving Service to Others), Civility (Making Common Cause), Flexibility (Skillful Adaptation to Change), Perspective (Holding on to the Moral Whole), and Magnanimity (Moral Leadership and Nobility of Spirit).
See also
- Applied ethics – Practical application of moral considerations
- Arete – Greek philosophical concept
- Buddhist ethics (discipline)
- Confucianism – Chinese ethical and philosophical system
- Cynicism (philosophy) – Ancient school of philosophy
- Environmental virtue ethics – Way of approaching environmental ethics through the lens of virtue ethics
- Modern Stoicism– Philosophical system
- Phronesis – Ancient Greek word for a type of wisdom or intelligence
- Rule according to higher law – Belief that universal principles of morality override unjust laws
- Seven virtues – Seven virtues in Christian tradition
- Stoicism – Philosophical system
- Tirukkuṟaḷ– Ancient Tamil composition on personal ethics and morality
- Virtue epistemology – Philosophical approach
- Virtue jurisprudence – Virtue ethics applied to jurisprudence
- Virtue signalling – Conspicuous expression of moral values
Notes
- ^ Pronounced /ˌærəˈteɪ.ɪk/.
References
- ISBN 9780415170734.
- ISBN 0878402217.
[Virtue Ethics] refers to a rather new (or renewed) approach to ethics, according to which the basic judgments in ethics are judgments about character.
- S2CID 143268990– via SpringerLink.
Virtues are viewed as necessary conditions for, or as constitutive elements of, human flourishing and wellbeing.
What is surprising today is how many of the most influential writers on the virtues today in fact defend some sort of teleological if not specifically utilitarian answer.
[Aristotle regards virtue as] a constitutive element of the human good rather than merely a means to its attainment.
Although modern virtue ethics does not have to take a 'neo-Aristotelian' or eudaimonist form..., almost any modern version still shows that its roots are in ancient Greek philosophy by the employment of three concepts derived from it. These are arête (excellence or virtue), phronesis (practical or moral wisdom) and eudaimonia (usually translated as happiness or flourishing).
[I]t is important to notice (1.) that virtue ethics is not necessarily tied to the notion of wellbeing; and (2.) that according to some philosophers, virtue ethics is necessarily, or at least typically, of a non-teleological nature.
- Aquinas, Thomas (1485). Summa Theologica.
- Aquinas, Thomas (1272). Commentary on the Ten Books of Ethics.
- Stephens, William O. "Stoic Ethics". www.iep.utm.edu. Retrieved 14 February 2023.
- Cicero, Marcus Tullius. "De Officiis" [On Moral Duties]. www.oll.libertyfund.org. Retrieved 14 February 2023.
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: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link[A] view shared by both deontologists and utilitarians... [is that] the value of character traits is dependent on the value of the conduct that these traits tend to produce, and it is the concept of right behavior that it theoretically prior, not that of virtue. In reversing the order of justification, virtue ethics is calling for a real revolution in ethical thought...