Virtue Ethics Origin ❧ The Origins of Greek Ethics ❧ ❧ 1) Practical concern for living life. ❧ 2) Based in human nature and human desires ❧ 3) The concept of an ultimate end and desire for all human being. ❧ 4) Agent centered view of ethics. ❧ 5) The assumption that we are incomplete beings searching for something more, some further sense of fulfillment. 1. Socrates (search for a good life). ❧ ❧ Socrates was the first Greek philosopher who focused on the question of ethics. ❧ His interpretation of ethics was very broad and practical. ❧ Socrates inquiry concerned the practical question of how to live one’s life. ❧ What does it mean to live a good life? ❧ This can also be reframed as a search for the purpose and meaning of life. ❧ What is it that we are supposed to be doing in this life? 2. Human Desires ❧ ❧ Human desires are central to ethics and to the question of how we should live our lives. ❧ Desires are what provide the motivation for our choices and actions. ❧ Ethics is about human choices and actions. Desires ❧ ❧ There seems to be two different kinds of desires: ❧ (1) rational desires and (2) Non-rational desire. ❧ Under rational desires we can have different types: emotional, intellectual, social and moral desires. Non-rational ❧ ❧ The non-rational desires are those natural impulses that originate in us as part of our essence (the kindof –thing-we-are). ❧ For instance, the desire for sleep, food and sex. ❧ These desires are connected more to our bodies than to our minds. ❧ They are neither good or bad because they are part of our nature. More non-rational desires ❧ ❧ There are also other kinds of desires that are not basic natural desires but that are still connected in a very essential way with our bodies and physical beings. ❧ These can be viewed through their connection with physical pleasure and pain ❧ For instance, consider smoking. People have a desire to smoke because it produces pleasure (it is pleasant in the short-term). Yet this desire is not an essential desire like hunger or the desire for food. Rational Desire ❧ ❧ We also have more sophisticated kinds of desires that are not as connected to our physical essence. ❧ We might have, for instance, emotional desires, for friendship and love. ❧ We might also have intellectual desire, such as to know things about the world. To know the why of things. ❧ We might also have social desire such as to be liked and accepted, to be honored, to be respected, etc. Different Views ❧ ❧ Socrates: we only have rational desires (even our most basic desires are infused with reasons). ❧ This is why for Socrates virtue is knowledge and vice is ignorance. ❧ People always do what they think is good for them. They simply are mistaken at times. Plato ❧ ❧ Plato unlike Socrates believes that there are different parts of the soul/mind. ❧ (1) the rational part, (2) the appetites or passions, and (3) the spirit or will. ❧ The main difference between Plato and Socrates is that for Socrates when people are immoral they are so because they are ignorant. They need education. ❧ For Plato people may be immoral because their lower desires stemming from their appetites overwelhm them. Here what is needed is not simply education but the cultivation (restrain) of our lower desires. Aristotle ❧ ❧ Aristotle conjectured that the nonrational desires were made up of two parts: (1) the physical desires (appetites) and (2) the emotions (anger, shame, etc). ❧ He referred to both as feelings. ❧ The rational desiring is a kind of willing that is neither a physical or emotional feeling. ❧ All behavior stems from feeling and willing. 3. Ultimate Desire Overriding Good ❧ ❧ A sign of rationality is that a being has goals, aspirations and ambitions he/she wants to accomplish (call these ends). ❧ To achieve these goals and ends, we think, reflect and deliberate about what would be the best (most efficient and effective way) to accomplish them. ❧ This thinking process (means to ends) is paradigmatic of rationality. It s in some sense the essence of rationality (what it means to be rational). Desire and Goals/Ends ❧ ❧ There is an important relationship among one’s rational desires and one’s goals. ❧ It seems that we do have control over our rational desires (what we want, what we decide to strive for) and thus we are responsible for our rational desire in a way that we are not responsible for our natural, non-rational desire. Rational Desires ❧ ❧ A central Greek concern was whether there was such a thing as an ultimate desire that all of our rational desires aspired to. ❧ For instance, if you have the desire to becomean attorney we ask you, Why? Why do you want to be an attorney? ❧ You might respond, ‘Because I want to make a lot of money?” Again, we might ask you why do you want to make a lot of money? ❧ You might respond, “Because I want to have a family and a big house and travel.” ❧ Again, We might ask you why do you desire all of these things? Ultimate Desire ❧ ❧ Is there some end or purpose for which all of these things (job, money, house, family travel, etc.) are desired for? ❧ The Greeks believed so. ❧ The answer is HAPPINESS The Good and Happiness ❧ ❧ Out ultimate desire is The Good and Happiness ❧ According to the Greeks we all desire what is good or what we think is good in order to be happy. ❧ You think studying is good, being an attorney is good, having a family is good, and making money is good, and all of these good things will make you happy. ❧ Notice however that happiness is not a means to a further end for is is absurd to ask someone why they want to be happy. 4. Agent Centered ❧ ❧ The Greeks were concerned with one’s own life and only derivatively with the lives of others. ❧ They were NOT individualistic they did NOT believe that a person could live a solitary life. ❧ Instead they believed that we were naturally socialpolitical animals and thus our concern for our selves in necessarily connected to our family, friends and citizens. ❧ Nevertheless, the goal was to search for our happiness thought the things we can control which are our ACTIONS. 5. We Are Incomplete Beings ❧ ❧ The assumption imbedded in Greek Ethics is that human are continuously strive to achieve a kind of fulfillment or happiness. ❧ We have an inherent desire to search for what is good and will make us happy. Objections ❧ ❧ 1) Virtue ethics commits the naturalistic fallacy (it goes from “is” to “ought”). ❧ 2) The teleological concept in human beings assumes some grand design (intelligent creator). Naturalistic Fallacy ❧ ❧ Some might object to virtue ethics in that it depends only on nature and has a natural foundation. ❧ In other words, ethics is based on our empirical observations about the human condition. ❧ However, the world of values transcends the empirical world. So how can we get to facts about the world to values beyond the empirical world. Response ❧ ❧ For Aristotle value is embedded in the physical world and thus there is not transcending it. ❧ The good is living and doing well in the work and not something different. ❧ “Values are embedded in what is, that is, in our biological and psychological striving to live a good life and to experiences happiness and fulfillment in our lives.” (Devettere 21) Teleological ❧ ❧ The notion of teleology (that things have an end or purpose) assumes a designer. ❧ Response: This is not the case for Aristotle. For Aristotle teleology simply means the natural function of a thing. ❧ For instance the human eyes have a natural function, which is to see. If it does this well then it is virtuous. The same can also be said of all our organs, such as the liver, heart, kidney, etc. ❧ None of this assumes a deity of any kind and such a view is completely consistent with Darwinism. PHIL 292 Virtue Ethics ONLINE ASSIGNMENT 1 Directions: The answers to the essay questions should include a critical analysis and an in depth examination of the issue in question. A critical analysis should NOT be simply an explanation of the arguments or of the view in question but should also include your assessment of whether the author’s arguments are good or bad, and why. It should also include an explanation of your personal view and a philosophical defense of it. Format: The document should have 1-inch margins. The answer should be in Times New Roman size 12 font and double-spaced. Please write out the complete question. The questions can be single-spaced and bold. The answers MUST be double spaced! Please make sure you put your name, the assignment #, the title of the course, and the date. Also number your pages. Turning in the Assignment: Students will upload their completed document to Google Drive and share it with me (Dr. Cantens). Please name your assignment “VE-Your Last NameAssignment #”. Due: Monday, July 23 by 6:00 AM. 1. What is ethics? What is ethics’ method and goal according to Aristotle? How is virtue ethics different from consequentialism and deontology? 2. Explain the five elements of Greek virtue ethics. Elaborate on each of these elements. 3. Explain Aristotle’s notion of happiness in Book I of the Nicomachean Ethics. (Why does it have to be complete and self-sufficient? How is this related to virtue, good and reason? How is it related to “the function of humans”? Can we be both ethical and happy? How is this possible? How do we achieve happiness? Can a virtuous person lose their happiness?) 
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