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Learning Outcomes:
Virtue: Words like generous, conscientious, and honest refer to morally good character traits/habits Vice: Words like envious, insensitive, and vain refer to morally bad traits/habits Character: The pattern of virtues and vices revealed in the life and relationship of an individual.
Ethics asks, "What character traits (like honesty, compassion, fairness) are necessary to live a truly human life?" Virtue: Martin in Everyday Morality defines virtues as "desirable character traits consisting of patterns of emotions, desires, attitudes, intentions, and reasoning as well as actions" (53) MacIntyre defines virtue as"An acquired human quality the possession and exercise of which tends to enable us to achieve those goods which are internal to practices and the lack of which effectively prevents us from achieving any such goods" (After Virtue 204). The Greek word for excellence, ARETE, also translates into virtue. Virtue ethicists say "the moral aim of life is to be a good person - to have virtuous character and to relate to other people in a desirable way" (Martin 43) McIntyre defines virue as "an acquired human quality the possession and exercise of which tends to enable us to chieve those goods which are internal to practices and the lack of which effectively prevents us from achieving any such goods." After Virtue What is a virtue? A desirable trait of character - a good habit What is vice? An undesirable character trait - a bad habit
What is a trait of character? "A general feature of a person that is manifested in patterns of actions, intentions, emotions, desires, attitudes and reasoning" (Martin 43). Virtues are the traits that allow a person to live the good life and achieve the good.
Edmund Pincoffs writes that moral "virtues and vices have have the common characteristic that they are forms of regard or lack of regard for the interest of others. They are roughly of two closely related classes: those that have to do with direct concern or lack of concern for the interests of other persons, on the one hand, and those that have to do with the unfair advantage that one accords to one's own interest over the interests of others" (Quandaries and Virtues 78). These character traits run deep, revealing themselves in "essentially every dimension of human life....feelings, wants, intentions, hopes, interests, attitudes, thoughts, reasoning, relationships, speech" (Martin 43)
Virtues cannot be judge only by actions, but must take attitude into consideration. A wealthy benefactor may give our college $200,000 and a student donates $5 to the foundation drive. Who is most generous? Might the wealthy person resent the donation but feel impelled to give to get his name in the paper and create good will?
The emphasis on virtue ethics (or character ethics) is on developing as moral persons. Plato and Aristotle ask, "What is it that sets humans aside from everything else? It is our reason. Therefore, "virtues are the excellences that enable humans to exercise their powers o reasoning and live accordingly. Hence, to be virtuous is to live effectively the distinctive form of life for humans ( (Marin 44).
Aristotle says man must use reason , live a balanced life, and pursue the right good. Lublin existentialism says we make and create ourselves by our actions and that each action has an intrinsic and extrinsic effect. It affects others as well as ourselves. One of the consequences of our actions is to contribute into making us a certain kind of person. People who behave dishonestly, become dishonest People who exploit others become exploitive "users."
Pamela Moss asks in Ethics and College Student Life, "If you observe some unethical behavior and stand by mutely without trying to stop it, might this damage your character? Could ignoring evil (or merely unpleasantness) make you more evil or unpleasant yourself?" (4)
Thomas Wall writes the following:
Goal of virtue ethics: "To show us how to be happy, how to live good lives, lives of 'human flourishing.'" Contrast this to goal theories of obligation (Kant): "To teach us how to determine the difference between right and wrong. It achieves this goal by identifying rules and principles that we are obliged to follow, even if we do not want to" (Wall, Thinking Critically 46)
Strength of virtue Ethics: 1. There is more to ethics than using rules and principles to assess right and wrong behavior. In addition to doing right, our moral lives also involve becoming morally good persons (Wall 45-46) Morally good persons are those who have acquired the habit of doing good, not just the knowledge. 2. Virtue Ethics encourages us to go beyond the call of duty & become the best person we can be. It presents us with a moral ideal. the moral ideal provides us with a conception of the good life, a life that is the most likely to give us "flourishing" (Wall 49) Weakness: The central objection to virtue ethics it that it "provides us with no way to tell the difference between right and wrong. It gives us no theory of obligation" (Wall 49).
Examples of weakness: Virtues can be used for evil = giving generously to the evil, being loyal and brave to a wicked cause
Aristotle (384-322 B.C.) contends community, relationships and character growth are inextricably linked. Humans live best in well-ordered communities that sustain virtues. |
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Contemporary virtue ethicists claim the lifeblood and heart of ethics is virtue and not over-emphasis of dry moral rules and principles. The Markkula Center of Applied Ethics states, "The fundamental question of ethics is not "What should I do", but "What kind of person should I be?" Virtue ethicists contend we should strive to develop virtues, our personal excellences, so that me may truly be what we were destined to be. What are these virtues? Positive traits which enable us to be fully human: prudence, fairness,, courage,, temperance, self-control, honesty, compassion.... "Virtues" are attitudes, dispositions, or character traits that enable us to be and to act in ways that develop this potential. They enable us to pursue the ideals we have adopted. Honesty, courage, compassion, generosity, fidelity, integrity, fairness, self-control, and prudence are all examples of virtues. Virtues are acquired through repeated action, so they are positive habits which characterize us. The ethical person is the virtuous person. As Aristotle said, "Excellence is a habit." In closing, to quote Markkula Center of Applied Ethics, "The moral life, then, is not simply a matter of following moral rules and of learning to apply them to specific situations. The moral life is also a matter of trying to determine the kind of people we should be and of attending to the development of character within our communities and ourselves."
A lovely quote: Aristotle and Plato, however, knew something contemporary moral philosophers have forgotten or renounced: The reason for studying ethics is to become a better person. To do that, we need self-scrutiny and transformation by attachment to a good beyond the self. Analytical skills alone will not get us out of the cave and into the light. William C. Spohn, Presidential Professor of Ethics and the Common Good at Santa Clara University.
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