Virtue Ethics

A third alternative to utilitarianism and

deontologism
Comparison of the 3

Name Column Tags

happiness or pleasure is the only thing that is valuable

Utilitarianism in itself, right action can be defined in terms of good Utilitarianism
consequences
actions are right or wrong irrespective consequences;
Deontologism an action is right if and only it it is in accordance with Deontologism
moral duty
virtue is a central moral concept; right and wrong action
Virtue Ethics Virtue Ethics
should be understood in terms of virtue

Virtue Ethics, Utilitarianism and Deontologism

For virtue ethicists, concepts of rights or wrong action are less important than the
broader question about living well or being a good person

ethics is concerned with one's whole life rather than a specific moral situation

For virtue ethics, an act is morally right just because it is one that a virtuous
person, acting in character, would do in that situation

💡 Virtue ethics = naikot sa virtue = which means morally right should be

based on how a virtuous person should act in a given situation

Virtue Ethics 1
 RESOLVING MORAL CONFLICTS

Assuming that virtuous people, acting in character, will sometimes do different

things in the same situation, we should say the following

Category of Action Whether virtuous people, acting in character, would

perform it

morally required all of them

morally permitted some but not all of them

morally forbidden none of them

THE PRIORITY PROBLEM

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 which comes first: virtue or right action?
→ Are people virtuous because they perform right actions, or are actions right
because virtuous people perform them?

Is rape evil because virtuous people never rape? or because it imposes

terrible harm without consent? BOTH??

Should we save a toddler from incoming traffic because it is what

virtuous people would do? or because we want to save the child's life?

What is virtue?
virtues are neither passions nor facilities, but states of character - Aristotle

THINGS THAT ARE FOUND IN THE SOULS

Passions

feelings that are accompanied by pleasure or pain

Faculties

capacities for feeling the passions, which comes from nature

State of Character

dispositions and modes of choice, on the ground of which we are praised

or blamed

Virtues Vices

good character traits bad character traits

💡 virtues and vices =

relatively stable
"...the virtue of a man also will be
the state of character which
dispositions(how one makes a man good and which

Virtue Ethics 3
 shall act/mood) to act in makes good and which him to
certain ways
do his own work well" - Aristotle

Moral or Character Virtues (for good)

are traits that allow us to live well

example: courage, kindness and honesty

Intellectual or Epistemic Virtues (for smart)

are traits that allow us to attain knowledge

example: open-mindedness, curiosity, perseverance, intellectual humility and

imaginativeness

💡 Our discussion will focus on moral rather than intellectual virtues

Practical Wisdom Prudence) - aka phronesis Greek)

requirement for moral action Aristotle)

A virtue is not just a habit or pattern of behavior. It requires so much more such as
a distinctive set of perceptions, thoughts and motives

example:

compare the perceptions, thought and motives of generous person with those of a
stingy person

Virtue Ethics 4
 What is Virtue

Name Perceptions Thoughts Motives

Status

Generous will see homeless will think about how to is moved by the
Person people on the street be helpful distress of others
Stingy will look the others will think only of his or is begruding of his
Person way her own needs or her time

Untitled

Virtuous people are defined not just by their deeds → but also by their inner life

We must take as a sign of states of character the pleasure or pain that supervenes
upon acts... Hence we ought to have been brought up in a particular way from our
very youth...so as both to delight in and be pained by the things that we ought →
this is the right education Aristotle)

Compare: The Beatitudes Christianity) and the Eight-Fold Path Buddhism)

The Golden Mean

Eudaimonism
Aristotle's virtue ethics is the most popular version → Eudaimonism (aka
Eudaimonia - a good human life)

focuses on WHAT IS A GOOD LIFE FOR HUMAN BEINGS?

Five Central Claims of Aristotelian Virtue Ethics

 Virtue is a human excellence

Virtue Ethics 5
  What makes a trait a virtue is that it allows its possessor to live a good
(happy or flourishing) life

 A virtuous person is motivated by the right feelings and right reasons

 Practical wisdom (phronesis) is required for virtue

 Actions are to be evaluated in terms of virtue and vice

Moral Complexity
virtue ethicists reject the idea that there are any simple formula for
determining how to act

"... matters concerned with "... conduct has to do

conduct and questions of what with individual cases,
is good for us have no fixity.... and our statements
the agents themselves must in must harmonize with
each case consider what is the facts in these
appropriate to the occasion" cases"

Moral Understanding
a species of practical wisdom

a kind of knowing how that requires a lot of training and experience

"... the virtues we get by first exercising them, as also happens in the case of the
arts...We learn by doing them" EXPERIENCE IS KEY

"...it is by doing just acts that the just man is produced, and by doing temperate
acts the temperate man.." JUST ACTS = MAN

"...it is no easy task to be good. For in everything it is no easy task to find the
middle...He who aims that the intermediate must first depart from what is the

Virtue Ethics 6
 more contrary to it...For of the extremes one is more erroneous (incorrect)" UP
TRAINING

"...we must consider the things towards which we ourselves also are easily carried
away...this will be recognizable from the pleasure and the pain we feel...the
pleasant or pleasure is most to be guarded against; for we do not judge it
impartially" RECOGNIZING FAULT

"but up to what point and to what extent a man must deviate before he becomes
blameworthy it is not easy to determine by reasoning, any more than anything
else that is perceived by the senses, such things depend on particular facts, and
the decision rests with perception" WE NEED A LAW OR LIKE BASED OUR
THINKING WITH FACTS

THE GOLDEN MEAN

moral virtue is concerned with passions and actions, and in these there is
excess, defect and the intermediate... to feel (the passions) at the right times
with references to the right objects, toward the right people with the right
motive and in the right way, is what is both intermediate and best, and this is
characteristic of virtue"

"virtue then is a state of character concerned with choice, lying in a mean. e.g.
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"

"...it is the nature of.. things to be destroyed by defect and excess, as we see
in the case of strength and of health"

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