Virtue Ethics

Virtue ethics has been dogged by the objection that it lacks the ability to provide adequate action-guidance, that it is agent-centered rather act-centered. Virtue ethics has also been faulted for devolving into moral cultural relativism. Rosalind Hursthouse has presented an action-based, naturalistic theory of virtue ethics intended to defuse these charges. Despite its merits, I argue that Hurthouse’s theory fails to successfully solve the problems associated with action guidance and relativism precisely because her attempt to provide a non-cultural basis for (...) virtue ethics undermines the possibility of using virtue ethics to derive useful action-guidance. The action-guiding power of virtue is derived from culture; seeking to avoid the cultural grounding of virtue merely brings one back to the problem of how virtue ethics can provide action-guidance. (shrink)

Study of Batman´s villain Scarecrow through the lens of ancient Stoicism, particularly according to the Stoic theory of passions.

Many theistic religions place a high value on faith in God and some traditions regard it as a virtue. However, philosophers commonly assign either very little value to faith in God or significant negative value, or even view it as a vice. Progress in assessing whether and when faith in God can be valuable or disvaluable, virtuous or vicious, rational or irrational, or otherwise apt or inapt requires understanding what faith in God is. This Special Issue on the normative appraisal (...) of faith in God for Religious Studies includes nine articles, from a diverse range of perspectives, which explore issues related to the core questions ‘What is faith in God?’ and ‘What normative questions about faith in God need to be addressed?’ In this Introduction, we briefly introduce each article. (shrink)

Virtue ethics is traditionally a conservative project. It analyses the virtues that humanity has been relying on since antiquity. This conservatism unduly limits the potential of virtue ethics to contribute to moral progress. Instead, we should pay more attention to constructionist virtue ethics with the help of conceptual engineering. I will argue that revising and ameliorating the virtue concepts which a community uses directly and indirectly leads to a change of the virtues that exist in this community. By revising and (...) innovating virtue concepts, we can re-make and improve the virtues that we have. (shrink)

Such a bewildering and contradictory welter of behaviors and traits are connoted by “honor” and its best equivalents in other languages that analyses of the concept have daunted philosophers, anthropologists, sociologists, political scientists, historians, and literary scholars for millennia. Is it an external good given — and revoked just as easily — by others? Or does “honor” name an inner good that’s absolutely in our control: our integrity, our very commitment to right conduct? Is honor a central moral virtue — (...) as when we might say that “all was lost, save our honor”? Or is it a good quality that’s not-quite “moral,” or indeed even an antiquated virtue hostile to true morality? Is the honorable man a heroic figure who protects the weak, or one who can be expected to bully the weak, as in the case of “honor killings”? Is honor aristocratic and inegalitarian, and thus a virtue that enables and ennobles what’s essentially oppression? Or is honor a signal virtue of fair-dealing, fair-fighting, and fair competition, as evidenced in sportsmanship? (shrink)

El desarrollo humano es, en el contexto de los estudios del desarrollo internacional, un concepto difundido a partir de 1990 por el Programa de las Naciones Unidas para el Desarrollo (PNUD). Este artículo propone una interpretación alternativa del concepto de desarrollo humano que resuelve algunas inconsistencias producidas por la confluencia de las distintas corrientes teóricas que dieron origen al concepto. La nueva interpretación propuesta proviene de los aportes del enfoque aristotélico de Martha Nussbaum y, más directamente, de la antropología aristotélica (...) y las nociones de acto y potencia. Se argumenta que el desarrollo humano puede ser entendido como el cambio que busca la realización plena del potencial humano. (shrink)

In the replies to my critics that follow I offer a more detailed account of the specific papers that they discuss or examine. The papers that they are especially concerned with are: “The Material World and Natural Religion in Hume’s Treatise” (Ryan) [Essay 3], “Hume’s Skepticism and the Problem of Atheism” (Fosl) [Essay 12], and “Hume’s Philosophy of Irreligion and the Myth of British Empiricism (Gautier) [Essay 16].

The aim of this paper is to argue that the normative significance of the inner aspects of filial piety—in particular, filial love—is better captured when we understand it as a part of the virtue of filial piety rather than as an object of duty. After briefly introducing the value of filial love, I argue that the idea of a duty to love one’s loving parents faces serious difficulties in making sense of the normative significance of filial love. Then I show (...) why the virtue-ethical approach to filial love, which views filial love as a constitutive part of filial piety understood as a virtue, can do justice to the normative significance while avoiding the difficulties. (shrink)

Recasting Hume and Early Modern Philosophy is a collection of essays that are all concerned with major figures and topics in the early modern philosophy. Most of the essays are concerned, more specifically, with the philosophy of David Hume (1711-1776). The sixteen essays included in this collection are divided into five parts. These parts are arranged under the headings of: (1) Metaphysics and Epistemology; (2) Free Will and Moral Luck; (3) Ethics, Virtue and Optimism; (4) Skepticism, Religion and Atheism; and (...) (5) Irreligion and the Unity of Hume’s Thought. A particularly important theme running through many of these essays is the subject of Hume’s irreligious aims and intentions. The fifth and final part of the collection is devoted to an articulation and defence of this specific understanding of Hume’s philosophical thought. (shrink)

Los aspectos ético y moral se insertan en los problemas de la filosofía antigua, aspectos que han sido tenidos en cuenta como determinantes en la búsqueda de la vida feliz. Una de tantas propuestas fue desarrollada por el heleno Epicuro oriundo de la isla de Samos quien argumenta que el placer es el fin de la vida feliz. Tal identificación del placer con la felicidad ha sido fundamento para que otros pensadores cataloguen a este filósofo de libertino, promiscuo, antimoral, etc. (...) Así pues, el presente estudio se desarrolla desde una propuesta hermenéutica que contribuya a la interpretación veraz de la filosofía ética epicúrea. Además, se pretende argumentar desde la objetividad el verdadero sentido del placer rebatiendo toda opción que le perfila desde la práctica como elemento propicio para la lujuria, derroche, narcisismo; e inclusive impugnar aquellas conjeturas que profieren falacias en torno al tema en desarrollo. (shrink)

Behavioral intervention techniques leveraging reactive responses have gained popularity as tools for promoting ethical behavior. Choice architects, for example, design and present default opt-out options to nudge individuals into accepting preselected choices deemed beneficial to both the decision-maker and society. Such interventions can also employ mild financial incentives or affective triggers including joy, fear, empathy, social pressure, and reputational rewards. We argue, however, that ethical competence is achieved via reflection, and that heavy reliance on reactive behavioral interventions can undermine the (...) development of ethical competence over the long term. Specifically, drawbacks may occur through motivational displacement, dependency, moral crowding out, loss of personal autonomy, and reactance. We introduce complementary cognitive boosting techniques designed to stimulate reflective cognition, as a more promising long-term strategy for instilling ethical behavior. One such approach is the Moral Self-Awareness (MSA) motivational construct, which incrementally leads agents to increasing levels of ethical reflection. We explain why ethical boosting approaches present more edifying and durable alternatives to reactive behavioral interventions and offer suggestions for social and organizational policy. (shrink)

Over the past two decades, virtue ethicists have begun to devote increasing attention to applied ethics. In particular, the application of virtue ethical frameworks to the environmental ethics debate has flourished. This chapter reviews recent contributions to the literature in this field and highlights some strengths and weaknesses of thinking about climate change through a virtue ethical lens. Section “Two Benefits of Virtue Ethical Approaches to Climate Change” explores two benefits of applying virtue ethics to climate change: (a) we can (...) better capture the phenomenology of our moral experience, and (b) we avoid the problem of inconsequentialism. Section “A Catalogue of Environmental Virtues” analyzes various practical proposals that have been put forward in the form of specific environmental virtues. Section “An Objection to Virtue-Oriented Approaches to Climate Change” reconstructs a fundamental objection to the idea of using a virtue ethical normative approach to tackling the urgent and imminent dangers of climate change. (shrink)

We assess John Bishop’s theory of the nature of Christian faith in God, as most recently expressed in ‘Reasonable Faith and Reasonable Fideism’, although we dip into other writings as well. We explain several concerns we have about it. However, in the end, our reflections lead us to propose a modified theory, one that avoids our concerns while remaining consonant with some of his guiding thoughts about the nature of Christian faith in God. We also briefly examine three normative issues (...) Bishop’s views present. (shrink)

What sort of moral theory should we view Saint Anselm of Canterbury as holding and using in his writings? In this paper, I argue that Anselm is best understood as a virtue ethicist. In the first part of the paper, I consider whether his approach could be understood in terms of deontological or natural law theories. In the second, I make a case for Anselm being a virtue ethicist. In the third part, I focus on this theme as found in (...) treatises published during Anselm’s lifetime. In the fourth, I look at other texts within the Anselmian corpus, notably the De humanibus moribus and the Dicta Anselmi. In the fifth and sixth parts, I turn to Anselm’s letters, focusing first on general discussions, and then on discussions focused upon specific virtues and vices. -/- . (shrink)

The statement everyone wants to live a fulfilled and happy life may seem simple, self-evident, and even trivial at first glance. However, upon closer philosophical analysis, can we unequivocally assert that people are truly focused on well-being? Assuming they are, the question becomes: what guidelines should be followed and how should one behave in order to achieve true well-being and attain their goals? One popular viewpoint is that cultivating moral virtues and personal qualities is essential for a life of "true" (...) well-being, rather than mere pleasure. This perspective is not particularly original, as it was advocated quite clearly by Aristotle. However, we must ask: what guarantees that virtue will lead to well-being? Can we really ignore the common-sense doubt that virtue (and moral life), as Kant points out, may not be rewarded with any form of well-being or "happiness" in the broadest sense during our earthly existence? How might we address this doubt? If questions about the relationship between happiness and virtue have been asked since ancient times, why don't we have definitive answers yet? Perhaps there is something wrong with the questions themselves, as is often the case in philosophy. Views on this relationship have influenced the modification of theories that philosophers have put forth in order to provide satisfactory answers. One such theory is the renewed and modernized ethics of virtue, which places the greatest emphasis on building an individual's moral character, assuming that Aristotelian character virtues such as courage, honesty, generosity, prudence, self-control, and compassion will enable us to lead a happy and fulfilling life. "Virtues" refer to a wide range of "excellences" or activities that individuals can use to perfect themselves. For example, an ordinary person might accept that courage can make their life more fulfilling, but it's important to recognize that virtues cannot be acquired overnight. Furthermore, many people believe that virtues are innate qualities that one either possesses or lacks. In contrast, ethics of virtue provides guidance and instructions for developing virtues over extended periods of time, as well as for continuously "practicing" the development of moral characteristics that will make us better individuals. The central and most significant concept in ethics of virtue is the golden mean, which can be interpreted in various ways. Essentially, ethics of virtue offers a path to a life filled with pleasure, harmony, and virtuous action. However, this collection of essays, Virtues and Vices: Between Ethics and Epistemology, is not exclusively concerned with virtues or ethics. Knowledge, as well as the processes of belief formation and justification of those beliefs, are also essential to ethics of virtue. Going back to the systematic Greek philosopher and his teacher, we can emphasize that virtues and knowledge are inseparable. Without the epistemology of virtues, even a thematic collection like this one would be incomplete. The Epistemology of Virtue is a relatively new branch of philosophy that has emerged as a response to questions about the value-neutrality of science. For a long time, the separation of values and scientific inquiry has been viewed as the correct methodological approach. However, it is clear that every scientist is also a human being with their own virtues and flaws. It is naive to assume that a scientist can leave their values and moral qualities outside the laboratory and treat their colleagues in the team differently than they would treat other people in their everyday life. Taking this into account, we can notice that Epistemology of Virtue is a theory that examines the influence of virtues on the processes of acquiring knowledge. Epistemic virtues refer to qualities that enable individuals to acquire knowledge and make reliable judgments. These virtues include traits such as openness to diverse testimonies and arguments, critical thinking, a tendency to question one's own assumptions, and the ability to identify errors in one's own thought processes. Just like in virtue ethics, the Epistemology of Virtue raises the question of how we can cultivate the necessary virtues and how these virtues can have a positive impact on both individuals and society. The field also explores how epistemic virtues can be put into practice, such as in educational settings, scientific research, and various social activities. Finally, we turn to a topic that is often overlooked in philosophy - human flaws. While ethics typically views flaws as the opposite of virtues, requiring correction both individually and socially, the Epistemology of Virtue questions what happens when flaws occur in knowledge-related qualities. Do these flaws also need to be eliminated, or are they an inherent part of the process of acquiring knowledge and making judgments? At first glance, prejudices, stereotypes, dogmatism, conformism, closed-mindedness towards arguments and evidence, as well as uncritical acceptance of authority, can all hinder our ability to acquire knowledge. Epistemologists view these qualities as vices, rather than flaws like ethicists do. The Epistemology of Vices is the newest of the three branches of philosophy covered in this thematic collection, and it examines the ways in which false and untrue beliefs develop and persist in society. This area of study seeks to answer questions about how people form delusions and whether it is possible to overcome them. On the other hand, the Epistemology of Virtue is like the "older brother" that supervises these vices. It contributes to the investigation and overcoming of vices by developing virtues that enable individuals to more accurately assess the truthfulness of their beliefs. However, even though vices can have a destructive impact on knowledge acquisition, the question remains: are vices always detrimental in every context? Conversely, can virtues be detrimental? For example, does a virtue like solidarity sometimes hinder the efficient formation of true beliefs in time-sensitive situations such as finding a vaccine to combat a virus pandemic? Can vices be useful? Can stubbornness and uncooperativeness sometimes help a research team by allowing two sides to reach the same goal through different paths? Within this collection, some of these questions will receive answers, some of which may confirm existing impressions, while others may surprise readers. The thematic collection, Virtues and Vices: Between Ethics and Epistemology, consists of four interesting chapters and 21 papers that cover the selected topic through the prism of philosophical disciplines such as ethics, epistemology, the history of philosophy, philosophy of mind, political philosophy, and philosophy of science. In this introduction, we will not discuss the contents of the articles so as not to disrupt the intended integral approach to reading the collection. A significant feature of this collection is the continuity that extends from one paper to another, from topic to topic, and from problem to problem. Lastly, we would like to express our gratitude to the Faculty of Philosophy at the University of Belgrade for their support in realizing this collection, as well as to our colleagues from the Department and Institute of Philosophy who have made this collection a relevant and significant achievement with their contributions. We are also thankful to the reviewers of the collection as a whole, as well as to the referees of individual articles, who have provided us with detailed comments and remarks that have made this collection clearer and more comprehensive. We owe a special thanks to our colleagues from Zagreb, Rijeka, and Maribor, whose exceptional papers have contributed to making this collection an unabashed international contribution to debates about the ethics and epistemology of virtues and vices. (shrink)

The time of the Reverie. Memory and duration in Rousseau There are three modes adopted by the temporal succession to which we are subjected: succession of desires, succession of identities and succession of instants. But happiness is a permanent state; therefore, it is not a state that corresponds to man. We propose that succession is the horizon from which Rousseau thinks about the possibility of happiness that, being discontinuous and brief, can achieve a permanence that results from another experience of (...) time that we will call duration. Our hypothesis is: firstly, that this possibility is available thanks to memory given over daydream (rêverie); secondly, that this memory is a memory of love because love, like happiness, aspires to eternity. We examine the main feature of duration, that is: the past is preserved in the present without being confused with it, just as each past note of a melody is somehow preserved in the present one. Past times are never lost times. We consider two discoveries by Rousseau, the sensitive memory and the memorious imagination, to show the interplay between memory and personal identity. Finally, we venture a comparison with the duration according to Bergson through the metaphor of a symphony and we confront this memory in love with the memory of pain inaugurated by Nietzsche in his Genealogy of Morality. -/- El tiempo del ensueño. Memoria y duración en Rousseau Tres son los modos que toma la sucesión temporal a la que estamos sometidos: sucesión de deseos, de identidades y de instantes. Pero la felicidad es un estado permanente, luego, ella no es un estado que corresponda al hombre. Proponemos que la sucesión es el horizonte desde el cual Rousseau piensa la posibilidad de una felicidad que, siendo discontinua y breve, pueda alcanzar una permanencia que resulta de otra experiencia del tiempo que nombraremos duración. Nuestra tesis es: primero, dicha posibilidad está abierta gracias a la memoria librada al ejercicio del ensueño; segundo, esa memoria es una memoria enamorada porque el amor, como la felicidad, aspira eternidad. Examinamos el rasgo principal de la duración, este es: el pasado se conserva en el presente sin confundirse con él tal como sucede cada una de las notas de una melodía. El tiempo pasado nunca es un tiempo perdido. Nos detenemos en dos descubrimientos de Rousseau, el de una memoria sensitiva y una imaginación memoriosa para mostrar la articulación entre memoria e identidad personal. Finalmente, arriesgamos la comparación con la duración según Bergson através de metáfora de la sinfonía y confrontamos esta memoria enamorada con la memoria del dolor que inaugura Nietzsche en la Genealogía de la moral. (shrink)

Antti Kauppinen Les philosophes se sont efforcés de montrer que nous devons être vertueux pour être heureux. Mais tant que nous nous en tenons à la compréhension moderne du bonheur comme quelque chose de vécu par un sujet – et je soutiens contre les eudaimonistes contemporains que nous devrions effectivement le faire – il peut au mieux exister un lien de causalité contingent entre la vertu et le bonheur. Néanmoins, nous avons de bonnes raisons de penser qu’être vertueux est non (...) accidentellement propice au bonheur. Pourquoi? Premièrement, le bonheur est, sommairement, la condition expérientielle de jouir d’états phénoménaux affectifs principalement positifs concernant des choses qui sont subjectivement importantes pour nous. Je soutiens que ce sentimentalisme à propos du bonheur a plusieurs avantages par rapport à la conception de Daniel Haybron comme état émotionnel. Deuxièmement, dans la mesure où nous sommes vertueux, nous pouvons identifier correctement ce qui vaut la peine d’être fait dans notre situation particulière et nous la poursuivrons habilement. En même temps, nous ne sommes pas dérangés par des choses qui ne valent pas la peine d’être prises en charge ou de s’inquiéter. Par conséquent, les personnes vertueuses sont susceptibles de profiter d’émotions positives centrales liées au succès et à l’approbation des autres, et d’éviter les émotions négatives communes liées à la comparaison sociale ou à l’avarice. Bien que leur bonheur soit encore en partie une question de chance, il l’est dans une moindre mesure que pour le reste d’entre nous. (shrink)

We compare the definition of virtue in philosophy with the definition and operationalization of virtue in psychology. We articulate characteristics that virtue is presented as possessing in the perennial western philosophical tradition. Virtues are typically understood as (a) dispositional (b) deep-seated (c) habits (d) that contribute to flourishing and (e) that produce activities with the following three features: they are (f) done well, (g) not done poorly, and (h) in accordance with the right motivation and reason. We form a definition (...) from these characteristics and defend our exclusion of some other characteristics from the definition. Using our definition as a rubric, we evaluate conceptions of virtue in psychology, showing how many fall short at operationalizing at least one component of the philosophical notion of virtue. (shrink)

First, the thorny problem of locating the Midwest is treated. Second, the ancient Stoics’ understanding of nature is proposed as a fertile field of ecological wisdom. The significance of nature in Stoicism is explained. Stoic philosophers (big-S Stoics) are distinguished from stoical non-philosophers (small-s stoics). Nature’s lessons for living a good Stoic life are drawn. Are such lessons too theoretical to provide practical guidance? This worry is addressed by examining the examples of Cincinnatus and Cato the Elder—ancient Romans lauded for (...) their virtues who worked the land. They exhibited the virtues of civic responsibility, justice, self-sufficiency, parsimony, perseverance, equanimity, modesty, and respect for limits—an agrarian virtue dear to Wendell Berry. Agrarianism views rural society as superior to urban society and the independent farmer as superior to the paid worker. Reflection on the virtues of stoical Roman agrarians suggests that features of Roman Stoic agrarianism resonate with a contemporary instantiation of Stoicism in the Midwest. The main thesis is that Midwest Stoic agrarianism (MSA), guided by an array of earthy virtues, promotes agricultural practices that harmonize with nature and support living in agreement with nature, while rejecting agricultural practices contrary to nature and propelled by vice. MSA endorses, e.g., locally sourced, sustainably grown crops instead of CAFOs. MSA tackles the ecological and sociopolitical pressures confronting Midwest farmers in the Anthropocene and can fortify environmental virtue ethics beyond this region. (shrink)

Over the last few decades, virtue has become increasingly important in philosophy, psychology, cognitive science, and education. However, as each of these disciplines approaches virtue from a decidedly different perspective, it has proven difficult to come up with an understanding of virtue that satisfies the standards of all four disciplines. In their book, Jennifer Wright, Michael Warren, and Nancy Snow attempt to put forward such an understanding.

In this paper, we embark on the complicated discussion about the nature of vice in Virtue Ethics through a twofold approach: first, by taking seriously the claim that virtues (and certain flavours of vices) are genuinely dispositional features possessed by agents, and secondly, by employing a pluralistic attitude borrowed from Battaly’s pluralism (2008). Through these lenses, we identify three varieties of viciousness: incontinence, indifference, and malevolence. The upshot is that the notion of vice is not as categorically homogeneous as that (...) of virtue: some states of viciousness consist in interference of present virtuous dispositions, or mimicking of absent vicious ones, whereas others can be considered genuine dispositions themselves. Furthermore, this set-up can provide an interesting, albeit highly idealized story as to how, through the interference in one’s environment, one gets acquainted with vice in various degrees. Finally, this approach can be illuminating vis-à-vis Virtue Ethics in general; e.g. we can employ it to discuss more productively Johnston’s (2003) objection to Hursthouse’s (1999) account of moral conduct. Finally, this approach can be illuminating vis-a-vis Virtue Ethics in general; e.g. we can employ it to discuss more productively Johnston’s (2003) objection to Hursthouse’s (1999) account of moral conduct. (shrink)

The intersection between virtue and care ethics is underexplored in contemporary moral philosophy. This thesis approaches care ethics from a neo-Aristotelian virtue ethical perspective, comparing the two frameworks and drawing on recent work on care to develop a theory thereof. It is split into seven substantive chapters serving three major argumentative purposes, namely the establishment of significant intertheoretical agreement, the compilation and analysis of extant and new distinctions between the two theories, and the synthesis of care ethical insights with neo-Aristotelianism (...) to generate a virtue ethical theory of care. In the first two chapters, I outline virtue ethics and care ethics, and argue for considerable agreement over central premises. Chapter 2 summarises the foundational commitments of care ethics, focusing particularly on their relational ontology and its links to the other ethical claims care ethicists universally ascribe to, namely particularism, partialism, the moral salience of emotions, and the rejection of hard public/private distinctions. Chapter 3 lays out the central concepts in neo-Aristotelian virtue ethics, including eudaimonism, virtue, and character traits, and drawing a number of comparisons between virtue and care ethics specifically with regard to relational ontology and the meta-ethical commitments it underpins. In addition to doing the necessary expository work for the remainder of the thesis, Chapters 2 and 3 also argue that care ethics and virtue ethics have much more in common than is typically acknowledged – the first major contribution of this thesis to the literature. Chapters 2 and 3 to provide at least a prima facie justification for pursuit of the questions I confront in the remainder of the thesis. In Chapter 4, I ask what differentiates these two ethical theories. I survey some of the differences which philosophers in either camp have identified and offer some of my own. I suggest that several of those differences either rest on misunderstandings of one ethic or the other, or that in erecting a divide between virtue and care ethics they also disunify ethics of care. I do, however, identify two differences which seem defensible. Specifically, they are that virtue ethics seems to lack an account of care, which I define minimally as a response or responsiveness to need, and that virtue and care ethics organise their meta-ethical and normative concepts differently. This chapter thus presents a second contribution to the literature: a study of the differences between virtue ethics and care ethics. It also serves to set the trajectory for the remaining chapters, where I respond to the claim that virtue ethics lack an account of care. I spend the remainder of the thesis constructing what I take to be a satisfying foundation for a virtue ethical theory of care. In Chapter 5, I offer three initially viable means of incorporating care into virtue ethics, all of which treat care as a virtue. These are the analogical approach, according to which care is analogous to an existing virtue; the additive approach, according to which care is a novel virtue; and the bundling approach, according to which care is a bundle of virtues. I also offer and evaluate reasons to reject the claim that care is a virtue, concluding that the claim is indeed a viable one so long as the concept of care is sufficiently thick, and I contend that analogical approaches, and particularly analogies with charity, outperform the others. Chapter 5 therefore serves two ends. First, it proffers a novel meta-analysis of concepts of care as a virtue, and thus makes a third contribution to the literature. In doing so, it makes an inroad into the second: the development of a neo-Aristotelian theory of care. Chapter 6 continues this project. I attempt to show how care can be construed as an act-type and a practice. I argue in this chapter that practices are a subcategory of actions, and that care qualifies as an Anscombean act-type which aims at the meeting of needs relating to the care-recipient’s flourishing. I go on to consider the implications of this account for ethics which deploy care as a moral concept, maintaining that it not only offers a better account of consequences than theories of care which include success criteria, but also that it affords us interesting insights into the distinction between ‘caring about’ and ‘caring for’ which allow us to make sense of certain tenets of neo-Aristotelianism. This represents a contribution to both discourses, since neither care nor virtue ethicists working at the intersection of their respective normative theories have delved very deeply into the philosophy of action. Chapter 7 discusses caring relations, suggesting that a virtue ethical theory of caring relations can lean on the work care ethicists have done, and adding some necessary refinements, such as a distinction between ideal and non-ideal caring relations, and a theory of caring relations as reasons for action. This final chapter also draws these three concepts of care together by arguing that virtuous caregivers who are invested in the flourishing of those for whom they care are also sensitive to the relations those care-recipients bear to their institutional environment. I argue that because they are caring participants in caring relations, virtuous agents are characteristically motivated by states of need and dependency to engage in certain sorts of conventionally political practices. In other words, the virtue or virtues of caring characteristically manifest in certain sorts of political or social practices, relating specifically to those areas of moral life. This allows us to build upon recent work in feminist virtue ethics of the sort offered by Tessman and Friedman. I also offer a novel analysis of migration, suggesting that the account of care presenting here is analytically useful both when it comes to historical cases of migration such as the underground railroads and escapes from Nazi-occupied Europe, but also for contemporary issues such as the migrations occurring in the Southern United States and in much of Europe. I thus conclude not only that virtue ethicists ought to incorporate care into their normative framework, and that the theory of care presented here is a coherent one, but that this leads us naturally into applied topics such as virtue politics. I conclude the thesis by considering some its implications and by identifying some further avenues for research. (shrink)

Whatever else a theory of impeccability assumes about the moral life of heavenly agents, it seems to imply something about the type of actions possible for such agents, along with the quality of their moral characters. Regarding these characters, there are many that have argued impeccable and heavenly agents must also be perfectly virtuous agents. Michael Slote has recently argued, however, that perfect virtue is impossible. Assuming Slote’s argument is successful, a theory of impeccability that relies on the possibility of (...) perfect virtue would be greatly harmed, even to the point of incoherence. My intent here is to defend the coherence of the doctrine of impeccability, at least as it applies to the moral life of heavenly agents. (shrink)

Some philosophers have argued that Aristotle’s view of habituation gives rise to a ‘paradox of moral education.’ The inculcation of habit, they contend, seems antithetical to the cultivation of virtue. I argue that this alleged paradox arises from significant misunderstandings of Aristotle’s view. Habit formation need not be at odds with the development of the kinds of intelligent, reflective capacities required for virtue. Indeed, Aristotle seems right to insist on an important role for habit in the cultivation of virtue. I (...) suggest that habit formation is part of the story of how the virtuous come to see the world aright. (shrink)

While those who take a "structuralist" approach to racial justice issues are right to call attention to the importance of social practices, laws, etc., they sometimes go too far by suggesting that antiracist efforts ought to focus on changing unjust social systems rather than changing individuals’ minds. We argue that while the “either/or” thinking implied by this framing is intuitive and pervasive, it is misleading and self-undermining. We instead advocate for a “both/and” approach to antiracist moral education that explicitly teaches (...) how social structures influence ideas about race and how ideas about race shape, sustain, and transform social structures. Ideally, antiracist moral education will help people see how social change and moral progress depend on the symbiotic relations between individuals and structures. We articulate a conception of “structure-facing virtue” that exemplifies this hybrid approach to illuminate the pivotal role moral education plays in the fight for racial justice. (shrink)

To fully rationally answer Socrates’s question, ‘How should one live?’, we need to answer the epistemic question: ‘How can one know how one should live?’. This paper attempts to answer both. ` The issue of rationality is crucial here. ‘Rationality’ here only concerns knowledge, e.g., ways to acquire scientific knowledge, and meta-knowledge concerning values. No values as such are rational or knowledge. However:- Many factors are required for human rationality to exist and develop, e.g., life, mental health and evidence-based education. (...) Human rationality’s need for those factors, hence their value to rationality, is rationally-unquestionable – and that applies to the practised values prescribing the prescribable factors. Those prescribable factors require certain interrelated epistemic, moral, social, political, legal, educational and other values to be practised. This implies a pro-rationality values-theory with one obligatory, general end – a uniquely rationally-unquestionable end. This end provides the basis for answering Socrates’s question as rationally (correctly) as is possible for values. That end is fundamentally epistemic, namely ‘Be pro-rationality’, yet the theory has deeply-humanly-meaningful, universal applications. It has implications for current and all possible moral, social, political, legal, educational, environmental etc issues. E.g., the theory shows that human rationality crucially requires certain emotions, health-care, education and upbringing. With this, the paper discusses affection, free speech, journalism, psychotherapy, political and sexual consent, rights, responsibilities, freedom and government. The theory’s sub-values prescribe much prescribed by some other theories, e.g., broad and deep knowledge-acquisition (in certain areas), rationally-critical thinking, non-sexism, non-racism, general types of liberalism, holistic flourishing, happiness, unselfishness and fairness. However, all other values-theories lack pro-rationality theory’s maximum possible rational-unquestionability, internal coherence and coherence with rationality. The theory encourages total freedom in a-rationality areas, areas irrelevant to its obligatory end. The theory inherently requires its advocates to be (self )critical, rationally viewing the theory’s necessarily human-suggested specifics as often fallible or unavoidably approximate. So the theory is a work-in-progress. (shrink)

Moral perceptualism is the view that perceptual experience is attuned to pick up on moral features in our environment, just as it is attuned to pick up on mundane features of an environment like textures, shapes, colors, pitches, and timbres. One important family of views that incorporate moral perception are those of virtue theorists and sensibility theorists. On these views, one central ability of the virtuous agent is her sensitivity to morally relevant features of situations, where this sensitivity is often (...) spoken of in perceptual terms. However, sensibility theorists have often not been careful to specify how to understand their claims about moral sensibilities as perceptual. In this paper, we distinguish between what we call Attentional Moral Perception and Contentful Moral Perception. We argue that sensibility theorists should endorse Attentional Moral Perception, because it has very powerful empirical evidence in its favor, and it can play all of the explanatory roles that the sensibility theorist needs in her theory of moral sensibilities. (shrink)

Today, many armed forces consider teaching virtues to be an important complement to imposing rules and codes from above. Yet, it is mainly established military virtues such as courage and loyalty that dominate both the lists of virtues and values of most militaries and the growing body of literature on military virtues. Some of these virtues, however, may be less suited for today’s missions, which more often than not require restraint on the part of military personnel. This chapter looks into (...) military ethics education from the perspective of military virtues and addresses the question of what we need to solve the aforementioned misalignment: a new set of virtues, a different interpretation of the existing virtues, or something else altogether? (shrink)

Unmanned systems bring risk asymmetry in war to a new level, making martial virtues such as physical courage by and large obsolete. Nonetheless, the dominant view within the military is that using unmanned systems that remove the risks for military personnel involved is not very different from using aircrafts that drop bombs from a high altitude. According to others, however, the use of unmanned systems and the riskless killing they make possible do raise a host of new issues, for instance (...) the question to what extent the willingness to take risks is part of the military profession. This article addresses that existential question, but also the question of whether the elimination of all risk would make the military profession a less moral one. To that end, it juxtaposes the military viewpoint that riskless killing by means of drones is morally uninteresting with the more critical viewthat such riskless killing is in fact highly problematic. (shrink)

Ignorance is commonly assumed to be a lack of knowledge in Plato’s Socratic dialogues. I challenge that assumption. In the Protagoras, ignorance is conceived to be a substantive, structural psychic flaw—the soul’s domination by inferior elements that are by nature fit to be ruled. Ignorant people are characterized by both false beliefs about evaluative matters in specific situations and an enduring deception about their own psychic conditions. On my interpretation, akrasia, moral vices, and epistemic vices are products or forms of (...) ignorance, and a person who lacks knowledge is not necessarily ignorant. (shrink)

What is the value of intellectual playfulness? Traditional characterizations of the ideal thinker often leave out playfulness; the ideal inquirer is supposed to be sober, careful, and conscientiousness. But elsewhere we find another ideal: the laughing sage, the playful thinker. These are models of intellectual playfulness. Intellectual playfulness, I suggest, is the disposition to try out alternate belief systems for fun – to try on radically different perspectives for the sheer pleasure of it. But what would the cog-nitive value be (...) of such playfulness? I suggest that intellectual playfulness function as, at the very least, a kind of intellectual insurance policy against epistemic traps. An epistemic trap is a belief system that re-directs good-faith inquiry to bad results. Am epistemic trap manipulates background beliefs to fend off contrary evidence. For example, a conspiracy theory might include a set of beliefs about how the mainstream media has been taken over by some vicious cabal. Normal epistemic attempts will be captured by a well-wrought epistemic trap, because normal attempts at inquiry are guided by these background beliefs -- which set what counts as a plausible path to explore, and what is implausible or beyond the pale. And a clever epistemic trap will manipulate those background beliefs for ill effect. Intellectual playfulness, on the other hand, isn’t motivated by an epistemic interest in the truth, but in the sheer pleasure of intellectual exploration. Since intellectual playfulness isn’t oriented towards the truth, it won’t be constrained by an agent’s background beliefs – it won’t, for example, prefer to investigate apparently more plausible pathways. Intellectual playfulness offers an opportunity to escape from epistemic traps. But intellectual playfulness has its own limitations. It will only drive us to explore belief systems when that exploration is fun. What we need is an array of differently-motivated exploratory tendencies – empathy, curiosity, playfulness – each of which will each cover for the others’ limitations. (shrink)

Recently, Brummett and Crutchfield advanced two critiques of theists who object to moral enhancement. First, a conceptual critique: theists who oppose moral enhancement commonly do so because virtue is thought to be acquired only via a special kind of process. Enhancement does not involve such processes. Hence, enhancement cannot produce virtue. Yet theists also commonly claim that God is perfectly virtuous and not subject to processes. If virtue requires a process and God is perfectly virtuous without a process, however, then (...) theists contradict themselves. Second, a moral critique: theists who reject moral enhancement are selfish, since accepting moral enhancement would (allegedly) reduce widespread suffering. Theists often condemn selfishness, however. By condemning selfishness and (simultaneously) rejecting enhancement, therefore, theists contradict themselves yet again. We argue that both critiques fail. Both substantially misrepresent their target. First, Brummett and Crutchfield confuse metaphysical enhancement (attempts to alter human nature) with moral enhancement (attempts to become better human beings). Authors that Brummett and Crutchfield cite object to the former, not the latter. Second, both conceptual and moral critiques overlook the many resources within theistic traditions that can quickly resolve relevant (alleged) contradictions. The conceptual critique, for example, misrepresents both common views held among theists (regarding God’s virtue) and the ways in which virtue may be acquired. Similarly, the moral critique mischaracterizes the relationship commonly posited by theists between enhancement and agency. By attending to what theists actually claim—rather than relying on caricatures—it becomes clear that each of Brummett and Crutchfield’s critiques fail. (shrink)

I argue that moral skill is limited and precarious. It is limited because global moral skill—the capacity for morally excellent behaviour within an über action domain, such as the domain of living, or of all-things-considered decisions, or the same kind of capacity applied across a superset of more specific action domains—is not to be found in humans. It is precarious because relatively local moral skill, while possible, is prone to misfire. My arguments depend upon the diversity of practical structures confronting (...) human agents, the limitations of human skill learning and reason-sensitivity, and the failure of moral considerations to respect the social and institutional boundaries we develop to structure our practical lives. (shrink)

In questo saggio traccio un profilo del pensiero di Bernard Williams, concentrandomi su temi relativi alla filosofia morale e, più nello specifico, ricostruendo la sua disamina dell’idea di oggettività in questa disciplina. Dopo aver esaminato le sue critiche all’idea di teoria etica normativa, offro un inquadramento metaetico della sua posizione e concludo mostrando le sue affinità con la riflessione etica degli antichi Greci e, in particolar modo, di Aristotele.

This paper introduces a body of research on Organizational Behavior and Industrial/organizational Psychology that expands the range of empirical evidence relevant to the ongoing character-situation debate. This body of research, mostly neglected by moral philosophers, provides important insights to move the debate forward. First, the OB/io scholarship provides empirical evidence to show that social environments like organizations have significant power to shape the character traits of their members. This scholarship also describes some of the mechanisms through which this process of (...) reshaping character takes place. Second, the character-situation debate has narrowly focused on situational influences that affect behavior episodically and haphazardly. The OB/io research, however, highlights the importance of distinguishing such situational influences from influences that, like organizational influences, shape our character traits because they are continuous and coordinated. Third, the OB/io literature suggests that most individuals display character traits that, while local to the organization, can be consistent across situations. This puts pressure on the accounts of character proposed by traditional virtue ethics and situationism and provides empirical support to interactionist models based on cognitive-affective processing system theories of personality. Finally, the OB/io literature raises important challenges to the possibility of achieving virtue, provides valuable and untapped resources to cultivate character, and suggests new avenues of normative and empirical research. (shrink)

Having an agreed-upon definition of character education would be useful for both researchers and practitioners in the field. However, even experts in character education disagree on how they would define it. We attempted to achieve greater conceptual clarity on this issue through a prototype analysis in which the features perceived as most central to character education were identified. In Study 1 (N = 77), we asked character education experts to enumerate features of character education. Based on these lists, we identified (...) 30 features. In Study 2 (N = 101), experts assessed which features were central to character education through a categorization task. In Study 3 (N = 166), we assessed the extent of centrality using scalar items. We conclude by offering practical advice for the development of future character education studies and programs rooted in what is deemed central to such programs. (shrink)

Patrick Byrne argues that MacIntyre’s account of practical reasoning is inadequate because it is based upon a notion of flourishing that places too much emphasis on impersonal facts, likewise because it is excessively focused on means without considering the role of desire for ends, and because it is does not account for the role of feelings in explaining how knowledge of ends is attained. In this essay, I argue that MacIntyre’s account provides adequate responses to each of these concerns. But (...) more broadly, I argue that Byrne is right to suggest that a Lonerganian perspective offers important insights that can extend MacIntyre’s neo-Aristotelian practical philosophy. Specifically, Lonergan’s account of the generalized empirical method may inform MacIntyre’s theory of rival, and potentially incommensurable traditions, explaining how standards of argument are both transcultural and historically articulated. (shrink)

the proclivity of many people to classify human acts as good or bad calls into mind the import of ETHICS. The penchant for classification warrants the evaluation of the bases for saying that one is bad or good action. Normally, human act is ethical if it is in accordance with what one would relatively expect in view of the events or the circumstances and unethical if the action is not called for by the circumstances, or a person whose behavior is (...) disorderly and inconsistent. The same observations harbor on perception rather than on paradigms and frameworks which ethicists have somehow perfected to classify bad behavior into one division and good behavior into another. The study of ETHICS will therefore increase proficiency at least in moral decision making. Likewise, knowledge of the course will give students certain techniques for evaluating others’ action as moral or immoral, including their own. ETHICS is the science of action but the action herein alluded to is not the action that concerns those that are unconscious and spontaneous. Action here is that resulting from intellect and will herein referred to as human act. ETHICS is both a theoretical and a practical discipline. The language of ethics refers to rights, duties, and values. One of the goals of ethics is to explore the nature of moral experience, its universality, and its diversity. Another is to provide intellectual analysis of values, and value conflicts in order to define man’s duties. Also, it is oriented toward the determination of right decisions. In order to do that, it is necessary to go step by step, analyzing, first, the facts of the case, second, the values at stake, and third, the duties. In short, ETHICS has the very practical purpose of helping us to choose, decide, and act morally. It should enable us to discover defects in the action of others and to avoid defects in our own action. (shrink)

... The Philosophers’ Quarrel is an enjoyable tour through the salons, great cities and country retreats of the Enlightenment, in the company of some of its brightest stars. Although much of the tale turns on some tedious details of the various intrigues of Hume and Rousseau, together with their friends and collaborators, Zaretsky and Scott manage to provide their account with a number of interesting and valuable insights into the character of the thinkers involved and the social and cultural life (...) of Enlightenment Europe at this time. I particularly recommend this book to contemporary academics, who may be comforted and reassured to see that prickly, neurotic and insecure dispositions are not the invention of contemporary academic life. (shrink)

Cruelty and morality seem like polar opposites – until they join forces. Beware those who persecute in the name of principle... -/- Following in the steps of Michel de Montaigne, the distinguished political philosopher Judith Shklar has argued that cruelty should be considered the supreme evil and that we should put it first among the vices. The essence of cruelty is to wilfully and needlessly inflict pain and suffering on another creature – be it an animal or a human being. (...) Closely related to this vice are malice and sadism, both of which involve taking pleasure or delight in the suffering of others. Although cruelty might not be peculiar to human beings, it is a familiar and pronounced feature of human nature and social life. One important feature of human cruelty is the way that it varies, both with respect to its instruments and when it is occasioned, depending on our particular cultural and social circumstances. With this in mind, we can ask: what is the relationship between cruelty and morality? -/- . (shrink)

This article considers the substantive difference Aquinas's theological commitments make to his otherwise Aristotelian account of courage in the Summa Theologiae. (Author's note: This article appeared in Medieval Philosophy and Theology, not Nietzsche Studies, but Philpapers is not allowing me to edit that line.).

فضائل العقل إبستمولوجيا الفضيلة في سياق التَّنمية الثقافية -/- إحدى السمات الرائعة لجنسنا هي ميله إلى البحث. ولكن البحث يمكن أن يسير بشكل جيد أو بشكل سيء. وربما يرد الخطأ إلى خلل في قدرة إدراكية مثل ضعف الذاكرة، ومع ذلك، غالبًا ما يصدر نجاح أو إخفاق البحث عن مصدر شخصي. إذ يتطلب ممارسة سمات شخصية عقلية مثل الملاحظة اليقظة، أو التحليل الدقيق والشامل، أو التفسير والتقييم المنصفين. عندما نفكر في الشخصية أو الفضائل، فإننا نفكر في شيء أخلاقي على نحو مميز. (...) ولكن السمة الأخلاقية لا تستنفد السمة الشخصية. ذلك بأن للسمة الشخصية بعدًا معرفيًا أو عقليًا: يمكن أيضًا الاعتماد على الشخص الفاضل للاهتمام بغايات مثل الحقيقة والمعرفة والدليل والعقلانية والفهم. وبسبب هذا الاهتمام ستظهر سمات معرفية أخرى مثل حب الاستطلاع، والانتباه، والحرص، والشمولية في البحث، والإنصاف، والانفتاح العقلي، والأناة الفكرية، والصدق، والشجاعة، والتواضع. وعندما تزودنا إبستمولوجيا الفضيلة بأوصاف الفضائل المعرفية، فإنها تهدف إلى تشجيع كائن عقلي جيد، وتدعم الإصلاح الثقافي والازدهار الفكري. ويكشف العمل الحالي في إبستمولوجيا الفضيلة التطبيقية عن مشروعات أخذت طريقها إلى التنفيذ في التعليم. تهدف أكاديمية الفضائل العقلية، مثلا، إلى تعزيز الفضائل العقلية. زد على ذلك أن أنصار إبستمولوجيا الفضيلة يقومون أيضًا بتطبيق وجهات نظرهم على مسائل تتعلق باتخاذ القرارات البيئية، والرعاية الصحية والطب. وتهدف هذه المقالة إلى تحديد موضوع إبستمولوجيا الفضيلة، وبيان نشأتها واتجاهاتها، وتهدف أيضا إلى تفسير طبيعة الفضائل العقلية، وبنيتها، ودورها في استدامة التَّنمية الثقافية. -/- . (shrink)

A number of paradigms have been proposed to understand the sources of meaningful work, but a non-Western approach has attracted little attention. This study aims to make a theoretical contribution toward an understanding of meaningful work from a virtue-ethics framework that is culturally meaningful and relevant to Filipino realities and their distinct cultural heritage. It develops a paradigm for a Filipino view of meaningful work that could guide both researchers and practitioners in business ethics by defining what is meaningful work, (...) explaining why it is important, and presenting some examples of concrete measures that management can utilize to promote meaningful work in the Philippine workplace. (shrink)

This chapter explores the relationship between an agent’s moral responsibility for their actions and the situations in which an agent acts. Decades of research in psychology are sometimes thought to support situationism, the view that features of an agent’s situation greatly influence their behavior in powerful and surprising ways. Such situational fea­tures might therefore be thought to threaten agents’ abilities to act freely and responsi­bly. This chapter begins by discussing some relevant empirical literature on situationism. It then surveys several ways (...) of construing the situationist threat to moral responsibility as reducible to worries about determinism, manipulation, or luck. It is then argued that the best way to understand the situationist challenge is as a threat to reasons-responsive­ness. A common strategy for responding to the situationist threat to reasons-responsive­ness—the so-called modal response—is discussed. The chapter then defends a view called pessimistic realism: While the situationist literature puts human agency in an unflattering light, it does not show that agents’ reasons-responsiveness capacities are generally un­dermined by situational features. Several objections both to the modal strategy and to pessimistic realism are discussed. The chapter concludes with three thoughts concerning future directions. (shrink)

[Encyclopedia entry] Born in Italy in 1225, and despite a relatively short career that ended around 50 years later in 1274, Thomas Aquinas went on to become one of the most influential medieval thinkers on political and legal questions. Aquinas was educated at both Cologne and Paris, later taking up (after some controversy) a chair as regent master in theology at the University of Paris, where he taught during two separate periods (1256-1259, 1269-1272). In the intermediate period he helped establish (...) a studium for his Order in Rome, beginning work on the Summa Theologiae, the masterwork for which he is still well-known. Subsequent to an experience (traditionally, a vision) Aquinas had on the feast of St. Nicholas in 1273, Aquinas intentionally refrained from further work on that text, so that it remained incomplete at the time of his death a year later in 1274. Apart from his own contributions, the Thomistic school – including followers within and without the Dominican Order to which Aquinas belonged – has had profound and far-reaching influence upon the history of legal thought in the West. Many of the classical developments of Thomistic thought are written as commentaries on the Summa Theologiae (hereafter, ST), including the works of Tomasso de Vio (Cajetan) and those of Domingo Banez, Francisco de Vitoria, Bartholome de las Casas, and the other highly influential members of the School of Salamanca who are noteworthy for developing Aquinas’ political and legal thought in the 16th century. Specifically, the ways in which Aquinas synthesized classical political and legal themes around the law, morality, and the common good provided a touchstone for what has come to be called ‘natural law jurisprudence.’ Natural law thinkers, in short, appeal to objective facts about what is good for human beings, and the social or political nature of the kind of creatures that we are, as a standard against which we measure the legal and social institutions created by human institutions. What is crucial here is that facts about human beings as social animals constitute reasons for individuals and groups to act or be structured in certain ways, such that ‘nature’ is the proper source for jurisprudential and political principles. (shrink)