An overview is presented of what I take to be the role of the intellectual virtues within the epistemological enterprise. Traditionally, the theory of knowledge has been thought to be central to the epistemological project, but since, as I explain, the intellectual virtues aren’t required for knowledge, this might suggest that they have only a marginal role to play in epistemological debates. I argue against this suggestion by showing how the intellectual virtues are in fact crucial to several core epistemological (...) topics, including the nature of inquiry, epistemic axiology and our understanding of ignorance. (shrink)

The globalism objection poses two distinct challenges to Aristotelian views of virtue. On the one hand, the consistency thesis demands that a virtue is behaviorally expressed in a wide range of trait-relevant situations. On the other hand, the evaluative integration thesis suggests that the presence of one virtue increases the probability of other, similar virtues, posing a problem for Aristotle’s reciprocity of the virtues thesis. I show that, by contrast to contemporary Aristotelian views and views attributed to Aristotle, Aristotle’s own (...) theory of virtue escapes the globalism objection. I address the consistency thesis by showing that each of Aristotle’s moral virtues are narrower than commonly assumed. I then address the evaluative integration thesis through a discussion of practical wisdom, showing that Aristotle believed one could fall short of perfect virtue, while still being fully virtuous. The upshot is that, despite idealizations of virtue throughout the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle held a realistic account of virtue, one that is different from contemporary Aristotelian views, and one that is empirically adequate insofar as it allows for more than a few virtuous people. (shrink)

Seneca’s Letters sketch a theory of attentive action according to which distraction is caused by inconsistent beliefs about values, such that the degree of an agent’s attention to an endorsed action is proportionate to the consistency of her beliefs about value, i. e. her proximity to virtue. The agent’s activity of attentive action is co-ordinated with a state of alertness to her interests, which accordingly triggers switches in attention that sustain the endorsed action in single-minded agents or cause distraction if (...) the new interest is irrelevant to it. Seneca’s theory reflects the older Stoic conception of the tensional mental strength of the virtuous agent, which Chrysippus identified as the causal factor over and above virtue that ensures her successful performance of right action. (shrink)

Beneficence and respect for autonomy are two of the most fundamental moral duties in general and in bioethics in particular. Beyond the usual questions of how to resolve conflicts between these duties in particular cases, there are more general questions about the possible forms of the interactions between them. Only recognition of the full spectrum of possible interactions will ensure optimal moral deliberation when duties potentially conflict. This paper has two simultaneous objectives. The first is to suggest a typological scheme (...) of all possible modes of interaction; these will be classified under the “discrete,” “semi-discrete,” and “non-discrete” categories, according to whether the meaning and/or forms of expression of each duty are treated as independent from or rather as constrained by the other. The second objective is to show that all logical possibilities of interaction indeed have real expressions in medical ethics, to provide clear illustrations of each, and in particular to stress those that have usually escaped recognition. (shrink)

Using evidence from experimental psychology, some social psychologists, moral philosophers and organizational scholars claim that character traits do not exist and, hence, that the philosophical tradition of virtue ethics is empirically inadequate and should dispose of the notion of character to accommodate the empirical evidence. In this paper, I systematically address the debate between dispositionalists and situationists about the existence, status and properties of character traits and their manifestations in human behavior, with the ultimate goal of responding to the question (...) whether virtue ethicists need to abandon the very enterprise of building a character-based moral theory in business ethics and organizational behavior. In the course of this paper, I shall defend the claim that the situationist argument relies on a misinterpretation of the experimental evidence. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:To have a virtue is to possess a certain kind of trait of character that is appropriate in pursuing the moral good at which the virtue aims. Human beings are assumed to be capable of attaining those traits. Yet, a number of scholars are skeptical about the very existence of such character traits. They claim a sizable amount of empirical evidence in their support. This article is concerned with the existence and explanatory power of character as a way to assess (...) the possibility of achieving moral virtue, with particular attention paid to business context. I aim to unsettle the so-called situationist challenge to virtue ethics. In the course of this article, I shall defend four claims, namely, that virtues are more than just behavioral dispositions, that at least some virtues may not be unitary traits, that psychologists cannot infer virtues from overt behavior, and that the situationist data do not account for the observational equivalence of traits. Since it rests on a misconception of what virtue is, the situationist objection remains unconvincing. (shrink)

This article seeks to show the importance of Cicero for Kant by pointing out the systematic relationship between their respective views on ethics and law. Cicero was important to Kant because Cicero had already elaborated an imperative, “quasi-jural” conception of duty or obligation. Cicero had also already prefigured the distinction between ethical duties and duties of justice. The article does not establish any direct historical influence, but points out interesting systematic overlaps. The most important in the realm of ethics are (...) a universal rationalism; a rule-based normative framework of duty; and skepticism about (Cicero), or rejection of (Kant), eudaimonism. In the realm of political theory, it is the centrality of law and of property that unites both thinkers; both reject voluntarism in thinking that consensus flows from the right external laws, not the other way around, and thus creates a juridical community; and lastly, both Cicero and Kant believe that transparence, or publicity, is a key ideal that might be presupposed by both the ethical and the juridical domain. The article thus shows that both Cicero and Kant separate ethics from law, but there are indications that neither has given up the aspiration to bridge the two realms on a higher plane. This reading of Kant yields both a more Ciceronian Kant and allows us to perceive Kantian aspects of Cicero. (shrink)

Tonkens has issued a seemingly impossible challenge, to articulate a comprehensive ethical framework within which artificial moral agents satisfy a Kantian inspired recipe—"rational" and "free"—while also satisfying perceived prerogatives of machine ethicists to facilitate the creation of AMAs that are perfectly and not merely reliably ethical. Challenges for machine ethicists have also been presented by Anthony Beavers and Wendell Wallach. Beavers pushes for the reinvention of traditional ethics to avoid "ethical nihilism" due to the reduction of morality to mechanical causation. (...) Wallach pushes for redoubled efforts toward a comprehensive account of ethics to guide machine ethicists on the issue of artificial moral agency. Options, thus, present themselves: reinterpret traditional ethics in a way that affords a comprehensive account of moral agency inclusive of both artificial and natural agents, or give up on the possibility and “muddle through” regardless. This series of papers pursues the first option, meets Tonkens' "challenge" and pursues Wallach's ends through Beavers’ proposed means, by "landscaping" traditional moral theory in resolution of a comprehensive account of moral agency. This first paper sets out the challenge and establishes the tradition that Kant had inherited from Aristotle, briefly entertains an Aristotelian AMA, fields objections, and ends with unanswered questions. The next paper in this series responds to the challenge in Kantian terms, and argues that a Kantian AMA is not only a possibility for Machine ethics research, but a necessary one. (shrink)

In this paper I discuss Plato's conception of expertise as a part of the Platonic theory of a good, successful life (eudaimonia). In various Platonic dialogues, Socrates argues that the good life requires a certain kind of knowledge that guides all our good, beneficial actions: the “knowledge of the good and bad”, which is to be acquired by “questioning ourselves and examining our and others’ beliefs”. This knowledge encompasses the particular knowledge of how to recognize experts in a given technical (...) domain. The central element in Socrates’ account of an expert is what I call the truth-and-caring criterion: an expert has to make seeking the truth and avoiding (avoidable) error her supreme epistemic goal and she has to make caring for common goods the supreme goal of practising her expertise. (shrink)

‘Unity of virtues’ (UV) in Aristotle is the claim that the ethical virtues are mutually entailing. But commentators typically focus on the fact that wisdom implies all the ethical virtues, without explaining how the ethical virtues themselves are mutually entailing. I argue that the so-called ‘Grand End’ view, understood as applying to both wisdom (φρόνησις) and political expertise (πολιτική), allows us to give an account of UV at the level of the ethical virtues. By discussing the ethical virtues individually, I (...) show how all the ethical virtues can be seen as different aspects of the philosopher-statesman’s multifaceted character. (shrink)