Exploring Virtue Ethics in Plato's Philosophy

1. Philosophy 2030 Class #3 Title: Introduction to Ethics Instructor: Paul Dickey E-mail Address: pdickey2@mccneb.edu • Nina Rosenstand, The Moral of the Story: An Introduction to Ethics, 7th Edition, 2013. • Assignment Due Today: • Chapter 8, pp. 391-400. 406-412 • Chapter 9, pp. 450-458 • Portfolio Project #1 • Assignment for Next Week • Chapter 3, pp. 119-141 • Portfolio Project #2

2. Sherman Alexie, Smoke Screens Discussion Are emotions rational? Is “story telling” moral or immoral? Can one “tell the truth” though fiction?

3. Plato & Socrates: What is the Nature of a VirtuousCharacter? What makes an ActMoral or Good? What is the Good Life? How Should We Live? What Makes Life Worth Living, that is, Good?

4. What is the Good Life? Wealth? The Love of Family & Friends? Job Satisfaction? Security & Being Protected? Adventure & Challenge? Having Purpose? Fulfillment? Seeking the Truth? Obeying God (or “the gods”)? Perhaps all (or at least many) of these are necessary but not individually (or perhaps even combined) are not enough. Socrates continually probed for what is the one essential thing that makes life good!

5. Plato’s Dialogues & the Socratic Search for How to Live • Plato’s dialogues demonstrate Socrates’ pursuit of how one should live. He is asking the question: • WHAT IS THE GOOD LIFE? • In The Apology, Socrates claims that the wisest man is he who knows he does not know. The unexamined life is not worth living. It is better to obey God than man. His pursuit of philosophy is following the instruction of God. • In Crito, Socrates is awaiting execution in his prison. Crito arrives and tries to persuade Socrates to escape. In order he says to act on reason alone, he asks Crito what is right and wrong. Socrates argues we must obey the laws of the society in which we live.

6. Plato Plato is history's first great philosopher because, among other reasons, he provided the first set of answers to some of the largest and most difficult questions: What is the structure of reality? What can be known for certain? What is moral virtue? What is the nature of the ideal state? No philosopher before Plato had ever attempted such a wide and deep exploration of philosophical problems.

7. Is Morality an issue of character or conduct? That is, does one do the right thing because one has a virtuous character, or does one have a virtuous character because they consistently do the right thing? Or, saying this another way, in studying ethics should we focus on acts of conduct and determine what makes an act moral, or should we focus on virtue to determine what makes a person good, such that guarantees that her actions will be good.

8. Plato & The Tripartite Soul • For Plato, humans have a nonphysical or material soul or self. That is a person’s essence. And the fundamental nature of that essence is the pursuit of reason. • Yet Plato contends that since reason often conflicts with our desires (or appetites) and that either of these can conflict with our aggressiveness or spirit, each of these comprise one of three main elements of our soul (self). • Thus, the soul is composed of three necessary elements which must be kept in balance for happiness and goodness. Different virtues are reflected in each of the three parts of the soul – wisdom from reason, courage from our spirit, and temperance from our desires.

9. Reason should rule the other two elements, just as a charioteer controls the wild horses. This achieves the fourth virtue – justice. • For Plato, man can choose what part of his self rules his actions. (Free Will?) Because reason alone can know how we ought to live, it should rule the appetite and our aggressions without disturbing the soul’s balance. • Thus, a truly virtuous and just man is one who controls his desires and aggressiveness through reason. From such virtue arose the moral acts of a virtuous man. • Note Plato is not describing morality in terms of what constitutes good conduct, but what constitutes virtue.

10. What is the problem with which Plato is faced? • How can one live a happy and satisfying life in a contingent, changing world without there being some permanence on which one can rely? • Indeed, how can the world appear to be both permanent and changing all the time. • Plato observed that the world of the mind, the world of ideas, seems relatively unchanging. Justice, for example, does not seem to change from day to day, year to year. • On the other hand, the world of our perceptions change continuously. One rock is small, the next large, the next…?

11. African Theory: Tribal Virtue Ethics • The culture of the Akan people of West Africa dates from before the 13th century. • Morality does not come from Onyame(God). Morality comes from the nature of being human and having good character. • The issue is what makes a “good person.” We can develop good character though by exercising good habits. • Knowledge of good habits is taught through storytelling. • Thus, the Akan ethics is a matter of linking conduct and virtue. A human being is born ethically neutral. • This ethics emphasizes values that promote social well-being (recall Socrates’ argument to Crito). Thus, it is basically utilitarian. The individual is not a palm tree. • http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/akan-person/

12. Native American Values Ecological Virtue • Native American tribes lived in harmony with nature. The moral community consists not only of the human members, but also non-human elements, including animals, spirits, the rocks, the trees, the winds and the waters. • The issue is what moral obligations one has to all members of the moral community. • “Beauty before me, beauty behind me.” • This system of virtue and values came into serious conflict with the settlers from Europe who were coming from a moral point of view that did not see the moral community in the same way. • The Native American approach emphasizes the balance of nature as the major part of virtue.

13. Aristotle: What is a Virtuous Person? • Aristotle suggests to be virtuous is to act with excellence, that is to live your life well according to its purpose • Each person has both an individual purpose (what you do best?) and a human purpose. • Man’s universal, human purpose is to reason, to think rationally. In so doing, he will develop a rational character which is moral goodness. • There are two forms of virtue: • When our soul controls our desires, we engage our moral virtues. • When our soul contemplates intellectual or spiritual matters, we engage our intellectual virtues. (“sophia”)

14. Aristotle: What is a Virtuous Person? • Virtue thus responds to each situation at the right time, in the right way, in the right amount, for the right reason. • Thus, a virtuous person will act with “moderation.” • This view is called “The Golden Mean” (and should be distinguished from “the golden rule.”) • Aristotle would cite the example of an artistic masterpiece from which nothing can be added or subtracted without harming the work’s “excellence.”

15. Aristotle: What is a Virtuous Person? • Aristotle though recognizes the need to act to be virtuous and thus virtue and conduct must be considered together. Thus, he describes habit of action as a way of developing characteras in the Akan view. • How can all acts of virtue be acts of moderation? Is acts of murder “in moderation” potentially virtuous? Actually, Aristotle agrees that some acts are absolutely wrong in themselves, yet…. He would say that this is because some acts cannot be done in the right amount. • Still, for most considerations, virtue comes from moderation, such as in the nature of pleasure seeking, spending money, pride, being angry, even truthfulness. See page 455 for a good chart on the Golden Mean.

16. Aristotle: What is a Virtuous Person? • Only by following such a life of moderation will a person achieve excellence, happiness or courage, not by pursuing them directly. • The reward of a virtuous man is happiness and all things “good.” There is no other way to achieve it. • Ironically, Aristotle was ultimately charged with the same crime as Socrates, but acted the opposite and left Athens so that “Athens would not sin twice against philosophy.” In so doing, he may have been acting courageously on his principle of the Golden Mean, but some argue his action lacked the moral strength of Socrates’. What do you think?

17. “To Do the Right Thing” In Opposition to Virtue Ethics • Christianity emphasized following God’s rules and conducting oneself by the will of God. Christianity prescribes that man cannot be virtuous in oneself, but only by the grace of God. • Thus, the virtue ethics of the Greeks was supplanted with “Doing the Right Thing.’ Human nature by itself is frail. • From the time of the Renaissance, the trend continued in favor of ethics of conduct (not virtue), but somewhat changed to pursuing acts of right perhaps out of seeking the best for others and the welfare of all, acts from reason, etc. • But the fundamental approach to morality in terms of virtue has not died. We shall see it’s influence when we study Immanuel Kant and the Categorical Imperative.

18. Is Ethics Based on Virtue? (#21) A Video

19. Virtue or Conduct? In 2-3 paragraphs each, describe two moral choices that you made in the last few weeks and evaluate if they were examples of you acting out of a core nature of being a virtuous person, or as an independent act of conduct based on a principle of action that just seemed to be the right thing to do given the situation? For example, perhaps you chose to tell the truth when telling a lie would have “got you out of trouble.” Was your fundamental motivation to act from personal and permanent virtue or was it primarily an independent choice that you should “do the right thing?” at this time? Is this a difference that makes a difference to you? Student Portfolio: Assignment #2