VIRTUE ETHICS And Feminist Ethics

Why Should I Be Moral?

Emphasizes Virtues (Strengths) and Vices (Weaknesses) of Character Not “What Should I Do?” (both Deontology and Teleology) but “What Kind of Person Should I Be?”

Aristotle’s Ethics 384-322 B.C. The Nicomachean Ethics Two Kinds of Persons Continent: Do what is right, but not necessarily because they want to Temperate: Do what is right because they want to; the more holistic person

The Goal of Human Existence Eudaimonia Flourishing, Happiness A Lifelong Pursuit, accomplished Rationally, through theoretical wisdom and contemplation Functionally, through practical wisdom and politics

The Goal of Human Existence & Eudaimonia Goal is the flourishing through virtuous activity. Human happiness is the activity of the soul (reasoning well) in accordance with perfect virtue (excellence).

The Virtues Intellectual Virtues Moral Virtues Wisdom, Understanding, Taught through instruction Moral Virtues Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, Temperance The result of habit Not natural or inborn but acquired through practice Habit or disposition of the soul (our fundamental character) which involves both feeling and action

Virtues Prudence Compassion Generosity Benevolence Wisdom Justice Courage Temperance

The Doctrine of the Mean Proper position between two extremes Vice of excess Vice of deficiency Not an arithmetic median Relative to us and not the thing Not the same for all of us, or “In this way, then, every knowledgeable person avoids excess and deficiency, but looks for the mean and chooses it” (II.6)

Aristotle argued that moral virtues are means between two corresponding vices, one of excess and one of deficiency. For example: courage is a virtue found between the vices of cowardliness and rashness. Rashness Courage Cowardliness |_______________|______________|

Other Virtue Ethicists Elizabeth Anscombe In 1958 she published an article called Modern Moral Philosophy arguing that we should return to the virtues, as the idea of a law without a lawgiver was incoherent.

Other Virtue Ethicists Philippa Foot Tries to modernise Aristotle. Ethics should not be about dry theorising, but about making the world a better place (she was one of the founders of Oxfam) Virtue contributes to the good life.

Other Virtue Ethicists Rosalind Hursthouse A neo-Aristotelian – Aristotle was wrong on women and slaves, and there is no need to be limited to his list of virtues. We acquire virtues individually, and so flourish, but we do so together and not at each other’s expense.

Other Virtue Ethicists Carol Gilligan In a Different Voice (1982) Developmental theories have been built on observations and assumptions about men’s lives and thereby distort views of female personality. The kinds of virtues one honors depend on the power brokers of one’s society. The Ethics of Care