EL6

• Virtue Ethics

  • Concentrates on the character of the actor.
  • More interested not with what makes an act right, but with what makes a person good.
  • Focus is on the person performing the act
• Eudaimonia

  • The ultimate end of all human actions (roughly translates to happiness or well-being)
  • The knowledge of the ultimate good is crucial in one’s attainment of an ethical life.
  • A being’s essence or nature lies in its unique or proper function.
  • The key to human happiness is cultivating our rational faculty.
• The Concept of Virtue

  • Happiness consists in the activity of the soul in conformity with virtue.
  • Two kinds of virtues: intellectual and moral, which can be primarily acquired through practice and habitual action.
• Endowments are given by nature. Virtues are practiced before they are acquired.
• Virtue – is a state of character that emanates from the continuous, repeated practice of doing the right action.
• Virtue – mean between the two extremes of our emotions and desires.
• Vice – is the undesirable character trait of either the extreme of excess or the extreme of deficiency.
• Courage – is a virtue because it is the mean between the extremes of cowardice and rashness on the other.
• Nichomachean Ethics

  • Does not provide guidance on how we should act morally in personal situations.
  • No clear measure to determine if what is right and moderate has been achieved after committing/failing to commit an act.
  • We have to define first what is right before we can identify someone as a person of virtue.
• Distributive Justice

  • Aims to cultivate the virtue of justice among human individuals and social institutions acting as agents of distributive acts.
  • When agents are just, distributions can be deemed fair.
• Retributive justice – fair imposition of punishments on those guilty of performing wrongful acts.