Chapter 5 and Chapter 6

• Virtue ethics is distinct from two ethical theories which focuses on right or wrong actions

  1. consequentialism
  2. deontology
• TRUE OR FALSE:

  • It is more interested not with what makes an act right, but with what makes a person good. (TRUE)
• TRUE OR FALSE:

  • for virtue ethicists, being a good moral person is more than doing what is right. (TRUE)
• • The starting point for virtue ethics is not the question of what acts are right or wrong, but what characters are virtuous or vicious. 
• the virtuous person is one who consistently does the right acts for the right motives.
• • The western tradition is represented by Aristotelian ethics and the eastern tradition emanates from the Confucian and Buddhist ethics. 
• • The western tradition is represented by Aristotelian ethics and the eastern tradition emanates from the Confucian and Buddhist ethics. 
• Aristotle’s ethics is mainly derived from the philosophical treatise Nicomachean Ethics
• Good - Whatever one seeks and pursues as worthwhile
• Intrinsic good - what we desire for its own sake, an end which determines all other desires
• Money, for example, is an instrumental good for no one derives complete satisfaction in gazing at money. But we desire money for the sense of security which it affords, or the many things one can buy with it.
• TRUE OR FALSE: Eudaimonia is final and self-sufficient good (TRUE)
• • For Aristotle, the ultimate end of all human actions is eudaimonia, which has been roughly translated as happiness.
• • Eudaimonia is also translated as “well-being,” “flourishing,” or “living well”——which are said to be nearer to the Greeks’ understanding of the term.
• For Aristotle, the proper and peculiar end of human beings is to live a life in accordance with reason.
• • distinct to human beings is their unique capacity to reason and act on the basis off reason
• • A virtuous life enables the person to cultivate and fulfill his/her true nature which fructifies into happiness
• • Aristotle categorizes virtues into two kinds:

  1. Intellectual virtues
  2. Moral virtues
• 1. Intellectual virtues

  • virtue that enable us to think rationally
• Of the nine intellectual virtues that Aristotle identified, only practical wisdom cannot be thought, as it is learned through experience.
• 1. Moral virtues

  • virtue that enable us to handle our desires and emotions rationally
• TRUE OR FALSE: Aristotle acknowledges that moral virtues are fully developed when combined with practical wisdom (TRUE)
• Intellectual virtue owes its origin and development chiefly to teaching, while Moral virtue is formed by habit.
• • Endowments 
  • are given by nature
  • we receive the power of using them first and only later exercise these endowments in action
• Example of endowment

  • sense faculties, such as sight and hearing
• • Endowments 
  • we first possess and then use them; we do not acquire them by use.
• • Virtues
  • we have to first practice them before we can acquire them, which, according to Aristotle, is comparable to how we acquire skills in the arts
• • virtue emanates from the continuous, repeated practice of doing the right action
• • Virtue - state of character; internally located
  • Moral action - external exercise; overt act
• • moral action is doing the right thing, to the right person, at the right time, in the right manner, and to the right extent
• • virtue demands that the right act flow effortlessly from the personality as its characteristic trait
• TRUE OR FALSE:

  • , it is possible for a person to do a right act without necessarily being virtuous, just as it is possible for a virtuous person to succumb to an immoral deed without forfeiting his virtuous nature. (TRUE)