ARISTOTLE

Life

Aristotle on Morality

Concept of Good and Moral Virtue 3 Steps towards a virtues life Division of human psyche Main points on Aristotles

virtue
Nature and Moral Virtues Nicomachean Ethics

LIFE
Aristotle was born in Stageira, a Greek colony in Macedonia, in 384 BC. Generations of Aristotle's family including his father, Nichomachus, had served as physicians to the Kings of Macedonia.

His parents died when he was about ten years old and he was taken in by foster
parents: Proxenos and his wife.

He moved to Athens at the age of seventeen, and he remained there for some

twenty years. This is where he got his first taste of the sciences and actively became
a teacher.

 He studied under Plato, whose influences are most apparent in Aristotle's theoretical and practical philosophies. He greatly admired Plato all the way to his death, despite the fact that he later opposed some of his most important points. Aristotle was married twice, first to the foster daughter of his noble friend Hermeias, named Pythias. After her death he married Herpyllis, who came from his birthplace, Stageira. There was some controversy surrounding this marriage because Herpyllis did not have as high a social position as his first wife, Pythias. Herpyllis gave birth to his son Nichomachus and was entrusted with the care of his daughter from his first marriage. After the death of Alexander the Great, Athens was taken over by people who didn't like Alexander. They suspected Aristotle of sympathizing with Alexander, and he was exiled from Athens. Aristotle died in 322 BC at the age of sixty-two in Chalkis on the island of Euboea, which had granted him refuge when he was exiled from Athens.

ARISTOTLE ON MORALITY
Aristotle believed the task of ethics was to find the highest and best good in human life. All human activities aim at some higher end that we consider good. People generally disagree as to the nature and conditions of

happiness.
Eudemonia is a Greek word commonly translated as happiness. Some people believe happiness is 'wealth, honour, pleasure, or even

virtue.'

 Aristotle thinks that wealth is not happiness, because wealth is just a monetary value, but can be used to gain some happiness. Just like wealth, honour is not happiness, because honour focuses more of the people that honour, rather than the honouree. Pleasure is not happiness, because "the life of gratification" is "completely slavish, since the life they decide on is the life for grazing animals." The last is virtue, and virtue is not happiness either, since one could be virtuous and not use it.

Instead, Aristotle says that happiness is a combination of the four. Thus, Aristotle describes the good life by saying that, "the happy person is one who expresses complete virtue in his activities, with an adequate supply of external goods, not just for any time but for a complete life." Aristotle lists the following as moral virtues: Courage Temperance (moderation) Liberality (moderation in giving and taking money) Magnificence (correctly dealing with great wealth or power) Pride (claiming what is due to you) Gentleness (moderation with respect to anger) Agreeableness Truthfulness Wittiness Justice

CONCEPT OF GOOD AND MORAL VIRTUE

Moral virtue, or excellence of character, concerns what we do voluntarily, and not what we do because we are forced to do so. The traditional word for the opposite of virtue is vice.

Aristotle believed that every moral virtue or positive character trait can be described as a pleasant intermediate activity, between a painful excess and a painful deficiency. But seeing what is most pleasant and most painful in truth is not something everyone can easily do, especially if they are badly brought up and not experienced.

 Another way Aristotle describes each of the moral virtues is as a correct aiming at what is beautiful (kalos - Ancient Greek word for beautiful). Same as for example, bravery: too little bravery is being cowardly and afraid of everything whereas too much bravery is being rash and afraid of nothing.

One obvious emotion that is separated from the others and not treated as an emotion by Aristotle is "thumos", the spiritedness which is the cause of anger. Aristotle, like Plato in his Socratic dialogues, treats thumos as an important and positive part of the human soul, which helps a well broughtup young person become virtuous. Thumos is not an emotion (pathos) according to Aristotle because it tries to follow the leadership of the sensible part of the soul which makes mindful decisions. The true emotions on the other hand, are able to distort rational thinking and dominate it.

Virtue in the highest sense, in an adult who has been brought up well, will not just involve good personal habits such as courage and temperance, but also friendship and justice and intellectual virtue.

3 STEPS TOWARDS A VIRTUES LIFE

A virtue is a state of a character or state of thoughtful moral purpose, consisting of a rational mean relative to ourselves. There are two kinds of virtues: intellectual and moral.

Moral Virtue Concerns what we do voluntarily, and not what we do because we are forced to do so. (Deal with people) - Discipline of action acquired through habituated moral action Moral Virtues According to Aristotle:

Prudence Justice Fortitude Courage Liberality Magnificence Magnanimity Temperance

Intellectual Virtue Character traits necessary for right action and correct thinking. - Discipline of the mind acquired through education Intellectual Virtues According to Aristotle: A sense of justice Perseverance Empathy Integrity, Intellectual courage Confidence in reason Autonomy

3 Steps towards a virtues life

1. One must have knowledge of what is moral - ignorance is amoral 2. One must Will the moral action - no accidental morality 3. One must act out of a consistent character - no occasional morality

DIVISION OF HUMAN PSYCHE

Aristotles conceptual divisions of the parts of the human psyche There are deep ambiguities which must be acknowledged in Aristotles discussions of the parts of the soul and their rationality. Aristotle expresses several misgivings about schemes for dividing the soul into parts, not least of which is that when adopting a fundamental rational-irrational distinction, locating the sensitive (aisthtikon), imaginative (phantastikon), and desiring parts (orektikon) raises difficulties.

He notes, self-referentially as it turns out, that distinguishing and dividing the soul into parts according to their powers produces an exuberant number (pampolla) of parts. He names the part as (examples): Nutritive - This is the power living beings have to grow and take in nourishment Sensitive - This is the power of perceiving things with the senses Appetitive (epithumtikon) - This is the power of desiring Locomotive - This is the ability to move Reasoning

MAIN POINTS ON ARISTOTLES VIRTUE

The highest good and the end toward which all human activity is directed is happiness (eudaimonia), which can be defined as continuous thought of eternal and universal truth.

One attains happiness by a virtuous life and the development of reason and the faculty of theoretical wisdom. For this one requires sufficient external goods to ensure health, leisure, and the opportunity for virtuous action.

 Moral virtue is a relative mean between extremes of excess and deficiency, and in general the moral life is one of moderation in all things except virtue. No human appetite or desire is bad if it is controlled by reason according to a moral principle. Moral virtue is acquired by a combination of knowledge, habituation, and selfdiscipline.

Virtuous acts require conscious choice and moral purpose or motivation. Man has personal moral responsibility for his actions.
Moral virtue cannot be achieved abstractly it requires moral action in a social environment. Ethics and politics are closely related, for politics is the science of creating a society in which men can live the good life and develop their full potential.

NATURE AND MORAL VIRTUES

Nature Aristotle applied his doctrine of the four causes to the study of the natural world. Although all natural objects were composed of a certain matter and certain direct causes for all their changes, it was the formal and final causes that illustrated most of Aristotle's attention. All objects, both alive and inanimate, have an essential form that makes them what they are and a goal or final state that they are progressing towards. These two causes were very closely related in Aristotle's natural science.

 Consider, for example, an acorn. It has a particular form, particular way that its matter is arranged. This is what makes it the type of thing it is, in this case the seed of an oak tree. This form defines for the acorn a goal or final state which defines it and guides all the various changes the acorn will go through. In this case the goal or final state is to be an oak tree. The goal or final cause guides the object through the various changes of form that the object goes through on the way to the accomplishment of its goal. It provides unity, order, and intelligibility to the change that an object undergoes. The essential form of the thing, however, determines what goal it pursues. The final state of a thing depends upon what type of thing it is. This close connection of the final and formal causes led Aristotle to combine the two in his later account of what form is.

One of the most important applications that Aristotle made of this theory was to the explanation of the motions of physical objects. Aristotle held that there were only four main types of things or elements. These were earth, air, fire, and water. Each of these had a natural place, which it strived to move towards. Earth strived to move towards the centre of the planet Earth. Water's natural place was on the surface of the planet Earth. Air's natural place was next furthest from the earth, followed by fire. Finally, outside of the realm of the planet Earth, were the spheres of the stars. This was the place of a fifth, different element, either. It was what made up the stars. The natural motions of objects and their weight depended, then, upon what type of object they were, for this determined their natural place or goal. Dirt for example moved down towards the natural place of Earth and was heavier than cotton, because it was composed mostly of earth instead of air and water. Everything moves the way it does because of the type of thing it is, because of its form. It was this that determined the natural place of the thing.

Moral Virtues

The good life involves developing a good character. Moral virtues are cultivated by habit. To become a generous person, I must get into the habit of being generous. Put another way, it is not enough to be told that I should be patient. To become patient, I need to practice patience.

NICOMACHEAN ETHICS
The Nicomachean Ethics is the name normally given to Aristotle's best known work on ethics. The English version of the title derives from Greek transliterated Ethika Nikomacheia. The Latin, which is also commonly used, can be thica Nicomachaor, Moribus ad Nicomachum. The Nicomachean Ethics is widely considered one of the most important historical philosophical works, and had an important impact upon the European Middle Ages, becoming one of the core works of medieval philosophy. It therefore indirectly became critical in the development of all modern philosophy as well as European law and theology.

 Though written more than 2,000 years ago, it offers the modern reader many valuable insights into human needs and conduct. Among its most outstanding features is Aristotles insistence that there are no known absolute moral standards and that any ethical theory must be based in part on an understanding of psychology and firmly grounded in the realities of human nature and daily life. In addition, the book vividly reflects Aristotle's achievements in other areas of philosophy and is a good example of his analytical method, which must be considered the ultimate basis of all modern scientific research.

 In Aristotles Nicomachean Ethics, he expresses his opinions on the basis of thought through eudaimonia and arete. Eudaimonia is the goal of human conduct, or telos in Greek. In English, Eudaimonia translates into happiness, but Aristotle uses it as a well-being through prospering and flourishing. To achieve this prospering and flourishing, one needs satisfaction of a job well done. Arete is excellence in fulfilling a function, also known as an ergon. Aristotle finds arete, or a virtue in all objects, animate and inanimate.

 People have not changed significantly in the many years since Aristotle first lectured on ethics at the Lyceum in Athens. The rules of conduct and explanations of virtue and goodness that he proposes can all help modern man to attain a fuller and more satisfying understanding of his responsibilities as a member of society and the purpose of his existence.

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