Talk:Aristotelian ethics
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I compiled this page from info I recently put on Aristotle and that which was on Nicomachean ethics but seemed to broad to fit there. It fits well here. Uriah923 05:17, 28 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
The article could certainly do with some polishing and re-structuring. I have started today. It covered many subjects multiple times and seemed to follow no particular sequence as if it was just cut and paste from snippets written for somewhere else. It also contains a lot of debateable opinions without sourcing. I have removed some of those also. Editors of this article should probably also watch Nicomachean Ethics which is being expanded to the point that it is too big. Eventually material from that article could be used to expand this article, as long as we can find ways to compress that article without distorting it. In any case that article probably already gives some ideas for this one.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 14:01, 21 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you Andrew! I will try to continue working on it, and document what I am doing. I also agree that it's better to delete cautiously, and try to give the benefit of the doubt to any previous editors. So I will try to do that also. Thank you for taking the time to reply to my concerns. I really appreciate that. Verazzano (talk) 11:05, 13 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Here are a list of some possible areas for improvement:
Verazzano (talk) 11:09, 13 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Changes made:
Verazzano (talk) 20:03, 13 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you Andrew! Good suggestion. I'll see if I can get a hold of it. More citations directly to Aristotle's texts would also improve the page, and that's pretty easy for me to do -- at least for the Nicomachean Ethics. And possibly I'll try to get ahold of a copy of the Eudemian Ethics and the Magna Moralia also.Verazzano (talk) 18:32, 14 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Not all of the sections in the article are equally represented, some being more developed than others. When discussing objections to Aristotle's function argument, the article does not go into detail about this topic, merely using one sentence in an attempt to explain the counter-argument while other topics under this section of the article are explained more thoroughly. Furthermore, another example of this problem can be seen when the article is discussing the highest good. In this section the article offers numerous quotes in order to demonstrate the main point of the section; however, only one line is offered after the main quotes are presented. This demonstrates how not all of the quotes throughout the article are developed and explained as fully as others which leads the article to be less developed, not explaining the evidence it is using.Mizamor (talk) 05:17, 14 February 2017 (UTC)mizamor[reply]
Andrew -- I will look to see if I can find articles debating whether Aristotle thinks philosophical contemplation is the highest good. Verazzano (talk) 12:53, 15 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for the reply. This dispute relates partly to the textual unity of the Nicomachean Ethics. Some scholars regard NE X as an addition that is not consistent with the rest of the NE. For a brief comment on the lack of unity of the NE, see Jonathan Barnes, "Roman Arsitotle," in Philosophia Togata II (Clarendon Press: 1997) pg. 59, note 252.
The function argument in NE I may be interpreted as trying to show that the human function is some kind of excellent exercise of the intellect -- leaving open both possibilities -- practical activity, *or* contemplative activity -- without yet specifying which is actually the true human function (which is then specified in NE X). But in the NE I argument, Aristotle uses the Greek adjective "praktikos" to characterize the distinctively human exercise of reason, which creates a problem for this "unspecified excellent exercise of reason" interpretation. Gabriel Richardson Lear has argued that practical activity somehow indirectly aims at contemplative activity, but I find it implausible Aristotle believed anything so convoluted and odd (simply inconsistency seems more plausible to me).
The fact that Aristotle associates contemplation with a Godlike life also creates problems for viewing this as the fulfillment of a specifically human function. It is also difficult that in the Politics, Aristotle says that man is by nature a political animal. If the perfection of man is through philosophy, this characterization seems surprising. One needn't assume that Aristotle's views are consistent in all of his writings, but NE I-IX seems to share the assumption that man is practical and political by nature, and that he fulfills his function through practical activity in the community.
Julia Annas writes: "1 am standing aside from the dispute as to whether in Book I Aristotle is indicating that the best life is the life of theoretical contemplation and, if so, how this relates to the passage on the life of contemplation in Book X. (For my own view of this dispute, see chapter 9 n.l.) The issues I am dealing with do not depend on resolution of this problem. For extensive discussion of it see Kraut (1989)." See Annas, The Morality of Happiness (1993) pg. 366, note 7. I will try to track down some more substantial references. Verazzano (talk) 17:13, 15 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Verazzano (talk) 04:36, 24 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
As I see it, the paradigm of cardinal virtues simply does not apply to Aristotle who composes his virtues in an entirely different way (the distinction between ethical and theoretical virtues, the "social" virtues of magnanimity and beneficence, the relation between φρόνησις and σοφία just to name a few).
References to the cardinal virtues (their constitution, character and parts) is prevalent in the litterature, but only to a limited degree in Aristotelian scholarship (and usually restricted to short remarks). The so-called cardinal virtues are probably to be found in some form or another in Plato, but it seems to me much more doubtful whether you could even talk about cardinal virtues in Aristotle. The most obvious reason for that would be that his list of virtues is not restricted to the four orthodox cardinal virtues. We might find some indirect (and dispersed) indications that two or three of the orthodox virtues play a central role to Aristotle, but in my view it would be very difficult to defend a clear-cut and unmistakable unity of the four cardinal virtues as being of a higher order or priority than his other virtues.
So it surprises me to find the cardinal virtues highligted in the manner of this article. Especially since there is no clear trace of them neither in Aristotle nor the scholarly litterature on his ethics. Further, the description of the four virtues seems rather out of place in the article, and no explanation is given about their role, place and possible presence in the Aristotelian corpus. It would be more natural to present the practical/ethical virtues and theoretical virtues in separate sections reflecting Aristotle's own presentation.
My suggestion would this be
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Intellectual virtues and moral virtue 158.62.66.192 (talk) 13:27, 17 April 2023 (UTC)[reply]