Applied Definition: Virtue Ethics Essay

1 . In what ways would the historical context from which virtue integrity emerged condition its basics? Presocratics, viewed as the first philosophers, helped bring the term trademarks to idea (literal translation: ‘word’; as well denotes ‘logic’, ‘argument’, ‘reason’. Aristotle’s concept of Virtue Integrity regards humans as rational animals, suggesting that ‘logos’ is simply a human characteristic.

Known as Plato’s most talented student, Aristotle disagreed together with his teacher’s perspective that the “essence of fact lies in several abstract associated with Forms or perhaps Ideas” (Brannigan, 2005: 60). Aristotle’s standpoint directly clashes his teacher’s, stating that the “source of meaning comes from concrete, physical reality” (Brannigan, 2005: 60). This immediate contrast with Plato contributes to Aristotle opening his personal school, which usually he named the Lyceum.

Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics is usually his literary formation of his honest theories. Aristotle believes that ethics result from real world experiences, that there is not only a set of rules to apply to life that will mould us in ethical creatures, but rather the “individual is out there in marriage with others” (Brannigan, 2005: 61). Thus, ethics relies upon how the individuals align with each other and the cultivation of good persona. How do we cultivate good personality? Aristotle claims we must accomplish our human nature.

He lets us know that all items existing in nature get their own certain end goal, which he refers to as telos (Greek term for certain end). For instance , an apple seed’s telos is always to grow into a f tree and produce oranges. Aristotle tells us that only individuals are capable of using logos being a form of believed, and that most humans are, by nature, logical animals. Therefore , the human’s end goal is to “fulfill our human nature as logical animals by properly working out our reason” and this individual also claims that, “only in this way can we be really happy” (Brannigan, 2005: 62).

Furthermore, Aristotle states that all humans have one main end goal – eudaimonia (Greek for happiness), and that joy is a great “intrinsic good”. Intrinsic great means that we all seek happiness for the sake of being happy, and do not look for happiness to acquire something else. In contrast, instrumental good are actions we take to accomplish this intrinsic and ultimate good of pleasure.

For example , learners take university courses to fulfill a necessity, gain understanding, and so on. No matter the reason, ultimately students consider courses to attain something, with another objective in mind, thus making it a great instrumental good. All merchandise are instrumental, except delight. Human brilliance and telos can be acquired, “only when we realize our the case natures while rational pets or animals, when we properly exercise the reason through our lives” (Brannigan, 2006: 62). Aristotle terms man excellence with a brand new name – virtue; genuine happiness should be to live focus, and only by simply living virtuously can we obtain happiness, and living virtuously requires producing a habit of practicing virtue to cultivate very good character.

For that reason only people that have good personality can be really happy. To live virtuously, we should avoid extreme conditions and maintain an equilibrium, which Aristotle terms as the “golden mean”. The “golden mean” is the balance between the extremes, and we need to use realistic thinking and reasoning within a balanced style.

He distinguished two types of virtues: perceptive and meaningful. Intellectual virtues require us to use away reason in two ways, one practical and one philosophical. First, “we reason in order to live pretty much in our day-to-day lives, which in turn requires us to live properly through practical reason” (Brannigan, 2005: 64), which Aristotle terms phronesis. Second, “we reason for the purpose of discovering bigger truths… so that we may contemplate higher, more theoretical truths and principles such as the thought of the Good” (Brannigan, june 2006: 64). Meaningful virtues (which Aristotle known as ethike) concentrate on our behavior and how we all live existence, and are primary of Aristotle’s ethics.

Aristotle’s belief is that moral benefits only came into being with regular practice, the Greek word for habit is cast, which displays the link with ethics. In summary, a summary of Aristotle’s ethical morals: the goal/aim is to progress good character, which can be attained only through habitual practice of advantage (intellectual and moral), which will create the health of virtue, therefore making all of us virtuous individuals. Repeated activities lead to a disorder, which makes an action distinct by a condition, consequently meaning one particular virtuous action does not produce a person virtuous.

Rather, acts of virtue should be an ethos(or habit), in order that virtuous functions become a type of second-nature. These kinds of repeated acts of virtuous ethos bring about the condition of virtue, and the current condition of virtue sama dengan good persona, and vice versa. Since functions of virtue are not functions of advantage unless logic, reason, and rationalization are utilized to find the “golden mean” among two conceivable extremes, one cannot accomplish their telos and/or in the end the condition of pleasure, without getting balance in every decision that presents itself then acting upon this balanced decision.

This creates the assumption of your natural hyperlink between who we are and what we do, among being and doing. However , doing the proper thing because you will be following a secret or criteria does not make a desired person, as a result placing the emphasis of Aristotle’s ethics on being instead of doing, meaning that an honest person will inform the truth as this person’s character/being is genuine.

The reverse of this will be a dishonest person will be deceitful, or a deceitful person can tell the facts because societal rules/guidelines declare it’s the virtuous decision – no matter what, a dishonest person’s getting and persona is still unethical, regardless of whether your husband tells the truth or not – a single act of virtue does not equal a virtuous person. “Virtue after that is a express of deliberate moral goal, consisting in a mean relative to ourselves, the mean being determined by explanation, or like a prudent guy would decide it. ” (Brannigan, 2006: 88) 2 . What might virtue integrity suggest must be done in response for the dilemma from the school child who was built to turn his shirt inside out? Why?

Advantage ethics really focuses on “the golden mean”, which is attained through realistic and reasonable thinking. By simply avoiding extremes habitually when coming up with decisions, “the golden mean” can be obtained, leading to a virtuous person, and eventually happiness and telos; this can be a only way to truly attain the ultimate target of delight and virtue. Blindly subsequent rules, with no rationalization and an effort to avoid extremes, would not make a virtuous person or achieve “the fantastic mean”. Thus, being virtuous leads to positive and honest actions, although not vice versa.

In the matter of the principal, a virtue ethicist would argue that the principal was merely using a rule, and so the action had not been virtuous. However , the principal as well exhibited harmony between extremes, by making the kid turn the shirt within behind a tree; the principal could have made an extreme decision by possibly ignoring the child’s shirt (and the rule in place) and letting him/her wear this shirt through the rest of the university day (deficit), or by simply sending the child home for the morning (or longer) as punishment for within the shirt that breaks clothes code. When you look at the parents actions and choices by a advantage ethicist’s viewpoint, they have skipped “the gold mean” when making decisions.

With regards to the choice of dress up their child within a University of Michigan t-shirt, a advantage ethicist could state that this kind of decision revealed ignorance (since they were supplied with a student handbook, which has outfit code guidelines), but only if they chosen not to read guidelines that they were provided with. In the event that they simply weren’t provided with this kind of rules, that they still displayed ignorance, but is not because of becoming ignorant. If perhaps they read these rules and decided not to follow them since they did certainly not agree, then they should be congratulated for not blindly following guidelines for the sake of subsequent them.

Nevertheless , the decision to deliver their child to school in a shirt that fractures the rules could possibly be argued as a balanced decision. The deficit decision will be sending your child in all Ok college clothing, just to stay within the recommendations; the extreme can be sending their child in a accomplished University of Michigan soccer uniform. It can be clear the parents miss finding the “golden mean” when ever deciding how to express their particular feelings regarding the guideline, by see the extreme and bringing it to the media’s attention (they could have met with school planks, or even the principal, to try to compromise).

They also take the extreme side of things when they accept gifts from your university (who surely appreciated the attention through the media). 3. Making use of your own personal moral beliefs, in what ways do you agree or disagree while using decision as well as the reasoning used to reach the choice in the above question? I agree with the final statements presented by taking a virtue ethical perspective, such as the principal making a balanced decision when acquiring action about the shirt, the parents quite possibly being ignorant of the guideline through personal neglect or neglect in the school, plus the choices the parents made pursuing the shirt concern being serious. However , I actually do not necessarily accept how these outcomes were achieved through this look at.

First, Certainly that there is an equilibrium that needs to be accomplished (or atleast attempted to be achieved) in most of the decisions and actions we generate daily, yet I do not thing that nonethical options and activities are made since the person’s “being” is bad. I feel like good people can and do make ignorant, unethical, or bad selections; vice versa becoming true too. While I think that being and doing certainly shape one another, I do certainly not feel that one is formed finally by the different. As far as the things i feel needs to have been required for this situation, I agree with the principal’s decision.

Could be the code needs refined a little, however your 5 yr old having to convert his/her t-shirt inside out is known as a much better alternative than your 5 yr old getting taken because the shirt holds a different sort of meaning into a gang affiliate. In class, it had been argued which the University of Michigan’s company logo held simply no meaning towards the local bande, but it does not eliminate the prospect of the logo getting mistaken to get something else, or even influencing a gang all of us don’t know about. The possibility that the child’s safety is in query should be lots enough cause of the parents to, at the very least, complain to the college board instead of the media.

The fact that the parents brought the media in the situation, I feel, decreases the credibility of their complaint, specifically since they eventually prospered through the incident as well as the resulting press attention (game tickets, university apparel, and so on). In case the principal got ignored the shirt, area child put it on throughout the day, and then the child became the patient of gang-related violence as a result of his shirt, I’m sure the parents could hold another type of view-point about the rule – and still end up bringing the issue for the media’s focus.