scholarly journals The Soul, the Virtues, and the Human Good: Comments on Aristotle's Moral Psychology

Labyrinth ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 137
Author(s):  
Kathi Beier
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Moral Psychology ◽  
Moral Philosophy ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Human Soul ◽  
Philosophy Of Psychology ◽  
Ethical Inquiry ◽  
Aristotle's Ethics ◽  
The One ◽  
Modern Moral Philosophy

In modern moral philosophy, virtue ethics has developed into one of the major approaches to ethical inquiry. As it seems, however, it is faced with a kind of perplexity similar to the one that Elisabeth Anscombe has described in Modern moral philosophy with regard to ethics in general. For if we assume that Anscombe is right in claiming that virtue ethics ought to be grounded in a sound philosophy of psychology, modern virtue ethics seems to be baseless since it lacks or even avoids reflections on the human soul. To overcome this difficulty, the paper explores the conceptual connections between virtue and soul in Aristotle's ethics. It claims that the human soul is the principle of virtue since reflections on the soul help us to define the nature of virtue, to understand the different kinds of virtues, and to answer the question why human beings need the virtues at all. 

Introduction

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
Edward Harcourt
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Attachment Theory ◽  
Moral Psychology ◽  
Developmental Psychology ◽  
The Other ◽  
Aristotle's Ethics ◽  
The One

The chapters in this volume have mostly been selected from papers given at a workshop and three conferences which brought together on the one hand a group of philosophers, most of whom were interested in one way or another in what has come to be known as ‘virtue ethics’—moral psychology in the wake of Aristotle—and, on the other, some developmental psychologists working, albeit in different ways, in an attachment paradigm. I organized these meetings partly because my own reading of attachment theory persuaded me there were a number of exciting points of contact between developmental psychology done this way and the kinds of questions Aristotle’s ethics raises, and which interest me; partly because almost no philosophers back then seemed even to have heard of attachment theory. This Introduction presents, inevitably through the eyes of a philosopher, what I take to be attachment theory’s main claims, and then tries to identify why philosophical moral psychologists should take it much more seriously than they have done to date—as I hope this volume itself will help them to do....

scholarly journals Aristotle for the Modern Ethicist

2019 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 192-214
Author(s):  
Sophia Connell
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Moral Philosophy ◽  
Normative Theory ◽  
Aristotle's Ethics ◽  
Mary Midgley ◽  
Modern Moral Philosophy

Elizabeth Anscombe and Mary Midgley discussed Aristotle's ethics as an alternative to modern moral philosophy. This idea is best known from Anscombe's 1958 paper ‘Modern Moral Philosophy’. The mainstream response has been to design a normative theory of ‘virtue ethics’ to rival deontology and consequentialism. This essay argues that that response is inadequate; it misses Anscombe's point and obscures various aspects of Aristotle's ethics, in particular his emphasis on friendship and human interconnectedness. This element of Aristotelianism was favoured by Midgley. By returning to Midgley, with the support of Aristotle, it is possible to find an alternative modern Aristotelianism in ethics.

Aristotle in the Ethic Wars

2019 ◽  
pp. 7-22
Author(s):  
Sylvia Berryman
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Moral Philosophy ◽  
Short History ◽  
History Of Ethics ◽  
History Of ◽  
Potential Alternative ◽  
Research Questions ◽  
Aristotle's Ethics ◽  
Modern Moral Philosophy

Beginning from a short history of ethics offered in Korsgaard’s The Sources of Normativity, this chapter notes the practice—dating back to Anscombe’s ‘Modern Moral Philosophy’—of offering narratives about the history of modern ethics in order to unsettle the metaphysical picture underlying the rise of non-cognitivism or subjectivism in ethics. These narratives often feature Aristotelian virtue ethics as a potential alternative, and have shaped the reading of Aristotle’s ethics. The supposed ‘gap’ separating ancient and modern ethics is questioned, and with it the claim that Aristotle was unreflective about the grounding of his ethics; the supposition is also disputed that he regarded human nature as an ‘Archimedean Point’ to ground the demands of ethics, as the work of Williams and Foot might suggest. From a survey of modern appropriations of his ideas, two research questions are isolated: was Aristotle an Archimedean naturalist, and was he metaethically naive?

Freedom and Responsibility in Neoplatonist Thought

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ursula Coope
Keyword(s):  
First Principle ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Human Soul ◽  
The One ◽  
Freedom And Responsibility

The Neoplatonists have a perfectionist view of freedom: an entity is free to the extent that it succeeds in making itself good. Free entities are wholly in control of themselves: they are self-determining, self-constituting, and self-knowing. Neoplatonist philosophers argue that such freedom is only possible for nonbodily things. The human soul is free insofar as it rises above bodily things and engages in intellection, but when it turns its desires to bodily things, it is drawn under the sway of fate and becomes enslaved. This book discusses this notion of freedom, and its relation to questions about responsibility. It explains the important role of notions of self-reflexivity in Neoplatonist accounts of both freedom and responsibility. Part I sets out the puzzles Neoplatonist philosophers face about freedom and responsibility and explains how these puzzles arise from earlier discussions. Part II looks at the metaphysical underpinnings of the Neoplatonist notion of freedom (concentrating especially on the views of Plotinus and Proclus). In what sense (if any) is the ultimate first principle of everything (the One) free? If everything else is under this ultimate first principle, how can anything other than the One be free? What is the connection between freedom and nonbodiliness? Part III looks at questions about responsibility, arising from this perfectionist view of freedom. Why are human beings responsible for their behaviour, in a way that other animals are not? If we are enslaved when we act viciously, how can we be to blame for our vicious actions and choices?

The Philosophy of Moral Development

2007 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 71-86
Author(s):  
Anna Abram
Keyword(s):  
Moral Development ◽  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Moral Psychology ◽  
Moral Philosophy ◽  
Developmental Psychology ◽  
Philosophy Of Education ◽  
Moral Failure ◽  
Personal Interaction ◽  
Interdisciplinary Study

This article presents a view of moral development based on the interdisciplinary study of moral psychology and virtue ethics. It suggests that a successful account of moral development has to go beyond what the developmental psychology and virtue ethics advocate and find ways of incorporating ideas, such as “moral failure” and “unpredictability of life.” It proposes to recognize the concept of moral development as an essential concept for ethics, moral philosophy and philosophy of education, and as a useful tool for anyone who wants to engage constructively in dialogues of religions, cultures and personal interaction.

Plotinus (AD 204/5–70)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
EyjÓlfur Kjalar Emilsson
Keyword(s):  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Human Soul ◽  
Roman World ◽  
Philosophical Movement ◽  
Ultimate Cause ◽  
The One

Plotinus was the founder of Neoplatonism, the dominant philosophical movement of the Graeco-Roman world in late antiquity, and the most significant thinker of the movement. He is sometimes described as the last great pagan philosopher.His writings, the so called Enneads, are preserved as whole. While an earnest follower of Plato, he reveals other philosophical influences as well, in particular those of Aristotle and Stoicism. Plotinus developed a metaphysics of intelligible causes of the sensible world and the human soul. The ultimate cause of everything is ‘the One’ or ‘the Good’. It is absolutely simple and cannot be grasped by thought or given any positive determination. The One has as its external act the universal mind or ‘Intellect’. The Intellect’s thoughts are the Platonic Forms, the eternal and unchanging paradigms of which sensible things are imperfect images. This thinking of the forms is Intellect’s internal activity. Its external act is a level of cosmic soul, which produces the sensible realm and gives life to the embodied organisms in it. Soul is thus the lowest intelligible cause that immediately is immediately in contact with the sensible realm. Plotinus, however, insists that the soul retains its intelligible character such as nonspatiality and unchangeability through its dealings with the sensible. Thus he is an ardent soul-body dualist. Human beings stand on the border between the realms: through their bodily life they belong to the sensible, but the human soul has its roots in the intelligible realm. Plotinus sees philosophy as the vehicle of the soul’s return to its intelligible roots. While standing firmly in the tradition of Greek rationalism and being a philosopher of unusual abilities himself, Plotinus shares some of the spirit of the religious salvation movements characteristic of his epoch.

Moral psychology

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Slote
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Moral Psychology ◽  
Moral Evaluation ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Psychological Issues ◽  
Moral Agents ◽  
Moral Weakness ◽  
Moral Requirements ◽  
Wrong Action

Moral psychology as a discipline is centrally concerned with psychological issues that arise in connection with the moral evaluation of actions. It deals with the psychological presuppositions of valid morality, that is, with assumptions it seems necessary for us to make in order for there to be such a thing as objective or binding moral requirements: for example, if we lack free will or are all incapable of unselfishness, then it is not clear how morality can really apply to human beings. Moral psychology also deals with what one might call the psychological accompaniments of actual right, or wrong, action, for example, with questions about the nature and possibility of moral weakness or self-deception, and with questions about the kinds of motives that ought to motivate moral agents. Moreover, in the approach to ethics known as ‘virtue ethics’ questions about right and wrong action merge with questions about the motives, dispositions, and abilities of moral agents, and moral psychology plays a more central role than it does in other forms of ethical theory.

Virtue, Rule-Following, and Absolute Prohibitions

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 78-97
Author(s):  
JEREMY REID
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Moral Philosophy ◽  
Virtuous Person ◽  
Rule Following ◽  
Moral Rules ◽  
Seminal Article ◽  
Modern Moral Philosophy ◽  
Taking Responsibility

AbstractIn her seminal article ‘Modern Moral Philosophy’ (1958) Elizabeth Anscombe argued that we need a new ethics, one that uses virtue terms to generate absolute prohibitions against certain act-types. Leading contemporary virtue ethicists have not taken up Anscombe's challenge in justifying absolute prohibitions and have generally downplayed the role of rule-following in their normative theories. That they have not done so is primarily because contemporary virtue ethicists have focused on what is sufficient for characterizing the deliberation and action of the fully virtuous person, and rule-following is inadequate for this task. In this article, I take up Anscombe's challenge by showing that rule-following is necessary for virtuous agency, and that virtue ethics can justify absolute prohibitions. First, I offer a possibility proof by showing how virtue ethics can generate absolute prohibitions in three ways: by considering actions that directly manifest vice or that cannot be performed virtuously; actions that are prohibited by one's institutional roles and practical identities; and actions that are prohibited by the prescriptions of the wise. I then seek to show why virtue ethicists should incorporate rule-following and absolute prohibitions into their theories. I emphasize the central role that rules have in the development of virtue, then motivate the stronger view that fully virtuous agents follow moral rules by considering the importance of hope, uncertainty about consequences, and taking responsibility for what eventuates. Finally, I provide an account of what Anscombe called a ‘corrupt mind’, explaining how our understanding of virtue is corrupted if we think that virtue may require us to do vicious actions.

Anscombe on Brute Facts and Human Affairs

2020 ◽  
Vol 87 ◽  
pp. 85-99
Author(s):  
Rachael Wiseman
Keyword(s):  
Moral Philosophy ◽  
Philosophy Of Action ◽  
Philosophy Of Psychology ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Modern Moral Philosophy

AbstractIn ‘Modern Moral Philosophy’ Anscombe writes: ‘It is not profitable at present for us to do moral philosophy. It should be laid aside at any rate until we have an adequate philosophy of psychology, in which we are conspicuously lacking’. In consideration of this Anscombe appeals to the relation of ‘brute-relative-to’ which holds between facts and descriptions of human affairs. This paper describes the reorientation in philosophy of action that this relation aims to effect and examines the claim that this reorientation makes possible the sort of philosophy of psychology that can provide a starting point for ethics.

scholarly journals THE REVIVAL OF VIRTUE ETHICS AS AN ETHICAL VIEW

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 154
Author(s):  
Chris O. Abakare
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Moral Philosophy ◽  
Moral Obligation ◽  
Moral Sense ◽  
Moral Duty ◽  
Philosophy Of Psychology ◽  
New Form ◽  
Kantian Deontology ◽  
Ethical View

<span lang="EN-US">Aristotle and Plato were the chief architects of virtue ethics, but their own formulation of virtue ethics was mostly subdued with the appearance of consequentialism as well as Kantian deontology. However, modem thinkers have attempted to revive virtue ethics in its new form and in this regard the name which is popularly known is G.E.M. Anscombe. In fact Anscombe clearly indicates in what sense virtue ethics can be revived and what was wrong with the traditional virtue ethics as expounded by Aristotle and Plato. Anscombe points out three important issues for which traditional virtue ethics perhaps lost its glory. First, moral philosophy in general cannot survive without an adequate philosophy of psychology and this thing was absent in the traditional virtue ethics. Secondly, without psychological possibility the concepts of moral obligation and moral duty, the moral sense of ought to be jeopardized. Thirdly and importantly, the differences between the well-known English writers on moral philosophy from Sidgwick to the present day are of little importance. This task of this paper is to review the revival of virtue ethics</span>

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