It is commonly assumed that Aristotle's ethical theory shares deep structural similarities with neo-Aristotelian virtue ethics. I argue that this assumption is a mistake, and that Aristotle's ethical theory is both importantly distinct from the theories his work has inspired, and independently compelling. I take neo-Aristotelian virtue ethics to be characterized by two central commitments: (i) virtues of character are defined as traits that reliably promote an agent's own flourishing, and (ii) virtuous actions are defined as the sorts of actions (...) a virtuous agent reliably performs under the relevant circumstances. I argue that neither of these commitments are features of Aristotle's own view, and I sketch an alternative explanation for the relationship between virtue and happiness in the Nicomachean Ethics. Although, on the interpretation I defend, we do not find in Aristotle a distinctive normative theory alongside deontology and consequentialism, what we do find is a way of thinking about how prudential and moral reasons can come to be aligned through a certain conception of practical agency. (shrink)

This paper argues that there was considerably more philosophy of action in moral theory before 1958 (when Anscombe complained of its lack under the banner 'philosophy of psychology') than there has been since. This is in part because Anscombe influenced the formation of 'virtue theory' as yet another position within normative ethics, and her work contributed to the fashioning of 'moral psychology' as an altogether distinct (and now increasingly empirical) branch of moral philosophy.

Acknowledgements: thanks go to Margarita Mauri who arranged for an earlier version of this paper to be delivered at the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Barcelona in 2011. I have incorporated several useful and improving comments made by Margarita and colleagues.

Immanuel Kant is known for his ideas about duty and morally worthy acts, but his conception of virtue is less familiar. Nevertheless Kant’s understanding of virtue is quite distinctive and has considerable merit compared to the most familiar conceptions. Kant also took moral education seriously, writing extensively on both the duty of adults to cultivate virtue and the empirical conditions to prepare children for this life-long responsibility. Our aim is, first, to explain Kant’s conception of virtue, second, to highlight some (...) distinctive and potentially appealing features of the Kantian account of virtue, third, to summarize and explain Kant’s prescriptions for educating young children and youth as well as the duty of moral self-improvement that he attributes to all adults, and, fourth, to respond to some common objections that we regard as misguided or insubstantial. (shrink)

Define “patriotism” as love for one’s country and devotion to its well-being. This essay contends that patriotism thus defined is a virtue and that environmentalism is one of its most important manifestations. Patriotism, as devotion to particular places and people, can occur at various levels, from the local to the national. Knowing and caring about particular places and people and working to protect them is good for us and good for them and hence a good thing overall. Knowing and caring (...) and working less on behalf of more remote places and people is also good, since it allows us to focus our efforts, act effectively, and do more good in the world. Philosophical analyses of patriotism by Alasdair MacIntyre and Martha Nussbaum are complemented by the more “down to earth” understanding of the virtue presented here. While patriotism’s dangers are undeniable, so are the dangers stemming from lack of patriotism. The proper answer to bad patriotism is not cosmopolitanism, but good patriotism: the kind illustrated by environmental activists. (shrink)

Some people claim that some instances of suffering are intrinsically bad in an impersonal way. If it were true, that claim might seem to count against virtue ethics and for consequentialism. Drawing on the works of Jason Kawall, Christine Swanton and Nietzsche, I consider some reasons for thinking that it is, however, false. I argue, moreover, that even if it were true, a virtue ethicist could consistently acknowledge its truth.

Virtue ethics is often understood as a rival to existing consequentialist, deontological, and contractualist views. But some have disputed the position that virtue ethics is a genuine normative ethical rival. This chapter aims to crystallize the nature of this dispute by providing criteria that determine the degree to which a normative ethical theory is complete, and then investigating virtue ethics through the lens of these criteria. In doing so, it’s argued that no existing account of virtue ethics is a complete (...) normative ethical view that rivals existing consequentialist, deontological, and contractualist views. Moreover, it is argued that one of the most significant challenges facing virtue ethics consists in offering an account of the right-making features of actions, while remaining a distinctively virtue ethical view. (shrink)

In 1958, a group of New-Confucians issued “A Manifesto for a Re-Appraisal of Sinology and Reconstruction of Chinese Culture.” Equally in 1958, the British philosopher Elizabeth Anscombe published her classical paper “Modern Moral Philosophy.” These two papers have the same target — modern Western morality — and the solutions they proposed respectively. Yet Anscombe’s paper did not mention Confucianism, and the “Manifesto” ignored Aristotelian tradition of virtue. Furthermore, from 1960s to 1990s, the revival movement of Confucianism and the revival movement (...) of Aristotelian ethics have not had much dialogue. This paper seeks to explain this phenomenon by comparing these two historically important documents. In particular it tries to understand why the “Manifesto” fails to see the similarities between Aristotle and Confucius. (shrink)

This paper provides a new interpretation of Plato’s account of justice as psychic health in Republic IV. It argues that what has traditionally been considered to be one single analogy is actually a more complex line of reasoning that contains various medical analogies. These medical analogies are not only different in number but also in kind. I discuss each of them separately, while providing a response to various objections.

The classical doctrine that the moral virtues are unified is widely rejected. Some argue that the virtues are disunified, or even mutually incompatible. And though others have argued that the virtues form some sort of unity, these recent defenses of unity are always qualified, advocating only a partial unity: the unity of the virtues is limited to certain practical domains, or weak in that one virtue implies only moral decency in the fields of other virtues. I argue that something like (...) the classical doctrine—a full unity of the virtues thesis—remains defensible. After reviewing the arguments of partial unity theorists for the claim that the virtues form at least some sort of unity, I examine their main arguments for thinking that this unity is only partial (limited or weak). I then show that these arguments fail, and address some further criticisms (such as the argument that full unity implausibly requires that a person must attain the virtues “all at once”). I do not seek here to prove the truth of the full unity thesis (in fact I suggest a modification of it), but only to refute important extant criticisms of it, and thus to show that it remains a plausible view. (shrink)

The emerging discipline of Machine Ethics is concerned with creating autonomous artificial moral agents that perform ethically significant actions out in the world. Recently, Wallach and Allen (Moral machines: teaching robots right from wrong, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2009) and others have argued that a virtue-based moral framework is a promising tool for meeting this end. However, even if we could program autonomous machines to follow a virtue-based moral framework, there are certain pressing ethical issues that need to be taken (...) into account, prior to the implementation and development stages. Here I examine whether the creation of virtuous autonomous machines is morally permitted by the central tenets of virtue ethics. It is argued that the creation of such machines violates certain tenets of virtue ethics, and hence that the creation and use of those machines is impermissible. One upshot of this is that, although virtue ethics may have a role to play in certain near-term Machine Ethics projects (e.g. designing systems that are sensitive to ethical considerations), machine ethicists need to look elsewhere for a moral framework to implement into their autonomous artificial moral agents, Wallach and Allen’s claims notwithstanding. (shrink)

This paper draws on Claudia Card’s discussions of moral luck to consider the complicated moral life of people—described as pessimists—who accept the heavy knowledge of the predictability of the bad moral luck of oppression. The potential threat to ethics posed by this knowledge can be overcome by the pessimist whose resistance to oppression, even in the absence of hope, expresses a sense of still having a ‘‘claim’’ on flourishing despite its unattainability under oppression.

This paper examines expressed hopelessness among environmental activists in Extinction Rebellion. While activists claim that they have lost all hope for a future without global warming and species extinction, through despair emerges a new hope for saving what can still be saved—a hope for what is left. This radical hope, emerging from despair, may make Extinction Rebellion even more effective. Drawing from personal interviews with 25 Extinction Rebellion activists in the United Kingdom and the published work of other Extinction Rebellion (...) activists, this paper identifies signs of radical hope. While activists have cast off false hope and passive hope, a new hope for what is still possible remains. This hope is based on virtue ethics: doing what is right in the moment, rather than being attached to a desired outcome. This drives forward activism despite the results. Through their principle of regenerative culture, Extinction Rebellion activists learn to support each other and be prepared for a more turbulent and challenging future. Through a regenerative culture they can salvage and repair what is left and sustain radical hope. (shrink)

We often act in ways that create duties for ourselves: we adopt a child and become obligated to raise and educate her. We also sometimes act in ways that eliminate duties: we get divorced, and no longer have a duty to support our now ex-spouse. When is it morally permissible to create or to eliminate a duty? These questions have almost wholly evaded philosophical attention. In this paper we develop answers to these questions by arguing in favor of the asymmetric (...) approach to deontic value. This approach holds that we must assign zero deontic value to fulfilling a duty, while assigning negative deontic value to violating that duty. Taking the opposing more natural symmetric approach, which holds that fulfilling duties has positive deontic value, leads to perverse recommendations about when to create or eliminate duties. A formal proof supporting the asymmetric approach is offered. We further show that moral theories require a consequentialist component to explain why we sometimes have duties to create or maintain duties. (shrink)

I argue in favour of the central claim of virtue-ethical accounts of right action: that right action is virtuous action. First, I disambiguate this claim and argue for a specific interpretation of it. Second, I provide reasons to prefer target-centred over both agent-centred and motive-centred accounts of virtuous action. Third, I argue that an action is right if, only if, and because it is overall virtuous. Finally, I respond to important arguments to the contrary.

Trends of recent demographical development show that the world's population is aging at its fastest clip ever. In this paper, I ask whether adult children should support the life of their chronically ill parents as long as it takes, and I analyze the matter with regard to the doctrine of Confucianism. As the virtue of filial piety plays a central role in the ethics of Confucianism, adult children will face stringent demands while giving care to their chronically ill parents. In (...) this paper, I argue that because of the extreme moral demands Confucians impose on adult children, Confucianism is an objectionable moral theory. I also argue that if Confucianism allows these agents to opt out of the caregiving tasks, it may cause conflict with its own doctrines. For these reasons, I conclude that Confucianism cannot provide a defensible response to the problem of long-term caregiving. (shrink)

In the second volume of Rinrigaku, Watsuji Tetsurō focuses on developing his notion of betweenness through the ethical organisations of family, local commun...

It is commonly believed that the Doctrine of Double Effect is identical with, or presupposes, the Intention Principle according to which an act can be impermissible if done with a wrongful intention. A main line of objections to the DDE, then, stems from the worry that the Intention Principle implausibly interiorizes the wrongness of an action. I will argue, first, that the DDE does not presuppose the Intention Principle, and, second, that intuitions brought against the Intention Principle do not warrant (...) us to reject the DDE. Therefore, a main line of objections to the DDE is misguided. (shrink)

This essay outlines an account of virtue ethics applied to the profession of journalism. Virtue ethics emphasizes character before consequences, requires the "good" prior to the "right," and allows for agent-relative as well as agent-neutral values. This essay offers an exploration of the internal characteristics of a good journalist by focusing on moral virtues crucial to journalism. First, the essay outlines the general tenets of Aristotelian virtue ethics. Second, it offers arguments touting virtue ethics in comparison with other popular normative (...) theories such as Mill's utilitarianism and Kant's deontology. Finally, an original account of journalistic virtue ethics is offered, with an emphasis on the virtues of justice and integrity. (shrink)

Thomas Hurka, Simon Keller, and Julia Annas have recently argued that virtue ethics is self-effacing. I contend that these arguments are rooted in a mistaken understanding of the role that ideal agency and agent flourishing (should) play in virtue ethics. I then show how a virtue ethical theory can avoid the charge of self-effacement and why it is important that it do so.

While there is now considerable anxiety about whether the psychological theory presupposed by virtue ethics is empirically sustainable, analogous issues have received little attention in the virtue epistemology literature. This paper argues that virtue epistemology encounters challenges reminiscent of those recently encountered by virtue ethics: just as seemingly trivial variation in context provokes unsettling variation in patterns of moral behavior, trivial variation in context elicits unsettling variation in patterns of cognitive functioning. Insofar as reliability is a condition on epistemic virtue, (...) we have reason to doubt that human beings possess the cognitive materials required for epistemic virtue, and thereby reason to think that virtue epistemology is threatened by skepticism. We conclude that while virtue epistemology has resources for addressing this challenge, exploiting these resources forces tradeoffs between empirical and normative adequacy. (shrink)

The Analects appears to offer two bodies of testimony regarding the felt, experiential qualities of leading a life of virtue. In its ostensible record of Confucius’ more abstract and reflective claims, the text appears to suggest that virtue has considerable power to afford joy and insulate from sorrow. In the text’s inclusion of Confucius’ less studied and apparently more spontaneous remarks, however, he appears sometimes to complain of the life he leads, to feel its sorrows, and to possess some despair. (...) Where we attend to both of these elements of the text, a tension emerges. In this essay, I consider how Confucius’ complaints appear to complicate any clean conclusion that Confucius wins a good life, particularly where we attend to important pre-theoretical sensibilities regarding what a “good life” ought to include and how it ought to feel for the one who leads it. (shrink)

In this paper, I investigate the moral status of agricultural biotechnology and, more specifically, genetically modified crops by employing the hubris argument. The old notion of hubris, given to us by the ancient Greeks, provides a narrative from which we can understand ourselves and technology. Ronald Sandler offers us an understanding of hubris he claims gives us a prima facie reason and a presumption against the use of GM crops. I argue that Sandler’s hubris argument fails for several reasons: Sander (...) and many others fail to have a proper understanding of agriculture as an inherently technological practice which is radically different from ‘nature’; the notions of control and manipulation which are central to the concept of hubris are difficult to understand and use in the context of agriculture; trying to establish a prima facie reason against GM crops runs into serious difficulty since many GM crops are profoundly different from each other; and even if we accept Sandler’s argument of hubris, it actually plays no role in the reasoning and evaluation of the moral status of different GM crops. (shrink)

Most ethicists agree that at least some nonhumans have interests that are of direct moral importance. Yet with very few exceptions, both climate ethics and climate policy have operated as though only human interests should be considered in formulating and evaluating climate policy. In this paper I argue that the anthropocentrism of current climate ethics and policy cannot be justified. I first describe the ethical claims upon which my analysis rests, arguing that they are no longer controversial within contemporary ethics. (...) Next, I review work in climate ethics and policy, demonstrating the absence of consideration of nonhuman interests in both domains. Finally, I consider five possible justifications for omitting nonhuman interests in the evaluation climate policy options, arguing that none of these arguments succeeds. (shrink)

Journal of Social Philosophy, EarlyView.

Zhi 李贄, also named ( hao 號) Zhuowu 卓吾 (1527–1602), and argues that he articulates a coherent and compelling vision of a good life focused on the expression of genuine feelings distinctive to each individual. Through a study of literary texts and terms of art he refers to in his critical essay “On the Child-like Heart-mind” ( Tongxin Shuo 童心說), as well as the metaphors and images he fleshes out throughout his writings, I characterize Li’s ethical vision and show that (...) it is rooted in a particular loose and accommodating conception of human nature and centered on the simple and intuitive act of daily maintaining the birthright of our “child-like heart-mind.”. (shrink)

Over the past decade, a number of accounting and financial reporting frauds have led to lost stock wealth, destroyed public trust, and a worldwide recession that called for necessary reform. Regulatory responses and systemic reforms quickly followed, and we show that, while necessary, these reforms are insufficient. The purpose of this paper is to forward virtuous professionalism as a necessary path toward restoring financial reporting systems. We take the position of external observer and analyze the accounting profession over time to (...) assess what has transpired within our financial reporting systems. Our analysis reveals that the combined influence of commercialism and regulatory response has led to a systemic decline in accounting’s professional ideals and, as a result, an erosion of public trust. We then propose virtuous professionalism as a necessary process for restoring financial reporting systems based on sociological, professional, and philosophical theories. We argue that virtuous professionalism is necessary for restoring the public servant identity of the accounting professional. We conclude that efforts to restore financial reporting systems should begin with reforms that restore professional identity shaped by virtues. (shrink)

As is widely known, the last 25 years have seen an acceleration in the development of theories of emotion. Perhaps less well-known is that the last three years have seen an extended defense of a predominant, though not universally accepted, framework for the understanding of emotion in philosophy and psychology. The central claim of this framework is that emotions are a form of evaluative response to their intentional objects, centrally involving cognition or something akin to cognition, in which the evaluation (...) of the object relates to the concerns, interests, or well-being of the subject. I aim to summarize and review the work of five authors on three of the central themes of this framework, and to note some implications for the understanding of emotion in different psychotherapeutic approaches. (shrink)

Virtue epistemology is among the dominant influences in mainstream epistemology today. An important commitment of one strand of virtue epistemology – responsibilist virtue epistemology (e.g., Montmarquet 1993; Zagzebski 1996; Battaly 2006; Baehr 2011) – is that it must provide regulative normative guidance for good thinking. Recently, a number of virtue epistemologists (most notably Baehr, 2013) have held that virtue epistemology not only can provide regulative normative guidance, but moreover that we should reconceive the primary epistemic aim of all education as (...) the inculcation of the intellectual virtues. Baehr’s picture contrasts with another well-known position – that the primary aim of education is the promotion of critical thinking (Scheffler 1989; Siegel 1988; 1997; 2017). In this paper – that we hold makes a contribution to both philosophy of education and epistemology and, a fortiori, epistemology of education – we challenge this picture. We outline three criteria that any putative aim of education must meet and hold that it is the aim of critical thinking, rather than the aim of instilling intellectual virtue, that best meets these criteria. On this basis, we propose a new challenge for intellectual virtue epistemology, next to the well-known empirically-driven ‘situationist challenge’. What we call the ‘pedagogical challenge’ maintains that the intellectual virtues approach does not have available a suitably effective pedagogy to qualify the acquisition of intellectual virtue as the primary aim of education. This is because the pedagogic model of the intellectual virtues approach (borrowed largely from exemplarist thinking) is not properly action-guiding. Instead, we hold that, without much further development in virtue-based theory, logic and critical thinking must still play the primary role in the epistemology of education. (shrink)

Confucianism is potentially relevant to business ethics and business practice in many ways. Although some scholars have seen Confucian thought as applicable to corporate social responsibility :433–451, 2009) and to corporate governance :30–43, 2013), only a few business ethicists :415–431, 2001b; Journal of Business Ethics 116:703–715, 2013; Romar in Journal of Business Ethics 38:119–131, 2002; Lam in The Analects, Penguin Classics, London, 2003; Chan in Journal of Business Ethics 77:347–360, 2008; Woods and Lamond in Journal of Business Ethics 102:669–683, 2011) (...) have taken seriously the possibility that Confucius may have important insights to offer regarding virtue ethics, which has now become the most popular normative theory as evidenced by the number of recent articles published in business ethics journals :287–318, 2017). This paper aims to help rectify this oversight. The paper focuses on several distinctive aspects of Confucian ethics, discussing both how Confucius’ approach differs from Aristotelian virtue ethics in significant ways and how these key differences suggest numerous directions for future research. (shrink)

Communication by scientists with policy makers and attentive publics raises ethical issues. Scientists need to decide how to communicate knowledge effectively in a way that nonscientists can understand and use, while remaining honest scientists and presenting estimates of the uncertainty of their inferences. They need to understand their own ethical choices in using scientific information to communicate to audiences. These issues were salient in the Fourth Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change with respect to possible sea level rise (...) from disintegration of the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets. Due to uncertainty, the reported values of projected sea level rise were incomplete, potentially leading some relevant audiences to underestimate future risk. Such judgments should be made in a principled rather than an ad hoc manner. Five principles for scientific communication under such conditions are important: honesty, precision, audience relevance, process transparency, and specification of uncertainty about conclusions. Some of these principles are of intrinsic importance while others are merely instrumental and subject to trade-offs among them. Scientists engaged in assessments under uncertainty should understand these principles and which trade-offs are acceptable. (shrink)

Philosophical investigation in synthetic biology has focused on the knowledge-seeking questions pursued, the kind of engineering techniques used, and on the ethical impact of the products produced. However, little work has been done to investigate the processes by which these epistemological, metaphysical, and ethical forms of inquiry arise in the course of synthetic biology research. An attempt at this work relying on a particular area of synthetic biology will be the aim of this chapter. I focus on the reengineering of (...) metabolic pathways through the manipulation and construction of small DNA-based devices and systems synthetic biology. Rather than focusing on the engineered products or ethical principles that result, I will investigate the processes by which these arise. As such, the attention will be directed to the activities of practitioners, their manipulation of tools, and the use they make of techniques to construct new metabolic devices. Using a science-in-practice approach, I investigate problems at the intersection of science, philosophy of science, and sociology of science. I consider how practitioners within this area of synthetic biology reconfigure biological understanding and ethical categories through active modelling and manipulation of known functional parts, biological pathways for use in the design of microbial machines to solve problems in medicine, technology, and the environment. We might describe this kind of problem-solving as relying on what Helen Longino referred to as “social cognition” or the type of scientific work done within what Hasok Chang calls “systems of practice”. My aim in this chapter will be to investigate the relationship that holds between systems of practice within metabolic engineering research and social cognition. I will attempt to show how knowledge and normative valuation are generated from this particular network of practitioners. In doing so, I suggest that the social nature of scientific inquiry is ineliminable to both knowledge acquisition and ethical evaluations. (shrink)

Subjects can know what their attitudes are and also their motivating reasons for those attitudes – for example, S can know that she believes that q and also that she believes that q for the reason that p. One attractive account of self-knowledge of attitudes appeals to the ‘transparency method’. According to TM, subjects answer the question of whether they believe that q by answering the world-directed question of whether q is true. Something similar also looks intuitive in the case (...) of self-knowledge of motivating reasons, but cashing out such a view requires determining what the relevant world-directed question would be. This paper argues that subjects learn why they believe that q by answering the world-directed question ‘what are good reasons for believing that q?’ I argue for this against an alternative that I develop from Boyle 2011a. (shrink)

I argue that recent virtue theories (including those of Hursthouse, Slote, and Swanton) face important initial difficulties in accommodating the supererogatory. In particular, I consider several potential characterizations of the supererogatory modeled upon these familiar virtue theories (and their accounts of rightness) and argue that they fail to provide an adequate account of supererogation. In the second half of the paper I sketch an alternative virtue-based characterization of supererogation, one that is grounded in the attitudes of virtuous ideal observers, and (...) that avoids the concerns raised in the first part of the paper. (shrink)

The tension between organizational values and the operation of aged care as a business is often characterized as the “mission versus margin” dilemma. It is common across the industry in both not-for-profit and for-profit organizations. However, in for-profit aged care facilities, there is no question about the intention to make a profit or the purpose of the profits. This is not so clear in not-for-profit aged care organizations. This article explores the tension through the examination of a detailed case study (...) of one of the larger not-for-profit social service organizations—All Saints Christian Care. It analyses the culture and managerial decisions though the lens of the political philosophy value pluralism. Finally, based on the value-plural theory, recommendations are made that would create greater operational transparency in not-for-profit aged care service. (shrink)

In 1958, a group of New-Confucians issued "A Manifesto for a Re-Appraisal of Sinology and Reconstruction of Chinese Culture." Equally in 1958, the British philosopher Elizabeth Anscombe published her classical paper "Modern Moral Philosophy." These two papers have the same target — modern Western morality — and the solutions they proposed respectively. Yet Anscombe's paper did not mention Confucianism, and the "Manifesto" ignored Aristotelian tradition of virtue. Furthermore, from 1960s to 1990s, the revival movement of Confucianism and the revival movement (...) of Aristotelian ethics have not had much dialogue. This paper seeks to explain this phenomenon by comparing these two historically important documents. In particular it tries to understand why the "Manifesto" fails to see the similarities between Aristotle and Confucius. /// 摘要 1958年，现代新儒家发表了 "为中国文化敬告世界人士宣言"。该宣言批判 西方文化的缺陷，并通过探索中国文化对世界人类问题的贡献而倡导中国文化的复 兴。同样在1958年，英国学者安思康发表了 "近代道德哲学"。这两篇文献有着共 同的批评目标一一近现代西方道德，而且，各自提出的解决方案也有相似之处。然 而，安思康并没有提及孔子，而宣言也漠视亚里士多德传统。进一步说，从19世纪 60年代到90年代，由他们所分别推动的新儒学复兴与德性伦理学复兴这两大运动之 间缺少对话和交流。通过比较分析这两篇同年发表的历史性文献，不仅可以找到两 大复兴运动对话缺失的原因，而且还可以解释为什么 "宣言" 没有能够发现孔子与 亚里士多德在德性伦理学方面的一致性。. (shrink)

The concept of moral identity based on virtue ethics has become an issue of considerable import in explaining moral behavior. This attempt to offer adequate explanations of the full range of morally relevant human behavior inevitably provokes boundary issues between ethics and moral psychology. In terms of the relationship between the two disciplines, some argue for ?naturalized (or psychologized) morality,? whereas, on the other hand, others insist on ?moralized psychology.? This article investigates the relationship between virtue ethics and moral identity (...) based on previous research on the relationship between ethics and moral psychology. This article especially attempts to show that meaningful links between the two concepts possible by using theoretical frameworks constructed by the most influential philosophers of science such as Kuhn and Lakatos. (shrink)

Psychological situationism is the view that our behavior is ordered by external features of situations as opposed to robust character traits. Philosophical situationists have taken this claim to be conservatively revisionary for ethics; on their view, situationism problematizes only character, not any essential features of our ethical deliberation. Little has been said, however, about how these revisions motivate situationists’ claim that we ought to redirect our attention from cultivating virtues to managing situational influences on behavior. Virtue theorists have typically responded (...) to situationists by arguing that skill-based practical wisdom—the exercise of which underwrites all other virtues—can be appropriately sensitive to situational influences. Following this response, discussions about the prescriptive consequences of situationism have largely resulted in a stalemate. In this paper, I argue that situationism faces a dilemma: it is either too conservative to be ethically revisionary or too radical to inform our ethical deliberation. I argue that both horns of this dilemma are unacceptable. Thus, we should reject situationist revisions to our ethical deliberation, and conclude that situationism is not conservatively revisionary for ethics. (shrink)

A virtue-based theory of right action aims to explain deontic moral principles in terms of virtue and vice. For example, it may maintain the following account of moral obligation: It is morally obligatory for an agent A to ϕ in circumstances C if and only if a fully virtuous and relevantly informed person V would characteristically ϕ in C. However, this account faces the so-called supererogation problem. A supererogatory action is an action that is morally praiseworthy but not morally obligatory. (...) Suppose John risks his own life to save a stranger, which is supererogatory rather than obligatory. However, a fully virtuous... (shrink)

Folly is an under-explored vice, despite its common occurrence and close relationship to core aspects of practical rationality and the good life. This paper develops an account of folly as a subspecies of imprudence and distinctive source of wrongdoing, with a special focus on its relational, social or inter-personal aspect. Drawing on Rotenstreich’s historically-based account, folly is defined as a form of practical irrationality resulting from closedness to the world. I expand Rotenstreich’s view and depart from him on two key (...) points. First, I argue that folly should be cleanly differentiated from stupidity. Second, I show that the wrong in folly—i.e. the harms it involves intrinsically, as opposed to as a matter of causal consequence—is partly obscured by Rotenstreich’s exclusive focus on the fool as an isolated individual agent. When, instead, we consider folly as a pathology of interpersonal relations, it reveals itself to be a vice which infects and undermines human relationships of love and care, and thus to be a serious threat to living well or human flourishing in almost all of their forms. (shrink)

Environmental virtue ethics (EVE) can be applied to environmental justice. Environmental justice refers to the concern that many poor and nonwhite communities bear a disproportionate burden of risk of exposure to environmental hazards compared to white and/or economically higher-class communities. The most common applied ethical response to this concern—that is, to environmental injustice—is the call for an expanded application of human rights, such as requirements for clean air and water. The virtue-oriented approach can be made consistent with such calls, but (...) there are broader applications as well that generate unique strategies for moral responsiveness and for expanding the role of moral philosophers in civic affairs. (shrink)

In this essay several challenges are raised to the project of classifying Śāntideva’s ethical reasoning given in his Bodhicaryāvatāra, or Guide to the Way of the Bodhisattva, as a species of ethical theory such as consequentialism or virtue ethics. One set of difficulties highlighted here arises because Śāntideva wrote this text to act as a manual of psychological transformation, and it is therefore often difficult to determine when his statements indicate his own ethical views. Further, even assuming we can identify (...) a set of statements that accurately portray the moral position of Śāntideva, it is argued that these statements underdetermine which foundational normative theory should be ascribed to him. (shrink)

The paper concerns two familiar lines of inquiry. One, stemming from a neo-Aristotelian naturalism associated with Foot and others, asks whether we can derive human excellences from what humans need in order to be some way. The second asks whether virtue is a kind of health, and vice a kind of illness. The first is often seen as a failure to the extent that the list of characteristics derived by this approach does not include familiar moral virtues. However, it is (...) argued that the concept of human excellence is many-layered, so the fact that the approach may not succeed for moral virtues does not show that it is no good for anything. Moreover, the kinds of psychological characteristic derived by a liberalized version of Foot’s approach may also help to give non-trivial answers to the second, Platonic, line of inquiry. (shrink)

The present article sets out to defend the thesis that among the more or less familiar enemies or challenges an adequate theory of virtue has to cope with is another, less obvious one – virtue ethics itself. The project of establishing virtue ethics as a third paradigm of normative ethics at eye level with consequentialism and deontological approaches to ethics threatens to distort not just our ethical thinking but the theory of virtue itself. A theory of virtue that is able (...) to meet the demands of a full-blown virtue ethics necessarily has to face three fundamental dilemmas and thus seems to fail as an adequate theory of virtue. And vice versa: An ontologically and normatively viable theory of virtue will be unsuited to provide a promising starting point for virtue ethics as the “third kid on the block” among the options of self-standing paradigms of normative ethics. (shrink)

This paper provides an account of the Aristotelian virtue of temperance in regards to food, an account that revolves around the idea of enjoying the right objects and not enjoying the wrong ones. In doing so, the paper distinguishes between two meanings of “taking pleasure in something,” one that refers to the idea of the activity and one to the experience of the activity. The paper then connects this distinction to the temperate person’s attitude towards enjoying the right things and (...) to hitting the mean by enjoying the right object, at the right time, and so on. Throughout, the paper uses eating meat as a case in point, to both illustrate and inform the discussion. In the penultimate section, the paper argues that temperance admits of various conceptions depending on what is right and wrong in regards to eating meat. The paper concludes by responding to three objections. (shrink)