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Notes
See John M. Cooper, Reason and Human Good in Aristotle (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1975), p. 89f with n. 1, and Richard Kraut, “Two Conceptions of Happiness,” Philosophical Review, Vol. 88, No. 2 (1979), pp. 167–197, for influential discussions.
Translations of the Nicomachean Ethics are by Christopher Rowe (in Sarah Broadie and Christopher Rowe, eds., Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics. Translation, Introduction and Commentary (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002)), and of the Rhetoric by George A. Kennedy (in Kennedy, ed., Aristotle. On Rhetoric. A Theory of Civic Discourse (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991)), sometimes emended. Thus, I have replaced Rowe’s ‘excellence’ with the more common ‘virtue’ for aretê.
Daniel Statman, “Introduction to Virtue Ethics,” in Statman, ed., Virtue Ethics. A Critical Reader (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1997), p. 8. Cf Roger Crisp: “the only reasons we ever have for acting or living in any way are grounded in the virtues.” Crisp, “Modern Philosophy and the Virtues,” in Crisp, ed., How Should One Live? Essays on the Virtues (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998), pp. 1–18, p. 7. (This defines “pure virtue ethics”; there are also impure, or “pluralistic,” forms.) See also the introduction in Crisp and Michael Slote, eds., Virtue Ethics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), pp. 1–25, p. 2f; and Rosalind Hursthouse, On Virtue Ethics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), pp. 25–31.
Statman, op. cit.
Cf. the title of Gary Watson, “On the Primacy of Character,” in Statman, ed., op. cit, pp. 56–81.
The term “deontology” may cause some unclarity. For me the term refers primarily to the moral theory of Kant and his followers, but in Anglophone philosophy it seems more often to refer to a wider class of theories of which the Kantian type is one, but which also include such theories as those of Ross or Pritchard, and such that these latter are taken as more representative. This wider class is characterized by its focus on the notion of the right, defined by reference to rules, while the Kantian version centers on the notion of respect for human dignity. As I am using the term, it refers to the Kantian theories. (Thanks to Julia Annas for nudging me to make this clear.)
For related readings of this passage and its significance for understanding Aristotle’s ethics and his concept of virtue, see Sarah Broadie, Ethics With Aristotle (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), pp. 82–90 (esp. p. 83); Broadie, “Philosophical Introduction,” in Broadie and Rowe, eds., op. cit., pp. 9–91, p. 34; Ben Morison, “Aristotle, Almost Entirely,” Phronesis, Vol. 52 (2007), pp. 239–249, pp. 243–245 (contra C. C. W. Taylor, Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics Books II–IV (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), ad loc); Gerasimos Santas, “Does Aristotle Have a Virtue Ethics?” in Statman, ed., op. cit., pp. 260–285; Gisela Striker, “Aristotle’s Ethics as Political Science,” in Burkhard Reis, ed., The Virtuous Life in Greek Ethics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), pp. 127–141; Iakovos Vasiliou, “Aristotle, Agents, and Actions,” in Jon Miller, ed., Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics. A Critical Guide (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), pp. 170–190.
In addition, of course, he will do it (A) because he knows it is called for, (B) because it is called for, and (C) because of his firm disposition to do what he knows is called for (cf. the three parts of the agent condition).
The use of term “virtuous action” needs clarification, since the term is ambiguous between (i) actions in accordance with virtue, i.e. justice, courage, etc., and (ii) actions manifesting virtue, i.e. justice, courage, etc. Thus, (ii) is action done virtuously or the way the virtuous person does it. Aristotle seems to be using the term in both senses, whereas I reserve it for (ii), in order to highlight the difference from virtue ethics. It is clear that (i) is done by several kinds of people in addition to those who have the virtue in question: (a) learners; (b) people with character-states that resemble, but fall short of virtue, e.g. those discussed in III 8 on courage; (c) continent people; and (d) hoi polloi who are compelled to act in accordance with the virtues by external sanctions imposed by the law (cf. IX 9, 1179b10–16, 1180a5–14). Thanks to Lesley Brown, Terry Irwin, and Lindsay Judson for alerting me to the need for this clarification.
Howard J. Curzer, Aristotle and the Virtues (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), p. 62; cf. pp. 45f. (courage); pp. 71, 74 (temperance); pp. 97–99 (liberality); pp. 155–165 (good temper); pp. 174f (wit). Cf. Michael Pakaluk, Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics. An Introduction (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), pp. 110f., who talks about “the ‘particulars’ of an action or emotional response.”
See, e.g., III 7, 1115b11–20, 34–5 (courage); III 11, 1118b21–7, 1119a16–18 (temperance); IV 1, 1120a23–7 (generosity).
These two terms mean something like “someone who steals other people’s clothes” and “robber,” respectively. The point seems to be that the former are petty thieves, the latter steal on a larger scale. Cf. Taylor, op. cit., p. 210 ad loc.
I have revised Kennedy’s translation somewhat. I have “rectification” instead of “retaliation,” and “belittling” instead of “slight”. In addition, I have “apparent” rather than “conspicuous”: the point is surely that the belittling must be apparent to the angry person – otherwise he would not get angry – and, similarly, the rectification must be apparent to the sufferer as well as to the perpetrator. Whether, in addition, it is also conspicuous is a different question; probably it will often be so, since honor has a public dimension, but this does not seem essential and thus not part of the definition.
Stephen L. Darwall, “Two Kinds of Respect,” Ethics, Vol. 88, No. 1 (1977): pp. 36–49.
Ibid., p. 38.
Darwall, Honor, History, and Relationship. Essays in Second-Personal Ethics II (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), p. 19 (my italics).
Ibid.
Douglas Cairns, “Honour and Shame: Modern Controversies and Ancient Values,” Critical Quarterly, Vol. 53, No. 1 (2011), pp. 23–41, p. 23.
P. Bourdieu, “The Sentiment of Honour in Kabyle Society,” in J.G. Peristiany, ed., Honour and Shame: The Values of Mediterranean Society (London: Weidenfield and Nicolson, 1965), pp. 191–241, p. 211; quoted from Cairns, loc. cit. Cairns starts his useful discussion of honor and shame by referring to a view predominant in anthropology as well as in the study of classical antiquity throughout most of the 20th century, and still prevalent in many quarters. Part of my project is to dislodge its hold on our understanding of Aristotle’s ethics.
The paradigmatic illustration of this competition for being best qualified for a position is the quarrel between Achilles and Agamemnon over who is “the best of the Achaeans” (i.e. the material for the Iliad).
Broadie, “Philosophical Introduction,” op. cit., p. 26.
There is also another problem with ancient ethics, as many modern moral philosophers see it, and that is its naturalism, i.e. the way the human good and the virtues are supposedly based in, and explicated on the basis of, human nature. I discuss this in my “Eudaimonia, human nature, and normativity”, in Ø. Rabbås, E. K. Emilsson, H. Fossheim, and M. Tuominen, eds., The Quest for the Good Life (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), ch. 4.
For a forceful critique along these lines, see Darwall, op. cit., chs. 1 and 2.
Ibid., pp. 15, 79; two last emphases added.
The closest would be prosopon (Lat. persona), but that is not used in the modern sense; see Michael Frede, “A Notion of a Person in Epictetus,” in Theodore Scaltsas and Andrew S. Mason, eds., The Philosophy of Epictetus (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), pp. 153–167.
Darwall calls the latter “second-personal competence” (Darwall, op. cit., pp. 25f, 86, 148, 152). The (quite obvious) existence of these requirements is what allows us to disqualify certain human beings as our equals, worthy of moral respect: infants and small children, mentally disabled or demented people, psychotics. But, as we know, this also raises thorny issues concerning the moral status that such “disqualified” humans should have. The “reactive attitudes” include, e.g., guilt, shame, indignation, resentment, etc. The terms goes back to Peter Strawson’s classic paper “Freedom and resentment” (originally published 1963, reprinted several times).
Cf. the examples discussed above (text following note 19) of how status implies obligations as well as entitlements. p. 23f.
This is what Aristotle, following Plato, calls “proportional” or “geometrical equality” (see V 3, 1131b12–13). While there is no doubt that Aristotle does not develop a systematic conception of human worth or dignity as such, I think it is still an open question whether one cannot see traces of some such idea in his thought, or in ancient ethical thought more generally, but that is a topic for another occasion.
For a fascinating and highly stimulating, although ultimately unsatisfactory, account along these lines, see Kwame Anthony Appiah, The Honor Code. How Moral Revolutions Happen (New York: Norton, 2010).
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Rabbås, Ø. Virtue, Respect, and Morality in Aristotle. J Value Inquiry 49, 619–643 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10790-015-9525-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10790-015-9525-6