No livro dois da Ética Nicomaqueia, Aristóteles afirma com clareza que a prática reiterada de ações virtuosas leva à constituição de uma determinada disposição de caráter, ou seja, o hábito funcionaria como uma segunda natureza, em função da fixidez e estabilidade da disposição por ele constituída, o que aparentemente impediria qualquer modificação no que concerne ao caráter. O problema é que várias passagens do Corpus Aristotelicum parecem contradizer esta asserção, permitindo uma leitura diferente daquela que sugeriria a ideia do hábito (...) como algo que operasse de modo similar à natureza. Este artigo propõe-se investigar se é possível uma leitura que permita, nas Éticas, bem como em outras obras do Corpus Aristotelicum, a possibilidade da mudança de caráter, da decadência ou da reforma moral, bem como sua implicação na investigação sobre o problema do determinismo e da responsabilidade moral. (shrink)

This paper discusses the moral responsibility issue in Aristotle and, especially, in Harry Frankfurt and Alexander of Aphrodisias, seeking to identify whether it is compatible with determinism.

This text intends to point out aspects of the Aristotelian moral agency, which presupposes that there is something, the character, which supports the existence of strong lines from the point of view of behavior, morals, of our moral constitution, and which ends up defining the way in which we act, and therefore operating as something that really defines us. This notion of character is the majority among Aristotle’s commentators, although different interpretations can be defended about the scope of this character (...) disposition in Aristotle. This conception has spread over time, but it has been questioned - at least its more traditional reading - by recent studies on social psychology, which attenuates or rejects the idea of a character that supports our moral agency, stating that this is not the case, but the situations that determine the action. From this perspective, we especially have Nisbet, Ross, Doris and Harman, who, based on the results concerning experimental social psychology, even claim that there would not be what we understand by character, which would imply a serious problem for the well-known ethics of virtues, as this requires, in most of its formulations, the idea of ​​an absolutely robust character (Harman), which would allow us to predict the behavior of an agent in a given circumstance (Doris). (shrink)