Comparing Aristotle And David Hume

Society has not changed much in the thousands of years since Aristotle first addressed ethics in Athens, Greece. Everyday situations and problems he discusses all relate to everyone in the present day. The rules of demeanor and clarifications on virtue that he suggests can all help people today attain a complete and satisfying realization of their duties as an equal member in society and ultimately discover the purpose of life.

Aristotle and Plato both said that there are four "natural virtues": Justice, Prudence, Temperance, and Fortitude. These values are all necessary to achieve human flourishing. Another key part of Aristotle’s ethic is what he referred to as ‘The Golden Mean’. He believed that a virtue can not necessarily be viewed as a virtue when it is used in excess. For example, courage is a virtue, but in excess it becomes rashness, a vice rather than a virtue. Moreover, when there is a lack of a certain virtue, this is also considered a vice. Aristotle's ethic is based primarily on balance. There cannot be too much excess or too little of the virtue. Thus, he said: "The mean [i.e. the balance] is successful and commendable. Virtue then is a state of deliberate moral purpose consisting in a mean that is relative to ourselves, the mean being determined by reason, or as a prudent man would determine it.”

Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, at an absolute basic sense, aims at the title of this course: the good life. In an age where philosophy and ethics were not largely developed, Aristotle aims to provide a universal standard for human flourishing and happiness, or the good life. His main argument is that all of our actions and goals are aiming towards human flourishment, but that each action falls into a range of virtues, where excess is one extreme and deficiency is the other extreme. The virtue that we all strive for, he states, is in the middle of these. For example, temperance is a universal human virtue, with pleasures and pains as the excess and deficiency. He states that virtues can be developed and learned over time and through practice,

According to Nicomachean Ethics, Arisotle aims to identify the highest good for human beings. While most people believe the highest good is the accumulation of material worth, pursuit of honor or satisfaction of bodily pleasure, he argues all of these are deficient of the highest good in some way. Individuals who commit insider trading would likely value material wealth above all else, even up to the extent of risking their entire career for it. However, material wealth is always acquired for the purpose of attaining something else, and thus falls short for Aristotle’s perceived highest good. Instead, he argues that the good life for a human being would focus on contemplation and learning, or acquiring the intellectual virtues. Aristotle associates the intellectual virtues with what we might understand today as scientific knowledge. But just obtaining the intellectual virtues is not enough, and we can see what type of individuals may result from this limited mindset after reading previous cases of insider trading starring talented businessmen who suddenly take a greedy, wrong turn into corruption. Aristotle claims that in addition to possessing intellectual virtues, the person who lives a good life also acts rightly and develops the appropriate state of character

Aristotle’s virtue ethics assume that moral virtue is necessary for flourishing, It logically follows, then, that those exhibiting the ordinary vices of domination, despite appearances to the contrary, are far from ever attaining a truly good life. Aristotle’s ethics are too narrow in scope, because any code of ethics should be universally applicable and equal because reinforcing privilege and oppressive structures negatively affect everyone's chances--including the perpetrator’s-- at developing the virtues described in Nicomachean Ethics and therefore negatively affect everyone's chances at leading the best life possible.

Virtue is behavior showing high moral standards. People can accept this definition as true for three reasons. First of all it includes all types of virtue, and second it does not include non-virtuous characteristics. All things that are classed as a virtue are under the definition. Some kinds of Virtue include justice, loyalty, love and kindness. All of these character traits fit the definition of virtue. For example, Justice means to treat people fairly and morally. In order to dispense justice, you must have moral standards. Therefore, it fits the definition of virtue. Loyalty is another example that fits the definition of virtue. Loyalty means a strong feeling of support and allegiance. In order to have loyalty, that does not include indoctrination, you must

I chose to write about Aristotle and his beliefs about how the virtuous human being needs friends from Book VIII from Nicomachean Ethics. In this essay I will talk about the three different kinds of friendship that (Utility, Pleasure, and Goodness) that Aristotle claims exist. I will also discuss later in my paper why Aristotle believes that Goodness is the best type of friendship over Utility or Pleasure. In addition to that I will also talk about the similarities and differences that these three friendships share between one another. And lastly I will argue why I personally agree with Aristotle and his feelings on how friendship and virtue go hand in hand and depend on each other.

Aristotle was one of the earliest writers to ground morality in nature, and specifically in human nature. For Aristotle, virtue was an excellence of some sort. According to Aristotle, there are two types of virtues: intellectual virtues and moral virtues. Intellectual virtues are excellences of the mind, such as the ability to understand, reason, and judge well. These traits can be learned from teachers. Moral virtues on the other hand, dispose us to act well. These virtues cannot be taught, and they are learned by repetition. Aristotle’s list of virtues includes courage, temperance, justice, pride, and magnanimity. However Aristotle is probably most well known for his position that virtue is a mean between extremes. For example courage is to be understood as a mean between the two extremes of deficiency and excess. Too little courage is cowardice, and too much is foolhardiness.

Aristotle’s work, The Nicomachean Ethics, consists of numerous books pertaining to Aristotle’s Ethics—the ethics of the good life. The first book discloses Aristotle’s belief on moral philosophy and the correlation between virtue and happiness.

Aristotle’s Nicomahean Ethics is a rich text of ancient wisdom, much of which has become ingrained into today’s rhetoric in many schools of thought in the western world. It is with Aristotle’s views on Virtue that this paper is primarily concerned, more specifically with his idea that to have virtue is to display attitudes and actions to a moderate and intermediate degree. Stan Van Hooft (2008) notes that, although Aristotle’s thoughts on this matter are logically sound for the most part, that his assertion that Virtue is the Mean was not his final, conclusive stance on the issue, and that this theory “is only a part of a bigger picture of virtue that he is

Aristotle wrote the first book ever written about ethics titles “The Nicomachean Ethics,” and it is still one of the greatest and most influential. Its purpose is to teach us to be virtuous rather than to understand what virtue is. (Aristotle, 2009)

In Book One of the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle argues for an ultimate end, and that knowledge of the good should be influential and important to all human life. He explains that it is better to act aimed at the good of the whole, meaning society, and transcend the level of individual preservation (1094b5-1094b10). Aquinas created a hierarchy of rules to follow when acting in the name of the good. There is a specific order of the precepts of natural law. The lowest inclination affects all substances and is the desire to preserve the self. Next,

In his work the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle posits the idea that many desirable characteristics, the virtues, are what he calls “means,” much like the concept of the average mean in mathematics. He states that these qualities are not extremes, but rather, the degree to which a given quality should be expressed so as to be virtuous falls somewhere between the extremes. He elaborates that specific locations of each mean are determined by their nature, that is, some virtues fall closer to one end of a spectrum than another end, and that from one individual situation to another, the specific location may change. Furthermore, Aristotle goes on to differentiate between a number of different subcategories of justice and describe how they connect to the theory of virtue as a mean. I assert that although Aristotle’s ideas are in some ways helpful, he fails to give a clear, adequate account of the true nature of justice, and fails as well to effectively connect it to his theory of virtue as a mean. Instead, his description of justice is muddled and inconsistent with his theory of virtue as a mean, and he does not achieve the objectives he sets out for himself regarding connecting the two theories.

Aristotle’s overlook on what is the ‘good life’ as he used an empirical approach to ethics. The ‘good life’ as Aristotle defines it as one which has happiness as a characteristic or ‘a life of happiness’. ‘Happiness is an activity of the soul in accord with perfect virtue’. ‘People ought to behave so as to achieve happiness’. I believe that Aristotle’s answer will be everyone always ought to follow the middle course between certain kinds of activities. Aristotle uses an analogy to describe happiness. The analogy of happiness is best described as how much a person can eat. For example, if a person believes that having two cakes would be sufficient for his lunch, but if he believes that having one cake would not be enough for his lunch, then how much is right for him? To be right for him, he must eat between one and two cakes in order to satisfy his appetite. This is Aristotle’s formula, ‘the doctrine of the mean’ or the preferred name ‘golden mean’. The ‘Doctrine of the Mean’ is the moderation in all things. The virtues we must have are virtues of moderation. This will be different for different people as Aristotle believed. Aristotle is therefore a relativist.

As well as being a devoted biologist, botanist, moral philosopher, psychologist, zoologist and many more things besides Aristotle held a view about human nature that he interwove into his concept of virtue theory, this is described at some length in the text Nicomachean Ethics. It is this view on human nature that I intend to explain and discuss throughout this essay with reference to some more recent philosophers to show that Aristotle’s view was not only linked directly to Athenian society but has managed to stand the test of time. A point I will return to later in a yet to posted article ‘Can we Consider Modern Ethics to be Aristotelian or Nietzschean?’, this article is much better written and argues the points in greater detail. I must admit this was in fact a very early work of mine and although some editing has been made it still lacks the strength some of my later pieces possess.