preview

Pros And Cons Of Virtue Ethics

Good Essays

Martin Zemlock
Ethics in Public & Private Life
Essay
Dr. Dan Johnson
11/15/2017

Flaws of Aristotelian Virtue Ethics
When most think of philosophy a list of people come to mind. You have your “greats” such as Plato, Nietzsche, and of course Aristotle. However, this does not mean that their ideas cannot be challenged and questioned, as no one is above criticism. Aristotelian Virtue Ethics have a major flaw that strikes at the heart of the idea. There is a severe lack of guidance both in what a virtue is, and what happens when they conflict. The mains question is, is one virtue more important than another?
What is Aristotle’s virtue ethics theory exactly? Aristotle was one of the first to describe this type of theory and he based it largely on Eudaimonism. “Eudaimonism bases virtues in human flourishing, where flourishing is equated with performing one’s distinctive function well” (Virtue Ethics). For humans, Aristotle believed that our main function is reasoning and to “live well” we would need to reason well. The largest part of virtue ethics is the titular “virtues” that decide whether or not a person was truly flourishing or not.
To first create an argument over the conflict of virtues one must first understand what makes a virtue a virtue. In Aristotelian Virtue Ethics, a virtue is described as something a virtuous person does. In turn, a virtuous person is someone who does virtuous acts. This is where a big issue arises in this theory. There are hardly any ground laws

Get Access