Essay about Socrates Views on Virtue and Happiness

In this paper, I will deconstruct and explain Socrates’ argument of that a person with justice in their lives is a person with happiness in their lives. Socrates argues about justice and its presence and how it works in the world, but I will only be talking about justice and its presence in people. He argues that justice the virtue that allows for people to live well and have happy lives though the relationship of justice, souls, functions, and virtues.

In Book 1 of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, he argues that happiness is the best good, and the goal of an individual and of those leading and governing society. Here, happiness is understood as both living well and doing well, rather than the convention sense of happiness as an emotion. According to Aristotle, happiness is achieved though actions involving reason and in accord with virtue, or the best of the virtues of there are more than one. In this paper, I will provide a brief overview of the work and its author, then proceed to provide an overview of the ideas expressed and the argumentation supporting them, before finally performing an analysis and critique of the ideas expressed.

Socrates spent his time questioning people about things like virtue, justice, piety and truth. The people Socrates questioned are the people that condemned him to death. Socrates was sentenced to death because people did not like him and they wanted to shut him up for good. There was not any real evidence against Socrates to prove the accusations against him. Socrates was condemned for three major reasons: he told important people exactly what he thought of them, he questioned ideas that had long been the norm, the youth copied his style of questioning for fun, making Athenians think Socrates was teaching the youth to be rebellious. But these reasons were not the charges against him, he was charged with being an atheist and

The claim that “nothing terrible will happen to you as long as you really are a good and moral person, training yourself in the exercise of virtue” [527d] is one that raises questions of both truth and meaning. In order to answer these questions, one must first understand the claim itself. The audience must come to understand the context in which Socrates makes the claim. First, then, one must attempt to look at the world through the eyes of Socrates. In doing so, one finds that Socrates feels that, if justly distributed, punishment is beneficial overall.

In the Republic of Plato, the philosopher Socrates lays out his notion of the good, and draws the conclusion that virtue must be attained before one can be good. For Socrates there are two kinds of virtue; collective and individual. Collective virtue is virtue as whole, or the virtues of the city. Individual virtue pertains to the individual himself, and concerns the acts that the individual does, and concerns the individual’s soul. For Socrates, the relationship between individual and collective virtue is that they are the same, as the virtues of the collective parallel those of the Individual. This conclusion can be reached as both the city and the soul deal with the four main virtues of wisdom, courage, moderation, and justice.

In this paper I will argue that Socrates’s argument at 30a-b of the Apology that the best possible state of the soul is the most important thing in life means to eliminate false beliefs and to have virtue. Specifically, I will show why Socrates wants to eliminate false beliefs and why he insist on having virtue is important in life. Then I will demonstrate why Socrates’ argument is incorrect because he fails to identify the true catalyst that drives his happiness. I conclude Socrates’s reasoning behind his arguments are logical and sound, however he made the mistake of thinking that whatever drives his happiness will drive others as well.

In his Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle explores virtues as necessary conditions for being happy. A virtuous person is a person with a disposition toward virtuous actions and who derives pleasure from behaving virtuously. Aristotle distinguishes between two types of human virtue: virtues of thought and virtues of character. Virtues of thought are acquired through learning and include virtues like wisdom and prudence; virtues of character include bravery and charity, which are acquired by habituation and require external goods to develop. As a consequence, not all people can acquire virtues of character because not all people have the external goods and resources required to develop that disposition.

Throughout The Republic, Plato argues that the virtuous person is the only individual capable of achieving true happiness, since his tripartite soul is in complete harmony. In contrast, the immoral individual is unable to achieve any sort of true happiness, as without virtue, his soul is in a state of chaos and would thus impede any action to satisfy his desires. While virtue is depicted as the most crucial and major key to achieving happiness, Plato also acknowledges that a moral individual can achieve happiness through performing civic duty as well. He regards happiness that comes from performing socially just acts from fulfilling one’s duty to his society, as on the same level as happiness that stems from morality. On the other hand, Plato suggests that material and sensual forms of happiness, such as wealth, leisure, and pleasure, are deemed to be essentially false forms of happiness. Individuals who indulge in these forms of “happiness” cannot be considered as individuals who are experiencing true

This means that a truly good life requires that we moralize, in order to determine our true human potentialities. Once we determine that this is moral and intellectual virtue, then we must actualize the good in every situation we are encountered with. Without a civilized society, humans merge into animalistic creatures or beyond the spectrum as God-like. Therefore, the eudemonia sets principles and ethics of happiness that are governed by virtue, activity, and logos. A well civilized and positive society must make human think according to reason by the activity of practicing virtues in order to reach certain desires and needs, which govern and construct our social relationships with others in the society we are developed on. Therefore, in order

To find out what the function of a human being is, Aristotle looks at what is distinctive about humans. He discovers that the good of the human is to act in accord with reason well, which can translate into acting in accord with virtue. One cannot have happiness without virtue, just as it is impossible to be virtuous with the absence of rational thinking. Because man is a rational creature, rather than plants which are vegetative, happiness for man must include the excellent functioning of the rational faculties.

Many philosophers through history have dealt with happiness, pleasure, justice, and virtues. In this essay there will given facts on virtues between two philosophers who have different views on the topic. Aristotle and Kant have two totally different views on virtue, one being based on the soul and how you character depicts you virtue and the other which is based of the fact that anyone has a chance of being morally good, even bad people. There is a lot of disagreement between Aristotle and Kant, which has examples to back the disagreements. Aristotle takes virtue as an excellence, while Kant takes it more to being a person doing something morally good in the society and for them as a person. One similarity between these two philosophers though, is that these two descriptions of virtue lead back to happiness in the individual. At the end of this essay, the reader should be capable of understanding that Aristotle’s theory is more supported than Kant’s theory. Of course, explanations for both sides will be given thoroughly throughout this comparison.

We should not adopt Socrates’ objective conception of happiness because happiness is more intuitive—there isn’t just one way a person can be happy. As a human being, we are different from other species in that we have the capacity to surpass instinct and desire to make cognizant and ethical choices. This is not to say that instinct and desire does not shape human behavior, but what does is being able to act against these urges simply because we know that the act is “wrong.” That, in itself, is regulating the human behavior unobserved. To Socrates, this is what it means to fully be human. Suppose Socrates said, “the unexamined life is not worth living for full rational beings,” he would mean that those who do not make conscious, ethical choices

In Plato’s Menon, Socrates and Menon discussed about the nature of virtue and whether it can be taught. The definition of virtue varies a lot through the whole conversation. Even though Socrates and Menon failed to reach a precise definition of virtue after spending amount of time and effort, their arguments enlightened my idea that virtue consists in the ability to take the responsibility to good purpose and a willingness to explore and learn. Virtue is not some sort of knowledge that can be acquired by teaching or through predecessors, instead, being virtuous can be achieved by constantly discovering and applying true opinions.

For this essay this paper will be discussing the subject of moral behaviour and if it is necessary for happiness. The view that this paper will reflect and focus on is that “moral” behaviour is not absolutely necessary to be happy. To fully comprehend the topic in question we must look at the definitions of morality and happiness. Moral behaviour is subjective in the sense that what may seem right to one person may not seem right to another. Happiness is also entirely subjective due to the fact that what can make one or some people happy might not be the case for others. Examples will be given to demonstrate the fact that moral behaviour is not necessary for happiness. To be blunt the matter of the fact is that there are many people out

In Plato’s Republic Book 2 and 3, Socrates gives two arguments and proposals about making a just city. Socrates proposes and later argues, the ideal society being a society in which there is supervision over the storytellers. He believes this is necessity to make sure the youth of the society grow up to be just characters. Socrates’ second proposal that an ideal society would have the “myth of the metals” as a “noble lie” implemented into their society. This ideal society therefore following the Natural Division of Labour, which is a point of view created by Socrates. The two proposals of Socrates’ ideal society have many comparisons in both function and inconsistency. Socrates’ arguments in Books 2 and 3 of the Republic portrays his view