"Aristotle felt that virtue is the ability habitually to know the good and to do the good." (Dreisbach 2009, p. 84) However; what did he mean by this? Can a person be considered morally virtuous, if he is judged by a single action he has committed? What is virtue any way? Well according to Dictonary.com "virtue is moral excellence, righteousness and goodness. (Dictonary.com, 2014) Humans are not born virtuous or moral in nature. They are characteristics that are learned. Such as being compassionate, kind, honest or modest. Aristotle called them habits; habits are a learned behavior pattern. Some can be good, while other a course is not so good.
When the youth of today are looked at, one often wonders if they have good moral virtues or habits. Some of the older population are often heard saying that teens or kids of today have no respect for people or property and they have no manners. So essentially, these elders are saying that children are not being raised to have proper values or morals in life. However, is this caused by the children, or by those who raise them? Better yet, is the so-called lack of morals brought on by how our society has evolved?
Some very good ways to instill proper morals into children is to be a positive role model from the very beginning to them. Take the time out to show them what is considered right and what is considered wrong. Some methods of teaching children good and positive morals are being lost in this modern day and age, such as going to church, or sitting down together and sharing a meal. Why is this happening? Simple, parents of today are forced into having both parents work because it is no longer a one-paycheck life style. Mother's once were able to stay at home and tend to the family...
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...ood habit; it is second nature to them. A bad archer either does not understand how to aim, or does not know how to aim. (Dreisbach, 2009) What does this have to do with habits or morals? Simply stated, if one starts out developing a positive habit, it will become part of who that person is, however; if they do not develop good habits, and then they will never succeed in life.
References
2 former Boy Scout leaders plead guilty..... (2014, March 18). Retrieved from FoxNews.com: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/03/18/2-former-boy-scout-leaders-plead-guilty-to-toppling-ancient-utah-rock-formation/
Boy Scouts. (2014). Retrieved from Boy Scouts of America: http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/boyscouts.aspx
Dictonary.com. (2014). Retrieved from http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/virtue?s=t
Dreisbach, C. (2009). Ethics in Criminal Justice. New York: McGraw-Hill.
According Aristotle, a virtuous person will always use reason and intellect, and effortlessly make the correct decisions in every situation. They have their hexis in the correct place, and they have truly lived and struggled. With a virtuous person, life will have not been easy, and a virtuous person will have had to experience difficult times and learn from these experiences. These experiences are what will make them a virtuous person. For example, a person who had lived their life in poverty, then makes the decision to work and study to get a high paying job. With this, they dedicate a great deal of their time and money to helping the homeless. This person would be an example of what a virtuous person, their soul has had struggled, and without this they would have not become this person. They need to have this struggle in order to become a virtuous person. With a virtuous person, they are naturally a good person.
Aristotle further divided his thought on ethics into two categories, intellectual virtue and moral/social/political virtue. With respect to his views on moral virtue, Aristotle developed a doctrine that showed that virtue is staying in the mean, the doctrine of the mean. “The moral virtue is a mean…” (Aristotle 109). This doctrine claimed that having the right amount of a characteristic would be virtuous and most often is in between having too much or too little of ...
Its primary aim is to praise and blame and it deals with excellence, goodness, shame, nobility, honor and matters of vice and virtue. According to Aristotle, virtue comprises courage, justice, magnificence, liberality, self-control, magnanimity, gentleness and wisdom that is speculative.
It is unfortunate to see how ethics in the American culture are constantly declining. People’s moral values are below normal societal standards, which is why, the older generations are outraged by the way things are now, and become rather upset and feel disturbed towards society. Furthermore, religion has lost its value throughout the years. In the essay, "Do Kids Need Religion?" by Anthony Brandt, he underlines the idea of how religion is not properly taught or provided to children. In Wendy Shalit’s essay, "The Future of Modesty," she discusses how much modesty has reached its worst in the younger generations, however society is beginning to raise these standards once again. Nonetheless, education has also lost its honor code. Mark Clayton calls attention to how cheating is becoming incredibly common among students throughout the United States in his essay, "A Whole Lot of Cheatin’ Going on." In fact, it is obvious that American culture is declining fast in ethics, especially in religion, dating, and education.
Sachs first talks about Aristotle’s views on habit and how through habit people can become morally virtuous. There is one clear problem that Sachs
Morals are developed from the moment we are born to the moment we die, and are cultivated by what we see, hear, and do within our lives, but more importantly by the people we meet. In the world there are all manner of things for us to bear witness to, whether it be the beauty of birth or the gritty horror that is war, in either case men and women are shaped and changed by these events whether it be good or bad. The greek philosopher Aristotle is quoted as saying, “And to say what makes good morals vs what are bad ones is completely based on self, for no two people have the same upbringing, class, or position in life, for how is a slave who has known nothing but the brutality of his/her master to understand under what morals, owned by their
He stated, “So virtue is a provisional disposition… virtue is a mean; but in respect of what is right and what is right and best, it is an extreme (Aristotle, 42).” Here Aristotle explains that moral virtue is determined by reason and that it avoids the states of too much, excess, or too little, deficiency. He believes that our soul is the principle of living because it is inside of us. Therefore, for Aristotle the soul was morally which is where we are given the right reason. He believes that, “there are two parts of the soul, one rational and one irrational (Aristotle, 145).” The rational part, which is how he believe we should do our actions upon, consists of possessing reason, part that can think and command, and intellectual virtues, which are virtues that come from time and experience. Courage is a moral virtue. When having courage, you either have too much fear, which makes you a coward, or you have too little fear, where you’d be considered rash or fool hardy. Generosity is also a moral virtue. When you are generous, you are either giving too much, which makes you profligate, or you are giving too little which would consider you as a stingy person. Moral virtues lead you to happiness because of their intermediate state that is by
According to the ABC News survey, 73 percent of Americans feel manners are worse today than they were 20 or 30 years ago. Although character education is a hot topic in schools across the nation, education in maners often receives scant attention; with growing demands on teaching time, etiquette is rarely a priority. It might be a mistake to ignore the adage that actions speak louder than words, however. Teachers who teach manners said they notice a real difference in students' attitudes, in the way they treat one another, and in their schoolwork. Although some might say that manners are to be taught from the parents, the places children learn to socialize are not only at home, but also at school; it is their second home. A child either learns different moral values from his home or from his school. These days with both of the parents working, a child rarely gets the opportunity to learn moral and social values from home. In the past, although the parents were working, grandparents took care of their grandchildren and taught them important lessons of life, however, this is no longer prevalent as more and more families get unconcerned of teaching manners to young people. Of course not all the parents are failing to teach manners, but it is surprising to see many adults who do not know the correct ways of being respectful. Then how are they to educate their children? Thus, the only way we can ensure our future generation to learn etiquette is by schools.
Aristotle's ethics consist of a form of virtue ethics, in which the ethical action is that which properly complies with virtue(s) by finding the mean within each particular one. Aristotle outlines two types of virtues: moral/character virtues and intellectual virtues. Though similar to, and inspired by, Plato and Socrates’ ethics, Aristotle's ethical account differs in some areas.
...Aristotle’s conclusion relates human good, activity of soul and excellence. It is this expression of virtue through action that allows happiness to be obtained. Such dependence on virtue sets the scene for Aristotle to examine virtue more closely. He will elaborate on the two parts of reasoning well (virtue). The first part of reasoning well is having the right desires to aim oneself at the right good and not just the apparent good. The second part of reasoning well is knowing how to get to this proper desire. This will be further elaborated in book two where Aristotle will explore what it means to reason well and what is means to be virtuous.
A conduct can't be either great or insidiousness, however an individual can have great or awful character qualities. Aristotle said that all individuals are made out of a consolidation of bad habit (awful character qualities) and ideals (great character characteristics). He utilizes this idea to illustrate the postulation: Virtue is a demeanor concerned with decision.
Children are influenced by their parents’ action. If the parents are not teaching his or her child what is right from wrong, then it may leave the child to experiment for themselves, like becoming involved in bad activity. If a child commits a delinquent act his or her parent should be held accountable.
The virtues defined by Aristotle consist of two extremes or vices, the excess and the deficiency. The mean or the intermediate between the excess and the deficiency is the virtue. One virtue Aristotle explains is bravery, with its vices being rashness and cowardice. Each aspect of these is contrary to the others, meaning that the intermediate opposes the extreme. Similarly, one extreme opposes the mean and its other extreme. The implications of this are that the excess opposes the deficiency more than the mean. This causes the mean to sometimes resemble its neighboring extreme. Obtaining the mean involves the challenge of being excellent. The challenging part, however, is “doing it to the right person, in the right amount, at the right time, for the right end, and in the right way” (Nicomachean Ethics 1109a28-29:29). Fortunately, one can steer themselves to the mean if one is conscious of the extreme they are naturally inclined to go towards. Since everybody is uniquely different the means by which one steers themselves in the right direction is different for each individual. In addition, Aristotle names three requirements for an action to be a virtue. First one must be cons...
He claims that virtue of thought is taught and that virtue of character is habitually learnt. Either way, virtues do not “arise in us naturally” (216, 1103a20). He argues that humans have the capacities for virtues, but they must act on them (216, 1103a30). Thus, a person must learn to use the capability of being virtuous, meaning someone needs to teach them those virtues (217, 1103a10). To be virtuous, it is not just the action that matters, but the reason behind the action too. Aristotle says that a person should be consciously acting virtuous because this would result in him living a happy life (221, 1105a30). This takes time and a person must constantly repeat these actions to achieve the end goal of being virtuous (221,
times. Then the sand was sunk. Aristotle was a great believer in virtues and the meaning of virtue to him meant being able to fulfil one's functions. Virtue ethics is not so much interested in the question, "What should I do?" but rather the question 'what sort of person should I become?'