Exploring Human Good in Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics

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Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics investigates what is the human good, or “the highest good and end to which all human activity is directed towards” (Aristotle x). Through an argument against Plato’s theory of Forms, specifically that there is an ideal and eternal Form of Good, Aristotle says that the highest good is happiness, or eudaimonia (10). Happiness here refers to the fulfillment, or the flourishing, of one’s life (Aristotle x). It is not a mental or emotional state, the modern views of happiness. Aristotle reasons that in order to know how to achieve this human good, we must first know what is the human function (ergon), meaning “task” or “work,” because happiness means to perform the human function well, which he claims is “a life of …show more content…

The flourishing of humans through some kind of rational activity pertains to our functioning well according to nature. Aristotle claims that being an excellence human being is also good for the human being (Aristotle 103). This depends on the difference between things such as pleasure and pain and the state of the soul (Aristotle 25). By reason of pleasure and pain, by pursuing or avoiding these, men become bad (Aristotle 26). This is reflected in the state of one’s soul (26). As Aristotle says, “Pleasure in doing virtuous acts is a sign that virtuous disposition has been acquired” (Aristotle 25). However, pleasure and pain is found in all activities, so they are not good all the time (Aristotle 27). Therefore, pleasure and pain are not the final causes, or the highest goods (Aristotle 10), because they are not good for the human all the …show more content…

Humans have a rational part of the soul, which holds the intellect used in reasoning (Aristotle 103). Unlike other animals, whose soul has perception and desire, human beings are rational animals due to possessing the rational part of the soul (103). Therefore, performing the human function well is good for human beings. The human function then must be living a life according to reason (Aristotle 11). If human beings have the function of reasoning, and the function is performed well, then the function makes a good human being and is good for the human being (Aristotle

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