More About Virtue

more about virtue

can you be too nice?

from last day..

we all have heroesthey are our heroes because they have desirable attributeswe call them virtues

recapvirtues are characteristics or attributes that people possess if they are ‘living well.’

there are billions of them.

‘who should i be?’ not ‘what should i do?’

today

we will look at some examples of these ‘virtues.’

think about how they work.

think about if someone can ever have too much of a virtue...

Do you like him? Why?

so girls...can a guy be ‘just too

nice?’

?

watch dvd clip

think about Graham Norton’s character.

are we meant to like him?

why/why not?

Q1

Q1

Are we meant to like the character played by Graham Norton?

Why/why not?

what do you hate?

what sorts of things do you hate about other people?

morning people?

they are just TOO happy!

far too happy.

can you ever be too...honest?

sensitive?

happy?

confident?

self-assured?

smart?

aristotleremember this guy?he said that it was possible to be ‘too much’ of all the things we had called virtues

think about it...

aristotlein fact all virtues were a balance between ‘too much’ and ‘too little.’

he called these extremes vices.

one was a vice of ‘deficiency’, the other a vice of ‘excess’.

so...

courage

generosity

honesty

loyalty

foolhardycowardly

extravagant

tactless

naive

liar

tight/stingy

betrayal

virtue as balance‘the doctrine of the mean’

what is good is having the

right balance between the two negative attributes...

Q2: what does aristotle think is the relationship

between vice and virtue? Give an example.

Vice Virtue Mean Deficiency Excess

dullness?

imagine someone who’s always self controlled, has no strong opinions.

would you want to spend time with them? discuss.

aristotle says no...not ruling out massively strong reactions.

just the have to be in response to a situation where strong reaction is a good thing...

we just need to work out what these are...

reason

conclusionso that’s how to be like Peter Griffin.

always react with the right balance of the virtues, to meet every situation.

got it?

but wait...

conclusionso that’s how to be like Sandy Cohen.

always react with the right balance of the virtues, to meet every situation.

got it?

but wait...

next day...is this virtue stuff actually useful in helping us to know what we should live like?

Does it really just all come down to opinions?

If it does, does that make it pointless?