Ethics Aristotle Exam 2

what does "That which appears to the good man is thought to be really so." mean?

there are things that are objectively pleasant, but the good man is the one who feels them as they are.

Why are true arguments the most useful?

they harmonize with the facts they are believed, and so they stimulate those who understand them to live according to them

which people are talking nonsense?

those who believe a man can be constantly unfortunate and be happy at the same time

What is the good state of the contemplative/scientific intellect?

truth

What is the good state of the practical intellect?

truth and right desire

What things would we choose ("be keen about") even if no pleasure resulted

we should choose things like seeing, remembering, knowing, and possessing virtue even if no pleasure resulted because they are desirable in themselves

what view does Socrates hold?

when he acts against what he judges best-- people act so only by reason of ignorance

why does wickedness causes us to be deceived about?

wickedness perverts us and causes us to be deceived about the starting points of action

two reasons why even the completely virtuous man needs friends

1) Friends are considered the greatest of external goods to a good man. 2) men think that the happy man ought to live pleasantly. If he were a solitary, life would be hard for him; for by oneself it is not easy to be continuously active; but with others and towards others it is easier

the two kinds of friendship

1) Friendship of Utility 2) Friendship of pleasure

What are the five states by virtue of which the soul posseses truth?

1) art 2) scientific knowledge 3) practical wisdom 4) intuitive reason 5) philosophic wisdom

two reasons why people think that pleasure is not good at all

1) in itself and incidentally 2) most pleasures are bad 3) the best things in the world cannot be pleasure

What two things must happen if the choice is to be good?

1) reasoning must be true 2) desire must be right

the three moral states to be avoided & their contraries

1) vice -> virtue 2) incontinence-> continence 3) brutishness -> superhuman virtue

three ways in which the way a good man feels about himself is similar to the way someone feels about a friend.

1) we define a friend as one who wishes and does what is good for the sake of his friend, but also can do so for himself. 2) one wished for his friend to exist and live for his sake, also wishes for his own existence. 3) one who lives with and has the same tastes as another

What is the difference between being loved and being honored

Being loved is something you are delighted in for its own sake. (desirable for itself) Being honored is to believe in your own goodness based on the strength of the judgement of those who speak about you

Why can a young man of practical wisdom not be found?

A young man of practical wisdom cannot be found because that such wisdom is concerned not only with the universals but also with the particulars, which become familiar from experience and a young man has no experience since experience comes with time and age.

Aristotle thinks it is "difficult to get a right training for virtue" if your country does not have good laws. Why?

Aristotle thinks it is difficult to get from youth a right training for virtue because if you don't know any differently, you will believe that is the virtuous activity if the laws are all you know. Young people do not have practical wisdom, because practical wisdom is brought about through experience and knowledge, so the right training for virtue is altered if you are taught inaccurately

why does Aristotle say that this view plainly contradicts the observed facts?

Aristotle thinks that people still can act against what is good- they do not truly think before acting and follow passion

Aristotle's definition of art?

Art is identical with a state of capacity to make, involving true reasoning.

Why practical wisdom and moral virtue depend on each other

Because virtue makes the goal correct, and practical wisdom makes what leads to it correct MV is needs PW to find the mean, need to know based on circumstances to know when is a good time. PW needs MV to know where to aim at and to aim for the correct end

What is Aristotle's evidence that friendship is more essentially about loving than it is about being loved?

But is seems to lie in loving rather than in being loved, as indicated by the delight mothers take in loving... seem to be satisfied if they see them prospering and they themselves love their children if these owing to their ignorance give them nothing of a mother's due.

What two parts of the rational principle? What does each do?

Contemplative/Scientific: theoretical (things are always that way) Calculative: practical (causes are variable)

What things "seem to be bound up together"?

For they seem to be bound up together and not to admit of separation, since without activity pleasure does not arise and every action is completed by the attendant pleasure.

Can a bad person love himself, according to Aristotle

Having nothing lovable in them they have no feeling of love to themselves

is the temperate man continent? what kind of appetites does the continent man have?

No, because the temperate man will have neither excessive of bad appetites. Continence involves having strong appetites.

Why Aristotle says that reason/a life of contemplation is divine

If reason is divine then, in comparison with man, the life according to it is divine in comparison with human life, and we must not think of human things, but try to be godlike and think of this life that is divine in comparison to the average human life We must not follow those who advise us to think of human things and of mortal things that are done in accordance with indulging in passion. Instead, we should try to make ourselves immortal and strain every nerve to live in accordance with the best things in us (contemplation and reason) because by doing that, we will become better.

Which virtues "belong to our composite nature"?

Passions and moral virtues belong to our composite nature and the virtues of our composite nature are human. Meaning, to achieve our happiness and goodness, we will need to practice our practical wisdom and activity of reason

What does "intuitive reason" grasp?

Intuitive reason grasps at the first principles (scientific knowledge involves demonstration)

Why is friendship necessary?

It is necessary because if a man had all other goods, he would not be able to share the goods he has with others as well as aiding others to keep from error. Friendship also holds states together.

What does Aristotle say it is "necessary to determine"?

It is necessary with regard to the states of the soul also, not only that this is true statement should be made, but also that it should be determined what correct reason is and what is the standard that fixes it.

Why is friendship noble?

It is noble because we praise those who love their friends, and it is thought to be a fine thing to have many friends.

According to Aristotle, can you love yourself most of all and still sacrifice and even die for others?

It is true of the good man that he does many acts for the sake of his friends and his country and, if necessary, dies for them; for he will throw away both wealth and honors and the general objects of competition, gaining himself nobility

Is marriage a friendship? What kind?

Marriage is friendship in the sense that they both compliment each other are bonded in utility and pleasure. Because of these two reasons, this type of friendship may be virtuous, if both parties are good; for each has its own virtue and they will delight in the fact.

Does Aristotle think that people can be friends "if there is a great interval in respect of virtue or vice" between them?

No, Aristotle believes that quantitative equality is primary and proportionate to secondary merit

What does "he has the knowledge by is not exercising it" mean?

Not being ignorant to the concept and not acting upon that knowledge

Aristotle's definition of friendship

People that are mutually recognized as bearing goodwill and wishing well to each other

How incontinence (acting against knowledge) is possible

Physical state (tired or drunk), you don't apply knowledge to the specific situation(just one more), follow a different opinion that is more in line with your appetite (rationalizing hitting snooze)

What does Aristotle mean by "the other kind of virtue," which provides a happy life "in a secondary degree"

Practical wisdom (actions done to one another that reflect character)

Aristotle's definition of practical wisdom

Practical wisdom is a true and reasoned state of capacity to act with regard to the things that are good or bad for man

Aristotle argues that the activity of contemplating truth is godlike

Since we assume the gods to be above all other beings blessed and happy, the activity of god, which surpasses all others in blessedness, must be contemplative, and of human activities, therefore, that which is most akin to this must be most of the nature of happiness

How does the example of the friend and the flatterer work?

The fact that a friend is different from a flatterer seems to make it plain that pleasure is not a good, or that pleasures are different in kind for the one is though to consort with us with a view to the good, the other with a view to our pleasure, and the one is reproached for his conduct while the other is praised on the ground that he consorts with us for different ends

Aristotle's argument that ethics isn't enough to make men good

The laws and paternal stuff "The paternal command has not the required force or compulsive power." This just means that eventually your dad can't stop you from doing whatever you want anymore. (for example, grounded teenager who realizes he can just walk away) Aristotle thinks it is difficult to get from youth a right training for virtue because if you don't know any differently, you will believe that is the virtuous activity if the laws are all you know. Young people do not have practical wisdom, because practical wisdom is brought about through experience and knowledge, so the right training for virtue is altered if you are taught inaccurately.

What kinds of pleasures are bad? Good?

The pleasure proper to a worthy activity is good and that proper to an unworthy activity is bad; just as the appetites for noble objects are laudable, those for base objects culpable

Are arguments able to convince the general population to be noble and good? Why?

They're good, yes, but they are NOT able to convince the general population (the many) to be good, because most people obey fear, not reason.

"The paternal command has not the required force or compulsive power." What is Aristotle talking about?

This just means that eventually your dad can't stop you from doing whatever you want anymore. (for example, grounded teenager who realizes he can just walk away)

Who really loves himself?

Those who give themselves the preference in regard to virtuous action

What do those who use the term "self-lover" as a "term of reproach" mean?

Those who use the term as one of reproach ascribe self-love to people who assign to themselves the greater share of wealth, honours, and bodily pleasures for the are what most desire and busy themselves about as though they were the best of all things, which is the reason, why they become objects of competition

Why would is be "strange" if happiness were amusement? (193) Why is relaxation "not an end"?

We choose everything for the sake of something else (except happiness which in itself is an end), and to choose something for the sake of amusement is childish and silly. It would be strange if the end were an amusement, and one were to take trouble and suffer hardships all one's life in order to amuse oneself. Relaxation is not an end because it is taken for the sake of an activity because we cannot work continuously

What advice must we not follow? What should we do instead?

We must not follow those who advise us to think of human things and of mortal things that are done in accordance with indulging in passion. Instead, we should try to make ourselves immortal and strain every nerve to live in accordance with the best things in us (contemplation and reason) because by doing that, we will become better

Why should we "strain every nerve in an endeavor to be good"?

We should strain every nerve to avoid wickedness and should endeavor to be good; for so and only can one be either friendly to oneself or a friend to another

Why do wicked men avoid being left alone?

Wicked men seek for people with whom to spend their days, and shut themselves; for they remember many a previous deed, and anticipate others like them, when they are by themselves, but when they are with others they forget.

does Aristotle think that pleasure is good?

Yes, pleasure is necessarily a good. Good pleasures are worth doing because they are worthy activities

pleasure should rather be called...

activity of the natural state, and instead of perceptible unimpeded.

which pleasures imply appetite and pain?

bodily pleasures and pleasure that appeal to the senses

How does philosophic wisdom produce happiness?

for being a part of virtue entire, by being possessed and by actualizing itself it makes a man happy

why is the work of man achieved only in accordance with practical wisdom as well as with moral virtue?

for virtue makes the goal correct and practical wisdom makes what leads to it correct.

What is "perfect friendship"?

friends who are good and alike in virtue and who love one another for their own sake

What is the reason for pleasure being good?

if certain pleasures re bad, that does not prevent chief good from being a sort of pleasure

Aristotle argues that the activity of contemplating truth is pleasant

it is expected that those who know will pass their time more pleasantly than those who inquire.

Aristotle argues that the activity of contemplating truth is continuous

it is the most continuous, since we can contemplate truth more continuously than we can do anything else.

how id natural virtue different from virtue in a strict sense?

natural virtue does not involve practical wisdom

Do pleasant and painful objects destroy our judgment about triangles? What do they destroy our judgment about?

no, what is to be done and how to act.

What should we say "in reply to those who bring forward the disgraceful pleasures"?

one must say that these are not pleasant; if things are pleasant to people of vicious constitution, we must not suppose that they are also pleasant to others than these

Aristotle argues that the activity of contemplating truth is self-sufficient

one possessing any virtue when they are sufficiently equipped with things of that sort the just man needs people towards whom and with whom he shall act justly, but even when by himself, can contemplate truth, and the wiser he is. For he can perhaps do so better if he has fellow workers, but stull he is the most self-sufficient.

the three reasons why someone is lovable

pleasant, good, useful

Aristotle argues that the activity of contemplating truth is best

since not only is reason the best thing in us, but the objects of reason are the best of knowable objects

What does pleasure "complete"

the activity

Aristotle argues that the activity of contemplating truth is loved for its own sake

the activity of reason, which is contemplative, seems both to be superior in serious worth and to aim at no end beyond itself, and to have its pleasure proper to itself, and the self-sufficiency, leisureliness, unweariedness, and all the other attributes ascribed to the supremely happy man are evidently those connected with this activity, it follows that this will be the complete happiness of man, if it be allowed to a complete term of life.

Is the bad man bad because he pursues food, drink, and sex?

the bad man is bad by virtue of pursuing the excess, not by virtue of pursuing necessary pleasures

According to Aristotle, what is "the best activity"

the best activity is that of the best-conditioned organ in relation to the finest of its objects. Respect of thought and contemplation, the most complete is pleasant

what does the continent man know? what does he do?

the continent man, knowing his appetites are bad, refuses on account of his rational principle to follow them.

what does the incontinent man know? what does he do?

the incontinent man knowing that what he does is bad, does it in result of passion

Wisdom must be...

the most finished of the forms of knowledge. For the wise man must not only know what follows from the first principles but also possess truth about the first principles.

What is "the object of scientific knowledge"?

the object of scientific knowledge is necessity.