1.6: The Good Life: Virtue and Happiness
Read Book I of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. The Nicomachean Ethics is Aristotle's most comprehensive work on ethics and establishes ethical inquiry as a field unto its own apart from other fields of inquiry. In this text, Aristotle sustains the Platonic dialogue on how society should best be organized, but he does so by focusing on the codification of virtuous behavior and what it means for a person to live a good life.
Read this article, which provides context for Aristotle's ideas of ethics.
1.6.1: The Doctrine of the Mean
Read Book II of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. Book II sets out to discover how we can determine what is virtuous, or that which is fine or excellent, such that our practical reason can be in accordance with it, both in the sense of actions to be taken and ends to be achieved. What Aristotle determines is that what is virtuous with regard to a person's character can be found between the extremes as to what it is not - or the mean between the two vices of excess and deficiency.
Read this article, which provides context for Aristotle's ideas concerning virtue and other related concepts.
1.6.2: The Preconditions of Virtue: Voluntary vs. Involuntary Action
Read Book III of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. After describing what is virtuous in Book II, Aristotle gives an outline of what must be in place if virtuous action is to result. What constitutes virtuous action is dependent on a variety of external factors as well as the mindset and character of the actor. Aristotle distinguishes between actions taken voluntarily and involuntarily. He determines that actions must be voluntary if they are to be virtuous and thus worthy of praise.
Read this article, which provides context for Aristotle's ideas concerning the preconditions of virtue and other related concepts.
1.6.3: Justice as a Virtue
- Read Book IV and Book V of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. In Book IV, Aristotle explains how we may determine what is virtuous through the doctrine of the mean using examples of individual virtues such as bravery, generosity, and temperance. In Book V, Aristotle discusses the virtue of justice, which carries an exalted status among the virtues. Aristotle makes a distinction between two different but related types of justice: the general and the special (or particular). Of general justice, he writes, "this type of justice then, is complete virtue, not complete virtue unconditionally, but complete virtue in relation to another. And this is why justice often seems to be supreme among the virtues, and 'neither the evening star nor the morning star is so marvelous,' and the proverb says 'And in justice all virtue is summed up'." As you will see, Aristotle's conception of justice stands in sharp contrast to that of Plato's, with the realization that individual justice is inextricably tied to the common good.
Read this article.
1.6.4: The Importance of Contemplation
Read Book VI of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics.
In Book II, you learned that Aristotle divides virtue into two sorts that correspond to the rational and non-rational parts of the soul. The rational part is that which has reason within itself or is reason "through-and-through", while the non-rational part is capable of being influenced by reason. Book VI of the Ethics first addresses the non-rational part of the soul, which is integral to Book X and the transition made from the Ethics to Aristotle's Politics. Here, we first address the intellectual virtues applied to the non-rational parts of the soul in Book VI, or the virtues of thought associated with our emotions, feelings, dispositions, and actions, before turning to Book X.
After you have read Book VI of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics, read Book X.
Read this article.
Answer these questions on the major themes in Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics.
In Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle devotes two books to the topic of friendship. Why does he consider friendship to be a critical component of the good life? How might Plato have responded to such an assertion?
Post your response in the course's discussion forum, and check back to see what some of your classmates have written. Feel free to leave comments on the posts of your classmates.