Basic Ethical Theories
Virtue Ethics
Plato and Aristotle
Plato (424 BC – 348 BC)
Glaucon: It is in man’s nature to do
injustice
Do injustice To suffer from
without being LAWS injustice without the
punished power to retaliate
The goal of injustice: to be perceived as just
The Myth of Gyges’s Ring
Plato’s Concept of Reality
Soul
•Virtue
•Truth
•Goodness
Body
•Pleasure
•Senses
•Pain
Man is like a charioteer of two-winged horses
Socrates: Justice is
gaining the mastery
of everything inside a
person
◦ Just Person:
Has integrity, honest,
unifies himself
◦ Unjust Person:
Deceitful, his nature is
in chaos, destroyed
within
Laws –
◦ rules the unjust
◦ Imposed so we are all steered by justice
◦ Sets man apart from beasts
◦ “…spend his life directing all his efforts to this
end…”
Aristotle (384-
322BCE)
Nicomachean Ethics
Virtue
INTELLECTUAL MORAL
(inheritance and (habit)
education) resulting in States of
Character i.e.,
propensities to act in
accordance with a
mean of moderation
Philosophical Practical
Wisdom Wisdom
deficiency excess
mean
What is the end of our
actions?
Is life a mere “to-do” list?
The highest of all goods is
HAPPINESS
◦ What is happiness?
◦ Definition varies
Happiness- final, self-sufficient,
end of all action
Three Kinds of Life
1. Sensual – pleasure
2. Political
Honor and Virtue
3. Life of Thought - ?
What is Happiness for Humans?
Three Types of Life
1. Vegetation
2. Sensation
3. Rationalization
What is good for each of
these creatures?
Virtue
INTELLECTUAL MORAL
(inheritance and (habit)
education) resulting in States of
Character i.e.,
propensities to act in
accordance with a
mean of moderation
Philosophical Practical
Wisdom Wisdom
deficiency excess
mean
Life of thought - ?
The Two Kinds of Virtues
Intellectual Virtues
◦ the trained faculty of choice
◦ philosophical wisdom, understanding, prudence (practical
wisdom)
◦ requires teaching, Intelligence, foresight
◦ Experience and Time
◦ No Shortcut
Moral Virtues
◦ Habit
◦ Liberality, temperance, courage, justice,
friendship
◦ One becomes good by doing good.
Law –to train the citizens to have good habits
◦ Constant training
Education – to feel pleasure and pain at the
right objects
◦ Pleasure at courage, justice
◦ Pain at cowardice and injustice
What makes an act just?
1. Knows what he is doing.
2. Deliberately chose to do it.
3. Doing it as part of his own
firm and immutable
character.
A person does not become
virtuous by a theory. One
must do the act.
Nature of Virtue
Three Properties of a Soul
1. Emotions
2. Faculties – that which
makes us capable of
experiencing emotions
3. Moral States
Deficiency Excess
Mean
Teleology
Utilitarianism by John Stuart Mill
The Greatest Happiness Principle
Definition of Terms
Actions are:
Right – promotes happiness
Wrong – reverse of happiness
Happiness – intended pleasure and absence of
pain
Pain – lack of pleasure
The Desirable End
Pleasure or Freedom from pain
a. Desirable for the pleasure inherent in them
b. Means to promote pleasure and/or
prevention of pain
But what is pleasure? Is this the same as
pleasure of animals?
What is pleasure?
Mental Pleasures
Intellect
Feelings
Imaginations
Moral Sentiments
Intelligence over
foolishness
Education over ignorance Human Dignity
Feeling and Conscience
over Selfishness
“It is better to be a human
being dissatisfied than a pig
satisfied. Better to be a
Socrates dissatisfied than a
fool satisfied.”
The Greatest Amount of Happiness
Altogether
The world gains in noble character
• Intellect
• Feelings
• Imaginations
• Moral Sentiments
Happiness
multiplied
General cultivation of character
Everyone must contribute
How many people will benefit from it?
Utilitarianism requires the individual to be
disinterested.
“To do as you would be done by and
to love your neighbor as you love yourself.”
Owning the happiness of the majority as your
own happiness
Deontological Ethics
The Categorical Imperative by Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant (1724-
1804)
Intelligence,
Courage, Wit,
Judgment
Gifts of Nature
Courage,
Good Will (gives Perseverance
pleasure) ->
Happiness
Power, Riches,
Gifts of Fortune
Health, Pride
Imperatives - commands
Hypothetical – good
only as a means to
something else; for
a purpose
Categorical – good in itself
“Act only on that maxim whereby thou canst
at the same time will that it should become a
universal law.”
Hence, the imperative of duty is:
“Act as if the maxim of the thy action were to
become by thy will a universal law of
nature.”
Examples
1. Taking one’s own life
“From self-love I adopt it as a principle to
shorten my life when its longer duration is
likely to bring more evil than satisfaction.”
Destroy life to improve life
2. Lying to borrow money
False pretenses
3. Squandering one’s
talents
4. Refusal to help others
Worth of an object – acquired
Worth of a person – ends in themselves
“…Man and any rational beings exists as an end in
himself, not merely as a means to be arbitrarily
used by this or that will…”
Of course I would still
love you if you lost all
your money – I’d miss
you too.
“What most people need to learn in life is how
to love people and use things instead of using
people and loving things.” – Zelda Fitzgerald
Kingdom of Ends
The possibility of unity of all ends through
abstraction.
