Aristotle Notes

Special Terms:
eudaimonia
virtue
function/end/purpose
reason/rationality
mean ("golden" mean)
practical wisdom
theoretical wisdom
habit


(Extremely Compact) Summary Statement:
Moral virtue is a fixed habit developed from innate potential through exercise guided originally by one's parents, and later continued by one's self.  It is a habit of choosing the mean, relative to one's self, and of enjoying both the choice and the action it dictates.  This choice, of the mean, is to be made as the prudent person would make it (by employing one's practical wisdom).  A life lived in this fasion is one which conduces toward eudaimonia.

Eudaimonia:
Eudaimonia is a supreme sort of happiness resulting from a well-lived life.  One can achieve it through emphasis on theoretical wisdom (a contemplative life), and/or through emphasis on the exercise of practical wisdom as discussed above in the summary statement.  It is the final end, or final good, of human life, in that it is desired for its own sake, not instrumentally or for the sake of something else.

Virtue:
A virtue is that which helps in the performance of a given function.  For example, sharpness is a virtue in a knife, because it helps the knife to cut better, and cutting is the function of the knife.  Two intellectual virtues Aristotle discusses are practical wisdom and theoretical wisdom.  Moral virtues are to be found at the midpoint, or mean, between excess and deficiency.  Courage, for example, is the mean between foolhardiness (excess) and deficiency (cowardice). Practical wisdom helps us to find the mean.  As Aristotle says in Book II of the _Nicomachean Ethics_, "irtue, then, is a state of character concerned with choice, lying in a mean, i.e. the mean relative to us, this being determined by a rational principle, and by that principle by which the man of practical wisdom would determine it."

Function:
As you will see from the first excerpt below, everthing has a function (aims at some good). It is a teleological, goal-directed, purpose-filled world.  Our distinctive, human function is to reason: "Man is a rational animal", Aristotle says.

"Golden" Mean:
A "mean" is an average, but Aristotle does not intend the strict, arithmetic mean.  He has in mind a midpoint, or point of moderation, that is neither an excess nor a deficiency.  When choosing the mean, it is a mean relative to ourselves: it is personal.  The amount you consume when you eat in moderation, for example, may be too excessive or too deficient for someone else.

Habit:
Aristotle said, "One swallow does not make a spring" (or "summer", in some translations).  In the context of moral virtue, one must make a habit of living a certain way; a virtuous way of life must come naturally to you.  In other words, a single, heroic act does not make you morally virtuous; moral virtue is not earned episodically, and neither is eudaimonia.  They are the result of a well-lived life.


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Excerpts from Nicomachean Ethics (Books I and II only) - sections refer to online edition:

"Every art and every inquiry, and similarly every action and pursuit,
is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason the good has rightly
been declared to be that at which all things aim."
(Opening line of Nichomachean Ethics)

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"If, then, there is some end of the things we do, which we desire for
its own sake (everything else being desired for the sake of this),
and if we do not choose everything for the sake of something else
(for at that rate the process would go on to infinity, so that our
desire would be empty and vain), clearly this must be the good and
the chief good. Will not the knowledge of it, then, have a great influence
on life? Shall we not, like archers who have a mark to aim at, be
more likely to hit upon what is right? If so, we must try, in outline
at least, to determine what it is, and of which of the sciences or
capacities it is the object."
(Book I, Section 2)

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"The life of money-making is one undertaken under compulsion, and wealth
is evidently not the good we are seeking; for it is merely useful
and for the sake of something else. And so one might rather take the
aforenamed objects to be ends; for they are loved for themselves.
But it is evident that not even these are ends; yet many arguments
have been thrown away in support of them. Let us leave this subject,
then."
(Book I, Section 5)

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"So the argument has by a different course reached the same point;
but we must try to state this even more clearly. Since there are evidently
more than one end, and we choose some of these (e.g. wealth, flutes,
and in general instruments) for the sake of something else, clearly
not all ends are final ends; but the chief good is evidently something
final. Therefore, if there is only one final end, this will be what
we are seeking, and if there are more than one, the most final of
these will be what we are seeking. Now we call that which is in itself
worthy of pursuit more final than that which is worthy of pursuit
for the sake of something else, and that which is never desirable
for the sake of something else more final than the things that are
desirable both in themselves and for the sake of that other thing,
and therefore we call final without qualification that which is always
desirable in itself and never for the sake of something else.

Now such a thing happiness [eudaimonia], above all else, is held to be; for this
we choose always for self and never for the sake of something else,
but honour, pleasure, reason, and every virtue we choose indeed for
themselves (for if nothing resulted from them we should still choose
each of them), but we choose them also for the sake of happiness,
judging that by means of them we shall be happy. Happiness, on the
other hand, no one chooses for the sake of these, nor, in general,
for anything other than itself.

[....]
Happiness, then, is something final and
self-sufficient, and is the end of action.

Presumably, however, to say that happiness is the chief good seems
a platitude, and a clearer account of what it is still desired. This
might perhaps be given, if we could first ascertain the function of
man. For just as for a flute-player, a sculptor, or an artist, and,
in general, for all things that have a function or activity, the good
and the 'well' is thought to reside in the function, so would it seem
to be for man, if he has a function.
[....]

Now if the function
of man is an activity of soul which follows or implies a rational
principle, and if we say 'so-and-so-and 'a good so-and-so' have a
function which is the same in kind, e.g. a lyre, and a good lyre-player,
and so without qualification in all cases, eminence in respect of
goodness being idded to the name of the function (for the function
of a lyre-player is to play the lyre, and that of a good lyre-player
is to do so well): if this is the case, and we state the function
of man to be a certain kind of life, and this to be an activity or
actions of the soul implying a rational principle, and the function
of a good man to be the good and noble performance of these, and if
any action is well performed when it is performed in accordance with
the appropriate excellence: if this is the case, human good turns
out to be activity of soul in accordance with virtue, and if there
are more than one virtue, in accordance with the best and most complete.

But we must add 'in a complete life.' For one swallow does not make
a summer, nor does one day; and so too one day, or a short time, does
not make a man blessed and happy.
(Book I, Section 7)
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"Virtue, then, being of two kinds, intellectual and moral, intellectual
virtue in the main owes both its birth and its growth to teaching
(for which reason it requires experience and time), while moral virtue
comes about as a result of habit, whence also its name (ethike) is
one that is formed by a slight variation from the word ethos (habit).
From this it is also plain that none of the moral virtues arises in
us by nature; for nothing that exists by nature can form a habit contrary
to its nature. For instance the stone which by nature moves downwards
cannot be habituated to move upwards, not even if one tries to train
it by throwing it up ten thousand times; nor can fire be habituated
to move downwards, nor can anything else that by nature behaves in
one way be trained to behave in another. Neither by nature, then,
nor contrary to nature do the virtues arise in us; rather we are adapted
by nature to receive them, and are made perfect by habit.

Again, of all the things that come to us by nature we first acquire
the potentiality and later exhibit the activity (this is plain in
the case of the senses; for it was not by often seeing or often hearing
that we got these senses, but on the contrary we had them before we
used them, and did not come to have them by using them); but the virtues
we get by first exercising them, as also happens in the case of the
arts as well. For the things we have to learn before we can do them,
we learn by doing them, e.g. men become builders by building and lyreplayers
by playing the lyre; so too we become just by doing just acts, temperate
by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts. "
(Book II, Section 1)

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"But though our present account is of this nature we must give what
help we can. First, then, let us consider this, that it is the nature
of such things to be destroyed by defect and excess, as we see in
the case of strength and of health (for to gain light on things imperceptible
we must use the evidence of sensible things); both excessive and defective
exercise destroys the strength, and similarly drink or food which
is above or below a certain amount destroys the health, while that
which is proportionate both produces and increases and preserves it.
So too is it, then, in the case of temperance and courage and the
other virtues. For the man who flies from and fears everything and
does not stand his ground against anything becomes a coward, and the
man who fears nothing at all but goes to meet every danger becomes
rash; and similarly the man who indulges in every pleasure and abstains
from none becomes self-indulgent, while the man who shuns every pleasure,
as boors do, becomes in a way insensible; temperance and courage,
then, are destroyed by excess and defect, and preserved by the mean."
(Book II, Section 2)

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" Hence we ought to have been brought up in a particular
way from our very youth, as Plato says, so as both to delight in and
to be pained by the things that we ought; for this is the right education."
(Book II, Section 3)

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"If, then, the virtues are neither passions nor faculties, all that
remains is that they should be states of character.

Thus we have stated what virtue is in respect of its genus."
(Book II, Section 5)

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We must, however, not only describe virtue as a state of character,
but also say what sort of state it is. We may remark, then, that every
virtue or excellence both brings into good condition the thing of
which it is the excellence and makes the work of that thing be done
well; e.g. the excellence of the eye makes both the eye and its work
good; for it is by the excellence of the eye that we see well. Similarly
the excellence of the horse makes a horse both good in itself and
good at running and at carrying its rider and at awaiting the attack
of the enemy. Therefore, if this is true in every case, the virtue
of man also will be the state of character which makes a man good
and which makes him do his own work well.

How this is to happen we have stated already, but it will be made
plain also by the following consideration of the specific nature of
virtue. In everything that is continuous and divisible it is possible
to take more, less, or an equal amount, and that either in terms of
the thing itself or relatively to us; and the equal is an intermediate
between excess and defect. By the intermediate in the object I mean
that which is equidistant from each of the extremes, which is one
and the same for all men; by the intermediate relatively to us that
which is neither too much nor too little- and this is not one, nor
the same for all. For instance, if ten is many and two is few, six
is the intermediate, taken in terms of the object; for it exceeds
and is exceeded by an equal amount; this is intermediate according
to arithmetical proportion. But the intermediate relatively to us
is not to be taken so; if ten pounds are too much for a particular
person to eat and two too little, it does not follow that the trainer
will order six pounds; for this also is perhaps too much for the person
who is to take it, or too little- too little for Milo, too much for
the beginner in athletic exercises. The same is true of running and
wrestling. Thus a master of any art avoids excess and defect, but
seeks the intermediate and chooses this- the intermediate not in the
object but relatively to us.

If it is thus, then, that every art does its work well- by looking
to the intermediate and judgling its works by this standard (so that
we often say of good works of art that it is not possible either to
take away or to add anything, implying that excess and defect destroy
the goodness of works of art, while the mean preserves it; and good
artists, as we say, look to this in their work), and if, further,
virtue is more exact and better than any art, as nature also is, then
virtue must have the quality of aiming at the intermediate. I mean
moral virtue; for it is this that is concerned with passions and actions,
and in these there is excess, defect, and the intermediate. For instance,
both fear and confidence and appetite and anger and pity and in general
pleasure and pain may be felt both too much and too little, and in
both cases not well; but to feel them at the right times, with reference
to the right objects, towards the right people, with the right motive,
and in the right way, is what is both intermediate and best, and this
is characteristic of virtue. Similarly with regard to actions also
there is excess, defect, and the intermediate. Now virtue is concerned
with passions and actions, in which excess is a form of failure, and
so is defect, while the intermediate is praised and is a form of success;
and being praised and being successful are both characteristics of
virtue. Therefore virtue is a kind of mean, since, as we have seen,
it aims at what is intermediate.

Virtue, then, is a state of character concerned with choice, lying
in a mean, i.e. the mean relative to us, this being determined by
a rational principle, and by that principle by which the man of practical
wisdom would determine it. Now it is a mean between two vices, that
which depends on excess and that which depends on defect; and again
it is a mean because the vices respectively fall short of or exceed
what is right in both passions and actions, while virtue both finds
and chooses that which is intermediate. Hence in respect of its substance
and the definition which states its essence virtue is a mean, with
regard to what is best and right an extreme.

But not every action nor every passion admits of a mean; for some
have names that already imply badness, e.g. spite, shamelessness,
envy, and in the case of actions adultery, theft, murder; for all
of these and suchlike things imply by their names that they are themselves
bad, and not the excesses or deficiencies of them. It is not possible,
then, ever to be right with regard to them; one must always be wrong.
Nor does goodness or badness with regard to such things depend on
committing adultery with the right woman, at the right time, and in
the right way, but simply to do any of them is to go wrong. It would
be equally absurd, then, to expect that in unjust, cowardly, and voluptuous
action there should be a mean, an excess, and a deficiency; for at
that rate there would be a mean of excess and of deficiency, an excess
of excess, and a deficiency of deficiency. But as there is no excess
and deficiency of temperance and courage because what is intermediate
is in a sense an extreme, so too of the actions we have mentioned
there is no mean nor any excess and deficiency, but however they are
done they are wrong; for in general there is neither a mean of excess
and deficiency, nor excess and deficiency of a mean. "
(Book II, Section 6)


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"That moral virtue is a mean, then, and in what sense it is so, and
that it is a mean between two vices, the one involving excess, the
other deficiency, and that it is such because its character is to
aim at what is intermediate in passions and in actions, has been sufficiently
stated. Hence also it is no easy task to be good. For in everything
it is no easy task to find the middle, e.g. to find the middle of
a circle is not for every one but for him who knows; so, too, any
one can get angry- that is easy- or give or spend money; but to do
this to the right person, to the right extent, at the right time,
with the right motive, and in the right way, that is not for every
one, nor is it easy; wherefore goodness is both rare and laudable
and noble."

But this is no doubt difficult, and especially in individual cases;
for or is not easy to determine both how and with whom and on what
provocation and how long one should be angry; for we too sometimes
praise those who fall short and call them good-tempered, but sometimes
we praise those who get angry and call them manly. The man, however,
who deviates little from goodness is not blamed, whether he do so
in the direction of the more or of the less, but only the man who
deviates more widely; for he does not fail to be noticed. But up to
what point and to what extent a man must deviate before he becomes
blameworthy it is not easy to determine by reasoning, any more than
anything else that is perceived by the senses; such things depend
on particular facts, and the decision rests with perception. So much,
then, is plain, that the intermediate state is in all things to be
praised, but that we must incline sometimes towards the excess, sometimes
towards the deficiency; for so shall we most easily hit the mean and
what is right."
(Book II, Section 9)

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