TPQs (2/5) Group 1 Posts, Group 2 Responds

[Becko Copenhaver]

[vmco...@lclark.edu]

Rosalind Hursthouse's piece, "Normative Virtue Ethics" attempts to describe how Aristotle's Virtue Theory can be used as a normative, or "how to act", discipline. She points out the similarities between deontology and utilitarianism's path for deciding the course of action, while defending Virtue Theory as also having a way of determining what the right action is and how to pursue it. She claims, "An action is right if it is what a virtuous agent would characteristically do in the circumstances." Alike with the other two opposing theories, she mentions that this premise alone does not give sufficient advice for how an agent can act, and neither does the first premise in deontology or utilitarianism. She clearly defends her argument, stating that to know how a virtuous agent would act, ask a friend or person that you regard as more virtuous than yourself.

The point she makes of asking another person you hold to be more virtuous (i.e. more honest, just, or fair) than yourself, seemed to be a bit odd to me. Isn't it merely by other people claiming that this particular person is more virtuous that one can request to seek their advice? Just because you believe that someone is more virtuous than yourself, it would be very hard to know that they aren't equally as virtuous as yourself and could therefore offer worse advice to you than if you followed your own morals. It may seem nit-picky, but Hursthouse does not make a strong argument for deciding who exactly to turn to when faced with a moral dilemma.

[rh...@lclark.edu]

I'm inclined to agree.  Humans are after all not perfect so it's possible that we could misjudge whether or not someone is more virtuous than ourselves.  Different people may have very different ideas about who embodies certain virtues.  That being said utilitarianism suffers the same problem, we can't always be sure which action will bring the most happiness.  It seems that from this the decision process of virtue ethics isn't any more reliable than that of utilitarianism.  Hursthouse's argument would be helped if she could provide at least some sort of criteria for identifying virtuous people, at least something more than personal feelings on the subject.  

[beaub]

Hursthouse, as mentioned in the posts above, attempts to defend virtue ethics against the objection that it doesn't tell us how we should act. She does this with mixed success. When discussing moral wisdom, she draws on Aristotle to claim that "moral knowledge, unlike mathematical knowledge, cannot be acquired merely by attending lectures and is not characteristically to be found in people too young to have much experience of life." She then asks "Why are there not moral whiz-kids, the way there are mathematical whiz-kids?" (250). 

This seems to contrast with her discussion of how we must look for virtuous agents when determining a course of action in specific circumstances when we are otherwise unsure (246). Do you think there are moral whiz-kids? Surely we know people in our lives (or maybe we think of ourselves as someone) who we see as very ethical. Can we learn morality just as we learn math? Is morality really as developmentally empirical as Hursthouse and others might claim, or do some people have a more innate sense of morality? 

[mblak...@lclark.edu]

I felt Hursthouse's statement regarding the lack of "moral whiz-kids," in relation to there being a set of rules that "any clever adolescent could apply correctly," to be somewhat contradictory of the relationship between virtue and preexisting conditions. If a human were to be born with the preexisting conditions necessary to lead a virtuous life--if she were to win the hypothetical virtue lottery--could she in fact be considered a moral whiz-kid? Do humans in such a position have a duty to reach a level of virtue that others do not, or do they not need to "practice" virtue in the way that their less fortunate counterparts do? Do they have a duty to teach such practices to the less virtuous? Can a Demandingness Objection be argued in opposition of normative virtue ethics? 

[sbea...@lclark.edu]

In Normative Virtue Ethics, Hursthouse explains that the fact that virtue ethics is agent-centered and deontology and utilitarianism are act-centered, does not mean that virtue ethics cannot determine which actions are right and which are wrong.  She then goes on to give an example to illustrate that the acceptance of irresolvable dilemmas does not validate pluralism, claiming, "I am imagining a case in which my two virtuous agents have the same moral views about everything, up to and including the view that in this particular case, neither decision is the right one, and hence neither is wrong (Hursthouse, 252)."

Would you agree that in a case of an irresolvable dilemma that is faced by two people with the same moral views, that the fact that there is no right action for either of them entails that neither of the actions they decide to take could be wrong?

[Ian Dechow]

Given that their seems to be no standard in the indoctrination of a good moral grounding in children, is it ethical in virtue theory to set one up, if it could be done?  We have parents and religion, but these are not hardly enough. Thinking of ways to teach someone to be ethical is mind numbing. They have to come to it on their own at least from a logical perspective.  Growing up we are put in settings that give us an outline of how to behave (all Mythos), but that is not a product of logic. the ethical theories we have learned about all stem from logic. But virtue theory stems from intuition also.  Does this make it a more human ethical theory? And as such more applicable to human life?

[sretzlaff]

I do agree with this case where two agents, whom have the same moral views about everything, figure that there is no right action for either of them, thus neither action is wrong.  If the agents are required to choose to do an action, they would be doing so to "To avoid that evil, or, To secure this good" as a good moral reason of her own which lead to the understanding that the dilemma was irresolvable in the first place (Hursthouse, 252). Each agent could give reasons for what they did, but the explanation would be in terms of 'psychological autobiography.' Ultimately, I do agree that if each agent believed there to be no right choice, then there would be no wrong choice.

[ega...@lclark.edu]

Hursthouse's argument does not seem to be that if 'there is no right action for either of them [it' entails that neither of the actions...could be wrong." On the contrary, I interpreted her argument to be that If two virtuous agents deliberate on a situation and come up with two different actions, it is conceivable that both of those actions could be right. Her point seems to be that if you possess the virtues needed to deliberate on a case with much thought and consideration, then the very possession of the virtues would lead you to do the right thing, and it is reconcilable that that action could be different from another virtuous agents', and be just as right.