IB Philosophy 4.1.2 Virtue/character-based Theories Notes

Virtue Ethics: A Third Approach to Morality

1. Topic 4.1.1 introduced two major families of ethical theory: deontological theories, which judge actions by conformity to moral duties, and teleological theories, which judge actions by consequences. This topic introduces a third approach, virtue ethics, which shifts the fundamental question from "What should I do?" to "What kind of person should I be?"
2. Virtue ethics originates with Aristotle in the fourth century BCE. Rather than asking which rules to follow or outcomes to maximize, Aristotle asked what it means to live a flourishing human life.
3. His answer centres on developing virtues: stable character traits enabling a person to act well and achieve eudaimonia (human flourishing).
4. Eudaimonia is not mere pleasure or subjective happiness. It is an objective condition of living well and doing well encompassing the full range of human capacities.
5. For Aristotle, a eudaimon life is one in which a person exercises the virtues consistently over a complete lifetime. This connects to the Unit 4 question, "How should we treat people?", by suggesting that the answer lies in the character of the moral agent.
6. Consider two lives: Pericles, the Athenian statesman who built civic institutions, fostered the arts, and exercised political leadership, and Callias, who spent his life pursuing pleasure and accumulating wealth. For Aristotle, Pericles exemplifies eudaimonia; Callias does not, regardless of how happy Callias subjectively felt.
7. Flourishing is not a feeling but an activity: the sustained practice of the virtues (the excellences that make us fully human) across a complete life.
8. Aristotle identifies virtue as a mean between two extremes (the "doctrine of the mean"). Courage is the mean between cowardice (deficiency) and recklessness (excess).
9. Generosity lies between miserliness (giving too little) and profligacy (reckless over-spending). The virtuous person has developed the practical wisdom to find the appropriate response in each situation.
10. This practical wisdom is what Aristotle calls phronesis: the capacity to perceive the morally relevant features of a situation and respond appropriately. Phronesis cannot be reduced to rules.

Virtues, Community, and the Limits of Virtue Ethics

1. Phronesis develops through experience, habituation, and reflection. This sets virtue ethics apart from Kantian deontology, which seeks universal rules you can apply straight from reason, without needing any life experience at all.
2. Aristotle divides virtues into two categories. Moral virtues (courage, temperance, justice, generosity) develop through habit and practice.
3. Intellectual virtues develop through teaching and reflection. These include phronesis (practical wisdom), sophia (theoretical wisdom about deep truths), and episteme (scientific knowledge). Phronesis holds a special place because it guides the exercise of all other virtues by determining the right action in each context.
4. Virtue is not developed in isolation but within a political community (polis) that provides conditions for flourishing. Aristotle argues that humans are by nature political animals and that the state's purpose is enabling citizens to live virtuous lives.
5. This connects virtue ethics to political philosophy (Unit 7).
6. A key strength of virtue ethics is its focus on moral character rather than isolated actions. Deontological and teleological theories evaluate individual decisions, but virtue ethics recognizes that moral life is shaped by long-term patterns of behaviour, emotional response, and practical reasoning.
7. A common objection is the problem of action guidance. If the right action is "whatever the virtuous person would do," how do we know what that is?
8. Critics argue that virtue ethics provides a character ideal but insufficient guidance for specific moral decisions.
9. Defenders respond that this objection misunderstands phronesis. Virtue ethics argues that moral perception and good judgement, cultivated through experience, are more reliable guides than abstract rules or calculations.
10. This point about phronesis and action guidance will be revisited in 4.1.3.

Anscombe, MacIntyre, and the Revival of Virtue Ethics