Download Aristotle The only true justification of a kingdom is to create the ideal

Aristotle
 The only true justification of a kingdom is to create the ideal environment for its people
to achieve greatness.
 The state’s main job is “to provide the best life for the individuals.”
 But this life is not simply a matter of needs being met it must also be a life of virtue and
good actions.
 Community takes precedence over the individual. It is in community that one seeks
happiness
 Pleasure is not the same as happiness – happiness is the good (to live well and to do
well)
 Happiness is achieved by frequently performing with success the most perfect of
typically human tasks
 Teleological Ethics: for humans that end is to achieve happiness
 happiness can only be realized by striving to develop a good, ethical character
Habitual - When one performs certain tasks
 to do and be good they must be habits
 Teleology – happiness is what we want, but we are confused about how to achieve it.
 Happiness is the end; we desire it for its own sake
 Humans are intended to be rationale; our greatest capacity is our intelligence and our
ability to reason

*To act ethically is to engage our capacity to reason as we develop good character*


Need to maintain balance and avoid excess.
We must be moderate in all things and develop self-control – morality is destroyed
by excess
Human excellence: when people search to find who they are intended to be they develop
habits that represent what is means to be human (virtues)
To act virtuously (excellently) is to do things well and act successfully, guided by reason.
These virtuous acts must become habitual
Reason must control desire



Kant


Theoretical Reason
o Primary concerns was clarifying how humans come to know things
o This is the area of reasoning where we come to know how the laws of nature, the
laws of cause and effect, govern human behaviour
o we can understand what people actually do
Practical Reason
o moves beyond scientific and empirical knowledge to the moral dimension
guiding human behaviour
o Within the realm of knowledge, humans act not only on impulses as affected by
the laws of nature, but also out of conscious choice based on principles
o understand what we ought to do
o It is the concept of moral duty
o Believed in practical reason rather than theoretical reason












Ethics has to be based on laws of freedom and not on laws of nature (facts about the
world)
But ethics is not empirical, it must be founded on entirely priori principles i.e.
principles that are based on reason, not on experience
For our ideas to be moral laws, they must pass through our reason and judgement and not
merely be based on our experience
In analysing ideas such as ‘one should not lie’, we are using our reason (a priori
knowledge)
We must consider rationally what principles are absolute and true for everyone
You can’t say that the end justifies the means
Ethics doesn’t present us with rational, cognitive certainty, cut with practical certainty
There are three main interests in the practical area
We need these practical principles to be able to pursue and attain the supreme good
GOD
o Humans cannot achieve supreme good. Kant proposes the existence of God to
allow us to achieve the supreme good
FREEDOM
o If the supreme good is to be, in part, our achievement, then what we ought to do,
we can do. Therefore, Kant argues, humans are by nature free
IMMORTALITY
o It is impossible to obtain supreme good in this life time. That is why there is
immortality, a life beyond, in which we can achieve the supreme good.
The Good Will
 Autonomy to be a law unto one’s self
 Kant believes our most prized possession is good will; it is good in itself
 “Good Will” for Kant is the will to do our duty for no other reason that it is our duty
 Deontological
 It is hard for us to attain our purpose in life, because impulses and desires draw us away
from our duty
Moral Maxims
 First maxim
o Duty is determined by principles according to which we act
 To be ethical, an action must have a more objective principle
 To be a principle it must apply to everyone
 An ethical maxim is one on which every rational person would necessarily act if reason
were fully in charge of his or her actions

Principles tell us how we ought to act. But reason determines how this duty is
universally applicable
The person as end…not as a means
 Kant intended that people never be treated only as a means, that is, without regard to their
dignity or their working conditions
 Everyone would treat each other according to his second maxim:
o Treat another as an end not just as a mean
 He started the slogan of the eighteenth century: Dare to Know!
Deontology vs. Utilitarianism
Deontology
 Duty
Utilitarianism or Consequentialism
 Defines good or right action in terms of effects on the greatest number of people
Levinas
"The search for the good is found in our responsibility to other human beings"
-believes in singularity over community which is why each face-face encounter causes one to be
ethically responsible for the other
- believes that the face is the most nude part of the body
-God communicates to us and touches us through the eyes of others
-looking into the eyes of another causes us to feel moral obligation towards them
-For example if you look straight into your mothers eyes and tell her a lie you are sinning
directly against God
-makeup is what people use to cover up their face
-the face and eyes are the window to the soul
-therefore Levinas is against makeup
-believes that “the other” is my superior and I owe things to them
-in the face to face encounter we also see how Levinas splits ethics from morality
-ethics would be the initial experience of the face-face encounter
-morality which would be your decision of how to act on it
The Scream
-Upon hearing a scream or a “cry for help” ethically, you feel a moral obligation to help the
fellow human
-EX the movie Totsi- upon hearing the babies cry Totsi was notable to leave it alone to die
The Beggar
-The feeling of responsibility to help a fellow human in need
-EX seeing a homeless man on the street asking for change; why do we avoid eye contact?
- according to Levinas by looking into the eyes of that beggar we will have the ethical
experience and become morally obligated to help this person
I Have To
-Ones ethical character telling them to do what is right
-can apply to authority figures; when you are asked to do something by somebody in power their
request invades your conscience and evokes an ethical response
-EX having a really good time with your friends at lunch and they suggest skipping the next
period
-do you do what is bringing you momentarily happy
-or do you do what is right and fulfill your obligation
This Is Intolerable And Unfair
-The natural feeling of rage and anger when something that is obviously unfair or unjust happens
-every human has views and expectations of the world, life, and what is right and wrong
-when what “should be” contrasts from “what is” you have the ethical experience of the
intolerable and unfair
-EX you are not really a preaching catholic until you get put into a situation where your faith is
being challenged- when this happens your defense comes up and your feel obligated to react and
defend your religion even though you wouldn’t have done so if not put in that situation