Aristotle
Aristotle
Aristotle
Ruziah bt Zainuddin(0610066)
(0616164)
Rahimah bt Omar(0618472)
1
EDC2354
Topic:
Aristotle And Moral Character
Lecturer:
Dr.Adnan b. Abd.Rashid
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Historical Context
The “Golden Age” of Greece (500-300 BCE)
Socrates > Plato > Aristotle > Alexander
Aristotle (384-322 BCE)
Born in Macedonia where father and
grandfather were personal physicians of the
kings of Macedonia, tutored Alexander, left
Athens to avoid persecution and “to prevent
Athens from sinning twice against philosophy”
20 years and studied under Plato, founded
the Lyceum
Wrote c. 27 “books” including works on
science (10, including 2 on psychology)
logic (6)
philosophy (7)
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Character according to Aristotle..
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Aristotle’s account of moral character
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Aristotle’s Conception of Human
Development
Teleology
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Teleology
Definitions:
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Aristotle’s Model of the Mind
The soul is “the substantial form” of the body.
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Divisions of the Soul
Definition of a “Faculty”
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Divisions of the Soul
(The Main Divisions)
The two main
divisions of the soul
are its rational and
irrational faculties,
which are
distinguished by
their governing
principles, namely
Reason (upper
circle) and Pleasure
and Satiety (lower
circle).
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Pure & Calculative Reason
Pure (Theoretical) Reason:
knows reality but does not
change it.
Calculative (Practical) Rea-
son: knows how to change
reality.
Deliberates over which actions
will best achieve specific goals
in specific circumstances.
“Rationalizes” the irrational
parts of the soul by imposing
its rule on them.
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Practical Reason & Virtue
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Human Flourishing
To answer Aristotle’s question one can ask what
everyone wants out of life.
Note: Acorns strive but don’t “want”; however, for
humans wanting and striving go together.
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Human Teleology
(The Function of “Man”)
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Cont..The Function of Man
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How do we Define Virtue?
a virtue is often (but not always) a “mean”
between two extremes, an excess and a
defect:
example of courage – sometimes the
deficiency is more to be avoided than the
excess
there do not seem to be general rules or
principles, and certainly no algorithms or
formulae for virtue
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Moral Virtue
Moderation is the
heart of moral
excellence.
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Example: Courage
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Conclusion
‘Good’ is not so much in terms of
following a system of ultimate
principles, obeying rules or
calculating pleasurable
consequences but rather in term of
human excellence that is the ability
to choose the golden mean between
deficiency and excess.
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Cont…
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