Virtue Ethics

Aristotle thinks that the human being possesses a distinctive function to fulfill.
Aristotle in Nicomachean Ethics stated that all activities aim at some good and the good
has rightly been declared to be that which all things aim.
Ethics constitutes the finality of our action.
Aristotle thinks that goodness and virtue are linked.
The good for Aristotle is concerned with the state of living well.
Eudaimonia - the state of “living well”, which for the Greeks means living the good life
or the life that is truly lived which is never about the accumulation of material wealth, rather,
goes beyond the ephemeral value of things.
Happiness defines the good life and that, “Happiness seems to come as a result of virtue
and some process of learning and training.”
Virtue - state of character concerned with choice and is built from practical wisdom. It
defines a person’s ultimate goal in molding himself as an individual.
Intellectual Virtue - owes its genesis and growth to teaching.
Moral Virtue - comes about as a result of habit and signifies the capacity to be excellent
in doing things. These are character traits that help the individual attain self-perfection.
Self-perfection - the realization of the potentials of the soul.
Character - refers to the human beings’ ability to make choices in such a way that his
actions are neither excessive nor inadequate which requires a form of self-mastery.
Self-mastery - it constitutes the meaning of good character.
The self can achieve perfection through phronesis or practical wisdom.
Practical wisdom - refers to one’s knowledge of the good.
The human being when he acts must seek the middle, the mesotes or the mean as a
balance between two extremes of excess and deficiency.
Human beings are composed of body and soul where the soul is the seat of control and
commands the body as the instrument.
Rational soul - composed of the intellect that determines how human beings must act.
Intellect - it is the highest element of the human soul that regulates human action.
Irrational soul - composed of the vegetative and the appetitive elements.
Vegetative - the lowest part of the soul that deals with the body’s organic growth.
Appetitive - deals with human emotions and desires.
The basic idea is for the human being to be able to control these impulses and direct the
soul to the morally virtuous act.
Utilitarianism

Utility - a property in every object, either it tends to produce good effects or prevents bad things
from happening is considered (Jeremy Bentham, 1976:34).

Utilitarianism as consequentialism - an act is to be evaluated based on its tendency to bring

pleasure on utility.

John Stuart Mill on Utilitarianism

Greatest Happiness Principle - “human actions are morally right in proportion as they tend to
produce happiness and wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness.”

Quality of Pleasure - we act in terms of a benefit or advantage; an act is undesirable if it results

in a loss or disadvantage.

Happiness - the intended pleasure and the absences of pain and by unhappiness, pain and
privation of pleasure.

Jeremy Bentham on Utilitarianism

“The morality is sacrificed from little goodness to big goodness, where it is evaluated based on
its tendency to bring pleasure or utility to a greater happiness for all concerned.

Quantity of Pleasure - actions should be taken to produce the greatest amount of happiness to
increase the overall happiness or pleasure experienced by people and reduce pain or suffering.

The Hedonistic Calculus - it is called the “measurement of pleasure or happiness,” developed by

Jeremy Bentham, where utilitarianism judges the rightness or wrongness of an act.

A person can measure human happiness by evaluating the level of:

Intensity, Duration, Probability, Proximity, Fecundity, Extent, Purity

Utilitarianism as a Hedonistic Theory - “the right act is the one that produces the greatest net
happiness or pleasure for all concerned.”

Act Utilitarianism - all consequences of each human action should result in general happiness or
the greatest net utility and requires that individuals must act in order to realize pleasure.

Rule Utilitarianism - it follows the rule of conduct where moral action which belongs to a kind of
acts by way of common experience results in maximum utility. It simply sets a standard for
morality to achieve the same result.