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Full Idea
An individual distinctive excellence is attached to the name of the function (e.g. a good 'harpist').
Clarification
'Excellence' here is the Greek word 'areté', which also translates as 'virtue'
Gist of Idea
Each named function has a distinctive excellence attached to it
Source
Aristotle (Nicomachean Ethics [c.334 BCE], 1098a09)
Book Ref
Aristotle: 'Ethics (Nicomachean)', ed/tr. ThomsonJ A K/TredennickH [Penguin 1976], p.76
A Reaction
This is the core idea of Aristotle's metaethics. It seems hard to deny that a function implies the values of success and failure. The debate is likely to focus on the exact meaning of 'distinctive'.
| 5838 | A well-made dung basket is fine, and a badly-made gold shield is base, because of function [Socrates, by Xenophon] |
| 2094 | A thing's function is what it alone can do, or what it does better than other things [Plato] |
| 2095 | If something has a function then it has a state of being good [Plato] |
| 33 | Each named function has a distinctive excellence attached to it [Aristotle] |
| 23909 | Wearing a shoe is its intrinsic use, and selling it (as a shoe) is its coincidental use [Aristotle] |
| 398 | Each thing that has a function is for the sake of that function [Aristotle] |
| 15772 | A thing's active function is its end [Aristotle] |
| 22381 | Being a good father seems to depend on intentions, rather than actual abilities [Foot] |
| 3505 | The function of a heart depends on what we want it to do [Searle] |