display all the ideas for this combination of texts
12 ideas
| 5966 | All virtue is good, but not always praised (as in not lusting after someone ugly) [Chrysippus] |
| Full Idea: Although deeds done in accordance with virtue are congenial, not all are cited as examples, such as courageously extending one's finger, or continently abstaining from a half-dead old woman, or not immediately agreeing that three is four. | |
| From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE], fr 211), quoted by Plutarch - 70: Stoic Self-contradictions 1038f | |
| A reaction: Presumably the point (so elegantly expressed - what a shame we have lost most of Chrysippus) is that virtue comes in degrees, even though its value is an absolute. The same has been said (by Russell and Bonjour) about self-evidence. |
| 20196 | Virtue theory is hopeless if there is no core of agreed universal virtues [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: An analysis of virtue is hopeless unless we can assume that most of a selected list of traits count as virtues, in a way not strictly culture. ...These would include wisdom, courage, benevolence, justice, honesty, loyalty, integrity, and generosity. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.1) | |
| A reaction: This requirement needs there to be a single core to human nature, right across the species. If we are infinitely flexible (as existentialists imply) then the virtues will have matching flexibility, and so will be parochial and excessively relative. |
| 20200 | A virtue must always have a corresponding vice [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: It is important for the nature of virtue that it have a corresponding vice (or two, in the doctrine of the mean). Claustrophobia is not a vice not only because it is involuntary, but also because there is no corresponding virtue. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.3) | |
| A reaction: Presumably attaining a virtue is an achievement, so we would expect a label for failure in the same field of endeavour. The failure is not purely negative, because bad things ensue if the virtue is not present. |
| 20201 | Eight marks distingush skills from virtues [Zagzebski, by PG] |
| Full Idea: The difference between skills and virtues is that virtues must be enacted, are always desirable, can't be forgotten, and can be simulated, whereas skills are very specific, involve a technique, lack contraries, and lack intrinsic value. | |
| From: report of Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.4) by PG - Db (ideas) | |
| A reaction: [my summary of her II 2.4 discussion of the differences] She observes that Aristotle made insufficient effort to distinguish the two. It may be obscure to say that virtues go 'deeper' than skills, but we all know what is meant. 'Skills serve virtues'. |
| 20203 | Virtues are deep acquired excellences of persons, which successfully attain desire ends [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: A virtue can be defined as 'a deep and enduring acquired excellence of a person, involving a characteristic motivation to produce a certain desired end and reliable success in bringing about that end'. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.7) | |
| A reaction: She puts this in bold, and it is the culminating definition of a long discussion. It rather obviously fails to say anything about the nature of the end that is desired. Learning the telephone book off by heart seems to fit the definition. |
| 20207 | Every moral virtue requires a degree of intelligence [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: Being reasonably intelligent within a certain area of life is part of having almost any moral virtue. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 3.1) | |
| A reaction: The fact that this bars persons of very limited intelligence from acquiring the Aristotelian virtues is one of the attractions of the Christian enjoinder to merely achieve 'love'. Anyone can have a warm heart. So is virtue elitist? |
| 20855 | Chrysippus says virtue can be lost (though Cleanthes says it is too secure for that) [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus says that virtue can be lost, owing to drunkenness and excess of black bile, whereas Cleanthes says it cannot, because it consists in secure intellectual grasps, and it is worth choosing for its own sake. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.127 | |
| A reaction: Succumbing to drunkenness looks like evidence that you were not truly virtuous. Mental illness is something else. On the whole I agree the Cleanthes. |
| 5970 | Chrysippus says nothing is blameworthy, as everything conforms with the best nature [Chrysippus, by Plutarch] |
| Full Idea: Chrysippus has often written on the theme that there is nothing reprehensible or blameworthy in the universe since all things are accomplished in conformity with the best nature. | |
| From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Plutarch - 70: Stoic Self-contradictions 1051b | |
| A reaction: This is Leibniz's "best of all possible worlds", but deriving the idea from the rightness of nature rather than the perfection of God. Chrysippus has a more plausible ground than Leibniz, as for him nasty things follow from conscious choice. |
| 20214 | Virtue theory can have lots of rules, as long as they are grounded in virtues and in facts [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: A pure virtue theory can have as many rules as you like as long as they are understood as grounded in the virtuous motivations and understanding of the nonmoral facts that virtuous agents possess. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 6.1) | |
| A reaction: It is important, I think, to see that a virtue theorist does not have to be a particularist. |
| 20213 | We need phronesis to coordinate our virtues [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: We need phronesis (practical wisdom) to coordinate the various virtues into a single line of action or line of thought leading up to an act or to a belief. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 5.2) | |
| A reaction: If I have a conflicting virtue and vice in a single situation, something must make sure that the virtue dominates. That sounds more like Kant's 'good will' than like phronesis. |
| 20209 | For the virtue of honesty you must be careful with the truth, and not just speak truly [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: It is not sufficient for honesty that a person tells whatever she happens to believe is the truth. An honest person is careful with the truth. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 3.2) | |
| A reaction: Not sure about that. It matches what Aristotle says about courage, which also needs practical reason [phronesis]. But being sensitive and careful with truth seems to need other virtues. If total honesty is not a virtue, then is honesty a virtue at all? |
| 20197 | The courage of an evil person is still a quality worth having [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: In the case of a courageous Nazi soldier, my position is that a virtue is worth having even in those cases in which it makes a person worse overall. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.2) | |
| A reaction: A brave claim, which seems right. If a nasty Nazi reforms, they will at least have one good quality which can be put to constructive use. |