LA SALLE UNIVERSITY

Ozamiz City
COLLEGE OF COMPUTER STUDIES, ENGINEERING AND ARCHITECTURE

ETHICS
(GROUP REPORTING: WRITTEN)

TITLE:
VIRTUES AND ETHICS

SUBMITTED BY:
BALAIS, LEDY MEA D.
CELECIOUS, JOHN REXIL A.
CARREON, IMMAN J.
HERVIAS, JOHN LLYOID M.
MANZO, JEFFRONE
MATILDO, JUSCENT CHELDON G.
PASOK, JONEL S.

SUBMITTED TO:
MR. WELDON SACRO
INSTRUCTOR
Phase 2

Question no.1, Does virtue ethics help us understand what it means to be a human being?

As we were born in the world, the life and the world we lived is something to be very
meaningful, very crucial and very sentimental for each one of us. A person is an individual
that has a soul and a body but to be a human being is to have the ability to think, analyze,
communicate and expresses thoughts. A human being is to give his/her life a purpose and a
mission to live. As time passes by and our number of age is apparently increasing, the norms
we practiced that was reinforced and taught from the people, who were with us that helped us
to be empathetic for individuals, who deserves the empathy they needed. Every single act of
thoughtfulness and kindness equates wonderful change for everyone, for the true essence of
being alive is to be able to share and to make difference in some way. In a manner of being
commiserated to see the true realm of humanity. On the other hand, to be a human being is
also to socialize and adapt to their environment and being good as a human is a nature where
society created that concept.

The virtue ethics founding fathers were Plato and Aristotle, in the West. Also,
Mencius and Confucius in the East. Figured in the virtue ethics tradition, the virtues and
vices, motives and moral character, moral education, moral wisdom or discernment, friends
and family relationship, a wider concept of happiness, with the emotions of our lives that
gives it a role to our moral life, and the fundamentally important wondering and questions of
what sorts of persons we should be and how we should live (Anscombe 1958).

A virtue is a multi-track system, it would obviously be unwise to assign one to an

agent on the basis of a single action observed or even a series of similar actions, particularly
if a person do not know the agent’s motives for doing the same thing as a person did
(Screenivasan 2002).

It is a matter of degree to hold one virtue. To completely possess such a tendency is to

embody total or perfect virtue, which is uncommon, and there are a number of ways to fall
short of that ideal. (Athanassoulis 2000). Mostly, people who can be categorized as relatively
decent, and definitely substantially better than those who can really be characterized as
selfish, self-centered and greedy, still have their blind spots. Small places where they do not
behave for the reasons one would assume. Further, having one’s emotions in balance with
one’s logical understanding of certain motivations for action is not trivial.
 Virtue ethics accept that virtue is needed for fundamental and practical knowledge
and they vary in how they incorporate these and the other principles to show what a person
ought to make in a specific circumstances and how a person ought to fulfill the entire life.

It describes the four form of virtue ethics taken through a current virtue ethics. The
eudaemonist virtue ethics, agent-based virtue ethics, target-centered virtue ethics, and
platonistic virtue ethics. The eudemonia idea, came from the ancient Greek moral philosophy
that is mean as “happiness” or “prospering” and sometimes as “well-being”. It is to believe
that live a life including the external matter, like physical pleasure or luxury. Second, agent-
based virtue ethics. “Agent-based virtue ethics understands rightness in terms of good
motivations and wrongness in term of having of bad (or insufficiently good) motives” (Slote
2001:14). The third one, target-centered virtue ethics, according to Swanton (2003) target-
centered virtue ethics starts with the existing perceptions of virtues. We already have a fair
idea of what traits are virtues and what they imply. It does make right action allows us to go
beyond evaluating one or a single action or value and the acts that arise from it because a
single action may have following different fields. Lastly, platonistic virtue ethics, the concept
from Plato. Which in the clearest and widest context that good agency implies reflection of
the quality of the good.

Virtue ethics help individual to understand what it means to be a human being.

According to Aristotle, it is a search to understand how to live life of moral character. Virtue
ethics is a normative type of ethical approach that seeks for norms and standards within
humanity and society. By practicing virtue of mind, having a sense of good values, honesty,
generosity, prudence, zeal, and so on, it develops one's character.

Virtue ethics helps individual how to be human because it allows individual to act in
accordance of what is essential for a human morality.

Within the virtue ethics help a person to be a human being. Virtue ethics makes a
person the highest form of animal that has five and more senses such as touch, sight, smell,
taste, hearing and a capacity as a person that cooperates and defined their characteristics.
According to Kant, we must know the concept of a good will, responsibilities, obligation and
duty as a human being as well as the logical relationships to one another, before we can say
certainly that our use of these concept is justified. And Kant said that ethics should start with
analysis.
 Without virtue ethics human is no difference to an animal. Both humans and animals
can act instinctively but the difference is that humans can control itself, and is reasonable
while animals are impulsive by its instinct. Humans and animals are programmed on what to
do in most situations. Most animals since birth knows what is food and how to eat them, they
kill for survival without thinking weather killing is good or bad. On the other hand, human
babies also act instinctively, they don't know how to talk but every time they get hungry they
cry as form of communication.

Humans and animals have its instinct but the only thing that separates humans from
animals is that through time humans develop moral character. Humans feel a sense of what is
right or wrong from innocent babies to a virtuous ethical person. Because human is virtuously
ethical he/she knows what is evil and good that enables him/her to act accordingly to the
norms. With this people tend to have concern to others and do things for the betterment of
his/her surroundings. Thus, if a person doesn't have norms of being virtuously ethical and
only focuses on its self without any consideration to his/her surroundings he/she is just being
instinctive just like an animal.

Understanding virtue ethics is somehow a means of being upright since it discusses

how a sentient being’s actions were criticized and sorted. Being in reliable of his/her actions,
an individual must do things that are morally acceptable in the society in order for him/ her
not to deviate the rules and regulations a certain organization and legislation had
implemented.

Individuals who do good or in contrast, violated the rules means, that the person had
realized what it is to be more humanistic and empathic in this world. As a human being, we
have our own foundation of principle. Each human has its own traits. By this we can act
according to our own desires. It also involves our way of understanding moral life that we are
practicing.

What about those person who committed crime but still shows of having principles
and virtues in life, are they consider inhuman? Just like the security guard named Alchie
Paray who hostages civilians at Virra mall Greenhills shopping complex in Manila.
According to his statement he did that because he was being fired in his job and for the
reason that he didn't want how his employers treated employees like him. He added that there
is curruption happening within the mall and this pushes him to do this action so that people
will be aware of this and there will be no employees like him will be exploited with this kind
of system. Despite of what he have done many citizen admire the braveness that Paray
display. It takes courage and sacrifice to face the wrongness that happened in the society
even himself could commit such crime. During the hostage taking Paray show concern with
his hostages he still taking good care of them. In this dilemma Paray commit violation in the
law but he able to gain respect and sympathy of the citizens in these case Parays shows
principles and virtue of braveness, displaying concern to the employee but still he should be
penalized of what he have done according to the law.

We were born humans biologically but it takes virtue ethics to be human. A person
who is virtues automatically become ethical. This person knows how to act and think
ethically. Because of the norms and standards that are set by the society we can classify
person who is being human to a person and who is being inhuman. With virtue ethics we
have better understanding what it really means to be human and that is to do good and do
what is morally right.

People tend to seek what is the true essence of life and it mirrors the question of how
to be human. In accordance to the teachings of the Catholic religion, the true essence of our
very own existence is to worship and please God and the only thing to please God is to be
good and do good things to other. God is pleased by a virtuous person and He is displease by
hypocrite and evil person. In terms of philosophy, by being virtuously ethical person one can
understand how to be human and can able to have a good life. What ever norms it may be,
philosophically and biblically, both have the same answer on how to be human and that is to
be good and be a virtuous person.

Virtue pertains to a standard of right meanwhile ethics means philosophical study of

human conduct; particularly to determine whether it is morally good or morally bad.
Moreover, through virtue ethics we will be able to know our goals within us and what we
really wanted to be. If we did things that marks and gives significance with each and every
one, it is just we automatically realized that the truth about humanity is doing such great
things that others can’t do which molds us to be the better human person of tomorrow.

The virtue and ethics is said to be synonyms, both makes a person do and think what
is right and defined as what makes a person good or bad. Virtue ethics is somewhat the basis
of the society to have the rights and laws to every human being. Thus, this helps us
understand that everyone has the traits to be called as a human being.
 As we people lived in the same global world. We lived in different perspective, lived
with different ideology and also lived with different belief and practices. As the world today
we believed with either injustice or justice because of the law we follow in order to gain
freedom and empathy to each one of us people.

The time pass by our empathy, also our own norms as we practice, we gain full of
kindness and generosity that base of our families and teachers who teach us well-mannered to
educate us well enough to face the real world. That also some of us people does not educate
us well enough to be real mannered persons because of lack of discipline and governance of
each one of us, that's why it's hard for us humans to gain real virtue ethics for ourselves.

Through our verbal and non-verbal cues, we communicate or the conversations of

ourselves to other people that surround us. We speak and think base of our practices or
believed that some of us think that through our words that we spoke out of our mouths know
that we are right or wrong and also our body gestures that we spoke out to someone's. As we
humans know our limits when to start and when to stop because of our humanistic ideology.
As we humans, we do good and we do bad because of our own satisfaction and decisions for
ourselves that end the end that we benefit as base on our decisions we made. Every person in
this world have realize to be empathy and humanistic persons in our society.

Through virtues ethics mold us to be a decisions maker is not about to have a good
manner or to have a good conduct for ourselves to our society. Through this we simply doing
morally good and doing morally bad through our choices. This is not about selfishness or
something else to think of. It is all about to balance the societies life of people, simply base
on their ideology and also their significance of virtues ethics that we believed in because
through virtues ethics we achieved our ultimate goals in life to be better persons especially to
our respective societies we lived in. Therefore, as we people do not have same ultimate goals
in life or have a virtue ethics in ourselves. The important matter is we think the best of our
choices and think decisions through morally good or morally bad as we speak or actions we
made in our societies.

Initial Table of content:

Reference:
Johnson, Robert and Cureton, Adam, “Kant’s Moral Philosophy”, The Stanford Encyclopedia
of Philosophy (Spring 2019 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.)

URL = https://plato.stanford,edu/archives/spr2019/entries/kant-moral/

“Ethics Unwrapped” University of Texas at Austine.edu. Virtue Ethics. 2020

URL = https://ethicsunwrapped.utexas.edu/glossary/virtue-ethics