MARY ROSE T.

TOLENTINO ETH BSTM 2A

ARISTOTLE – Nicomachean Ethics

Book 1, Chapter 1. According to Aristotle, every artwork, line of inquiry, action, and decision
seeks some end, or “good”, but these goods differ. For instance, health is the end of medicine.
Few of these are subordinate or minor to others – bridle-making, for example, is subordinate to
horsemanship, and different warfare actions are subordinate to generality. Thus, Aristotle argues,
the ends of these "ruling sciences" are more "choice worthy" than their subordinate ends (like
horsemanship or generalship), since the lower ends are followed for the sake of the higher.

Book 1, Chapter 7. Whether or not, according to Aristotle, there's good thing from which all
other good things come, Aristotle says that, in each science, the good thing is the goal that it
strives for, and sometimes that's more than one thing, and for the sake of others, we aim at those
things. He also concludes that this kind of good is exactly happiness. On the other side, nobody
prefers happiness to become virtuous, therefore, it is a full end in itself.

He describes human work as "activity of the soul in accordance with reason" and a "serious man"
(one committed to moral virtue) task is to work well and nobly. Thus, in accordance with virtue,
human good has much to do with soul behavior. Not just any virtue, however: the fullest virtue.
Remember, the absolute best in any category is that which is most complete and self-sufficient.
Principles may be found, but each according to its own character, some by observation, and
others by logic and "habituation."

Book 2. Chapter 1. There are 2 kinds of virtue: Intellectual and moral. The product of education,
which involves experience, is called as intellectual virtue, while moral virtues happen because of
habits. Moral virtues came from the word “ethike”, which means “habit” or “ethos”. This also
shows that moral virtues for humans are not "natural"; it is something we learn by habit over
time. According to Aristotle, we only acquire virtues only by following the habits associated
with them. He compares this with any skill, such as constructing a house; it is the experience that
counts. This is the intention of those who make laws: to create good people by encouraging them
to obey the law. And for Aristotle, this just proves that we need teachers to nurture us, since we
are not born already good or bad.

Book 2. Chapter 2. Aristotle tells us that we are not only speaking about this inquiry into
happiness/goodness, it is intended to help us become good. And he wants to talk about acts
because being successful means that we're going to have to act in ways that is worthy. Also, note
that our acts decide our attributes – the virtues we create as we practice them. He addresses the
principle of acting with "correct reason" (which is sometimes called "right reason" by other
translators). More on this later, Aristotle promises. He states that, through excesses or failures,
all virtues either prosper or die. If we're scared of something (a lack of bravery), we become
cowards. We're reckless when we run into danger (excess). To become a good person who acts
with virtue, we must look for the "mean", the balance between abundance and deficiency. And
only if we cultivate the features associated with each virtue will we behave virtuously. So, in the
face of terror, if we want to be brave, we have to learn to act well.

Book 2. Chapter 5. In this chapter, Aristotle says that virtue must belong to one of those soul
parts: passions, faculties, and state of characters. Passions and how we treat them have to do with
pleasure and pain (desire, fear, joy, etc). Faculties allow us to cope with passions (i.e. the
mechanism that helps us feel empathy, desire, etc). And in relation to passions, characteristics
help us place ourselves. They help us respond to them well or negatively. So, depending on our
features, it is possible to react badly to fear or to be reckless or to be moderate in our response.
Aristotle says that, since men are neither rewarded nor punished for their passions, as they are for
virtues and vices, virtues cannot come under passions. The same applies to ability. For one thing,
from birth, we have "natural abilities" not so for virtues. Also, our capacity to have passions is
not celebrated or blamed on us. That leaves us with some features. This works out nicely,
because we possess the potential to behave well or poorly in our characteristics.

Book 2. Chapter 6. Aristotle tries to further break down virtue. What kind of trait is it, especially
with regard to human beings? It's the trait that makes people successful and allows their acts to
be done well. On the contrary, Aristotle requires the essence of virtue to be debated. In itself,
what is a virtue? Some other ways of thinking about virtue and vice are given to us by Aristotle.
First, it's a preference, a thinking attribute. It's a mean, then, between two vices (one of excess,
one of deficiency). So if the virtue is bravery, and the weakness is egotism, the excess will be
recklessness. Virtue can be an extreme on the other hand (i.e. it's the extreme of doing well).