Philosophy: Virtue and Vice: The Origin and Nature of Virtue Ethics

Running over 6 weeks this course will begin with an analysis of Aristotle’s claim that good moral judgement cannot be codified into any set of rules, but is instead a practical skill, or techne, that can only be learnt through practice, and that to be a virtuous person is to develop phronesis, or practical wisdom. From these beginnings in ancient Greece, virtue ethics in various forms has emphasised that it is not actions that are good or bad, but people, and that morality is a question not of doing certain things, but of developing a virtuous character. Through the Roman period into subsequent Christian thinking, the focus centred on the four cardinal virtues, wisdom, justice, fortitude and temperance, so the course will explore these through the work of Thomas Aquinas. The bulk of the course, however, will focus on the modern resurgence of secular versions of virtue theory during the twentieth and twenty first centuries. Looking at the work of Philippa Foot, Rosalind Hursthouse, Alasdair MacIntyre, Michael Sandel and others, we will explore the reasons for this modern renaissance, and its links to wider developments in modern philosophies of knowledge, mind and action.