Virtue in Virtue Ethics

This paper represents two polemics. One is against suggestions (made by Harman and others) that recent psychological research counts against any claim that there is such a thing as genuine virtue (Cf. Harman, in: Byrne, Stalnaker, Wedgwood (eds.) Fact and value, pp 117–127, 2001). The other is against the view that virtue ethics should be seen as competing against such theories as Kantian ethics or consequentialism, particularly in the specification of decision procedures.     

解读作为美德的感恩德性

作为美德的感恩德性蕴含了三重维度伦理关系.感恩美德德性的生成不是一个自发过程,而是在三重维度的感恩伦理关系交互作用下,经过主体一系列的伦理心理环节而生成.如何增强人们对于感恩美德的认知,自觉地履行感恩美德?如何让青少年学会感恩?一是须区分作为美德的感恩与建立在利益计较、物物往来关系之上的人与人交往中的感恩;二是引导人们特别是青少年对于感恩美德的认知,激励人们作为美德的感恩情感;三是对于社会组织而言,须增强感恩美德的制度供给机制.     

论德性

德性是人优秀品质中的一种,是由理智或智慧在正确道德观念的前提下根据有利于具有者和他活动于其中的共同体及其成员更好生存的根本要求培育的,通常以心理定势对人的活动发生作用并使人的活动及其主体成为善(好)的道德意义上的善(好)品质,即道德的品质.它具有指向性、意向性、多维性、统一性、稳定性和普适性等主要特征.德性从直觉的层次看是社会道德要求的内化,但从批判的层次上看则根源于人更好生存的需要.德性一般都体现为德目或德性要求,因而具有规范性,但德性规范是构成性规则,与作为规范性规则的道德规范有所不同.     

Virtue Ethics

I discuss a puzzle that shows there is a need to develop a new metaphysical interpretation of mathematical theories, because all well-known interpretations conflict with important aspects of mathematical activities. The new interpretation, I argue, must authenticate the ontological commitments of mathematical theories without curtailing mathematicians' freedom and authority to creatively introduce mathematical ontology during mathematical problem-solving. Further, I argue that these two constraints are best met by a metaphysical interpretation of mathematics that takes mathematical entities to be constitutively constructed by human activity in a manner similar to the constitutive construction of the US Supreme Court by certain legal and political activities. Finally, I outline some of the philosophical merits of metaphysical interpretations of mathematical theories of this type.     

Virtue in Argument

Virtue theories have become influential in ethics and epistemology. This paper argues for a similar approach to argumentation. Several potential obstacles to virtue theories in general, and to this new application in particular, are considered and rejected. A first attempt is made at a survey of argumentational virtues, and finally it is argued that the dialectical nature of argumentation makes it particularly suited for virtue theoretic analysis.     

德性与善

从根本上说,德性不仅是完成人们的内在利益所必需的品格,同时也是有益于整体生活的善的品格。德性作为一种品格,它在成就人的至善行为中能稳定和促进人的向善能力。     

Virtue and Salience

This paper explores two ways in which evaluations of an agent's character as virtuous or vicious are properly influenced by what the agent finds salient or attention-grabbing. First, we argue that ignoring salient needs reveals a greater deficit of benevolent motivation in the agent, and hence renders the agent more blameworthy. We use this fact to help explain our ordinary intuition that failing to give to famine relief (for example) is in some sense less bad than failing to help a child who is drowning right before your eyes, in a way that's compatible with the contention that there's no principled reason to see the one life-saving act as any more or less choiceworthy than the other. Second, we argue that alleged ‘virtues of ignorance’ (modesty, believing better of friends than the evidence supports, etc.) are better understood as ‘virtues of salience’. Rather than placing demands on what we believe, these virtues place demands on what we find salient.     

Virtue and Arguers

Is a virtue approach in argumentation possible without committing the ad hominem fallacy? My answer is affirmative, provided that the object study of our theory is well delimited. My proposal is that a theory of argumentative virtue should not focus on argument appraisal, as has been assumed, but on those traits that make an individual achieve excellence in argumentative practices. An agent-based approach in argumentation should be developed, not in order to find better grounds for argument appraisal, but to gain insight into argumentative habits and excellence. This way we can benefit from what a virtue argumentation theory really has to offer.     

Virtue and Continence

John McDowell argued that the virtuous person (VP) knows no temptation: her perception of a situation silences all competing motivations – be it fear in the face of danger or a strong desire. The VP cannot recognize any reason to act non-virtuously as a reason, and is never inclined to act non-virtuously. This view rests on the requirement that the VP rationally respond, and not merely react, to the environment – it rests on the requirement that the relation between the VP and the world (ethical requirements) must rule out the possibility that the VP is a brain in a vat. I will argue that the opposite is true: virtue requires a sensitivity to temptation. The VP, as such, must be able to recognize reasons for performing non-virtuous actions as reasons, and be inclined to perform them. She must find nothing human alien. This is so because the VP must possess the ability to understand non-virtuous agents, and understanding necessarily involves vulnerability to temptation. Otherwise, it will be argued, the VP views the actions of others as determined from outside the space of reasons. But the VP, like any other person, must have the ability to view the actions of others as rational responses to the environment, not only as reactions to it. Put differently, the VP’s view of others must rule out the possibility that they are brains in a vat – the possibility that their actions are merely caused, rather than justified, by the facts. Finally, it will be suggested that an amended conception of the VP can meet both requirements: view others as rationally responsive to the world, without relinquishing its relation to the facts.