Aristotle - Nicomachean Ethics

From The Inferno

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Nicomachean Ethics: I, II, X

Contents 1 Author's Notes/Introduction 2 Book I 3 Book II 4 Book X

[edit] Author's Notes/Introduction

[edit] Book I

1. Happiness is that which all actions aim at:
   1. “there is some end of the things we do, which we desire for its own sake”.
   2. “we do not choose everything for the sake of something else (for at that rate the process would go on to infinity)”.
   3. Conclusion: That which we desire for its own sake must be the end of all other actions.
   4. “Verbally there is a very general agreement: for both the general run of men and people of superior refinement say that it is happiness”: We call this end happiness.
2. Function/Ergon determines what happiness and virtue are:
   1. “a clearer account of what it [i.e., happiness] is still desired. This might perhaps be given, if we could first ascertain the function of man”.
   2. “the function of man is an activity of soul which follows or implies a rational principle”.
   3. Human good is good performance of the function.
   4. Virtue is the “appropriate excellence” according to which the function is performed well.

[edit] Book II

1. Virtue and discussion of soul:
   1. Vegetative/Nutritive part of soul.
   2. Two-fold irrational part of soul “There seems to be also another irrational element in the soul -- one which in a sense, however, shares in a rational principle”.
   3. Rational part.
   4. Intellectual virtue for rational part of soul. Moral virtue for two-fold irrational part.
2. Moral virtue:
   1. Formed by habit (not by knowledge, knowledge is not enough).
   2. However, in order to be considered virtuous, the agent must:
      1. Have knowledge.
      2. Choose the acts for their own sake.
      3. Action must proceed from a firm and unchangeable character.
   3. You need to remember that virtue is a “state of character” from which emanate regular virtuous acts.

[edit] Book X

1. Pleasure:
   1. Pleasure completes activity. (Activity desired partly for pleasure)
   2. Activity entails pleasure. (No pleasure without activity)
   3. Pleasure differs in kind according to activity. The virtuous man is the measure of pleasure.
2. ‘’ Summum Bonum’’
   1. Best life is contemplative life, because it corresponds to the best part of the human being.
   2. Human beings difficult to achieve the best life: “But such a life would be too high for man; for it is not in so far as he is man that he will live so, but in so far as something divine is present in him”. Human beings should strive for the best.
   3. Virtue acquired, not by nature, but by habit (as previously said) that is in turn formed through the compulsion to do virtuous acts by some rational authority such as legislation.