Title
Full Human Flourishing: The Place of the Various Virtues in the Quest for Happiness in Aristotle’s Ethics
Department/School
Philosophy
Date
2007
Document Type
Article
DOI
https://doi.org/10.5840/acpaproc20078127
Abstract
Human ability to freely choose requires knowledge of human nature and the final end of man. For Aristotle, this end is happiness or full flourishing, which involves various virtues. Modern scholarship has led to debate over which virtues are absolutely necessary. Taking into account the hierarchical nature of the soul and the fact that relationships with the divine and with others are necessary for human flourishing, it can be seen that human flourishing requires contemplation, phronesis and all the moral virtues, as perfections of the various parts of the soul. The truly happy person has actualized all of his faculties and potential relationships. Rather than taking one of the standard exclusivist or inclusivist viewpoints on this ‘problem of the two lives,’ this paper argues that a holistic reading of Aristotle’s ethical works requires a hierarchical and relational view of the virtues, with all of them necessary for human flourishing.
Volume
81
Published in
Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association
Citation/Other Information
Spencer, Mark K. “Full Human Flourishing: The Place of the Various Virtues in the Quest for Happiness in Aristotle’s Ethics.” Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Association 81 (2007): 193-204. https://doi.org/10.5840/acpaproc20078127.