Wk 5 habituation HO - PHIL0044 Aristotle\'s Moral Psychology (1819) lecture handout PDF

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PHIL0044 Aristotle's Moral Psychology (1819) lecture handoutPHIL0044 Aristotle's Moral Psychology (1819) lecture handout...

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PHIL0044 Aristotle’s Moral Psychology Dr. Elena Cagnoli Fiecconi & Dr. Fiona Leigh (UCL)

Handout Week 5: Habituation Today: The key passages in the Nicomachean Ethics (NE), I.13, II.1-4 on habituation. The topic of moral development, and asking how it is that we become virtuous. We become virtuous through habituation. 1. Why is this process necessary for us to become virtuous? 2. What is involved in this process, i.e. how, exactly does it work? 1. INTRODUCTION NE Book 1: The human good consists in living a eudaimon (flourishing) life. Practical nature of ethical inquiry. Our present discussion does not aim, as our others do, at study; for the purpose of our examination is not to know what virtue is, but to become good, since otherwise the enquiry would be of no benefit to us. (II.2, 1103b26-29) The aim in practical things is surely not to study and know each thing, but rather to do them. Hence knowing about virtue is not sufficient, rather we must try to possess and to use it, or to become good in any other way. (X. 91179a35-b4) 2. NICOMACHEAN ETHICS II 1 - 3 Division of the virtues and modes of acquisition Intellectual virtues arise mostly from teaching, whereas moral virtues/virtues of character [ēthos] result from habit (or custom, perhaps usage, ethos). Nature vs. Habit No natural property can be altered by habit. A stone cannot be trained to fall upwards; people can be trained to be virtuous. Moral virtues clearly possessed ‘by nature’, although nature gives us the capacity to acquire or develop them: so do not arise in us by nature. An analogy with crafts Aristotle claims in II.1 that the way we act determines whether we become virtuous or vicious, just as in the crafts. Virtue is both produced and destroyed through the same things, so we need to act, to do those things, well as opposed to badly. What does it take to act ‘well’ or ‘badly’? Note the analogy with strength in II.2: people become strong from eating a lot and enduring hard work.

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Pleasures and pains In II.3 the discussion of pleasure and pain reinforces this claim. From childhood – learn to take pleasures in the right things, to be unaffected by the bad things. Three objects of choice and three objects of avoidance (II.3, 1104b30-34):  Objects of choice: the fine (noble, kalon), the expedient (or advantageous, beneficial, convenient, useful), and the pleasant  Objects of avoidance: the shameful, the harmful and the painful Aristotle sums up ‘virtue is about pleasures and pains’, and saying that the actions (involving pleasures and pains) that are the source of virtue also increase it, and if they’re done badly, they ruin it. 3. NICOMACHEAN ETHICS II.4 A puzzle and objection Aristotle raises a puzzle at 1105a17-21: Someone might suppose that the person who performs just actions is just, and that the person who performs grammatical or musical actions is grammatical or musical. Qu (small groups): What might be the imagined objection here? Crafts: an analogy and disanalogy Again, appeals to crafts. First Aristotle says that actions are not enough, as in crafts. You can do something grammatical by accident, or under instruction, and not be a grammarian. To be a grammarian, you must produce a grammatical result and act in accordance with your knowledge of grammar. Qu (large): how does this solve the puzzle, at least for being a grammarian? Then a disanology between skills and virtue: acting grammatically – in accordance with grammatical knowledge. However, to act virtuously: 1. Act knowingly 2. Choose the actions and choose them for their own sake / for the fine 3. Act from a firm and unchanging state or disposition Qu (large): Imagine that giving some money to charity was the virtuous (generous) thing to do in a particular situation. In what ways could an agent, whilst performing that right action, nevertheless fail to act virtuously? Qu (large): How has the puzzle been solved? 4. PLEASURE AND COGNITION Burnyeat’s example of learning to ski (or you can imagine some other activity, game or sport: playing tennis, football, chess, whatever – until you actually do it, you can’t properly know that it’s pleasurable and how it’s pleasurable). In habituation we learn to take pleasure in the fine, he

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suggests. His distinction between learning the ‘that’ and the ‘why’ in habituation into the moral virtues. Consider this excerpt from NE X.9: ‘....arguments and teaching surely do not prevail on everyone, but the soul of the student needs to have been prepared by habits for enjoying and hating finely, like ground that is to nourish the seed. For someone who lives in accord with his feelings would not even listen to an argument turning him away, or comprehend it [if he did listen]; and in that state, how could he be persuaded to change? And in general, feelings seem to yield to force, not to argument. Hence we must already in some way have a character suitable for virtue, loving what is fine and objecting to what is shameful. It is difficult, however, for someone to be trained correctly for virtue from his youth if he has not been brought up under correct laws; for the many, especially the young, do not find it pleasant to live in a temperate and resistant way. That is why laws must prescribe their upbringing and practices; for they will not find these things painful when they get used to them.’ (NE X.9, 1079b4-35) Now imagine: 

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A little girl has been an only child until now, and is used to having her toys all to herself. At the age of 4, a baby brother is born, and as they both grow up, she needs to learn how to share with her brother’ A little boy is naturally very timid, and scared of many things, including dogs, fire, traffic, and so on. He needs to learn to be appropriately confident and cautious as he grows up.

What we are trying to understand is how, in relation to feelings and beliefs (or other cognitions, such as appearances), might this process work, according to Aristotle. Group discussion questions: 1. Does the distinction between teaching and habituation at the start of NE II.1 mean that habituation cannot involve any kind of teaching or guidance? What do you think Aristotle has in mind when he makes this distinction? 2. Is habituation a purely non-rational process? If so, does this mean that it ultimately amounts to a form of Pavlovian conditioning? What do you think is involved in the process? 3. How do we get children to take pleasure in the right sort of actions? To what extent can rewards and punishments play a role in this process? Will these be sufficient to train a moral learner to be virtuous? 5. THE ‘PROBLEM OF CONTINUITY’

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Group Presentation: Marta Jimenez, ‘Aristotle on Becoming Virtuous by Doing Virtuous Actions’, (Phronesis, 2016). What, according to Jimenez, is the ‘problem of continuity’, that arises from previous accounts of a learner’s action? How is Jimenez’ proposed reading of Book II.4 intended solve this apparent problem?

Discussion Questions i. To what extent does the learner perform ‘the same’ actions as a virtuous person? ii. Do you think that actions count as ‘virtuous’ if they are not performed from virtuous motives? iii.Does Jimenez’ solution overcome the apparent problem of continuity? Is there a problem of continuity? iv. Does Jimenez’ account satisfactorily explain how a learner comes to develop virtuous dispositions? What, if anything, is left unexplained on her account?

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