Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-g8jcs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-29T19:54:46.584Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Aristotelian Virtue Ethics and the Normativity Challenge

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 November 2015

ÉTIENNE BROWN
ÉTIENNE BROWN*
Affiliation:
Université Paris-Sorbonne
*
*<[email protected]>
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Aristotelian virtue theorists are currently engaged in a discussion with philosophers who use psychological findings to question some of their main assumptions. In this article, I present and argue against one of these psychological challenges—Jesse Prinz’s Normativity Challenge—which rests on the claim that findings in cultural psychology contradict the Aristotelian thesis that the normativity of virtues derives from nature. First, I demonstrate that the Normativity Challenge is based on three problematic assumptions about contemporary Aristotelianism. Second, I argue that it presupposes the truth of a metaethical framework that Aristotelians reject: moral relativism.

Plusieurs éthiciens de la vertu qui se revendiquent d’Aristote débattent actuellement avec des philosophes qui emploient des données empiriques psychologiques afin de remettre en question certaines des thèses centrales qu’ils défendent. Dans cet article, j’argumente contre l’un de ces philosophes — Jesse Prinz — qui soutient que la psychologie culturelle contemporaine compromet l’idée aristotélicienne que la normativité des vertus dérive de leur caractère naturel. Dans un premier temps, je démontre que le «Normativity Challenge» de Prinz s’appuie sur trois idées préconçues problématiques au sujet de l’aristotélisme contemporain. Dans un deuxième temps, je souligne que l’argumentation de Prinz présuppose la vérité d’une doctrine métaéthique que les aristotéliciens rejettent : le relativisme moral.

Type
Articles
Information
Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review / Revue canadienne de philosophie , Volume 55 , Issue 1 , March 2016 , pp. 131 - 150
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Philosophical Association 2015 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Annas, Julia 2005 “Comments on John Doris’s ‘Lack of Character,’” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 71 (3): 636–642.Google Scholar
Aristotle 2004 Nichomachean Ethics . Translated and edited by Crisp, Roger. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Darley, John and Batson, Daniel 1973 “From Jerusalem to Jericho: A Study of Situational and Dispositional Variables in Helping Behavior,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 27 (1): 100–108.Google Scholar
Diener, Ed and Diener, Marissa 1995 “Cross-Cultural Correlates of Life Satisfaction and Self-Esteem,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 68 (4): 653–663.Google Scholar
Doris, John 2002 Lack of Character: Personality and Moral Behavior . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Enoch, David 2011 Taking Morality Seriously: A Defense of Robust Realism . Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Foot, Philippa 2001 Natural Goodness . Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Harman, Gilbert 1999 “Moral Philosophy Meets Social Psychology: Virtue Ethics and the Fundamental Attribution Error,” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 99: 315–331.Google Scholar
Hartshorne, Hugh and May, Mark 1928 Studies in the Nature of Character . New York: MacMillan.Google Scholar
Isen, Alice and Levin, Paula 1972 “Effects of Feeling Good on Helping: Cookies and Kindness,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 21 (3): 384–388.Google Scholar
Joyce, Richard 2009 “Review: Jesse J. Prinz: The Emotional Construction of morals,” Mind 118 (470): 508–518.Google Scholar
Kilham, Wesley and Mann, Leon 1974 “Level of Destructive Obedience as a Junction of Transmitting and Executant Roles in the Milgram Obedience Paradigm,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 29 (5): 696–702.Google Scholar
Leaman, Oliver 2000 Eastern Philosophy: Key Readings . Routledge: London.Google Scholar
Levine, Robert, Norenzayan, Ara and Philbrick, Karen 2001 “Cross-Cultural Differences in Helping Strangers,” Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology 32 (5): 543–560.Google Scholar
Mantell, David, 1971 “The Potential for Violence in Germany,” Journal of Social Issues 27 (4): 101–112.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Milgram, Stanley 1974 Obedience to Authority . New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Nussbaum, Martha C. 1988 “Non-Relative Virtues: An Aristotelian Approach,” Midwest Studies in Philosophy 13 (1): 32–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Prinz, Jesse 2007 The Emotional Construction of Morals . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Prinz, Jesse 2009 “The Normativity Challenge: Cultural Psychology Provides the Real Threat to Virtue Ethics,” Journal of Ethics 13: 117–144.Google Scholar
Suh, Eunkook, Diener, Ed, Oishi, Shigehiro and Triandis, Harry C. 1998 “The Shifting Basis of Life Satisfaction Judgements across Cultures: Emotions versus Norms,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 74 (2): 482–493.Google Scholar