Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-dzt6s Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-25T01:22:27.457Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Virtue, Rule-Following, and Absolute Prohibitions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2019

JEREMY REID
JEREMY REID*
Affiliation:
UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND, COLLEGE [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

In her seminal article ‘Modern Moral Philosophy’ (1958) Elizabeth Anscombe argued that we need a new ethics, one that uses virtue terms to generate absolute prohibitions against certain act-types. Leading contemporary virtue ethicists have not taken up Anscombe's challenge in justifying absolute prohibitions and have generally downplayed the role of rule-following in their normative theories. That they have not done so is primarily because contemporary virtue ethicists have focused on what is sufficient for characterizing the deliberation and action of the fully virtuous person, and rule-following is inadequate for this task. In this article, I take up Anscombe's challenge by showing that rule-following is necessary for virtuous agency, and that virtue ethics can justify absolute prohibitions. First, I offer a possibility proof by showing how virtue ethics can generate absolute prohibitions in three ways: by considering actions that directly manifest vice or that cannot be performed virtuously; actions that are prohibited by one's institutional roles and practical identities; and actions that are prohibited by the prescriptions of the wise. I then seek to show why virtue ethicists should incorporate rule-following and absolute prohibitions into their theories. I emphasize the central role that rules have in the development of virtue, then motivate the stronger view that fully virtuous agents follow moral rules by considering the importance of hope, uncertainty about consequences, and taking responsibility for what eventuates. Finally, I provide an account of what Anscombe called a ‘corrupt mind’, explaining how our understanding of virtue is corrupted if we think that virtue may require us to do vicious actions.

Keywords

Anscombevirtue ethicsrule-followingabsolute prohibitionsapplied ethics
Type
Articles
Information
Journal of the American Philosophical Association , Volume 5 , Issue 1 , Spring 2019 , pp. 78 - 97
Copyright
Copyright © American Philosophical Association 2019 

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.)

Footnotes

Thanks are due first to my teachers, Rosalind Hursthouse and Julia Annas. Both have been deeply inspiring and provided valuable guidance during the course of this project and in the years leading up to it. I hope this article continues the spirit of their work. Special thanks are also due to Sean Whitton and Robert Wallace, who provided extensive feedback and crucial insights. I am grateful to Sukaina Hirji, Nathaniel Oakes, Glen Pettigrove, Rachel Singpurwalla, Eric Solis, Steven Steyl, and the anonymous referees for their helpful comments on earlier versions of this article.

References

Adams, Robert Merrihew. (1999) Finite and Infinite Goods: A Framework for Ethics. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Annas, Julia. (2011) Intelligent Virtue. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Annas, Julia. (2014) ‘Why Virtue Ethics Does Not Have a Problem with Right Action’. Oxford Studies in Normative Ethics, 4, 13–33.Google Scholar
Annas, Julia. (2015) ‘Applying Virtue to Ethics’. Journal of Applied Philosophy, 32, 1–14.Google Scholar
Anscombe, Elizabeth. (1958), ‘Modern Moral Philosophy’. Philosophy, 33, 1–19.Google Scholar
Aristotle. (2014) Nicomachean Ethics. Translated and edited by Crisp, Roger. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Baril, Anne. (2016) ‘The Ethical Importance of Roles’. Journal of Value Inquiry, 50, 721–34.Google Scholar
Baumeister, Roy. (1997) Evil: Inside Human Violence and Cruelty. New York: Holt.Google Scholar
Burnyeat, M. F. (1980) ‘Aristotle on Learning to be Good’. In Rorty, Amélie Oksenberg (ed.), Essays on Aristotle's Ethics (Berkeley: University of California Press), 69–92.Google Scholar
Chappell, Timothy. (2014) ‘Virtue and Rules’. In van Hooft, Stan (ed.), The Handbook of Virtue Ethics (London: Taylor and Francis), 76–87.Google Scholar
Cicero. (1913) On Duties. Vol. 21 of Cicero: In Twenty-Eight Volumes. Translated by Miller, Walter. Loeb Classical Library 30. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Crisp, Roger. (2003) ‘Particularizing Particularism’. In Hooker, Brad and Little, Margaret (eds.), Moral Particularism (Oxford: Clarendon Press), 23–47.Google Scholar
Dancy, Jonathan. (1993) Moral Reasons. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Foot, Philippa. (1978) ‘Virtues and Vices’. In Foot, Virtues and Vices, and Other Essays in Moral Philosophy (Oxford: Blackwell), 1–18.Google Scholar
Foot, Philippa. (2001) Natural Goodness. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Fridland, Ellen. (2017) ‘Motor Skill and Moral Virtue’. Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement, 80, 139–70.Google Scholar
Geach, Peter. (1999) God and the Soul. South Bend: St. Augustine's Press.Google Scholar
Gill, Christopher. (1988) ‘Personhood and Personality: The Four Personae Theory of Cicero's On Duties 1’. Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 6, 169–99.Google Scholar
Hursthouse, Rosalind. (1999) On Virtue Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hursthouse, Rosalind. (2006) ‘Practical Wisdom: A Mundane Account’. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 106, 285–309.Google Scholar
Hursthouse, Rosalind. (2008) ‘Two Ways of Doing the Right Thing’. In Farrelly, Colin and Solum, Lawrence (eds.), Virtue Jurisprudence (Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan), 236–55.Google Scholar
Hursthouse, Rosalind. (2011) ‘What Does the Aristotelian Phronimos Know?’ In Jost, Lawrence and Wuerth, Julian (eds.), Perfecting Virtue: New Essays on Kantian Ethics and Virtue Ethics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 38–57.Google Scholar
Irwin, T. H. (2003) ‘Ethics as Inexact Science’. In Hooker, Brad and Little, Margaret (eds.), Moral Particularism (Oxford: Clarendon Press), 100–29.Google Scholar
Kamtekar, Rachana. (2004) ‘Situationism and Virtue Ethics on the Content of Our Character’. Ethics, 114, 458–91.Google Scholar
Korsgaard, Christine M. (1996) The Sources of Normativity. Edited by O'Neill, Onora. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Lovibond, Sabina. (2015) ‘Absolute Prohibitions without Divine Promises’. In Essays on Ethics and Feminism (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 146–170Google Scholar
McDowell, John. (1979) ‘Virtue and Reason’. Monist, 62, 331–50.Google Scholar
McDowell, John. (2001) Mind, Value, and Reality. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Nussbaum, Martha. (1986) The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Nussbaum, Martha. (1990) Love's Knowledge. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Nussbaum, Martha. (1999) ‘Virtue Ethics: A Misleading Category?’ Journal of Ethics, 3, 163–201.Google Scholar
Plato. (1997) Complete Works. Edited by Cooper, John M.. Indianapolis: Hackett.Google Scholar
Sherman, Nancy. (1997) Making a Necessity of Virtue: Aristotle and Kant on Virtue. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Swanton, Chistine. (1991) ‘Weakness of Will as a Species of Executive Cowardice’. Canadian Journal of Philosophy, 21, 123–40.Google Scholar
Tsu, Peter Shiu-Hwa. (2017) ‘Can Virtue Be Codified?’ In Birondo, Noell and Braunt, S. Stewart (eds.), Virtue's Reasons: New Essays on Virtue, Character, and Reasons (New York: Routledge), 65–87.Google Scholar
Vogler, Candace. (2013) ‘Aristotle, Aquinas, Anscombe, and the New Virtue Ethics’. In Hoffman, Tobias, Müller, Jörn, and Perkams, Matthias (eds.), Aquinas and the Nicomachean Ethics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 239–57.Google Scholar
Wallace, R. Jay. (1991) ‘Virtue, Reason, and Principle’. Canadian Journal of Philosophy, 21, 469–495.Google Scholar
Williams, Bernard. (1994) Shame and Necessity. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Zagzebski, Linda Trinkaus. (2004) Divine Motivation Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar