DOCSLIB.ORG

Virtues for an Ethicist

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Virtues for an Ethicist FEATURE ARTICLE Virtues for an Ethicist Patricia Talone, RSM, Ph.D. Vice President, Mission Services Catholic Health Association of the United States St. Louis, MO [email protected] In the past 15 years, the number of education. However, recognizing the ethicists at Catholic health care systems, complexity of health care systems, it was hospitals, and ethics centers has increased not long before these ethicists also significantly. Although Catholic health addressed the less acute but no less care had long been a pioneer in the field challenging dilemmas faced by health care of bioethics, forces like the Joint administrators in executive suites and Commission on Accreditation of Health boardrooms. Care Organizations (JCAHO), by insisting that facilities have a “mechanism” While there is a growing cadre of to resolve ethical conflicts, have committed persons academically primed contributed to this growth, as have federal for this challenging career, academic Corporate Compliance programs and preparedness alone is insufficient for the federal offices like the Office for task at hand. In ethics, it is not simply Protection from Research Risks and Office what one knows, but who one is that for Human Research Protection. The insures credibility, efficacy and endurance increasing complexity of medical in the field. The ethicist must be technology likewise raises ethical knowledgeable, but if he or she is not also challenges for patients, families and virtuous, they will do little to advance the clinicians. Catholic theologians, ministry of the systems they purport to philosophers and multi-disciplinary serve. After 25 years in the field, and a bioethicists, whose tradition of addressing personal list of both successes and failures, medical moral issues systematically several virtues stand out as necessary for develops from at least the end of the 16th contemporary ethicists in Catholic health century, are uniquely prepared to assist care. By no means an exhaustive or with the thorny dilemmas facing these exclusive list, these qualities ably serve groups. Health care systems scrambled to administrators and clinicians in health hire qualified women and men to help care as well as their ethics colleagues. steer them through the turbulent seas of technology, managed care, diminished Ethicists stand at a bustling crossroad of staffing and fiscal restraint. Most of these humanity. It is a place where the healthy individuals began their work as clinical meet the sick, the educated teach those ethicists, assisting in emergency rooms, who are untutored, life gives way to death, intensive care units and medical-staff science faces mystery, and doubt and Copyright © 2010 CHA. Permission granted to CHA-member organizations and Saint Louis University to copy and distribute for educational purposes. 8 FEATURE ARTICLE despair seek faith and understanding. habitual modes of action or, in the words While the discipline requires a strong of Robert Bellah, et al, “habits of the academic and doctrinal foundation, heart.”1 They give structure and ethicists are also involved in a ministry expression to one’s character and that is first and foremost relational. Not contribute to good actions, good persons ivory tower philosophers or theologians, and a good society. Virtues can be innate they have no choice but to work with or connatural – some individuals seem people with a variety of needs. Daily they born with a particular gift. They may also encounter people in crisis, persons who be infused through grace, a gift from God. are extremely vulnerable, persons from a And they may be acquired, that is, variety of cultural, ethnic and religious developed through discipline and hard backgrounds. Although there is a growing work because one recognizes the need to number of nurse/ethicists and enhance one’s character. Because ethicists, physician/ethicists, for the most part the whether clinical or organizational, ethicist is neither a clinical insider nor an function in a milieu in which time is of outsider, but often serves as a facilitator the essence, it is vital that virtues become and negotiator, a listener and a guide for second nature, drawn upon at a moment’s many disciplines. notice. How does one determine the most Reflection throughout my years of important virtues for one’s profession or experience as both a clinical and calling? Virtues are constitutive aspects of organizational ethicist elevates five virtues a person’s character and the most as particularly helpful for contemporary important of them will reflect the bioethicists. They may reflect the character that is presented as normative. character of the writer whom, while For Socrates, for example, the greatest highlighting them, acknowledges that they virtue was wisdom, but he also are, for her, by no means connatural. emphasized temperance, justice and piety, focusing on the more rational aspect of The great Jesuit spiritual writer, Alonso humanity. Aristotle included the Rodriguez (1526-1616), in his three- intellectual virtues but underscored more volume tome, The Practice of Christian affective ones as well, including humility, Perfection, wisely cited humility as the honor, self-respect and “grandness of primary virtue, addressing it in his first character.” Christian asceticism chapter. The Latin root “humus” denotes emphasizes the theological virtues of faith, the earth, standing firmly upon the hope and charity above all others, while ground. Aquinas calls humility “keeping also upholding the cardinal virtues of oneself within one’s own bounds, not prudence, justice, fortitude and reaching out to things above one, but temperance. Thomas Aquinas summed submitting to one’s superior.” Humility up virtue in the definition “habitus moderates pride and vainglory; it calls operativus bonus” an operative habit that forth a modest estimate of one’s own is essentially good. Virtues, then, are worth and is willing to defer to others. Copyright © 2010 CHA. Permission granted to CHA-member organizations and Saint Louis University to copy and distribute for educational purposes. 9 FEATURE ARTICLE Why is this virtue necessary for an to apply to a specific case. One must judge ethicist? In some circles, clinicians and soundly the means suggested, and one administrators tend to see the ethicist as needed the strength to command or direct the “answer” man or woman, according their employment. Prudence seeks the the individual esteem and a sense of medium rationis, helping the moral agent power. Such treatment can go to one’s to maintain a balance in all things.2 head, fostering hubris, a fatal flaw for Without it, courage can be reckless, anyone claiming to be an expert in the kindness can be frailty, and fidelity can be ethical life. The ethicist moves in circles of stubbornness. Prudence requires foresight, experts: nurses, physicians, technicians, memory, circumspection, shrewdness, technologists, psychologists, social diligence, care and caution. It is not a workers, chaplains, and executives among virtue for the faint of heart, but vital for them. He or she is just one expert among an ethicist. many, neither above nor below others. The best ethicists approach their peers One cannot hold an indispensable role in with a deep sense of humility recognizing Catholic health care without the virtue of that years of academic preparation do not compassion. Precisely because the provide one with all the answers, all the ethicist stands at a crossroads in life, he or theological principles or all the she confronts vulnerable persons: philosophical syllogisms to approach life’s patients, grieving and often angry families, exigencies. disillusioned and displaced staff and employees, harried executives. While the One may achieve intellectual clarity about ethicist hones his or her skills through a a proper course of action and possess modicum of objective reality, he or she is proper humility to execute it, but never far from the suffering pulse of prudence demands that one know the humanity. The virtue of compassion right time, place and manner of allows one to suffer with the other. Not a addressing the situation. One image of distant or removed pity, it extends itself prudence depicted in medieval art and touches the other. In Mark 1:40-42, displayed the virtue as a woman with two we see Jesus confront a man with leprosy. faces, one looking forward and one “Moved with compassion,” Jesus reaches backward. She held what appears to be a out his hand, touching the leper, thus colander in one hand to sift through the healing him. Those in Catholic health facts before her, and a mirror in the other care, in whatever capacity they serve, for necessary self-reflection. Later, the commit themselves to “see suffering as a 16th century artist, Titian, portrayed the participation in the redemptive power of virtue of prudence as a three-headed man, Christ’s passion, death and denoting the need to consider past, resurrection….”3 Compassion does not present and future in one’s deliberations. remove objective reality or the need for Thomas Aquinas taught that prudence professionalism, but it serves as the demanded three things of the moral agent. backdrop from which one "does ethics.” One must seek counsel for the right means It grounds the individual in the realization Copyright © 2010 CHA. Permission granted to CHA-member organizations and Saint Louis University to copy and distribute for educational purposes. 10 FEATURE ARTICLE that we are all sisters and brothers, sharing health care commits itself. While “ethics the same Creator and a common is not reducible to religion, or religion to humanity. It forces one to remember, at ethics, ethics opens up to religion as its the 250th family meeting about use or source and final fulfillment” as moral non-use of a ventilator, that one looks philosopher James Drane asserts in face-to-face with the visage of the suffering Becoming a Good Doctor.4 For an ethicist Christ. in Catholic health care, I would extend this virtue to include participation in the For those persons ministering as ethicists life of a believing community.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Philosophy and the Art of Living Aristotle, Spinoza, Hegel
    Philosophy and the Art of Living Osher Life-Long Learning Institute (UC Irvine) 2010 The Masters of Reason and the Masters of Suspicion: Aristotle, Spinoza, Hegel Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Sartre When: Mondays for six weeks: November 1 ,8, 15, 22, 29, and Dec. 6. Where: Woodbridge Center, 4628 Barranca Pkwy. Irvine CA 92604 NOTES AND QUOTES: Aristotle: 384 BCE- 322 BCE (62 years): Reference: http://www.jcu.edu/philosophy/gensler/ms/arist-00.htm Theoretical Reason contemplates the nature of Reality. Practical Reason arranges the best means to accomplish one's ends in life, of which the final end is happiness. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-ethics/#IntVir Aristotle distinguishes two kinds of virtue (1103a1-10): those that pertain to the part of the soul that engages in reasoning (virtues of mind or intellect), and those that pertain to the part of the soul that cannot itself reason but is nonetheless capable of following reason (ethical virtues, virtues of character). Intellectual virtues are in turn divided into two sorts: those that pertain to theoretical reasoning, and those that pertain to practical thinking 1139a3-8). He organizes his material by first studying ethical virtue in general, then moving to a discussion of particular ethical virtues (temperance, courage, and so on), and finally completing his survey by considering the intellectual virtues (practical wisdom, theoretical wisdom, etc.). Life : Aristotle was born in northern Greece in 384 B.C. He was raised by a guardian after the death of his father, Nicomachus, who had been court physician to the king of Macedonia. Aristotle entered Plato's Academy at age 17.
    [Show full text]
  • Nietzsche's Platonism
    CHAPTER 1 NIETZSCHE’S PLATONISM TWO PROPER NAMES. Even if modified in form and thus conjoined. As such they broach an interval. The various senses of this legacy, of Nietzsche’s Platonism, are figured on this interval. The interval is gigantic, this interval between Plato and Nietzsche, this course running from Plato to Nietzsche and back again. It spans an era in which a battle of giants is waged, ever again repeating along the historical axis the scene already staged in Plato’s Sophist (246a–c). It is a battle in which being is at stake, in which all are exposed to not being, as to death: it is a gigantomac√a p'r¥ t›V o¶s√aV. As the Eleatic Stranger stages it, the battle is between those who drag every- thing uranic and invisible down to earth, who thus define being as body, and those others who defend themselves from an invisible po- sition way up high, who declare that being consists of some kind of intelligibles (nohtº) and who smash up the bodies of the others into little bits in their l¬goi, philosophizing, as it were, with the hammer of l¬goV. Along the historical axis, in the gigantic interval from Plato to Nietzsche, the contenders are similarly positioned for the ever re- newed battle. They, too, take their stance on one side or the other of the interval—again, a gigantic interval—separating the intelligible from the visible or sensible, t¿ noht¬n from t¿ aÎsqht¬n. Those who station themselves way up high are hardly visible from below as they wield their l¬goi and shield themselves by translating their very position into words: m'tΩ tΩ fusikº.
    [Show full text]
  • Read Article
    Title: "Not Buying in to Words and Letters: Zen, Ideology, and Prophetic Critique" Author: Christopher Ives Word length: 2515 Date of Submission: May 2, 2006 Professional Address: Department of Religious Studies, Stonehill College, 320 Washington Street, Duffy 257, Easton, MA 02357-4010 Email: [email protected] Phone: 508-565-1354 Abstract: Judging from the active participation of Zen leaders and institutions in modern Japanese imperialism, one might conclude that by its very nature Zen succumbs easily to ideological co-optation. Several facets of Zen epistemology and institutional history support this conclusion. At the same time, a close examination of Zen theory and praxis indicates that the tradition does possess resources for resisting dominant ideologies and engaging in ideology critique. Not Buying in to Words and Letters: Zen, Ideology, and Prophetic Critique D.T. Suzuki once proclaimed that Zen is "extremely flexible in adapting itself to almost any philosophy and moral doctrine" and "may be found wedded to anarchism or fascism, communism or democracy, atheism or idealism, or any political or economic dogmatism."1 Scholars have recently delineated how, in the midst of Japan's expansionist imperialism, Zen exhibited that flexibility in "adapting itself" and 1 becoming "wedded" to the reigning imperial ideology. And for all of its rhetoric about "not relying on words and letters" and functioning compassionately as a politically detached, iconoclastic religion, Zen has generally failed to criticize ideologies—and specific social and political conditions—that stand in tension with core Buddhist values. Several facets of Zen may account for its ideological co-optation before and during WWII.
    [Show full text]
  • Health Care Ethics and Casuistry
    Jrournal ofmedical ethics, 1992, 18, 61-62, 66 J Med Ethics: first published as 10.1136/jme.18.2.61 on 1 June 1992. Downloaded from Guest editorial: A personal view Health care ethics and casuistry Robin Downie University ofGlasgow In an editorial (1) Dr Gillon looks at some recent method of teaching and discussing medical ethics. The difficulties which have been raised about philosophy answer to Smith here is to point out that what is taking and the teaching ofhealth care ethics. This matter is of place in such discussions is a form of what he calls sufficient importance to the readers of this journal that 'natural jurisprudence'. It is an attempt to translate it is worth looking at it again, this time in an historical into case law, to give concrete application to, the ideals perspective. contained in codes. If natural jurisprudence is a One claim which is often made by those advocating legitimate activity, so too is this. the study of health care ethics is that such a study will Smith's second group ofarguments against casuistry assist in the solving of what have come to be called are to the effect that it does not 'animate us to what is 'ethical dilemmas'. Since health care ethics is so widely generous and noble' but rather teaches us 'to chicane taught for this reason the claim is worth examining. Is with our consciences' (4). Smith is certainly correct in health care ethics in this sense possible? Is it desirable? claiming that casuistry is concerned mainly with whatcopyright. Is it philosophy? In other words, can a case be made out is required or forbidden, that is, with rules, rather than for what earlier centuries called 'casuistry, or the with questions of motivation.
    [Show full text]
  • Nietzsche's Ethic
    Nietzsche’s Ethic: Virtues for All and None? A thesis submitted To Kent State University in partial Fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts by Daniel Robinson May 2015 ©Copyright All rights reserved Except for previously published materials Thesis written by Daniel Robinson B.A., University of South Alabama, 2012 M.A., Kent State University, 2015 Approved by Linda Williams, Associate Professor, Masters Advisor Deborah Barnbaum, Chair, Department of Philosophy James Blank, Associate Dean, Dean of Arts and Sciences Table of Contents Introduction……………………………………………………….……………......01 Chapter I. Solomon’s Nietzsche: A Summary………………….………….....04 Introduction…………………………………..………...………….04 Concern for Character …………………………………………….05 Passion as the Root to the Virtues…………………………..……..15 Building Nietzsche’s Ethic: Virtues for All……………….….…...22 II. Nietzsche on Ethics……………………………………...……..….32 Introduction………………………………………………………..32 Custom & Natural Morality……………………………………….35 Master-type and Slave-type Moralities…………………………...41 Slave-type’s Universalization ……………………………………48 Nietzsche on Virtue and Virtues …………………….……………52 III. Ethical Contortions: Fitting Nietzsche into Virtue Ethics……...…59 Introduction…………………………………………………….…59 Against a Prescriptive Interpretation……………………….….….60 Redefining Virtue and Ethics……………………………….….…64 Nietzsche’s Individualism …………………………………..…....74 Relevant Bibliography…………………………………………………………….83 i Introduction A year ago I read Robert Solomon’s Living with Nietzsche: What the Great “Immoralist” Has to Teach Us for the first time with the hopes of finding a greater understanding of both Nietzsche and virtue ethics. I was undecided on whether Nietzsche was a virtue ethicist, but I was considering it, simply because of how frequently he mentions virtue and because Aristotle was one of the few major philosophers I knew of that Nietzsche didn’t routinely, vehemently reject. The beginning and middle of Solomon’s text made me very hopeful for his conclusion.
    [Show full text]
  • The New Casuistry
    Boston College Law School Digital Commons @ Boston College Law School Boston College Law School Faculty Papers April 1999 The ewN Casuistry Paul R. Tremblay Boston College Law School, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://lawdigitalcommons.bc.edu/lsfp Part of the Legal Ethics and Professional Responsibility Commons, Legal Profession Commons, and the Litigation Commons Recommended Citation Paul R. Tremblay. "The eN w Casuistry." Georgetown Journal of Legal Ethics 12, no.3 (1999): 489-542. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Digital Commons @ Boston College Law School. It has been accepted for inclusion in Boston College Law School Faculty Papers by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ Boston College Law School. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The New Casuistry PAUL R. TREMBLAY* Of one thing we may be sure. If inquiries are to have substantialbasis, if they are not to be wholly in the air the theorist must take his departurefrom the problems which men actually meet in their own conduct. He may define and refine these; he may divide and systematize; he may abstract the problemsfrom their concrete contexts in individual lives; he may classify them when he has thus detached them; but ifhe gets away from them, he is talking about something his own brain has invented, not about moral realities. John Dewey and James Tufts' [A] "new casuistry" has appearedin which the old "method of cases" has been revived.... 2 Hugo Adam Bedau I. PRACTICING PHILOSOPHY Let us suppose, just for the moment, that "plain people ' 3 care about ethics, that they would prefer, everything else being equal, to do the right thing, or to lead the good life.
    [Show full text]
  • The Contemporary Discussion of Augustine's Concept of Peace Entre La Paz Del Cielo Y La Tierra: 7 La Discusión Actual Alrededor Del Concepto De Paz En Agustín
    Between Earthly and Heavenly Peace: The Contemporary Discussion of Augustine's Concept of Peace Entre la paz del cielo y la tierra: 7 la discusión actual alrededor del concepto de paz en Agustín Michael J. S. Bruno St. Joseph´s Seminary, United States of America Abstract This work will first present the recent magisterial appropriation of Augustine’s concept of peace, es- pecially in the magisterium of Pope St. John XXIII, Pope St. John Paul II, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, and Pope Francis. Having established the Church’s reliance upon St. Augustine’s concept of peace, the author then explores contemporary interpretations of Augustine’s understanding of peace in the twentieth century, especially in Catholic philosophy (Gilson, Arquillière, Marrou), and American Protestant theology (Niebuhr, Hauerwas, Ramsey). This essay will also explore recent interpretations, which have sought to re- claim Augustine’s realism based upon his Chris- tian anthropology. In addition to recontextualizing Augustine’s thought in light of his anthropology, these interpretations have sought to demonstrate the essential Christological and eschatological di- mensions of Augustine’s understanding of peace (Markus, Milbank, Dodaro, Kaufman, Eckenrode, Mathewes, and O’Donovan, among others). This ar- ticle will also attempts to review central arguments proposed by these commentators in relation to the concept of peace, and discuss significant points of dialogue and debate. Keywords: Augustinianism, Augustinian Christolo- gy, Augustinian realism, eschatological peace, just war, peace. [226] Agustín de Hipona como Doctor Pacis: estudios sobre la paz en el mundo contemporáneo Resumen Este capítulo presenta, en su primera parte, la re- ciente apropiación magisterial del concepto de paz en Agustín, específicamente en el magisterio de los papas Juan XXIII, Juan Pablo II, emérito Bene- dicto XVI y Francisco.
    [Show full text]
  • Human Dignity After Augustine's Imago Dei: on the Sources and Uses of Two Ethical Terms Matthew Puffer Valparaiso University, [email protected]
    Valparaiso University ValpoScholar Christ College Faculty Publications Christ College (Honors College) Spring 2017 Human Dignity After Augustine's Imago Dei: On the Sources and Uses of Two Ethical Terms Matthew Puffer Valparaiso University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholar.valpo.edu/cc_fac_pub Recommended Citation Matthew Puffer, "Human Dignity After Augustine's Imago Dei: On the Sources and Uses of Two Ethical Terms" Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics, 37, 1 (2017): 65–82. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Christ College (Honors College) at ValpoScholar. It has been accepted for inclusion in Christ College Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of ValpoScholar. For more information, please contact a ValpoScholar staff member at [email protected]. Human Dignity after Augustine's Imago Dei : On the Sources and Uses of Two Ethical Terms Matthew Puffer Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics, Volume 37, Number 1, Spring/Summer 2017, pp. 65-82 (Article) Published by The Society of Christian Ethics DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/sce.2017.0010 For additional information about this article https://muse.jhu.edu/article/665905 Access provided by Valparaiso University (16 Mar 2018 16:03 GMT) Human Dignity after Augustine’s Imago Dei: On the Sources and Uses of Two Ethical Terms Matthew Puffer This essay considers how Augustine’s writings on the imago Dei might shed light on contemporary human dignity discourse and on debates about the sources, uses, and translations of these two terms. Attending to developments in Augustine’s expositions of scriptural texts and metaphors related to the ima- go Dei, I argue that his writings exhibit three distinct conceptions of the imago Dei that correspond to three accounts of the imago Dei and human dignity offered by Pico, Luther, and Aquinas, respectively.
    [Show full text]
  • Cindy Bruzzese, MPA, MSB, HEC-C Executive Director & Clinical
    Cindy Bruzzese, MPA, MSB, HEC-C Executive Director & Clinical Ethicist, Vermont Ethics Network Clinical Ethicist, University of Vermont Medical Center Testimony House Health Care Committee – April 7, 2021 Thank you for the opportunity to testify on S.22 regarding the administration of stem cell products that have not been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration. The Vermont Ethics Network (VEN) recognizes that legitimate research in the use of cellular based therapies remains a rapidly advancing and highly promising field for therapeutic products. However, the proliferation of clinics marketing unapproved stem cell products with claims of efficacy and safety that are not evidence-based is both concerning and ethically problematic. Particularly worrisome is the growing practice of promoting expensive “stem cell treatments” for myriad diseases (including COVID-19) that have unknown or unproven benefits and may pose significant risks to the health of sick and vulnerable patients. History of Vermont Ethics Network Involvement In October of 2018, the VEN Board had a presentation from a UVM pulmonologist on the topic of stem cell medical tourism. This, along with a series of ads appearing in the Times Argus in November of 2018, prompted the organization to send letters to the Attorney General, The Board of Medical Practice and the Office of Professional Regulation requesting investigation into the advertising practices of these clinics. Specifically that the ads may: • Falsely imply that stem cell therapy is effective for all of the conditions listed in the ads; • Falsely imply that the stem cell process is regulated by the FDA; • Fail to give adequate informed consent of downside risks compared to lack of proven efficacy; • Fail to disclose weak or non-existent scientific rationale for the treatment and the lack of knowledge of any known mechanism of “healing”; • Fail to disclose that the experimental nature of the treatment is not subject to standardized experimental protocols.
    [Show full text]
  • The Augustinian Just War Tradition and the Problem of Pretext in Humanitarian Intervention
    View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Fordham University School of Law Fordham International Law Journal Volume 28, Issue 3 2004 Article 7 The Augustinian Just War Tradition and the Problem of Pretext in Humanitarian Intervention Thomas H. Lee∗ ∗ Copyright c 2004 by the authors. Fordham International Law Journal is produced by The Berke- ley Electronic Press (bepress). http://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/ilj The Augustinian Just War Tradition and the Problem of Pretext in Humanitarian Intervention Thomas H. Lee Abstract I will try to show how the present laws of war might be viewed as consistent with the Au- gustinian just war tradition. The modern international legal regime, codified in the Charter of the United Nations (”U.N. Charter”), permits States to engage in war only in “individual or collective self-defense if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations;” or pursuant to a determination by the U.N. Security Council of ”existence of any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression,” and Security Council authorization of the use of force ”to maintain or restore international peace and security.” Thus, modern international law would seem to fore- close preemptive wars in advance of armed attack and humanitarian interventions lacking Security Council authorizations. Although just war theorists have argued the morality of limited subsets of both sorts of formally unlawful wars, Professor Elshtain’s concern in her lecture, and mine in this Essay, is with humanitarian interventions that are seemingly unlawful under the U.N.
    [Show full text]
  • PLATO's LYSIS and ITS INFLUENCE on KANT and ARISTOTLE a Thesis by MICHAEL OVIEDO Submitted to the Office of Graduate Studies
    PLATO’S LYSIS AND ITS INFLUENCE ON KANT AND ARISTOTLE A Thesis by MICHAEL OVIEDO Submitted to the Office of Graduate Studies of Texas A&M University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS August 2008 Major Subject: Philosophy PLATO’S LYSIS AND ITS INFLUENCE ON KANT AND ARISTOTLE A Thesis by MICHAEL OVIEDO Submitted to the Office of Graduate Studies of Texas A&M University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS Approved by: Chair of Committee, Scott Austin Committee Members, Kristi Sweet Stjepan Mestrovic Head of Department, Daniel Conway August 2008 Major Subject: Philosophy iii ABSTRACT Plato’s Lysis and Its Influence on Kant and Aristotle. (August 2008) Michael Oviedo, B.A., Gonzaga University Chair of Advisory Committee: Dr. Scott Austin Most scholarship concerning Plato’s Lysis focuses on the failure of Socrates’ elenchus in its endeavor to define friendship. However, this construal of the dialogue is shortsighted. If one analyzes the dialogue’s dramatic subtext then one will discover a fairly complete theory of friendship attributable to Plato. This issue is critical, for the Lysis is a significant influence on Aristotle’s ethical theory. Thus, unless one grasps the relationship between Aristotle’s ethical theory and this particular dialogue, then one could argue that one does not really understand Aristotle’s motivations regarding his usage of friendship as the defining normative force of his political community. Similarly, understanding the Lysis is paramount to understanding Kant’s theory of friendship as well, for Kant can be interpreted as a virtue ethicist.
    [Show full text]
  • Ius in Bello Norms in Just War Theory the Case of the War in Gaza in 2009
    human rights & human welfare a forum for works in progress working paper no. 51 Intent: Ius In Bello Norms in Just War Theory The Case of the War in Gaza in 2009 by Howard Adelman Professor Emeritus, York University [email protected] Posted on 15 February 2009 http://www.du.edu/gsis/hrhw/working/2009/51-adelman-2009.pdf © Howard Adelman. All rights reserved. This paper may be freely circulated in electronic or hard copy provided it is not modified in any way, the rights of the author not infringed, and the paper is not quoted or cited without express permission of the author. The editors cannot guarantee a stable URL for any paper posted here, nor will they be responsible for notifying others if the URL is changed or the paper is taken off the site. Electronic copies of this paper may not be posted on any other website without express permission of the author. The posting of this paper on the hrhw working papers website does not constitute any position of opinion or judgment about the contents, arguments or claims made in the paper by the editors. For more information about the hrhw working papers series or website, please visit the site online at http://www.du.edu/korbel/hrhw/working Intent: ius in bello Adelman Intent: Ius In Bello Norms in Just War Theory The Case of the War in Gaza in 2009 by Howard Adelman On the panel “Utility in Ethics: Past Precedents and Future Reforms re: ius in bello ” International Studies Association Theme of “Exploring the Past, Anticipating the Future” 15 February 2009 New York City [email protected] 1 February 2009 2 Intent: ius in bello Adelman I Introduction “I am sure they (the IDF soldiers) committed this crime.”1 I read these words just after I had finished the first draft of this paper on 1 February 2009.
    [Show full text]