Virtue Ethics

Is virtue ethics a form of moral particularism? Respond in relation to the SEP entry on “moral particularism”

Frequently, Virtue ethics is associated with moral particularism. This is certainly because virtue ethicists and moral particularism as a theory share many common beliefs and overlap one another in many cases of moral judgments. Naturally those similarities cause many to believe that virtue ethics and moral particularism is one and the same thing, or similarly that one of them must be a form of the other that is applied differently. This essay however, aims to prove that not to be the case. As there are a few nevertheless major areas of conflict between those two theories of ethics. This will be achieved throughout the essay by primarily comparing two texts; those are Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics and the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy’s entry on moral particularism. The essay also intends to slightly hint that virtue ethics is a more adaptable and practical theory of ethics when it comes to the regular situations of moral dilemma, yet this will not be done by a method of direct evaluation and comparison between the pros and cons of the two theories, as such a method will mislead us from the main question that the essay aims to tackle, which is whether virtue ethics is a form of moral particularism. The essay will go through the common beliefs that are shared between both ethical doctrines whilst at the same time highlighting the major areas of conflict relating to (ethical concerns, different opinions, exceptions and unity of the virtues) to support the claim that virtue ethics cannot be regarded as a form of moral particularism.

Primarily, one of the main common beliefs shared by both ethical theories is that there are no moral principles that are able to calculate the morality of the action. The ultimate judge for the morality of the action is the agent himself. Unlike generalists who believe that we adopt the same method of judging the morality of an action in each situation of ethical dilemma using moral principles as tools, virtue ethics and moral particularism believe that the agent evaluates the morality of an action exceptionally in each specific case, using a completely new method in each case that arises. Generalists also hold two radically different notions of moral principles; The first being absolute principles, those are moral principles that would cause an action to be wrong if they are broken, regardless of the specific situation of the action. The second being contributory principles, those principles are more flexible, meaning they contribute to the evaluation of the morality of an action in the same way in every circumstance, however an action is not necessarily wrong if the contributory principle is broken, so long as there are more moral principles being followed that contradict with it. In the latter case it is believed by the generalists that breaking the contributory principle will worsen the action, but it will not judge the action as a whole as morally wrong^[1]. Both virtue ethics and moral particularism agree that absolute principles fail when they contradict each other in one circumstance. They also harmonize in the belief that contributory principles cannot be used in the same way in each action to evaluate its morality.

Nonetheless one of the main areas between virtue ethics and moral particularism is that of their central ethical concern. The ethical concerns of moral particularism seem to be more ontological while those of virtue ethics are more epistemological^[2]. This conflict is demonstrated, as moral particularism judges that contributory principles are completely unnecessary in judging the morality of an action. Though Aristotle’s account of virtue ethics proves otherwise. Aristotle claims that it is necessary to use our experiences to develop our virtuous faculty^[3]. This certainly does not suggest that Aristotle believes that we use contributory principles in an analogous to evaluate the morality of each of our moral action, that is the view of the generalists. Rather what Aristotle claims is that we learn that contributory principles are not able to calculate the morality of an action through repetitive error until we have developed our virtuous faculty enough, the more we develop our virtuous faculty through this trail and error method the less we need the aid of contributory principles for our virtuous faculty. This conflict might seem confusing at first, maybe the use of an example would aid in clarifying this conflict. If someone were to teach children a doctrine of ethics to provide them with a simple account of separating between what is right and wrong, surely we would agree that the account of moral particularism would be far beyond complicated and that it would be near impossible for the children to grasp this doctrine. Baring in mind that moral particularism completely rejects moral principles. Conversely, Aristotle’s virtue ethics will encourage that young children be taught absolute moral principles, even though he rejects them as well. That is because through error of absolute principles students will evolve into adopting an ethical account of contributory principles, and yet again through error, they will abandon the repetitive use of contributory principles, this is when we can say that they have developed a virtuous faculty that can guide them without those principles. Thus Aristotle admits that the only way to teach his doctrine of virtue ethics is through teaching moral principles and subsequently he has given us the method by which we can reach an understanding of virtue ethics. Furthermore, moral particularism also allows little room for contributory principles, Dancy claims: “The third question asks us what relevance other cases do have to a new case, if not the sort of relevance that the generalist supposes. The answer to this is that experience of similar cases can tell us what sort of thing to look out for, and the sort of relevance that a certain feature can have; in this way our judgment in a new case can be informed, though it is not forced or constrained, by our experience of similar cases in the past.” (Dancy, 2013)^[4]. Nonetheless, by using the word “can” tell us what sort of things to look out for, Dancy has danced around the objection or criticism by opening little room for the assistance of contributory principles when making moral judgments, but he has not admit that they are necessary in order for people to be capable of following and reaching an understanding of his ethical philosophy, unlike Aristotle who did. This is why his doctrine is more epistemological, concerned with the “the structure of moral knowledge” (Gardiner, 2005)^[5]. While moral particularism is more ontological, meaning it is concerned with the “character of the moral fact” (Gardiner, 2005)^[6], it does not show us how to adopt its ethical doctrine and this is why it is less practical.