PHIL-250 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Potentiality And Actuality, Akrasia, Intellectual Virtue
Document Summary
Akrasia - usually translated as incontinence, this term connotes a lack of self-control. A person exhibiting akrasia knows what good behavior consists of but lacks the self-control not to give in to physical pleasures. The concept of akrasia is significant to aristotle, he generally agrees with the socratic claim that no one willingly does evil and that all wrongdoing is a result of ignorance. Arete - usually translated as virtue, this important term means something more akin to. Generally speaking, a person, animal, or thing exhibits arete when it is performing its function properly. That the greeks use the term arete in their discussions of ethics implies a strong sense that humans have a function just as knives do, and that we become good by fulfilling this function. Doctrine of the mean - aristotle"s doctrine, that virtue is a mean state between the vicious extremes of excess and deficiency.
