Political Science: Aristotle’s View on Human Nature

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Table of Contents

Introduction
Main body
Conclusion
Works Cited

Introduction

Aristotle, in his Nicomachean Ethics, wrote the first systematic treatise on ethics. Reason, well-being and moderation are central concept. Aristotle was indeed the logical nature of his mind that enabled Aristotle to make contributions to so many fields. He had a gift for organizing thought, and the definitions that he proposed and the categories that he established have provided the basis for later thought in many different fields. He was consistently the voice of practical common sense. Aristotle maintains that virtue is always defined by reference to reason. Aristotle’s ethics therefore looks at a kind of faith that believes that such a person exists and that man needs to appreciate his judgments.

The virtuous person acts from the right motive and actually gets pleasure from doing so. (Arrington). According to Aristotle, virtuous activity does not mean that it is an end in itself (VI.5, 1140b7; X.6, 1176b7), but is in actuality only just a means to happiness because in the final analysis, it must be seen that there is no other way to reconcile the past contention with Aristotle’s other claim that man can do all just for the sake of happiness (I.12, 1102a2; X.6, 1176b30-32). According to him, “virtuous activity is desirable both for its own sake and for the sake of the happiness it produces, is discouraged by Aristotle’s insistence” (I.7, 1097b14-23; X.6, 1176b6 as cited in Arrington). He maintains that an act is compulsory if it happens to originate in an external cause and the person who does the act does not contribute to it. (Cliffs Notes on Aristotle’s Ethics).

According to Aristotle, human action should aim at its proper end. Everywhere people aim at pleasure, wealth, and glory. But none of these ends, although they have value, can occupy the place of the chief good for which man should aim. To be an ultimate end, an act must be self-sufficient and final—“that which is always desirable itself and never for the sake of something else”— and it must be attainable.

Main body

Aristotle seemed certain that all people would agree that happiness is the only end that meets all the requirements for the ultimate end of action. Indeed, we choose pleasure, wealth and glory only because we think that “through their instrumentality we shall be happy.” Happiness, it turns out, is another name of the good for human beings; like the good, happiness is the fulfilment of our distinctive function as human beings—our self-realization. The highest good is eudaemonia, or both excessive repression and excessive indulgence. The good life involves the harmonious development of the normal functions of the organism. The theory of self-realization has emphasized the development of all the functions of the person as the greatest good. Nothing short of the harmonious development of all sides of human nature can be accepted as a satisfactory standard.

Just as the excellence of the sculptor lies in the skill with which she or he applies his art, so the excellence of humans lies in the fulfilment of their function as human beings. The function peculiar to humans is their life of reason. They should live a life that fully actualizes their rational capacities, and by principles that best express what it means to be a human being.

Aristotle maintains that citizens and especially leaders must be persons of unquestionable character. This is especially useful when applied on the job. Virtuosity is very important in reaching a country’s social goals designed for the common good, yet it is not an exclusive thing among the aristocrats. One can witness virtue from all people in all walks of life. In this regard, democracy, with all its imperfections, is still the best form of governance. In democracy, every person born within the State automatically becomes its citizen regardless of one’s traits, hence, becoming entitled to the privileges and duties set by the Constitution. Every individual’s capacity to be of service to the society is recognized. His attitude in the workplace is recognized too. Part of the privilege to participate in governance is expressing one’s views on issues affecting one’s role as a citizen. This, in most cases, becomes a duty as well.

Aristotle’s argument can be refuted though, by citing the way our government has been providing for its people regardless of one’s participation in stately affairs or one’s aptitude to do so. Everyone is a citizen entitled to all social services and assistance, though everyone is also required to give something back to the State through the taxes proportionate to one’s earnings and needs. This country has tried to provide equal education to everyone so that all will have the chance to a better life as well as become educated individuals capable of holding one’s own in any predicament. The more educated people have become in this nation, the more they grow to be aware of the realities of the times, and so, the more they begin to articulate what they think is right for our society. This voice is loudly manifested when the citizens vote for their leaders during elections. The smarter the people, the wiser are the choices. Thus, in this regard, Aristotle’s argument is totally an unjust elitist one, especially after seeing that everyone can be their best once given the confidence and the opportunity to do so. Because of this, each person, at a particular point of his or her life, can be a citizen that a country can be proud of.

If Aristotle was indeed using the logical nature of his mind to make contributions to so many fields, then he had a gift for organizing thought, and the definitions that he proposed and the categories that he established have provided the basis for later thought in many different fields. He was consistently the voice of practical common sense. Aristotle’s teachings are deemed as one of the cornerstones of the social sciences, including philosophy, political science and ethics. A citizen, for Aristotle, is an individual who has the capacity and the right to engage in the governance of a “polies.” Citizenship must be earned as a birthright through one’s parents, and through one’s aptitude and keenness to participate in public decision-making. His ideology is an apparent opposition to democracy in that only some are qualified to become citizens and rulers, and the essential qualification of virtuosity is solely found among the aristocrats.

Aristotle’s views when applied in the workplace points one to a study of his psychology. Aristotle’s psychology is not confined to the study of the human mind or soul, but is concerned with all forms of psyche, which means to Aristotle, all that distinguished living creatures, including man, from inanimate objects. What is sometimes quaintly called Aristotle’s distinction between “types of soul” takes on a different and more immediately intelligible aspect if we recognize it as a classification of the kinds of living organism—plants, animals and man. But we must guard against a misunderstanding to which the alternative way of putting it may give rise. In Book I he states that he regards knowledge as something fine and precious. The affections of the soul are linked with the body such as anger, joy, love and confidence. Again Aristotle distinguishes several different sense of justice. He identifies one sense of justice with virtue as a whole, but specifically in relation to other people. Another sense of this justice pertains to rectification—setting right previous wrongs. Aristotle holds a simple but extremely powerful theory of distributive justice holding that both goods and obligations ought to be distributed according to merit. This can be likened in the workplace and ethics at work. For instance, he considers a group of people who have somehow obtained a flute. Who in the group should get the flute? The best flute player, according to Aristotle. Similarly, goods ought to go to those who deserve them—that is, those who can make the best use of them. This answer has very strong intuitive appeal. According to Aristotle, they should be the people with the greatest ability to bring about good government. Aristotle’s theory is a patterned theory of justice. It says that people should receive goods of a certain kind to the extent that they have merit of that kind. Thus, it answers the question of distributive justice in terms of who has what other characteristics now or at some other definite time. In Book I of his Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle posits that “every art and every inquiry, and similarly every action and pursuit, is thought to aim at some good; and for this reason, the good has rightly been declared to be that at which all things aim. But a certain difference is found among ends; some are activities, others are products apart from the activities which produce them.” In the workplace, the goal is that all individuals become happy while working. “Happy” means a feeling of well-being in the moment. Workaholics have difficulty remaining in the here and now. They are in the past or in the future, either avoiding work or doing work. Work addicts feel driven by the compulsion to work. There is a feeling of emptiness.

Neither driveness nor emptiness is happiness. Some work addicts say they will feel happy when their tasks are accomplished. Of course the work is never done. Thus, happiness dangles like the proverbial carrot, it is only the next project away. The myth that workaholics are happy is like the myth that workaholics are productive. Both are illusions of an addictive society that would have us blind ourselves to what is really going on. Putting this in the context of Aristotle’s philosophy, the “end” here is no longer a state of happiness for the employee because he is so much driven to produce results that the many activities that surround that has resulted otherwise. Piles and files are common stashes in work. For some employees, the files represent a continuing supply of work projects upon projects for years to come. You never get ahead; and when you finish one, another is waiting.

In Section 6, he notes that “to decide what happiness is like, it is necessary to determine what the function of man is.” He says that excellence means performing one’s function well. In the workplace, man is supposed to function well. Yet, files and piles are the tools of the addictive process. They become the tools a work addict uses to stay in the addiction. Given man’s lifestyle, there will always be stuff that needs attending. When people believe that they can and should control theses things, then there is trouble. There is some truth to the saying that “We are what we do.” When what we do is live preoccupied with our files and piles, we become just as lifeless as these objects.

In sum, Aristotle gives much of his space to a description of human characters and motives, to the discomfiture of those for whom the ethics must be judged. Similarly, his suggestions for the constitution of an ideal community are based on an empirical study of actual tragedies. He is concerned with the concrete and particular and adopts a more piecemeal approach because it is natural for him to judge men by internal, that is to say, human, and standards. Some may be inclined to dismiss Aristotle’s ethics as “merely descriptive” or even as “subjective.” In doing so, one can miss the point of Aristotle’s treatment. He is keenly concerned that one acquires moral understanding in order to become better men and to lead better lives, and that there is an objectively determinable answer to every well-formulated moral question.

“An act is compulsory if it originates in an external cause and the doer does not contributes nothing to it.” (Cliffs Notes on Aristotle’s Ethics). The client of the lawyer was being ambiguous in the sense that in order to free his client from punishment, he used an escape that the criminal may be ignorant of what’s right or wrong. In my opinion, although I have not spoken to Aristotle directly, his insights tell us that in any course of action, if the person involved acted it out, and he or she does not know that doing it is punishable, the doer is not guilty of the evil act itself because the idea of evilness is no yet definite in his mind. Aristotle may be a philosopher to take the side of his own concepts but he is also logical. Aristotle will state that the rapist is not guilty of murder because it is not defined in his ideals what that crime is. The criminal involved in this argument, I suppose, based on Aristotle’s philosophy, is innocent of the act but he is not innocent of evil. He was moved by a tyrant and the tyrant is the person who had raped him at a time that he was most vulnerable. As a child, the one who murdered and raped received only one of the two acts he committed. Then realizing the context of Aristotle’s point, the doer is guilty of rape. He must be punished for it because he knows what rape is from his childhood.

Aristotle maintains that man is born without his own consent so that his ideas are there involuntarily and his habits are under those who cause him to make them.” (Baron D’Holbach). If this philosophy were to be absorbed by all of us as true and applicable to life in general, then to speak of the innocence of the rapist-cum-murderer is partly valid again. D’Holbach neither disagreed nor agreed with Aristotle. Instead, he added further insights that would support the main theory we all have deep within us. The theory that we are being controlled by a higher entity on whatever we do is what most of us believe in. D’Holback will respond to the argument by citing examples of how we, as humans are powerless due to the circumstances we are faced with. There is an old saying that goes “If such thirst for water is extremely parching the throat, any man will take the risk to swallow it.” D’Holback believes that we are also moved by our surroundings. Having said this, it becomes clearer and at the same time, it proves that our rapist-cum-murderer may be innocent of murder but not of rape. In this writer’s viewpoint, the doer did the act of rape because he has knowledge of what the nature of rape really is. However, human instinct will tell us to fight back any attack whether it is as small as an ant bite.

According to Aristotle, the actions of people should aim at pleasure, wealth, and glory. But none of these ends, although they have value, can occupy the place of the chief good for which man should aim. To be an ultimate end, an act must be self-sufficient and final.

Conclusion

Works Cited

Aristotle’s Ethics, Books 1, 2, 5, 8, and 9. Cliffs Notes on Aristotle’s Ethics. Voluntary and Involuntary Action. 2008. Web.

Holbach, Paul The System of Nature. 2008. Web.

Nicomachean Ethics. The Basic Works of Aristotle, New York: Random House, 1941.

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Political Science: Aristotle’s View on Human Nature

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