[mdgdue222]

It is in this context that we can best understand the Stoic teaching about indifferents, such as health and wealth. An individual’s health is vulnerable to being lost if right reason that governs the universe requires it for the good of the whole. If happiness depended on having these assets and avoiding their opposites, then, in these cases, happiness would be impossible. However, if virtue is living in agreement with nature’s government of the universe and if virtue is the only good, one’s happiness is entirely determined by his patterns of assent and is therefore not vulnerable to being lost. If one understands that the good of the whole dictates that in a particular case one’s health must be sacrificed, then one recognizes that his happiness does not require health. We should not, however, see this recognition as tantamount to renunciation. If the Stoic notion of happiness has any relation at all to the ordinary sense, renunciation cannot be a part of it. Rather, the Stoic view of living in accordance with nature should imply not only understanding the way right reason rules the universe but agreeing with it and even desiring that things happen as they do. We can best appreciate the notion that virtue is the good, then, if we take virtue as both acknowledging that the universe is well governed and adopting the point of view, so to speak, of the government (DL VII 87–9).

[GeoRW]

In the end, however, he palliates the differences, leaving the possibility for some way to harmonize the two (1178a30). The differences between the two lives are rooted in the different aspects of the soul. Moral virtues belong to the appetites and desires of the sensory soul – the part obviously associated with the active political life, when its activities are brought under the guidance and control of excellent practical thought and judgment. The “highest” virtues, those belonging to the scientific or philosophical intellect, belong to theoretical reason. To concentrate on these activities one must be appropriately disengaged from active political life. While the latter description leads Aristotle to portray as possible a kind of human life that partakes of divine detachment (1178b5 ff), finally human life is an indissolvable composite of intellect, reason, sensation, desires, and appetites. For Aristotle, strictly speaking, happiness simply is the exercise of the highest virtues, those of theoretical reason and understanding. But even persons pursuing those activities as their highest good, and making them central to their lives, will need to remain connected to daily life, and even to political affairs in the community in which they live. Hence, they will possess and exercise the moral virtues and those of practical thought, as well as those other, higher, virtues, throughout their lives. Clearly, this conception of happiness does not hold all virtue, moral and intellectual, to be of equal value. Rather, Aristotle means the intellectual virtue of study and contemplation to be the dominant part of happiness. However, problems remains since we can understand dominance in two ways. In the first version, the activity of theoretical contemplation is the sole, exclusive component of happiness and the exercise of the moral virtues and practical wisdom is an instrumental means to happiness, but not integral to it. The problem with this version of dominance is that it undermines what Aristotle has said about the intrinsic value of the virtuous activity of politically and socially engaged human beings, including friendship. In a second version of dominance, we might understand contemplation to be the principal, but not exclusive, constituent of happiness. The problem with this version of dominance lies in integrating such apparently incompatible activities into a coherent life. If we give the proper weight to the divine good of theoretical contemplation it may leave us little interest in the virtuous pursuits of the moral goods arising from our political nature, except, again, as means for establishing and maintaining the conditions in which we may contemplate. here

[BgB]

If the objections to intellectualism are warranted, Plato makes significant progress by having his character Socrates suppose that the soul has desires that are not always for what is good. This allows for the complexities of moral psychology to become an important issue in the account of virtue. That development is found in Plato’s mature moral theory. In the Republic, especially in its first four books, Socrates presents the most thorough and detailed account of moral psychology and virtue in the dialogues.

[deedee_1987@hotmail.com]

(For further detailed discussion, see entry on Aristotle’s ethics.) here

[rydiamage]

Nevertheless, Aristippus’ school holds that the end of life is a psychological good, pleasure. Still, it is particular pleasures not the accumulation of these that is the end. As a consequence, their moral theory contrasts sharply with others in antiquity. If we take the claims about the wise man, prudence, and friendship to be references to virtue, then Aristippus’ school denies that virtue is indispensable for achieving the end or goal of life. While they hold that virtue is good insofar as it leads to the end, they seem prepared to dispense with virtue in circumstances where it proves ineffective. Even if they held virtue in more esteem, the Cyrenaics would nonetheless not be eudaimonists since they deny that happiness is the end of life. [links]

[buck]

Knowledge, then, about what is good, bad, and indifferent is the heart of virtue. Courage, e.g., is simply knowledge of what is to be endured: the impulse to endure or not, and the only impulse that is needed by courage, then follows automatically, as a product or aspect of that knowledge. This tight unity in the soul is the basis for the Stoic teaching about the unity of the virtues. Zeno (the founder of the school) defines wisdom (phronêsis), or rather practical knowledge, in matters requiring distribution as justice, in matters requiring choice as moderation, and in matters requiring endurance as courage (Plutarch On Moral Virtue 440E–441D). Practical knowledge, then, is a single, comprehensive knowledge of what is good and bad in each of these kinds of circumstance. [links]

[30dirtybirds]

A common complaint about Aristotle's attempt to defend his conception of happiness is that his argument is too general to show that it is in one's interest to possess any of the particular virtues as they are traditionally conceived. Suppose we grant, at least for the sake of argument, that doing anything well, including living well, consists in exercising certain skills; and let us call these skills, whatever they turn out to be, virtues. Even so, that point does not by itself allow us to infer that such qualities as temperance, justice, courage, as they are normally understood, are virtues. They should be counted as virtues only if it can be shown that actualizing precisely these skills is what happiness consists in. What Aristotle owes us, then, is an account of these traditional qualities that explains why they must play a central role in any well-lived life.

[emj]

When Aristotle begins his discussion of friendship, he introduces a notion that is central to his understanding of this phenomenon: a genuine friend is someone who loves or likes another person for the sake of that other person. Wanting what is good for the sake of another he calls “good will” (eunoia), and friendship is reciprocal good will, provided that each recognizes the presence of this attitude in the other. Does such good will exist in all three kinds of friendship, or is it confined to relationships based on virtue? At first, Aristotle leaves open the first of these two possibilities. He says: [links]

[sjaak]

In VII.1–10 Aristotle investigates character traits—continence and incontinence—that are not as blameworthy as the vices but not as praiseworthy as the virtues. (We began our discussion of these qualities in section 4.) The Greek terms are akrasia (“incontinence”; literally: “lack of mastery”) and enkrateia (“continence”; literally “mastery”). An akratic person goes against reason as a result of some pathos (“emotion”, “feeling”). Like the akratic, an enkratic person experiences a feeling that is contrary to reason; but unlike the akratic, he acts in accordance with reason. His defect consists solely in the fact that, more than most people, he experiences passions that conflict with his rational choice. The akratic person has not only this defect, but has the further flaw that he gives in to feeling rather than reason more often than the average person. more

[manixrock]

What emerges from the haggling is not only a deal, but something larger: a community. There was no central decision about who should produce tin, or whether anyone should; no central decision about who should consume tin, or whether anyone should; no central decision about what should be given in return for tin. All that happened is that some people guessed that if they were to produce tin and bring it to market, it would be worth something to customers—enough to make the venture worthwhile. When some of these guesses prove correct and trades are consummated, a market in tin emerges and becomes part of what brings people together as partners in mutually beneficial ventures. here

[martin]

The system has a logic. Planners cannot change that logic. Their main decision is whether to work with that logic or against it (which Smith regards as a choice between harmony and misery). Smith holds that planners who disregard economic logic are deciding in effect to sacrifice their “pawns,” something that a person of true benevolence would not do.

[otiffanipacey]

Hayek seems to worry that our sense of justice can make it harder for us to live together, and make progress together. To Hayek, if people cannot claim that a starting point is unjust, then whatever we do must be justified as an improvement, not as rectification. If there is no injustice needing rectification, then the improvement we have a right to strive for is pareto-improvement, or in any case, improvement by mutually acceptable means. By contrast, if (contra Rawls) the natural distribution were unjust, that would open the field to all of the zero-sum and negative-sum moves that people feel warranted in imposing on each other under the guise of being fair. The right to make such moves with other people’s money becomes an overwhelmingly lucrative political football, luring a society’s entrepreneurial talent into politics, where instead of creating new social capital, entrepreneurs spend their time inventing clever new ways of dividing it. (Rawls could note that money being in the possession of others does not entail that the money is rightfully theirs, but Hayek is doing social science here. Hayek would not deny the plain fact that people can and often do treat other people’s possessions as a political football, and sometimes even invent theories according to which they have a right to do so. Hayek is talking about the actual empirical cost of treating other people’s possessions as a political football, not the theoretical possibility.) [links]

[HostFat]

It’s a cliché worth repeating: focusing on the root causes of mental illness (poverty, unemployment, poor education, social isolation) will reduce disease burden in the long-term.

[soultcer]

A programme in Finland promotes and facilitates re-employment through training and support, and participants showed significantly lower levels of depression and increased levels of self-esteem, relative to controls at two years. here

[muftimoh]

Pilgrim D. The biopsychosocial model in Anglo-American psychiatry: Past, present and future? Journal of Mental Health, 2002, Vol. 11, No. 6 , Pages 585-594 [PDF]

[Jerryparson]

Various social, economic and physical environments affect a person’s mental health at different stages during their life. One major contributor is social inequality, which has a dose-dependent effect (McManus et al, 2007). Not only are the poor negatively affected by steep gradients, but so are people in the middle (Allen, 2014).

[bitanarchy]

In China, a workplace health promotion programme, incuding a focus on communication skills, stress management, problem solving, conflict management, and self-awareness, reduced depression and anxiety among the workforce, improved work performance, and reduced absenteeism. here

[legion050]

“Medicine is a social science, and politics is nothing else but medicine on a large scale.” – Dr Rudolph Virchow