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Essay / The Concept of Ethics and the Pursuit of Happiness
Ethics SectionAccording to Aristotle, the highest good, or the one thing to which everything is meant to lead, is Eudaimonia. Eudaimonia is a Greek word meaning happiness or well-being. Thus, the highest good in Aristotle's eyes is happiness. Happiness is something that has intrinsic value, meaning it is desired for its own sake. This begs the question: how can we achieve this highest good of happiness? Aristotle says that the path to the highest good is through virtue. He lists the cardinal virtues of courage, prudence, temperance and justice. Through these cardinal virtues we can be led to the highest good. Furthermore, there are two other kinds of virtues: moral and intellectual. Intellectual virtues are acquired through teaching and learning. Moral virtues, on the other hand, are acquired through habit and practice. Overall, virtue comes from knowledge, choice, the will to do it, and the pleasure that virtue brings. Finally, Aristotle mentions that the virtues are a sort of “golden mean”. To attain a specific virtue is to find oneself at neither extreme. For example, having too much courage is considered arrogance, a negative virtue, while having too little is considered cowardly, which is also a negative virtue. Overall, finding the golden mean of the cardinal virtues, practicing the moral virtues, and acquiring intellectual virtues are the means to achieving the end goal of the highest good, or happiness. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an original essayOne of the cart problems we talked about was the lever problem. The example states that there is a cart speeding down the tracks and you are sitting in front of a lever. The trail forks, and on the current path there are five people, and on the other path there is one. The moral problem is whether or not you pull the lever. If you pull the lever, one person dies and you save five. If you don't, all five people die and you save one. For one thing, if you shoot it, you save five lives instead of one. Many people's moral intuition leans in favor of this solution, because it seems like an easy decision to save more lives. But on the other hand, things are getting complicated. Those whose moral intuitions decide not to pull the lever and let five people die is because when you pull the lever you are actively killing someone. There is a situation beyond your control because you did not put the cart on track. Therefore, you are not committing murder if you let all five people die. It's a horrible accident. The patient problem is one where there are five people, each of whom has a separate problem with a separate organ. A healthy person fits exactly all five organs. The question is: should we kill a single person to save the five patients? Most people's intuitions are no, it has nothing to do with them, so we shouldn't kill them. The other side is yes, we should mutilate him and remove all his organs, just to save the five people. Thought experiments show that intuitions are not universal. They can be moved. My intuitions are contradictory: I would pull the lever, but I would not kill the only healthy person. There is no clear solution to this problem, as there are always more cases with conflicting intuitions. Practical section The original position describes an agreement in which everyone would agree. For a group of people who were going..