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The Importance of Roles in the Skill Analogy
Title / Series / Name
Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy
Publication Volume
17
Publication Issue
1
Pages
Authors
Editors
Keywords
URI
https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14018/28420
Abstract
This paper argues for a reinterpretation of the skill analogy in virtue ethics. It argues that the skill analogy should not be understood as proposing that being virtuous is analogous to possessing a practical skill but, rather, as proposing that being virtuous is analogous to being a good occupant of a skill-involving role. The paper argues for this by engaging with various standard objections to the analogy, two recent defences of it, and Aristotle’s treatment of it in developing his account of virtue in the Nicomachean Ethics. It aims to show that neither virtue nor the skill analogy is correctly understood without recourse to the notion of a role and that once we have recourse to that notion, many objections to the analogy are met.
Topic
Publisher
Place of Publication
Type
Journal article
Date
2020-03
Language
ISBN
Identifiers
10.26556/jesp.v17i1.753