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Philosophy vocabulary · Key Thinkers' Concepts

Golden mean

Meaning in philosophy, with examples

nounCommon term

In philosophy, golden mean means: Aristotle's idea that a virtue lies between two vices, one of excess and one of deficiency, as courage lies between cowardice and rashness.

In Turkish: altın orta, orta yol

How it is used

Also called the doctrine of the mean, from the Nicomachean Ethics. The mean is relative to us and is found through practical wisdom; it is not a mathematical average or a call for moderation in everything.

Example sentences

  1. For Aristotle, generosity is the golden mean between wastefulness and stinginess.

  2. The golden mean doesn't tell you always to feel a moderate amount of anger.

Common collocations

  • Aristotle's golden mean
  • doctrine of the mean
  • excess and deficiency
  • find the mean
  • virtue ethicsAn approach to ethics that focuses on good character and virtues such as courage, honesty and practical wisdom, rather than on rules or consequences.
  • ethicsThe branch of philosophy that studies right and wrong, good and bad, and how we ought to live and treat one another.
  • StoicismAn ancient Greek and Roman school teaching that virtue is the only true good and that we should calmly accept what we cannot control.
  • normativeConcerned with how things ought to be, or with what is good, right or reasonable, rather than with describing how things actually are.

More terms: Key Thinkers' Concepts

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