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Philosophy vocabulary · Ethics and Moral Philosophy

Virtue ethics

Meaning in philosophy, with examples

nounCore term

In philosophy, virtue ethics means: An approach to ethics that focuses on good character and virtues such as courage, honesty and practical wisdom, rather than on rules or consequences.

In Turkish: erdem etiği

How it is used

Rooted in Aristotle and revived in the twentieth century. Instead of asking 'What should I do?', virtue ethicists ask 'What kind of person should I be?' Key terms: virtue, vice, character, eudaimonia and practical wisdom (phronesis).

Example sentences

  1. Virtue ethics asks what an honest and kind person would do in your situation.

  2. Anscombe's 1958 paper helped bring virtue ethics back into mainstream debate.

Common collocations

  • Aristotelian virtue ethics
  • virtue and vice
  • moral character
  • practical wisdom
  • golden meanAristotle's idea that a virtue lies between two vices, one of excess and one of deficiency, as courage lies between cowardice and rashness.
  • ethicsThe branch of philosophy that studies right and wrong, good and bad, and how we ought to live and treat one another.
  • deontologyA family of ethical theories holding that some actions are right or wrong in themselves, because of duties or rules, whatever their consequences.
  • consequentialismThe view that whether an action is right or wrong depends only on its consequences, so the best action is the one with the best outcome.

More terms: Ethics and Moral Philosophy

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