Time Management!

In Aristotelian thought happiness is acquired by using reasoning to make decisions rather than following desires, and right now I am not happy. I did the things I desired and put myself on a really tight schedule, rather than thinking about and then doing all of my work beforehand. Not only am I not happy in the Aristotelian sense, but also in the emotional sense.

Natural Virtues

When it comes to ethics and morality and virtues, I have never known exactly what to think. I’m not a religious person, but I definitely do have a sense of what’s right and wrong. Secular morality, or something like that. Now in class we’ve talked about natural virtues and true virtues. Although what we’ve learned is about people doing things that seem good, but not necessarily with the intent of being virtuous, or knowing exactly why they are good, I think it’s definitely possible for people do be good and virtuous without necessarily knowing why. Distinguishing between the two almost seems to suggest that natural virtue isn’t worth as much attention as “true” virtue.

I’d definitely consider myself to be a good person, even if I might not know why I believe the things I believe. So I think that being virtuous naturally is also a possibility, in a different sense from that we discussed in class. I think people can do good things without any reason. And call me an optimist but I’d like to think most people are inherently good and naturally want to do good things.