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Monday, September 11, 2017
MORAL TRAGEDY?
by Scott F. Aikin and Robert B. Talisse
It was probably Aristotle who first took
careful notice of the special role that
the concept of happiness plays in our
thinking about how to live. Happiness,
he argued, is the final end of human
activity, that for the sake of which
every action is performed. Although it
makes perfect to sense to ask someone
why she is pursuing a college degree, or
trying to master chess, there is
something decidedly strange in the
question, "Why do you want
happiness?" Aristotle saw that when explaining human action, happiness is where the buck stops.
Aristotle's insight seems undeniable, but nearly vacuous. To identify happiness as the ultimate aim of
human action is simply to assert that we tend to do what we think will bring us happiness. It is to say that
when we act, we act ultimately for the sake of what we take to be happiness. As appearances can be
deceiving, all of the deep questions remain.
Perhaps this is why Aristotle affirmed also that happiness is the culmination of all of the good things a
human life could manifest. He declared that the truly happy person not only derives great enjoyment
from living, but also is morally and cognitively flawless. In fact, Aristotle goes so far as to affirm that the
happy person necessarily has friends, good looks, health, and wealth. And, as if these advantages were

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RECENT COMMENTS
Dwight Furrow
Ha. I can relate, although I
have my family well
trained. Thanks for your
comment.
3quarksdaily: Wines of
Anger and Joy (Part 2) · 8
minutes ago
James Fuller
As explained previously:
"He AND his wife have
one house in his home
state of Vermont, and an...
3quarksdaily: 'The S-
word': how young
Americans fell in love
with socialism · 3 hours
ago
Logan Paul
This is so me every time I
see a flawed argument it
just made me hyper,
between the article was...
3quarksdaily: Robert
Epstein’s empty essay · 4
hours ago
S. Abbas Raza
This is brill! :-)
3quarksdaily: Parade of
Images · 6 hours ago
jimculleny
Eve, I'm glad the poem
meant something to you. I
miss my young nephew
also.
not enough, he holds further that the happy person is invulnerable even to misfortune and bad luck.
According to Aristotle, then, happiness is not simply that for the sake of which we act; it is also that
which renders a human life complete, lacking nothing that could improve it. It is no wonder that
Aristotle also thought that happiness is rare.
Few today subscribe to the view that complete success in every evaluative dimension is necessary for
happiness. Surely a person could be happy but not especially beautiful or wealthy. It is important to note,
however, that those who affirm this more modest view often take their insight to show that things like
wealth and beauty are not really the incontrovertible goods that they often appear to be. That is, the
claim that one might be happy in the absence of wealth and good looks is most often accompanied by the
rider that these latter attributes are not especially valuable after all. Consequently, the core of Aristotle's
second claim is retained, albeit in a moderated form: the happy life manifests not every good that a
human life could realize, but all of the really important goods that a human life could realize.
This moderated version of Aristotle's second claim is undeniably attractive. It strikes many as obvious
that success in living involves achieving a range of centrally important values; in order to be good, a life
must manifest integrity, honesty, loyalty, hopefulness, kindness, determination, charity, trustworthiness,
and much else. It also seems obvious to many that these success-making attributes must be manifest to
the fullest degree. A person who only occasionally manifests integrity and determination, or who is
sometimes disloyal and untrustworthy, is living a life that is to some degree failing from the moral point
of view. He may of course feel satisfied with his life, but it is nevertheless unsuccessful.
To be sure, even on the moderated version, it is not easy to live successfully. The important goods upon
whose manifestation success depends are not easily attained; one must work to achieve a good life. It is
not surprising, then, that we live in a social world that inundates us with competing images of success,
each promoting its distinctive conception of how all of the truly important values best can be realized
and maintained. From automobile advertisements and fashion magazines to university websites,
television preachers, and political candidates, the social environment is saturated with depictions of the
good life, and, again, all but the most simplistic of these includes some program for achieving the right
balance of all of the goods. The self-help section of your local bookstore tells the tale: success in life
consists in having it all, making no compromises, missing out on nothing, achieving and sustaining all of
the good things, all at once.
But what if it should turn out that success in this sense is not only hard to achieve, but impossible? What
if the reason why it's so difficult to live a life that manifests all of the important goods to the fullest
degree is that it is not possible to do so? Would it follow that we are doomed moral failure?
To get a better sense of the possibility we are raising, consider that our lives feature periodic episodes
where we must choose not between a good and a bad, but rather between two or more goods. We
sometimes can remain loyal to one person only by betraying the trust of another; in some circumstances,
kindness requires dishonesty; and often seeing things clearly results in little more than a loss of hope. In
cases like these, the achievement of one good requires the violation of another good. And, more
importantly, it is not clear how one could determine whether in any instance the preservation of loyalty
was worth the corresponding dissolution of trust. Hence it's possible that humans just can't have it all.
Cases in which goods conflicts are common enough. What should we make of them?
One view claims that irredeemable losses involving important goods is an inescapable feature of human
lives because strife among goods is built into the fabric of the moral universe. Another view is that the
cases of strife are all due to limitations on human insight, knowledge, or imagination. According to the
first view, there could be no human life without serious moral loss. That may sound harsh. However, this
view offers something of a consolation: As moral loss is inevitable, it is in the end not clear how it could
constitute a moral failure. The second view also seems harsh. It claims that moral losses have their roots
in our limitations, and so it would appear that such losses are due to our shortcomings. However, there is
consolation in the idea that finite beings are always subject to cognitive and epistemic limitations; such,
after all, is part of what constitutes our finitude.
Both views at once condemn us to inescapable moral loss while offering a corresponding consolation
that derives from the loss's inevitability. Both provide parallel doom and comfort in the thought that we
are human, after all.
However, matters are more complicated than it might seem. We have identified only two accounts of the
conflict between goods. There are other accounts, including a number that hold that moral loss is not
inevitable. These views hold that every conflict among goods is resolvable either because there is always
an overarching good that can adjudicate the conflict, or because the limitations on our moral
understanding are surmountable. Thus, there is a conflict among two styles of thinking about moral
conflicts. One holds that strife among goods is inevitable and irresolvable, and the other denies this. Can
this conflict be addressed?
It matters how we think about conflicts among important goods. If we think that such conflicts are
irresolvable, in the face of them we will see no point in agonizing over their resolution. In fact, agonizing
over them and trying to think of solutions will seem only to their difficulty. If alternatively we think that
all such conflicts admit of some resolution, then striving to find the right response might be obligatory.
Consequently, the hasty inference from it being difficult to find an answer to there being no answer is not
only a cognitive but also a moral error.
3quarksdaily: Monday The trouble is that it is unclear that this conflict over how to think about moral conflict is itself
Poem · 10 hours ago resolvable. This second-order conflict is at least as vexed as any first-order conflict over goods like
honesty and loyalty is. But if we don't know how to resolve the conflict over how to think about moral
Eve German conflicts, a different and more thoroughly unsettling possibility looms.

Thank you thank you for
this poem. My brother,
who passed away in 2008,
was a guitarist and his...
3quarksdaily: Monday
Poem · 11 hours ago
Urban Fringe
This is the question and
the answer: "Why attribute
According to plausible account, a morally successful life must be a life of moral reflection and
command. One might say that in order to live well, one must achieve a certain level of moral
understanding. One cannot live a successful life by accident; success must be in some way won by way
of deliberate effort. But if we can't resolve the conflict among ways of thinking about moral conflicts, we
lack a significant -- some might say indispensable -- ingredient of moral understanding. In the same way
that we may lack real happiness if we fail to achieve some first-order good, it seems we also lack
happiness if we lack this second-order good of moral understanding. Hence our lives might be
condemned not only to imperfection, but tragedy too.
ShareThis Facebook Tweet Reddit LinkedIn Pinterest Email
Posted by Scott F. Aikin and Robert B. Talisse at 12:45 AM | Permalink

emotional expression to
wine? There can be...

3quarksdaily: Wines of
Anger and Joy (Part 2 Comments 3 Quarks Daily ! Login
2) · 12 hours ago
Sort by Oldest
& Recommend 1 ⤤ Share
Luke's teacher

Luke. Here, since you're Join the discussion…

too lazy to go look.
"Happiness evidently also
needs external goods to...
3quarksdaily: Moral
Tragedy? · 17 hours ago
Luke Lea
Luke Lea • 20 hours ago
"He declared that the truly happy person not only derives great enjoyment from
living, but also is morally and cognitively flawless. In fact, Aristotle goes so far
as to affirm that the happy person necessarily has friends, good looks, health,
and wealth. And, as if these advantages were not enough, he holds further that
the happy person is invulnerable even to misfortune and bad luck. "

"He declared that the truly
happy person not only
derives great enjoyment
from living, but also...
3quarksdaily: Moral
Tragedy? · 18 hours ago
△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›
Teller
He's not only at my Most
Interesting People dinner
party, he's invited to spend
the weekend.
3quarksdaily: A master
class in writing from John
△ ▽ • Reply • Share ›
McPhee · 19 hours ago
I don't remember him saying that. In fact as I recall -- it's been fifty years! --
Aristotle made the point that true happiness is not temporary or fleeting
phenomenon, like a happy childhood (I had one of those btw). It is something
that is achieved over a life-time, the sum total of a life well-lived. The notion
that you have to be good looking or never have an instant of bad luck in order to
be truly happy -- come on, that's silly! Let's see the quotes.
Luke's teacher • 18 hours ago
Luke. Here, since you're too lazy to go look.
"Happiness evidently also needs external goods to be added, since we cannot, or
cannot easily, do fine actions without the resources.... for we do not altogether
have the character of happiness if we look utterly repulsive or are ill-born,
solitary or childless... if our children or friends are totally bad...." (NE 1099a 27-
1099b5).

M.W. Poe
✉ Subscribe d Add Disqus to your siteAdd DisqusAdd 🔒 Privacy

gave me a solid chuckle.

very nice. "be the eclipse"
is probably my new
favorite generically...

3quarksdaily: Parade of
Images · 20 hours ago

M.W. Poe

I'd add one of my

favorites, from Sir Philip
Sydney's "The Defense of
Poesy" To the second,...

3quarksdaily: Lying
Quotes · 20 hours ago

Jim Harrison

Lie once in a while.

Otherwise people may
believe you when you tell
the truth.
—my Dad

3quarksdaily: Lying
Quotes · 20 hours ago

D. L. Pughe

I believe the running joke

has become: Climate
Deniers "There is no
global warming!"
Mother...

3quarksdaily:
CATSPEAK · 20 hours
ago

bill

Socialism to Democrats is
what Gun Control and
Abortion is to Republicans
-- a no win...

3quarksdaily: 'The S-
word': how young
Americans fell in love
with socialism · 20 hours
ago

Mr__Neutron

Short answer: No.

3quarksdaily: Are natural

disasters part of God’s
retribution? · 20 hours ago

Leanne Ogasawara

WONDERFUL
poem!!!!!!!! "from fingers
to strings was by god a
grace bridge..."

3quarksdaily: Monday
Poem · 22 hours ago

Robin Varghese

A Truth that's told with

bad intent
Beats all the Lies you can
invent
--William Blake

3quarksdaily: Lying
Quotes · 1 day ago

steve3

I don't know if under

Democratic socialism you
are supposed to have three
houses, I guess his...
3quarksdaily: 'The S-
word': how young
Americans fell in love
with socialism · 1 day ago

hicksmokeduckie

Yeah steve3, everyone is

aware of this, but it's
irrelevant to the fact that
you and "Guyflaneur"...

3quarksdaily: 'The S-
word': how young
Americans fell in love
with socialism · 1 day ago

steve3

Clinton and the DNC are

the reason Sanders did not
get the nomination. That is
a fact

3quarksdaily: 'The S-
word': how young
Americans fell in love
with socialism · 1 day ago

Carson Leong

It may be premature to say

conclusively that there is
any trend towards more
powerful hurricanes...

3quarksdaily: In the Eye

of Hurricane Irma Lie the
Fingerprints of Global
Warming – and
Inequality · 1 day ago

Luke Lea

Nonsense. There has been

no trend towards more or
more powerful hurricanes.
Stick to the science.

3quarksdaily: In the Eye

of Hurricane Irma Lie the
Fingerprints of Global
Warming – and
Inequality · 1 day ago

jG

Defelction. It's not a

matter of what feels good,
or your political biases,
let's just stick to...

3quarksdaily: 'The S-
word': how young
Americans fell in love
with socialism · 1 day ago

steve3

The forest for the trees....

Sanders was wronged, and
while pointing fingers at
Trump feels good,...

3quarksdaily: 'The S-
word': how young
Americans fell in love
with socialism · 1 day ago

Dwight Furrow

Ha. I can relate, although I

have my family well
trained. Thanks for your
comment.

3quarksdaily: Wines of
Anger and Joy (Part 2) · 8
minutes ago

James Fuller

As explained previously:
"He AND his wife have
one house in his home
state of Vermont, and an...

3quarksdaily: 'The S-
word': how young
Americans fell in love
with socialism · 3 hours
ago

Logan Paul

This is so me every time I

see a flawed argument it
just made me hyper,
between the article was...

3quarksdaily: Robert
Epstein’s empty essay · 4
hours ago

S. Abbas Raza

This is brill! :-)

3quarksdaily: Parade of
Images · 6 hours ago

jimculleny

Eve, I'm glad the poem

meant something to you. I
miss my young nephew
also.

3quarksdaily: Monday
Poem · 10 hours ago

Eve German

Thank you thank you for

this poem. My brother,
who passed away in 2008,
was a guitarist and his...

3quarksdaily: Monday
Poem · 11 hours ago

Urban Fringe

This is the question and

the answer: "Why attribute
emotional expression to
wine? There can be...

3quarksdaily: Wines of
Anger and Joy (Part
2) · 12 hours ago

Luke's teacher

Luke. Here, since you're

too lazy to go look.
"Happiness evidently also
needs external goods to...

3quarksdaily: Moral
Tragedy? · 17 hours ago

Luke Lea

"He declared that the truly

happy person not only
derives great enjoyment
from living, but also...

3quarksdaily: Moral
Tragedy? · 18 hours ago

Teller

He's not only at my Most

Interesting People dinner
party, he's invited to spend
the weekend.

3quarksdaily: A master
class in writing from John
McPhee · 19 hours ago

M.W. Poe

gave me a solid chuckle.

very nice. "be the eclipse"
is probably my new
favorite generically...

3quarksdaily: Parade of
Images · 20 hours ago

M.W. Poe

I'd add one of my

favorites, from Sir Philip
Sydney's "The Defense of
Poesy" To the second,...

3quarksdaily: Lying
Quotes · 20 hours ago

Jim Harrison

Lie once in a while.

Otherwise people may
believe you when you tell
the truth.
—my Dad

3quarksdaily: Lying
Quotes · 20 hours ago

D. L. Pughe

I believe the running joke

has become: Climate
Deniers "There is no
global warming!"
Mother...

3quarksdaily:
CATSPEAK · 20 hours
ago

bill

Socialism to Democrats is
what Gun Control and
Abortion is to Republicans
-- a no win...

3quarksdaily: 'The S-
word': how young
Americans fell in love
with socialism · 20 hours
ago

Mr__Neutron

Short answer: No.

3quarksdaily: Are natural

disasters part of God’s
retribution? · 20 hours ago

Leanne Ogasawara

WONDERFUL
poem!!!!!!!! "from fingers
to strings was by god a
grace bridge..."

3quarksdaily: Monday
Poem · 22 hours ago

Robin Varghese

A Truth that's told with

bad intent
Beats all the Lies you can
invent
--William Blake

3quarksdaily: Lying
Quotes · 1 day ago

steve3

I don't know if under

Democratic socialism you
are supposed to have three
houses, I guess his...

3quarksdaily: 'The S-
word': how young
Americans fell in love
with socialism · 1 day ago

hicksmokeduckie

Yeah steve3, everyone is

aware of this, but it's
irrelevant to the fact that
you and "Guyflaneur"...

3quarksdaily: 'The S-
word': how young
Americans fell in love
with socialism · 1 day ago
 steve3

Clinton and the DNC are

the reason Sanders did not
get the nomination. That is
a fact

3quarksdaily: 'The S-
word': how young
Americans fell in love
with socialism · 1 day ago

Carson Leong

It may be premature to say

conclusively that there is
any trend towards more
powerful hurricanes...

3quarksdaily: In the Eye

of Hurricane Irma Lie the
Fingerprints of Global
Warming – and
Inequality · 1 day ago

Luke Lea

Nonsense. There has been

no trend towards more or
more powerful hurricanes.
Stick to the science.

3quarksdaily: In the Eye

of Hurricane Irma Lie the
Fingerprints of Global
Warming – and
Inequality · 1 day ago

jG

Defelction. It's not a

matter of what feels good,
or your political biases,
let's just stick to...

3quarksdaily: 'The S-
word': how young
Americans fell in love
with socialism · 1 day ago

steve3

The forest for the trees....

Sanders was wronged, and
while pointing fingers at
Trump feels good,...

3quarksdaily: 'The S-
word': how young
Americans fell in love
with socialism · 1 day ago

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