Introduction
Human beings are born free, and Aristotle’s famous differentia, “human beings are rational animals” (NE, 1098a3-5). Contrary to other beings, humans are capable of deciding their course of action in everyday life and so can respond to multiple internal and external stimuli that help them with this decision. However, often we see cases of moral weakness – defined by Aristotle as cases of “going against one’s own calculation” of what has been judged to be morally superior (NE 1145b10-14). We often choose the “vicious” option over the “virtuous.” And although Aristotle has dedicated an entire book to this concept (NE VII), for multiple reasons it has been discussed very little in contemporary literature. It holds great importance in our lives; even if we are taught formal moral education, if we are not abiding by the best course of moral action taught to us for some internal reasons, this education becomes ineffectual. Further, if human nature is believed to be “moved by both virtue and vice, reflecting on the forces that move us will strengthen our ability to control them (Gilead, 2011, p. 272). In other words, we must develop self-knowledge, in order to understand how to abide by the best moral course of action in a given situation.
Aristotle’s classifications of moral weakness (otherwise translated as incontinence) may shed light on these forces. One classification is whether a person is knowingly or unknowingly incontinent (NE 11546b7-8), thus indicating the first force for moral weakness: knowledge. What role does knowledge of a virtue play in preventing moral weakness, and is it sufficient to do so? The second classification is between one who is incontinent by choice i.e. is licentious and deliberately goes against the best calculated choice of action, and the one who is incontinent without choice, out of temptation that he is unable to resist (NE 1150a25-30). This classification brings out two forces: the force of calculation i.e. rationality and reasoning, and the force of temptation and desire. We must understand the scope and role of these three forces in the phenomenon of moral weakness in order to progress in our understanding of character and how it can be built. Being a moral agent is more than simply education of what it is to be moral, and we must recognise moral weakness as an important concept that should be integrated into our understanding of morality.
Knowledge
Consider the person doing an action out of the knowledge that it is ‘virtuous’ to do so, and the person doing an action without knowledge of its virtue. For example, the man who tells the truth about breaking a vase because he knows honesty is virtuous and the child who tells the truth about the vase, not because it is virtuous to do so, but because he has not learned to lie and so truth is his only option. He has no knowledge of the distinction between honesty and dishonesty, and will not base his actions on such. We call the first action ‘virtuous’, but not the latter. The one who has knowledge about a matter (i.e. a specific virtue) will be able to act according to it; or to its contrary, a person who has no knowledge about a matter will not be able to act according to it (not consciously or meaningfully, as illustrated by the above example). More succinctly, knowledge is necessary for virtue. This is a view held by most major philosophers, put forth by Socrates and held by Plato and Aristotle, and is its general sense, is a premise that most of us can accept without duress.
However, Socrates goes further and presents the idea that knowledge and virtue are identical (Meno 89b) i.e. moral wisdom is sufficient for virtue (Charmides 199d-e from Irwin, 1995, pg 42), and if one has knowledge of a virtue, this is identical to possessing the virtue in full. It is widely held that Socrates, especially in his early writing, does not believe in akrasia (Thero, 2006, p. 11). I.e. he believes that if a person holds knowledge of a virtue, he will never do anything against that knowledge, against that virtue. What is further implied by Socrates is that nobody would choose to do evil when he knows of the good – his reason would not allow it out of the sheer foolishness of the idea (Irwin, 1995, p. 85; Thero, 2006, p. 11). If a person understands virtue to be part of the good life and contributing to one’s own eudaemonia, knowledge of virtue would prevent one from doing anything contrary to one’s happiness. While this premise is highly criticised (Thero, 2006, p. 25) as incompatible with our own nature – we frequently see ourselves committing actions against what we know to be good – it can hold an interpretation that may deepen our understanding of the relationship of knowledge to moral weakness. What I have purposely neglected from the above premises is the qualifier of “complete knowledge” of a virtue. While a virtue can be taught formally, caught from role models or gained from experience, it is very difficult to attain complete knowledge of it; to know its outcomes and consequences of not adhering to it. This can be likened to a child going near a hot object. We can warn them of the danger of touching this object, but it is personally experiencing the painful consequences of touching it that would drive the child to stay far away in future. Similarly, if we had such knowledge about every virtue and could see into the future and see the consequences of each potential bad choice – its long term repercussions and effect on our ultimate happiness – it is almost certain that we would only choose the good, having seen it would be to our own detriment to do otherwise. Although we cannot see into the future, we can achieve the same end with knowledge by reflecting on the consequences of moral decisions in ours and others’ lives as well as formal moral education. Attaining near complete knowledge of a virtue in this way will lead to a realisation that it would be simply foolish not to take the virtuous route.
This interpretation of Socrates’ idea of knowledge and virtue may be more palatable, and exmplain why Socrates attributes full virtue only to the few, the ‘philosophers’ (Thero, 2006, p. 46): there are few who can obtain complete knowledge of a virtue, only after extensive philosophical training and reflection. Furthermore, there may be even fewer who can keep this knowledge active. Aristotle refers to those who are incontinent as possessing knowledge of the virtue only in potential (NE. Ward, 2011, p. 6). The recollection of touching a hot object is a strong deterrent and the memory likely to remain in the mind longer than a verbal warning. Thus, knowledge that is kept ‘active’ may refer to knowledge that remains constantly vivid in the soul, and is a strong deterrent or motivator regarding a particular virtue.
However, even if one is to take this perspective on the relationship between knowledge and virtue, one arrives at conclusions that mirror some of the common criticisms to Socrates’ aforementioned theory. Even if one can attain complete knowledge of a virtue, it is rare that such knowledge (that should lead to a correct moral decision 10 times out of 10) will be the only driving force and lead to virtuous action. More often than not, this knowledge only remains the normative reason (the reason why one should take the morally higher ground), and the motivating reason (the real push that leads to action) is entirely different, leading to a correct moral decision only some of the time. Here is where reason, desire and their effects on knowledge come in.
Desire
Desire: also known as the appetitive faculty by Socrates and Plato, and temptation by Aristotle. This refers to the part of us that wishes to indulge in pleasures that are necessary for survival and also those that are unnecessary; food and Aphrodite’s desires under the former, and pleasures such as honour, wealth, reputation, love under the latter (NE 1147b26-31). It is clear that desire plays a big role in moral weakness; what we want to do often prevails over what we should do. The Stanford marshmallow experiment is a light-hearted example of this, and we even use the same language: “cupcakes are my weakness”. As mentioned above, this extends to our desire for intangible things as well: honour, love, reputation; in short, our ego. Thus, it may be that we take credit given to us for something admirable that we did not do, even though our moral compass says this is wrong; our ego prevails. Therefore, even if we have developed “complete” knowledge of a virtue, and know the consequences of following its dictate versus giving into desire, our desire may give us a stronger push than our knowledge, resulting in moral weakness.
Hume attests to this; he believes that knowledge and reason (to be discussed in the next section) can only give us information about what to do; they can only process abstract and causal relations and have no direct practical effect. In other words, they provide no motivating reason, nor immediate cause, for action (Treatise 2.3.3.1). The implications for moral weakness are huge; knowledge of a virtue cannot independently bring virtuous action into existence, but can only provide desire with information, leaving desire to produce the force for action (Treatise 2.1.1.4, 2.3.9.7).
However, introspective reflection finds man often desiring moral goodness for itself; not for base pleasures, nor for honour, wealth nor reputation. This may indicate a different perspective on Hume’s theory. If Hume gives an accurate picture of desire as immediate cause for action, the existence of a ‘noble’ desire may be conceivable; a strong desire to do good, informed by reason and knowledge. And as all Humean desires exist to maximise pleasure (and prevent pain) (Treatise 1.1.2.2)., it may be that this ‘noble’ desire exists to facilitate pleasure in the form of happiness (Aristotelian eudemonia) or personal long term success. And further, the conflict we observe within ourselves when faced with a moral decision, explained by most philosophers as a fight between desire and reason, may in fact be a fight between conflicting desires: a base desire, looking to fulfil an immediate pleasure, and a noble desire, looking to facilitate long term pleasures (of eudemonia, success or otherwise). In the words of some philosophers, who refer to the existence of two ‘selves’(Mutahhari, 1981), this is the higher self conflicting with the lower self. In this conception, the lower self is comparable to the animal self normally associated with fulfilling base desires, while the higher self is the nobler, spiritual self, capable of attaining ‘perfections’ in the form of virtues, and is guided by reason.
Thus, whether understood as a higher spiritual self, or a nobler desire as conceived in a Humean framework, or even a Platonian rational desire (Patterson, 1987, p. 37), it is clear there is an existence within us that directs us to moral goodness, whether for its own intrinsic goodness or for a further goal (happiness, personal success, actualising human potential, etc). This leads us to a practical consideration; how can we train the soul to decrease the instance of basal desire prevailing this over the noble part of the soul?
Aristotle’s primary technique is habituation, repeated action that can eventually constitute a stable disposition in the soul (NE, 1103a15-17; Liu, 2012; Ward, 2011, p. 6). In other words, the more a person chooses and acts on the inclination of the noble virtue, the stronger it becomes in the soul (NE 1103a31-b1). This weakens the opposing basal desire and creating a stable disposition to act virtuously, thereby increasing the incidence of acting on the noble virtue; a (not so vicious) circle. The soul can be understood as a clean slate; a sea of potentiality, where we can actualise whichever virtues we choose through habit. The reality of our soul may be no more than the choices we make (Mutahhari, 1981). Aristotle believes that we can even control what the soul takes pleasure from. In other words, at lower levels of overcoming moral weakness, it may be difficult and unpleasant to do the right thing, but as the disposition becomes deep, choosing the nobler path may even become sweet. This is the height of Aristotelian virtue: to love the good (NE 1151b34-1142a4).
It can be debated whether basal desires and the feelings associated with them can ever be entirely eliminated, or should be eliminated. This is with reference to the necessity for a certain level of these desires for survival – e.g. food – and for one’s own desire for overall happiness – wealth, reputation and honour. We also observe major world religions who, for the most part, never entirely suppress basal desires, but restrict them to moderation (e.g. sexual relations restricted to the institution of marriage). However, it is reasonable to assume that one can, at the very least, reduce one’s instance of basal desire prevailing through practice and habituation, training the soul to act in a noble way until it becomes ‘second nature’. We can take comfort that this appears realistic to achieve; unlike the Socratic philosopher, everyone can aim at becoming virtuous in this way.
Reasoning
The first challenge is the definition of reasoning. Socrates and Plato do not appear to define it, even as they name one of the divisions of the soul to be the faculty of reasoning. Aristotle’s main reference to reasoning and rationality comes in his differential between man and animal: rationality is the power of thinking and thought (De Anima, 415a12). Reflecting on what is different between man and animal, we can arrive at a conception of “rationality” or “reasoning”. The Islamic philosopher Sadr al Din Shirazi outlines consequences of reflecting on this differential (Shirazi c.1640 from Nikzād, 2007). Reasoning is:
- The knowledge of self-evident concepts
- The gathering of practical experience
- To understand well and reach conclusions quickly when understanding and analysing actions that should or should not be done. Shirazi further qualifies this to say that this reasoning draws a person away from his base desires.
The final consequence echoes the tripartite soul of Plato, in which reason is one of 3 faculties that interact to produce motive and action – the rational faculty, the appetitive faculty and the spirited faculty. According to some interpretations of Plato’s partitioned soul, each faculty produces a desire; the appetitive faculty dealing with basal desires, the spirited part dealing with competitiveness and self-esteem [mirroring Aristotle’s division of desires into those necessary and not necessary for survival], and the rational faculty also producing a desire to achieve a certain end (Irwin, 1995, p. 214; Thero, 2006, pp. 27–28). In other words, reason also has its own appetite (Patterson, 1987, p. 325). Thus, in this paradigm, rationality has its own desire and so is also able to produce a motivating reason, rather than simply being normative information that guides but cannot directly generate action. Further, Plato believes that virtue is “a condition of the soul in which each part acts properly” (Irwin, 1995, pp. 223–243), and therefore moral weakness is a condition where each part does not act properly. Reason must, rule over the soul and its appetitive and spirited desires (Irwin, 1995, p. 218), regardless of whether as a guiding faculty or a motivating reason. When it does not, we ‘give in’ to lower desire, rather than rational desire for a good end, which will often make us happier in the long term. This idea of an equilibrium between the faculties has become well-known in moral philosophy; desires are necessary for survival and fulfilling needs, but needs to be restrained towards noble ends by the intellect.
However, the faculty of reasoning is not just a binary quality (i.e. you either have it or you don’t), and in order to strengthen its power over lower desire, it must be discussed in more detail.
Reason in generating universal moral rules
Reflecting on our power of reason, we see that we are able to look at instances in external reality and abstract universal concepts from them. E.g. We can look at things that are white and abstract the concept of ‘whiteness’. We can do the same with moral concepts. This has led to our understanding of concepts such as ‘honesty’ and ‘compassion’, leading us further to virtue theory, and these concepts have been heavily discussed by all moral theorists. This has led to the generation of ‘golden rules’ (Gensler, 1998, pp. 67–69), universal rules based on these moral concepts, such as “treat others as you would like to be treated” – a golden rule of compassion – that can be applied to moral situations. Aristotle refers to this as the practical syllogism (NE 1147a1-9), and Gensler (1998, pp. 67-69) indicates that this leads to being morally consistent; an admirable moral quality by his standards. While theoretically this is a technique with potential for success, practically this leads to moral weakness for two reasons: the meta-ethical basis from which these rules are derived, and the applicability of these to particular situations. With regards to the latter, the particularities of each moral virtue are heavily debated and yet under discussed. It is easy to prioritise virtue over vice, but in particular situations, how do we prioritise between two conflicting virtues? How can our reason understand the nuances of particular instances? The common example is the conflict between honesty of telling someone their dress is ugly over compassion in not hurting their feelings, but this can extend to situations with graver implications. For example, when threatened to have your family hurt when you stand against oppression, do you stand down for your family or go on for the sake of your moral stance, and the potential to save many more people?
Some have attributed this role to Aristotle’s phronesis, the ability to “deliberate rightly about what is good and advantageous for oneself” (NE 1140b26-8), into an integrative phronesis that adjudicates multiple conflicting virtues to act virtuously in an overall way (Kristjansson, 2015, pg 96). Annas (2011) argues that we cannot teach virtues in isolation, but that they must be taught in an overall way so that integrative phronesis can be taught from the onset (Annas (2011) from Kristjansson, 2015, pg 97). These discussions are beginning to fill a gap in moral literature rich in examining the use of reason to create universal rules in individual virtues, but lacking in its application to everyday situations. This is of great importance; otherwise in the name of ‘using reason’, we may judge the situation incorrectly and assume ourselves to be choosing the higher moral path, when in fact we have been morally weak.
Returning to the second reason for moral weakness: the meta-ethical roots of these universal rules. A person’s moral view is based on a moral theory: usually deontological (value in actions regardless of their consequences), consequentialist (value in outcomes), utilitarian (value in actions if they contribute to a chosen goal) or virtue theory (value in the character trait itself). Based on these, our universal moral rules will differ. The deontological “do no lie” does not apply universally for the consequentialist who believes it is justified in some cases. Further to this, multiple psychological studies have shown that in moral dilemmas, the moral worldview one subscribes to will affect the choice they make (Waldmann, Nagel, & Wiegmann, 2012, p. 280). However, this is not the source of moral weakness. The problem of moral weakness arises when a universal rule turns into a heuristic; a general rule-of-thumb that often becomes blindly applied to every moral dilemma (and is sometimes used superficially by society to criticise a particular course of action) (Waldmann et al., 2012, pp. 283–284). For example, a deontological rule may be “allow individual freedom”, which is arguably valid in its own right. However, if a deontologist rejects all consideration for consequences and applies this rule blindly to any moral situation that demands it, he may miss the ability to help the misguided teenager falling into drug addiction. In other words, after using reason to decide the most ‘correct’ moral worldview for oneself and derive universal laws from it, we may switch off our reason and (almost dogmatically) obey these laws in moral situations without consideration for context, leading to poor moral decision in the name of being consistent and ‘rational’. We must be aware of this tendency for reason to fall into the habit of lazily applying universal rules to all situations, and generate more discussion on this topic to combat this.
Intellectual character
Earlier, ‘noble desire’ and Plato’s ‘rational desire’ were discussed as possible interpretations of the rational faculty. This plays into a Platonic understanding of the rational faculty, which “delights” in trying to look for truth and understanding (Patterson, 1987, p. 325). It has its own desire – albeit a nobler one than the appetitive faculty – for truth. However, while desire is a strong motivating reason for any moral action, it also has the characteristic of becoming unruly when “indulged”; excessive unless controlled by reason itself. That is, we shift from a view of interfaculty to “intrafaculty” conflict; reason conflicts with itself (Patterson, 1987, p. 326). While the semantics of a faculty that has conflicting states can be discussed (Republic IV (436c7–e7, 439b8–c1) from Irwin, 1995, pg 204), its practical implications may be more important, for if reason is corrupted from within, moral weakness cannot be combatted; reason has no authority over itself. Thus, we must cultivate intellectual character within ourselves, and develop manners for seeking truth. If reason becomes corrupted by its own desire, it will treat an intellectual opponent with disrespect and anger, become blind to falsehood that exists in its own soul, conflate a desire for truth with a desire to be with the truth i.e. a desire for victory of one’s own view regardless of its truth value (Patterson, 1987, pg 326). These are all instances of moral weakness, where desire (even rational desire) can prevails over what is the most noble cause of action. Thus, we must cultivate intellectual character, especially that relevant to morality: a detachment from the ego, perseverance in finding moral truths, courage to accept that we may be wrong in order to continue the search for moral truth (Patterson, 1987). We must be aware of reason’s ego and fight it.
Intellectual character
The power of our rational faculty can vary in degrees of strength. If we choose to, we can have power over our own self (qua lower self). If we have identified deficiencies in our reason, some of which have been discussed already, we can employ strategies of self-restraint that strengthen our ability to control desire. Behavioural psychologists suggest multiple techniques, all with a common theme; changing the perspective on the situation. For when desire takes hold of our moral thought process, it often fixates on its goal and nothing else; nothing seems bigger or more important than that cupcake. Thus, we must distract our soul, and point it towards its nobler goal. Suggested techniques by Myrseth and Fishbach (2009) are:
- Avoiding sources of temptation to prevent desire from being activated. For example, it would be foolish for a diabetic to spend time in a cake shop.
- Self-imposed penalties and rewards, thereby giving oneself motivation to act according to reason.
- Promoting “goal pursuit” (Myrseth & Fishbach, 2009) by devaluing the object of temptation and focussing on the potential happiness that one could attain by persevering in this way. E.g. “That cake doesn’t even look that good anyway.”
This will indirectly enable us to strengthen our faculty of reason until temptation and desire decrease and reason becomes strong enough to act not based on self-imposed reward, but for the sake of doing good itself. In the words of Aristotle, the temperate man who finds no pleasure in bad desires, rather than the incontinent man still struggling against his temptation (NE 1151b34-1142a4).
Conclusion
Mutahhari (1981) makes an acute observation; when we speak of conflict in the soul between the higher and lower self, we always speaks from the perspective of the higher self; if one’s noble desire prevails and one’s basal desire is defeated, we do not speak of defeat but of victory of the soul (and vice versa). Thus, our real self is the higher self, the self that differentiates us from being merely animal and indulging in our own desires.
This essay brings together a culmination of thought on moral weakness and indicates the role of different factors in moral strength: knowledge, desire and reason. Each have their own role to play. Put simply, knowledge of consequences of bad decisions on us and the world around us can deter us from choosing the wrong path. Appetite, a strong factor for moral weakness. However if habituated to generate the right type of desire – noble, rational desire for good moral ends – it can be a strong driving force to be morally superior. The rational faculty, if developed in the right way and aware of its own potential pitfalls, can govern the soul and keep it in check. There are multiple different theories on the nature of these factors – knowledge and reason are sometimes discussed as normative information and sometimes as moral drivers, and philosophers have spent many centuries proving the case for one of these. While this is important in many ways, what appears as relevant, if not more, is what can be practically taken from these discussions; how can we use these factors to be morally strong – both in correctly calculating the best moral path and then in adhering to that calculation?
These discussions must be brought into our understanding of morality; moral agents are often not aware of the forces that drive them in everyday life – they are not self-aware. Societal pressure is just one of many factors that may amplify the internal forces that motivate moral weakness. Without awareness of the roles of these forces and a toolbox to develop them, we cannot be cultivated into forces for the good. Although there are many external influences that we cannot control, but we can control our inner strength: to always choose the best way.
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