While I know the question, "What is virtue?", cannot be answered in a definitive way as our friends Socrates and Meno have demonstrated to us, I am curious as to how each of you would answer if asked.
Meno believes that virtue consists of "desire of things honorable and the power of obtaining them", and that with these inevitably comes the additional "virtue" of the "power of governing mankind".
Personally, I do not think that you have to have power to have virtue, or even that they are related at all. A person in power may be a good leader if he or she is virtuous, but it does not have to work the other way. The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines virtue as "morally good behavior or character" or "a conformity to a standard of right"; no where does it refer to virtue as a result of power. While it is possible, even probable, that the definition of the term has transformed over the centuries, even in the times of the ancient Greek philosophers, I do believe that poor and powerless men and woman could be virtuous. While I believe that morality is a key component of virtue, this is yet another term which, when asked to define, people have a hard time giving a definitive answer. And as to conforming to a "standard of right", how is one to define such a standard across different cultures, religions, and social standards?
While delving more into the subject, I came across the following web sight which discusses ideas on virtue. It covers a range of ideas on the subject from present day, all the way back to the ancient greek philosophers. I found it very interesting to read about the different opinions and theories on the topic as the years progressed, and hope you all will enjoy it as well.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-character/
Here are a few more definitions of the word virtue as well as my thoughts for food for thought:
ReplyDelete“Behavior showing high moral standards.” -Google
"A woman who has only one lover and don't steal."- Twain (on Parisian virtues)
“I know it when I see it.” - Justice Potter Stewart (Not necessarily on virtue but it applies)
On power and virtue: Perhaps Meno was right, but for the wrong reasons. Power is needed to be virtuous, but not the power to govern mankind. I believe that a sort of spiritual or self-virtue is necessary in order to be virtuous. This self virtue can be simplified as one's 'will', or willpower. One needs willpower in order to do the right thing, Meno was close but unfortunately no cigar.
On virtue across cultures, time, space, dimensions, universes and etc.: It seems that each culture has a right and a wrong, or at least something close to it. It is inevitable that the rights and wrongs of these cultures will differ across the world not to mention that that fiend of time always tends to influence culture for "a crime persevered in a thousand centuries ceases to be a crime, and becomes a virtue." -Twain (again).
The question of virtue can be simplified into the question of "What is right and what is wrong?" Despite the numerous differences between cultures I believe that there exists a true right and a true wrong that is all encompassing. There only exist blacks and whites in this realm with no allowance for any grays. For gray can still be subdivided into blacks and whites. So I believe that despite the differences in virtue across the world, there exists one or more true virtues or rights that encompasses all actions and defines them as either virtuous or right, or wrong and not virtuous.
I agree with Matt R’s notion of that the power Meno was talking about was willpower or the power within oneself to be righteous and virtuous. However, consider the different types of powers or forces a person needs to be virtuous. Besides the conscious decision and willpower to do “what is right” are the circumstances surrounding one’s life. For example, consider someone in poverty who is starving. This person chooses to steal bread so that he/she may eat. Many people have deemed stealing as the opposite of virtuous; but if the starving person had no other way of obtaining food and if he/she chose to starve himself/herself in the name of the virtue, many people would view this as stupidity and fruitless martyrdom. The starving person does not have the financial power to be “virtuous” or to abide by the law that stealing is wrong. Many more examples like this can be constructed with regards to the physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, financial, etc. states of the individual.
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