Aristotle

Throughout his philosophy, Aristotle is concerned with the question 'Why?' Everywhere, he looks for answers to why-questions; but before that he seeks to identify and distinguish between different kinds of why-questions. In his practical philosophy he is above all concerned with the whys and wherefores of human action. 'Why are you doing this?' 'Why did she do that?' Aristotle, like all moral philosophers, is of course interested in the question 'What shall I do?' But the answer to that question, according to his own account, demands reflection on the more basic question why human beings do anything at all. Aristotle was the first philosopher to attempt a systematic account of practical reasoning, just as he was the first philosopher to systematize theoretical logic. But his account of the practical syllogism lacks the elegance and rigor of his theoretical syllogistic. There are many reasons for this. Some of the reasons are accidental and contingent, but some of them are rooted in the essential differences between practical and theoretical reasoning, which make the codification of practical reasoning an intrinsically more difficult matter.

Aristotle often writes as if he is more concerned with chains of reasoning from ends to means than with the comparative evaluation of ends. It is not that he is uninterested in evaluating ends: this is one of the major concerns of his ethical treatises. But he is inclined to present discussions of competing intrinsic values as if they were discussions of means to a single overarching end.

The opening of the Nicomachean Ethics (NE) is concerned with the hierarchy of the ends of action and choice, the series of goods chosen for the sake of other goods. From one point of view, this can be seen as an account of means-end reasoning. The first point to be made is that all such chains of reasoning must halt somewhere: they must terminate in an end, for if there were no ends there could be no means either. At 1094a20 Aristotle says that if we choose everything for the sake of something else, then there will be an infinite regress and appetite will remain idle and void. Later in the same book, Aristotle gives lists of things which we choose for their own sakes, such as pleasure, honor, wisdom, sight, virtue, and happiness. Any choice which we make, he tells us, must be made for the sake of good (1094a2). But according to the NE, there are three kinds of good: the pleasant, the useful, and the noble (1104b31).

A doctrine common to all Aristotle's ethical treatises is that the halting-point of a person's practical reasoning-the ultimate end which motivates action-reveals the agent's moral status or character. For instance, if an action is characterized as pleasant, then we can ask whether the agent has a general policy of pursuing what is pleasant or not. If so, then we have the vice of akolasia: the choice manifests the moral character of intemperance. If not, then what is the reason for the present pursuit of pleasure? If a reason is given (e.g. 'Even the hardest working politician needs a break sometimes'), this will reveal something about the agent's ultimate goal in life. If no reason is given, then the agent's present pursuit of pleasure is not the result of choice: what we have is the impulsive action of the incontinent. If the action performed is characterized on the other hand not as pleasant but as noble, then the agent's action is performed for the sake of virtue, as the brave man performs his brave actions for the sake of what is noble.

In the NE Aristotle prepares the ground for his own account of happiness by saying that the good we are looking for must be an end with two special properties. First, it must be a specially 'endy' (teleion) end: it must-to use a more traditional translation - be perfect by comparison with other ends. That is to say, it must be something sought always for its own sake and never for the sake of anything else. Secondly, it must be self-sufficient - that is, it must be something which taken on its own makes life worth while and lacking in nothing.

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