Aristotle Virtue Ethics

One of the most powerful tools people have is introspection. Introspection has guided our decision making throughout the history of humanity, but in an age where technological development has reduced the need for full mobilization of communities, misguided youth and adults abound. There exists a vast store of self-help guides, career guidance articles and related modern literature, but it is worth looking for a system of core values conducive to a principled life. Aristotle provided such a set of principles in his system of Virtue Ethics. In what follows, I use Aristotle's Virtue Ethics to reflect on my standing as a software engineer. I proceed by describing Aristotle's formulation of Virtue Ethics, relating it to software engineering, and

Aristotle specified four cardinal virtues which can be treated as a distilled version of the entire system. First is have prudence, or practical wisdom. Its relevance to engineering is self-evident as logic is central to any scientific discipline. Next is have temperance, which is defined to be synonymous with moderation. As students and professionals, temperance is vital in that without it we are at risk distracting ourselves with detritus so much so that we lose sight of what is actually important to us. Third is courage. Courage gives us the strength to make necessary decisions that might harm our relationships or put us at risk in some way. This is extremely important in any profession, as coworkers must not be afraid to voice criticism and take part in debate. Last, we have justice. Justice requires one to simultaneously be decent to others and to have the courage to prosecute those corrupt individuals that threaten the rest of society. Engineers must have respect for everyone working with them, regardless of their company rank. As is required by engineering ethics codes, engineers must be just. This entails performing acts such as whistle-blowing when one's company or organization is pursuing some corrupt or unethical act or motive. Furthermore, it is evidently the case that Aristotle’s

Software development requires patience in order to learn background information required by projects and new technologies. Developers also require great patience during the development process in order to continue through seemingly hopeless errors. In spite of how talented one may be, the vast amount of information developers must process and put to work makes patience a necessary virtue for any developer. In team programming environments, and workplaces in general, people need to have a reasonable level of humility. Many of us will often trust ourselves too much and even develop a sense of infallibility. This usually doesn't last long and the resulting errors in code generated by hubris likely could have been caught easily by a second set of eyes. Software developers should be able to handle and seek out constructive criticism. Humility is an exercise in temperance and justice where we limit our hubris. We also need to be willing to take risks and be honest, which requires a level of courage. This is especially important when writing code for clients and dealing with management. For example, we must be able to voice concerns or even decline potentially lucrative commissions when we find project requirements to be infeasible. With that said, it is also necessary that we be socially adept. Communication between engineers is full of technical jargon and specialized knowledge.