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Kantian Ethics Vs Virtue Ethics

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There have been many attempts by philosophers throughout history to decide the best way to live. Immanuel Kant created a system of ethics known as ‘Kantian Ethics’, and Jeremy Bentham created a consequentialist system known as ‘Utilitarianism’. Aristotle attempted to live a moral life through a character-refining system of ethics known as ‘Virtue Ethics’. There has been much discussion around the problems and benefits of each system of these systems, but, overall the matter of whether or not self-control is important in ethical life has been one of little debate. Self-control is important in both Kantian and Virtue ethics. It is necessary in Kantian ethics to do only the unconditional duties required of you, such as not lying or breaking promises, …show more content…

It dictates that we all have unconditional duties that we must always do, and uses the ‘categorical imperative’ to judge whether our actions are moral. The categorical imperative has 3 rules that must always be followed when making a decision, and these are the ‘ends’ rule, the ‘respect’ rule and the ‘univerisability rule’. These principle state that we must treat people as ends, not as means to an end, treat others with respect as if they were all rational moral agents, and our actions must be moral even when used by others in the same situation. It is evident that self-control is very important to follow this ethical …show more content…

Following vices is a much easier to do than follow virtues, for example, we can keep all of our money to ourselves and not share it to help anyone. But overall, following virtues leads to a more fulfilled life and is how one can achieve eudemonia, which is the greatest good. If a swimmer saw a drowning person, it would be the virtue of courage to go and save that person, however, if a poor swimmer saw a drowning person, it would be a vice of rashness to rescue them as they would be risking their lives as well as the drowning persons, no matter how much the poor swimmer wanted to save them. In this case, and in virtue ethics, self-control is necessary to live a virtuous life and achieve

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