Is murder immoral according to Aristotle?

According to Aristotle the mean of any characteristic is what is considered to be moral. So having the extreme or being difficient in any characteristic is immoral. Murder itself would be an extreme on the spectrum of characteristics. So, according to Aristotles theory it would be immoral because it is definitely not a mean of any sort.

Who’s a party to the Social Contract?

According to Hobbes people must enter into social contracts to ensure that we do not return to the state of nature where there is a war of all against all. These social contracts apply to everyone who lives in the particular state. That would include children because although they have not made the particular agreement they don’t really have the mind state to decide what they do or do not agree to.

The State of Nature

According to Hobbes in the state  of nature all people are concerned for themselves. Without a government and because of the finiteness of resources, this leads to a war like state where everyone fights for themselves and isnt concerned with anything else. Becausse of this, rights have to be determined and restricted through contracts.

Kant or Mill?

Although both Kant and Mill clearly have their shortcomings, I think that Mills theory is less troubling than that of Kant. This is because although it is important to take the reason behind the action into account, it is also incredibly inportant to look at the effect of the action itself. This is what Mill’s theory does. It looks at the effect that each action has on everyone to determine if it is right or wrong which makes some sense.

Kant and Self-Love

Kant uses the idea of self-love to explain why suicide is morally wrong. In most cases, someone who commits suicide does it because they want to avoid the pain and suffering they feel will come with living any longer. So, to get out of that situation, they kill themselves. That indicates some sort of self-love because since the person cares so much about avoiding pain, it shows that they do love themselves. So, since they do posses some self-love and self-love usually indicates that a person will do anything to presevre themselves, suicide doesn’t fit in and is morally wrong.

Categorical Imperitive

According to Kant’s categorical imperitive it would be immoral to cheat on a test. This is because if cheating on a test became morally acceptable for people to do because they wanted a better grade, then everyone would cheat on their tests and getting a better grade wouldn’t be possible anymore. So, the idea of cheating on a test is not going to be considered moral according to Kant.

Morality of people not actions

I think Aristotle and Nietzsche are right when they say tha morality is a quality of people and not of actions themself. it is hard to decide if an action is moral or not without knowing about the character of the person who preformed the action. this is because it must be taken into account because if the person is generally moral or not is important. So, it makes sense and seems like the right thing for Aristotle and Nietzsche to say that morality is based on the peson themself not on the actions that are done.

Hobbes and Government

When a group of people give up certain rights, those rights do not just disappear. Instead, they are transferred to the government in charge of those people. Because of this, I don’t think the government can be judged in the same way as the people. This is because it has a different set of rights then the people that are governed. But, this doesn’t mean the government shouldn’t be judged at all. It should be judged as immoral when it interferes in rights that the people have not surrendered to the government.

Value of Happiness

I feel that happiness does have some intrinsic value. Happiness itself does not depend on other things, when it is thought of as an ideal thing that people want to have. It is generally thought of as a something that people want to have. Although it is difficult to explain exactly why happiness has intrinsic value, most people do want happiness and would say that it does have value on its own.

Is Utilitarianism too Demanding?

One objection raised against utilitarianism is that it is too demanding because it is concerned with the overall happiness of everyone. I do not agree with this. When most people act on a dailt basis, they have no effect on more than a few people that they are directly in contact with. So, their happiness is all that is taken into account when calculating the change in overall happiness. So, it is not too demanding that these people should have an increase in happiness after an action, but not the entire population because mose other people have nothing at all to do with one person’s actions.