- 01The Chief Good as the end of action
- 02Political science and the Good of Man
- 01Method and precision in moral inquiry
- 02Who should study moral philosophy
- 03Happiness as the highest good
- 01The Chief Good and the three modes of life
- 02Critique of the universal Good and the Forms
- 01The Chief Good as the end of action
- 02Happiness as the final and self-sufficient good
- 01Happiness as the final and self-sufficient good
- 02The work of man and the rational activity of the soul
- 01Method for studying first principles
- 02Arguments for happiness as virtuous activity
- 03External goods needed for happiness
- 01Happiness as virtue, not chance
- 02Whether happiness can be called complete in life
- 01Happiness, virtue, and external fortune
- 02The effect of descendants and friends on the dead
- 01Happiness as a precious and final good
- 02Excellence and the statesman’s inquiry
- 01The statesman’s concern with human excellence
- 02The soul’s irrational and rational parts
- 03Intellectual and moral excellence
Nicomachean Ethics
Virtue, flourishing, habit, and practical wisdom.
10Chapters
111Lessons
240Topics
Certificate of completion included
This course was produced by Cavua from a public-domain text.
Skills this course leaves you with.
- Explain Aristotle's account of virtue and human flourishing
- Distinguish voluntary from involuntary action in moral responsibility
- Analyze moral choice, deliberation, wish, and the role of reason
- Apply the doctrine of the mean to virtues such as courage, liberality, and meekness
- Interpret the relationship between habit, self-control, and vice
- Summarize the role of practical wisdom and right reason in ethical life
Curriculum
The full table of contents.
Every chapter, every lesson, every topic — laid out before you enroll. Click any chapter to expand it.
- Chapters
- 10
- Lessons
- 111
- Topics
- 240
- 01Virtue as habituation, not nature
- 01Habit formation through repeated actions
- 02Virtue as a mean between excess and defect
- 03Pleasure and pain as tests of virtue
- 01Virtue’s concern with pleasure and pain
- 02Why virtuous actions require the right state
- 03Habit, knowledge, and becoming good
- 01Virtue as a state of the mind
- 02Virtue as the mean in feelings and actions
- 01Virtue as a mean state
- 02Particular virtues and vices by sphere
- 01Opposition of the mean and extremes
- 02Why one extreme is more contrary
- 01How moral virtue is a mean state
- 02Practical rules for aiming at the mean
- 03Difficulty of judging particular cases
- 01Voluntary and involuntary action
- 01Compulsory actions and external causes
- 02Ignorance, regret, and involuntary action
- 03Acting because of ignorance versus with ignorance
- 01Ignorance of particulars and involuntary action
- 02Voluntary action and actions from anger or lust
- 01Moral choice and voluntary action
- 01Moral choice versus opinion
- 02Objects of deliberation
- 03Means, search, and choice after deliberation
- 01Wish as the end and the good
- 01Vice, character, and voluntary action
- 01Courage as a mean state and its proper object
- 02False forms of courage: citizenship, compulsion, skill, and animal spirit
- 03False forms of courage
- 04Courage as endurance of fear and pain
- 01Courage and the pain of noble action
- 02Bodily pleasures and self-mastery
- 03Natural desire, excess, and the mean
- 01Voluntary character of self-control failure
- 02Childlike appetite and obedience to reason
- 01Liberality as the mean in giving and receiving wealth
- 02Right giving, proper receiving, and the liberal character
- 01The liberal man's proper giving and receiving
- 02Prodigality as excess in giving and receiving
- 03Stinginess as defective giving and base gain
- 01Magnificence as fitting large-scale expenditure
- 02Vulgar Profusion and Meanness
- 01Definition of great-mindedness and related character types
- 02Great-mindedness as the ornament of virtue
- 01Traits of the great-minded man
- 01Small-mindedness and vanity
- 02The mean state in regard to honour
- 01Meekness as the mean between anger and angerlessness
- 02Forms of excess in anger: passionate, choleric, bitter-tempered, and cross-grained
- 01Anger and the moral mean
- 02Social intercourse and the amiable mean
- 01Truthfulness
- 01Jocularity
- 01Shame
- 01Justice and injustice as moral states
- 02Lawful, equal, and unjust meanings
- 03Grasping desire for good things
- 01Chapter II.
- 01Particular injustice and grasping gain
- 02Lawful and equal justice
- 01Chapter V.
- 01Corrective justice as arithmetical equality
- 01Reciprocity in exchange and proportionate equality
- 02Justice and injustice as moral states
- 01Chapter X
- 01Chapter XI
- 01Deliberate injustice and involuntary harm
- 02Being unjustly dealt with and voluntary consent
- 01Chapter XIII
- 01Chapter XIV
- 01Equity as a correction of universal law
- 01Equity as a corrective of strict law
- 02Why a man cannot wrong himself
- 01Unjustly dealt by versus dealing unjustly
- 02Metaphorical justice within the soul
- 01Right Reason and the mean states
- 02The rational soul: knowing and calculating
- 03Truth, will, and moral choice
- 01Definition of knowledge as demonstrable truth
- 02Art as a state of mind apt to make
- 01Practical wisdom as deliberation about the good
- 02Practical wisdom, self-mastery, and moral principles
- 01Intuition as the grasp of first principles
- 01Practical wisdom versus scientific knowledge
- 02Practical wisdom in deliberation and action
- 03Political wisdom, legislation, and individual affairs
- 04Experience, youth, and practical judgment
- 05Practical wisdom, intuition, and the ultimate particular
- 01Nature of good counsel
- 01Judiciousness and practical wisdom
- 02Right judgment and equitable allowance
- 01Practical intuition and moral particulars
- 02Objections to the usefulness of practical wisdom
- 03Practical wisdom, cleverness, and moral virtue
- 01Knowledge through demonstration and prior knowledge
- 01Vice, brutishness, and superhuman virtue
- 02Imperfect self-control, softness, and endurance
- 01Common views on self-control and practical wisdom
- 02Socrates’ denial of imperfect self-control
- 03Opinion, knowledge, and the role of desire
- 04Practical wisdom versus imperfect self-control
- 05Self-control and perfected self-mastery
- 01Difficulties in defining self-control and lack of self-control
- 02Knowledge, opinion, and practical syllogism in failure of self-control
- 03The next question about the incontinent character
- 01Necessary bodily pleasures and excess
- 02Non-necessary objects of choice and added qualifiers
- 03Softness and the ranking of self-control states
- 04Excess in honourable and indifferent desires
- 01Excess in noble desires and analogical self-control
- 02Brutish and morbid pleasures
- 01Brutish and morbid imperfection of self-control
- 02Why anger is less disgraceful than lust
- 01Lust, anger, and brutish pleasures
- 02Self-control and its opposites in bodily pleasures
- 03Forms and degrees of imperfect self-control
- 01Self-Control and true moral choice
- 02Positive character and false resemblance
- 03Pleasure, noble motives, and imperfect self-control
- 04Self-Control as the mean between excess and deficiency
- 01Self-Control and Perfected Self-Mastery
- 02Imperfect Self-Control, Practical Wisdom, and Habit
- 01Arguments against pleasure as the chief good
- 02Defense of pleasure as good and choice-worthy
- 01Violent pleasures and self-mastery
- 02Pleasure as relief from pain
- 03Natural pleasure, simplicity, and change
- 01Why friendship is necessary and honorable
- 02Disputed theories of friendship
- 01Physical theories of contrariety and likeness
- 02Object-matter of friendship: the good and the pleasurable
- 03Kindliness and reciprocal goodwill
- 01Mutual knowledge as the completion of friendship
- 02Three kinds of friendship: utility and pleasure
- 03Instability of utility friendships and youthful pleasure friendships
- 01Perfect friendship among good people
- 02Pleasure, utility, and lesser friendships
- 01Friendship in action and companionship
- 02Friendship between good men
- 01Imperfect friendships and their limits
- 02Equal friendships and unequal friendships
- 03Honor, affection, and stability in friendship
- 01Friendship and justice in communities
- 01Three political constitutions and their corruptions
- 02Domestic analogies of political rule
- 01Friendship in households and constitutions
- 01Communion as the basis of friendship
- 02Friendship of kindred and family bonds
- 01Friendship in family and marriage
- 02Equality, fault-finding, and kinds of advantage friendship
- 01Requital in friendships of utility and goodness
- 02Unequal friendships and proportional return
- 03Paternal and filial obligations
- 01Proportionate exchange in unequal friendships
- 02Broken friendships from unmet expectations
- 03Fixing the rate of payment in teaching and sophistry
- 01Requital for services and voluntary dealings
- 02Conflicting claims of duty and gratitude
- 01Proportionate duties to relatives and benefactors
- 02Dissolving friendships when motives change
- 01Friendship as self-directed goodwill
- 01Self-friendship and the wicked
- 02Kindly feeling as the beginning of friendship
- 01Kindly Feeling and dormant friendship
- 02Unity of Sentiment as social friendship
- 01Why benefactors seem more friendly than beneficiaries
- 01Self-love and benefaction
- 02True and false self-love
- 01Friends as Objects of Benefaction
- 02The Happy Man and the Need for Friends
- 03Good Friends, Shared Activity, and Self-Perception
- 01Friends as a second self and necessary for happiness
- 02How many friends one should have
- 01Friends in prosperity and adversity
- 01Calling on friends in good and bad fortune
- 02Intimacy as the aim of friendship
- 03How friendship shapes character
- 04Conclusion and transition to pleasure
- 01Why Pleasure merits discussion
- 02Eudoxus’s case for Pleasure as the Chief Good
- 03Replies to objections against Pleasure
- 01Pleasure as not the chief good
- 02Pleasure as a complete activity, not a movement
- 01Pleasure distinguished from movement and generation
- 02Pleasure as the completion of perception and thought
- 03How pleasures differ by the work they perfect
- 01Pleasures of the good man
- 02Happiness as self-sufficient activity
- 03Amusement, rest, and bodily pleasures
- 01Contemplative activity as perfect happiness
- 02Human and divine life in pure intellect
- 03Moral virtue and external goods
- 01Contemplative speculation as happiness
- 02External prosperity and moderate goods
- 03The man of science dearest to the gods
- 04Knowledge versus practice in moral action
- 01Virtue, habit, and legal regulation
- 02Law as compulsory guidance
- 03Learning legislation from political practice
- 01The science of society and civil government
- 02Exhaustive division of goods and faculties
- 01Virtue as regulated habit and moral responsibility
- 02Quantity, proportion, and the measure of virtue
- 01Moral discipline, responsibility, and ignorance
- 02Deliberation, choice, and will
- 01Moral declension, habit, and courage
- 02Justice, equality, and reciprocal proportion
- 01Practical wisdom and moral choice
- 02Induction, scientific knowledge, and first principles
- 03Practical wisdom in action, art, and government
- 04Practical wisdom, good counsel, and judgment
- 01Practical view of virtue and vice
- 01How pleasure overrules right reason
- 01Friendship and reciprocity
- 02Movement, pleasure, and happiness
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