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    Carmelics

    A reasoning platform. Break down any belief into clear reasons, explore both sides, and weigh the evidence honestly.

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    LoyalLoyalJusticeJustice
    Made withinDC&Austin
    Statements
    321,452
    Perspectives
    108,905
    Topics
    42
    Home/Original/inverse
    See Original
    Inverse View

    It is not the case that It is in our power to be either virtuous or vicious.

    ?Set your confidence on the premises below to see your aggregate.

    Reasons For

    2 perspectives
    Reason for 1 of 2
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    • 1.Neuroscientific evidence (Libet et al.) indicates that neural activity initiating action precedes conscious awareness of the intention to act.
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    • 2.If conscious deliberation is epiphenomenal to causally sufficient brain states, then the 'choice' between virtue and vice is determined prior to reflective awareness.
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    • 3.An agent cannot be genuinely responsible for outcomes determined by processes outside conscious control, making virtue and vice matters of constitution, not power.
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    Reason for 2 of 2
    ?
    • 1.Aristotle himself concedes in Nicomachean Ethics III.5 that character, once formed through early habituation, constrains the range of choices available to the agent.
      ?

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    • 2.If the formative conditions of character—childhood environment, education, social circumstance—are not themselves in our power, then the resulting dispositions toward virtue or vice are not fully in our power.
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    • 3.This undermines the claim's universality: for agents raised under vicious or severely deprived conditions, the path to virtue may be practically unavailable regardless of deliberative effort.
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    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
    ?
    • 1.Mature humans make choices after deliberating about different available means to their ends.
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    • 2.Choosing consistently well results in a virtuous character forming over time, and choosing consistently poorly results in a vicious character forming over time.
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    Strongest counterpoint
    Explore the most compelling reason on the other side.