THE NECESSITY OF EUDAIMONIA

A detailed Summary of THE NECESSITY OF EUDAIMONIA

Defining the Good Throughout history, many people have attempted to define what it is to be good. They have tried to explain what it is like to live a good life and what it means to be a good person. Many have tried to offer their own insights into what being good really is. Some philosophers have spent most of their lives pondering and arguing their idea of what being good really is. Some philosophers are thick headed about the subject and will refute anyone else's idea of what being good is. Other philosophers were more open minded about what being good is and would accept other's ideas and maybe even include other people's ideas in their own hypothesis. But, there really is no real answer to what being good is.

The philosophers who listened to others and accepted other people's ideas might get a little closer to describing good, but even they could not fully define it. The word good is far too obscure to give one true definition to. Instead it will always live as a word with no true meaning. In order to find what the good and apply this, the primary concern of political theorists such as Aristotle whom will be the subject of this research, is to determine by what form of ordinance or law, would succeed the state. And he cla

According to Aristotle the definition of political success means the general happiness of the citizenry. Aristotle believes that putting together the excellent character within the citizenry is the first and most important step towards solidifying the happiness of the state as a whole, which gives us the idea of "The unity of the Polis leads to Eudaimonia". The basic structure of Aristotle's philosophies are derived by gathering as much information about the history of a subject as possible taking from the good and removing the bad Aristotle thought he could develop superior political theories. The conclusion Aristotle came to in his effort to write the perfect constitution was that it was necessary to first pay attention to the development of the parts of a society (the citizens). Once the parts are in harmony the emergence of the whole is the next logical step. In developing political theory Aristotle begins by addressing issues of personal character on a microscopic level believing that in turn this will assist the state on a macroscopic level. Developing character or as Aristotle refers to it, "human excellence" is an activity of the soul, rather than the physical body. Aristotle refers to the cultivation of human excellence as an activity of the soul because on a spiritual level he believes the soul to be the whole of an individual, similar to his belief that on the political level the state is the whole of a group of citizens. The soul of the citizens forms the soul of the city and unity is the only way to provide this. Aristotle's ideas concerning the relationship between the cultivation of character and the maintenance of a just, free, and orderly political system can be most clearly seen in book VIII of The Politics when he discusses the value of gathering the minds of the youth. Aristotle proposes that the constituents of a nation establish the character of government and depending on the goodness of the character formed a political structure either sinks or swims. What Aristotle is saying is that in order to put together a political system of maintained justice, freedom and order, society must start with the right materials. The "right materials" are young minds trained to pursue the virtues that comprise excellent adults. The sentence at the end of the first paragraph of book VIII of The Politics shows the value Aristotle placed on excellent character being a fundamental part of excellent government where he says the better the charact

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Category: Politics