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23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 2. Elements of Virtue Theory / f. The Mean

[virtues as appropriate route between evils]

26 ideas
Excess and deficiency are equally at fault [Kongzi (Confucius)]
Contentment comes from moderation and proportion in life [Democritus, by Stobaeus]
Something which lies midway between two evils is better than either of them [Plato]
The arts produce good and beautiful things by preserving the mean [Plato]
The mean implies that vices are opposed to one another, not to virtue [Aristotle, by Annas]
Virtues are destroyed by the excess and preserved by the mean [Aristotle]
Aristotle aims at happiness by depressing emotions to a harmless mean [Nietzsche on Aristotle]
The mean is relative to the individual (diet, for example) [Aristotle]
Skills are only well performed if they observe the mean [Aristotle]
One drink a day is moderation, but very drunk once a week could exhibit the mean [Urmson on Aristotle]
In most normal situations it is not appropriate to have any feelings at all [Urmson on Aristotle]
We must tune our feelings to be right in every way [Aristotle]
The mean is always right, and the extremes are always wrong [Aristotle]
The vices to which we are most strongly pulled are most opposed to the mean [Aristotle]
To make one's anger exactly appropriate to a situation is very difficult [Aristotle]
Patient people are indignant, but only appropriately, as their reason prescribes [Aristotle]
The sincere man is praiseworthy, because truth is the mean between boasting and irony [Aristotle]
People sometimes exhibit both extremes together, but the mean is contrary to both of them [Aristotle]
The law is the mean [Aristotle]
One of Zeno's books was 'That Which is Appropriate' [Zeno of Citium, by Long]
The chief good is indifference to what lies midway between virtue and vice [Ariston, by Diog. Laertius]
An appropriate action is one that can be defended, perhaps by its consistency. [Stoic school, by Diog. Laertius]
Galen's medicine followed the mean; each illness was balanced by opposite treatment [Galen, by Hacking]
How do we distinguish a mean? The extremes can involve quite different maxims [Kant]
If virtue is the mean between vices, then virtue is just the vanishing of vice [Kant]
The instinct of the herd, the majority, aims for the mean, in the middle [Nietzsche]