To really serve ethics
Introduction
As for the content, which in the Maraña of formalities seems irrelevant, when it is precisely the important thing and that is why it is what the teacher elaborates and carefully, I tried to show how ethics is woven throughout historyFrom traditions that emphasize the indispensable letters to play the moral game.
The acquisition of virtues, which are those predispositions to act well that we are conquering throughout life and that make up the good character. From the Homeric world, that of the Iliad and the Odyssey, these virtues are understood as excellences of character, the virtuous is the one that is above the average in an activity, such as Achilles in speed, Héctor in value, prudent. Today we continue talking about virtuous piano or violin, and also of the virtues that it is necessary to conquer to have a good character.
Justice, prudence, strength, honesty and so many others. The conviction that there is an end of human life that matters to discover to try to access him, because it is the way of living a life worthy of being lived. All agree to understand that this end is happiness, but they do not give happiness the same content. Aristotle said that it consists of eudaimonia, in carrying out those activities that are more typical of a human being, such as trying to unravel the secrets of the universe or dedicate themselves to political life making use of justice and prudence.
Developing
The Epicureans encrypted happiness in pleasure, while the Stoics understood that happiness cannot consist of pleasant emotions, because feeling them does not depend on us. These traditions, that of virtues, dialogue and happiness, have prolonged to this day, charging more strength in some periods or others, reformulating to respond to the new demands of new times, and these are indispensable cards to playThe ethics game.
I refer to the customs that we potentiate freely and that have effects on everyday life, because ethics is effective, it has effective.
Epicurus, going through Socrates, Plato or Aristotle, understood that the most important task of people is to carve a good character, which increases the chances of being happy instead of increasing the probability of being unfortunate. 5 But it is also true that who tries to make a good character increases the probability of being happy, because he enjoys good actions that are valuable for themselves and because he knows how to take better advantage of the
Fortune or Providence gifts, converting problems in growth opportunities. It can become, as Seneca said, an artisan of his own life. This is what has happened with the crises that began at least in 2007, which also our ways of living have helped us to reach the catastrophe, because they are effective, they have effects on ordinary life, opting for one or the other helps usMake the world more habitable or, on the contrary, to escape our hands.
Now, if it is impossible for us to change the temperament with which we were born, if our actions are already determined by our genetic and neuronal constitution, as some genetics gurus and neurosciences have been saying today, if the fairies have written the scriptOf our life, whether cosmological, economic or social fairy, then we are radically unable to acquire new habits, new virtues, to forge a character from ourselves.
The dark HGW XX/7 of the Stasi, Gerd Wiesler, the protagonist of the life of others, radically changes attitude by knowing the love, beauty of music and poetry. Accustomed to their routine to teach others to discover conspirators against the regime, their routine of spying possible enemies, lifeless, living from the lives of others, begins to change when, through their espionage, discover theRevolutionary force of love and music. It is the Minister of Culture, Bruno Hempf, who is interested in declare that "a man cannot change" to manipulate the action and appropriate the protagonist.
But the film proposes precisely to refute that statement and show how an individual who can become a good man. People can change, so ethics makes sense, because we are born with a temperament that we have not chosen and in a social environment, which was not in our hands to accept or reject, but from it we are making decisions that reinforce some predispositionsor others, generating good habits if they lead to a good, bad life, if they lead to the opposite.
The question is not new, the sociologists who talked about the different roles that each person represent, but in recent times they insist on the subject and a good amount of experiments are already asked to verify that this internal incoherence is moreHow usual in humans. Of all this, some authors conclude that the features of the character do not manifest intersituational stability, or, what is identical, that the same person in different circumstances acts differently.
Of course, if you ask these people why they have given change, they will ignore that the cause is the good smell of bread and cakes and will seek a reason, reason that will often have to invent themselves because in reality, according to the authors we talk about, they do not know that their action was caused by good aroma. If all this were true, it seems that this that we make a good character would be rather an illusion that human beings make ourselves because it is not known what secret mechanisms of our brain, to be able to preserve a better image of ourselves, and thatWe invented reasons to justify those actions that deviate from virtue so as not to lose our self – esteem.
And I say "it seems" because, in my opinion, it is not true, and the project to forge a good character remains one of the smartest that a person can propose. Because people have what is called second -order interests, that is, we can decide, and also make the decision to extend to the whole of life the honest and fair action, or at least become aware of why it is not possible to do so. Who reflects can realize that he was very friendly because they had just given good news or that he was unbearable because they had given him a disgust. It is worth thinking about what we want to do in the future, and this is what makes desire into will.
He had just explained in a seminar what the ethics of discourse consists of, an ethic then practically unknown in the Hispanic world, and in the thread of the explanation he had formulated the ethical principle, according to which, a norm is fair if all those affected by itThey can give their consent after a dialogue held in the closest possible conditions to symmetry, a dialogue in which those affected have brought their interests to light transparently and are willing to take the final result, which satisfies interestsUniversalizable. The most important thing is to have true interest in being, having a will to be, reflect on what has been done and project the future. A few years ago the sociologist Richard Sennett described in his book the corruption of character to what extent the new capitalism makes practically impossible the formation of both people and companies.
It is related to those personal features that we value in ourselves and for which we want to be valued, so we try to maintain some feelings, which will be the ones that serve our character. However, forge a character seems impossible in a capitalist society focused on the immediate, in a society that has the slogan not to consider "nothing in the long term". This principle undermines the basis of trust, loyalty and commitment, which need the medium and long term to consolidate. The hypothesis that Sennett tries to confirm in his book is that the short -term economy threatens to corrupt the character, especially in those aspects that unite human beings with each other and give each one the feeling of maintaining a sustainable self.
And it is true that the curse of short -termism is a threat to the careful construction of character in the economic world. But the political world is also subject to the imperative of the short term, because conquering and conserving power requires being obsessively attentive to electoral calendars, to calibrate which is the best time to make certain decisions so that the number of votes does not go, tolaunch the networks in unsuspected places trying to fish what you can, adapting the network to the possible fishing. But beyond chameleons and dinosaurs, people should be, capable of caring for the best possible character with a view to living a good life.
conclusion
Cosmetics would be a matter of makeup that improve the appearance of people for a while, but do not transform them inside, while ethics would refer to an internal transformation, born of the conviction that it is worth acting well, by theinternal value of acting well and because, as we have been saying since the previous chapter, it is fruitful. The makeup vanishes after a few hours, while the character is loo.
Labing a good character, a good êthos, is the most intelligent thing a person can do to increase their possibilities to carry out a good, happy life. And what is worth for people, also for organizations and for peoples, which also make decisions that generate predispositions to act in one way or another.
Therefore, when organizations, institutions or peoples generate a bad character, bad habits and customs, they lose the lordship over their present and their future and become reactive beings.
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