{"id":2151,"date":"2022-03-25T05:00:50","date_gmt":"2022-03-25T05:00:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2022\/03\/25\/virtue-vice-and-mastery-2\/"},"modified":"2022-03-25T05:00:50","modified_gmt":"2022-03-25T05:00:50","slug":"virtue-vice-and-mastery-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2022\/03\/25\/virtue-vice-and-mastery-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Virtue, Vice, and Mastery"},"content":{"rendered":"

I lately quoted St. Augustine  to the effect that a bad man has as many masters as he has vices. But to be mastered by one's virtues, though better than to be mastered by one's vices, is arguably shy of the ne plus ultra<\/em> of mastery.<\/span><\/p>\n

The ultimate in mastery is mastery of both one's vices and one's virtues.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

My pithy formulation wants explanation. It may have been from Donald Davidson that I picked up the notion of akrasia<\/em> in reverse. Akrasia<\/em> is weakness of the will.  Imagine a runner who runs every day without exception. He is proud of himself, his 'streak' going on two years now, and his self-mastery. And then a day comes when conditions are bad; there are patches of ice on the roads and a freezing rain is falling. Our man is tired from a hard day at work, and a cold is taking hold. He suits up anyway. The upshot? He slips on the ice, smashes a knee and is out of the running for a good long spell.   Our runner has demonstrated akrasia<\/em>  in reverse. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

In this instance he has failed to master his virtue: it has mastered him to his own detriment.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The virtues exists for us and our flourishing; we do not exist for them.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The ultimate in mastery is mastery of both one's vices and one's virtues. <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I lately quoted St. Augustine  to the effect that a bad man has as many masters as he has vices. But to be mastered by one's virtues, though better than to be mastered by one's vices, is arguably shy of the ne plus ultra of mastery. The ultimate in mastery is mastery of both one's … Continue reading “Virtue, Vice, and Mastery”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[540,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2151","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-akrasia","category-virtues-and-vices"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2151","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2151"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2151\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2151"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2151"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2151"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}