Right but ethics isn't meant to make you feel good or give you meaning in the same way physics isn't meant to make you feel good or give you meaning.

You are not doing yourself any favors by factoring in the "meaning you get" from something when deciding its truth or usability for certain applications.

edit: I take that back. you are doing yourself a favor if the "meaning you get" is more valuable to you than reducing chances of error

Strength-based psychology. Social skills, self skills, life skills...

Virtues, strengths, skills. Oh my.

We're not at an impasse, or at least shouldn't be. You made a specific claim about Socrates/Plato's philosophy:

But, this is just wrong. The Republic is the story of a conversation between Socrates and a local notable and some other philosophers/sophists. It starts with the question of what is the just life. The other people in the conversation give their own theories, which under questioning by Socrates are claimed to be insufficient. Then Glaucon presents as the culmination of these other views a theory of justice as a social construct that doesn't ultimately have to do with moral truth and uses the Ring of Gyges story as an argument for this view in opposition to Socrates' own view of the just life. The rest of the book is Socrates laying out his theory of justice in reply. But you are claiming that the Ring of Gyges is Plato/Socrates' own view of justice.

Here is a link to book 2 of the Republic. If you think you are correct, show me in the text.

I would actually say your claiming we are at an impasse is an indication of a lack of intellectual virtue on your part...

I have read the republic once and listened to an audio book of it a second time. This was roughly 10 years ago. I would like to revisit it now that I am talking about it again but you will have to give me some significant time. I am currently in uni and trying to fit 1.5 years into 1 so that I can graduate in spring. When I was talking about it I was talking in reference to what I remember about it from a while ago, but I still think its the case.

I think the main problem here is that we are talking about two different things. We can sort this out if you answer this question:

Did Socrates do ethics by staring with some list of virtues and determining if an action was ethical or unethical based only on whether or not the action conformed to one of those predefined virtues?

I still don't know if you are correct because you haven't presented any evidence.

Okay. As I said, read the article from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy on Virtue Ethics. Or from IEP.

No. Nor, to the best of my knowledge, did Aristotle, Aquinas, Epictetus, MacIntyre or any other virtue theorist. For instance, the Republic is in part an exploration of the virtue of justice. Plato starts by exploring different definitions of justice, some arguing that it is virtuous, others that it isn't. Then, on the basis of claims involving his political philosophy, metaphysics, and epistemology, Plato argues for a particular conception of justice as a virtue and how that manifests in action.

Similarly, in the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle begins with an exploration of the nature of the good more generally, and from that derives an account of the virtues.

Now, you answer a question. Did Socrates invoke the ring of gyges thought experiment to show that the just man was not a just man, but rather acting in his own self interest which happened to produce the beneficial side-effect of making him appear to be a just man?

Right then its not virtue theory / virtue ethics as I understand it. We are talking about two different things with the same name to signify it. Ours is a hopeless situation.

Innocence virtue is innocent.

I find your responses frustrating. You've made specific claims about Socrates/Plato that are provably false, and easily so (which I did). You've characterized Virtue Ethics in an inaccurate manner, which I pointed out and referred you to authoritative sources to confirm my comments.

Your responses has been to claim that we are stuck in a hopeless, relativistic quagmire and so we should just drop it. This is just not true. We are not stuck. You've made factually false claims, which I showed to be false. There is nothing preventing you from acknowledging this except your own pride.

Also, you are not talking about something else, you are talking about something that doesn't exist - at least, not as part of western philosophy. If you think differently because of what your professor said, show me the evidence he provided. What textbook described virtue ethics in the manner you described it? What sources did your teacher refer to as being exemplary of the kind of virtue ethics you are referring to?

What makes a good virtue that isn't directly related to what a person says makes them feel and reason being virtuous?

Accessibly is a quality to examine.

Will respond later. Currently doing family stuff / first half of summer finals (im on fast-tract in order to graduate this coming spring). Just didn't want you to feel that I was blowing you off. My summer vacation is this weekend and I'm trying to enjoy it best I can.

Fair enough, take your time.

In the meantime if you're bored, what might Aristotle say about trolleys?

He'd probably get very excited about advances in science and technology.

Do you think the virtue ethics tradition has something on offer to address the trolley problem and its cousins? Or are these not properly ethical problems for virtue ethicists?

Philippa Foot was a virtue ethicist.

Does she say switch and if so why?

To clarify, I'm not actually that interested in a specific answer about what virtue ethicists suggest to do in trolley cases (I accept that virtue ethics tends not to be about abstractly justifying actions), but I don't know what virtues if any are relevant to deciding the trolley cases, so if there is an ethical dilemma in the trolley cases then it doesn't concern virtues.

Like the consequentialist, who Foot is attacking with the trolley problem, the virtue ethicist also tries to answer the question "how should I behave" and answers that actions are good insomuch as they reflect the behaviour of a virtuous person.

But virtuous behaviour is generally situational and so the virtue ethicist may deny that there's a general answer such as those that can be deduced from consequentialist or deontological principles but that the virtuous person will act according to the situation

I don't have a problem with virtuous behavior being situational or with the lack of generalized principles for behavior. I'm just asking for the trolley problem specifically, if you're the virtuous person having to decide whether to switch, which virtues or what notion of flourishing could be relevant to informing your decision?

With the trolley problem, the most virtuous would purely depend on calculation of lives saved/lost without concern for their own mental well-being or the opinions of others.

Isn't that just a utilitarian position? Are you implying that the virtuous person knows when to be a utilitarian and when not to be?

This seems like almost the opposite of virtue ethics.

The virtue theorist will deny that the virtuous person does a cost benefit analysis in approaching these situations and instead act through phronesis.

I'm not sure I can pick out the specific virtues it seems more that the virtue theorist rejects the idea of an ethical theory having rules that direct acts rather than requires the moral agent to apply the practical wisdom derived from being virtuous to specific situations as they are encountered.