The Price of Virtue

Pacific Philosophical Quarterly

88 (2007) 403–423© 2007 The AuthorJournal compilation © 2007 University of Southern California and Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

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Blackwell Publishing LtdOxford, UKPAPQPacific Philosophical Quarterly0279-0750© 2007 University of Southern California and Blackwell Publishing Ltd.XXXOriginal ArticlesPACIFIC PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY

Pacific Philosophical Quarterly

THE PRICE OF VIRTUE

BY

ANNE MARGARET BAXLEY

Abstract:

Aristotle famously held that there is a crucial difference betweenthe person who merely acts rightly and the person who is wholehearted in whatshe does. He captures this contrast by insisting on a distinction betweencontinence and full virtue. One way of accounting for the important differencehere is to suppose that, for the genuinely virtuous person, the requirementsof virtue “silence” competing reasons for action. I argue that the silencinginterpretation is not compelling. As Aristotle rightly saw, virtue can havea cost, and a mark of the wise person is that she recognizes it.

This paper concerns the relationship between the requirements of virtueand competing options. It is common to suppose that considerations incompetition with virtue fail to tempt the person who is genuinely virtuous,although they often attract those of us with less fully developed moralcharacters. We are told that the fully virtuous person wants to do theright thing for the right reason and takes pleasure in it, whereas themerely continent person acts in accordance with her correct judgment inspite of contrary emotions and appetites. There is, however, a furtherquestion we can ask here about how things appear from the virtuousperson’s particular outlook in circumstances where the requirements ofvirtue are pitted against competing options. Does the brave person recognizethat bravery has a cost, since bravery at times requires tremendous sacrifice?Or does the brave person feel no pain at the prospect of death whenstanding firm in the face of danger for a good cause?

Favoring the latter account of the virtuous person’s particular moraloutlook, John McDowell has argued that the truly virtuous person neversees any conflict between the demands of virtue and other options,because, for her, the requirements of virtue “silence” competing reasonsfor action. McDowell thinks that the silencing thesis is the best way tounderstand Aristotle, and he takes it to represent a philosophically attractivepicture of virtue that we should endorse. I argue that the silencing view isnot compelling. As Aristotle rightly saw – and as we should agree – virtuecan have a cost, and a mark of the wise person is that she recognizes it.

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© 2007 The AuthorJournal compilation © 2007 University of Southern California and Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

I. The silencing view

McDowell has defended the merits of the silencing thesis as both an inter-pretation of Aristotle and a systematic proposal for how to think aboutvirtue and the relation between moral and nonmoral value.

1

According tothis view, virtue does not outweigh or override other reasons; instead, it

silences

them. In the face of virtue’s dictates, any prospective enjoyment thetruly virtuous person might have found in other available opportunitiesis effaced by her clear perception of the requirements of virtue, whichsilence competing attractions.

McDowell intends for this silencing view to supplant a more commonconception of virtue, according to which the dictates of virtue always

outweigh or override

reasons for acting otherwise. That familiar picture –let us call it “the overriding view” – allows that the virtuous person mightat times recognize and consider reasons in competition with virtue, as longas she always chooses the virtuous course of action and firmly believesthat the sacrifices associated with the life of virtue are well worth theprice. McDowell, however, insists that the overriding view fails to capturewhat is truly distinctive about the person with full virtue. As he argues,what sets the virtuous person apart is not that she takes the requirementsof virtue to outweigh or override competing reasons for action, but thatshe does not balance the dictates of virtue against other reasons at all.

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For her, foregone opportunities that might have provided incentives foraction in alternative circumstances fail to hold any attraction and cease tocount as reasons at all in actual circumstances where virtue marks outsome other action as required:

If a situation in which virtue imposes a requirement is genuinely conceived as such, accordingto this view, then considerations which, in the absence of the requirement, would haveconstituted reasons for acting otherwise are silenced altogether – not overridden – by therequirement.

3

The notion of silencing is of course a metaphor, and it is not immediatelyobvious what McDowell even means by it. In the different discussionsin which he appeals to the silencing metaphor, McDowell tends to talkmostly about reasons, emphasizing that virtue silences other reasons foraction, that the virtuous person’s clear perception of the requirements ofvirtue silences other reasons for action, so that considerations that wouldhave constituted reasons lack reason-giving force in circumstances wherethey ought not to be pursued.

4

Yet, while McDowell’s main contention isthat virtue silences other reasons, he treats a number of subsidiary claimsas implied by this thesis. He claims, for instance, that the virtuous person’sinclinations for competing attractions evaporate under the impact of therequirements of virtue, that, for her, the attraction of competing options

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counts for nothing, and that competing alternatives play no role in formingher judgment about what she should do. Here, we might differentiate thefollowing claims: (1) the virtuous person sees no reason to act contrary tothe requirements of virtue; (2) the virtuous person recognizes no value incompeting options in circumstances where they should not be pursued;(3) the virtuous person feels no genuine loss in foregone opportunities;(4) the virtuous person accords competing options no deliberative role indetermining how she should act. McDowell never explains the preciserelation(s) he envisions between (1)–(4). Nevertheless, given his commitmentto all four claims, it seems right to attribute to him the general view thatextra-moral considerations

lack practical significance

when in competitionwith virtue – not only do they fail to provide reasons for action, they ceaseto hold any attraction for the agent, they no longer engage her inclinations,and they play no role in her practical judgment about which course ofaction is best.

Before turning to some concrete applications of the silencing thesis, wemight press one further question about how best to understand it as ageneral, systematic proposal for how to think about virtue and the relationbetween moral and nonmoral value. Does virtue silence other reasonsinsofar as there can be no (objective) reasons that compete with thedemands of virtue? Or does virtue silence other reasons insofar as thevirtuous person does not recognize or consider competing reasons?Although McDowell himself does not sharply distinguish epistemic ormotivational issues about how the virtuous person should reason or feelfrom normative issues about what is true about her (objective) reasons foraction, his own discussions of silencing invite precisely this distinction. Inother words, we can construe the silencing thesis in two different ways:(a) that there can be no nonmoral reasons that conflict with the demandsof virtue; or (b) that the virtuous person should never recognize orconsider nonmoral reasons that conflict with the demands of virtue.

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As an illustration, consider the following example. Suppose that virtuehas a non-personal, aesthetic cost, when saving you requires that I driveover a bed of beautiful rosebushes. Interpreted as a normative thesis aboutan agent’s (objective) reasons for action, silencing implies that there simplyis no reason for me not to save you. By contrast, interpreted as an epistemicor motivational thesis about how the virtuous person should reason orfeel, silencing entails that, although I may have a (weak) reason not to saveyou (viz., saving the rosebushes), I should not entertain or be moved it.

At times McDowell suggests (b), but for the most part he appears toemphasize (a), that considerations that otherwise provide reasons foraction no longer constitute (objective) reasons for action when they conflictwith an action virtue marks out as required.

6

Notice, finally, that whereMcDowell conceives of the silencing thesis in terms of an epistemic ormotivational thesis about how the virtuous person should think or feel

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about her options – as in (b) outlined above – we might take him to bemaking a version of Bernard Williams’s “one thought too many” argument.In other words, in this context, McDowell’s point is that, in some cases, itwould be unattractive (morally) to register certain sorts of nonmoralcosts to doing what one ought to do. (For example, it would be unattrac-tive for me to be concerned with my precious rosebushes when I ought tobe concerned solely with your welfare.) In this paper, I aim to show that,as perfectly general theses about virtue, both versions of silencing arequestionable.

At this point, it will be helpful to keep in mind what silencing impliesabout how we ought to conceive of temperance – the mean concernedwith bodily pleasures – and courage – the mean concerned with feelingsof fear and confidence. The silencing interpretation does not recommenda thoroughgoing asceticism, by requiring the temperate person to beinsensible, for it allows that the temperate person enjoys physical pleasuresand pursues them in suitable circumstances. Consider, for example, a mannamed Oscar, who desires a woman named Stella. If virtue did notrequire that Oscar refrain from sleeping with his best friend’s partner,Oscar’s prospective pleasure in indulging his libido might constitute areason for sleeping with Stella. Nevertheless, the silencing interpretationmaintains that Oscar’s vivid appreciation of virtue’s dictates would insulatehis prospective pleasure in circumstances where Eros and virtue are atodds. Since Oscar is virtuous, he would never even begin to desire Stellaas long as virtue forbids it (as long, say, as Stella is not Oscar’s partner butanother’s). Further, on the silencing view, Oscar’s missed opportunity forpleasure is not an admitted loss, one compensated for by the counterbalanc-ing gains he rightly feels in acting temperately.

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Rather, in circumstanceswhere such physical pleasure could only be obtained by flouting arequirement of excellence, “missing the pleasure is no loss at all.”

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Takenas a claim about an agent’s (objective) reasons for action, the silencingthesis implies that there just is no reason for Oscar to pursue Stella.Taken as a claim about how the virtuous agent feels or reasons about heroptions, it implies that, even if Oscar has a (weak) reason to pursue Stella,he should not consider this option or be moved by it.

Similarly, the silencing interpretation allows that the courageous personvalues life and health and takes harm to be something she has reasonto avoid. Nevertheless, it requires that, in circumstances where virtuerequires standing firm in the face of danger for the sake of the noble, thevery considerations about preserving one’s life and health that the virtuousperson normally cares about are stilled by the demands of bravery. Inother words, when facing danger for a good cause, the courageous person

eo ipso

relinquishes an interest in the security of life and limb that sheotherwise values and sees no reason to remove herself from harm.

9

Again,taken as a normative claim about an agent’s reasons for action, the silencing

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thesis implies that, here and now, considerations about preserving one’slife simply do not constitute a reason for acting otherwise than virtuously.Taken as an epistemic or motivational claim about how the virtuousagent feels or thinks about her options, silencing implies that, althoughthe courageous person may have a (weak) reason to remove herself fromharm, she should not consider this option or be moved by it.

As these examples of temperance and courage reveal, on the silencingview, no sacrifice necessitated by the life of virtue counts as a real cost tothe agent, because foregoing some opportunity one has no reason to wantor to pursue will not constitute a genuine loss. Further, since virtue hasno real cost, the virtuous person never experiences conflict between therequirements of virtue and other options, or regret about the sacrificesthe life of virtue would appear to exact. For her, they are, in fact, notsacrifices.

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McDowell thinks that a philosophically attractive account of virtuemust recognize the distinction between virtue silencing other options andoverriding them. He also insists that this distinction is central to Aristotle’sunderstanding of virtue and, further, that Aristotle’s distinction betweenvirtue and continence actually

requires

the silencing thesis. McDowellrightly notes that, for Aristotle, if one needs to overcome an inclination toact otherwise in getting oneself to act virtuously, one’s action manifestsmere continence rather than full virtue. Although the continent personresembles the virtuous person insofar as she makes the right judgmentand acts as she should, she nonetheless differs from the virtuous personinsofar as she acts as reason exhorts her to in the face of inclinationsopposed to reason. As McDowell sees it, then, the only way the Aristoteliandistinction between virtue and continence is even intelligible is to supposethat virtue silences considerations that would have constituted reasons foracting otherwise. For, if we allow (as he thinks the overriding view mustallow) that the virtuous person might arrive at a judgment as to what sheshould do by first weighing some reason for acting in a way that manifestscourage against a reason for doing something else – for instance, preservinglife and limb as a reason for running away – and only then deciding thatthe former reason trumps the latter one, then virtue amounts to nothingdifferent from continence. Notice that, here, McDowell assumes that, ifthe virtuous person weighs competing claims, this weighing itself entailsthat she feels inclined to act contrary to her best judgment and hencedoes the right thing in the face of contrary desires.

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McDowell there-fore contends that, in order to mark the contrast between virtue andcontinence in a meaningful way, it

must

be the case that virtue silencesother options:

The distinction becomes intelligible if we stop assuming that the virtuous person’s judgmentis a balancing of reasons for and against. The view of a situation which he arrives at by

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exercising his sensitivity is one in which some aspect of the situation is seen as constitutinga reason for acting in some way; this reason is apprehended, not as outweighing or overridingany reasons for acting in other ways which would otherwise be constituted by other aspectsof the situation (the present danger, say) but as silencing them. Here and now the risk tolife and limb is not seen as any reason for removing himself.

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Having explored the silencing thesis and seen how it shapes our view oftemperance and courage, there are two aspects of this account of virtueparticularly worth highlighting. First, it represents an exceptionallyaugust standard of virtue. Virtue, on the silencing interpretation, is asublime state of character, manifested in “a renunciation, without struggle,of something which in the abstract one would value highly.”

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In light ofthe fact that mere mortals can approximate this lofty ideal only partiallyand imperfectly, true virtue is seldom met with in the real world, where atbest we are fortunate to encounter it mixed with continence. McDowell isaware of this aspect of the silencing view and welcomes it, remarking that,“in a view of what genuine virtue is, idealization is not something to beavoided or apologized for.”

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Second, the silencing interpretation reinforces a more general thesisthat the virtuous person has a special conception of her circumstances,one that the rest of us fail fully to share.

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Given that virtue silences, ratherthan overrides, other reasons for action, the virtuous person possessesa clear perception of the requirements of virtue never obfuscated bytemptation. McDowell reasons that, by contrast, both the continentand incontinent person’s inclinations are aroused by their awareness ofcompeting attractions, for competing attractions still resonate for them,and are not silenced. But this means that, for both the continent andincontinent person, “a lively desire clouds or blurs the focus of [her]attention on ‘the noble.’ ”

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On the silencing view, then, the virtuous personboth feels things in a distinctive way and sees things in a unique light –she never feels conflicted or tempted to act otherwise than virtuouslybecause she sees no reason to act contrary to virtue’s demands, andbecause extramoral considerations do not appear valuable to her whenthey should not be pursued.

II. Textual concerns about silencing in Aristotle

The silencing interpretation has the distinct advantage of providing a clear-cut way of explaining Aristotle’s contrast between virtue and continence.Moreover, it may seem

necessary

to explain that contrast. According toAristotle, with virtue, there is agreement between the rational and non-rational parts of the soul, but with continence, the rational part of thesoul wins the battle against countervailing appetite (EN 1102b15–30).

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Whereas the continent person experiences temptation and conflictbetween the demands of virtue and other courses of action, the virtuousperson is not supposed to be conflicted in this way. The thesis that compet-ing attractions are silenced by the requirements of virtue would explainthe difference. Indeed, Aristotle appears to draw precisely these conclusionswhen discussing the pleasures and pains of the virtuous person. In mattersof temperance and bravery, he argues, actions are not enough:

But we must take someone’s pleasure or pain following on his actions to be a sign of hisstate. For if someone who abstains from bodily pleasures enjoys the abstinence itself, he istemperate; if he is grieved by it, he is intemperate. Again, if he stands firm against terrifyingsituations and enjoys it, or at least does not find it painful, he is brave; if he finds it painful,he is cowardly. For virtue of character is about pleasures and pains. (EN 1104b1–7)

On the face of it, Aristotle’s suggestion in this passage that the brave andthe temperate person feel no pain in acting virtuously appears to supportthe silencing thesis. The main issue in terms of Aristotle interpretation,however, is what his discussions as a whole suggest or require. Somediscussions in Aristotle square nicely with McDowell’s proposal, butothers do not. What follows are several central reasons for thinking that, onbalance, the silencing thesis is not the best way to understand Aristotle.

First, in his discussion of bravery, Aristotle explicitly agrees with thecommonsense view that virtue can have a price. Aristotle holds that braverydoes not apply to every particular fear and danger, but is instead concernedwith fear of death, primarily with fear of death in war. The brave personhas trained himself not to be excessively afraid and to have confidencein facing danger for a good cause. In distinguishing bravery from otherconditions resembling it, Aristotle insists that the brave person is differentfrom both the coward, who fears the wrong things in the wrong way, aswell as the fearless person, whom he characterizes as a kind of madmanincapable of feeling distress. What sets the brave person apart, in otherwords, is that he has the right degree of fear about the right things on theright occasion. Given that Aristotle explicitly understands fear as anexpectation of something bad (EN 1115a8–9), in acknowledging that thebrave person has the appropriate degree of fear in facing danger wherereason prescribes it, Aristotle agrees that the life of virtue carries with itcertain sacrifices, which the virtuous person rightly conceives to begenuine costs.

Will the brave person be pained at the prospect of death? Aristotle isemphatic on this point:

And so, if the same is true of bravery, the brave person will find death and wounds painful,and suffer them unwillingly, but he will endure them because that is fine or because failureis shameful. Indeed the truer it is that he has every virtue and the happier he is, the morepain he will feel at the prospect of death. For this sort of person, more than anyone, finds

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it worthwhile to be alive, and knows he is being deprived of the greatest goods, and this ispainful. But he is no less brave for all that; presumably, indeed, he is all the braver, becausehe chooses what is fine in war at the cost of all these goods. (EN 1117b8–16)

Here, in indicating that the end pursued by the brave person is accompaniedby evils the brave person regrets – namely, death – Aristotle acknowledgesthat virtue can have a price and that the wise person recognizes it.

Second, Aristotle plainly thinks that the virtuous person can beharmed. According to the silencing interpretation, the courageous personis serene in the face of death because he recognizes that no harm cancome to him by acting bravely. Yet, as we have just seen, Aristotle deniesthat the brave person will be entirely unperturbed at the prospect of death,for he more than anyone will find death painful. In addition, Aristotletakes this Stoic thesis that no harm can come to the virtuous person to bemistaken.

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Although Aristotle believes that the greatest harm that thevirtuous person can experience is to act contrary to virtue, that is, to fail toact nobly or honorably, he does not think this is the only way the virtuousperson can be harmed. There are countless ways the virtuous person canbe harmed, at least some of which lie outside of his control. Moreover,sometimes these harms themselves are associated with virtuous activity.This is presumably part of the significance of the analogy Aristotle drawsbetween the boxer and the brave person (EN 1117b1–17). Although theboxer finds the end at which he aims (the crown and honors) pleasant, healso finds it distressing and painful, because he is human and made offlesh and blood. Similarly, while the brave person finds the end at whichhe aims (facing danger in war for a good cause) pleasant, he also findsdeath and the wounds accompanying the battlefield painful, because hemore than anyone finds it worthwhile to be alive. Indeed, it is preciselythis fact that the brave person is well aware that real harm can come tohim that leads Aristotle to suggest that brave people might not make thebest soldiers, for people less brave, but who possess no other good, maybe less aggrieved by the costs associated with facing danger in war (EN1117b18–20). The notion that the virtuous person can be harmed countsagainst the silencing interpretation, for harm entails losing or giving upsomething that the agent still values, whose attraction still resonates forthe agent, and is not silenced.

I take the aforementioned considerations from Aristotle’s discussionsof bravery to provide decisive evidence against McDowell’s silencing thesisas a perfectly general thesis about virtue. But a third problem facing thesilencing interpretation is worth mentioning. Here, the worry is that thesilencing view may run into trouble by obviating Aristotle’s often-neglected distinction between human virtue and divine or heroic excellence.Aristotle conceives of divine or heroic excellence as superior to virtue, inthe sense of being beyond our normal human capacities (EN 1145a21).

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Such a state of excellence best characterizes the gods, who are self-sufficientand need nothing. This, Aristotle notes, helps explain the ordinary use ofthe term ‘divine,’ as when Homer had Priam say that noble Hector wasremarkably good and so appeared less like a mortal and more like a god(EN 1145a20–25). The relevant point for our purposes is that, in insistingthat virtue always silences concerns that are sacrificed by virtuous action,the silencing view would appear to give us a recipe for a divine or heroicexcellence, a state exceeding the normal capacities of embodied rationalbeings like ourselves, even the best of whom tend to take death to bea harm, insofar as it deprives us of the greatest good of living a noble andworthwhile life of virtuous activity. Whereas McDowell insists that thethesis that virtue silences competing reasons alone enables us to markthe distinction between virtue and mere continence in a meaningful way,it may turn out that the silencing thesis is able clearly to register thatdistinction at the cost of conflating another one – namely, human virtueand divine or heroic excellence – by demanding not just that the courageousperson exclude certain considerations from deliberation, but that hediscount such excluded considerations as reasons at all, and take himselfto incur no genuine loss in failing to respond to them. But we might thinkthat only a god or hero can take himself to have suffered no real loss byfailing to respond to considerations about his natural welfare and futurelife. Besides, Aristotle does not think that we should strive to becomegods – even if their life of study is the life that would best promote ourhappiness – for the change would be so radical that we would not survivethe transformation (EN 1145a23, 1159a5, 1166a19).

Fourth, the main reason for supposing that Aristotle ought to deny thecommon view that virtue can have a price is the assumption that he

must

,in order to mark the distinction between the fully virtuous and the merelycontinent person. Yet that distinction requires only that the virtuousperson have a sufficiently steady and unwavering commitment to act as hejudges best and not seriously be tempted to act otherwise. But one can besteadfast in one’s commitment to the virtuous course of action and notseriously tempted by competing attractions while recognizing that activitiesand opportunities one knows would be wrong to pursue have value, thatis, that virtue has a cost. The virtuous person need only see that the costis always and well worth paying, or, as Aristotle says, that virtue is thecontrolling ingredient in

eudaimonia

.

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But what about temperance? McDowell thinks that the silencing inter-pretation helps us to understand Aristotle’s views about both courage andtemperance. I have suggested that the evidence from Aristotle’s discussionsof bravery actually counts against the silencing thesis.

Prima facie

, however,his account of temperance supports it. For instance, in more than onepassage, Aristotle indicates that the temperate person does not feel painat refraining from what is pleasant and finds no pleasure in the wrong

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things (EN 1119b3–5; 1119a11–16; 1151b35–1152a4). There are, however,a few considerations that undercut the

prima facie

case. In the first place,even if Aristotle allows that virtue can sometimes have a cost, he need notclaim that the virtuous person

always

experiences foregone opportunitiesas costs, because obviously some such opportunities are not valuable orworth pursuing. Temperance, as Aristotle conceives of it, concerns pleasureswe share with non-human animals, pleasures that appear “slavish andbestial” (EN 1118a25–26). Consequently, this might explain why he seemsunwilling to concede that temperance in particular involves sacrifice –those specific pleasures that the temperate person recognizes as contrary toreason do not rank highly in a human life. Or, in other words, such bodilypleasures are not themselves noble (

kalon

), even if they are appropriateobjects of pursuit in suitable circumstances.

In the second place, Aristotle’s claim that the temperate person finds nopleasure at all in the wrong things (EN 1119a11–16) could be squaredwith the view that virtue can have a cost, insofar as it seems plausible thatone could see value in activities that it would be wrong to engage in, whilenonetheless be unable to take pleasure in doing something wrong. Thevirtuous person takes no pleasure in wrong things

qua

wrong.Finally, Aristotle sometimes make a

comparative claim

about temperanceand intemperance, as when he suggests that someone is intemperatebecause he feels

more pain

than is right at failing to get pleasant things(EN 118b29–1119a5; 1119b3–5). He explains, for instance, that thetemperate person suffers no pain at the absence of bodily pleasures, and“has no appetite for them, or only a moderate appetite, not to the wrongdegree or at the wrong time” (EN 1119a14–15). This comparative claimallows that the virtuous person could feel some pain, just not excessivepain, at failing to get pleasant things. If so, this might be evidence againstthe silencing interpretation, according to which the temperate personnever experiences pain over foregone opportunities.

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’

III. Systematic concerns about silencing

Apart from providing an initially plausible reading of Aristotle, we mightthink that the silencing thesis has broader systematic appeal (entirelyindependent of Aristotle interpretation), because it is easy enough to isolatea range of cases where competing options are and should be silenced bythe requirements of virtue. These are cases in which competing options inconflict with virtue are actually

immoral or vicious

. In such cases, as oneversion of Williams’s “one thought too many” argument suggests, itwould be unattractive (morally) for the virtuous person to register certainsorts of nonmoral costs to doing what she ought to do. For example, thecommitted parent will not recognize the cost of not killing or undermining

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her child’s rivals in school, sports, or professional matters in order toadvance her child’s interest, just as the honest professor will not recognizethe cost of not altering her student evaluations in order to get goodreviews of her classes. Similarly, the devoted public servant will not considerthe option of slandering his opponent in order to get reelected, just as theloyal partner will not consider the option of lying to his spouse in order tohave a weekend away with friends. In these examples, moral considerationsscreen off or condition what would otherwise be legitimate practicalconcerns. The nonmoral considerations in question, which would makethe actions attractive, are perfectly good ones, but the virtuous person wouldnot regard the attractive features of the actions (the desired consequences)as giving her genuine reasons to act otherwise than virtuously. Indeed, thegenuinely virtuous person will not even consider the prospect of acting insuch unvirtuous ways. Here, where competing options are immoral orvicious, it makes sense to think that both versions of the silencing thesis(outlined above in section I) obtain. The virtuous person will not consideror entertain competing considerations contrary to virtue that are immoralor vicious, nor do such considerations provide (objective) reasons foraction that compete with the demands of virtue. In short, there are nottwo reasons here, one of which gets overridden, but only one reason thatsilences the other. Yet, whatever plausibility the silencing requirement hasin relation to these kinds of examples, it fails to hold more generally,because there is a wide range of other cases where it is either wrong tothink that virtue should silence other reasons for action, or unnecessaryto think that it must.

In the first place, there can be occasions where the requirements ofvirtue are set against other, less exigent reasons that are themselves

moral

.In such cases of moral/moral conflict, where the reason in tension withvirtue is a less weighty moral reason that would normally be wrong toviolate, silencing would be surprising, if not objectionable. Under thesecircumstances, competing moral considerations in conflict with virtuethat should not be chosen or pursued can still resonate for the agent asvaluable, even though she believes it right to forego them when virtuedirects her toward a different course of action. In other words, the factthat she might take such foregone options to have practical significancedoes not imply that she is merely continent, not virtuous.

Consider, for example, the remarkable Miep Gies, who helped to hideOtto Frank and his family during their twenty-five months of hidingduring the Nazi occupation of Holland.

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In serving as a lifeline to theFrank family during their time in the Secret Annex, Gies acted in accord-ance with what she perceived justice required, and did so at considerablerisk to her loved ones (and of course herself). If Gies had considered thecost of acting against the explicit directives of the Nazi occupation, andtaken herself to have a reason to act contrary to what she decided were

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the requirements of justice, this presumably would not prevent us fromthinking her less than fully virtuous. On the contrary, we should expectthat considerations about her family’s welfare still mattered to her – thatcompeting (moral) considerations still held a certain attraction andcounted for something – even when Gies firmly believed that competingoptions in tension with virtue took second place. Or imagine a man namedWilliam, who demonstrates courage by jumping into freezing, stormywaters to save a stranger after their boat has capsized. He risks not justhis own life, but in an important sense the welfare and happiness of hiswife and small children, who depend on him. In this case, William actscourageously, even though he recognizes that he has a reason to remainsafely with his wife and children in their lifeboat, and sees the cost tohimself and his family that his rescue effort poses. Finally, take a lessdramatic case of a conflict between virtue and a competing moral con-sideration, as when Emma believes that true friendship requires franknessin pointing out her friend’s defects (as Aristotle suggests is necessary forthe best kind of friendship). Emma may recognize that being a true friendcarries with it calculable risks – in particular, hurting her friend’s feelingsand alienating her affection. Consequently, she might take herself to havea competing (moral) reason for being less than candid, and see the attrac-tion in that option, even if she is not seriously tempted to act against herbest judgment. In such cases of moral/moral conflict, the presumptivereason not acted on, which, under normal circumstances, provides theagent with a sufficient reason for action, can still count for the agent;it need not be silenced by the requirements of virtue. Indeed, here, bothversions of the silencing thesis seem misplaced. The relationship betweenthe requirements of virtue and competing (moral) considerations is suchthat the moral considerations not acted on ground (objective) reasons foraction, and, further, the virtuous person may register and consider competingreasons. If this is right, then, in such cases of moral/moral conflict, notonly is it not required that virtue silences other reasons for action, here itshould not, because recognizing the value of competing (moral) optionsand feeling pain about the prospect of foregone opportunities wouldappear to be a condition of a morally good character. In short, theseexamples are meant to show that some sacrifices necessitated by the life ofexcellence entail a price and that, through such sacrifice, the virtuousperson will take herself to have endured a loss that really matters.

One possible rejoinder on behalf of the silencing view at this juncture isto point out that the silencing thesis can accommodate this first mainobjection, if we reject the idea that it

must

apply in cases of moral /moralconflict.

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If we restate the silencing proposal to make explicit that it pertainsmore narrowly, that is, only in cases of moral/nonmoral conflict, then itcan allow that there can be less exigent moral reasons that are overriddenby the requirements of virtue.

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This amendment is probably in order,

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especially if we consider McDowell’s concession that the virtuous personwill feel regret and recognize that virtue has a cost in tragic predicaments.

24

In cases of tragic conflict, no acceptable course of action is available tothe agent, because she cannot act fully consistently with her conception ofthe sort of life that is worthwhile or meaningful to live. Perhaps McDowellcould make a similar point with respect to cases of moral /moral conflictthat are not fully tragic cases on the grounds that, in hard cases of moral /moral conflict, the agent rightly regrets giving up something she still valuesand finds attractive. This would allow that, even though the requirementsof virtue silence competing nonmoral reasons for action, they need onlyoverride competing moral reasons, which can still have practical signi-ficance for the agent with full virtue. Still, it would be arbitrary to treatmoral/moral and moral/nonmoral cases so differently without furtherargument. As the following examples are meant to suggest, just as itwould be mistaken to think that virtue silences competing moral reasonsfor action, so it would be mistaken to think that competing nonmoralreasons for action always are, and should be, silenced by the demandsof virtue.

The civilian faced with the choice of accepting torture or betrayingher friend or country displays real courage when she accepts torture, eventhough she feels the significant (personal) cost of virtue, and sees theattraction in preserving her bodily (and psychological) integrity. If truth-fulness about oneself dictates that one divulge some fact whose revelationcan have damaging consequences to one’s own interest – for instance, thetruth about one’s sexual orientation – the truthful person may see thatintegrity sometimes entails a high price – for example, alienation, harass-ment, or loss of the opportunity to adopt a child – and think that she hasa reason for being less than fully honest. The loyal son may feel painedabout the prospective loss to his career when he turns down an attractivejob offer to remain in his current position to be near his ailing parent,and see that considerations about his career still provide him with a reasonfor accepting the new job, even if he thinks that it would be wrong toneglect his father’s needs. Perhaps there are even some instances where thevirtue of temperance need not silence other reasons for action. Supposethat Oscar has a deep and abiding love for Stella, whom he came to knowbefore her involvement with his best friend. In that case, Oscar might stillsee the attraction in pursuing his desire for Stella, even though he is notconflicted about the right course of action, or seriously tempted to actotherwise than virtuously. Finally, recall the example of the rosebushesinvoked at the outset of this paper. If saving you requires that I drive overmy beloved rosebushes where my roses are a long-standing personal projectthat I take to be part of my conception of a good life, I may think that Ihave a reason not to destroy them, even if I am not seriously tempted tosave them instead of you, or conflicted about how to act. (Here, unlike in

416



the initial formulation of this example, virtue has an aesthetic cost that isconsidered

personal

.) Appealing once again to our two possible versionsof the silencing thesis, where competing nonmoral reasons for action aremorally neutral and do not conflict with virtue in the strict sense of beingimmoral or vicious, we need not think that either version of silencingmust apply. In other words, in these cases, where the requirements of virtueare set against nonmoral interests and projects of the agent in which shehas a stake, we should allow that there can be (objective) reasons thatcompete with the requirements of virtue, and, further, that the fullyvirtuous person can recognize and consider them.

These various counterexamples aim to underscore the implausibility ofthe silencing view as a

general theory

about the psychology of virtue.Though the silencing thesis nicely captures a narrow range of cases wherethere is one (and only one) clear dictate of virtue set against explicitlynonmoral considerations in tension with virtuous activity that we mightrightly agree are, and should be, silenced, just in case the appraiser andagent is virtuous, there is a wide range of other cases in which the silencingrequirement either need not, or should not, be satisfied, since foregoneoptions in conflict with virtue can be genuine goods that are choiceworthy,even when they should not be pursued.

25

Or, to put this in the terminologyof reasons, in light of the fact that the demands of virtue may be setagainst genuine (or pro tanto) reasons for action that do (and ought to)motivate the agent to act in the absence of a reason that turns out to beall-things-considered best, it is paradoxical to think that virtue should bedefined in terms of a narrowness of focus with a concomitant blindness –or deafness – to conflicting considerations that are there, and thatnormally count for the agent as valid or sufficient reasons for action. Thisis to say that a plausible account of the relation between the requirementsof virtue and competing considerations, which is able to deliver plausibleresults in a range of cases, should deny that virtue always silences competingreasons for action.

IV. Virtue can have a price, and the wise person recognizes it

Having argued that, on balance, the silencing view is not compelling,either as a reading of Aristotle or as a systematic account of virtue thatwe should endorse, I conclude by returning briefly to what I have labeled“the overriding view,” in order to head off two central objections to itand, tentatively, to outline its appeal.

26

According to the overriding view,all that is strictly required by virtue is that the demands of virtue alwaysoverride or outweigh competing reasons for actions. This position implies(a) that there can be nonmoral reasons that conflict with the demands

THE PRICE OF VIRTUE

417


of virtue; and (b) that the virtuous person may recognize and considernonmoral reasons that conflict with the demands of virtue. On the over-riding view, then, competing considerations outweighed by the demandsof virtue can still have

practical significance

for the agent. The virtuousperson can see the value in competing opportunities that she thinks itwould be wrong to pursue and recognize reasons to act otherwise thanvirtuously. Indeed, at times she may feel pain and regret about theprospective loss of foregone options that the life of virtue entails, whenacting virtuously involves giving up something that she would – or should– otherwise choose.

This is by no means to deny that the silencing requirement might some-times be satisfied – indeed, in certain circumstances, virtue might silenceother reasons for action in a way that is unobjectionable or even laudable(as when competing considerations in conflict with virtue are actuallyimmoral or vicious). But silencing is

not required

. In light of the fact thatthe requirements of virtue can at times be set against projects, commitments,and concerns of the agent that she deeply values, we need not think thatcompeting considerations should not be heard by her will, or shouldcount for nothing. When foregone options trumped by the requirementsof virtue are genuine goods that the agent would normally choose orpursue, or when acting virtuously involves real sacrifice that the agentregrets, it is unnecessary to think that virtue must silence other reasons,or wrong to think that it should.

There are two main points about the overriding view that deserveclarification. First, it does not imply that virtue

always

has a cost, butmerely that it

can

, for virtue does not always require foregoing competingattractions, nor are competing attractions always valuable. Second, theoverriding view does not imply that virtuous person is seriously temptedto act in ways that conflict with what correct reason prescribes. On thecontrary, even on the view on which the requirements of virtue merelyoutweigh competing attractions, the virtuous person is not actuallymotivated to act otherwise than virtuously, because she has no desire toact contrary to her best judgment, even when she recognizes competingnon-virtuous options and perceives their attraction. Whereas McDowellassumes that to recognize a reason to act otherwise than virtuously

just is

to have a desire to act in contrary-to-virtue ways and to be seriouslytempted to act against one’s best judgment, this assumption is notwarranted. The virtuous person can recognize other reasons for actionand see the value of competing attractions without being seriouslytempted by them. She is not seriously tempted, because she possesses asufficiently steady disposition always to act as she judges best, because herfeelings and desires have been shaped by her conception of right action,and because, consequently, she is not actually motivated to act in waysthat conflict with courses of action that virtue has marked out as required.

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Surprisingly, another look at temperance might bolster this key claimthat one can see the attraction of competing options without having adesire to pursue them and without being seriously tempted by them. ForAristotle, the temperate person, but not the continent person, has the

right degree of appetite

, while in the continent person it is stronger than itshould be. This suggests that, even if competing options are not silencedfor the virtuous person, she still has a special self-possession and internalharmony that the continent person lacks. The continent person experiencesa psychic dissonance that is foreign to the virtuous person, insofar as sheactually desires things she knows she should not want, and so her emotionsand appetites counter what reason recommends. As an example, considerthe recovering alcoholic, who occasionally thinks about a drink withoutthereby having a desire to drink.

27

A less securely sober alcoholic has adifferent relationship to the thought of a drink. In the former case, theagent might sometimes recognize competing options but is not seriouslytempted by them, or not motivated to act on contrary-to-virtue considera-tions. She may recognize competing options and even see them as in somesense good – a perfectly cold, dry martini sometimes still appears delicious– but she is not tempted to pursue them, for they are not commensurablewith what is

kalon. If this is right, then we have reason to think that, paceMcDowell, recognizing foregone opportunities as in some sense attractivedoes not on its own amount to having a desire to pursue them, or tobeing seriously tempted to act otherwise than virtuously.

Although much more would need to be said in order to defend fully thedetails and merits of the overriding view, we might think that it has thefollowing distinct advantages over the silencing view. First, it represents amore human model of virtue, one appropriate for the kinds of beings weare, namely, finite rational beings, who value a range of goods, activities,and projects, and who sometimes face hard choices in acting well (andnot only in genuinely tragic circumstances). By contrast, the silencingview presents virtue as ultimately an austere ideal, one best suited forperfectly rational beings, who lack feelings and non-rational appetitesand who (in Kantian terms) possess wills that conform perfectly to purereason. It is not just that the silencing thesis sets the bar too high inpresenting an ideal account of character that we might never reach, butthat it sets up the wrong ideal for human virtue.28 Second, the overridingview seems more apt at capturing the virtuous person’s special conceptionof her circumstances, because it allows that, from her perspective, all thevarious ingredients in a complete and meaningful human life resonateand show up as perspicuous, instead of demanding that she turn a blindeye – or a deaf ear – to the attractions of goods and opportunities agreedto be important for a fully happy life. In other words, on the overridingview, the virtuous person is not oblivious to important nonmoral (andless exigent moral) considerations that are part of her conception of

THE PRICE OF VIRTUE 419


a complete, happy life. Third, in agreeing that foregone options might beappropriate objects of value even when they are not proper objects ofpursuit or choice, it acknowledges that there can be genuine conflicts ofgoods that matter to us and that value cannot be reduced in our psychologiesto the narrowly moral kind.

V. Conclusion

Finally, we should return to the central issue that appears to motivate thesilencing view, namely the distinction between virtue and continence.McDowell thinks that this distinction between virtue and mere continencerequires that virtue silence other reasons for action. As he sees it, if weallow that virtue overrides competing reasons for action, this means thatthe virtuous person weighs the requirements of virtue against otherreasons, and this, in turn, entails that the virtuous person feels the weightof countervailing inclinations and is in fact conflicted and tempted to actcontrary to what correct reason prescribes. But it is important to understandthat this does not follow. On the overriding view, the virtuous person doesnot experience conflict and temptation because she has a sufficientlysteadfast and unwavering commitment to act as she judges best, becauseher emotions and appetites have been trained to harmonize with rightjudgment, and because she knows that ultimately there is no pleasure tobe found in acting in contrary to virtue ways. Moreover, unlike the merelycontinent person, she does not have to overcome contrary inclinationsfor things she knows she should not choose, that is, she does not haveinclinations for things that reason tells her she should not value, for herfeelings and appetites reliably track her correct judgments of value.29 Inother words, even if the virtuous person at times recognizes the attractionin competing options, those are options that practical reason recommends,whereas the attractions the continent person is tempted to pursue arequite different ones, namely, considerations that practical reason fails toendorse. If this is right, then virtue is still distinct from mere continence,even on the commonsense view that virtue can have a cost and a mark ofthe wise person is that she recognizes it.30

Department of PhilosophyWashington University in St. Louis

NOTES

1 See McDowell, J. (1978), “Are Moral Requirements Hypothetical Imperatives?,”Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society Supplemental Volume 52, pp. 26–29; (1980) McDowell,1980, in A. O. Rorty (ed.) Essays on Aristotle’s Ethics, Berkeley: University of California

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Press, pp. 369–371; and (1979) “Virtue and Reason,” The Monist 62, pp. 334–335 and 345.Also relevant is (1996) “Incontinence and Practical Wisdom in Aristotle,” in S. Lovibondand S. Williams (eds) Essays for David Wiggins: Identity, Truth, and Value, Oxford: Blackwell,pp. 95–112.

2 McDowell, 1978, p. 26.3 Ibid.4 See, especially, McDowell, 1978, pp. 26, 27, 28; McDowell, 1980, p. 370; and McDowell,

1979, p. 335.5 For a related discussion, in which he draws the distinction differently, see Seidman, J.

(2005) “Two Sides of ‘Silencing,’ ” The Philosophical Quarterly 55 (218), pp. 68–77. Seidmanthinks that McDowell’s silencing thesis can be explained in two ways: a virtuous agent (a)will not be tempted to act otherwise than virtuously (‘motivational silencing’) or (b) willnot believe that he has any reason to act otherwise than virtuously (‘rational silencing’).Seidman’s labels are somewhat misleading, though. Given that McDowell understands therequirements of virtue as requirements of reason, the silencing thesis (however we interpretit) will necessarily be a thesis about rational silencing. Further, Seidman’s way of drawingthe distinction fails to capture one important element of McDowell’s proposal, where theclaim is not merely that the virtuous person is not tempted by competing reasons, or doesnot believe that she has reason to act otherwise than virtuously, but that in fact there areno genuine reasons in competition with the requirements of virtue (irrespective of how thevirtuous person feels or reasons about her options).

6 In the three earlier papers, “Are Moral Requirements Hypothetical Imperatives?,”“The Role of Eudaimonia in Aristotle’s Ethics,” and “Virtue and Reason,” McDowellseems to understand the silencing thesis foremost as a thesis about an agent’s (objective)reasons for action. Yet, in the later “Incontinence and Practical Wisdom in Aristotle,” inwhich he does not explicitly invoke the silencing metaphor but clearly has it in mind, hislanguage suggests an epistemological or motivational thesis about how the virtuous agentshould think or feel about her options. For example, there, he emphasizes the notion thatthe practically wise person possesses a “singleness of motivational focus,” insofar as theattraction of competing options is insulated from generating a desire to pursue them(because they are silenced). See McDowell, 1996, p. 103.

7 McDowell, 1980, p. 369. McDowell holds that competing courses of action could notultimately satisfy the virtuous person, but denies that this is a result of the fact that thevirtuous person judges such options to be on balance less desirable. On the contrary,McDowell maintains, the virtuous person is incapable of taking satisfaction in competingoptions because, for him, “the attractions of the competing course count for nothing”(McDowell, 1978, p. 27).

8 McDowell, 1980, p. 370.9 McDowell, 1978, p. 27.10 It is hard to see how the silencing view allows that virtue at times requires genuine sacrifice

in the ordinary sense of the word, since it denies that the virtuous person experiencesmissed opportunities as losses, or that she can be harmed.

11 See McDowell, 1979, pp. 334–35.12 Ibid., p. 335.13 McDowell, 1978, p. 27.14 McDowell, 1978, p. 28.15 In “Are Moral Requirements Hypothetical Imperatives?,” “The Role of Eudaimonia in

Aristotle’s Ethics,” “Virtue and Reason,” and (1998) “Some Issues in Aristotle’s MoralPsychology” in Stephen Everson (ed.) Ethics: Companion to Ancient Thought 4: Ethics,Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 107–128, McDowell denies that the virtuous



person’s conception of her circumstances can be fully shared by someone who sees no reasonto act as the virtuous person does. That denial is itself intimately connected with McDowell’slarger project of defending a cognitivist view of moral motivation, according to whichcognitive states – moral beliefs – can be motivational. On McDowell’s rationalist view ofmotivation, in the case of moral (and prudential) motivation, ascription of a proximate pro-attitude is “merely consequential” on viewing the action as intentional. Or at least this istrue of the virtuous person. Since McDowell maintains that an unclouded perception of therequirements of virtue is sufficient on its own to constitute a reason for action, he rejects the ideathat any appetitive state is necessary to motivate the virtuous person to act. He consequentlyunderstands failure to see a reason to act as the virtuous person acts as stemming not froma lack of desire to act as virtue requires (on which the rational influence of moral requirementswould be conditional), but from “the lack of a distinctive way of seeing situations” (McDowell,1978, p. 23). Yet, in his further analysis of the particular perceptual failing of the continentand incontinent person, McDowell claims that, in both cases, having contrary desires disturbsthe agent’s perception of the requirements of virtue, thereby conceding that failure to actvirtuously is best understood as involving some form of appetitive and cognitive defect. Ashe explains: “This is to allow that someone who fails to act virtuously may, in a way, perceivewhat a virtuous person would do, so that his failure to do the right thing is not inadvertent;but to insist that his failure occurs only because his appreciation of what he perceives isclouded, or unfocused, by the impact of a desire to do otherwise” (McDowell, 1979, p. 334).

16 McDowell, 1978, p. 28.17 Aristotle (1999) Nicomachean Ethics, trans. T. Irwin, 2nd edn. Indianapolis: Hackett.

All references to Aristotle are to the second edition of Irwin’s translation. Irwin, of course,uses the standard OCT Bywater [1890] text for his translation. Although the Hackett editionis as faithful to the original Bekker pagination as possible, the line numbers are sometimesnot exactly the same. The line numbers in my citations sometimes show a touch of thisinexactness, but this will not impede the reader seeking the cited texts.

Aristotle introduces the distinction between virtue and continence in this general way inNicomachean Ethics Book 1, where he explains the various relations that can obtainbetween the rational and non-rational parts of the soul. When Aristotle returns to thetopic of incontinence in Book 7, however, he states that “continence and incontinence areabout bodily appetites and pleasures” (EN 1149b25–8) and appears to contrast continencewith the virtue of temperance in particular. I follow McDowell and other contemporaryinterpreters and ethical theorists in reading Aristotle’s distinction between virtue andcontinence as one of broad scope, that is, as one identifying two different states or conditionsof character. For a helpful discussion of some potential implications of construing thedistinction more narrowly, as a contrast between temperance and continence with respectto bodily appetites, see Stohr, K. E. (2003) “Moral Cacophony: When Continence is a Virtue,”The Journal of Ethics 7, pp. 339–363.

18 This also seems to be Socrates’ view in the Apology, where he claims that no harm cancome to the good (agathos) person.

19 David Brink raises this point in his unpublished lecture notes on Aristotle. See EN1100b1–15 for one illuminating discussion of the controlling role of virtue within eudaimonia.It is important to note that, even though the continent person also recognizes that virtue isthe controlling ingredient in eudaimonia and is committed to acting as she judges best, shenonetheless is seriously tempted to act otherwise than virtuously. For more on how to drawthe distinction between virtue and continence without the silencing thesis, see section IV.

20 I thank David Brink for helpful correspondence, in which he raised a number of theseand other points about how Aristotle’s views about temperance might be squared with theview that virtue can have a cost.

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21 Along with a small group of others, including her husband, Miep Gies aided OttoFrank and his family during their twenty-five months of hiding. (On July 6, 1942, Otto andEdith Frank and their two daughters moved into the Secret Annex, where they remaineduntil they were discovered and deported on August 4, 1944.) I conjecture about Gies’psychological state for the sake of argument, in a way that goes beyond what Gies herselfreports in her extraordinary memoir, (1998) Anne Frank Remembered: The Story of theWoman Who Helped to Hide the Frank Family, New York: Simon & Schuster. Gies insiststhat she was not a hero, only an ordinary person during extraordinarily terrible times, andthat there was nothing special about her – she was simply willing to do what was asked ofher and what seemed necessary at the time. More than twenty thousand Dutch peoplehelped to hide Jews and others in need of protection during World War II.

22 Indeed, although McDowell himself never explicitly says so, I indicated in section IIthat we should conceive of the silencing thesis as a proposal for how to think about therequirements of virtue and the relation between moral and nonmoral value.

23 This point has been overlooked in other critical discussions of McDowell’s view,including Seidman, 2005 and Stohr, 2003. There is some evidence to think that McDowellultimately has in mind cases where virtue is set against explicitly nonmoral considerations orreasons. For instance, at the end of “Are Moral Requirements Hypothetical Imperatives?,”McDowell adds a “caveat” to his view, explaining that his position is not that the clearperception of any moral reason silences other reasons of any sort, but that the reasonsthat silence are those marking out an action as required by virtue. He concludes this briefcaveat by remarking, “There can be less exigent moral reasons, and as far as this positiongoes, they may be overridden” (p. 29). We should then agree that, if the silencing viewneed not apply in cases of moral/moral conflict, it can satisfactorily meet this first mainobjection.

24 See McDowell, 1996, p. 108.25 Robert Burton suggests a similar point about the range of cases for which McDowell’s

thesis seems appropriate in (1987) “Neonintuitionism: The Neglected Moral Realism” TheSouthern Journal of Philosophy XXV, p. 150.

26 Clearly, a full defense of the overriding view would require further positive argument,including a fleshed-out view about the nature of reasons. The present paper is thus limitedin its aim, raising doubts about the plausibility of the silencing view as a general thesis aboutvirtue and indicating that the overriding view is not obviously saddled with the problemsMcDowell assumes it is.

27 I thank Sean McAleer for raising this example (which he himself appealed to in theservice of defending the silencing view) in his helpful commentary on an earlier version ofthis paper.

28 The point I mean to emphasize here parallels one main line of emphasis in SusanWolf ’s influential (1982) “Moral Saints,” The Journal of Philosophy 79, pp. 419–439.There, Wolf argues that a form of moral perfection captured by the notion of moralsaintliness fails to represent a model of personal well being toward which it would berational or good or desirable to strive. So, too, I suggest, the silencing view fails to rep-resent a model of good character toward which it would be rational or good or desirableto strive.

29 I borrow this term from Karen Stohr. For a nice discussion of this notion of correctjudgments of value, which she invokes in her own discussion about the virtue-continencedistinction, see Stohr, 2003, pp. 361–363. I differ from Stohr in maintaining that thedistinction as it is generally understood is worth maintaining, whereas Stohr argues,interestingly, that there are cases where the virtuous person should actually be conflictedabout acting virtuously and that continence is therefore sometimes a virtue.



30 Many people provided helpful conversation and written comments on various versionsof this paper, and I owe a debt of gratitude to them all. Members of The North CarolinaResearch Triangle Ethics Circle, especially Tom Hill, Jr., Geoff Sayre-McCord, Susan Wolf,and David Wong, patiently supported my nascent thinking on this topic. Audience membersin the Philosophy Departments of The University of British Columbia, The University ofGeorgia, and The University of Virginia gave me important criticism along the way. I benefitedenormously from Sean McAleer’s incisive comments in his capacity as commentator ata session of the 2006 Pacific Division Meetings of the American Philosophical Association,as well as Christine Swanton’s lively discussion on that occasion. For other written comments,I thank Emily Austen, Eric Brown, Jill Delston, Frances Ferguson, Bill FitzPatrick, MarilynFriedman, Zach Hoskins, Ken Rogerson, Rachel Singpurwalla, and Iain Thomson.Finally, my warmest thanks go to David Brink for initially suggesting this topic and for hisinsightful conversations about the silencing thesis over the last several years.

The Price of Virtue

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