Topic 1. The Function Argument
The Nicomachean Ethics opens with the claim that "every craft and every
discipline, and likewise action and decision, seems to seek some good"
(I.1). Ends form a hierarchical structure: subordinate ends (flute-playing)
serve higher ends (musical performance), which culminate in the
architectonic art of political science, which "embraces the ends of all the
others" (I.2). The formal end of political science is in turn eudaimonia, the
human good. Aristotle suggests that that there is such an end is
uncontroversial; the true issue is identifying what it is.
His Function Argument in Book I, Chapter 7 seeks to do so by appealing to
the distinctive function (ergon) of human beings. It can be simplified as
followed:
P1: There exists a human function.
P2: The human function is activity of the rational part of the soul. (the
Substance claim)
P3: Performing your function well is performing it in accordance with the
virtue proper to it (the Virtue claim)
P4: The good of a thing is to perform its function well (the Inference
claim).
C1: The human good is rational activity in accord with virtue (over a whole
life)
Aristotle’s argument for existence
Aristotle's case for the existence of a human function in I.7.11 is famously
compressed and reads more as rhetorical persuasion than as formal
argument. He observes that (a) carpenters and leatherworkers have
functions, and (b) eyes, hands and feet have functions, so why not
humans? He then c) poses the rhetorical question of whether man can
really be, "by nature, argon" (a derogatory term in the Greek associated
with laziness and being unemployed). Read at face value this is no
argument at all: there is no logical inconsistency in granting that
craftsmen and body parts have functions while denying that man as a
whole does. Charitable reconstructions exist but Aristotle’s subsequent
appeal to our intuitive aversion to the idea of humans as purposeless –
with his argon question – perhaps shows that even he failed to recognise a
conclusive philosophical case for the existence of a human function.
Nevertheless, for present purposes, P1 carries less weight than it appears:
the formal criteria of completeness and self-sufficiency established in I.4–6
already presuppose some substantive end at which human life aims, so
,the Function Argument is best read not as establishing the existence of
such an end from scratch but as specifying its content.
Aristotle’s argument for substance
Aristotle appears to offer a disjunctive argument for the substance of the
human function as, in I.7.12 he explains that “what we are looking for is
the special (idion) function of a human being.” Because of this, he
immediately dismisses the life of nutrition and growth, and the life of
sense perception and locomotion, as we share these lives with plants and
animals. Aristotle conceives of a thing's essence as being its soul and
recall that he views the human soul as consisting of three parts: a
nutritive part, a locomotive part, and a rational part. Therefore, by
elimination, he concludes that the “human function is activity of the soul
in accord with reason” as this is the part which is unique to humanity.
This disjunctive interpretation is unsuccessful because “looking for the
special function of a human being” in terms of distinctness is highly
problematic. Firstly, the human function turns out to be highly contingent
on what other beings are capable of. Suppose that dolphins or aliens, like
humans, have rational souls. If this were the case, activity of the rational
part of the soul would not be uniquely human, and hence could not be the
human function. This argument’s conclusion seems to be contingent on a
fact that we have little reason to think is true, namely that no other being
reasons.
Worse, Aristotle is himself committed to the fact that other being’s reason
since his gods engage in contemplation. In fact, because they
contemplate continuously and without tiring, they do so better than
humans can. Thus, if Aristotle's argument is that the human function is
the activity unique to humans, he should have eliminated contemplation
as a candidate. This would leave the activity of practical reason as the
only uniquely human activity left. However, this cannot be the correct
interpretation because Aristotle, in book X.6-9, explicitly states that
contemplation features as at least a constituent, if not completely, in
eudaimonia. Thus, if Aristotle's argument for Substance is in fact
disjunctive, it undermines the conception of eudaimonia that Aristotle
appears to eventually defend.
The response is to deny that idion means unique at all. The Greek admits
of two senses of the term – unique but also essential/proper to the kind –
and Aristotle must be understood as using the word in the latter sense in
the function argument. When Aristotle isolates rational activity, he is
identifying not what humans alone do but what is essential to what
humans are. This reading is squarely supported by Aristotle's surrounding
,metaphysical commitments: for Aristotle, a thing's essence (ousia) just is
its soul, and the function of any soul-part is the activity that defines that
part. Hence, the function of an organism is what it does qua that kind,
regardless of whether other kinds happen to do something similar. The
function of a horse, for Aristotle (unlike for Plato), is not to serve human
ends but to lead a flourishing equine existence - and it is not undermined
by the existence of zebras with overlapping capacities, because what
matters is not what is unique to horses but what is essential to being one.
Our function is what is distinctive or proper to us in the sense that it best
realizes our nature: we do it best and most characteristically of the things
we do.
The reason Aristotle references plants and animals is because rational
action is our distinctive way of being alive, and this becomes most
apparent when contrasted with the lives of other living things.
Virtue
Our good requires us to perform the function of a human being. But simply
performing the function will not ensure our good: many people live human
lives, performing human functions to some extent, and yet are still badly
off in their lives. "Performing one's function" therefore cannot be a
sufficient account of a person's good - what is needed is performing it
well. This is the completion principle: for any kind F whose function is
some activity X, the good F is one that performs X well, and the virtue of F
just is the state that disposes F to perform X well.
Inference
Suppose now, for the sake of argument, that there is a human function
and this human function consists in rational activity, and suppose we also
accept Aristotle’s claim in I.7.14 that performing your function well means
performing it in accordance with the virtue proper to that function. Thus,
rational activity of the soul in accordance with virtue makes for a good
human. Unfortunately, it simply does not follow from these premisses that
rational activity of the soul in accordance with virtue is actually good for
humans. To reach this conclusion Aristotle relies on an implicit fourth
premiss: that the good for something consists in its excellently serving its
function.
As such, many charge that Aristotle moves from purely descriptive and
non-evaluative claims about what the human function is to explicitly
normative conclusions about what is good for men.
This premiss is dubious to say the least. Let us use the example of the
Unemployed Harpist. It is the function of a harpist to play the harp and so,
as Aristotle explicitly states, a good harpist is one that plays the harp well.
, Talents such as perfect pitch that enable excellent harp-playing make for a
good harpist. Nothing from this, however, necessarily seems to follow
about what is good for a harpist. The unemployed harpist may well have
been better off had they been tone deaf, and pursued a more lucrative,
secure career rather than the career of a musician - during a recession
this would certainly be the case. This shows that the fourth premiss is
questionable.
However, rather than uncharitably condemn the function argument to
failure, let us attempt to construct a plausible defence of this controversial
step.
One natural defense, defended by Wilkes, is to deny that P4 is a general
principle at all. On Wilkes's reading, Aristotle is not arguing from a
universal claim (for any X, what is good for X is what makes X a good X)
but is making the local claim that, because the human function is rational
activity, excellently performing the human function is good for humans.
Aristotle writes nothing to suggest he intended the fourth premiss to be
universal; thus perfect pitch does not have to necessarily be good for a
harpist or sharpness somehow good for a kitchen knife.
This still leaves us with the challenge of explaining why the specifically
human function justifies the fourth premiss in this instance. On any
plausible interpretation of Aristotle’s function argument, the human
function is either rational activity (broadly defined, including both
theoretical reason and practical reason) or just the theoretically rational
activity of contemplation. Suppose we take the latter. Aristotle writes in
book X that contemplation is a divine activity accompanied by a divine
sort of happiness, and that contemplation is "complete eudaimonia". A
person who contemplates therefore engages in a complete and divine
activity, which makes this person blessed, and so excellently performing
the human function of contemplation would be good for any human.
Suppose instead that rational activity (in the broader sense) is the human
function. According to Aristotle, practical reason is employed in
deliberations about “things that are good and beneficial for [the person
who reasons, and] about what sort of things promote living well in
general.” So, when someone reasons practically, they are trying to shape
and organise their life in a way that achieves the good for themselves. If
rational activity really is the human function, then someone who performs
it excellently will not only share in the divine good of contemplation, but
also gain the other goods that practical reasoning helps to secure in life.
Excellently performing the human function, whether that is narrow
contemplation or broad rational activity, then, not only makes for a good
human being, but is good for human beings.
The Nicomachean Ethics opens with the claim that "every craft and every
discipline, and likewise action and decision, seems to seek some good"
(I.1). Ends form a hierarchical structure: subordinate ends (flute-playing)
serve higher ends (musical performance), which culminate in the
architectonic art of political science, which "embraces the ends of all the
others" (I.2). The formal end of political science is in turn eudaimonia, the
human good. Aristotle suggests that that there is such an end is
uncontroversial; the true issue is identifying what it is.
His Function Argument in Book I, Chapter 7 seeks to do so by appealing to
the distinctive function (ergon) of human beings. It can be simplified as
followed:
P1: There exists a human function.
P2: The human function is activity of the rational part of the soul. (the
Substance claim)
P3: Performing your function well is performing it in accordance with the
virtue proper to it (the Virtue claim)
P4: The good of a thing is to perform its function well (the Inference
claim).
C1: The human good is rational activity in accord with virtue (over a whole
life)
Aristotle’s argument for existence
Aristotle's case for the existence of a human function in I.7.11 is famously
compressed and reads more as rhetorical persuasion than as formal
argument. He observes that (a) carpenters and leatherworkers have
functions, and (b) eyes, hands and feet have functions, so why not
humans? He then c) poses the rhetorical question of whether man can
really be, "by nature, argon" (a derogatory term in the Greek associated
with laziness and being unemployed). Read at face value this is no
argument at all: there is no logical inconsistency in granting that
craftsmen and body parts have functions while denying that man as a
whole does. Charitable reconstructions exist but Aristotle’s subsequent
appeal to our intuitive aversion to the idea of humans as purposeless –
with his argon question – perhaps shows that even he failed to recognise a
conclusive philosophical case for the existence of a human function.
Nevertheless, for present purposes, P1 carries less weight than it appears:
the formal criteria of completeness and self-sufficiency established in I.4–6
already presuppose some substantive end at which human life aims, so
,the Function Argument is best read not as establishing the existence of
such an end from scratch but as specifying its content.
Aristotle’s argument for substance
Aristotle appears to offer a disjunctive argument for the substance of the
human function as, in I.7.12 he explains that “what we are looking for is
the special (idion) function of a human being.” Because of this, he
immediately dismisses the life of nutrition and growth, and the life of
sense perception and locomotion, as we share these lives with plants and
animals. Aristotle conceives of a thing's essence as being its soul and
recall that he views the human soul as consisting of three parts: a
nutritive part, a locomotive part, and a rational part. Therefore, by
elimination, he concludes that the “human function is activity of the soul
in accord with reason” as this is the part which is unique to humanity.
This disjunctive interpretation is unsuccessful because “looking for the
special function of a human being” in terms of distinctness is highly
problematic. Firstly, the human function turns out to be highly contingent
on what other beings are capable of. Suppose that dolphins or aliens, like
humans, have rational souls. If this were the case, activity of the rational
part of the soul would not be uniquely human, and hence could not be the
human function. This argument’s conclusion seems to be contingent on a
fact that we have little reason to think is true, namely that no other being
reasons.
Worse, Aristotle is himself committed to the fact that other being’s reason
since his gods engage in contemplation. In fact, because they
contemplate continuously and without tiring, they do so better than
humans can. Thus, if Aristotle's argument is that the human function is
the activity unique to humans, he should have eliminated contemplation
as a candidate. This would leave the activity of practical reason as the
only uniquely human activity left. However, this cannot be the correct
interpretation because Aristotle, in book X.6-9, explicitly states that
contemplation features as at least a constituent, if not completely, in
eudaimonia. Thus, if Aristotle's argument for Substance is in fact
disjunctive, it undermines the conception of eudaimonia that Aristotle
appears to eventually defend.
The response is to deny that idion means unique at all. The Greek admits
of two senses of the term – unique but also essential/proper to the kind –
and Aristotle must be understood as using the word in the latter sense in
the function argument. When Aristotle isolates rational activity, he is
identifying not what humans alone do but what is essential to what
humans are. This reading is squarely supported by Aristotle's surrounding
,metaphysical commitments: for Aristotle, a thing's essence (ousia) just is
its soul, and the function of any soul-part is the activity that defines that
part. Hence, the function of an organism is what it does qua that kind,
regardless of whether other kinds happen to do something similar. The
function of a horse, for Aristotle (unlike for Plato), is not to serve human
ends but to lead a flourishing equine existence - and it is not undermined
by the existence of zebras with overlapping capacities, because what
matters is not what is unique to horses but what is essential to being one.
Our function is what is distinctive or proper to us in the sense that it best
realizes our nature: we do it best and most characteristically of the things
we do.
The reason Aristotle references plants and animals is because rational
action is our distinctive way of being alive, and this becomes most
apparent when contrasted with the lives of other living things.
Virtue
Our good requires us to perform the function of a human being. But simply
performing the function will not ensure our good: many people live human
lives, performing human functions to some extent, and yet are still badly
off in their lives. "Performing one's function" therefore cannot be a
sufficient account of a person's good - what is needed is performing it
well. This is the completion principle: for any kind F whose function is
some activity X, the good F is one that performs X well, and the virtue of F
just is the state that disposes F to perform X well.
Inference
Suppose now, for the sake of argument, that there is a human function
and this human function consists in rational activity, and suppose we also
accept Aristotle’s claim in I.7.14 that performing your function well means
performing it in accordance with the virtue proper to that function. Thus,
rational activity of the soul in accordance with virtue makes for a good
human. Unfortunately, it simply does not follow from these premisses that
rational activity of the soul in accordance with virtue is actually good for
humans. To reach this conclusion Aristotle relies on an implicit fourth
premiss: that the good for something consists in its excellently serving its
function.
As such, many charge that Aristotle moves from purely descriptive and
non-evaluative claims about what the human function is to explicitly
normative conclusions about what is good for men.
This premiss is dubious to say the least. Let us use the example of the
Unemployed Harpist. It is the function of a harpist to play the harp and so,
as Aristotle explicitly states, a good harpist is one that plays the harp well.
, Talents such as perfect pitch that enable excellent harp-playing make for a
good harpist. Nothing from this, however, necessarily seems to follow
about what is good for a harpist. The unemployed harpist may well have
been better off had they been tone deaf, and pursued a more lucrative,
secure career rather than the career of a musician - during a recession
this would certainly be the case. This shows that the fourth premiss is
questionable.
However, rather than uncharitably condemn the function argument to
failure, let us attempt to construct a plausible defence of this controversial
step.
One natural defense, defended by Wilkes, is to deny that P4 is a general
principle at all. On Wilkes's reading, Aristotle is not arguing from a
universal claim (for any X, what is good for X is what makes X a good X)
but is making the local claim that, because the human function is rational
activity, excellently performing the human function is good for humans.
Aristotle writes nothing to suggest he intended the fourth premiss to be
universal; thus perfect pitch does not have to necessarily be good for a
harpist or sharpness somehow good for a kitchen knife.
This still leaves us with the challenge of explaining why the specifically
human function justifies the fourth premiss in this instance. On any
plausible interpretation of Aristotle’s function argument, the human
function is either rational activity (broadly defined, including both
theoretical reason and practical reason) or just the theoretically rational
activity of contemplation. Suppose we take the latter. Aristotle writes in
book X that contemplation is a divine activity accompanied by a divine
sort of happiness, and that contemplation is "complete eudaimonia". A
person who contemplates therefore engages in a complete and divine
activity, which makes this person blessed, and so excellently performing
the human function of contemplation would be good for any human.
Suppose instead that rational activity (in the broader sense) is the human
function. According to Aristotle, practical reason is employed in
deliberations about “things that are good and beneficial for [the person
who reasons, and] about what sort of things promote living well in
general.” So, when someone reasons practically, they are trying to shape
and organise their life in a way that achieves the good for themselves. If
rational activity really is the human function, then someone who performs
it excellently will not only share in the divine good of contemplation, but
also gain the other goods that practical reasoning helps to secure in life.
Excellently performing the human function, whether that is narrow
contemplation or broad rational activity, then, not only makes for a good
human being, but is good for human beings.
