Téchnē and Phronesis

• The pursuit of téchnē is valuable if it contributes to achieving eudaimonia, which the Greeks define as living well.

Téchnē and Phronesis

• The passage distinguishes between those who practice téchnē and the phronimos, clarifying the relationship between the good life and those who practice téchnē.
• A practically wise man deliberates about what leads to the good life in general, contrasting with téchnē, which focuses on specific skills.
• Phronetic deliberation concentrates on a particular good end, differentiating it from the specific good ends of téchnē.
• Both physicians and phronimos can engage in deliberation regarding a specific situational good.
• The deliberative context for téchnē and phronesis focuses on particular situations but a difference arises between virtuous actions and products.
• Téchnē employs instrumental deliberation for productive ends beyond the actions undertaken, while phronetic deliberation concerns virtuous actions as ends.
• The aim of the phronimos points to activities leading to eudaimonia, or "the good life in general".
• While both téchnē and phronesis ask, "what constitutes x in situation y?", only phronetic deliberation leads to eudaimonia.

Phronetic Deliberation

• The telos of phronetic deliberation entails excellence of deliberation as correctness of thinking.
• Aristotle distinguishes between unqualified deliberative excellence and deliberative excellence with reference to a particular end.
• Unqualified excellence succeeds with reference to an unqualified object, distinguishing it from lesser versions and virtuous activity.
• A deliberating man aims in accordance with calculation at the best for man of things attainable by action.
• Practical wisdom must recognize particulars, as practice is concerned with particulars.
• Putting the passages together, both the universal and the particular poles are clarified.
• The universal is that which succeeds with reference to the unqualified end, "the best for man of things attainable by action,"
• Elsewhere, Aristotle identifies above as eudaimonia.
• Practical wisdom is action-oriented, involving "recognizing particulars" and deliberating about particular actions while aiming at the good life in general.
• The aim of practical wisdom is deploying under the aim at the whole of eudaimonia, even while confined to the particular practical context.

Phronetic vs. Téchnē Deliberation

• Phronetic deliberation is distinguished from téchnē deliberation by two things, its tele (virtuous actions) and the aim of its agent, who aims at eudaimonia.
• Téchnē and phronetic deliberation operate in particular situations, but the physician aims at health while the phronimos aims at living well writ large.
• Practical wisdom shows the gap between the proposed end and action.
• The end is "the best" for man, or eudaimonia, thus what is the content of deliberation in accordance with so unfocalized an end?
• As correctness of thinking, deliberation needs a determinate object.

Challenges in Defining Deliberation

• Aristotle's examples are usually cases of technical deliberation or at best, partial deliberation.
• We are never given a clear example of what it means to deliberate well with a view to "the best" or "living well" as a whole.
• The doctor might ask himself specification questions ("what constitutes health in this situation?"), and since he is working with a growing, but determinate body of knowledge, expertise, or skill set, he knows more.
• Although the physician and the phronimos both employ specification-type deliberation, matters of health do have some disciplinary fixity which matters of ethical conduct do not.
• Matters concerned with conduct and questions of what is good for us have no fixity, unlike matters of health.
• The phronimos aims at "living well" as a whole, and has to have some conception of eudaimonia.
• A conception of "living well" in general is informed by rightly habituated character and practical wisdom with its deliberative activity.
• The virtuous agent comes to any deliberative situation with a larger desiderative concern and some concept of eudaimonia.
• In the absence of a fixed blueprint, ethical rule, or technical body of knowledge as a referent, all of the weight of specifying the end or practical aim is placed on the shoulders of the deliberative process with a view or "aim" toward living well.
• The phronimos does not deliberate about her end in the sense asking whether or not to pursue eudaimonia.

Practical Liberality

• The rightly habituated person has a settled state of character that disposes her to care about the activity of expressing her largesse, to enjoy it, and to have a concern for largesse-expression itself as a constituent part of her overall view of what living well means
• Hence, when confronted with a situation in which deliberation and action are required, she does not start with an explicit major premise, rather she starts with inquiry into the minor premise, "what should I do in this situation?"
• All of her concerns, interests, emotional responses, deliberative thoughts, and intuitive judgments transpire, while her larger view of eudaimonia simply supervenes on the situation, but only those portions which are relevant in the context of the deliberation
• Now, we want an account in which liberality is involved, so let us suppose our phronimos is confronted with the following situation.
• In both cases, the phronimos draws on knowledge of some sort, but it is rooted in the particulars of the situation.
• She is not working from an utilitarian (or any other) principle of the greatest good for the greatest number, rather, she aims at "living well" under the particular situational aspect of largesse expression.
• In this case, it is feasible for her to give to either, but one deliberative option causes the emotion of disgust and conflicts with her general conception of eudaimonia, while the other causes delight and aligns with both liberality in the particular case and her general conception of eudaimonia.