The Life of Contemplation

In his Apology, Plato famously quoted Socrates, saying, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” I first heard this quote on my first day of college, and it has been an integral tenet of my education. All of my professors have challenged me to examine my life, the lives of those who came before me, and the implications of history and current events on the lives of those who will come long after I am gone. Emphasis both in class and in the world around me on issues of things like race, class, gender, religion, freedom, expression, right action, and countless others have forced me to face some challenging questions.

Clearly, there are inequalities and injustices in the world. All of these problems seem so big and complex, and they make me feel hopeless sometimes because there do not seem to be any real solutions. I am always thinking along several trains of thought at any given time. It’s pretty loud inside my brain. If you’re a contemplative insomniac with OCD like myself, you can imagine how allowing issues like these to become salient in your life and in your subconscious could create some problems. As annoying as it may be to spend hours contemplating things like the wage gap and child abuse when I would rather be sleeping, I have to realize that the fact that these injustices upset me so much is probably a good thing because it points to the strength of the morals that make me human and compassionate. This is not to say that people who get their eight hours in every night are not moral, compassionate people, of course, but it is to say that this phenomenon is an expression of virtue.

Aristotle says that the life of contemplation is the highest of the intellectual virtues. I can confidently call myself a contemplative person (even though Aristotle wouldn’t say so because I’m a woman, but that’s for a different blog). However, I am a bit perplexed as to how this contemplation in itself constitutes virtue because virtuous activity is supposed to bring pleasure to the virtuous person. I’m not perfect, but I would generally consider myself virtuous, and yet I do not feel pleasure upon contemplation of gentrification or human trafficking. I believe this is where Aristotle and I differ most widely. I don’t think intellectual virtue is enough. Contemplating things like God and literature is fine and should be pleasurable, but I believe we were gifted with reason and a moral conscience in order to understand problems and find ways to help. We shouldn’t feel pleasure in simply being contemplative when it comes to issues like restriction of civil liberties and the drug trade. Intellectual virtue is not enough in this situation. These sorts of contemplation should cause the virtuous person pain and inspire her or him to take action in order to prevent further injustice.

Altruism

One thing we talked about in our discussions on friendship was the question of altruism. Zach said that complete friendships seem inherently self-interested; if reciprocity is a key element of the complete friendship, along with well-wishing, then wouldn’t the friends only be wishing one another well only to be wished well in return due to reciprocity?

I thought this was a very interesting reading of Aristotle, and also a very bleak one. As a philosopher, I’d like to believe that altruism exists. I really do believe that people can do things just because they are good things to do. As to how often this actually happens, I am not as optimistic, but that’s a different blog post. I think the fact that we feel good when we do good things is definitely a perk, but if a person is truly acting in accordance with virtue, these warm fuzzy feelings are not the motivation behind the action.

Reciprocity is indeed a necessary condition of the complete friendship, but it is not a sufficient condition. We should expect our friends to wish us well just as we wish them well if we are entering a friendship of virtue. If this mutual well-wishing were not present, the relationship would not be virtuous. However, affection, intimacy, cooperation, and pursuit of similar activities are necessary to form the complete friendship as well as goodwill. There is an element of activity present in the complete friendship that is not found in the other types, and this activity is the active pursuit of virtue with another person. Virtue is a good in itself – we are supposed to practice virtue in order to become virtuous people, and we are supposed to become virtuous people in order to achieve the highest form of happiness. I don’t think it’s possible to achieve the happiness that comes from activity of the soul in accordance with virtue by acting on the motivation of personal gain rather than acting altruistically. In fact, I would argue that altruism is a virtue itself.