Eudaimonia
Eudaimonia is a sense of well being resulting from achieving excellence in the fulfillment of one’s functions. It is sometimes translated to mean "happiness." This essay will present Aristotle’s theories on happiness including eudaimonia, the “good life,” actualizing the soul, and the purpose of reason and virtue in human life.
Aristotle classifies all living things according to their potential. The nutritive class eats, grows, and reproduces (plants), the sensitive class also has sensory experience (animals), and the rational class, which humans are apart of, are superior because of they also have the ability to reason. So if that is the function of a person then the criteria of what makes a good person or a good life is whether or not that person is reasoning. The “good life” to Aristotle is a process of reasoning where intellectual, physical, and social needs are met through figuring out the best choices moment-to-moment and living in moderation.
Plato, in The Republic discusses the idea that all people enter this world with a calling in a theory called “The Myth of Er.” He argues that each soul is given a unique purpose before birth and it is this soul-companion that remembers what is in our image, guides us, and is the carrier of our destiny. He called this our daimon, the Romans named it your genius, and in Egypt it was the ka or the ba. Aristotle discussed it as our entelechy, meaning having an end within itself. It is an inner order that governs all natural processes, and drives everything to blossom according to its nature.
While we are becoming, we are still in a potential stage and are unstable. We are like an acorn growing. When we reach our full potential (which some of us will never do) we are stable and are in a state of being. Then we have reached the full actuality of human life and are no longer an acorn, but are the tree we were always destined to become. The top of Maslow’s “Hierarchy of Needs” labels this Self-Actualization. This is also what is meant by eudaimonia. English translates that word as “happiness” but to Aristotle it meant something much deeper: being fully alive, fully alert, fully oneself, and this is being fully human.
Plotinus expanded Plato’s “Myth of Er” by saying that not only are we given a purpose before we are born, but also that we elected the body, parents, place, and circumstances of life. These things were all our own choice, but we forget them upon birth. This forces us to recognize everything in our lives as part of our image and a mold that we created for ourselves.
If we accept having a purpose as a fact of human existence, and all outside circumstances as being in order with a bigger picture, then achieving eudaimonia through reason is perfectly simple. All that is left for us to do is to bring our behaviors in alignment with that purpose.
Behaviors or habits are what Aristotle believed makes up our character. He discussed arête or virtue as excellence of function, or something that expresses the essence of its kind. For example, it is a knife’s function to cut so a virtuous knife is a knife that cuts well. It is the function of humans to reason, so the virtues of humans are based upon our ability to figure things out and act in the most reasonable way.
In every situation there are three options: the rational decision, vice of deficiency, or vice of excess. The ancient Greeks believed that sophyrosyne, or wisdom of moderation, was the most rational. Dr Charles Ess, on his “Atistotle’s Virtue Ethics” webpage quotes Aristotle as saying:
“To experience these emotions (fear, courage, desire, anger, pity and pleasure) at the right times and on the right occasions and toward the right persons and for the right causes and in the right manner is the mean or the supreme good, which is characteristic of virtue.” (35 in Arthur)
So basically, anything is “good” in the right time and the right place, of course in moderation. Human ability to reason is what determines what is appropriate when. For example for the virtue of courage, cowardice would be a deficiency and foolhardiness a vice. Or if realism were the virtue, than pessimism would be the deficiency and optimism the excess. Courage and realism are the “Golden Means,” the midpoint between the two vices. Having our choices, reactions, and emotions in alignment with the Golden Mean is being rational. Making rational choices over and over makes us a rational person, and if being rational is the function of being human than that makes us a good example of a human.
Heraclitus is quoted as saying “Ethos Anthropoi Daimon” which can be translated as “Character is Fate.” Our actions make up our character, and our character decides who we will become. Benjamin Franklin recognized this idea and he choose 13 desirable virtues to base his daily choices and goals around. For each he recognizes the value of moderation, not elimination, excess, or avoidance. He summarized these in The Autobiography:
1. Temperance- Eat not to dullness, drink not to elevation.
2. Silence- Speak not but what may benefit others; avoid trifling conversation.
3. Order- Let all your things have their places; and each part have its time.
4. Resolution- Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.
5. Frugality- Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; waste nothing.
6. Industry- Lose no time; be always employed in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.
7. Sincerity- Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and if you speak, speak accordingly.
8. Justice- Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.
9. Moderation- Avoid extremes; forebear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.
10. Cleanliness- Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, clothes, or habitation.
11. Tranquility- Be not disturbed at trifles or at accidents common or unavoidable.
12. Chastity
13. Humility- Imitate Jesus and Socrates.
He worked specifically on one virtue each week, continuing what he had learned from previous weeks. This is one example of someone making consistent conscious choices to create the character he desired, rather than reacting to life and accepting what character develops. Aristotle taught that it is up to us to create our character.
In short, a human’s function is to reason. We are living a good life when we are making rational choices about our virtues. Our choices make up our character and who we are. Our ultimate goal is to actualize our souls and to experience eudaimonia. Eudaimonia is living in alignment with our daimon, with our purpose.
