Example Of Voluntary Action example essay topic

Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and scientist who lived from 384-322 B. C who was born in Stagira, Macedonia. His father played a major role in society as a physician in the royal court. Young Aristotle took a liking to Plato and decided to go to his academy at the age of seventeen. For the next twenty years, Aristotle remained there first as a student then as a teacher.

After the death of Plato, Aristotle moved to Assos in the Asia Minor where he tutored his friend Her mias who was the ruler there and decided to marry his niece. After his death he then tutored Alexander the Great at the capital of Macedonia known as Pella. Later in his life, Aristotle decided to move back to Athens, Greece to open up his own school known as Lyceum. "Upon the death of Alexander in 323 B.C., strong anti-Macedonian feeling developed in Athens, and Aristotle retired to a family estate in Euboea ('Evvoia).

He died there the following year" (Brumbaugh, Robert S. ). Before he had died, the Athenians charged Aristotle, like Socrates, with impiety that means a lack of reverence to the gods. He remembered the fate that Socrates once had where he was condemned to death. "He fled to the city of Chalcis so the Athenians would not, as he said, 'sin twice against philosophy" (Soll, Ivan). Aristotle has written many works in his lifetime and has had many ideas. One of his many ideas was his idea of freedom.

He had many opinions on the way one should live their life. "Aristotle argued that the goal of human beings is happiness and that we achieve happiness when we fulfill our function" (Soll, Ivan). What Aristotle means by this is that you have to figure out what makes you happy in life and do whatever it takes for one to reach that ultimate goal of happiness. In order to do this, we must figure out what our function is. "Thus, according to Aristotle, a happy life for human beings is a life governed by reason" (Soll, Ivan). A book that Aristotle wrote in 350 B.C. was called Nicomachean Ethics Book that deals with his idea of freedom.

The purpose of this book is to express his beliefs of the importance of human actions and how those actions could shape up their lives. What he also does is emphasis the difference between voluntary and involuntary actions. Involuntary actions are those that are presented in ignorance or under pressure. An act is under pressure only when its purpose is not the human being performing it, but an outside power or individual. While somebody acts out of unreasonable emotion such as anger the act is not unintentional, as the sensation comes from his or her individual nature.

An act is acted upon through lack of knowledge known as ignorance when the performer is unaware of the consequences of the specific condition. Performing in the course of unawareness must be separated from performing in ignorance. One may be performing ignorance through drunkenness or moral depravity, which is an act of moral corruption that ends up being extremely worse. Voluntary acts are acts that are the opposite of involuntary acts. A voluntary act involves choice that human beings are only capable of. The choice that one makes is different from rage or desire.

"Such actions, then, are mixed, but are more like voluntary actions; for they are worthy of choice at the time when they are done, and the end of an action is relative to the occasion" (Book ). True choice requires rational consideration, an ability unique to human beings, which also means that the human being choosing can verify that one action is preferable to another. An example of voluntary action is the decision to play a sport for school or not. Playing a sport for school may take time out of your studies, but at the same time, make you become better physically fit and an overall better person by learning things about yourself and about life. That student has to make that decision if he wants to feel better about himself physically or concentrate more on his schoolwork. This rational consideration calls for concern.

An example of this concern is considering a circumstance in which the appropriate action or conclusion may perhaps not be comprehensible. We by no means consider about ends; rather, we think about how to accomplish the best ends. Obviously, we know how to only consider options that are well within our control. Consequently, choice is a well thought-out examination of things that lie in our control.

When choosing, one of good quality character will always attempt and strive for the good. In spite of this, individuals who are not of high-quality personality may recognize things the wrong way, and possibly will only hope for the obvious good. Both good and vice, as a result, lie in individual control, and it is extremely probable for people to voluntarily select vice. This explanation is supported by common laws of reward and punishment -- people are punished for their bad behavior, except in cases of ignorance or involuntary action. There are laws that prohibit such behavior and people are punished for their unacceptable behavior not including cases of involuntary action or ignorance. People are accountable for their moral states like they are accountable for their particular evil actions.

If somebody plunges into an unpleasant moral state, it is his or her own mistake for leading a bad life. Once recognized, a terrible moral state is difficult to cure. This happens because one has habits and increasing virtue relies on developing habits of respectable conduct, bad behavior reinforces their tendency in the direction of bad behavior. With all these facts that I have stated, we have the ability and freedom to make our own choices while living here in the United States.

We do things voluntarily, meaning that we have to freedom to them. We have the freedom to make the choice to do something or not do something. We choose who we are by making the choices that we make. If we make all wrong choices, it is our own fault because we have the freedom to the right thing and the wrong thing, and it all comes down to the decisions that we make for ourselves. Someone will perform voluntary acts when they know it will benefit themselves and / or others around them. People will not want to perform involuntary acts when they know it will cause them harm and pain and have no benefits with it.

No one wants to do things purposely to hurt themselves. A rare case of an example of voluntary and involuntary action is when a college athlete decides to drink on campus one night and gets caught by the authorities and the coach finds out. Although the athlete thought it was the right idea to drink that night to help him feel good, he did not think about the consequences of his actions if he gets caught. Not only will that student-athlete get in trouble, but also the whole team may get into trouble. Even though the student had the option to drink or not, he did not want to get himself or his teammates in trouble at the same time. Aristotle's idea of freedom relates to moral responsibility in a small number of ways.

What one must do to obtain happiness in life is make the right decision when opportunities are thrown their way. The more frequent an individual makes the correct choice the happier that person will be in the long run. If a person does not decide to go to college at the age of eighteen than that decision can still affect them at age sixty-five. The example I used with the student-athlete who got into trouble may have gotten his situation worse if the coach decided to punish the whole team by making them run extra and then his teammates would be disappointed with him.

What people must do is realize that the choices they make in life will not only benefit themselves, but will affect those around him / her. One must be as responsible as they can possibly be in order to obtain total happiness, which is their ultimate goal in life according to Aristotle. I agree with Aristotle in his way of thinking because I feel one must make the right decision in life and be responsible with those decisions that they make. Aristotle learned a lot back in this time period when education was very hard to find and this is why he is considered one of the most famous and respected people in Greek history.

Bibliography

Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics Book. Editorial. Classics of Philosophy. Louis P. Potman. 304. Oxford University Press, Inc. 1998.
198 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016. Brumbaugh, Robert S. "Aristotle,' Microsoft (R) Encarta (R) Online Encyclopedia 2003.
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