Iron Man and Philosophy

Just finished the "Iron Man and Philosophy" book- I was going to reread the bit about the chinese door problem... or whatever it's called, about the man in the closed room that is fed chinese characters and then must use chinese characters to communicate with the outside world to escape, all without speaking a lick of chinese. I liked that bit.

And there was the talk about unified virtues, that possessing one virtue to perfection would necessarily lead to possession of all the virtues. Specifically, they were wondering if Iron Man could be considered a virtuous person despite his serious moral failings.

They went with him being a relatively virtuous person, certainly better than a Doctor Doom, that we could look up to this person in that at least he wishes to improve himself and works towards a fulfillment of being a virtuous person. <- that's key right there, that good faith attempt at self improvement.

I actually was VERY interested in this topic, it's something I think about a lot. Does someone have to be good all the time to be good? Can a bad person do good things?

If we take the virtues as practical knowledge (which was the Platonic position, if I read this right), and that a full possession of one virtue necessitated full practical knowledge of that virtue and the extenuating facts surrounding that virtue, in the end meaning a full understanding of the one virtue meant the full understanding of all the virtues THEN:

If someone possesses ONE virtue, but then doesn't possess the others, is this a case of willful ignorance for the sake of vice? Is this person choosing to be bad, and therefore is totally reprehensible?

What the essay reminded me of was that I shouldn't assume full realization of the one virtue is even possible. More likely is the situation where they have say, 90% of the full realization of a single virtue, and it's that 10% that prevents, possibly, ANY understanding of the other virtues. From that perspective it's hardly their fault if they don't possess all the virtues- it's an impossible ideal.

In that case, while it can be the case that someone is willfully ignorant for the sake of their own vices, they aren't necessarily so, and without a clearer understanding of their character on my part I should really be more open to giving the benefit of the doubt.

The other wrinkle was the forwarding of the theory by Aristotle of a natural inclination towards particular virtues, an instincive knowledge versus aquired knowledge. He supposed that someone needs this natural inclination towards the virtues PLUS the aquiring of that practical knowledge, to achieve the full realization of the virtues.

Again, in relation to the book, they suggested Iron Man had a natural inclination towards couragousness and... something else, I forget, but suffers from the vices of narcissism, alccohol abuse, and womanizing (yeah, yeah, those would probably fit under a particular vice category and I needn't list the specific names, whatever.).

What there was no mention of was the concept of a natural inclination towards vice. In the terms of virtue as knowledge then I suppose a natural inclination towards vice would translate as some kind of inability to learn particular knowledge. But phrased like that, vice would be another possiblity of an unformed person. People born either good or bad. Not sure how I feel about that idea. But regardless, at least with that framework people could be born bad but become good with the application of knowledge, people would be able to change for the better, and short of a memory erasure device or something, wouldn't get worse. I've heard worse ideas.

I like these books every now and again; they give me a little insight into my lovely friend from London(Ontario)'s world. Ah, ha ha, yes, even though she said she hates these books! Well, what can I say? I learn best when concepts are presented in terms of super heroes!