Array
(
    [fullTitle] => Temperance and the Second-Person Perspective
    [abstract] => 
The virtue of temperance with respect to food and drink is often assumed to be relatively straightforward, a matter of steering a mean between excess and deficiency. Given also that humans share the need to eat and drink with non-human animals, this topic might therefore seem promising to explore for possible connections between evolutionary research on morality and theological ethics. In this paper, however, I argue that many aspects of temperance go far beyond the Aristotelian account and can be understood principally as reflecting the fact that human beings are embodied relational persons. This second-person account can indeed be connected to theological ethics, but it is also one that draws principally from the discontinuities of human and non-human behaviour.

    [authors] => Array
        (
            [0] => Array
                (
                    [givenName] => Andrew
                    [affiliation] => Ian Ramsey Center for Science and Religion, University of Oxford
                )

        )

    [keywords] => Array
        (
            [0] => Temperance
            [1] => Second person
            [2] => Relational virtues
        )

    [doi] => 10.24204/ejpr.v12i3.3408
    [datePublished] => 2020-09-24
    [pdf] => https://www.philosophy-of-religion.eu/menuscript/index.php/ejpr/article/view/3408/version/769/2717
)
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Temperance and the Second-Person Perspective

Andrew
Ian Ramsey Center for Science and Religion, University of Oxford

DOI: https://doi.org/10.24204/ejpr.v12i3.3408

Abstract

The virtue of temperance with respect to food and drink is often assumed to be relatively straightforward, a matter of steering a mean between excess and deficiency. Given also that humans share the need to eat and drink with non-human animals, this topic might therefore seem promising to explore for possible connections between evolutionary research on morality and theological ethics. In this paper, however, I argue that many aspects of temperance go far beyond the Aristotelian account and can be understood principally as reflecting the fact that human beings are embodied relational persons. This second-person account can indeed be connected to theological ethics, but it is also one that draws principally from the discontinuities of human and non-human behaviour.

Keywords: Temperance

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