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One world view that harmonizes particularly well with self action leadership is Aristotelian philosophy, and more specifically Aristotle’s concept of the Golden Mean. This concept holds that virtue or the good is to be found within a balance between extremes. Aristotle’s famous philosophy posits that right thinking and doing cannot occur in the presence of either deficiency or excess. The implication of course is virtually that all extremes can be labeled in the very least as incorrect and at the very most as downright evil.
As President Roosevelt once said as an example, “We can just as little afford to follow the doctrinaires of an extreme individualism as the doctrines of an extreme socialism,” therefore, according to Aristotle and Roosevelt the happy medium between or among extremes is where truth is most likely to be located.
While is it true that there are usually exceptions to every rule, meaning the isolated scenario is an unusual circumstance may require extreme actions for limited periods of time.
As, the saying goes “desperate times calls for desperate measures”.
Truth is roughly always developed in a general sense in a perfect balance between extremes.
Another way to explain Aristotle’s golden mean would be that courage is the middle, which is the good between one extreme, of deficiency; cowardness and the other extreme of excess; recklessness.
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“ She followed all my directions. It was really easy to contact her and respond very fast as well. ”
A coward would be the soldier who runs away from the battlefield, and a reckless soldier would charge against sixty enemy soldiers. Now, this doesn't define that the golden mean is the exact middle between two extremes, but that the middle relies on the situation.
The last example is former presidential candidate during the Eisenhower administration, Adlai Stevenson, who once made a comment about patriotism that effectively applies the principle of the golden mean, “Patriotism is not short, frenzied outbursts of emotion, but the tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime.”
The golden mean is relative to us in our particular situation but it is objective relatively.
People must normally be held responsible for what they do, that compulsion and ignorance may be excusing conditions, and that he is rather severe in his estimation of when these conditions may hold.
We can argue that now in the 21st century many of these issues are moral issues or merely character development goals. According to Aristotle, anything has a characteristic function that is properly used to perform. The good for humans, must essentially entail the entire proper task of human life as a whole, that must be an occupation within the soul that demonstrates genuine virtue or excellence. There is no general middle that would be relevant to every situation. Aristotle said, 'It's easy to be angry, but to be angry at the right time, for the right reason, at the right person and in the right intensity must truly be brilliant.' Because of the difficulty of the balance in certain situations can portray, persistent moral improvement of the character is crucial for acknowledging it. This does not indicate that Aristotle sustained moral relativism, because he listed specific emotions and actions (hate, envy, jealousy, theft, murder) as always wrong, nevertheless of the situation at hand. The golden mean pertains only for virtues, and not vices. In some ethical systems, however, murder can be discharged in certain situations, like self-defense. It is a way of life that allows us to live within the regulations of our nature, to improve our character, to better deal with the inescapable hardships of life and to have the desire for the good in the whole, not just of the individual.
What is Aristotle’s Golden Mean?. (2021, Mar 23). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/what-is-aristotle-s-golden-mean-essay
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