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After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory

by Alasdair MacIntyre

4.15 · Rating details · 3,271 Ratings · 177 Reviews

Discusses the nature of moral disagreement, Nietzsche, Aristotle, heroic societies, and the virtue of of justice.

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Paperback, Second Edition, 304 pages

Published August 30th 1984 by University of Notre Dame Press (first published 1981)

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Feb 22, 2008 David Gross rated it really liked it

Shelves: ethics, non-fiction

What if our contemporary moral discourse were a cargo cult in which we picked up fragments of a long lost, once-coherent moral philosophy, and ignorantly constructed a bunch of nonsense that didn’t work and could not work in principle?

After Virtue argues that this indeed is what happened, and this explains why our moral discourse is such a mess.

Why when we argue about moral issues do we make our case in a form that resembles rational argument, but the effect seems to be only like imperative stat ...more

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Sep 15, 2015 Jan Rice rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: history, philosophy, read-out-loud, morality-justice

I began this book around September 2015, then reviewed the first half in January of 2016 in advance of a hiatus in reading. I resumed in April, but this time I wasn't alone. It had looked like such fun that Dennis wanted to study with me.

First we backtracked and did some review, and then we forged ahead, reading out loud, mostly me. I read over half the book out loud. And then I took notes on every paragraph, since that's the only way I could digest it. My notes constitute, in effect, a condens ...more

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Sep 18, 2015 sologdin rated it liked it

Shelves: philosophy

Intertextuality Update: fairly obvious, in the course of my current re-read of A Confederacy of Dunces, that author here has simply taken protagonist there and channeled him as non-satirical: MacIntyre is Ignatius Reilly. The worm is the spice!

A fairly conservative endeavor overall. Outworks note, for instance, that “Marxism’s moral defects and failures arise from the extent to which it, like liberal individualism, embodies the ethos of the distinctively modern and modernizing world” (xviii). M ...more

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Nov 23, 2012 Paul rated it it was amazing

I've often wondered why I cannot seem to construct a coherent, rational argument with respect to any of the hot-button social issues of our day. MacIntyre says I'm not alone; both liberals and conservatives today are trapped in a radically individualist philosophical liberalism that cannot be defended despite "three centuries of moral philosophy and one of sociology." His counter-proposal is that the "Aristotelian tradition can be restated in a way that restores intelligibility and rationality t ...more

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Apr 09, 2013 Samantha rated it liked it

Shelves: read-in-2013

Though I didn't necessarily agree with all the author's ultimate conclusions, I found After Virtue to be a cogent and well-argued work on moral theory. One of MacIntyre's claims against "emotivism" that he finds to be pervading societal discourse on morality--that is, morals and "virtues" reduced to mere claims of preference--is that logical reasoning is actually being done in support of those chosen moral standpoints. He roots many of the virtues we now intuitively view as "good" (i.e., courage Though I didn't necessarily agree with all the author's ultimate conclusions, I found After Virtue to be a cogent and well-argued work on moral theory. One of MacIntyre's claims against "emotivism" that he finds to be pervading societal discourse on morality--that is, morals and "virtues" reduced to mere claims of preference--is that logical reasoning is actually being done in support of those chosen moral standpoints. He roots many of the virtues we now intuitively view as "good" (i.e., courage, loyalty, etc.)in their historical traditions, going back to the so-called "heroic" societies of myth and legend, and particularly to Aristotle. He traces the downfall of a common basis for the foundation of morality to the Enlightenment and particularly to the changes in the understanding of natural science, which discredited Aristotle's conception of the natural world, on which his ethics and metaphysics rested.

MacIntyre finds the "Enlightenment project" to find a universal secular basis for "the good life for man" to have been a failure. He denies that philosophical concepts can be divorced from their historical context. There is certainly some truth to this on some level, but he uses this refusal to give ground to what he sees as "academic" divisions between the disciplines is sometimes problematic, as in his discussion of social science, which he sees as founded on emotivism. Social science is not philosophy, however much it may be grounded in philosophy. Likewise, MacIntyre tends to regard concepts that do not have deep linguistic roots (i.e. "utility" and "rights") as "fictions"--a point which may be arguable but hardly settled. He finds Nietzsche's views on morality as the refuge of the weak to be a stronger argument than the claims of other post-Enlightenment philosophers, though he admits that Nietzsche's "superman" or "man who transcends" is problematic if not ludicrous. Nietzsche, he claims, only rejected the then-current foundations for moral thought, without offering a replacement.

To the problem of "interminability" of moral arguments in modern society--that is, that people are proceeding from incompatible premises when they advance their arguments--MacIntyre suggests a solution of something of a revived Aristotelianism without the Physics (as well as without some of that philosopher's more odious views, such as on slavery). Even if the reader has accepted that the philosophers of the Enlightenment did not provide the foundations for a universalizable basis for moral theory (and there is room for disagreement there), the solution presented doesn't seem quite workable. Though the radical individualism of an "emotivist" society is problematic for moral thought and behavior, a return to "tradition," even defined broadly and with a nod to modernity, is not without quagmires of its own. ...more

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Jul 29, 2017 Rahman rated it it was amazing

Shelves: non-fiction, history, philosophy, favorites, morality, priority

I was for the longest time seduced by liberal individualism and existentialism into thinking that I can exist by myself while disregarding the world around me, that I can build my own values out of pure reason, and pursue my wholly individualist aims. But I now realize that's just nonsense. Individuals can't exist in a vacuum. We exist with a history attached to us, a culture, a burden. And as much as I'd like to get rid of that burden, I can't, for it's a part of me. Detaching myself won't make ...more

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May 07, 2014 David rated it it was amazing

Shelves: philosophy, ethics

In my twenties I read a lot of books. I was in seminary, reading assigned readings, and then I was starting out in ministry reading books on leadership and spiritual formation and the like. Over time I began to notice some authors were referenced in numerous books I was reading. Now in my thirties, it seems as if I am reading the authors who were often being quoted in books I read in my twenties. Alasdair Macintyre is one such author. I’d heard of his books numerous times but it wasn’t until a f In my twenties I read a lot of books. I was in seminary, reading assigned readings, and then I was starting out in ministry reading books on leadership and spiritual formation and the like. Over time I began to notice some authors were referenced in numerous books I was reading. Now in my thirties, it seems as if I am reading the authors who were often being quoted in books I read in my twenties. Alasdair Macintyre is one such author. I’d heard of his books numerous times but it wasn’t until a friend told me I seriously should read him that I finally did.

It feels odd to call this a “review” of After Virtue, just as I always feel weird reviewing any book that could be considered a classic. This may not be a classic, but it has been incredibly influential in moral philosophy and I am nowhere near a philosopher. That said, this is the sort of book that I love reading. It stretches me. It is not as easy to read as those spiritual formation books of a few years back for it is the deep well which those authors were drawing on. But there is tremendous benefit in going to the well yourself rather then letting someone else get the water. I think a lot of my pastor and ministry friends would not only benefit from this book, but would receive great intellectual stimulation in reading it.

Macintyre asks early on, why is it so difficult to have a debate over morals in our society? People on both sides of the argument can give solid, cogent cases for their points but there never seems to be any headway made. Right there I was hooked. Whether it is gun rights, gay marriage, abortion, foreign affairs, or economics, this problem is clearly apparent. We argue and argue and argue. More often then not our arguments devolve into simple assertions, saying more about how we feel then anything else. That is because there is little common ground to gain headway in the “anything else”.

What I loved about this book, and what makes it readable, is Macintyre makes his case through looking at history, telling a story. He argues that the division between history and philosophy is artificial and unhelpful. The historical situation in which a philosopher lived was always very important. So instead of dry, difficult philosophy, Macintyre gives us a narrative.

His argument is that we have lost teleology, the sense of where a human life ought to be going. In the past moral decisions fit into a life lived towards a clear goal. It was akin to playing a game of chess – some moves are better then others and all moves are oriented towards a clear goal. Once this was removed it became impossible to present a rational moral system. Macintyre argues that all who have tried in the last three centuries, from Kant’s categorical imperative to Mill’s Utilitarianism, have failed. Our morals may be similar to those of before, but we’ve lost the ground for them. All we’re left with is preferences, some prefer one thing and some another. Macintyre’s solution is a call for a return to Aristotle’s virtues that would lead us to our life’s best ends.

Overall, a fantastic book. I will definitely be reading more Macintyre in the future. ...more

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Jan 23, 2011 Mike Horne rated it it was amazing

Pick a virtue you would want to have in spades. Pick a virtue you want others around you to have. Are they the same? Why or why not?

From the Iliad (or Njal’s Saga)
Courage
Allegiance to Kin
Hospitality

Cardinal
Temperance
Prudence
Fortitude
Justice

Aristotle’s (from the Nichomachean Ethics
Courage
Self-Control
Generosity
Magnificence
High-mindedness
(Nameless concerned with ambition)
(Nameless concerned with gentleness)
Friendliness
Truthfulness
Wittiness
Justice

Seven Heavenly Virtues
Chastity
Temperance
Charity
Dilige ...more

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Aug 16, 2007 John Doe rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: reviewed

You want to play chess, but the kid could care less. How do you get him to play? Give him a piece of his favorite candy if he plays. He doesn't play well because he has no incentive to play well, so you give him a piece of candy only when he wins. Now, what if he cheats? What if you leave the room and the kid, wanting sweets, moves some of your pieces around to gain advantage? An incentive to win is an incentive to cheat. So, you watch the kid carefully so he cannot have an opportunity to cheat. ...more

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Jan 09, 2008 Jennifer rated it really liked it

Shelves: philosophy

wrong, and in many ways absurd, but absolutely delightful. This book made me want to do ethics, when I was just a wee lass studying Medieval metaphysics and logic.

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Mar 19, 2015 Jonathan Karmel rated it really liked it

According to this book, after the Enlightenment, moral philosophers rejected Aristotle’s teleological philosophy of ethics in search of a rational basis for morality. But the effort to find a universal rationality for morality failed. Therefore, we are just left with Emotivism, the belief that moral arguments are ultimately just based on the subjective, personal feelings of individuals. The author believes that we should return to the teleological morality of Aristotle.

What is teleological moral ...more

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Jul 27, 2017 Tim added it

Shelves: philosophy

Whew.

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Aug 09, 2009 Bob Nichols rated it did not like it · review of another edition

MacIntyre provides a strong critique of contemporary moral theory, dominated as it is by varieties of emotivism: There are no objective standards; moral values are subjective and relative. This is the first half of his book. As much as MacIntyre admires Aristotle, he cannot go back to Aristotle's "metaphysical biology." Aristotle's "classical" perspective was replaced with a variety of rationalistic moral theories (e.g., Kant) that Nietzsche accurately and powerfully in MacIntyre's view said wer ...more

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Jan 14, 2014 Jeremy marked it as to-read · review of another edition

Shelves: religion, history, non-fiction, philosophy, ethics, catholicism

Mark Lilla calls this book "catnip for grumpy souls." Read the prologue here, and read a quote from p. 216 (on narrative and mythology; Justin Taylor is writing about N.D. Wilson's fiction) here.

This may be the MacIntyre book where he says that you can't talk about right and wrong without talking about purpose . . . and you can't keep from talking about right and wrong.

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Dec 12, 2014 Fouz Aljameel rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2015

ماكنتاير ناقد عنيف لكل المدارس الليبرالية في الثقافة الغربية بشكل غريب ولافت للنظر .. وما يدعو إليه باختصار شديد في هذا الكتاب الثريّ فلسفيا هو إعادة الاعتبار لمفهوم الفضيلة (وفقا لأرسطو) لذا يندرج في مدرسة المجموعاتية التي تتبنى ذلك ..

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Feb 03, 2016 Miles rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Several chapters from Alasdair MacIntyre’s After Virtue were instrumental in my undergraduate thesis, but I never got around to reading the whole book until now. This is a grand and fascinating journey through the history of ethics, fueled by MacIntyre’s argument for a modern renaissance of Aristotelian thought.

He begins with this assertion:

"The language of morality is in…[a] state of grave disorder…What we possess, if this view is true, are fragments of a conceptual scheme, parts which now lack ...more

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May 25, 2014 Ted rated it it was amazing

Shelves: academia

After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory is a work I've known by reputation and short excerpts, quotations, summaries, and paraphrases for years, but which I only read cover to cover recently.

It is simply one of the most impressive works of nonfiction I've ever read.

Like only a handful of relatively contemporary works, its combination of breadth and depth in covering a topic that would seem to defy such treatment in a single volume is impressive. Another such book that comes to mind that would fit After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory is a work I've known by reputation and short excerpts, quotations, summaries, and paraphrases for years, but which I only read cover to cover recently.

It is simply one of the most impressive works of nonfiction I've ever read.

Like only a handful of relatively contemporary works, its combination of breadth and depth in covering a topic that would seem to defy such treatment in a single volume is impressive. Another such book that comes to mind that would fit this bill is The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind. Like that book, one need not buy every detail of the author's argument wholesale to appreciate the sweeping scope of the view offered.

In the case of Macintyre, the view is of the history of how we think about virtue in the Western tradition, focusing particularly on how we have inherited a vocabulary with which to talk about moral theory which is anachronistic and unsuited to our times. That would be bad enough, but the real problem is that we are not aware of how anachronistic it is. The result is that we don't simply have disagreements when we attempt to discuss issues in terms of virtues--that's no problem at all. Rather, the problem is that it becomes impossible to even characterize these disagreements in any accurate way since we have no common language with which to speak to one another, and no common concepts with which to reason about them.

Macintyre charts the changing notions of what it means to lead a "virtuous" life, from Homer, through Aristotle, Scholasticism, the Renaissance, and the Enlightenment, noting that what counts as "virtuous" changes, and often for understandable reasons. The virtues of Bronze Age Greece, not surprisingly, have only limited value in the postmodern world.

But in our postmodern world, we have an even more difficult task, because not only do previous concepts of what the virtuous life is seem antiquated, but we have no clear foundation upon which to build our own ideas about what the virtues mean now. Our highly scientific approach to understanding the nature of lived human life negates what Macintyre sees as an essential prerequisite to formulating a coherent view of the virtues: the notion of life as a narrative--a story that we tell about ourselves and which is affected by the stories of others. Without a sense of life-as-narrative, we are left with static and/or fragmentary understanding of ourselves that makes creation of any clear criteria of what constitutes "the good life" impossible.

This is an impossibly simplistic and distorted version of Macintyre's argument, which is rich with discussions of philosophy, the social sciences (spoiler alert: the social "sciences" are not scientific), and history. Even more important than the conclusion Macintyre reaches is the path he takes to get there. Even if one ends up disagreeing with Macintyre in profound ways, spending time thinking along the lines he draws is incredibly valuable.

One potential criticism is one that can often be leveled at ambitious intellectual works, which is that it does a better job of describing the problem than offering any concrete solution. Toward the end of the book, one is hoping that Macintyre will lay out in some specifics how two people who, for example, disagree on the issue of abortion might carry out a coherent conversation and even reach a conclusion rather than talking past one another. That never quite happens. While I haven't yet read Macintyre's follow up work to "After Virtue," I gather that while he seems to hold out the promise of following through on this in these later works, it never quite emerges there either.

But I think the disappointment a reader might feel about this, as understandable as it is, misses the larger point, which is that the solution to the problem is fundamentally to understand that there *is* a problem at all. It truly is a case of "the first step is to admit you have a problem." We live in a world shot through with pseudo-moralistic discourse, but which is cut off from any common ideas about what these words and ideas actually mean. Yet we continue to blather away as if these concepts are clearly understood by all. For me, the upshot of the book is that we must be aware of the extent to which we lack a common language with which to speak about the virtuous life. Simply acknowledging this would be a hugely helpful step forward in creating more meaningful, coherent interactions with one another.

This isn't to say that Macintyre does not have specific points of view on how to approach the task of enriching our talk about the virtuous life. Some thinkers (e.g., Aristotle) are clearly more helpful than others, and some virtues (e.g. justice) are of particular importance. But the point is not to offer a bullet point list of steps or process flow chart with which to hammer out any and all moral conundrums. That would be to impose a pseudo-scientific understanding of something that is inherently human, interpersonal, situated in context, and narrative. Rather, the purpose is to make it clear what particular context we, today, are in and how this affects the way we think and talk about the virtuous life. Only by fully understanding the philosophical, historical, and social context in which we live (rather than attempting to find some sort of meta-contextual guide to virtue, be it the Categorical Imperative, the Old Testament, etc.)can we start speaking with one another in a way in which virtue again becomes comprehensible.
...more

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Apr 26, 2017 Clayton Raithel rated it it was amazing

Probably one of the most important texts on modern moral and political philosophy I've ever read. Very illuminating thoughts about why many of the moral debates we have, both in academic and popular discourse, are necessarily intractable. While it was first published in 1981, I think that it may be more relevant now than ever (MacIntyre's brief criticism of protests as a form of rational debate and his discussion of human rights is eerily prescient).

I found the identification of the problem we a ...more

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Mar 20, 2012 Robert Durough, Jr. rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Recommends it for: ethicists, lawyers, philosophers, politicians, theologians

Recommended to Robert by: Lee C. Camp

This is one of those books that I’ve had for several years, really wanted to read, but kept putting off to get through some easier reads. It took me a few days to get through this dense work of philosophy, but I am blessed to have finally completed Alasdair MacIntyre’s After Virtue (3rd ed.). I’ve had concerns and suspicions for years as to the foundations of moral arguments, particularly those of political establishments, but did not have the philosophical and historical background with which t This is one of those books that I’ve had for several years, really wanted to read, but kept putting off to get through some easier reads. It took me a few days to get through this dense work of philosophy, but I am blessed to have finally completed Alasdair MacIntyre’s After Virtue (3rd ed.). I’ve had concerns and suspicions for years as to the foundations of moral arguments, particularly those of political establishments, but did not have the philosophical and historical background with which to articulate those concerns beyond simple observations of impractical and illogical teleological claims (or lack thereof). Without being well read in Aristotle, Nietzsche, Sartre, Hume, Hegel, Hobbes, Marx, and many others, some of us are unable to fully appreciate and adequately assess MacIntyre’s arguments; so, we are left having to trust that MacIntyre has himself fairly and honestly done so with other philosophers. I do; and still lacking in this area, I am going to piggyback on MacIntyre with this one.

MacIntyre, a self-proclaimed Aristotelian, ultimately argues that Aristotle was wrong in his approach to morality, but that his arguments can be (are) broken down and restated to express a proper view. Basically, MacIntyre corrects Aristotle and helps us understand modern morality and the faults of arguments therein. This is an eye-opener; however, now thirty-four years since its first publication, it seems we still have a long way to go from academia to expressing these things in a way that pragmatically appeals to the general populous in order to make any kind of real change in the way we approach morality, virtue, and governance by way of such arguments.

I think I am right to assume this isn’t going to be on most people’s reading list, and even fewer will get excited enough about the material to do anything with it. So, I am going to make specific recommendations with this one. If you are or anticipate finding yourself working in any of the following fields, read and wrestle with this book: ethics, law, philosophy, politics, theology. ...more

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Jul 13, 2017 Aaron Crofut rated it really liked it

Shelves: philosophy

I picked this one up on a friend's recommendation and I was not disappointed. Everyone with any argumentative streak in them knows the problem being addressed: how do you prove your moral position to someone who doesn't seem to get it? Why won't they just see the reason of your enlightened ways?

Well, how do you know your morals are so superior? When confronted with that question, people will either brush it off as preposterous or attempt a few stock answers proving the internal logic of their v I picked this one up on a friend's recommendation and I was not disappointed. Everyone with any argumentative streak in them knows the problem being addressed: how do you prove your moral position to someone who doesn't seem to get it? Why won't they just see the reason of your enlightened ways?

Well, how do you know your morals are so superior? When confronted with that question, people will either brush it off as preposterous or attempt a few stock answers proving the internal logic of their viewpoint. The first obviously doesn't answer the question, but neither does the second. I didn't ask you if your conclusions follow from your premises (though if they don't, you really should be reevaluating your own ethics). The question is, how do you know this is right and this is wrong in a moral sense? Those honest with themselves will realize how tall of an order this is; the Enlightenment was driven by the goal of finding a rational, secular basis of morality similar to the laws governing the physical world.

They came up short. Oh sure, they came up with lots of attempts: categorical imperatives, pleasure as the basis of morality, utilitarianism, etc. But none of these are compelling. None make a man standing behind Rawls' famous "veil of ignorance" stand up and say "I must follow these rules regardless of circumstances!" But boy oh boy, did we try to pretend we had found such rules, until a man named Friedrich Nietzsche showed up and pointed out that none of them stand on any solid ground. The only morality is that what you make, so be an ubermensch if you can!

Most people are not willing to do that, especially after the 20th Century showed us what such men tend to be like, but at the same time we're riddling our political systems with crossfire because different sections of society hold different standards of ethics. They use phrases like good and bad, evil, natural rights, but one doesn't have to scratch very hard to find the emptiness in the phraseology.

MacIntyre beautifully and accurately paints the conundrum we find ourselves in, but goes a step farther and asks a question many would consider heresy: what if the Enlightenment was wrong to reject what came before? What came before, of course, was Aristotle and the Aristotelian tradition. Nietzsche was correct about the worthlessness of most moral babble today (called emotivism), but if Aristotle was discarded without cause, we have someone to battle the nihilism of our times. We've kept the terminology of his ethics but ditched the meaning, and by so doing have created an incoherent mess to use in our debates, but if we reestablish the old framework, we might just find a functional concept of right and wrong.

Has MacIntyre described a working alternative? Well, possibly; an amateur like me can't follow all of the moving parts in this theory, and after the first part of this book I'm not inclined to just trust the experts to know what is best. I do like the gist of what I got, however. Life has to be taken in a narrative sense rather than as a collection of random events. We are purpose driven, or teleological, and that purpose is to live the good life. Aristotle says that's an ongoing process (this particular moment is either the good life or it isn't), St. Augustine and the Christian theology postpone any possible eudaimonia to the afterlife, but the two are compatible. Being virtuous means having characteristics that move us towards that telos, or goal. But man is a social creature, and this quest is not a solitary pursuit. Finding eudaimonia is a goal of all in the polis, or city, and those pulling their weight towards that good life are the virtuous, while those who are not are the vicious. Our virtues, then, are tied closely to our role in society and how well we fulfill it. We work within a tradition; we are co-authors of a story that we neither started nor ended, but we are also characters within it, too. To burn all preceding chapters is to lose the point of the story altogether; to close tradition to mere repetition of the past is to lose the point of having a story. But there must be a story, with a beginning, a middle, and an end, an arc for the character with either improvement or deprecation, and a goal to which they move to judge that arc in an objective sense to make our ethical judgements one of fact rather than opinion.

Our understanding of virtue becomes tied to our current social and political world; MacIntyre rejects the idea that one can understand morals outside of knowing the current problems we deal with, what came before that colors our understanding of the world, etc. For a polis or community to function, there has to be some uncontested ground about the roles each are to fill, and the implications for our day are obviously dire. In a book largely academic in tone, MacIntyre stuns the 1981 reader by saying our society cannot make principled judgements because we lack any principles at all and that we are fighting a "civil war by other means" (aka, political). Every modern political tradition, including individualism/classical liberalism and its American descendants of the two major parties, is exhausted.

This is an incredible book and I highly recommend it to anyone seeking actual grounds to base their morality on. It's not an easy one, though as tone goes MacIntyre comes through with personality and wit. If you're anything other than a professional, you'll probably lose the thread at points, but you'll get enough of the picture to realize he may be on to something here. At the very least, the destruction of emotivism is a worthy contribution to our polis.

I have one last point to toss in, and of course it is about the last sentence. The buddy who recommended this to me did so because I showed interest in Rod Dreher's "The Benedict Option", a reference to us waiting for a very different St. Benedict. MacIntyre himself doesn't seem overly amused by Dreher hitching on to this sentence, but he may want to give it some serious thought. I'm not saying Dreher's work is particularly great or insightful (though I do think MacIntyre incorrectly writes it off as a "run to the hills" book, which it isn't). What I'm saying is, people are forming new communities of people with common standards of decency and with a telos in mind. That telos is the destruction of the "other side" in our culture war. Whereas we had to live with one another in the early 1980's, we now have online communities that resemble the polis in certain ways, especially with the idea of friendship as common cause. People no long have to interact with those they disagree with, and many don't. We may have two functional communities within one geographic state, each with a teleological end of destroying the other.

The Benedict we wait for probably won't be a saint. ...more

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Feb 01, 2012 W. Littlejohn rated it it was amazing

After Virtue is a ubiquitous presence within the field of ethics, as indeed within many discussions of political theory and the predicament of late modernity. Scarcely a week has gone by, it feels, in which I do not hear it referred to in some context or other. And yet, I sheepishly admitted to no one that I had never actually read it. Since I had to read the first ten pages for a Christian Ethics tutorial I was leading this semester, I decided to go ahead and take the opportunity to read the wh ...more

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Oct 29, 2016 Stephen Case rated it really liked it

MacIntyre wants to understand virtue. In particular, he wants to know not so much why virtue seems to be lacking in society today (this isn’t book moralizing on the problems of a post-modern society); rather, he wants to know why social discourse about virtue seems so incommensurate, so broken, so pointless. My first thought on reading the initial portions of this book was that he was simply critiquing the advent of post-modernity, but what he's actually doing is something more sophisticated and MacIntyre wants to understand virtue. In particular, he wants to know not so much why virtue seems to be lacking in society today (this isn’t book moralizing on the problems of a post-modern society); rather, he wants to know why social discourse about virtue seems so incommensurate, so broken, so pointless. My first thought on reading the initial portions of this book was that he was simply critiquing the advent of post-modernity, but what he's actually doing is something more sophisticated and systematic. Yes, he’s acknowledging that our dialogue on any sort of moral issues or claims seems to be absolutely stymied today, but he wants to rigorously explain why and analyze how it came to be this way. And the answer, according to his historical and philosophical treatment, is the loss of Aristotelian virtue ethics.

After Virtue is largely a historical analysis of virtue. MacIntyre’s central claim is that moral discourse is broken because there are no central agreed-upon premises to begin with and that historically Aristotelian virtue ethics has proven one of the most fertile starting grounds for questions of morality and ways of living. (I admit the philosophical sophistication of this work was such that my review may simplify to the point of obscuring.) He’s careful not to idealize Aristotle’s system of virtue, and he points out the failings and shortcomings of the Philosopher’s model, but historically he looks at the primary aspects of Aristotelian ethics, how they were abandoned in the Enlightenment, and the failure of the Enlightenment project to construct alternative groundings for morality.

There are two central aspects to MacIntyre’s reading of Aristotle’s concept of the virtues, two primary characteristics the abandonment of which have bankrupted societal dialogue and endeavors on morality today. For MacIntyre (as for Aristotle) an understand of virtue was tied to an understanding of the good of man—the intended end or telos of humanity—not as individuals (the individual rights and internal morality that have dictated how we talk about these things since the Enlightenment is a central problem for MacIntyre) but as the good of communities. A community exists and evaluates virtue in terms of those things that are useful between individuals in relationship with one another for the good of the community.

But this isn’t a utilitarian good; MacIntyre’s resurrection of Aristotelian telos is something more philosophically nuanced. It is related to the internal goods of practices, for instance, and here’s where his argument seemed most profound (and most apt to slip away from me). Internal goods are those goods that are intrinsic to the practice itself (excellence in the practice of chess-playing or baseball, for instance), as opposed to external goods (money, fame) that might be found through those practices but aren't the intrinsic telos of the practice itself. If we lose a sense of humans in community working toward common, intrinsically-valuable ends, sharing practices that have internal goods—if we give this up for an Enlightenment sense of atomistic individuals pursuing their own self-interest—then MacIntyre says we don’t have a grounds to understand virtue.

The second aspect was that virtue can only exist in the context of narrative, also tied to Aristotelian views of telos. If we don’t have a clear understanding of our own story, of our own participation in narrative, and of our communities and institutions as also having narratives, then we won’t have a grounding for understanding virtue that is defined in terms of ends and intrinsic goods. Aristotle writes that it’s impossible to say someone has been happy until their death, until their story has played out. MacIntyre says profound things in this work (quotes I wish I would have saved, as they speak directly to the power of narrative) about the necessity of narrative and the view of humanity in a narrative structure to our understanding (or lack thereof) regarding virtue.

The problem with this book is illustrated by the fumbling manner in which I’m generalizing and vaguely pointing to the different aspects of the work. In reading it, one can follow MacIntyre’s thick analysis more or less. He’s building an argument for something that seems quite counter to modern analytical philosophy, but because he wants to engage philosophers he has to do it in a very careful and analytical manner. But because his ideas are radically different—a view that ethics and morality as a logical, analytical exercise is vacuous and things like history and narrative and practice have to come into play—he’s constantly reaching beyond analytical philosophy to make a bigger argument. It’s an argument that has a direct bearing on how we live (something that also makes it perhaps unique among analytical philosophies), yet it’s a book that’s out of reach of most, I fear. It would be ideal if there were a quality popularization of this work, something that pulled out MacIntyre’s central themes and set them out for the interested undergraduate or popular reader.

MacIntyre’s work has been influential (there’s a paper, for instance, in the latest issue of ISIS, applying MacIntyre’s concept of goods internal to a practice to the practice of science), but I’m not sure whether such an explanatory derivative work based on After Virtue exists. The posts of Father Stephen, an orthodox priest who maintains a popular blog, often draw on his arguments and in fact were where I realized I should probably read this book. (I don’t have an excuse for waiting so long, as an undergraduate roommate did his thesis on virtue ethics, and I ran into MacIntyre at least once during my time at Notre Dame.) Father Stephen goes so far as to say that he finds it useless to have discussions about modern morality (or lack thereof) unless his interlocutors have first read McIntyre’s work. I find that frustrating, as I imagine most people would find this book difficult going indeed. But the central concepts here are indeed crucial and deserve a far wider hearing. Indeed, the energy that most of us use arguing about morality, I would venture, would be far better applied to attempting to work through MacIntyre's analysis. ...more

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Nov 22, 2014 Devon Sawyer rated it it was amazing

Alasdair MacIntyre claims that the moral structure that grew out of the Enlightenment project was divested of its meaning and purpose because it abandoned Aristotelian teleology. While the implications for the state modern moral discourse is ostensibly bleak, it was personally exciting to revisit After Virtue after having read it in college because of it's emphasis on seeing the universe as meaningful and beautiful as "a work of art," rather than through the lens of man himself as a "work of art ...more

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Apr 27, 2007 Mairaj rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

This is an excellent book on ethics and cause quite a stir when it came out.

It was a very fast read for a philosophy book. Interestingly, while most authors are great at criticism/deconstruction and not so good at building their own constructive arguments, the opposite is the case for MacIntyre in this book.

I tend to agree more with his constructive picture of what virtue ethics is all about and disagree with his characterization of moral discourse in the modern west.

On the constructive side, hi ...more

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Feb 19, 2008 Jasmine Star rated it really liked it

Josh and I have different opinions on this book. He thinks its gospel and i take it less seriously-indicative of personality differences and majors…the book frowns on social science and glorifies philosophy as the only way to get things done, lol. I find it to be a great conversation piece, because many of the theories are controversial. I felt like the book began ranting at times, because the scope of the argument was so large that the author kept remembering more and more things he wanted to " ...more

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May 12, 2013 Brian Boyce rated it liked it

Bit disappointing the old Alasdair. Sure we need a tradition form which to speak and communicate to have a shared language. Sorry that Marxism didn't work out for you and you retreated to Thomism and communitarianism. It does seem as though you are collapsing into a bit of a post modern stance of there being a number of worlds happening at once, but there are some of here still trying to make progress beyond the political ideologies into something that can be said to be directional, rather than ...more

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Jul 12, 2009 Eric rated it really liked it

Shelves: biblical-and-theological-studies, working-well, to-read-in-2016, read-in-2016

4.5. Loved the historicist narrative approach that MacIntyre took here and now that I have an initial orientation to what he is trying to do the book demands a rereading. I'm glad that I have gone back to the source, so to speak, in light of the so-called Benedict Option that has been floated in some conservative circles in the last while. After Virtue certainly poses challenges for those people as well as other contemporary approaches to morality, primarily because of his challenge to rule-base ...more

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Oct 07, 2013 Sebastian Uribe rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Tuve que leer este libro para un ensayo de un curso de Ética para la universidad, y la verdad es que no fue tan pesado como pensé al inicio. Si bien es complejo si no se sabe mucho de los autores que se mencionan, es innegable la brillantez con que expone un feroz diagnóstico del devenir de la filosofía moral hasta nuestros días, así no se comparta con su propuesta central de remedio para ello.

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Sep 28, 2007 Bob rated it it was amazing

Recommends it for: Really smart people

Well written, but I found it really tough going. It tested everything I know about philosopy, ethics, morality, and then some. I've read it twice, and stuff is still sinking in. Its worth the effort, but you've got to read it all to get all that it offers.

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Jan 09, 2008 Jeffrey Mervosh rated it liked it

Recommends it for: philosophers.

A fine summation of Aristotelian ethics, though you get the idea that the author really enjoys his own writing. This book is most useful as the most comprehensive modern adaptation of the virtue ethic, but I feel it has been summed up more succinctly elsewhere (Henry Veatch's 'Rational Man').

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topics	posts	views	last activity
Kyrie Liaison: 5 - Why the Enlightenment Project of Justifying Morality Had to Fail	6	5	18 minutes ago
Kyrie Liaison: 4 - Predecessor Culture and the Enlightenment Project of Justifying Morality	7	5	Aug 22, 2017 08:01AM
Kyrie Liaison: 3 - Emotivism: Social Content and Social Context	12	8	Aug 08, 2017 06:53AM
Kyrie Liaison: 1 - A Disquieting Suggestion	9	13	Jul 31, 2017 07:46AM
Kyrie Liaison: 2 - The Natural of Moral Disagreement Today and the claims of Emotivism	10	9	Jul 31, 2017 05:03AM
Kyrie Liaison: Check in for After Virtue	9	8	Jul 14, 2017 08:04AM
Is morality mainly a matter of ideas?	2	14	Sep 19, 2013 09:40PM

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About Alasdair MacIntyre

Alasdair Chalmers MacIntyre is a leading philosopher primarily known for his contribution to moral and political philosophy but known also for his work in history of philosophy and theology. He is the O'Brien Senior Research Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame.

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Books by Alasdair MacIntyre

Dependent Rational Animals: Why Human Beings Need the Virtues (The Paul Carus Lectures)

A Short History Of Ethics: A History Of Moral Philosophy From The Homeric Age To The Twentieth Century

Three Rival Versions of Moral Inquiry: Encyclopedia, Genealogy, and Tradition

God, Philosophy, Universities: A Selective History of the Catholic Philosophical Tradition

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