the soul, or just functioning of the soul, as doing something you are able to do well.8 When this is the case, your life is pleasurable, and pleasure makes your life happy. In assessing the arguments put forth by Plato and Aristotle, I feel that both are very sound and convincing. Clearly, proving that one type of life is happier than another type, is a complex task, and there are several objections one might bring against the theory that the just life is happier than the unjust life. For example, I could easily agree with the objection that some acts of injustice, such as stealing money, will be a source of happiness to a certain extent. In the stated situation, the injustice would bring me happiness to the extent that I would have the means to buy things that I desire. However, Plato and Aristotle discuss happiness in terms of on overall happy life, not just short periods, or moments, of happiness. In fact, Aristotle makes this distinction quite clear in the Nicomachean Ethics, where he refers to the happy life as eudaimonia, literally meaning the ‘flourishing life’. This label expresses the idea that happiness is something that spans an entire lifetime. Next, the idea may be put forth that Plato’s and Aristotle’s assertions on the roles of wisdom and knowledge in creating a happy life are unreasonable. You may, for instance, pose the following question: why must a person possess some knowledge of the good, or of happiness, in order to be happy? Obviously, both Plato and Aristotle find fault with the idea that ignorance is bliss, but why is that so? In the Republic, Socrates argues that wisdom is what causes a person to act virtuously, and that without wisdom, a person is ignorant and lives according to vice rather than virtue. Aristotle states that certain knowledge of why an action is good is necessary. Without this knowledge, a person has no internal motivation to act virtuously. Therefore, in...
