A recent discussion in virtue ethics revives the question of how virtue relates to skill. Is skill merely a useful analog to explaining the nature of virtue, or is virtue actually a skill? The motivation objection is one of a number of arguments that virtue is not a skill. The idea is that virtues are motivationally constrained by requiring their possessors to have certain concerns, goals, and motivations, but skills are not. In this paper, we argue that the motivation objection fails because, c…
Read moreA recent discussion in virtue ethics revives the question of how virtue relates to skill. Is skill merely a useful analog to explaining the nature of virtue, or is virtue actually a skill? The motivation objection is one of a number of arguments that virtue is not a skill. The idea is that virtues are motivationally constrained by requiring their possessors to have certain concerns, goals, and motivations, but skills are not. In this paper, we argue that the motivation objection fails because, contra the objection, skills include at least four motivational constraints: aspiration for excellence, commitment to the game, beauty and truth, and the goods of persons. These four constraints ground our evaluation of skills and the skillful. Together, they form a motivational spectrum of skill. We conclude by arguing that the motivational spectrum of skill defeats the motivation objection and provides some evidence for virtue being a skill.
