Ética como Ciência da Felicidade

For Aristotle, ethics is the study of how human beings should act to achieve a happy life, eudaimonia, through virtues, the "golden mean," rational to avoid excesses, guided by prudence (phronesis). Happiness, being the activity of the soul in accordance with virtue throughout a complete life, is not a fleeting feeling, but a way of living. In Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle treats ethics as practical knowledge based on human rational nature; therefore, it is not something arbitrary, but grounded in reality and dependent on contextual deliberation. For Ayn Rand, prudence is not the absence of knowledge, but the contextual application of universal and demonstrable principles; its application requires the cognitive processing of concrete reality. Therefore, for Rand, ethics is the science of human life based on the objective nature of man, a fundamental science that responds to objective facts about human nature. She demonstrates the fallacy of the Aristotelian dichotomy between theoretical and practical knowledge: if man is a rational being who needs to act in order to live, and action requires choice, that choice demands criteria based on reality. To deny that ethics is epistemic is to introduce a rupture in the very structure of reason. The absence of clear ethical principles results in psychological phenomena such as internal conflict, cognitive dissonance, and existential insecurity. The mind needs criteria to choose objectives; without them, direction is lost. One can ignore ethics, but one cannot avoid the consequences of acting against reality. In short, the application of ethics is philosophy's main contribution to humankind: a set of logically integrated concepts, derived from reality and not contradictory to life. It was on this basis that Aristotle and, later, Ayn Rand, developed ethical theories in favor of human fulfillment and happiness. Watch the full class where Rafael Higashi, physician (52.74345-3), Master of Medicine, Neurologist (RQE: 13728) and Nutritionist (RQE: 19627) from the Higashi Clinic in Rio de Janeiro, explains the subject.