Is There Something We Call a Moral Character? A Discussion with John Doris’ Situationalist Critique of Virtue Ethics

Abstract

Virtue Ethics is now one of the most influential ethical theories. It postulates the necessity of work-ing over moral character, its appropriate features and dispositions (ethical virtues). Such a postulate assumes that the main determining factor of agent’s action is his or her moral character. A number of experiments in social psychology show however that it is rather situational factors (not character) which determine human action. John Doris in his book: Luck of Character radically criticizes moral psychology on which virtue ethics is founded: He denies the existence of moral character and its features globally understood. The paper aims to respond to this criticism.