In the article “Virtue ethics and the ‘medicine of the spirit’” author Capucine Lebreton delves into the causes and correlation between what she defines to be the ‘medicine of the spirit’, virtue ethics and consequentialism and deontological ethics. Lebreton then make a conclusion on how proper maintenance of the body is helpful in achieving whichever school of thought one chooses for acting virtuous.

To give a brief overview of these schools of moral thought, virtue ethics is based on the classical Greek philosophers, Aristotle & Plato. The idea behind virtue ethics is to act on a virtue, every day, little by little, until that virtue becomes second nature to you. What is considered a virtue, or moral act is to be defined. Thus if you wish to become a generous person, practice giving a little every day, and at the end of your life it will have become part of your nature. According to Consequentialism (or utilitarianism), an act is morally pious, if it seeks to have the best possible outcome on society as a whole. Thus, a utilitarianist would see what would be the most beneficial outcome to society as a whole as the primary reasoning behind. For example, if I am thinking about stealing a candy bar from a store, even though it would give me great pleasure in not having to pay for it, I realize that the effects detrimental effects in society are more severe than then pleasures I gain from this action and decide to not steal. Lastly, we have deontological ethics, a set of rules we have to subscribe to, like the Ten Commandments. I act piously if I obey these rules and breaking these rules is the same as acting morally wrong. The source of these rules is also to be determined (Divine Command Theory, Kantian Ethics).

Delving a bit deeper, adhering to virtue ethics consists primarily of two tasks. 1) Identify what is a virtue and 2) find the best way to develop it. Here, Lebreton makes a very interesting claim that Virtue Ethics is a precursor to the other approaches. Meaning which-ever morality you prescribe to, command-theory or utilitarianism, you will need to practice your version of what is morally right. In the case of consequentialism one could see how the calculation process prior to your actions should become second nature and in case of moral rules (deontology) how one needs to go through the list and see if one’s actions break the rules or not. Thus the answer to question 1) posed earlier is an open ended question based on your interpretation of morality.

The answer to question 2) brings us to the ’medicine of the spirit’. Imagine we have decided what our definition of morality is. Keeping in mind that we have to nurture and develop it to become second nature, what is the best way to achieve this? Here Lebreton introduces us to the discoveries and thoughts of 18th century French medical ethics authors, such as Le Camus. The idea behind the medical scientists and philosophers’ discoveries is that our environment (climate, food, sleep pattern, movement) affect how we view our surroundings. Thus, being in the optimal state would expedite our ability to make our virtues second nature. To give an idea, these authors go into great detail on what kind food expedites what kind of mood. Le Camus then proposes a regimen in life that favors sweet and joyful passions and shuns violent and sad ones. This would mean that by being in the right physical state (joyful passions) we optimize our ability to acquire virtues based on our definition of what is right. Lebreton hypothesis is that medicine of the mind is the same precursor (maybe even necessary condition) to virtue ethics that virtue ethics is to deontological or utilitarian ethics.

Lebreton’s hypothesis is most certainly thought provoking, and it is incredibly hard to argue that the right state of mind is important to acquire any sort of habit, skill, or knowledge. However, it does leave out two important cases. 1) Some ethics require us to act morally virtuous regardless of our state of mind. Thus I should not try to act virtuous only when I feel like doing so. Sometimes it is required to act morally virtuous even when one is hungry or had food that causes sad emotions. As a matter of fact, unless one becomes virtuous in all situations of life, it is not a second nature, rather a fragile equilibrium. One bad state of mind and one’s virtues are out the door. It is true that to start off, a conducive physical state is optimal, but after the initial stages, some discomfort becomes necessary to ensure one’s growth.

The second problem with the ‘medicine of the spirit’ is the acquisition of these optimal states. Le Camus’ claims on the food->inner state link are somewhat dubious in nature, but let’s assume that there is a link. One could state that in this day and age, there are certain pharmaceuticals that will produce the desires state that Le Camus first proposed. Le Camus dealt with known ‘inner-state-changing’ stimuli of his time, environment, food, sleep & movement. Today we could add more items to this list. What if there is a drug X that can get us in this optimal state? Is it therefore desirable to do so? 100 years from now, this list will be even longer than it is now. We might be able to switch certain genes on/off to produce any state including our optimal virtue state. Where does that leave us? Should we pursue these drugs today, these gene modifications 100 years from now to learn to be virtuous? One could argue that if it is medically safe, then why not? But this issue is ignored by Lebreton at this point in time.

Lebreton’s article is immensely informational, from the idea of scientific use of passions to the virtuous circle to the ‘medicine of the spirit’ itself . One can even see how the habit-acquiring nature virtue ethics serves as the precursor of any other ethical school of thought. But there are some serious holes in the idea that the perfect inner state is necessarily beneficial to habit acquisition.