Alasdair MacIntyre

Alasdair Chalmers MacIntyre ( born January 12, 1929 in Glasgow ) is a Scottish- American philosopher and is considered one of the main proponents of communitarianism.

Life

MacIntyre studied in London and Manchester and teaches in the United States since 1969. Since 1988 he has been Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana.

Teaching

MacIntyre dealt with issues of ideology criticism, psychoanalysis, and morality tale, before developing his philosophy to a time-critical moral philosophy. In his main work " After Virtue. A Study in Moral Theory ", he criticizes the" rationalist " morality of the Enlightenment since Kant, which have given man no roots. Building on the Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle, he wants to revive the tradition of virtue ethics.

Moral action is possible for MacIntyre only within a community. In communities traditions play a crucial role. Traditions are subject to ongoing development. You start with an authoritarian state, are taken without question by authorities in which certain beliefs, texts and utterances. As the story progresses, it may lead to conflicts and crises that lead to these authorities in question and their requirements are reformulated. Thus, the existing traditions are constantly being developed, until eventually a point is reached where within an existing tradition no more progress is possible. If there is a tradition to conflicts that can not be handled within her, that is the " epistemological crisis " have the result. This crisis can be overcome by learning to understand a competing tradition. As long as it does not lead to "epistemological crisis ", different traditions can coexist. In conflicts between traditions, there is no way to rationally solve, since there is no tradition -independent criteria of rationality.

Writings (selection )

  • A Short History of Ethics. A History of Moral Philosophy from the Homeric Age to the Twentieth Century. Routledge, London 1967, ISBN 0-415-04027-2.
  • Dependent Rational Animals. Why Human Beings Need the Virtues. Duckworth, London 1999, ISBN 0-7156-2902-6.
  • The loss of virtue. For the moral crisis of our time. Suhrkamp, Frankfurt am Main 1995, ISBN 3-518-28793-1 ( Original: After Virtue University of Notre Dame Press 1981, ISBN 0 - 268-00594 -X, second edition 1984, with a postscript, third edition 2007, with. a new preface: " After Virtue after a Quarter of a Century ").
  • Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry: Encyclopedia, Genealogy, and Tradition. AND Press, Notre Dame, 1990, ISBN 0-268-01877-4.
  • Whose Justice? Which Rationality? AND Press, Notre Dame, 1988, ISBN 0-268-01944-4.
  • The recognition of dependency. About human virtues. Red Book, Hamburg 2001, ISBN 3-434-53088-6.
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