Talk:Moral character

"Plato and Aristotle defined good moral character as striking a mean between extremes of feeling and one's actions on that feeling."

This was the entire content of the article. I don't know enough about this topic to judge the validity of the above, so I've moved it out to make way for a fresh stub. Fabiform 05:28, 29 Jan 2004 (UTC)


 * Actually Plato had nothing to do about it. His "surpasser" Aristotle did it all by himself. - Sigg3.net 18:05, 30 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Poor
this article is very poor; it reads like some kind sermon. In other words, very POV. I think it needs a complete re-write.

Needs a complete re-write
The article title must be renamed "character", rather than "moral character", as it implies that demonstrating 'character', which is ultimately a subjective assessment, will always be moral (ethical) in all situations. E.g. Oskar Schindler's lack of the moral qualities 'loyalty' (to the Reich) and 'honesty' saved hundreds of Jews from death. This was moral behaviour. Statements such as "Character is our Moral maturity and commitment to doing the right thing regardless of the personal cost" are ridiculous when you consider that ethical behaviour is situational; not based on a subjective judgement of a person's supposed moral and mental qualities.
 * I agree that the article is too POV and has the tone of a sermon rather than an informational encyclopedia article, but the term moral character doesn't refer to whether that person's character happens to be morally good or not but to the fact that this type of character relates to morality (as opposed to a fictional character or character in psychology). This article doesn't mention that people can have weak moral character or strong moral character, for instance. Also, your contention that ethical behavior is (entirely) situational is a matter of heated debate among moral philosophers (consider ethical subjectivism, cultural relativism, meta-ethical subjectivism, utilitarianism, virtue ethics, deontology, moral skepticism, ethical egoism, (divine) command ethics, and all the other schools of ethics).--NeantHumain 07:03, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Bridge concept
"Character" means something to people and is often used in WP articles, sometimes in this sense. It might make sense to attempt to explicate the concept as used in WP articles and commonly and link it to the deeper articles in philosophy (ethics), psychology, psychotherapy (?), and religion. DCDuring 20:15, 10 September 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.9.41.151 (talk) 17:51, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

Fortitude
I suggest removing this entry from the list of example virtues, because it links to a page that redirects to Courage and perhaps replacing it with something else. --213.130.252.119 (talk) 23:41, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Biblical Definition?
Man's in God's image + Man should act according to God's will = A morally correct act is one that reflects God's character?

1) Act like Yahweh of the bible!?

2) How is this relevant?

I could maybe understand if that section were generically religious or comparative, or that adherants hold such incongruent notions of their holy books' ethics out of ignorance. Or possibly, sources permitting, that they deliberately reverse such tortured logic to say good adherants mean their deity is good as a way to defend the central premise of their social group. But an absurd syllogism asserted without citation and no context should be removed. Vhati (talk) 09:19, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

My problem with this section is that character becomes whatever one thinks his or her God's character is. It just assumes everyone knows what the character of God is. For me, God is just an element of mythology (and, in a sense, so is character). Does that work for you? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 160.39.88.17 (talk) 14:11, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 1 one external link on Moral character. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20150625195538/http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/2219685?uid=2129&uid=2&uid=70&uid=4&sid=21101034165653 to http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/2219685?uid=2129&uid=2&uid=70&uid=4&sid=21101034165653

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