Dependent Rational Animals: Why Human Beings Need the Virtues by Alasdair MacIntyre (review)

BOOK REVIEWS Dependent Rational Animals: Why Human Beings Need the Virtues. By ALAsDAIR MACINTYRE. The Paul Cams Lectures. Chicago and La Salle: Open Court, 1999. Pp. 186. $26.95 (doth). ISBN 0-8126-9397-3. I read this book under very appropriate conditions, during a sojourn in the hospital that provided me with a hands-on experience of its main themes: human vulnerability in sickness and old age-the result of our sharing in animality through our bodies-and our consequent dependence on others within family, social, and political contexts. Comprising a series of conferences, this book is the fruit of profound reflection on a topic too much neglected by philosophers: human weakness as related to our bodily condition. The author critiques the rationalist concept, Cartesian in inspiration, which posits a break between human beings and animals particularly for this reason, that the latter, not having language, therefore possess neither thought nor reasoning power. In the tradition of Aristotle and St. Thomas, Alasdair Macintyre mailltains that there is a similitude, a continuity, and a gradation from the animal to the human being. This is apparent in the behavior of animals such as dolphins with their hunting strategies. We have to attribute a certain form of reasoning activity to them because of the way in which they proceed in view of an end and communicate among themselves with a kind of prelinguistic understanding. Thus, as St. Thomas says, animals possess something similar to reason and free will. In the same way Macintyre believes, contrary to Heidegger, that the bodily behavior of human beings vis-a-vis the world was originally animal behavior, that this heritage subsists, and that it is only partially transformed by culture. Macintyre characterizes the human being as "an independent practical reasoner," possessing the ability to reflect on reasons for and means to ends, based on desires and pleasures evaluated according to criteria of what is good in itself for human beings and their full development. The independence envisioned here, however, in no way signifies personal isolation, as is the case with individualism, but includes a recognition of the need to depend on others. This starts in childhood, to which philosophers have paid scant attention. Education given by parents plays a capital formative role and should ultimately teach the child to act freely and to do what he thinks is right, even though eventually this may not please his teachers. Nevertheless, to attain this 473 474 BOOK REVIEWS maturity, the progressive acquisition of the moral virtues is indispensable: selfcontrol and, when necessary, detachment from desires through tempernnce; courage in the face of conflicts and difficuhies; justice, which ensures respect for others and collaboration with them; and prudence, which guarantees the quality of practical judgment and caHs for the interplay of the other virtues. External rules are helpful for this kind of formation, but do not suffice by themselves. Rules and the virtues work together to produce growth and the formation of self-awareness in cooperation with others The author's research seems to me to culminate in the complementarity that he establishes between giving and receiving in human action. This creates relationships of generous and true friendship, associating the virtues of dependency with those of independence and transcending the opposition between egoism and altruism. Here we come to the virtues as analyzed by St. Thomas. With justice go liberality, decency, mercy, and works of charity. In this connection, the author does not hesitate to criticize a treatise of Aristotle in which the "megalopsychos" or magnanimous man, in his grandeur, prefers not to recognize benefits received because they reveal his dependence on others. In this context, self-awareness and self-confidence develop in relation to the identity others attribute to us. Seeking excellence as an end that has value in itself combines with the sharing of others' points of view in friendly dialogue. The author is finally led to discuss political and social structures ordered to the common good, precisely in their reciprocal integration of the common and individual good. He enumerates three conditions required in every society: the right to affect political decision-making, norms of justice conformed to generosity (granting to each according to his capacity and...