Difficult Decisions and Post-phronetic Pain

Abstract

Abstract Phronesis oversees and adjudicates moral decisions in dilemmatic situations. But what happens after a phronetic decision has been made? The aim of this chapter is to refute the standard assumption that a fully phronetic decision is characterized by psychological unity and freedom from ambivalent emotions, without eliciting any post-phronetic pain (PPP). The second section shows that the absence of nonoptimal emotions after a phronetic decision creates a mystery for Aristotelian virtue theory. The third section examines three different, but unsuccessful attempts to save Aristotle’s face, by defanging the non-PPP assumption from within his virtue theory. The fourth section delineates the nature of the PPP (when it occurs) by arguing that it comprises a number of distinguishable emotions of moral sadness. The final section probes a number of resources within neo-Aristotelian theory that would allow us to reconceptualize PPP as beneficial to a certain extent, without fetishizing it as a pure blessing in disguise.