My dissertation resolves two longstanding paradoxes about courage. (1) Courage seems to require both fear and fearlessness – on the one hand, mastering one’s fear (e.g., "being scared to death but saddling up anyway”), and, on the other, eliminating fear (e.g., acting coolly, calmly, and collectedly in the face of danger). (2) Virtues are commonly thought to make virtuous actions easy and pleasant, but courageous action is (often) difficult and painful.
I resolve both paradoxes by isolating three phases of courageous activity: the initial response to the situation, the choice of courageous action, and the execution of courageous action. In response to the first paradox, I argue that fear is required in the initial response phase and fearlessness is required in the action's final execution phase. In response to the second paradox, I argue that pleasure is only required in the second phase at the choice of courageous action. In resolving these paradoxes, I engage ancient (especially Aristotle) and medieval philosophy (especially Aquinas) and contemporary research in virtue theory, philosophical psychology, and the philosophy and science of emotions.
Below are my responses to each paradox in more detail.
(1) Plausibly, courage is a virtue for achieving one’s (significant) ends in a situation made difficult by the presence of a significant threat by means of facing rather than fleeing the threat. There are rival accounts of courage that fit this description and I highlight their strengths and shortcomings. In contrast to views on which courageous activity requires emotionlessness, I argue that the emotions of fear, hope, and daring are required. In contrast to views on which courageous activity requires overcoming one’s emotions by means of will-power, I argue that the emotions of the courageous are not overcome but that each has a proper place in the phases of courageous activity and that each occurs according to the direction of the agent’s attention to what is appropriate at each phase. Fear is necessary for properly responding to a significant threat, hope is necessary for properly pursuing a significant but obstacle-laden goal, and daring is necessary for properly facing the significant threat as a means to attaining the significant goal. The transition from fear to hope to fearless daring is well-ordered and serves rational activity. My view resolves our first paradox because courageous activity requires both fear (to respond initially and properly to the situation) and fearless daring (to energize properly the execution of courageous action).
(2) In addition to proper fear, hope and daring, courage requires reasoning well and willing the right thing in the right way with the right kinds of pleasure. I build upon an Aristotelian account of pleasure which I use to argue that, although the execution of courageous action need not be pleasant in any way, two kinds of pleasure are required in the choice of courageous action. These two kinds of pleasure are what I call pleasure in the end of the action and pleasure in the moral worth of the action. I resolve the second paradox by qualifying the claim that courageous action requires pleasure by locating the required pleasures at the choice of action rather than in the action’s execution.
A benefit of my project is that it explains how the distinction that Aristotle draws between natural virtue (a non-morally admirable state), continence (a morally admirable but less than perfect state), and genuine virtue (a morally admirable state of perfection that requires a threshold but that admits of degrees) applies to courage. The naturally courageous agent possesses fear, hope, daring, and pleasure in the end. The continently courageous agent lacks these, but possesses pleasure in the moral worth of the action and morally worthy reasons for action. The genuinely courageous agent possesses the excellences of both the naturally and continently courageous: fear, hope, daring, pleasure in the end, pleasure in the moral worth of the action, and morally worthy reasons for action.