Can Virtue Be Taught?

We argue about whether being good (having Virtue, Wisdom, Justice, and living a Good Life) can actually be taught. Then we're shocked that there are tons of skilled speakers, ship captains, musicians, builders, and farmers, but "good people" seem like a fairy tale, a myth like "Centaurs" or "Giants." We can't find a single perfect action, a flawless person, or a life without any shame. Even if someone is naturally good, that goodness gets hidden by lots of flaws, like good wheat mixed with weeds.

People learn to play the harp, dance, read, farm, and ride horses. They learn how to put on shoes and clothes, how to pour wine, and how to cook meat. You can't do any of these things well without being taught. But are we really saying that the very thing all these skills are for – living a Good Life – is unteachable, irrational, requires no skill, and is just a matter of luck?

Seriously! Why do we claim that virtue can't be taught, and by doing so, effectively make it nonexistent? If learning creates virtue, then preventing learning destroys it. Like Plato said, just because a poem doesn't fit the music, brothers don't go to war, friends don't fight, and countries don't attack each other.

Oh, mortals! Why do we claim that virtue can't be taught, and by doing so, effectively make it nonexistent? If learning creates virtue, then preventing learning destroys it.

Nobody claims that a war ever started over how to say a word, or that a couple ever fought over the details of weaving. But, nobody would try to weave, read, or play music without being taught. They wouldn't get hurt, but they'd look silly. (As Heraclitus said, "It's better to hide that you don't know.") But everyone thinks they can handle a family, a marriage, a town, a leadership job – without ever learning how to get along with people!

Diogenes saw a kid stuffing himself with candy and slapped the kid's teacher. He knew the problem was the one who didn't teach, not the one who didn't learn.

Diogenes, seeing a child gorging on sweets, slapped the boy's tutor. He rightly blamed the one who hadn't taught, not the one who hadn't learned.

Yet, do people enter into the relationships of a household, a city, a marriage, a way of life, or a leadership position without criticism, even if they haven't learned how to interact with others?

Someone asked Aristippus, "You're everywhere, huh?" He joked, "Then I'm wasting my price I pay for travel if I'm really everywhere." Shouldn't you also say, "If people don't get better from being taught, then we're wasting the money we pay teachers"?

Teachers are the first ones to get a child after they're done breastfeeding. Nurses shape the child's body; teachers, by teaching good habits, shape the child's character, helping them take their first steps toward being good. A Spartan teacher, when asked what he did, said, "I make good things fun for kids." And what do teachers teach? How to walk in public, how to eat different foods, how to sit, how to wear clothes.

So what? Someone who says doctors only deal with minor skin problems, but not serious illnesses, is like someone who says schools and rules are only for teaching little kid stuff, but for the big, important things, it's just brute force and luck. It's silly to say you need to learn to row a boat but can steer it without learning. It's the same as saying you learn other skills but not goodness.

But this person gives Reason, like an eye, to the subservient and supporting skills, while denying it to virtue.

Callias asked General Iphicrates, "What are you? An archer? A soldier? A horseman?" Iphicrates said, "None of those, but the one who commands them all." So, it's ridiculous to say you can teach someone to use a bow, fight in armor, or ride a horse, but being a leader just happens randomly, without any training! It's even more ridiculous to say that wisdom is the only thing you can't teach, because without wisdom, all the other skills are useless. If wisdom is in charge, organizing everything and putting everyone in the right place.

How can you enjoy a feast, even if the servants are well-trained and know how to cook the meat perfectly and pour the wine but there's no order among the servers?