MODULE 3: The prime of life

RR31 (Nov 19) -- Movie assignment -- worth 5 points -- can't drop 

• movie workbook

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"Adulthood is the prime of life"

• there are various things you can mean by this
• there are various ways to argue for it
• Aristotle, Michael Slote

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Recap: Aristotle (Rhetoric)

1. People at midlife have greatest moral virtue
2. Youth and old people have moral weaknesses

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Michael Slote, "Goods and Lives" (from Goods and Virtues, which he wrote in 1990) -- annotated article

• also says adulthood is the prime of life
• but means something different by that 
• makes different arguments

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Time preference (time importance)

• Starts chapter by asking a question about "time preference"
• "time preference" is a misleading phrase -- better if he talked about "time importance"
• take 3 equal stretches of your life--at 5, 40, and 80--a day, an hour, a year
• Are life events equally or unequally important during those times?
• Clarification: setting aside later impact of the events and whether you'll remember them.
  

Two answers 

• No Time Preference (importance)
• an hour is an hour, a year is a year, all time intervals are equally important
• Time Preference (importance)
• events in some periods matter more than events in other time periods

Dominant view in philosophy: No Time Preference

But Slote supports Time Preference/Importance

1. generally, life events matter more in adulthood
2. generally, life events matter less in childhood and old age 

Note: he never says events in childhood have no impact on later life!  Having no impact is not the reason why they matter less.

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Slote's arguments. for Time Preference

1. Schoolboy/girl glories don't count much (p. 14) 
2. Dreams. A period of time can matter less, like the time when we are dreaming (p. 14-15)  
3. Irrationality? Do we discount child-time because children are irrational? no, it's becuase of  time of life (p. 16) SKIP
4. Period relative vs. overall goods  Childhood things are often important in a "period relative" way but not in an overall way (p. 18-19) 
5. Old age. Fortunes and misfortunes in old age are often "period relative" - winning at shuffleboard (or bingo) (p. 19)  
6. Period relative goods, continued. Some (but not all) goods of childhood/old age are period relative  (p. 20)  
7. In the "prime of life" what happens is not just period-relative, but important "in a total human life" (p. 21) 
8. People are like trees -- development, maturity, decay -- the mature stage is most important (p. 36)

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WORKBOOK (tab at top or QR code)

Pick one of these arguments to discuss and assess

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So much for the "praisers" of midlife--now we turn to the problems of midlife

Friday--people are not so happy in midlife...we'll discuss why
Monday--how to solve the problem of the midlife crisis (or avoid ever having one)