From Wikipedia on 5-Jan-2013
URL: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Courage
Courage is the ability to confront fear, pain, danger, uncertainty, or intimidation. “Physical courage” is courage in the face of physical pain, hardship, death, or threat of death, while “moral courage” is the ability to act rightly in the face of popular opposition, shame, scandal, or discouragement.
In some traditions, forti’tude holds approximately the same meaning as courage. In the Western tradition, notable thoughts on courage have come from philosophers such as Aristotle, Aquinas and Kierkegaard; in the Eastern tradition, some thoughts on courage were offered by the Tao Te Ching. More recently, courage has been explored by the discipline of psychology.
Theories of courage
Western antiquity and Middle Ages
Ancient Greece
There is a tradition moving back to Ancient Greek philosophy for counting courage or fortitude as one of the four cardinal virtues, along with prudence, justice, and temperance. (“Cardinal” in this sense means “pivotal”; it is one of the four cardinal virtues because to possess any virtue, a person must be able to sustain it in the face of difficulty.)
As a [desirable] quality, courage is discussed broadly in Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, where its vice of shortage is cowardice and its vice of excess is recklessness.
Ancient Rome
In the Roman Empire, courage formed part of the universal virtue of virtus.[2] Roman philosopher and statesman Cicero (106-43 BC) lists the cardinal virtues, but does not name them such:
“Virtue may be defined as a habit of mind (animi) in harmony with reason and the order of nature. It has four parts: wisdom (prudentiam), justice, courage, temperance.” (De Inventione, II, LIII)
Medieval philosophy
In medieval virtue ethics, championed by Averroes and Thomas Aquinas and still important to Roman Catholicism, courage is referred to as “Fortitude”.
According to Thomas Aquinas, “Among the cardinal virtues, prudence ranks first, justice second, fortitude third, temperance fourth, and after these the other virtues.”
Part of his justification for this hierarchy is that
“Fortitude without justice is an occasion of injustice; since the stronger a man is the more ready is he to oppress the weaker.”
On fortitude’s general and special nature, Aquinas says,
“the term “fortitude” can be taken in two ways. First, as simply denoting a certain firmness of mind, and in this sense it is a general virtue, or rather a condition of every virtue, since as the Philosopher states (Ethic. ii), it is requisite for every virtue to act firmly and immovably. Secondly, fortitude may be taken to denote firmness only in bearing and withstanding those things wherein it is most difficult to be firm, namely in certain grave dangers. Therefore Tully says (Rhet. ii), that “fortitude is deliberate facing of dangers and bearing of toils.” On this sense fortitude is reckoned a special virtue, because it has a special matter.”
Aquinas holds fortitude or courage as being primarily about endurance, not attack:
As stated above (Article 3), and according to the Philosopher (Ethic. iii, 9), “fortitude is more concerned to allay fear, than to moderate daring.” For it is more difficult to allay fear than to moderate daring, since the danger which is the object of daring and fear, tends by its very nature to check daring, but to increase fear. Now to attack belongs to fortitude in so far as the latter moderates daring, whereas to endure follows the repression of fear. Therefore the principal act of fortitude is endurance, that is to stand immovable in the midst of dangers rather than to attack them.
Eastern traditions
The Tao Te Ching states that courage is derived from love (“慈 loving 故 causes 能 ability 勇 brave”) and explains: “One of courage, with audacity, will die. One of courage, but gentle, spares death. From these two kinds of courage arise harm and benefit.”
Courage (shauriya) and Patience (dhairya) appear as the first two of ten characteristics (lakshana) of dharma in the Hindu Manusmṛti, besides forgiveness (kshama), tolerance (dama), honesty (asthaya), physical restraint (indriya nigraha), cleanliness (shouchya), perceptiveness (dhi), knowledge (vidhya), truthfulness (satya), and control of anger (akrodh).
As a strength in psychology
From the end of the twentieth century, courage has been a concept generating interest in the field of psychology. In 2004, Christopher Peterson and Martin Seligman’s book, Character Strengths and Virtues proposed a uniform way of classifying positive traits that highlight the elements of humanity that uplift humanity, Courage being among the key virtues. In addition, Seligman and Peterson founded the Virtues in Action (VIA) Institute and created the VIA survey which hope to bring this uniform categorization of human strengths to the masses. The VIA classifies human strengths in six, broad categories: Wisdom and Knowledge, Courage, Humanity, Justice, Temperance, Transcendence. Courage is broken down into four main subcategories: Bravery, Perseverance, Honesty, and Zest.
Bravery
Bravery is the subcategory most people generally associate with Courage. It is defined as “the ability to stand up for what is right in difficult situations.” As opposed to less sophisticated definitions that simply categorize bravery as fearlessness or acting when an observer would be afraid. There are several forms of this bravery. Physical bravery involves acting in spite of possible harm to one’s body. Moral bravery involves acting in a way that enhances what one believes to be good in spite of social disapproval and possible backlash. A third, theoretically newer, definition of bravery is psychological bravery which involves things such as overcoming one’s own addictive habits, irrational anxieties, and harmful dependent relationships. Psychological bravery means acting against one’s own natural inclinations and facing fears which might not have any societal moral implications. Bravery works well as a virtue in the VIA classification system because it is highly regarded across cultures and has obvious benefits for those surrounded by brave people. Possible problems with viewing bravery as a classifiable human strength is that it could be argued that bravery is not trait-like since it only comes out under certain circumstances. The counterargument to this claim is that bravery is trait-like in the same way creativity is considered a trait; both appear only in certain situations. The VIA claims that it is a positive psychological trait that can be found and cultivated in certain individuals.
Perseverance
Perseverance falls under the larger category of courage because it often involves continuing along a path in the midst of and after having faced opposition and perhaps failure. Perseverance involves the ability to seek a goal in spite of obstacles and has been shown in human and animal studies to be a lasting trait with individual differences. In order to persevere at a task, a person must be able to suppress desires to give up and pursue an easier task, a metacognitive understanding that the ends justify the persevering means. But beyond meta cognition, a person high in perseverance is able to overcome low self-esteem and estimations that one cannot do the task as well as discouragement from peers and the desire to present oneself well. As a categorical psychological strength, perseverance is regarded highly by society as opposed to laziness. However, its one weakness as an entry on the VIA as noted by Peterson and Seligman is that it may not be discernible from other human strengths and virtues. It especially can be seen as overlapping with self-control. However Peterson and Seligman maintain its distinctiveness, pointing out that perseverance “is explicitly shown across time, whereas control and regulation of oneself have a more here-and-now flavor”. More research needs to be done in this area to empirically show that perseverance belongs in its own distinct category.
Honesty
As defined by positive psychologists, honesty and authenticity as a subset of courage means more than simply telling the truth. It involves integrity in all areas of one’s life and the ability to be true to oneself and one’s role in the world across circumstances. Though perhaps one would not immediately associate honesty with courage, there are obvious situations in life where to be honest and authentic requires a great deal of strength in the midst of fear. The positive view societies have of honesty can be seen from the fact that it is something people try to develop in young children and adolescents. While all people seem to grow in their understanding of the moral importance of honest and integrity as they grow older, there are certain individuals who seem to especially excel in this human strength. This trait is important in many areas of life, so much so that many measurements have been developed in an effort to identify especially honest individuals. These measurements test both overt honesty, the thoughts one has about blatant dishonesty such as stealing, and covert honesty, which is very similar to conscientiousness and dependability. Of all the subcategories under courage in the VIA, Honesty shows the most promise as a distinct, well defined area of classification.
Zest
Of the four categories involved in courage, zest or vitality, is the one that has the most weaknesses as a classification. It is defined as, “feeling alive, being full of zest, and displaying enthusiasm for any and all activities”. This is a category that is influenced not only by subjective psychological factors, but also objective factors affecting one’s physical well-being such as chronic pain. The reason Peterson and Seligman group Zest together with other courageous virtues is that Zest most often comes forth as a character strength in the midst of trying circumstances. For example, it has been shown that people’s subjective perception of their situation when faced with chronic pain, judging their perceived ability to handle the situation and their general positivity, is able to influence their well-being. This zest can be shown to be trait-like across situations.