First of three lectures in the 2011 Annual Uehiro Lecture Series "Making Good: The Challenge of Robustly Demanding Values". Delivered by Philip Pettit, Laurance S. Rockefeller University Professor of Politics and Human Values at Princeton University.
My loyalty or fidelity or honesty means that I can be relied upon to display a concern for your interests across a range of possible scenarios, not just in actual or probable circumstances. But the good constituted by this robust concern materializes as a result of my virtuous dispositions, not just as a result of what I do. And so virtue is a way of making good, not just an aid to doing good; it creates value in its own right.
