Good life and action in Paul Ricoeur ́s ethics

Abstract

After presenting a map of Paul Ricoeur’s ethical philoso- phy, the following pages explore the way in which he adopts the Aristotelian concept of good life, thus to pinpoint its con- tinuity with the contemporary concept of action, proper to the analytical philosophy, though amplified by life’s practices and plans, in order to show a broader framework for ethics’ teleolog- ical perspective, according to which all human actions tend to a good that is simultaneously its end. The narrative unity of a life, from the stance of the hermeneutical philosophy developed by Ricoeur, is the working locus of every ethical reflection insofar it is a narrative that presents actions as moments of more complex actions, from which in turn surface increasingly broader teleo- logical schemes.

Keywords

• ética, vida buena, acción, Paul Ricoeur.