Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics

In the Nichomachean Ethics, Aristotle carefully considers the issue of responsibility and finds that the human being is indeed responsible for his or her actions and may be morally culpable even for unintended consequences. This applies both to the private conduct of individuals and to the conduct of legislators acting for the public good. For Aristotle, acting unjustly is tantamount to wishing to act unjustly. The individual is responsible both for his or her moral disposition and also for the manner in which moral questions are decided by him or her. Indeed, this is seen as a natural process so that the individual is born with the ability to differentiate between good and evil. For Aristotle, it does not matter whether the individual is born capable of differentiating good from evil or that this is ingrained by society over time as the individual grows to adulthood. In either case, the individual possesses the knowledge as an adult to know the difference and thus is responsible for the decisions he or she makes.

In Book III Aristotle discusses involuntary actions, or those that are done under constraint or due to ignorance. He says that the terms "voluntary" and "involuntary" are to be used only with reference to the moment of the action, and an action is to be judged based on its consequences at the time it is performed. Socrates stated that "no one is voluntarily wicked nor involuntarily blessed," and this shows an important and major assumption made by him reg

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