Human nature and goodness › Questions the account must answer

One concern is variation within human life. People differ in abilities, circumstances, and worthwhile projects. A general account of human good must leave room for these differences without treating every individual choice as beyond criticism. The demanding question is how much common ground can support evaluation without imposing one narrow life on everyone.

A second concern is disagreement about what a need requires. People can agree that trust matters while disagreeing about a particular disclosure. They can agree that care matters while disagreeing about its limits. Natural goodness supplies an approach to these disputes, but naming a general good does not determine every application.

A third concern is the possibility of reasoning in a circle. If we identify human flourishing through the virtues, and defend the virtues only by calling them necessary for flourishing, a reader may reasonably ask what has been explained. An adequate defense needs developed accounts of the activities and relationships involved. It should show why the proposed characteristic belongs there.

These are tests of the account offered here, rather than a report that Foot gives a mechanical answer to every objection. They preserve the difference between explaining what her position proposes and deciding that it has succeeded. The attraction of her approach is the possibility of reasoning about moral evaluation through human life. Its difficulty is making that account sufficiently specific and defensible.