Virtue, practices, and traditions › Why excellence in one activity is not enough

An account restricted to practices leaves important conflicts unresolved. A person may pursue valuable achievements in several activities while neglecting commitments elsewhere. Even two worthwhile practices can make incompatible demands on time. We need to ask how their goods fit into a human life, rather than assume that becoming excellent at one activity settles how to live.

MacIntyre develops this issue through the narrative unity of a life (chapter 15). Understanding an action involves its place in a history: a promise made, a responsibility inherited, a project pursued. A departure that appears arbitrary in isolation may become intelligible when we learn that someone is keeping an earlier commitment. People are answerable to one another for such connections between their actions.

Narrative unity does not mean inventing a flattering autobiography. We share our lives with other people whose claims and actions limit the stories we can truthfully tell. A coherent account must confront failures and conflicting obligations rather than edit them away. The ethical task concerns living and answering for a life, not merely describing it attractively.

MacIntyre presents that task as a quest for the human good. The search begins with some understanding of worthwhile ends, while experience and inquiry can deepen that understanding. It is neither an aimless search nor a guarantee of a tidy ending. His proposal is that virtues help sustain the pursuit of a good life across difficulties that cannot be evaluated within one practice alone.