An Essay On Virtue
According to my experience in college, having a virtue is one of the key components to reaching your goals, it is a tool that helps you to have a grasp on what should be done and should not be done, nous is an element that requires you to have a principled way of thinking, a structured and specifically designed thought process, usually in order to bear this knowledge one must be self disciplined and strong willed. having a virtue means bearing an intellectual and apprehensive thoughts, and in my experience so far my intellectual and apprehensive thoughts are very much dependent on my way of prioritizing what I want more than what I need, Nous is a concept that maps out a way of thinking and that applies to how I map out my way through college, and all four of nous’s elements plays hand in hand to deliver a thought process that is rational to my wants and needs, those four elements includes episteme which represents science, techne which represents art, Sophia which represents wisdom and phronesis which represents prudence, all those four virtues have equal parts on someone’s intellectual and apprehensive thinking.
Let’s us start with episteme which in its own represents science, that means a way of thinking that is purely based on scientific comprehension, a way of thinking that is not filtered through ideologies and opinions, in some cases this knowledge is considered a realistic way of thinking and conducting a thought, I can see how this is one of the key virtues that someone who is in college would need, but so far with my journey in college, episteme is not an element that plays a significant role in my way of thinking, that is because what i study is mostly ideology based, even though architecture is a part of STEM, architecture on its own is a field that requires more opinion and individual creative thoughts rather than technological and scientific way of thinking, of course there is no doubt on how architecture is scientific and technological, but science is what made architecture not the other way around, so i think of it like a vessel that delivers the main ideas and goals of architects, it is something that works hand in hand with creativity so in hindsight is a vital but insignificant component.
Now lets move on to phronesis, i think this knowledge is a very critical component for making your way through college, to be adept in this knowledge one must have a good critical thinking and good judgment, what i think of Phronesis is that it is the base of having an organized and mapped out way of living, mastering phronesis means you know how to prioritize your goals, having to differentiate between your wants and needs, but most importantly making good, rational decisions, in college it is all about good decision making, in some instances i sometimes catch myself prioritizing my wants rather than my needs, which happens to a lot of individual, that type of decision making will lead to consequences that will later follow in time, those consequences may vary, it could be a minor inconvenience or a long term consequence that may change the course of your college study, for example, procrastination is one of the few things that came into mind when i think of phronesis, it is one of most common form of destructive habit that a lot of college student faces, though it seems menial and insignificant, it is now about the its significance that is the problem, it is how frequent that destructive habit occurs and reoccurs, so in hindsight phronesis is a knowledge that holds so much significance whether it is to students, workers or just a regular everyday basic knowledge.
Let us move to techne, techne is an element that contrasts with episteme, where as episteme means unfiltered science in its pure form techne opposes that, techne is a creative, ideology based way of thinking, it is the embodiment of “art’’, mastering this knowledge means one must be skilled in a certain field, usually it is a field that requires creativity, and in architecture techne is definitely an element that dominates more than the others, being in the architecture field means you must bare a fine taste and knowledge for craftsmen ship, but it’s not just knowing about what is good art and bad art, it should also be about the ability to skillfully craft one, because unlike episteme that is all about intellectual comprehensive skill and understanding something to a scientific degree, techne is all about creating and innovation, which is very in character with architecture, so i do feel techne represents a major portion of my nous mapping, for example when i have to come up with a design for a house lets say, i cannot just design a house that is there just to be a house, while it’s main purpose is to be a shelter, every aspects of the design must have a reason behind it, every line and curve, every color and every texture, that is why being adept at the techne knowledge is one of my goals while i am still in college, i can see how it will benefit me in the future and how i will be relying and using techne as a compass for architecture,
Now let us move to the last element, which will be sophia, sophia embodies both nous’s elements and episteme’s chractheristics, Nous involves a rational or intuitive grasp of necessary first principles, an intuitive first thought procces while Episteme involves a grasp of truths that can be delivered within the scope of scientific reasoning, that means sophia inherits both nous’ principled intuitive way of thinking and episteme scientific grasp on way of thinking qualities, but in my experience in college this knowledge is less prominent than the others, due to techne and nous having a bigger grasp on my thought process and also because sophia in its own sense is a submissive element that is usually only presents it self when the other element are dormant, at least for my experience that is, though sophia seems less significant, sophia holds the key to someone’s wisdom, therefore being adept in this knowledge will give oneself a benefit of seeing things from the perspective of a mature mind.
My Mayonnaise Jar 