From a Phenomenology of the Reciprocal Nature of Habits and Values to an Understanding of the Intersubjective Ground of Normative Social Reality

Abstract

In this article I take a phenomenological approach to clarify the concept of habit and advance the discussion of the relation between habit and social reality. This approach clarifies what may be referred to as Aristotle’s understanding of the reciprocal nature of virtue in regard to the virtuous agent. Reading virtue, then, as a kind of disposition which determines the value system in which an agent participates, a phenomenological understanding of the intersubjective ground of social reality emerges. This advances the discussion of the relation between habit and social reality with a more robust understanding of normativity.