Unlike virtue ethicists and deontologists, consequentialists believe the ethics of a person or action should be judged by the consequences they produce. In other words, the outcome that most favorably affects the greatest number dictates a particular action. But the notion of favorability requires some standard according to which we … Read more
A natural progression exists in ethics regarding the focus of ethical judgments. Virtue theorists hold that morality resides within qualities (virtues) held by agents. Deontologists claim ethical judgment should be reserved for an agent’s actions; consequentialists, for the consequences of actions. The eighteenth-century German philosopher Immanuel Kant remains the most … Read more
“How much of what [an athlete] does is within his own control? As Paul Konerko reminds us, all of it. Even when it defies what we think we know.” – Christina Kahrl on ESPN.com A great article on human agency in the face of inevitability: Paul Konerko redefines challenges, expectations
As one of the three major approaches to ethical thought, virtue ethics seeks to describe the qualities that constitute a good person. Rather than focus on how one should act or the consequences one should endeavor to produce, virtue ethics examines the virtues held by a good person. A good … Read more
Dear Kinesophites: The first three months of this blog have served as an introduction to the topics I intend to discuss in this forum. My takes on deadlifting and The Myth of Sisyphus were intended to provide a first glimpse into the interplay between ethics and health and fitness, and I dedicated … Read more
“I do muscular work, because I have muscles; and if I don’t use my muscles I shall become a bad-tempered sitting-addict … Western intellectuals are all sitting-addicts. That’s why most of you are so repulsively unwholesome. In the past even a duke had to do a lot of walking, even … Read more
Obesity: the condition of an adult having a body mass index (BMI; equal to weight in kilograms divided by the square of height in meters) of 30 or higher. Though BMI does not account for lean, muscular individuals such as competitive athletes, there is no doubt obesity is on the … Read more
The deadlift. A sinister-sounding word for “how to lift something heavy off the ground without your knees exploding or spine snapping in half.” The deadlift is a simple motion requiring sound technique. Yet it is also highly practical and extremely effective at improving total body strength. An inexhaustible amount of … Read more
We’ve all heard the common refrain “lift with your legs—not your back” or seen images like this one on the side of a heavy box: But such advice can be misleading. According to Mark Rippentoe, whose career as a former competitive powerlifter and current strength coach and author is based … Read more
“The gods had condemned Sisyphus to ceaselessly rolling a rock to the top of a mountain, whence the stone would fall back of its own weight. They had thought with some reason that there is no more dreadful punishment than futile and hopeless labor.” So begins existentialist philosopher Albert Camus’ famous … Read more