âA common saying among the Aztecs was that âthe earth (tlalticpac) is slippery, slickâ. Elsewhere, the meaning is clarified: âPerhaps at one time, one was of good life; later, he fell into some wrong, as if he had slipped in the mud.â The Aztecs held, in short, that itâs unrealistic to think that anyone can lead a perfectly good life, one in which you never slip up. A better goal, then, is to try to lead a rooted life, which they called neltiliztli: literally, rootedness. In this kind of life, one is able to manage the mistakes and slip-ups well, rather than avoid them altogether. [âŠ] What does it take to live a rooted life? [T]he fundamental insight behind the social dimension of Aztec ethics [is that] wisdom in human affairs consists in the recognition that the best that we can do is to learn to stand with the help of others, to alter our circumstances for the better, and to clasp hands so that we can pull ourselves back up when we fall. While Plato and Aristotle were concerned with character-centred virtue ethics, the Aztec approach is perhaps better described as socially-centred virtue ethics.â
â Sebastian Purcell, âLife on the slippery Earthâ in Aeon Magazine (via exhaled-spirals)
