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Chapter 1 8 contrary, she suggests that the ways in which some people excel in depending on each other, or the ways some people excel in caring for each other, can also be seen as ways in which they flourish. 33 I agree with MacIntyre and Feder Kittay that due to the common suggestion that flourishing human beings are individuals who ‘make it on their own’, there is too little attention for dependency, which is so central to what it means to be a human being. I agree with MacIntyre that we should ‘nurture’ our abilities to care for each other. However, MacIntyre’s virtues of acknowledged dependence are described as ideals, in the sense that they describe the excellent, or even perfect characteristics of the agent who faces situations in which she is dependent upon others. It is particularly these complex situations in human interactions in which we often do not succeed to behave perfectly, for example because of conflicting values (for example between one’s own and other people’s interests). To act ‘at once just, generous, beneficent, and from pity’ 34 is exactly what is the incredibly difficult thing to do as a human agent in a vulnerable, complex, intimate relationship. Instead of offering a ‘solution’ in the sense of cultivating the virtues of acknowledged dependence, i.e. again focusing on the effort-side of flourishing, I believe it important to pay attention to the ways in which we are not in control, i.e. look at the luck-side. I also agree with Feder Kittay that dependency is not necessarily a deciding factor in whether or not human beings are able to lead flourishing lives, in the sense that in so far as every human being and every human life is dependent on other human beings, this means that dependency in itself, without further qualification, cannot be used as a criterion of anyone’s flourishing. I disagree with Feder Kittay, however, that dependency should not be a factor in evaluating someone’s chances of a flourishing life, because there are degrees of dependency of which we can say that they are below a certain objective threshold of the capacities necessary to speak of someone being able to live a flourishing life. 35 But that does not affect the fact that dependency (which renders our flourishing fragile) is valuable – not in itself, but because it is an inherent aspect of what we deem a good human life, namely a life filled with intimate relationships and love. 36 I think it is important to be aware of the inescapable fact that if we would seek to eradicate all vulnerability from a human life, i.e. see that as perfect flourishing, we would necessarily have to adopt a conception of flourishing that does not (cannot) value things that render us vulnerable, such as friendship, and love. 37 33 Feder Kittay 2005, p. 468. 34 MacIntyre 1999, p. 121. 35 See Merriam 2010 who discusses anencephaly as a paradigm case of non-flourishing. 36 See Nussbaum 1986. 37 Nussbaum 1986, see also Wolbert 2018.