The Bloomsbury Companion to Aristotle 9781472548290

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I am grateful to the editors at Bloomsbury for offering me the opportunity to compose this choral work and rethink the meaning of companionship in reading Aristotle: Sarah Campbell, David Avital, Rachel Eisenhauer. It has been a unique privilege to provide the site for this collection of outstanding contributions. Thanks also to Merilyn Holme for her logistical assistance. A particular manifestation of gratitude goes to Erick R. Jiménez, whose advice and availability have been decisive at many junctures. Finally, many thanks (grazie mille) to Alessandra Indelicato, whose love of things Greek knows no measure, for her assistance in the final stages of editing.

New York City November 2012

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CORPUS ARISTOTELICUM

The Aristotelian Corpus is presented here in the standard order of the Bekker edition (Berlin, 1831–70). Texts deemed spurious are marked “**” while “*” indicates texts whose attribution is disputed. A list of abbreviations is available in the Bibliography section. (1a1) Categories (Categoriae) (16a1) On Interpretation (De Interpretatione) (24a10) Prior Analytics (Analytica Priora) (71a1) Posterior Analytics (Analytica Posteriora) (100a18) Topics (Topica) (164a20) Sophistical Refutations (De Sophisticis Elenchis) (184a10) Physics (Physica) (268a1) On the Heavens (De Caelo) (314a1) On Generation and Corruption (De Generatione et Corruptione) (338a20) Meteorology (Meteorologica) ** (391a1) On the Cosmos (De Mundo) (402a1) On the Soul (De Anima) Parva Naturalia (“Little Physical Treatises”) (436a1) On Sense and the Sensibles (De Sensu et Sensibilibus) (449b1) On Memory and Recollection (De Memoria et Reminiscentia) (453b11) On Sleep and Wakefulness (De Somno et Vigilia) (458a33) On Dreams (De Insomniis) (462b12) On Divination in Sleep (De Divinatione per Somnum) (464b19) On Length and Shortness of Life (De Longitudine et Brevitate Vitae)

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CORPUS ARISTOTELICUM (467b10) On Youth and Old Age, On Life and Death (De Juventute et Senectute, De Vita et Morte) (470b6) On Respiration (De Respiratione) ** (481a1) On Breath (De Spiritu) (486a5) History of Animals (Historia Animalium) (639a1) On Parts of Animals (De Partibus Animalium) (698a1) On Motion of Animals (De Motu Animalium) (704a4) On Locomotion of Animals (De Incessu Animalium) (715a1) On Generation of Animals (De Generatione Animalium) ** (791a1) On Colors (De Coloribus) ** (800a1) On Things Heard (De audibilibus) ** (805a1) Physiognomonics (Physiognomonica) ** (815a10) On Plants (De Plantis) ** (830a5) On Marvellous Things Heard (De Mirabilibus Auscultationibus) ** (847a11) Mechanics (Mechanica) * (859a1) Problems (Problemata) ** (968a1) On Indivisible Lines (De Lineis Insecabilibus) ** (973a1) Situations and Names of Winds (Ventorum Situs) ** (974a1) On Melissus, Xenophanes, and Gorgias (980a21) Metaphysics (Metaphysica) (1094a1) Nicomachean Ethics (Ethica Nicomachea) * (1181a24) Great Ethics (Magna Moralia) (1214a1) Eudemian Ethics (Ethica Eudemia) ** (1249a26) On Virtues and Vices (De Virtutibus et Vitiis) (1252a1) Politics (Politica) * (1343a1) Economics (Oeconomica) (1354a1) Rhetoric (Ars Rhetorica) ** (1420a5) Rhetoric to Alexander (Rhetorica ad Alexandrum) (1447a8) Poetics (Ars Poetica)

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CORPUS ARISTOTELICUM The Constitution of the Athenians, not included in Bekker’s edition, was first edited by Sir Frederick Kenyon in 1891. Among the works extant in fragmentary form are: Gryllus or On Rhetoric (Gryllus sive De Rhetorica) Eudemus or On the Soul (Eudemus sive De Anima) Protrepticus (Protrepticus) On Ideas (De Ideis) On the Good (De Bono) On Philosophy (De Philosophia) A few other fragments or titles included in ancient catalogues (the oldest of which is in Diogenes Laertius’ Lives V.1) are: Symposium, Sophist, Nerinthus, Erotic, On Riches, On Prayer, On Good Birth, On Pleasure, On Education, On Kingship, Alexander or On Colonies, Statesman, On the Poets, and On Justice.

SOURCES Rose, Valentin, Aristotelis qui ferebantur librorum fragmenta, Leipzig: Teubner, 1886. Walzer, Richard Rudolf, Aristotelis Dialogorum fragmenta, in usum scholarum, Florence: Sansoni, 1934 (reprinted Hildescheim: Olms, 1963). Laurenti, Renato, Aristotele. I frammenti dei dialoghi (2 vols), Naples: Loffredo, 1987.

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LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS

Idit Dobbs-Weinstein Vanderbilt University USA

Pierre Aubenque Université Paris IV Sorbonne, Institut International de Philosophie France

Arianna Fermani Università di Macerata Italy

Claudia Baracchi Università di Milano-Bicocca Italy

Benjamin J. Grazzini The University of Toledo USA

Enrico Berti Università di Padova Italy

Erick R. Jiménez Universidad de Navarra (Pamplona) Spain

Rémi Brague Université Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne, France Ludwig-Maximilian Universität (München) Germany

Pavlos Kontos University of Patras Greece

Barbara Cassin Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (Paris) France

Helen S. Lang Villanova University USA

Marcia Sá Cavalcante Schuback University College of Södertörn (Stockholm) Sweden

Christopher P. Long Pennsylvania State University USA

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LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS Kalliopi Nikolopoulou State University of New York—Buffalo USA

Alejandro Vigo Universidad de Navarra (Pamplona) Spain

Martha C. Nussbaum University of Chicago USA

Michael Weinman European College of Liberal Arts—Bard (Berlin) Germany

Spyridon Rangos University of Patras Greece

Russell Winslow St. John’s College (Santa Fe) USA

Eric Sanday University of Kentucky USA

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY

[T]here came to be established a form of philosophy that, though it had two designations, was one and concordant, that of the Academics and the Peripatetics, who, though agreeing regarding things, differed in name . . . [A]nd those with Aristotle were called the Peripatetics, because they used to debate while walking in the Lyceum, while the others, since they carried on Plato’s custom of getting together and holding conversation in the Academy, which is another gymnasium, got their designation from the name of the place. But both drew a great deal from Plato’s abundance. . . . Indeed, at first this was one philosophy with two names, as I said, for there was no difference between the Peripatetics and the old Academy of that time. Aristotle, as it seems to me, brought to it a certain copiousness of intellect, but both shared the same source and likewise distinguished things into desirable and repellent. Cicero, Academica I.iv.17

Gryllus or On Rhetoric (polemically engaging the art of rhetoric as systematized by Gorgias and Isocrates), Eudemus or On the Soul (in antiquity, and even by later neo-Platonists, held to be the equal of Plato’s Phaedo), Protrepticus (extensively cited by Iamblichus of Apamea), On Ideas (ideally situated in the context of the debates on Plato’s thought, within Plato’s Academy itself), On the Good (engaging Plato’s teaching on principles and reconfiguring the question of the ideas), and On Philosophy (anticipating various aspects of Aristotle’s later treatises on first philosophy, from his characteristic philosophy of history and critical analysis of past and present discussions, to the

When Aristotle came back to Athens in 335/334, he was about 50, widely known, and highly regarded. Yet, it seems likely that his fame rested then on texts that are now for the most part lost. With this return to the place where, still a teenager, he had come to study with Plato, begins the most fecund period of his life. The majority of the works composing the Aristotelian corpus as we know it probably date back to the years 335/334–323, when, having founded his own school in Athens (the Peripatos), Aristotle devoted himself to systematic teaching and concomitant writing. Aristotle had written copiously in the past when he studied at Plato’s Academy (367/366–348/347 ca): writings such as 1

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY interrogation of principles in their multiplicity and unity) enjoyed wide circulation and remarkable appreciation. With the necessary caution, due to the lack of a reliable chronology, other texts are frequently attributed to the period following Aristotle’s departure from the Academy and from Athens—when he traveled to Asia Minor, visiting Hermias of Atarneus (347–345/344), and then to Mytilene (345/344–343/342), subsequently to become the teacher of Alexander, son of the Macedonian king Philip II (343/342– 340). Suffice it to mention, here, the treatise On the Cosmos (almost unanimously held to be spurious, yet most influential throughout the Middle Ages and Renaissance, and available in numerous Latin translations)1 as well as On Kingship and Alexander or On Colonies, which may be ascribed to the years at the Macedonian court. Prior to Aristotle’s return to Athens and the founding of the Peripatos, then, numerous published texts had made him a conspicuous figure, prominently discussed in philosophical circles and in the public space alike. The exoteric writings were admired as well for their polished diction and artful composition, so much so that in later antiquity Aristotle was still remembered for the transporting force of his eloquence, celebrated as a “golden stream” (Cicero, Academica II.xxxviii.119) of distinctive suavitas (Quintilian, Institutionum Oratoriarum X.i.83). Indeed, we also have evidence of Aristotle’s practice in lyric composition, most notably two poems dedicated to Hermias, the friend from the times of the Academia—an epigram on his death and a commemorative song. Perhaps tellingly, the latter begins with an invocation of virtue, said to require much labor (ἀρετὰ πολύμοχθε), and ends with the evocation of Zeus the preserver of strangers, and the gift of steadfast friendship.2

Yet, what for about two millennia has been transmitted as the corpus aristotelicum includes almost exclusively writings from Aristotle’s years at the Peripatetic school. This body of work, closely associated with the teaching activity, though not necessarily reducible to the status of lecture notes, has survived in the systematization by Andronicus of Rhodes (first-century bc). This proved to be a momentous crystallization indeed, securing the transit of the corpus across centuries in an unvaried order and still providing the blueprint for Immanuel Bekker’s edition (Berlin, 1831–70). With the arrival of Aristotle’s original manuscripts in Rome3 and the edition by Andronicus, the esoteric texts pertaining to the Peripatetic courses, that is, Aristotle’s opera as we know it, became more broadly available than ever before. In the wake of this fateful event, a new perception of Aristotle began to take shape and, simultaneously, the exoteric writings earlier enjoying vast circulation began to sink into oblivion. Clearly the esoteric texts, in their difficulty and depth, imposed themselves at once as Aristotle’s outstanding contribution, eclipsing the public writings by virtue of their sheer stature. The material loss of the exoteric texts is probably, at least to some extent, the counterpart of this cultural/epochal shift. But a brief consideration is in order, concerning the nature of Andronicus’ catalogue and the implications of its ordering—even aside from the various collations and textual interventions attributed to him. There is almost universal concordance on the arbitrary and anachronistic character of this operation.4 It has been said that Andronicus forced Aristotle into a Hellenistic philosophical framework and, above all, that the systematic stringency driving Andronicus’ project was quite foreign to Aristotle’s own way of proceeding. Now, it may in fact be 2

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY edition, harbored in a millenary tradition and reaching us via Bekker—is this at all systematic, in the sense of a closed and self-enclosed doctrinal construct? In other words, are the preoccupations regarding the extraneousness of the ancient editorial decisions perceptive enough and to the point? It seems to me that the contrary is rather the case. Let us consider, albeit very succinctly, the progression fixed by Andronicus, from the focus on logical/“instrumental” discursivity, to the discourses on physical matters, to the psycho-biological discussions, to the question of principles and origins, to the study of human, ethical and political issues, and finally to discursivity, again, but in light of beauty, creativity, and the disclosiveness thereof. Reading, thinking with, or encountering Aristotle will have involved this transition: from logos to phusis to praxis.

dubious that Andronicus was the eleventh scholarch of the Peripatos and, consequently, it may be ill-advised simply to presume that his editorial decisions might faithfully reflect the organization of studies at the Peripatetic school. Furthermore, if Andronicus was convinced that one should read the Aristotelian texts starting from the logical treatises, he had his first critic in his student, Boethus of Sidon, who thought instead that one should access the corpus through the Physics. And yet. Yet, however cautiously, it may perhaps be fruitful to consider the matter in a less prejudiced fashion. Perhaps, indeed, the matter is not this straightforward. In the first place, systematicity may be said in many ways. As has consistently been acknowledged, certainly we do find in Aristotle a systematic vocation—if by this we mean the constant effort at drawing connections and magnifying webs of relations, at seizing the organic articulation of problems that only appear extraneous to each other, and at pursuing the interpenetration of questions of unity and multiplicity, singularity and the whole, finitude and immensity. Aristotle’s thinking is distinctively architectonic and always driven to situate the individual holistically. Every student or scholar of Aristotle may grant this. Thus, when scholars consider Andronicus’ initiative problematic, saying it would force Aristotle’s texts into a systematic unity alien to it, they must have in mind another sense of the word “system”: system in the modern, or even late-modern, Hegelian sense. This would indeed be genuinely alien to Aristotle. Systematizing Aristotle’s work in this manner would mean turning the open systematicity that envisions interconnections into the self-enclosed system that claims to have resolved multiplicity into totality—with no residue. But is this what Andronicus’ ordering does? Is the trajectory envisioned in his

*** Thus, one must start with the logical treatises. Or perhaps not quite: Aristotle does not speak of “logic” (this will be a Stoic innovation), but addresses the manifold phenomenon of legein, of logos—how speaking is possible and how it articulates itself in predication/attribution (Categories); how speaking pertains to that which is and is not, let alone that which may be and is not yet (On Interpretation); how logos as sullogismos can be demonstrative, show an unassailable truth, through what figures and modes (Prior Analytics); how demonstration is possible, that is, how premises and definitions (the starting points) are obtained (Posterior Analytics); how argumentation as dialectical exchange can be artfully sustained (Topics, Sophistical Refutations). The gathering of these discourses, opening the course of studies according to Andronicus, constitutes the Organon: quite literally, the tool, the 3

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY Aristotelian program proceeds to consider how the world as such is encountered. The Physics and, more broadly, the various treatises on cosmology and becoming concern precisely the world encountered in its dynamic unfolding and constant transformation: phusis. The beings of nature are those beings having the principle of motion and rest in themselves (Physics 192b13–14), each moving according to its own nature and belonging in nature as the comprehensive field of motility—far from inert matter mechanistically explainable. It is clear that the question of life imposes itself precisely in this connection. The psycho-biological treatises are a necessary and intrinsic development of issues confronted in the study of physics. The cosmos itself, phusis as a whole, is approached in the perspective of pervasive aliveness (though with different outcomes, say, in De Philosophia, Metaphysics XII, and De Caelo), in light of the sentience and vibrancy characteristic of living organisms. From this macroscopic level all the way to the most minute living beings (from cosmology to biology, via De Anima), the psychological questions are questions variously addressing the phenomenon of the animal, the animate, and animation. The trajectory of Andronicus’ Aristotle leads only at this point to “first philosophy.” That Aristotle did not have, let alone think, the word “metaphysics” has been amply discussed with diverse results, and I shall leave it aside here. For, in the first place, prior to taking a position on whether or not Aristotle “had” a metaphysics, it would be relevant to think through this problem in light of the fact that conceptual categories are not ahistorical, transhistorical entities, translatable and transposable from one epoch to another, across time and space, while remaining constant and intact. Indeed, Aristotle was among the thinkers most acutely aware of such

instrument propaedeutic to any kind of discussion and inquiry. Aristotle does not speak of logic but of analysis, of analytics, analutike-: at stake is taking apart, examining by laying out a complex subject matter in its elemental components. Strictly speaking, analysis is not a science,5 but rather the illumination of the presuppositions always already implicit in every scientific endeavor, in fact, in every gesture of logos: methodological awareness, one can say, is the capacity for proceeding along a path (hodos) of inquiry while cultivating the consciousness of the structural conditions involved (Metaphysics 1005b3). It also prepares one to distinguish between different ways of proceeding, assessing the most appropriate in each case: it is in virtue of this kind of study that one knows that demonstrations must come to an end at some point, and is therefore prepared to abstain from asking for a demonstration of everything (1006a2–11). Again, by virtue of this preliminary education, one knows when it is fitting to ask for demonstrations and when the situation calls for other approaches—indemonstrability being the common trait both of first principles (Posterior Analytics) and of becoming in its instability and fluctuation (Nicomachean Ethics 1094b11–27). Not a science in any proper sense, but rather the methodological consciousness that can make the practice of inquiry (scientific and otherwise) perspicuous to itself, the analysis of logos (logic, if you will) designates nothing formal, let alone abstract. It is always rooted in worldly involvements and practices at once preceding and enveloping it. Thus rooted, it allows one to seize more lucidly how the paths of inquiry are sustained, articulated, and drawn across the world’s open expanse. Starting from such considerations on how the world is traversed, Andronicus’ 4

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY is the examination of first principles as they operatively display themselves in the world and inform human practices—while, in turn, human practices critically shape the ways in which issues such as first principles emerge as problems and are interrogated. The architectonic discipline of ethics/politics, and the exercises of dialectical confrontation and poetic articulation embedded therein, determine the way in which principles come to appear at all. They make it clear that political stipulations will never have been secondary, derivative issues. They likewise illuminate the work of investigation as never simply separable from the contribution of creativity and the decisions involved in creative construction. Creativity itself emerges as a mode of exploration and disclosure no less than scientific inquiry. The treatises of this last segment present the self-conscious insight of the inquirer increasingly aware of the conditions and delimitations of her own pursuits. Far from paralyzing, the fact that all human endeavors, including theoretical investigation (NE 1094a1), are thus framed, lucidly situates the human in the awareness of its own finitude and, at the same time, in the openness to that which transcends and exceeds it—that which cannot be reduced to the human and its mortality, yet appears only through it.

difficulties pertaining to the philosophy of history, the genealogy of concepts, the finitude and mortality of cultures (Metaphysics I and II could hardly be more peremptory in this respect, as is Metaphysics XII.8). Secondly, however, in the present context the question of “metaphysics” in Aristotle seems less than compelling—for, even if Aristotle should have thought the being simply separate and unmoved, the point is how this thought would be woven into the fabric of his comprehensive reflection, where and at what juncture of the encompassing movement of his thinking this moment would be situated. The discussions surrounding “first philosophy” follow, according to Andronicus, those on physical, physiological, and psychological matters. It is only through the study of such issues that one comes to the questions of first philosophy. Only by attending to the physical may one come to the possibility of interrogating the physical in such a way as to transcend it, or as if transcending it—or, again, in such a way as to begin to envision the principles belonging to all the beings of phusis, principles so common and archaic that they no longer bear any resemblance to anything determinate. The principle of determination and determinacy in and of itself has no determinate outline. Whether or not the physical can actually be left behind, this is another matter, and a problematic one—as the discussion in Metaphysics IV paradigmatically shows, aiming as it does to speak of “being qua being” and the axiomatics of noncontradiction, yet at the same time necessarily maintaining an argumentation consistently ethico-practical in tenor. After the discussion on first philosophy, Aristotle’s trajectory culminates with the ethico-political treatises and comes to a close with the Rhetoric and Poetics, showing that the ultimate concern of the Greek philosopher

*** In the wake of this drastically abbreviated overview of the Aristotelian trajectory according to Andronicus, two brief remarks are in order—one systematic and the other historical in nature, both essentially philosophical. First, it seems hardly the case that the order envisioned by the ancient editor would amount to a closed system, in the sense of a static, lifeless systematization having extinguished all residual questions. If what was exposed above is at all sustainable, far from 5

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY volume, as will become clear below, is organized according to Andronicus’ decision. In collective volumes aiming to present the arc of Aristotle’s work in its entirety, it is not unusual to come across remarkable ways of ordering— remarkable precisely to the extent that they go without saying. The most remarkable among them is the choice to have Logic followed by Metaphysics, and only subsequently Physics and the other disciplines. This sequence displays the unquestioned, unwarranted privileging of formal-theoretical knowledge over against modes of investigation that, in one and the same gesture, are understood as “applied” or derivative. This posture, dominant in the Anglo-American tradition but by no means its exclusive prerogative, rests on not-so-self-evident assumptions regarding the hierarchical dualism of reason and experience. Whether or not one formally commits to a dualistic position (and today many do not), a certain protectiveness of reason’s unaffected and nonaffective exercise undeniably abides untarnished—a defense of freedom, separation, and autonomy (from life, ultimately). While this posture is prevalent after Descartes and Kant, the axiomatic projection of it onto ancient philosophy and the dissimulation of perhaps unbridgeable discontinuities seem worthy of being interrogated. As for the second remark, let it simply be said that one should wonder at the characterization of Andronicus’ edition as Hellenistic and therefore anachronistic and un-Aristotelian. The development recalled above, opening with analytical propaedeutics and leading from physics to first philosophy, to ethics/politics, seems rather inscribed in Greek philosophy from Plato’s and Aristotle’s time, and to constitute, as it were, the deep syntax of the Platonic/Aristotelian meditation. Does Plato not draw precisely this trajectory in the erotic ascent narrated by Diotima

having brought questions to rest and obtained conclusive and inclusive mastery over them, the course of studies outlined leads us to an open-ended culmination. In this culmination we may enjoy at once the possibility of a contemplative grasp of the whole and the persistence of limiting and obscuring conditions, conditions which are ineliminable because they are constitutive of us. We are made of this: constitutively open to that which we are not. Thus, rather than leading to the totalizing assertions of a fully accomplished, all-embracing rational system, this course of study fosters a certain awareness. It allows us (individually and collectively, alone and together), perhaps, fleetingly to glimpse the conditionality of our contemplation, its intermittent nature, its never being complete but always stretching out (the orexis at the threshold of Metaphysics I) to completeness and perfection. This is a sober reminder of the open structure that the human is: open, incomplete, and finding precisely in such openness and incompletion its distinctive trait. Thus, the open systematicity the editor brought to bear on the Aristotelian corpus emerges as altogether foreign to the modern system of rationalistic/idealistic inspiration. It emerges as an altogether unusual path of inquiry that leaves the problematic dimension of thinking unresolved. The philosophical significance of this trajectory, neither modern nor familiar, will be seized and deliberately thought through in the Judeo-Arabic context, in which the meditation on first philosophy always finds its fulfillment in the capacity for ethico-political regeneration—as in Avicenna’s paradigmatic Science of Divine Things, from the Book of Healing (Kitab al-Shifa), which in the end comes to rest in the return to human (political, ethical, religious) institutions. Because of the philosophically compelling reasons of this systematization, the present 6

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY the best of the animals, this too would make no difference; for there are also other things much more divine in [their] nature than the human being, like the most visible things (phanero-tata) of which the cosmos is composed” (1141a35–b1). Far from being an extraneous superimposition, the indication of a metaphysics proceeding out of physics and flowering into ethical formation seems to lie at the heart of Aristotle’s thinking.

in the Symposium? From beautiful bodies, to the psychological beauty manifest in worldly undertakings, to the beauty of knowledge, to the wondrous contemplation of beauty itself (if at all possible), to the possibility of giving birth to true excellence in this life together (210a–212a), the way up maintains its contact with the point of departure, and always returns, and blossoms like a seed planted in this terrain here. We endlessly encounter in Plato this circulation between below and above, upwards and backwards—one of its celebrated figures being that of the cave, which not only entails the liberation of the prisoner but also necessitates the coming back. But we can likewise think of the course of education in Republic VII, from mathematics, to geometry, to astronomy, to harmonics, in order finally to confront the most arduous task— taking care of things here. The path leads one all the way across the sky, and back to the polis, where the enterprise comes to completion, with dialectic assisting in the assessments and reckonings of which humans, individually and as a community, are capable. And do we not find traces of the same journey in Aristotle—even in unlikely circumstances, such as, for example, the elaboration of sophia (Nicomachean Ethics VI)? Sophia, the highest intellectual accomplishment, the capacity for the contemplation of the whole, is here disclosed as that which encourages a lucid ethical stance, the acknowledgment of the finitude and situatedness of human beings. It is precisely in virtue of this insightful reaching beyond exclusively human affairs, looking upwards, that the question may be broached, concerning the proper place of humans in the kosmos. Similarly, in a kind of nonanthropocentric turn, the insight of sophia may intimate that humans are perhaps not “the best of beings in the universe” (1141a22): “And if one were to say that the human being is

*** A volume conceived as a Companion in the adventure of reading Aristotle addresses an audience already initiated to ancient Greek philosophical discourse. The central task of such a volume, thus, is accompanying the reader (the advanced student, the discerning reader, even the scholar) from various degrees of familiarity with the themes and lineaments of ancient philosophy, into a deeper intimacy with the author at issue. Along this trajectory, the reader needs elucidation of complex discussions as well as an exposure to the problematic issues in scholarly interpretation. The collection presented here includes studies with a historical/philological focus as well as discussions rooted in recent/contemporary debates that show the fecundity and lasting energy of Aristotle’s thought. From the start, my inclination has been to gather a multiplicity of heterogeneous voices and to retain their irreducibility. I conceived of a volume presenting perspectives somewhat unusual in the context of Anglo-American debates in this field, without, however, bringing the various contributions into a uniform view, let alone imposing stringent directives, whether stylistic or doctrinal. I wished to set side by side diverse philosophical orientations, interpretive sensibilities, and paths of research that, if not incompatible, may be in tension with each 7

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY situates Aristotle between the claims of an ancient proto-phenomenological posture and those of rhetoric. The former would demand that one attend to phenomena and let logos emerge from them, so that saying what one sees may be granted in its truth by such an intimacy with the seen—a nascent striving for adequation of word to being that, according to Cassin, would lay down the conditions for modern and later dualisms. The latter would prompt one to attend to the creative gestures of logos, which originally light up the world in its visibility, thus literally allowing one to see. In what ends up being yet another confrontation between philosophy and sophistry, the Organon is examined along with the Rhetoric and Poetics, showing the continuity between the alpha and omega of the corpus (whose circularity is, thus, illuminated), in the sustained effort to explore the implications of speaking. With a phenomenological (rather than sophistical/rhetorical) emphasis, Russell Winslow focuses on the attainment of definitions (the origin and condition of all demonstrative endeavor) from the dialectical assessment of received discourses molding prior experience. In the essay “Aristotelian Definition: On the Discovery of Archai,” Winslow seizes in Aristotle what could be called a dialectical naturalism—the journey from what is according to us toward what is in itself, an ongoing task of attunement declining any claims to revelation and pretenses of objectivism.

other, because I am convinced of the richness, resonance, and fruitfulness of such juxtapositions without a conclusive synthesis. Such a polyphony may guide the reader without condescension, variously making forays into the Aristotelian corpus, while refraining from minimizing difficulties, from closing gaps, or from resolving what instead might profitably be articulated as an abiding problem. Indeed, assisting in the exercise of reading involves, along with the task of clarification, formulating questions as such and suggesting further lines of inquiry. Most of the essays were specially commissioned for the occasion, and I was delighted at the enthusiasm this project elicited from those I contacted, whether friends or colleagues I never met before, regarded as authorities in the field or at the early stages of academic recognition. However, this project also provided an occasion for presenting in translation works unavailable in English, although written by highly respected authors. As anticipated, the contributions are organized following Andronicus’ ordering. The sequence begins, therefore, with two readings of Aristotle’s meditation on the phenomenon of human logos.

LOGOS Prior even to the institution of logic as we know it, at stake in this section is the phenomenon of utterance in its possibility and nascent manifestations, and hence the connections between word and phenomenon—indeed, between naming, discursivity, structure of argumentation, and ontology. In “Saying What One Sees, Letting See What One Says: Aristotle’s Rhetoric and the Rhetoric of the Sophists,” Barbara Cassin

PHUSIS Pursuing the question regarding the nature and procedure of Aristotle’s discourses on phusis, in “Aristotle on Sensible Objects: Natural 8

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY with logos. Gathering and dividing, the operation of logos is shown at the heart of the now—the unity into which prior and posterior are brought together (while still abiding as two), the divided union that is never simple, never simply resolved, in fact always opening into that which it is not. The analysis of time reveals logos (articulation, configuration, number) at work in phusis as well as psuche- and, at the same time, undergoing in its articulation the tremor of a subject tending to dissolve into the predicate. The logic of time reveals the time of logic, that is, the implications of time at the heart of logic.

Things and Body” Helen Lang comprehensively examines Aristotle’s “science of natural things” from Physics to De Caelo, from On Generation and Corruption to texts in the Parva Naturalia, situating these discussions in the context of the ancient and archaic doctrines, in particular those of the atomists, and concentrating on the relation of form and matter. She then proceeds to call into question the well-known trope depicting Aristotle as an empiricist. Such a characterization of Aristotle clearly reflects an attempt to come to terms with his consistent appeal to phenomena and indefatigable striving to adhere to things as they are. Yet, Lang maintains, insofar as the empirical account is held to be posterior and secondary vis-à-vis the account of essence (i.e. insofar as one dwells on the dualism of experience and formal knowledge, or appearing and being), an altogether central trait of Aristotle’s way of inquiry is missed—namely, the intimation that it is in experiencing natural phenomena that one comes to essences. In the end, the descriptive/phenomenological approach magnifying the role of experience confirms the enduring meaningfulness of Aristotle’s physics and shows it as a possible resource for a critique of the ethos of abstraction distinctive of the modern/contemporary sciences. Through the interpretation of Aristotle’s discourse on time, Rémi Brague further delves into the relation between natural/psychological phenomena and essential (indeed, logical) structures, highlighting both the inherently logical/discursive articulation of motion/time and the unsettling of logical, grammatical, and syntactic order signaled most notably in the dispersion of the subject. In the concluding sections of his seminal work “On Aristotle’s Formula Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ὌΝ: Physics IV.11, 14,” Brague illuminates the dynamic unity of the “now,” and thereby the emerging structure of time, in their essential connection

PSUCHEˉ Aristotle’s discourses on the psuche- are approached with particular attention to the themes of intellect and imagination, but also from the point of view of the basic phenomenon of animal psychism—aliveness in the broadest sense. Focusing on the problems surrounding Aristotle’s treatment of the intellect (nous), Erick Raphael Jiménez’s essay, “Mind in Body in Aristotle,” allows the issue of perception, whether imaginal or intellectual, to emerge in its complexity. After recalling the interpretive orientations favoring a view of the intellect in its separation from body, Jiménez lays out what he calls an aesthetic interpretation delineating the ways in which the intellect is indeed not separate, and how its embodiment (and, hence, sensibility and imagination) may configure the reception/ formation of intelligibles. Eric Sanday turns to the thematization of the living organism in De Anima, in order to consider the relation between psyche and soma and, even more pointedly, the capacity for discernment emerging in the dynamic 9

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY the trajectory of the text known as the Metaphysics—a remarkable study in its extensiveness and ambition systematically to account for the unitary architecture of the text without downplaying or disguising the unresolved moments of aporia. Vigo confronts the “science of first principles” in the genetic perspective of Metaphysics I, emphasizing the terminological as well as thematic proliferation characterizing this discipline, its novelty and originality as well as its “naturalness” and archaic roots. On this ground, and through the assessment of diverse and often contrasting scholarly stances, he spans the discourses on “being qua being” in its “many-wayness,” on predication and the question of truth, on the connections between the language of being, that of “substance” (ousia), and that of divinity. The concluding open-ended remarks, concerning whether the unmoved mover (i.e. the ultimate principle) is one or many, leaves us with problems altogether not marginal. Spyridon Rangos’ contribution, “First Philosophy, Truth, and the History of Being in Aristotle’s Metaphysics,” focuses on the historicity of the ontological discourse, that is, on the temporality at the heart of thinking (even and most notably the thinking at stake in first philosophy) as well as the inaugural philosophy of history outlined in this context. The science of being has come to be shaped and finally to take place as such in virtue of a complex, stratified genealogy: problems have been handed down, received, or lost, along with diverse intertwined discussions, cultural exchanges, and inflections. Moreover, and even more crucially, Rangos sets into relief Aristotle’s concern (particularly keen in this turn to the first and ultimate principles/causes) with the altogether human conditions allowing for the “attainment of truth.” Here of course Metaphysics

interaction of the living organism with its environment, an interpenetration and constant exchange that are constitutive of the animal as such. In his essay “Phantasia in De Anima” imagination is shown as decisive with respect to animal motility and essential to the discriminating power, thus revealing a constructive dimension inherent in the movements of perception. Marcia Sá Cavalcante Schuback’s contribution, “The Hermeneutic Slumber: Aristotle’s Reflections on Sleep,” principally addresses three treatises from the Parva Naturalia, On Sleep and Wakefulness, On Dreams, and On Divination in Sleep, in a twofold discussion. On the one hand she outlines Aristotle’s analyses of modes of consciousness, whether wakeful or dormant. On the other hand she seizes the issue of sleep in its methodological reverberations and allows it to inflect and frame the entire discussion. In this light, the author calls for a hermeneutical approach receiving the corpus of ancient texts as a sleeping body, rather than confronting the past as if it were a corpse. Not surprisingly, the Aristotelian discourses on psychism, indeed, the overall meditation on aliveness and the interpenetration of consciousness and unconsciousness, emerge in their unexhausted richness, belonging in conversations with modern/ contemporary voices, from Freud to Husserl and beyond.

ˉ TEˉ PHILOSOPHIA PRO The engagements with the treatises comprehensively addressing phusis and the animation pervading it are followed by essays on Aristotle’s philosophia pro-te-. “First Philosophy,” by Alejandro Vigo, exposes 10

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY contemplation and architecture. Martha C. Nussbaum, in “Aristotle on Human Nature and the Foundations of Ethics,” with an “Addendum,” takes up this fundamental task in a fecund debate with Bernard Williams. Drawing upon the ethical treatises as well as the Politics, but also situating Aristotle in his confrontation with Plato and in the context of ancient and archaic poetry, Nussbaum vividly outlines the basic experience of being human, the human between beasts and gods, the human questions of identity, mortality, endurance, desire, and community. Crucial in her overall reading of Aristotle is the emphasis on the communal (political) ground of the individual, and hence the questioning of the self/other distinction, with all its implications in contemporary debates in interrelated disciplines, from philosophy to political thought, to economics. Equally decisive is her questioning of the distinction between “natural fact” and “ethical value,” especially with reference to the issue of grounding, and thus the refusal to give practical reflection a marginal, limited relevance. In the “Addendum” to her essay, Nussbaum further develops the lines of a broad-ranging contemporary debate suggestively revolving around the relation between ethics and biology, yet again casting light on the vitality of Aristotle’s discourse. Pavlos Kontos continues the examination of Aristotelian ethics in his contribution “The Visibility of Goodness,” where he emphasizes excellence in its phenomenal evidence, as an altogether worldly event irreducible to psychological interiority (if there is such a thing). This contribution guides us to a close analysis of the forms of ethical excellence and the experience of friendship. Arianna Fermani lays out a sustained phenomenological exposition of evil in the essay “To Kakon Pollacho-s Legetai: The Plurivocity of the Notion of Evil in Aristotelian Ethics.”

II is of primary importance, with its insistence on knowledge in its choral/genealogical enterprise, the relative blindness of humans and the inevitably perspectival character of their contemplation, and the material, linguistic, cultural conditions necessary for listening to a lecture and participating in such a collective meditation. Things in their truth and origin do not make themselves manifest simply and immediately. Thus, in following the trajectory leading from the exploration of the surroundings and their pervasive animation (phusis, psuche-) to the attempt to contemplate their causes, the question comes to impose itself, regarding what at first remained unthematized and implicit, that is, regarding the being who sustains such a trajectory of exploration and study. This is the question of the human being, the being that traces paths of wonder, attraction, and inquiry. It is, at once, an ethico-political question, for it regards the upbringing, context, awareness, and care making such a being possible, making the human blossom into itself, in fact, making the human as such.

EˉTHOS

With ethics, thus, the inquiry turns back upon itself and attempts to seize its own unspoken conditions. This means delving into the nature of the human phenomenon—of this being belonging in nature but not fully (mechanically) determined by it, belonging in life but having to choose how to live, since different ways of life appear likewise available. Delving into the nature of the human, thus, proves to be an especially delicate endeavor, for ethics is the site at once of human self-reflection and of human self-construction, that is, at once of 11

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY acknowledged as constitutive of the human, implicated in the very dawning of the human as such, let alone essential to human self-articulation and self-understanding (spectatorship as the exercise of contemplation of the human condition). Far from anachronistically consigned to the narrow field of aesthetics or the specialty of art appreciation (not to mention the logic of entertainment), the Poetics highlights the centrality of the artistic/creative phenomenon in its ethico-political and anthropological valence. After all, on Aristotle’s terms, the human animal is distinctively imitative and capable of laughter no less than political. Nikolopoulou’s essay manages to evoke a long history of discussions, transmissions, assimilations, and distortions of this text while, at the same time, striving to capture the source of its incisive simplicity, simultaneously disarming and infinitely compelling. Her insightful suggestion, here, points in the direction of nature—of a capacity to abide in an intimacy with nature that grants the experience of excess as well as the possibility of bringing excess into an outline. The quest for measure and rhythm appears to be similarly vital in the task of artful living and in poetic/dramatic composition. Once again, we note in this sequence of studies a gesture toward nature. This is probably one of the urgent questions haunting this day, and an open challenge to the contemporary a priori of abstraction that, whether in art or in the many guises of intellectualism, seems to have lost its ground and, by the same token, the capacity to speak meaningfully to the trained and the untrained—indeed, to speak at all.

Here she confronts key issues ranging from the voluntary or involuntary character of action (and hence the themes of ignorance, negligence, and responsibility) to the fine distinction between vice and the structure of continence/incontinence, from the analysis of contingent circumstances and effectiveness in action to the integrity or disintegration of the psychosomatic organism.

POLIS In “Education: The Ethico-Political Energeia,” Michael Weinman underscores the unity of ethics and politics, the ways in which it is within the framework of the polis (the aggregation of many revolving around the axis of a common orientation and aspiration, that is, of a common good) that ethics becomes an issue to begin with, and that its architectonic work unfolds. The ethico-political reflection is seen in its character of first philosophy, to the extent that it provides at once an analysis and an articulation of conditions. In addition to this, however, ethics/politics emerges in its first-philosophical function because of its essential bond with education, which Weinman provocatively elucidates in terms of a certain naturalness and even independence from context.

POIEˉSIS Kalliopi Nikolopoulou concludes this part of the present volume, with the essay “Toward the Sublime Calculus of Aristotle’s Poetics.” The theme of poie-sis, making, is addressed in its exquisitely poetic sense here. At the same time, poetry, in its sense and truth, is situated at the heart of the human venture,

*** In addition to the study of the different regions of Aristotelian inquiry, the volume includes contributions addressing aspects of 12

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY While many thinkers of the communitarian persuasion seem to think so, the answer involves a careful rethinking of the terms and presuppositions of the debate between communitarians and liberals (which is especially lively in the United States). Aristotle’s logos appears indeed to be at odds both with the abstract universalistic rationality disallowed by the communitarians and with the communitarian one-sided emphasis on “insular, monological, and mutually exclusive identities.” In its nuanced appeal to nature, exceeding the bounds of universalism and relativism alike, Aristotle’s thinking appears irreducible to either side of the American contention. Again, we cannot avoid noticing an insuppressible naturalism ever surfacing in a number of interpretive outlooks (from Dobbs-Weinstein’s emphasis on embodiment, the physics of the soul, and ethics as clothing the body of desire, to Long’s suggestive appeals to motility and evocations of thinking belonging in life, to Aubenque’s remarks on Aristotle’s alterity with respect to the categories of certain debates). Naturalism keeps presenting itself in different guises, nondogmatically, as other than a naturalizing move. It returns as a gesture pointing to problems that yet call for attunement—problems difficult and not fully intelligible.

the preservation and elaboration of Aristotle’s thought, whether in modern Europe and North America or outside the lineage of Western philosophy (if it is one). The essays gathered in this second part, far from providing exhaustive treatments of such matters, only present a few possible forays into these fields. Moreover, they amplify the attention, already noted in the preceding contributions, given to Aristotle’s enduring presence in a variety of debates. Thus, in “Aristotle on the Natural Dwelling of Intellect” Idit Dobbs-Weinstein develops a materialistic reading of De Anima (a “physics of psuche-”) in connection with the Nicomachean Ethics, an approach that she situates in the Judeo-Perso-Arabic lineage, reclaiming in Aristotle what the tradition of “Christo-Platonism” has made nearly illegible. In turn, Christopher Long follows the reading of Aristotle (again, with a focus on De Anima) in the wake of Frederick Woodbridge (and George Santayana). His essay “The Peripatetic Method: Walking with Woodbridge, Thinking with Aristotle” connects Woodbridge to the European scholarly tradition leading to W. Jaeger’s developmental view of Aristotelian thought, and emphasizes Aristotle’s way of thinking in its temporality and dynamic implication in life. In “What Remains of Aristotle’s Metaphysics Today?” Enrico Berti considers the intellectual legacy of Aristotle’s Metaphysics and enumerates the Aristotelian axioms and conceptual categories even now constellating discourses in contemporary philosophy, whether in the Anglo-American or European traditions. Inexhaustible and yet to be thought through, Aristotle's thinking of being in light of difference and mobility is shown to abide, if not perennial, at the very least still our contemporary. Finally, Pierre Aubenque confronts the question “Would Aristotle Be a Communitarian?”

*** This collection of essays is clearly not exhaustive. In the traversal of Aristotle’s corpus it touches on a few pivotal themes, forming possible thematic constellations. It goes without saying that this only calls for further investigations and developments to come. For this reason, in addition to the articles, the present volume contains a distinctive array of instruments for research—assisting in the work of deepening and contextualization. The Glossary lists a range of key 13

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY NOTES

Aristotelian terms/concepts, with transliteration, Latin concordance when relevant, discussion of semantic range, textual references, and cross references. A Chronology of Recent Research synoptically delineates the fundamental works, developments, and field reconfigurations in modern and contemporary scholarship. The Bibliography lists standard editions of the Aristotelian texts and key English translations, along with key commentaries from antiquity and the middle ages, as well as studies (mostly in English) from the last century. Finally, a section entitled Resources indicates reference texts in Greek and in translation available online, and a selection of academic journals, professional organizations, and societies crucially devoted to the study of Aristotle’s thought. The diversity of perspectives intersecting here introduces characteristic Aristotelian questions without settling them, thus conveying their depth and openness. Equally significant, the presentation/analysis of the Aristotelian texts is cast within the context of living, ongoing debates, thus intimating that the study of the ancient Greek thinker is no in vitro experiment. The matter is always there, embedded, inflected, and received in this or that way, never as such. The alleged objectivity/neutrality of basic, introductory readings emerges as a myth—or even as a most self-dissimulating superstition. The multiplicity of approaches and interpretive stances, both in the contemporary framework and throughout the history of philosophy (which is not one), reminds us that Aristotle “is said in many ways,” λέγεται πολλαχῶς. This, too, is the task of a companion. Claudia Baracchi

1

2 3

4

5

Note, however, the exception of Giovanni Reale, 1995, arguing for the authenticity of the treatise. See Ford, 2011. The peripatetic adventures of Aristotle’s manuscripts, from Theophrastus’ library to their resurfacing in Rome, were reconstructed on the ground of ancient sources, however fragile such accounts may be. See Diogenes Laertius, Lives V.ii.52 and Strabo, Geographica XIII.i.54. See also Bidez, 1943. See paradigmatically Düring, 1957. But see also Wehrli, 1959; Lynch, 1972; and Moraux, 1951. To my knowledge, the only occurrence of the phrase “analytical science” is in Rhetoric 1359b10, in a passing remark without further elaboration.

REFERENCES Bidez, Joseph, Un singulier naufrage littéraire dans l’antiquité : À la recherche des épaves de l’Aristote perdu, Bruxelles: Office de publicité, 1943. Bignone, Ettore, L’Aristotele perduto e la formazione filosofica di Epicuro, 2 vols, Firenze: La Nuova Italia, 1936. Düring, Ingemar, “Notes on the History of the Transmission of Aristotle’s Writings,” Göteborg Högskolas Arsskrift, 56 (1950), 35–70. —, Aristotle in the Ancient Biographical Tradition, Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1957. Ford, Andrew, Aristotle as Poet: The Song for Hermias and Its Content, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Gerson, Lloyd P., Aristotle and Other Platonists, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2005.

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INTRODUCTION: PATHS OF INQUIRY Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1968. Reale, Giovanni (ed.), Il trattato Sul Cosmo per Alessandro attribuito ad Aristotele, Milano: Vita e Pensiero, 1995. Wehrli, Fritz, “Rückblick der Peripatos in vorchristlicher Zeit,” Die Schule des Aristoteles, 10, Basel: Schwabe, 1959.

Lynch, John Patrick, Aristotle’s School. A Study of a Greek Educational Institution, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972. Moraux, Paul, Les listes anciennes des ouvrages d’Aristote, Louvain: Éditions Universitaires, 1951. Moraux, Paul (ed.), Aristoteles in der neueren Forschung, Darmstadt:

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1 SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS: ARISTOTLE’S RHETORIC AND THE RHETORIC OF THE SOPHISTS

all too well how to chatter, “to babble,” in order to detain Juno and prevent her from catching her husband, Jupiter, while he was adulterously caressing other nymphs. As punishment, Juno condemned Echo to “a diminished power of language” and to having only “very brief usages of her voice” (367). Echo therefore could do no more than “repeat the last sounds at the end of someone’s speech, and reproduce the last words she had heard” (368f.). Echo the “résonable”2 (358): speech without creativity, cut off from any intention to signify, talking of nothing and to nobody; speech that does not even contain a complete sentence or a repetition of what was first said, but that simply duplicates sound waves. Echo, the misery of speech that only refers back to itself, loves Narcissus and follows him everywhere. During a hunt, Narcissus found himself alone, separated from his friends. He called out, “Is anybody there?”—“Anybody there,” Echo responded. “Come out,” he said— “Come out,” she replied. “Come out here”— “Out here.” But as soon as the nymph came

NARCISSUS AND ECHO In the Metamorphoses (III.339–510),1 Ovid retells the story of an ancient Greek myth. There once was a newborn unparalleled in beauty, who was named Narcissus by his mother, a river in Boeotia. To see if her son would live a long life, she went to find Tiresias, who had just been blinded by Juno and who had been given the gift of clairvoyance by Jupiter in exchange. This was Tiresias’ first prophecy. In response to the mother’s question about her son, Tiresias said, “if he does not know himself,” thereby reversing the imperative engraved on the pediment of the temple of Delphi, the “know thyself” that has been so endlessly interpreted in Western philosophy since the age of the Seven Sages and Socrates up through Hegel, or Freud. When Narcissus was an adolescent, men, women, and nymphs alike were smitten with him. But the nymph Echo was the most in love of all. She was an odd nymph—nothing but a body and a voice—for she had been punished by Juno in accordance with her sin: Echo knew 21

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS “phenomenology.” I would like to begin with this term, taken from the Heideggerian reading of Aristotle—but not to dwell upon what is evidently central to metaphysics and thought; rather, to find the motive that leads outwards, which in turn shall lead me toward sophistry. Sophistry: a way to think the echo philosophically. Herein lies the paradox of my project: in taking up the theme of “the places of seeing,” to speak of the one who, Plato said, “will appear to you as someone . . . who has no eyes at all” (Sophist, 239e).

out from the thicket to embrace him, he pushed her away and ran off. She dried up from hopelessness: there was nothing left of her but “a voice and bones” (398), which took, they say, the form of a stone. “Sound is what lives on in her” (401). Narcissus was cursed by all the admirers whom he disdained. Eventually, Vengeance led him to a spring of undisturbed purity. We know the rest: that “as soon as he wanted to appease his thirst, a new thirst was born” (415); he “contemplated” (420) what he saw there with an “insatiable look” (439); “he was captivated by the image he saw” (416); “he was mirrored and admired himself” (424). But this perfect lover who smiles when Narcissus smiles, who holds out his arms when he holds out his arms, is only a “fleeting simulation” (432), a “shadow” (434), a “lying form” (493). Narcissus, when he finally understood that “I am he” (463), dried up in turn and “himself died on account of what he had seen” (440). “Goodbye,” he said to his image. “Goodbye,” responded Echo, while in the place of his extinguished body the poet’s flower began to grow. Narcissus: the simple look that only sees itself, sight reduced to the worst of seeing— the simulacrum. Echo: the simple voice that only repeats itself, speech reduced to the worst of speech—to sound. Narcissus and Echo miss each other eternally and die desiccated: sight and speech, obscured in this way, are untenable, and slowly die without each other. There is a philosophical term that serves as a counter-poison to the myth, and gives a name to the interlacing of speech and sight, the wedding of Narcissus and Echo. For Martin Heidegger this term bespeaks the essence of ancient Greek philosophy:

SAYING WHAT ONE SEES: ARISTOTLE’S PHENOMENOLOGY AND THAT OF THE SOPHISTS NOTIONS OF PHENOMENON AND PHENOMENOLOGY: AN ULTRA-HEIDEGGERIAN GREECE As Heidegger remarks, even if the term “phenomenology” does not appear historically until the eighteenth century (in Lambert), in its historicity it is Greek: phainomenon, the middle participle of phaino-, “that which shows itself, by itself, from itself,” and logos, “to say.” In paragraph 7 of Being and Time, Heidegger reminds us that phaino- comes from pho-s, “light.” Though even here, to tell the truth, there is already a tightly drawn etymological knot. Chantraine points out that phaino- comes from the Sanskrit radical bha, which has a built-in “semantic ambivalence” because it signifies both “to illuminate, to shine” (phainoi, ) and “to explain, to speak” (phe-mi, fari in Latin). In other words, there is already a belonging together in bha of the sayable and the shining; there is already phenomenology in the phenomenon itself. 22

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS Finally, pho-s, the same word as “light,” but with the acute accent instead of the perispomenon, designates as well (e.g. in Homer) man, the hero, the mortal. Chantraine tells us that the etymology here is somewhat “obscure.” However, “if the modification of the dental consonant is secondary, there is a formal identity between the Greek nominative and the Sanskrit bhas, meaning light, brightness, majesty”; “but,” he adds, “from a semantic point of view, the identification is troublesome.” Phenomenologically, on the contrary, it is too good to be true: etymological evidence that unifies “to appear,” “to say,” and “man.” The man of ancient Greece, that is to say man as such, is the one who sees light as a mortal (the light of the day of his birth, and of the return, death). He sees that which appears in the light, phenomena, and that which illuminates phenomena in saying them. Here we find a matrix of the common perception of Greece, at once classical and Romantic, and motivating Heidegger’s interest: if truth is the belonging together of appearing and saying in human Dasein, at once openness and finitude, then truth is both the tracing of and the meditation on this etymology.

σημεῖα πρώτων, ταὐτὰ πᾶσι παθήματα τῆς ψυχῆς, καὶ ὧν ταῦτα ὁμοιώματα πράγματα ἤδη ταὐτά (16a3–8). 3 That is: First of all, that which is in the voice is the symbol of the affections of the soul, and that which is written is the symbol of that which is in the voice. And just as the letters are not the same for everyone, so the vocal sounds also are not the same. But the affections of the soul, of which the vocal sounds are first the signs, are the same for everyone, and the things that the affections resemble are likewise the same.4 There is phenomenology, therefore, in the mediation of the soul allowing a passage from things into words: things soul words

phenomeno — logy

Phenomenology appears very well as a question of transitivity; the phenomenon shows itself in language and lets itself be written and spoken on a double condition: that it “passes” into the soul, and that the soul “passes” into the logos. However, this double condition constitutes a double problem as well: are we sure that the mediation of the soul does not obscure anything, and in turn, that the mediation of logos does not skew the affections of the soul? For the purpose of exposing “the phenomenological method” of his research, Heidegger proposes an exploration of the concepts of phenomenon and logos in paragraph 7 of Being and Time, winding up with a “provisional concept of phenomenology,” in order for the reader to progressively shed his or her classical prejudices and arrive at

THE PHENOMENOLOGICAL CHARTER: ARISTOTLE, DE INTERPRETATIONE 1, 16A3–8 De Interpretatione deploys, in its very first lines, the classical structure that informs phenomenology and remains the great charter of language: Ἔστι μὲν οὖν τὰ ἐν τῇ φωνῇ τῶν ἐν τῇ ψυχῇ παθημάτων σύμβολα, καὶ τὰ γραφόμενα τῶν ἐν τῇ φωνῇ. καὶ ὥσπερ οὐδὲ γράμματα πᾶσι τὰ αὐτά, οὐδὲ φωναὶ αἱ αὐταί. ὧν μέντοι ταῦτα

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS them. This νοεῖν is what is “true” in the purest and most primordial sense; that is to say, it merely discovers, and it does so in such a way that it can never cover up. This νοεῖν can never cover up; it can never be false; it can at worst remain a non-perceiving, ἀγνοεῖν, not sufficing for straightforward and appropriate access. (57 = 33 Ger.)

an understanding of the term that is more Greek, and more Aristotelian. Nevertheless, as we shall see, it seems just as possible to follow such a line of inquiry backwards in the opposite direction: we have to admit then that this phenomenological structure is, always already, and already in Aristotle, covered over and layered in and as the constitution of objectivity. In other words, transitivity in the end is only the guarantee that turns showing into a sign, logos into a judgment, unveiling into correspondence, and the phenomenon into an object. Is a Greek phenomenology, in spite of being the paradigm of phenomenology, unobtainable?

But, as soon as the mediation of the soul does not skew anything and transitivity is assured by an apprehension without detour, this truth that is always true risks being without speech, because, as indicated by what immediately follows in De Anima, “sensation of the proper sensibles is always true, and belongs to all animals” (427b12). It would therefore be a mute paradise, infraphenomenological as well as infrahuman, one in which it would not be a matter of saying what one sees, but simply of seeing it. Heidegger’s text juxtaposes sensible apprehension and “intellectual” apprehension, in this way placing Metaphysics IX.10,5 which concerns not the proper sensibles but “[things that are] without composition” (τὰ ἀσύνθετα, 1051b17, taken up again by ὅσα δή ἐστιν ὅπερ εἶναί τι καὶ ἐνεργείᾳ, 1051b31), on the same plane as De Anima. In both sensible and intellectual apprehension, it is impossible to be deceived, to be wrong (περὶ ὅ μὴ ἐνδέχεται ἀπατηθῆναι, De An. 418a12, περὶ ταῦτα οὐκ ἔστιν ἀπατηθῆναι, Met. IX.10, 1051b31). There is simply an unveiling reception or not, or nothing (ἢ νοεῖν ἢ μή, 32). Now, noetic reception as distinct from aesthetic reception is characterized as θιγεῖν καὶ φάναι (24),6 “touching and saying,” “emitting,” as though the affected soul could turn the contact felt into a sound. But Aristotle immediately specifies that “saying and affirming

THE MUTE PARADISE OF PHENOMENONOESIS In the best of all possible phenomenological worlds, transitivities would go without saying. In fact, Aristotle expressly assures us of the first one, the passage of the phenomenon into the soul, though under certain conditions. De Anima (III, 427b11) in effect stipulates that “the sensation of proper sensibles”—the “proper” sensible being “that which cannot be perceived by any other sense” (II, 418a11)— “is always true.” It is precisely on this point that Heidegger comments when he wants to push aside modern misinterpretations of the Greek concept of truth: Αἴσθησιϛ, the sheer sensory perception of something, is “true” . . . just as seeing aims at colors, any αἴσθησιϛ aims at its ἴδια (those entities which are genuinely accessible only through it and for it); and to that extent this perception is always true. This means that seeing always discovers colors and hearing always discovers sounds. Pure νοεῖν is the perception of the simplest determinate ways of Being which entities as such may possess, and it perceives them just by looking at 24

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS “that which appears-as,” as both appearing and the appearance grounded in this appearing.

are not the same,” just as “emitting (sounds? words?) and forming a sentence” are not the same (οὐ γὰρ ταὐτὸ κατάφασις καὶ φάσις, 24f.). This distinction corroborates the characteristic inarticulateness of the impossibility of the false, and the nonapophantic sense of “unveiling” that characterizes truth without a contrary. Thus, the paradise of phenomenonoesis is not mute, though it remains difficult to say if it is more than merely signifying, or sonorous.

If we are to have any further understanding of the concept of phenomenon, everything depends on our seeing how what is designated in the first signification of φαινόμενον (‘phenomenon’ as that which shows itself) and what is designated in the second (‘phenomenon’ as semblance) are structurally interconnected. Only when the meaning of something is such that it makes a pretention of showing itself—that is, of being a phenomenon—can it show itself as something which it is not; only then can it ‘merely look like so-and-so.’ (51 = 29 Ger.)

THE PHENOMENOLOGICAL PLANE: TO APPEAR-AS AND SYNTAX, OR, THE POSSIBILITY OF FALSEHOOD In order for there to be phenomenology, it is necessary to take logos into consideration to its fullest extent and thereby apprehend the concept of phenomenon otherwise. As Heidegger underscored just above (56 = 32 Ger.), returning in particular to chapters 1 through 6 of De Interpretatione,

In the end, we find solidarity between the “as” of the phenomenon and the sun- or cum- of logos, the combination, syntax, and synthesis of the nouns and verbs capable of seizing this relationship. And only because the function of the λόγος as ἀπόφανσις lies in letting something be seen by pointing it out, can the λόγος have the structural form of σύνθεσις. Here “synthesis” does not mean a binding and linking together of representations, in manipulation of psychical occurrences where the ‘problem’ arises of how these bindings, as something inside, agree with something physical outside. Here the συν has a purely apophantical signification and means letting something be seen in its togetherness (Beisammen) with something—letting it be seen as something. (56 = 33 Ger.)

Aristotle has explicated this function of discourse more precisely as ἀποφαίνεσθαι. . . . Discourse ‘lets something be seen’ . . . that is, it lets us see something from the very thing which the discourse is about. . . . In discourse (ἀπόφανσις), so far as it is genuine, what is said [was geredet ist] is drawn from what the talk is about. . . . Thus “phenomenology” means ἀποφαίνεσθαι τὰ φαινόμενα—to let that which shows itself be seen from itself in the very way in which it shows itself from itself. (56–58 = 32–34 Ger.) Now, this comprehension of logos implies that we are simultaneously in possession of a complete concept of phenomenon. The “in the very way” implies in effect that we comprehend the phenomenon as

In other words, the opposition between true and false takes its place in the phenomenological register of ἀλήθεια as unveiling. “‘Being false’ (ψεύδεσθαι) amounts to deceiving in 25

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS always true and belongs to all animals; however, on the other hand, thoughtfully traversing sensation (διανοεῖσθαι) can as well occur falsely (καὶ ψευδῶς), and this belongs only to those who also have logos” (427b14). It is therefore very much the same “as” that is shared between appearance-apparition, logical syntax, and the pathway of the soul: in other words, phenomenology begins only with the possibility of the pseudos.

the sense of covering up (verdecken): putting something in front of something (in such a way as to let it be seen) and thereby passing it off as something which it is not” (57 = 33 Ger.). Such is the interpretative horizon that Heidegger proposes for the second preamble to the theory of nouns, which, in De Interpretatione 1, follows what we have called the phenomenological charter: ἔστι δέ, ὥσπερ ἐν τῇ ψυχῇ ὁτὲ μὲν νόημα ἄνευ τοῦ ἀληθεύειν ἢ ψεύδεσθαι ὁτὲ δὲ ἤδη ᾧ ἀνάγκη τούτων ὑπάρχειν θάτερον, οὕτω καί ἐν τῇ φωνῇ· περὶ γὰρ σύνθεσιν καὶ διαίρεσίν ἐστι τὸ ψεῦδος καὶ τὸ ἀληθές (16a9–13).

THE LOGIFICATION OF LOGOS AND THE OBJECTIFICATION OF THE PHENOMENON Here is where everything accelerates, or rather precipitates in the full sense of the word, and phenomenology takes a metaphysical form, is turned into itself by eternity, all the way to Husserl. With what Heidegger calls the “AlsStruktur” in his Logik we are already within the framework of the traditional concept of truth, not only as resemblance, but as correspondence (e.g. 143, 153). Admittedly, Heidegger issues ceaseless and multiple warnings against correspondence as the basis for truth (“But here everything depends on our steering clear of any conception of truth which is construed in the sense of ‘agreement’” [Being and Time, 56 = 33 Ger.]), but the resemblance between the dia or the sun of the representational statement, and the hos or the hoion of the phenomenon, constitutes the phenomenological ground of correspondence: logos says the phenomenon as it appears, and that is why the current definition of truth can stand on the conformity between the statement and the thing, the adaequatio rei et intellectus. Heidegger’s work constantly shows that if we can slowly and patiently regress to an originary or fundamental phenomenology— which alone is capable of yielding “the inner

That is: Just as there are in the soul thoughts that cannot possibly be either true or false, and also those which must be either true or false, so it is with voice. For truth and falsity regard combination and separation. De Anima specifies in its own way the type of composition at stake. We have just seen that there cannot be error when sensing a proper sensible with its corresponding sense, but only ignorance. We are susceptible to the intervention of error, as Descartes will later echo, as soon as judgment is no longer a judgment that something exists (“that there is color, there is sound,” De An. 418a15), but a predication—whether general, categorial, concerning the “common” sensibles, as is the case when we propose, for example, a localization or a quantification of color or of sound, or singular, concerning sensibles that are “by accident,” as when we judge, for example, that “that white thing is the son of Diares” (418a16–23). In this way, Aristotle manages to balance two relationships between sensation and truth: “On the one hand, sensation of the proper sensibles is 26

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS THE PHENOMENOLOGICAL OBSTINACY OF PROTAGORAS

possibility of accordance” (“On the Essence of Truth,” Heidegger, 1993, 120) and, further, the foundation itself of this possibility, freedom—then such a phenomenology relentlessly leads, at full speed, in converse, for example, from Aristotle to Tarski.7 “To say that what is is not, or that what is not is, is false; but to say that what is is, and what is not is not, is true” (Aristotle, Met. IV.7, 1011b25ff.). “‘It is snowing’ is a true proposition if and only if it is snowing” (Tarski, “The Concept of Truth in Formal Languages,” in Tarski, 1938, 156) or, “The sentence ‘snow is white’ is true if, and only if, snow is white” (Tarski, 1944, 343). This transformation in the deployment of truth brings about what “On the Way to Language” calls “the transformation of the sign” (On the Way to Language, 115): the relationship between the showing and what is shown becomes a conventional relationship between a sign and what it signifies. Simultaneously, it is the phenomenon itself that is constituted as an object. The Aristotelian categories are only capable of describing the phenomenon on condition that it is formed, informed, and conformed as an object in an anterior or primary reciprocity because adaequatio intellectus ad rem is only possible on account of the adaequatio rei ad intellectum (“On the Essence of Truth,” Heidegger, 1993, 118). In Kant, the a priori forms of sensibility will radically bring this same reciprocity to light because they yield both the object and the possibility of experience. That is how the showing performed by logos organizes the appearance of the phenomenon into a demonstration. Just as the sun of phenomenology freezes in the synthesis of judgment, the apo- of apophansis, exhausting the categorical process, freezes it in the canons of apodicticity.

It is at the classic moment in Metaphysics IV when Aristotle has found the first principle of the science of being qua being, namely the principle of being and of the saying of being, that he assigns the term “phenomenon,” and the care for saying phenomena—apprehending them in their unveiling—to his adversaries. “All phenomena are true” (πάντα τὰ φαινόμενα ἀληθῆ) becomes emblematic of Protagoras. All those who deny Aristotle’s principle, from Heraclitus to Parmenides, by way of Democritus, Empedocles, Anaxagoras, and Homer, all those who searched for and loved truth the most, suffered, like Protagoras, from a phenomenological hubris: “it is because these thinkers suppose that thought is sensation and sensation alteration, that they affirm that the phenomenon as it appears to sensation (τὸ φαινόμενον κατὰ τὴν αἴσθησιν) must be true” (1009b12–15). Now, for Aristotle, to hold on to phenomenology alone in this way is precisely to risk condemning oneself to silence or to noise. In effect we lose ourselves in the phenomenon while looking for just how to say it, like Cratylus, the most consequential of the Heracliteans. We attempt to conform our logos to appearances, which disappear like the river “that we cannot enter even once,” and, failing to hold an adequate discourse, we condemn ourselves to silence. Therefore Cratylus, when he is not furiously whistling, “only moves his finger” (1010a10–15). Aesthetic heaven, among men, quickly becomes hell.8 Or, like Protagoras, we entrust ourselves to logos and maintain that all logos is the logos of a phenomenon. But then the phenomenological thesis leads to sophistical paradoxes. It implies, in effect, a belonging of the phenomenon to speaking that does not 27

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS the phenomenological tenacity wishes to hold immediately together, appear alternatively too weak or too powerful, leading to either a gnawing silence or an obsessive brouhaha.

leave any room for the distinction between true and false: according to the words of Antisthenes “all speech discloses truth” (πᾶς λόγος ἀληθεύει, Proclus, In Cratylum, 429b, ch. 37, Pasquali). Along with this distinction, those between seeming and appearing, being and non-being, or substance and accident, also disappear; if all speech discloses the true, that is just because it always says “what is.” The very possibility of distinction disappears, and with it all possibility of choosing a meaning, a being, a phrase, a behavior, an anything “instead of” another: once more, phenomenological paradise veers into its contrary. In terms of the consequent relativism, the discourse of Protagoras becomes phenomenologized to the point of being, according to Aristotle, irrefutable:

THE ANTI-PHENOMENOLOGICAL CHARTER: GORGIAS, ON NON-BEING This excess of phenomenology finds its paradigm in a text that contains many catastrophic pronouncements, Gorgias’ treatise On Non-Being. In the third part (after “nothing is,” “if anything is it is unknowable”: “if anything is and is unknowable, it is incommunicable”) he proposes, one could say in anticipation, a generalization of the structure of the Aristotelian proper sensible (true/ ignored), prior to the possibility of an “as.” For how could a man express in words what he has seen? Or how could a thing be clear to a man who heard it, if he has not seen it? For just as sight is not the sense which recognizes sounds, so hearing cannot hear colors, but only sounds; and the speaker speaks, but he does not speak a color or a thing. Anything, then, which a man has not in his own consciousness, how can he acquire it from the word of another, or by any sign which is different from the thing, except by seeing it if it is a color, or hearing it if it is a sound? For, to begin with, no one speaks a sound or a color, but only a word; so that it is not possible to think a color but only to see it, nor to think a sound, but only to hear it. (On Melissus, Xenophanes, and Gorgias, 980a20–b9)9

But if not all things are relative, but some are themselves in themselves, not everything that appears will be true; for that which appears appears to some one; so that he who says all things that appear are true, makes all beings relative to something. And, therefore, those who ask for an irresistible argument, and at the same time are committed to support their own discourse, must guard themselves by saying that it is not that which appears that is, but rather that which appears for him to whom it appears, and when, and in the respect in which, and in the manner in which it appears. (Met. IV, 1011a17–24) In other words, in a phenomenology so tyrannical Aristotelian categories themselves appear like instruments for the diffraction of appearances rather than for constituting the phenomenon into an object. In Cratylus as well as Protagoras thus interpreted, phenomenon and logos, which

The phenomenon is atomized into proper sensibles, each true, but confined to its kind without possible aggregation; or, alternatively, that which appears is never one but always many irreducible phenomena. The logos is 28

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS performance—and, correlatively, their paradigmatic tropes, metaphor, and ekphrasis or description—in order to distance the science of setting things before our eyes from the satisfaction of bringing them into plain sight.

in itself one phenomenon among others, a series of sounds that relate only to hearing. Absolutely no transitivity is possible, neither that which goes from what we see to what we say, nor that which goes from what we hear to what we can see. It is as though there is no soul to assure the link between the manifestations of sight and sound, we are left with a blank space between phenomeno and logy. The value of the sophistic aporias is to make clear that taking what is phenomenologically immediate strictly at face value, with the pretention of refusing to fall back onto any metaphysics, destroys the very possibility of this same phenomenology. Through Aristotle’s diagnosis of Cratylus and Protagoras, and his reading of Gorgias, we come to understand how phenomenological obstinacy veers into its contrary. Reading Aristotle, Heidegger, and Aristotle again, as read by Heidegger, testifies that phenomenology can only maintain itself by going beyond itself. If we refuse, we can neither speak nor understand what we see; but “there is only understanding,” in an echolalic narcissism of logos.

APODEIXIS AND EPIDEIXIS, DEMONSTRATION AND PERFORMANCE Deixis is the act and the art of showing without words, like Cratylus pointing his index finger at the disappearing phenomenon, or like Justice in Parmenides’ poem, pointing to the path of being with a sovereign gesture. Apodeixis is the art of showing by making what has already been shown into a ground for what follows, to demonstrate (dé-montrer). Epideixis is the art of showing by bringing to the fore, into public view, both to display and to draw upon what is being shown as an example, thus compounding it through an additional showing, amplifying, and exalting. The connotations of these prefixes persist for their habitual uses, particularly in Aristotle. SCIENTIFIC APODEIXIS AND RHETORICAL APODEIXIS: AN AID FOR PHENOMENA

LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS: ARISTOTLE’S RHETORIC AND THE RHETORIC OF THE SOPHISTS

Apodeixis presents a double localization in the Aristotelian corpus: within the Analytics, and at the heart of the Rhetoric. Apodeixis and apodictic science constitute the very object of the Analytics, as evidenced by the very first lines of the treatise (Prior Analytics I.1, 24a11). Differing from the dialectical syllogism, which begins from accepted ideas and takes off from probable premises, and the rhetorical enthymeme, which is nothing other than a shortening of the rhetorical syllogism, apodeixis has for its domain the truth: it begins from true

On the backdrop of this difference between two directions of phenomenology (ontology and logology), I would like to oppose not so much two philosophical models (saying what one sees), but rather two rhetorical registers (letting see what one says). I propose to contrast two rhetorical styles that can still be recognized in their avatars: that of Aristotle and that of the sophists. Therefore, I will study two different systems of exposition: apodeixis or demonstration, and epideixis or 29

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS demonstration of something, and one makes a preliminary statement in view of the demonstration that follows it. (III.13, 1414a31–35)

premises, either self-evident or previously demonstrated, and then “shows the cause and the why” (Posterior Analytics I.24, 85b23f.). There could not be a science of the sensible singular as such, let alone definition.10 Following the process of induction (epago-ge-, see APo I.16, 81a40–b2), apodeixis is exactly that procedure that allows the singular to be known as a universal and therefore permits deduction. For example, because Socrates is a man, Socrates is mortal (ibid., particularly 86a5–10; see 11, 77a5–9). Aristotelian demonstration (apodeixis), and the procedure issuing from the direction of its analysis, that is, from sensation, to induction, to deduction, yield the schema of philosophical science, in its perennial tradition, up to the very movement of Hegelian phenomenology, which likewise draws contingency to necessity and extracts the universal truth of the singular. But apodeixis is not only a procedure for transforming the phenomenon into an object of science, it is also a technique for eliciting agreement that lies at the heart of rhetoric. The Aristotelian definition of rhetoric is “the faculty of contemplating in any given case the available means of persuasion” (δύναμις περὶ ἕκαστον τοῦ θεωρῆσαι τὸ ἐνδεχόμενον πιθανόν, Rhetoric I.2, 1355b25f.). There are three objects proper to rhetoric: the parts of speech and their order, proofs and their sources, and style in the strict sense. Regarding the parts of speech, after ridiculing the proliferating of divisions, Aristotle keeps two and only two:

Aristotle proposes to call the first part— which corresponds to the dialectical “problem” (πρόβλημα, “that which is thrown ahead,” 36)—πρόθεσις or “proposition.” He proposes to call the second part—what we would call apodeixis in the strict sense— πίστις, a term with two indissoluble meanings: subjectively, it means faith, belief, and adherence; and objectively, proof and confirmation. Thus, analysis attains the principal object of rhetoric: the classification of proofs, πίστεις. The important division, we recall, separates “extra-technical” proofs— which come from outside and which it suffices to know how to “use,” for example, testimonies—from “technical” proofs, those which are furnished by the rhetorical method and by the orator him- or herself, which he or she has to “discover” (I.2, 1355b35–39). Technical proofs are, in turn, of three species. They are to be found either in the character of the orator (on the side of the emitter, so to speak); or in the dispositions of the hearer (on the side of the receiver); or, lastly, in the logos itself (in the message), in the fact that it shows or seems to show (1356a4). Apodeixis preeminently corresponds to the proof par excellence: that which constitutes the body of logos itself as rhetoric. “[A]rt completes what nature cannot complete, and imitates her” (Physics II.8, 199a17f.). Scientific demonstration and the system of rhetorical proof imitate nature and fulfill it, by helping the phenomenon to manifest itself over and above immediate apprehension (sensation, exposition) such that eternity transforms it, makes it true,

You must say the thing at stake, and you must demonstrate it. You cannot either say it without demonstrating it, or demonstrate it without first having stated it; since any demonstration must be the 30

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS rich if they like, but that their ambition is of another sort. (1259a9–18)

universal, persuasive: they help us to understand and believe in the phenomenon.

Thales, using foresight and the law of supply and demand, creates a monopoly: in doing so he is said to give “proof, epideixis, of his wisdom” (19). This chrematistic endeavor properly speaking, capitalist because it involves money that makes money, is opposed to the economy, either of a family or of a city, in that the latter does not let itself be limited by the possible instrumental use of its riches (see 1256a36f.). For Thales, it is a matter of acquiring for the sake of acquisition, without any other end but acquisition itself: it is an economy of “living” as limitless desire, as opposed to “living well,” which constitutes the end itself of politics (1257b40–1258a1). This is why we should not be surprised that, in spite of this deployment of inventiveness that became exemplary, Thales only serves as the paradigm of the imprudent sage (σοφοὺς μὲν φρονίμους δ᾽οὔ, VI.7, 1141b4f.) in the Nicomachean Ethics, like Anaxagoras but opposed to Pericles. At the bottom of the well, just as before his olive presses, Thales does not know how to recognize what is truly useful for himself or for others. Thales’ epideixis, which is accomplished without discourse, seems proper for bringing out certain traits of the epidictic genre. In fact, Aristotle tells us at the beginning of the Rhetoric that the hearer who directs his or her attention to discourse is necessarily “either a spectator or a judge, and a judge judges regarding both past and future” (I.3, 1358b2–4). The three genres of rhetoric find themselves determined by this simple remark. The judge of the future is the member of the assembly to whom deliberative discourse, which aims for the useful or the harmful, is addressed; the judge of the past is the one in courts, to whom is addressed

EPIDEIXIS, THE EPIDICTIC GENRE AND SOPHISTICAL DISCURSIVITY Before approaching the technical sense of epideixis in rhetoric, in distinction from apodeixis, I would like to linger over one of the very rare nontechnical occurrences of the term in the body of Aristotle’s work— perhaps the only one. Aristotle, in a rapid explanation of the general principles of chrematistic practices in Politics I, considers the example of Thales. From Plato to Nietzsche, Thales is usually presented as the “founding hero” or “great ancestor” (ἀρχηγὸς, Met. I.3, 983b20) of philosophy—at least, Aristotle specifies, of that philosophy which looks for the principles of all things “in the form of matter” (b7). As we know, it is this love of wisdom that exposes him to the laughter of the Thracian servant, when, looking up at the sky, he falls into a well full of the very water that he claimed was the principle of all things. The Politics tells the story of philosophy’s revenge: He was reproached because of his poverty, which was supposed to show that philosophy was useless. According to the story, in virtue of his astronomical knowledge he knew that there would be a great harvest of olives in the coming year; so, having a little money, in the winter he gave deposits for the use of all the olive presses in Chios and Miletus, which he hired at a low price because no one bid against him. When the harvest-time came, and many were wanted all at once and all of a sudden, he let them out at any rate which he pleased, and made a quantity of money. Thus he showed that philosophers can easily be 31

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS the epidictic style is graphiko-tate-, “most pertinent to writing” because “it is fulfilled in reading” (Rhet. III.12, 1414a18f.): in it everything is ever so calculated, the effects depend on exploiting the specific possibilities of language, on figures of speech, on the combination of sounds. So much so that, even when the lectures are improvised, as Gorgias boasts, in truth one can really only reproduce them, repeat them before others, or even in front of the same. Seven centuries later Philostratus still notes: “[The Thessalians] tried to write like Gorgias . . . and they would have changed over and tried to write like Critias, if Critias had made any ἐπίδειξις ἑαυτοῦ σοφίας”—any “proof of his wisdom,” in Aristotle’s words for Thales—that is, by giving one of the lectures to which he alone possessed the secret (Philostratus et al., 1922, 502). As later on in Aristotle’s Rhetoric, the model of epideixis/lecture actually is epideixis/eulogy. And the model itself of eulogy, the oldest available, is none other than The Praises of Helen written by Gorgias. The paradoxical nature of the eulogy is clear: Helen is the guiltiest of all women, for the entirety of Greece has been brought to ruin on her account, but Gorgias convinces us that Helen is innocence itself. As a supplement of deixis, epideixis manages to turn the phenomenon into its contrary: the phenomenon becomes the effect of the omnipotence of logos. Along the way, Gorgias even produces the theory of his practice: “Speech is a powerful lord, which by means of the finest and most invisible body effects the divinest works” (The Older Sophists, 52). The model that is the inverse of the one in De Interpretatione then finds its proper place—it is not phenomena but discourse itself that the soul undergoes, or, as Gorgias says, “through the agency of words, the soul is wont to experience a suffering of

juridical discourse, which aims for the just or the unjust; lastly, the spectator is the hearer of epidictic discourse and finds him- or herself the judge περὶ τῆς δυνάμεως, of the discourse’s “power” or “capacity” (according to Médéric Dufour’s translation,11 the “talent of the orator”). The two differential characteristics of the epidictic genre are, therefore, concerned with neither the useful nor the just, but with “the beautiful and the shameful” (ibid., 1358b25), and furthermore pertain to neither the future nor the past, but rather to “the present,” “current events” (17). It is a matter of what we communally call praise and blame. Epideixis, which we could very well call the most rhetorical of all the genres of rhetoric, is for the orator an occasion like no other to show what he knows how to do—without worrying about politics, and not too much about ethics either, or at the very least with an ethics guided by aesthetics—to seize upon the propitious moments that only the present can offer. This is an occasion for Thales, as it is for the sophist, to put something in plain sight for the hearer, for whom it is as though he or she were at the theatre. Epideixis is, par excellence, the name that tradition attributes to sophistic discursivity. The term is consecrated by Plato (e.g. Hippias major, 282c, 286a; Hippias minor, 363c; Gorgias, 447c), where it designates the discourse practiced by Prodicus, Hippias, and Gorgias, in opposition to Socrates’ dialogue through questions and answers. The best translation of Plato’s use of epideixis would be “conference,” and more exactly “lecture,” in the Anglo-Saxon sense of the term, because the sophist, often coming from Sicily or Magna Graecia, gave lecture tours abroad, that is to say in the major Greek cities like Athens, Sparta—just as celebrity American professors cross the Atlantic to shock old Europe. Aristotle remarks that 32

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS characterized by its “clarity” (to saphe-s). This is manifestly the case in scientific demonstration. Accordingly, the Posterior Analytics lines up clear definitions with conclusive reasoning. “Indeed, perspicuity is required in definitions, just as syllogism is required in demonstrations” (II.13, 97b31). We arrive at clarity by taking singulars, and regrouping them into species, then genres. In this way, we find what is common and wind up with a universal that is neither homonymous nor metaphoric, but is, as indicated in the Topics, kurio-s, “properly said”; take “temperance,” for example, so-phrosune-, virtue par excellence, which, contrary to what Plato says, is not a “harmony,” since harmony “properly speaking” cannot take place except between sounds. Proper names, clear definitions, conclusive syllogisms—the discourse that helps the phenomenon unveil itself must be transparent. Clarity is the style of logos qua phenomenological: qua disappearing in front of the phenomenon that it lets be seen. Apodeixis falls as well, we can recall, under the jurisdiction of rhetoric, for it is major proof and essential part of any disquisition. The point of departure is, once again, the same: “. . . the excellence of style is clarity, as indicated by the fact that speech which fails to show will fail to perform its work” (Rhet. III.2, 1404b1–3, referring back to the beginning of chapter 22 of the Poetics). But in the Rhetoric, just as in the Poetics, there is an “and”: style must be clear “and not banal,” “not flat” (me- tapeine-). Now, tropes save style from flatness, and of course the very first is metaphor. The stylist is thus caught in a double bind: the style must be clear, that is, without metaphor; but also not flat—with metaphor. It is as though demonstration is torn between the pure but flat clarity of scientific knowledge, and the embellished but contradictory clarity of poetry and rhetoric.

its own” (ibid.). In the place of having adequately to say the phenomenon, in the end it is discourse that produces the phenomenon in total autonomy: “logos is not evocative of the external, but the external becomes the revealer of logos” (46). Through his “game” of recreating a Helen who is innocent thereafter (from Euripides and Isocrates through Goethe, Hoffmansthal, Offenbach, Claudel, and Giraudoux), Gorgias brings to light that at stake in epideixis is not, as in phenomenology, the transition from the phenomenon to its speech, but rather, in a logological mode, the passage from speech to its effect.12 Therefore, opposed here are not only two discursive modalities but also two models of the world: a physical model, where it is a matter of determining the immutable principles of nature by way of demonstrations in accordance with its deployment; and a political model, where it is a matter of producing or performing, occasion by occasion, communal values, permitting the continual creation of a consensus that constitutes the identity of the city.

METAPHOR AND EKPHRASIS: TWO PHILOSOPHICAL STYLES THE APPROPRIATENESS OF PHENOMENOLOGICAL STYLE One of the paradoxes of phenomenology comes from the fact that its discourse is frozen by the metaphors of the visible and of light, and yet must remain nonmetaphorical. In fact, the style, the mode of expression, or, according to the beautiful definition of lexis provided by the Poetics, “the manifestation of meaning through words” (6, 1450b13–15), proper to epideixis, is always 33

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS an end it shares with the analytic procedure itself. Moreover, metaphor benefits from previously established resemblances, genre/species, species/genre, species/species, in order to exhibit new relations of similitude that are more difficult to catch sight of. That is the very virtue of analogies, which enjoy “the highest reputation” (Rhet. III, 1411a1f.) among all metaphors. It is why metaphor can go so far as to invent words when they do not even exist, either by transporting words taken from common genres and similar species into an empty, “anonymous” space (ibid., 1405a34–37; see Poet. 1457b25–33: “sowing the god-created flame,” or “shield, a cup without wine”), or by poetic creation—a veritable nomothesis. The Poetics’ conclusion on metaphor brings all these traits together: “The most important thing is the ability to make metaphors, for this alone cannot be borrowed from another and is the sign of a very gifted nature. The ability to make metaphors is the ability to see similarity” (22, 1459a5–9). That the “clarity” of metaphor can be linked to the supplemental knowledge it produces becomes even more manifest when we consider what Aristotle calls, in Rhetoric III.10, “urbane and reputable sayings.” Characterized by reference to astu, “town,” such sayings are that which circulates in the streets and that which, like doxa, constitutes the common world. Regarding them, Aristotle effects a remarkable reprise of the opening lines of the Metaphysics:

THE STATUS OF METAPHOR: A SUPPLEMENT TO KNOWLEDGE But we discover very quickly that clarity is also an attribute of metaphor. For metaphor is precisely not homonymy: it produces not confusion but, rather, additional knowledge. From the start the contradiction of excellent style relates to metaphor: “Metaphor possesses the clear, the pleasant, and the strange in the highest degree, and it is not possible to receive metaphor from the hands of another” (Rhet. III, 1405a8–10). It is therefore the contradictory virtues of metaphor, “clear and,” which make its originality decisive, the mark of the “style” of each one, inasmuch as the style is the man. In other words, it is in metaphor qua original that the contradictory components of clarity and attractiveness reach conciliation. For the sake of making the original clarity of metaphor even more explicit, it is appropriate to begin again from the canonical definition given in the Poetics: “metaphor is applying to something the name of something else [ὀνόματος ἀλλοτρίου ἐπιφορὰ], the displacement being either from genus to species, or from species to genus, or from species to species, or according to analogy” (1457b6–9). Contrary to homonymy, which is exploited to cloud definitions in sophistical refutations, metaphor does not take advantage of the signifier; metaphor instead has a regulated structure that depends strictly on an epistemological, or even scientific, classification, and, therefore, implies a preliminary knowledge (shared between the speaker and the hearer) of definitional taxonomies. It is only on the grounds of this placement that metaphor can “displace” or “slide,” in order to enable a better view of what there is in “common,”

“All men by nature desire to know. A sign of this is the pleasure we take in sensing. Sensations are liked in and of themselves, apart from their usefulness, and above all those that come from the eyes.”/“Easy learning is by nature pleasant to all; now words signify something, so that all words that make us learn 34

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS something are for us the most pleasant.” (1410b10–12)

metaphor shows things in their being just as much as philosophy, and without a doubt more easily. In brief, metaphor produces more meaning, more common sense, and more knowledge.

The echo is confirmed as soon as we realize why the urbane saying is, so to speak, the ultimate metaphor: it is a metaphor by analogy that has, additionally, the virtue of “setting something before our eyes.” Indeed, the Rhetoric continues, “it is metaphor that best brings this about; for when [Homer] says that old age is stubble, he brings forth a teaching and a knowledge through genus, for both are withered” (14–16). A leitmotif comes back again and again in the corpus of metaphors by analogy, which is so difficult for us, that they are πρὸ ὀμμάτων, that they bring things “before one’s eyes.” Aristotle specifies the meaning of this expression in the following chapter: “I say that words bring things before one’s eyes every time they signify things in act” (ὅσα ἐνεργοῦντα σημαίνει, 1411b24). Aristotle draws his most extreme examples from Homer, who not only speaks of living beings in act, but also himself gives life to lifeless beings: “‘Curving waves, crested with foam, some before others / some after.’ These words make everything alive and moving; and movement is activity” (1412a9f.). Since ἐνέργεια, the “act,” is being in the fullest sense according to Aristotle, as the Metaphysics and Physics teach—it is at once the being of beings and being par excellence, God itself—we must conclude that metaphor, at its best, shows things in their maximum of being, making them resemble what they are. Metaphor belongs doubly to the style of phenomenology itself: because it shows something “as” something else, in resemblances more distant and imperceptible than those that can be seized by philosophy, which is confined to the evidence of manifestation (1412a11f.); and because, in so doing,

THE SOPHIST AND THE BAD METAPHOR Long before Aristotle, the sophists developed the first rhetoric: [Gorgias] was the first to give to the rhetorical genre the verbal power and art of deliberate culture and employed tropes and metaphors and figurative language and hypallage and catachresis and hyperbaton and doublings of words and repetitions and apostrophes and clauses of equal length. (The Older Sophists, 32)

Even if the testimony comes late, it is certain that this Sicilian rhetoric, which uses not only figurative speech but plays on signification itself, is a generalization of tropes in which metaphor represents only one of many. We should not misinterpret the strange objection Aristotle makes to Gorgias’ style in book III of the Rhetoric, which we now have well in mind. His principal fault lies in the “coldness” of his metaphors. “Cold,” ψυχρός, is said of cadavers. Gorgias’ style is a style without life, the death of style. It is precisely from the “clarity” of his metaphors that Gorgias detracts “and these lack clarity if they are from too far away” (ἀσαφεῖς δέ, ἄν πόρρωθεν, 1406b8f., see 1405a35); “things fresh and full of sap” or “you sowed in shame and harvested in misery,” for example, are said “too poetically.” This metaphorical excess amounts to the accumulation of metaphors that the Poetics designates by the name of “riddles”: to write exclusively with metaphors permits one to “describe real 35

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS caught up with him. We can recall that it is a cosmo-political oeuvre. Not only are the earth, heaven, and sea represented, all encircled by the river Ocean, but also two cities in all of life’s detail, one in peace, the other at war. The blind poet omits nothing of what the god has put there, and by omitting nothing at all he produces the first synthesis of the world of mortals, proving for the first time that poetry is more philosophical than history. Not only is this first ekphrasis the description of a fictitious object, but it is followed in time by a second ekphrasis, attributed to Hesiod. The model this time, as in a remake, is the first ekphrasis itself: its subject is the shield of Heracles. This palimpsest does not conform to a phenomenon, a real shield, nor, in this connection, to nature itself and cities, but only to a logos. In this object saturated by culture, along with natural reference we also lose that which Aristotle would have called the life of the story. As Paul Mazon noted, with the value judgments that we expect: “In all of this, there is no gesture that would really be ‘seen,’ that would give us the sensation of life. Not a word either in the mouths of the characters that would make such a sound frank and clear: each speaks a language of pure convention.”14 We have reached the point of metaphors that are themselves dead, for, remote from the waves that press like warriors, this time it is warriors who roll like stones (374–9). The ut pictura poesis of metaphor (“like a picture”) takes an entirely different meaning; it is no longer a matter of imitating painting, insofar as painting seeks to set the object before our eyes—to paint the object—but rather to imitate painting as a mimetic art—to paint painting. To imitate imitation, to produce knowledge not of the object but of the fictitious object, of objectification: logological ekphrasis, this is literature.

things through impossible associations,” for example, “I saw a man glue brass on a man with fire” to speak of the placement of a suction cup (Poet. 22, 1458a 25–30 and Rhet. III.2, 1405a34–1405b5). Thus Gorgias, the stranger, looks too far away for what he should take from up close. Using metaphor for the sake of metaphor, tropes for tropes— just as he speaks for the sake of speaking— Gorgias makes the perception of the proper and common disappear along with clarity. At this moment we could take up the analysis of Jacques Derrida in “White Mythology”: metaphor “risks interrupting the semantic plenitude in which it should belong . . .”13 but only in order to show that it is sophistry that constitutes and accomplishes what is, in philosophy’s own eyes, the risk of philosophy. EKPHRASIS: FROM WORD TO WORD The clarity of the phenomenological style, which allows what is seen to be said, is increased by the clarity of metaphor, that which renders the invisible visible. Opposed to it is the logological style where one always goes too far. It seems to me that the accumulation of tropes that characterizes this latter style must crystallize further in a larger figure, not very well known to philosophers: ekphrasis. Like epideixis, the term ekphrasis itself connotes exhaustion, the insolence of going to the very end, pushing the envelope. It is a putting into words that depletes its object and, terminologically, designates the minute and complete descriptions that are given of works of art. At the end of Iliad XVIII, Homer gives the first, and without a doubt the most famous ekphrasis known: that of the shield of Achilles forged by Hephaestus. The weapon had been made on the demand of Thetis, not to prevent her son from being killed but rather so that “all would be amazed” (466f.) when destiny 36

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS on Daphnis and Chloe, that traditionally provide the paradigm of ekphrasis.17 The prologue is a description of a painting and the whole story, in four books, is nothing other than the explication of the painting, and this painting is not made, as we shall read, in lines and colors, but already from words:

In fact, the fate of ekphrasis is linked to that of the novel. I will not take up the analyses by which I have elsewhere tried to show how the second sophistry, more than six centuries after the first, develops, along with fiction, this pseudos by means of which the philosophy of Plato and Aristotle forever characterized the first sophistry.15 What interests me here is only the manner in which the style of fiction is obsessed with ekphrasis, just as the style of phenomenology is with metaphor. First of all, with the Images of Philostratus or the Descriptions of Callistratus, the ekphraseis multiply to the point of constituting a genre of their own. Take, for example, the xenia: the text consists in a collection of critiques of still lives, presents that a host sends to his guests and represent the dishes they could eat at his place. The phenomenon is pushed back three degrees, an infinite distance, to become a pretext for the literary representation of a pictorial representation.16 The phenomenon is never again given to the immediacy of perception. It is at most rejoined, or supposed, at the end of a procedure of fiction. Far from the discourse conforming to the phenomenon, one will wind up deducing from the phenomenon that it was in fact in conformity with the discourse. Such is, manifestly, the structure of the most celebrated Greek novels. For instance, in Achilles Tatius’ The Adventures of Leucippe and Clitophon, we learn from the storyteller in the very first lines of the first book that he has just ducked inside to escape a storm and is looking at ex-votos when he stops at a suspended painting that contains the whole matrix of the story of The Adventures of Leucippe and Clitophon—a story in the course of which we see the protagonist give the painting away. But it is the very famous Pastorals of Longus,

I was hunting on the island of Lesbos when I saw the most beautiful sight I have ever seen in the grove of the Nymphs. It was a story about Eros. The grove was a beautiful place, abounding in trees and flowers. Streams of water gushed down, flowing from the same spring that nourished the trees and flowers. But I found more pleasure in the painting, instilled as it was with unparalleled artistry and the fortunes of Eros. Many strangers, hearing about it, came to worship the Nymphs and gaze upon its images. It showed women giving birth, others wrapping the newborn in swaddling clothes, exposed infants, flocks of sheep suckling the babies, shepherds picking them up, and young people arranging marriages. There was a pirate raid and an invasion by the enemy. Many other things relating to Eros were there. I watched, and as I watched and stood amazed, passionate longing came over me to paint a response in writing to the painting. I searched out someone to interpret the images, and I completed four books. I offer them to Eros and the Nymphs and Pan as well as to all my fellows to be their delight and possession. It will heal whoever is ailing, console and comfort whoever is mourning, evoke memories for whoever has felt Eros, and educate whoever has yet to feel Eros. No one has escaped Eros or will escape Eros as long as there is beauty, and eyes see. May the gods grant me self-restraint in depicting what others have done. (Proem) 37

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS end in itself (an “offering,” a “good”). Not only does it heal and console, it effectuates at the same time an anamnesis of and a propedeutic to love (τὸν ἐρασθέντα ἀναμνήσει, τὸν οὐκ ἐρασθέντα προπαιδεύσει): it is wisdom itself. In this prologue, in this novel, ekphrasis is no longer a matter of having eyes to see and to live the phenomenon, but of having eyes in order to make sentences, eyes in order to write and read: eyes to deceive. Plutarch, in his On the Fame of the Athenians, reminds us of a famous saying of Gorgias’:

Nature in this story is less beautiful than painting (“the most beautiful thing”/“beautiful as well”). Only paintings, and then the story that is its exegesis, have the power to “charm” (τερπνότερα, τερπνόν), to delight like the music of Orpheus. All the same, it is the image itself that we “contemplate.” This painting that ekphrasis describes is already a story: “a painted image, a love story.” The violence of the parataxis inverts the ut pictura poesis: it is no longer poetry that sets things before our eyes, it is the painting that makes us listen. To contemplate is to lend an ear. This story that is a painting is strictly anti- or a-phenomenological in the Heideggerian-Aristotelian sense of the word. It makes nothing visible “as,” and defies all syntax. No resemblance, either epistemological or metaphorical, can be elaborated from here. All that we see is what discourse says in a frenzied parataxis. The subjects in action, each without predicate or modification, committed to his or her act: the women who give birth, shepherds picking up lambs, the youth who promise, the enemies who invade. . . . This story paints; it is a matter of “replicating.” The Greek expression, ἀντιγράφαι τῇ γραφῇ is much more rigorous: one must write “against” and “from scratch,” to compete with and to recopy the first writing that is painting, playing the defense attorney and the clerk of the court at the same time. This “rewriting,” this “replication,” is the interpretation of the painting in four books. The ut poesis pictura that graphe- is (the painting) is followed by the ut pictura poesis that antigraphe- is, the pastoral itself. It could not be anything other than an ut poesis poesis, the bucolic name for logology. The discourse thus composed is not an instrument of knowledge, an organon, but a remedy, a pharmakon, and constitutes an

Tragedy bloomed and was celebrated, a marvelous sound and spectacle for the men of that time and one which by means of myth and suffering produced a “deception,” as Gorgias says, “in which the deceiver is the more justly esteemed than the nondeceiver and the deceived is wiser than the undeceived.” The deceiver is more justly esteemed because he succeeds in what he intends, and the deceived is wiser, for a man that is not imperceptive is easily affected by the pleasure of words. (The Older Sophists, 65) With sophistry, it is apate-, “illusion,” simultaneously trickery and seduction, that is linked not only with justice and wisdom, but, more radically even, with αἴσθησις, with this “sensibility” itself that characterizes the phenomenological opening. The sensibility to the pleasure of speaking takes the place of the sensibility to the phenomenon, and takes its place. René Char reclaimed “the cruel honor of deception”: it is on the literary and political lucidity of this deception that I would like to conclude. Barbara Cassin Translated by Claudia Baracchi and Marcus Michelsen 38

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS NOTES 1

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[We translate Cassin’s French rendition of Ovid’s text.—Trans.] [Cassin writes “résonable,” a homophone for “raisonable” (reasonable), from “résonner,” to resound.—Trans.] With πρώτων, sounds as well as writings (ταῦτα, 6) are signs of affections of the soul in the first place, and of the things themselves in the second place. This interpretation is quasi-unanimous among the ancients, the Arabs, the moderns; the same goes for πρώτoν (Ammonius, Stephanos of Alexandria), and even for πρώτως. But this traditional interpretation erases a whole series of differences that constitute the details of Aristotle’s text; in particular, the difference between σημεῖον, natural sign, symptom, and σύμβολον, conventional sign, symbol (Heidegger chooses to consider these as “provisionally synonyms” [1982, 114–15]). At the same time, we also lose the distinction between φωναὶ and τὰ ἐν τῇ φωνῇ, γράμματα, and τὰ γραφόμενα, differences that, at least, problematize the Heideggerian reading according to which Aristotle always thinks the sign on the ground of showing. With πρώτως, the vocal sounds (ταῦτα, 6), both human and animal, are first of all natural symptoms of affections of the soul, and only thereafter (in the case of articulate language proper to human beings and, therefore, within the framework of the difference among tongues) become conventional symbols of such affections, just as letters are the conventional symbols of the articulated sounds. Besides, reading πρώτων obscures without a doubt one of the objectives of the passage: the anti-Platonism of this beginning of the treatise, written as a counterpoint to Cratylus (Kretzmann’s thesis). The most important reason to choose πρώτως over πρώτων can be drawn from Kretzmann, 1974, and from Pépin, 1985. However, whichever text is established, the whole movement that goes from logos to the soul, and from the soul to things themselves, remains unalterable and paradigmatic. [When quoting from Aristotle we follow Cassin’s own translations.—Trans.] It would be necessary to follow, step by step, the parallel analyses that Heidegger proposes, in

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particular of De Anima, De Interpretatione, and Metaphysics IX, in Logik (GA 21, §§11–14, 127–95). At this point, we can only indicate the necessity of such a comparison. The Greek here is difficult and open to different interpretations: ἀλλ᾽ ἔστι τὸ μὲν ἀληθὲς ἤ ψεῦδος, τὸ μὲν θιγεῖν καὶ φάναι ἀληθές (. . .), τὸ δ᾽ἀγνοεῖν μὴ θιγγάνειν. We will compare Heidegger’s construction “. . . vielmehr besagt das Entdeckt oder Verdeckt das Betasten und Ansprechen des Unverborgenen (. . .), das Nichtvernehmen aber soviel wie das Nicht-betasten” (Logik, 176), and Tricot’s: “Voici ce qu’est alors le vrai ou le faux : le vrai, c’est saisir et énoncer ce qu’on saisit (. . .) ignorer, c’est ne pas saisir.” In order to show, from an entirely different perspective, true and false resemblances, we can consider Imbert, 1985. See Cassin, 1987. For an analysis of the whole of Metaphysics IV, see Cassin and Narcy, 1988. See Cassin, 1980, 540–52. [English translation is taken from Hett, 1936—Trans.] See Met. VII.15, 1039b 28: διὰ τοῦτο δὲ καὶ τῶν οὐσιῶν τῶν αἰσθητῶν τῶν καθ᾽ἕκαστα ὄυτε ὁρισμὸς ὄυτε ἀπόδειξις ἔστιν. Dufour, 1960. Here, I am summarizing an analysis that can be found fully developed in Cassin, 1985. In Derrida, 1975, 267. Hesiod, 1967, 128n. But Mazon ends on a note of ambiguity: “In nine verses, everything is over: the marionettes are brought back behind the curtain. There is a casualness that is not disagreeable. The author, though he may have been without talent and originality, was not, perhaps, without spirit.” I refer on this point back to Cassin, 1986, 3–29. See Blanchard, 1986. For an analysis of these same texts in the perspective of Stoic logic, where ekphrasis would be the indication of the total translatability between phantasia and discourse, I refer to the remarkable article by Imbert, 1980. Our perspectives, starting from Stoic phenomenology and Sophistic fiction, are perhaps less incompatible than they appear herein: with the Stoic phenomenon, it is not a matter of data for consciousness, but rather of signs.

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SAYING WHAT ONE SEES, LETTING SEE WHAT ONE SAYS REFERENCES

M. Schofield, M. Burnyeat, and J. Barnes, Oxford: Clarendon, 1980, 182–216. —, “La vérité d’Aristote et celle de Tarski,” in Histoire et Structure, ed. J. Brunschwig, C. Imbert, and A. Roger, Paris: Vrin, 1985, 173–193. Kretzmann, N., “Aristotle on Spoken Sound Significant by Convention,” in Ancient Logic and Its Modern Interpretations, ed. J. Corcoran, Dordrecht/Boston: Reidel, 1974, 3–21. Longus, “Daphnis and Chloe,” Daphnis and Chloe, trans. W. B. Tyrrell, Michigan State University, n.d. www.msu.edu/~tyrrell/ daphchlo.htm Mazon, P. (ed.), Hesiod. Théogonie, Les Travaux et Les Jours, Le Bouclier, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1967. Pépin, J., “ΣΥΜΒΟΛΑ, ΣΗΜΕΙΑ, ΟΜΟΙΩΜΑΤΑ: À propos de De Interpretatione 1, 16a3–8 et Politique VIII 5, 1340a6–39,” in Aristoteles. Werk und Wirkung, ed. W. Jürgen, Berlin: De Gruyter, 1985, vol. 1. Philostratus, Eunapius and Wilmer Cave France Wright, Philostratus and Eunapius. The Lives of the Sophists, London: W. Heinemann, 1922. Sprague, R. K. and H. Diels-W. Kranz (eds), The Older Sophists, Columbia: University of South Carolina, 1972. Tarski, A., Logic, Semantics, Metamathematics: Papers from 1923 to 1938, Indianapolis, IN: Hackett, 1938. —, “The Semantic Conception of Truth: And the Foundation of Semantics,” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 4.3 (1944), 341–76.

Blanchard, M. E., “Problèmes du texte et du tableau,” in Le plaisir de parler, ed. B. Cassin, Paris: Minuit, 1986, 131–54. Cassin, B., Si Parménide, Lille: Presses Universitaires de Lille, 1980. —, “Encore Hélène. Une sophistique de la jouissance,” Littoral, 15.16 (1985), 161–76. —, “Du faux ou du mensonge à la fiction,” in Le plaisir de parler, ed. B. Cassin, Paris: Minuit, 1986, 3–29. —, “Le doigt de Cratyle,” Revue de philosophie ancienne, 2 (1987), 139–50. Cassin, B. and M. Narcy, La décision du sens, Paris: Vrin, 1988. Chantraine, P., Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue grecque, Paris: Éditions Klincksieck, 1968–99. Derrida, J., “La mythologie blanche,” Marges de la philosophie, Paris: Minuit, 1975. Dufour, M. (trans.), Aristote. Rhétorique, 2nd edn, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1960. Heidegger, M., Being and Time, trans. J. Macquarrie and E. Robinson, London: Blackwell, 1962. —, Logik. Die Frage nach der Wahrheit, ed. W. Biemel, Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1976. —, On the Way to Language, San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1982. —, Basic Writings: From Being and Time (1927) to The Task of Thinking (1964), ed. David Farrell Krell, SanFrancisco: Harper, 1993. Hett, W. S. (trans.), Aristotle. Minor Works, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1936. Imbert, C., “Stoic Logic and Alexandrian Poetics,” in Doubt and Dogmatism, ed.

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2 ARISTOTELIAN DEFINITION: ON THE DISCOVERY OF ARCHAI

What is a definition? Often, especially when speaking of Aristotelian logic, one encounters the answer: definitio fit per genus proximum et differentiam specificam (definition proceeds from the closest genus and the specific difference). Commonly, definition is understood as a kind of taxonomical description by which a being is assigned a certain universal genus that is then subsequently further differentiated by its unique, specific characteristics: the leopard is a feline animal belonging to the panther family, etc. As such, a definition serves the linguistic function of preserving a categorical awareness of a being, enabling humans to formulate a concept to be applied to the beings that they encounter in order to make them universally recognizable and graspable. By applying the conceptual categories of genus and species, human beings are intellectually able to divide a being into parts and to bring each of them into an outline in virtue of their mutual similarity and dissimilarity. In this way, beings encountered in the world are placed within an already existing organizational paradigm: leopards belong to the genus “panther” with the specific difference of possessing a light fur coat covered in spots.1 One might argue that

such a method provides human beings with a rational structure by which they are able to harness and master natural beings by rendering them knowable and reducing their complexity to orderable, catalogable (and hence meaningful) configurations. Definitions, in this view, originate a “demonstrative science” through which nature may be possessed and mastered.2 However, while the texts of Aristotle (which the above interpretation might claim as a source) may in fact betray a certain inclination to employ definition for the sake of coming to a dependable familiarity and knowledge of a being, they point toward this conception of definition as merely derivative and secondary. Rather than an investigation that cleaves beings from nature by abstraction into linguistic universals (genus and species),3 I undertake to retrieve in Aristotle a more primordial understanding of the activity of defining, which betrays a more immediate relation to nature and reveals a curious natural capacity that human beings harbor. Human beings, among natural beings, are perhaps uniquely capable of coming to an awareness of an other being not merely mediated through the structures provided 41

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ARISTOTELIAN DEFINITION by human nature, but in accordance with an unmediated encounter with the nature of an other being. With this suggestion, I allude to Aristotle’s ever present two-fold description of the way we know the world (according to us, according to itself):4 that is to say, human nature betrays a comportment in which one can be aware of an other being not merely through human nature (i.e. through the application of the cultural, linguistic, and habitual quotidian structures that form any given human’s identity), but by the unmediated encounter with the other nature of that being, by the noetic reception of the arche- of an other entity. In this light, definition would be the activity by which an inquirer seeks to unhinge herself from precisely those universal structures that govern a “definition” in the traditional understanding of that term (the genus and species that circulate in human cultural and linguistic economies) in order to open herself intellectually to the perception of the other being, as other. Thus, in this essay I will argue that Aristotle primarily understands definition as a kind of phenomenological reduction in which the inquirer turns toward a being in such a way that she loosens herself from the hermeneutic familiarity with a being in order then to be disposed to it in such a way that its nature, its arche-, its ti esti becomes manifest (de-lon). With these governing reflections on Aristotle’s texts, I will describe a mode of being in which humans may discover nature (and its singular beings) based neither upon mere sensuous perception nor strictly conceptual mediation. I will show that, though dialectical/conceptual deliberation does not reveal archai, it does place us in the comportment (the hexis, the mode of being) in which we are noetically receptive to archai (Aristotle lists nous as an intellectual hexis/ comportment, after all5). In addition, the

reader may already perceive that this account of definition differs from the majority of the literature referenced above, insofar as it conceives of the activity of defining as primarily philosophical/ontological and only secondarily logical/scientific. In the first part, in order to articulate this primary conception of definition in Aristotle, I will offer an interpretation of that structure by which Aristotle argues human beings know anything at all: the prouparchousa gno-sis.6 While prouparchousa gno-sis is often translated as “pre-existent knowledge,”7 the present reading will suggest that it must be understood not as an individual person’s inner repository of previous empirical experience, but rather as a kind of political, hermeneutical horizon deeply informed by Aristotle’s understanding of logos. Far from data filed away in a cabinet lying between the eyes and the ears, the prouparchousa gno-sis seems rather to resemble a kind of cultural horizon into which human beings are born—a public, dialogically constituted surrounding world that appropriates the individual and bequeaths an identity and a kind of citizenship. Most importantly, one’s engagement with the world becomes shaped and organized by the prouparchousa gno-sis. Thus, as we will see through brief considerations of Aristotle’s method in Physics I and his solution to the epistemological problem of the Meno in Posterior Analytics, one must employ a dialectical critique of the prouparchousa gno-sis in order to begin to perform the work of the definition of archai—which is the same as to say, in order to begin to move from an awareness of a being in accordance with our nature, toward an awareness of a being in accordance with its nature. Of course, with this claim, I enter into the troubled waters of Aristotelian dialectic.8 I will indeed attempt to show that, for Aristotle, 42

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ARISTOTELIAN DEFINITION which they are situated. Every form that a logos can take finds its origin in this preexistent knowledge; it is a logos-structure that bestows upon humans a language and a configuration of already-governing sciences and arts: “the learned sciences and each of the other technai . . . Similarly also in the case of the logoi—both those through syllogism and those through induction” (71a3–6). All uniquely human disclosure and meaningful awareness proceed from the prouparchousa gno-sis. Further, Aristotle argues that even rhetoric emerges out of the prouparchousa gno-sis: “and that with which rhetorical arguments persuade is the same” (71a9–10). Thus, it would seem that, for Aristotle, every activity that human beings perform that has to do with logos (that is to say, every activity that human beings perform that pertains to their unique nature) comes to be from out of the already-present, hegemonic structure of gno-sis. From a general Aristotelian point of view, this claim should not be surprising; for, as is said in the Physics, things always come to be from something else (189b32). As will become clear later, this ontological observation holds not only for the beings of nature but also for discourse. The argument that Aristotle proceeds to articulate—the three ways in which already-present gno-sis is “necessary”—helps to secure this claim. Aristotle writes that on the one hand “sometimes it is necessary to pre-suppose that something is” (Posterior Analytics 71a12). He gives the example: it is always the case that either an affirmation or a denial is true. In making affirmations or denials, one must presuppose that they both cannot be true. Such a principle is not demonstrated in making affirmations or denials, but is assumed to be a fact in advance of whatever is achieved in the articulation. This principle is a kind of

one gains access to the archai, or first principles, through the above-described dialectical process. In the second part, subsequent to providing an account of the prouparchousa gno-sis, I will offer a reading of definition as it is presented in the Posterior Analytics. It is in this text that we learn that definition is the mode in which human beings undergo the experience of the arche- of a being under inquiry. Definition, Aristotle tells us, is the logos of the arche-. Yet, this definition is not achieved through apodeixis, demonstration. Rather, Aristotle argues that definitions serve as the archai of demonstrations, so that demonstrations depend upon what is said in a definition; for, those performing demonstrations do not question their primary definitions, but rather hold them as convictions. How then do definitions come to be if not by demonstration? We will see that, through the work of critically engaging the prouparchousa gno-sis, the arche- is subsequently made visible; the nature of the being is made manifest (de-lon). The utterance of this vision of archeAristotle names a definition.

DEFINITION AND THE ˉ SIS PROUPARCHOUSA GNO As mentioned before, at the beginning of the Posterior Analytics, Aristotle states that all teaching and learning proceed from an already-present and already-governing knowledge (ἐκ πρoϋπαρχoύσης . . . γνώσεως) (71a2). Since human beings are the beings whose function and nature is formed and determined by logos,9 everything that human beings do, qua human beings, is shaped by a logos-structure that precedes them, that already governs the meaning-horizon into 43

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ARISTOTELIAN DEFINITION investigation into the arche- of nature with a survey of the arguments about the subject that are circulating in his surrounding world. Aristotle engages in a confrontation13 with Parmenides and the Eleatics (as well as with the phusikoi) in order to make nature more explicit and perceivable and, thereby, to be able to show that nature and the motions over which it rules admit of being (a claim at risk in the arguments of the Eleatics). In the present reading, Aristotle’s activity in these instances amounts to dialectically/critically engaging his own conceptual/cultural resources (the prouparchousa gno-sis) in order to more clearly elucidate the universal concept, qua common concept, of nature, so that he may then intellectually perceive the archeof nature in a definition. That is, in order to reach an acquaintance with something in accordance with its essence (in a definition), for Aristotle, we must first critically engage the arguments that already inform and shape what we think in accordance with our essence (logos, or the prouparchousa gno-sis). The necessity of this dialectical procedure for the intuition of the arche- of nature in the Physics is made evident in Aristotle’s solution to the epistemological problem presented by Plato’s Meno, namely, how do we come to knowledge if we cannot learn what we already know and we cannot come to know something that we do not yet know at all? Of course, Aristotle’s solution to this problem hinges upon the observation that it is possible to be familiar with something in more than one way: one can know something in a general way and one can know something simply. The much discussed passage at the end of the Posterior Analytics14 details a descriptive sequence that moves from aisthe-sis, to memory, to experience, and then to the universal, which might otherwise be interpreted as the formation of an

postulate of speech that simultaneously governs speech. All knowledge must presuppose such principles of speech in advance. Second, Aristotle posits the form of necessity that is most important for the present reading of definition: “sometimes what the thing being spoken is must be [already] understood [or agreed upon]” (71a13). Aristotle’s example is a “triangle.” I interpret this to mean that there must be a preexistent conceptual frame through which the thing being discussed would have meaning at all: the concept of “triangle” must already circulate in a prevailing conceptual economy if it is to be meaningful in knowledge. Third, sometimes one must have both together. For this combination, Aristotle offers the example of a “unit.” A unit is a kind of principle that we must already understand (qua concept) if we are to utilize it in speech and we must presume its existence as a postulate: a unit, to quote Euclid, is that “by virtue of which each of the things that exist is called one.”10 Here, a unit exhibits already-present gno-sis in both ways: (1) A unit is not a number; it is a postulate11 for the possibility of numbering, a principle assumed in advance of the activity of numbering. (2) Moreover, a unit is simultaneously a concept that must already be present in the common language in advance of numbering. Both of these “necessities” for knowledge are secured by inherited speech, by an already-present logos-structure. Yet, what does the prouparchousa gno-sis have to do with the activity of definition? A consideration of Aristotle’s initial mode of inquiry into archai will point us to an answer. As has been observed with much debate,12 Aristotle often begins inquiry related to the archai with an elucidation of the endoxa that subtend the prevailing thoughts on the subject under inquiry. In the Physics, for instance, Aristotle prefaces his 44

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ARISTOTELIAN DEFINITION in the way of mathematics or the diairesis of Platonism, or even as what we commonly call “science” but rather, (3) it is achieved in the comportment (hexis) in which one is attuned with the arche- of what something is (ti esti). The consequences of this account will be a conception of definition that forces a distinction between its use in philosophical/ ontological activity and its use in scientific activity. Further, it will occasion a certain alignment of logical activity with nature, thereby securing Proclus’ intuitions15 that, for Aristotle, logic and the rational disclosure of nature are not things to be distinguished from nature and are clearly not necessarily abstractions of nature; indeed, remarkably, Aristotle thinks in the Metaphysics that the very same ousia that governs the generations of biological forms also rules over what can be meaningfully said about them in syllogism: “ousia is the arche- of everything, for syllogisms come from ti esti, while [among biological forms] generations do” (1034a32). I will show that this form of disclosure, definition, is an articulation of what provides the continuity (sunecheia, the oneness that every form, eidos, must exhibit if it is to admit of being) to a natural being—an articulation of that ousia that both compels the activities and motions that constitute the nature of a being and inscribes itself upon the intellectual perception and, subsequently, meaningful discourse about that being.16

individual person’s subjective repository of previous empirical experience. Yet, it should be remembered that in this passage Aristotle, again, invokes the dilemma of the Meno by claiming that we cannot already be born with a potency to be disposed toward beings in the manner of episte-me-, yet, we also cannot simply take (lambano-) them from being without somehow having already had them before (again, “ἐκ . . . πρoϋπαρχoύσης γνώσεως”) (99b25–30). Thus, the empirical interpretation of the text would have to ignore this initial sentence that, again, insists that we are already disposed (in an imprecise way) with respect to the universal. Humans, for Aristotle, are born with the capacity to acquire logos and logoi, not with the capacity to originally employ logical procedures to subjectively construct universals—either vague universals or precise ones. Children become enveloped by the logos-world, the prouparchousa gno-sis, and only subsequent to becoming adult humans, to acquiring logos in an active and wakeful way, can they cultivate a critical disposition to this prouparchousa gno-sis in order to begin the process of becoming familiar with the nature of a being by its own nature; that is to say, only subsequent to becoming humans can a being be disclosed to them in the way of episte-me-. In the ensuing argument of the second part, the essay will highlight the following points about definition: (1) a definition is a way for a human to break out of the common conceptual economy (logos as endoxa) that governs her awareness of another being (awareness according to us)—by, nevertheless, employing the very same logos/endoxa critically/dialectically—in order to become aware of an other being by its nature (awareness according to the being itself); (2) yet, this logical activity is not one that abstracts from nature

DEFINITION AND THE VISION OF ARCHEˉ As is well known, Aristotle offers one of his more thorough accounts of definition in the Posterior Analytics. Here, in a text dealing principally with demonstration (apodeixis), 45

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ARISTOTELIAN DEFINITION (ti esti)”20 (94a8).21 It is this final and more primary conception of definition that interests us here. For, the third form most differentiates definition from apodeixis while also articulating the technical part that definition plays in any demonstration. Earlier in Posterior Analytics II Aristotle had already offered a reading of what is later called the third form of definition and this reading will help us to unpack the difficult definition of horismos above while also enabling us to understand the nature of horismos, insofar as it discloses natural beings in a unique way. In his explication of the way a definition differs from a demonstration, Aristotle lays out three different characteristics that belong to a horismos that do not belong to apodeixis. (1) On the one hand, definition is an arche- for a demonstration. (2) On the other hand, definition is of “what something is and of substance.” (3) Thirdly, definition makes what something is visible—it makes evident what something is, it does not prove ti esti (90b30ff.). As to the first of our characteristics, Aristotle comes to articulate one attribute of definition by assigning to it the role of arche-. Aristotle writes that definitions are the archai upon which demonstrations rely, the archai that apodeixis must assume are without being able to demonstrate them. We must consider precisely what this means, for Aristotle also states that this “has been shown earlier,” recalling a claim that “either the archai will be demonstrable and thus be archai of archai and this would be carried to infinity, or the first definition will be indemonstrable” (90b23ff.). By the phrase “has been shown earlier,” Aristotle refers to a passage in Posterior Analytics I in which he argues that, even though the first principles are not demonstrable or provable, in order to be disposed toward a being in scientific knowledge (episte-me-), we must be familiar

Aristotle famously differentiates a demonstration from a definition (horismos) in order to refute any claim that definition can show itself as a proof or that apodeixis proves a definition. Toward the end of his discussion of definition’s relationship to demonstration, Aristotle claims that there are three different ways that definition is said:17 (1) on the one hand, definition is spoken of as a logos of what something is (ti esti) (APo 93b30). Of this first definition of definition, we can say that it most likely refers to an account of something insofar as it belongs incidentally to or “comes along with” (sumbebe-kos) a substance (ousia), since otherwise it would essentially carry the same meaning as the third and more primary articulation of horismos. Aristotle confirms my suspicion here by offering “triangular” as an example of this first way that definition can be said and “triangular” is a characteristic that can only belong to a being incidentally (kata sumbebe-kos), not primarily.18 (2) On the other hand, definition bespeaks a mode of speech that in quite limited cases can make manifest “why something is”—a privilege usually reserved for episte-me-. As such, Aristotle argues, this second way that definition is said would be “like” a demonstration of what something is (93b39); that is, definition can resemble a demonstration. In other words, the definition in the form of a syllogism may bespeak “why something is” in unique cases. For instance, in a certain way, the definition of thunder (as “the extinguishing of fire in the clouds”) already includes an account of why thunder is, but not in the form of a proof.19 (3) Finally, Aristotle offers the third and more primary way the word “definition” becomes used: “definition is the laying down of the indemonstrable immediate [principles (archai)] of what something is 46

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ARISTOTELIAN DEFINITION with and believe (pisteuein)22 in the first principles even more than we do in conclusions of our demonstrations (72a37–38). Since the first principles (archai) are ruling origins of beings and shape and determine not only their physical being, but even what becomes said about them (even as endoxa) and, indeed, the knowing of them (72a30),23 then it is of utmost importance to display the first archai and to hold conviction as to their disclosure if what becomes proved about them in a demonstration is to hold any reliable currency. One needs to be secure in one’s conviction that the being about which a demonstration will be made is held in accordance with its arche-; for, the archeenters into the demonstration assumed and, for Aristotle, is not knowable (in the form of an episte-me-, qua demonstration), since “the arche- of apodeixis is not apodeixis and the arche- of episte-me- is not episte-me-” (100b12). For Aristotle, apodeixis takes the arche- for granted. In the comportment of scientific investigation (for Aristotle, apodeixis and its episte-me-), therefore, we presume the first principle of the being that we investigate. If, indeed, (1) a definition is of the arche-, a first principle of a being that is not only a logical first principle but also one that rules over the very nature of that being, and (2) this first principle is presumed by logical/ scientific investigation, then does this not necessitate the interpretation that the primary function of definition is philosophical/ ontological and only in a secondary sense logical/scientific? Perhaps such an observation, while certainly ancient,24 is not foreign to the contemporary world. If we direct our gaze not only toward syllogism but even toward experimental, empirical science, we may have the same question. For it seems to me questionable whether experimental

physicists who conduct the acceleration and collision of particles in the Hadron collider are asking questions about the arche- of nature—the arche- of physics. Moreover, we might wonder whether the electrical stimulation of a severed muscle submerged in a cylinder filled with saline by biologists seeks an answer to the question “what is life?”— the very object of biology. Are these experiments not conducted with presumed answers to the questions “What is nature?” “What is life?”—answers that they inherit from the hermeneutical situation in which they find themselves? Or do they genuinely seek the archai that rule over their work and arguments? Whatever our answer, for Aristotle, scientific knowledge does not aim at archai; one will have grasped the arche- of what something is in some other way. In order to consider how an arche- is grasped in a definition in such a way that it makes the being of something visible, for Aristotle, first we need to repeat what archemeans in its primary sense and state in what way a definition is philosophical/ontological and not merely logical/scientific. In the Physics, Aristotle argues that nature is an arche- for motion (192b21)—in this context, we mean not just any haphazard motion, but rather nature is an arche- for the primary activity of any being by nature. Thus, the arche- rules over the primary activity that preserves and secures the being of a being. The arche- provides the ruling activity that holds the being together in a unity as the being that it is; it provides the continuity (sunecheia) that is necessary not only for the being to exist, but even for its graspability in thought or perception (Metaphysics 1036a7), insofar as the being is to be grasped “as” any one25 thing and not a “heap” (1040b5–15). Thus, a definition is not some simple premise from which demonstrations begin; it is a unique 47

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ARISTOTELIAN DEFINITION articulation of an arche-, an arche- that rules over a demonstration, yet remains indemonstrable by apodeixis. Moreover, a definition is an articulation of the arche- of the primary activity of the being26 (its τὸ τί ἦν ε ἶναι); a definition bespeaks the nature of something in the primary sense. But what does the activity of primary definition look like, qua articulation of the arche-? In the literature, there remains much disagreement about how archai are made manifest to us. Earlier we noted the debate between those who locate within dialectic (and its engagement with the endoxa) a path toward the archai (for instance, Owen, 1986) and those who, in opposition to dialectical method, posit sensuous perception and empirical analysis as the way to archai (e.g. Bolton, in Judson, L. [ed.], 1991). While it is clear from the first part of the present essay that my thinking on the matter is more inclined toward the dialectical than the empirical mode of inquiry into archai (insofar as moving from an awareness of a being according to us to an awareness of a being according to itself is articulated above as fundamentally dialectical), nevertheless, strict adherence to the endoxa without qualification seems problematic for a number of reasons. For instance, the endoxa represent an awareness of a being according to us, according to the prouparchousa gno-sis. If we remain there, if we remain in preexistent familiarity, how do we grasp the being according to itself? Further, endoxa are logoi and, if we were to assert a conceptual/a priori relation to the archai (see n. 12), then we would have to ignore many passages in which Aristotle appeals to aisthe-sis and nous; for, aisthe-sis stars prominently in the description of coming to archai at the end of Posterior Analytics II.19 and nous—which is often described as being “of archai” across

the corpus—is without logos (Nicomachean Ethics 1142a27), thus without endoxa.27 At the opposite extreme, if archai “come directly from sensation and experience” (Halper, in Sim [ed.], 1999, 216),28 then how do we incorporate the prouparchousa gno-sis, from which all knowing proceeds, whether syllogistic, epagogic, or rhetorical? Even if we wanted to argue that preexistent knowledge is wholly explainable by subjective, personal, individual experience in Aristotle—and it seems to me that there are strong reasons to argue against this29 (not only in the case of socially structured concepts such as justice, truth, nature, etc. but also in more concrete concepts like species and organism)—the example of “a unit” that Aristotle offers as an explanation of the way that the prouparchousa gno-sis is necessary seems to prevent strictly empirical explanation. Allow me to repeat it here. A unit is a form of principle that we must already understand if we are to utilize it in speech and we must presume its existence as a postulate. As we saw, according to Euclid a unit is that “by virtue of which each of the things that exist is called one.”30 Here, to recall what was observed above, a unit exhibits already-present, presupposed gno-sis in two ways: (1) as a postulate and (2) as a concept. Both of these “necessities” for knowledge are secured by inherited speech, the already-present logos-structure; they are not appropriated by the senses of an individual perceiver. Even if the concept of unit were wholly available to sensuous impression (and there are reasons to doubt this), its existence as a postulate for the possibility for numbering is not constituted by individualized, subjective experience, since as a postulate it makes possible the experience of numbering. However, one must be careful here not to attribute to Aristotle a Kantian a priori. For, what counts as preexistent knowledge 48

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ARISTOTELIAN DEFINITION remember how we have employed it in geometry class to mechanically solve problems; images of triangles might surface in our mind’s eye. We know a great deal about this concept and we would not know the concept at all if we were not educated in a culture and surrounding world that considered it important to discuss. The algebraic concept circulates in our conceptual economy, in the economy that has appropriated us; and in a certain way, we have access to the mathematics of a triangle because of the common concept that this formula conveys. That is to say, we have a certain awareness of the being of triangles, and hence of right triangles, because of this formula that has been written upon us by the surrounding linguistic world. Thus, without too much distortion, we can say that the algebraic formula resides in the structure of preexistent knowledge that I describe above— the prouparchousa gno-sis. Moreover, it clearly exhibits itself as a form of endoxa—of the wise opinions of mathematicians without whom we almost certainly would not have access to triangles in the same way. However, in my experience, despite their ability to utilize the formula, to solve mathematical problems with it, to discuss characteristics of triangles as a consequence of being familiar with the Pythagorean theorem, students reading Euclid for the first time often have not had an immediate encounter with the actual structure of equalities; in all of their procedural experience with the formula, they have not actually encountered the phenomenon that is abstractly represented by the algebraic formulation (with which they are familiar in almost precisely the same way as a dictionary “definition”). Indeed, often they have never even considered that there are actual squares involved. Perhaps it was different for the mathematicians of Euclid’s day; but, with widespread practical knowledge of

(inherited speech) is not compatible with the “categories of the understanding.”31 Rather, as was stated before, the prouparchousa gno-sis is social and political and, as such, it is changeable, subject to criticism and malleability, and it varies according to cultures and practices. I will conclude with what I hope is an example that elucidates how we arrive at primary definitions and their archai in a way that reflects the movement from being aware of a being according to us toward being aware of a being according to itself. Despite the risk of confusing the matter by employing an example related to geometry and its demonstrative knowledge, I would like to reference a geometrical proposition from Euclid’s Elements in relation to the contemporary endoxa surrounding that proposition. One of the problems with employing such an example is that Euclid’s method is apodeixis and the way to definitions is not. Another problem lies in the fact that the object of geometry is not properly ousia in Aristotle’s view32 and a definition in the primary sense is of ousia. Nevertheless, I think this example will help to illuminate how we find our way to archai in a similar manner to the one that Aristotle himself uses often to describe phenomena difficult to put into speech: analogy; for, in the Physics, almost every example that Aristotle offers of natural beings is drawn from techne-— a house, or a statue, etc.—even though he specifically argues that technological artifacts do not actually have a nature proper to themselves.33 It is in the spirit of analogy that I offer the following example. If we consider the algebraic formulation A2 + B2 = C2, presumably everyone reading this essay will recognize it immediately. Moreover, the formulation might quickly invoke within the mind a narrative involving how and when we learned the formula; perhaps we will 49

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ARISTOTELIAN DEFINITION 1142a25), and (2) intellectual intuition is without logos (1142a27). Dialogical engagement with the prouparchousa gno-sis places us in a receptive comportment with respect to the archai, places us in the hexis in which we can intellectually perceive the being of a being37—but the reception of the archai cannot be reduced to rational, dialogical engagement, to the logos. A curious consequence of the latter is that it might be possible to argue that the discursive content of A2 + B2 = C2 with which we started is nevertheless identical to what would be articulated as a consequence of the dialectical work that led us to the intellectual vision of the meaning of proposition I.47.38 In merely articulating the content of two conceptual representations of the triangle, one cannot perceive a difference. The immediate perception of the meaning of the equalities requires the addition of the noetic perception. Moreover, if the articulation of the content of the two forms is identical, then this means that the vision of the arche- is experiential, not strictly conceptual. And, one achieves the experience through dialogically working through the proposition in order to work back toward its primary meaning, rather than simply presuming the meaning in the algebraic formulation and proceeding with the science of algebraic manipulations. The latter is a demonstrative science; the former is a philosophical, contemplative reflection on nature. In offering an account of primary definition in Aristotle, we have shown (1) that definition betrays a fundamental interpenetration of the ontological and logical, insofar as it is the very same arche- that rules over the motions of the natural being that also— through a definition—rules over any syllogisms about it. And we have seen (2) that definition exhibits a mode of being in which humans may discover nature (and its singular

the formula in the contemporary world, if one is to grasp the principle that underlies the algebraic statement, perhaps one must interrogate this common knowledge, this prouparchousa gno-sis34 that first makes possible my awareness of the structure of equalities suggested in the formula. One way to do that would be an historical investigation into the endoxa surrounding the content of the algebra. Euclid provides such an occasion for interrogation. Proposition I.47 in Euclid’s Elements actually exhibits the fundamental intuition that is assumed in the algebraic formulation—it makes the equalities in the properties of the squares explicit and visible.35 Moreover, in following Euclid, we are able to dialogically engage the triangle, to critically analyze what we already know about it, to add and subtract figures from its sides and compare their equalities. In doing this, we prepare ourselves for a fundamental insight, a noetic vision, an intuition in which we see the very meaning of the Pythagorean theorem we have already been employing without truly understanding it. It was precisely the critical engagement and the linguistic assessment of the triangle that placed us in the position for the “ah ha!” moment of seeing what the Pythagorean theorem means. However, it seems that the seeing of this fundamental meaning cannot be reduced to the discursive engagement that placed us in the position to be able to see. The seeing is rather something in addition to the logical moves in the proposition. I would argue that while the seeing of the equality would not be possible without the discursive assessment of the triangle in the proposition, it cannot be reduced to the discursive assessment. Perhaps this is what Aristotle means when he says in passages that I have quoted above that (1) “it would be nous that is of archai” (APo 100b13),36 “nous is of definitions” (NE 50

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ARISTOTELIAN DEFINITION beings) based neither upon mere sensuous perception nor strictly conceptual mediation. Though dialectical/conceptual deliberation does not reveal archai, it does place us in the comportment (the hexis, the mode of being) in which we are noetically receptive to archai. With these two observations, we have made clear how, for Aristotle, the activity of defining is primarily philosophical/ontological and only secondarily logical/scientific. Russell Winslow

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As Jack Lynch notes in his “Johnson’s Encyclopedia,” this description of definition derives from Porphyry’s interpretation of Aristotle’s Posterior Analytics (in the Isagoge) and Boethius’ own commentary on it. “From this Scholastic tradition emerged the ‘genusdifferentiae’ mode of definition, summarized as ‘Definitio fit per genus proximum et differentiam specificam’: a definition identifies the kind and offers a means of distinguishing it from other examples of that kind. The genus and a minimally adequate number of differentiae provide a definition. Much lexicographical practice even today employs some version of this genus-differentiae definition” (Lynch and McDermott, 2005, 131). The accounts of Aristotelian definition in the literature share a commitment to the conception of the purpose of definition as, first and foremost, a “foundation for demonstrative science” (Deslauriers, 2007, 2), insofar as definition articulates the first principles employed in those sciences. Indeed, for some, the “discovery of first principles” and the consequent articulation of those first principles, qua definition, is “the scientist’s . . . province” (Sim, 1999, xiii). My paper will argue for a conception of definition that is prior to a foundation for demonstrative science and formal logic. While I find Deslauriers’ account of definition compelling—especially insofar as (1) she suggests that through definition “we

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discover a link between logic and metaphysics” (Deslauriers, 2007, 1, 59, and chapter 3), (2) she distinguishes between the prior definitions that “reveal substance to us” and the derivative forms of definition (Deslauriers, 2007, 10), and (3) she argues that immediate definitions are the most philosophically important to Aristotle (Deslauriers, 2007, 44)—I disagree with her claim that “immediate” definition, the more primordial conception of definition, is understood by Aristotle as a “genus and a set of differentiae” (Deslauriers, 2007, 211). I will argue that these conceptual categories are already a move into abstraction from the arche-, which is the first object of a definition. See, for example, Physics I.1, 184a17–18 and Posterior Analytics I.2, 71b35. In the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle defines virtue as a hexis, which is to say, a habit/comportment of the soul in which “we hold/bear” (echomen) ourselves “well” or “badly” toward the passions (1105b25–6). Later, in book VI, Aristotle employs this term (hexis) again to describe the intellectual virtues insofar as they are comportments in which truth is disclosed. Nous is included among these (1139b12–13). Also, in Posterior Analytics, Aristotle employs the term hexis to describe nous when he begins the investigation into which form of “knowing hexis” knows the archai (99b19). Here and for the rest of the essay the quotations from Aristotle’s texts are based on the editions/ translations listed in the References, although I often offer alternative renditions of the Greek. APo 71a2. See, for example, Tredennick, 1960. The positions in the debate may be perused in Sim, 1999. See also Irwin, 1988, 1–70. “The work of the human is a certain life, and this is the activity and action of the soul with logos” (NE 1098a14). Heath, 1956, vol. 2, 277. In this context I italicize “postulate” in order to draw attention to the character of a substructure that this particular already-present gno-sis exhibits. It serves as what we might call a “holding place” for the content/ meaningfulness of numbering—one must already have an awareness of “unit” if one

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is to perform the activity of gathering like “units” into number. The function of endoxa in Aristotle’s method of discovery has engendered a great deal of debate between those who, on the one hand, wish to see a conceptual/a priori methodology at work and those who, on the other, wish to see an empirical method at work. With regard to Aristotle’s Physics, for example, compare Owen, G. E. L.’s “Tithenai ta Phainomena” (Owen, 1986, 239–51) with Robert Bolton’s challenge to Owen in “Aristotle’s Method in Natural Science: Physics I” (Judson, 1991, 1–30). I use the term confrontation in order to convey critical engagement, but not necessarily total negation. I would argue that Aristotle appropriates as much as he refutes his predecessors. 99b15–100b4. In his Commentary on Euclid’s Elements (Morrow, 1970, 11), Proclus appears struck by a curious tendency he sees in Aristotle’s understanding, on the one hand, of the relation of mathematics to nature and, on the other, of the relation of logic to nature. More specifically, Proclus draws our attention to the fact that Aristotle criticizes mathematical explanations of nature, arguing that they abstract from phusis. Of course, in Proclus’ reading, Aristotle fails to think clearly about the relation of the sensible and mathematical. Proclus wants to argue that attending to sensuous beings unhinges one’s logic and knowledge from true nature, while mathematical beings secure an accurate account of it. Yet, Aristotle argues for the reverse; the accuracy of logical disclosure of nature, for him, is better secured by attending to physical beings. Physical and particular beings give themselves as logical principles (archai) somehow already, while mathematical beings are abstractions of this sensuous experience. For instance, in Physics II.2 Aristotle explicitly denies that mathematics offers an account of nature as such. “The mathematician does busy himself about the things mentioned,” Aristotle writes, speaking of natural bodies, “but not insofar as each is a limit of a natural body” (193b32). Rather, the mathematician assesses the surfaces, lengths, and volumes of natural bodies by abstraction—by separating these “formal” characteristics from

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the motion and matter of a being in becoming. Yet, strangely and remarkably, as Proclus notes, Aristotle does not come to the same conclusion about logic and its relationship to nature. Logic—and the broader structure into which it is situated: reason (logos)—we can therefore conclude, is not an abstraction or a separation from the sensuous and particular beings of nature, for Aristotle, but rather logos must somehow be thought of as an expression of these beings of nature; or, perhaps better, logical structures, in contrast to mathematical structures, must be included when thinking of natural beings in the world. Here one might consider the finitude of the human intellectual encounter with the form of natural beings in Aristotle. Indeed, the very fact that we can engage critically the existing arguments and concepts shows that these arguments do not exhaust the ousia of the other. It is the irreducibility of the other that keeps arguments unstable, revisable, always in the process of dissolving and being reconstituted anew. Even if the reception of the form of the other being is noetic, that reception might be subject to malleability and change (perhaps even “corruption”) at the very moment it is raised into discourse (which is to say, at the very moment it is incorporated into speech). Perhaps this finitude bespeaks the urgency behind the activity of definition: we could even say that it is the force of definition that keeps discursivity on its tiptoes. There is much disagreement in the literature with respect to these three forms of definition. For reasons that are clear from the arguments below, I differ from the reading that the first and the third articulations of definition are identical (e.g. in Ross’ commentary on Aristotle’s Prior and Posterior Analytics (Ross, 1949, 634–9). Further, I remain unconvinced that these passages indicate a developmental conception of definition. In his “Definition and Scientific Method in Aristotle’s Posterior Analytics and Generation of Animals,” Robert Bolton offers a reading of these three types of definition as if they would represent three consecutive points of achieving a definition. For Bolton, first we are aware of something in accordance with its general sensuously perceived characteristics (this is conceived

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as a first definition), then we are aware of something that exhibits why something has the characteristics in the first definition (this is the second), and then we continue our inquiry to clarify the features most basic to our first sensuously perceived characteristics (this is the third and most primary “indemonstrable definition”). I do not think Aristotle suggests that there are consecutive degrees of definition through which a definition passes. Rather, I think Aristotle is speaking of two incidental (sumbebe-kos) ways we speak of definition and then also the primary way we speak of definition, the third being the primary sense of definition. Bolton’s summary of this process is to be found in Gotthelf and Lennox, 1987, 145–6. Aristotle confirms this assertion in his recapitulation of the three forms of definition (94a11), in which this first kind is said to be “the conclusion of a demonstration” (94a14). Clearly, Aristotle has already said numerous times that it is not demonstration, but definition that accounts for what something is (ti esti) and, moreover, that definition and what something is (ti esti) cannot be proved. Yet, there is a way in which a definition can resemble a demonstration in form, but not in such a way that it proves anything about the primary substance, but rather, in such a way that it makes manifest something incidental (sumbebe-kos) to or something that “comes along with” substance. “For it is different to tell why thunder is and to tell what thunder is. For it will be said: ‘because fire is extinguished in the clouds.’ But [the question] ‘what is thunder?’ [is answered by] ‘noise from extinguishing fire in the clouds’” (94a3). Aristotle explains that the former is a continuous demonstration (moving forward in the way that syllogisms do) while the latter is a definition. In Posterior Analytics, Aristotle writes that definition is of the ti esti and ousia (90b16, 91a1). Yet, in Metaphysics, he writes that definition is a logos of the τὸ τί ἦν εἶναι (1030a7). With Aristotle, my essay presumes a certain synonymy between the three phrases. Aristotle has earlier stated that “it is clear that the essences (ti esti) of things [whose cause is not other than themselves] will be also immediate and [will be] first principles (archai)”:

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which is to say that their “ti esti must be assumed” (as in the case of a demonstration) or they must be “made manifest in some other way” (93b22–4). We will presently pursue this “other way.” For the importance of conviction and belief in Aristotle’s logical thinking, see Baracchi, 2008, 27–8. On this point consider, once more, the claim in Metaphysics VII.9 that “just as in demonstration, ousia is the arche- of everything, for syllogisms come from ti esti, while [among biological forms] generations do” (1034a32). Thus, the ousia of something rules over, provides continuity and completeness, qua arche-, both to thinking and rational disclosure and to the generation of natural beings. As shown in the first part of the present essay, the continuity in Aristotle between the motions of generation and those of logic (and the fact that the latter depend upon the former) signal a deep connection between the ontological and the logical. While it does not employ the language of definition, there is a version of such a structure articulated already in the discussion of the divided line in Plato’s Republic, stating that science is not concerned with the archai as such, but rather begins with hypotheses about the forms and proceeds from these hypotheses with its scientific work—it operates with presumed conceptions of archai. Philosophy, too, begins with the hypotheses but turns back from the hypotheses (rather than simply proceeding from them) to the beginning (510b). Oneness is precisely the origin of one of the problems with thinking definition in the Metaphysics (1037b11); for, insofar as a definition is composed of several concepts, it must nevertheless exhibit oneness insofar as it is to articulate something that is one and continuous. This conception of a definition as a philosophical articulation of what makes a being one, continuous, and intimately connected to a being’s substance is even stronger in Metaphysics VII than in the Posterior Analytics. For example: “a definition and a τò τí ἦν εἶναι belong primarily and simply to ousia . . . [and a definition] belongs to something that is one, not by being continuous in

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the way that the Iliad is, nor by being bundled together, but [by being continuous] in just the ways one is meant” (1030b5). Compare also: 1036a1, 1037b25, and 1038a20. In the words of T. H. Irwin, “Aristotle’s description of dialectical method seems to offer no grounds for believing that it systematically reaches objective first principles, it reaches a more coherent version of the beliefs we began with, solving the puzzles revealed by our examination of the initial beliefs. But coherence within common beliefs does not seem to be a ground for claiming to have found objective principles” (1988, 8). Halper also argues that the procedure at the beginning of the Physics and other texts that open with an engagement of the endoxa “cannot quite count as science” (Sim, 1999, 216). I agree with him here; for, as I argue above, philosophical work involves the disclosure of archai, not scientific work. Thus, I would want to argue that the first books of those texts originate a philosophical comportment, a comportment concerned with moving from awareness of nature (in the case of the Physics) according to us . . . to an awareness of the arche- of nature. Winslow, 2006, 163–80. Heath, 1956, vol. 2, 277. Kant, 1855, 58. Phys. 193b32. NE 1140a15. For a contrasting view, compare Robert Bolton’s essay “Aristotle’s Posterior Analytics and Generation of Animals” (in Gotthelf and Lennox, 1987, 120) in which he argues mostly against the view that Aristotle’s principal method of discovery is dialectic. Bolton, quoting the Topics (142a6–7, 141b15–19), sees definition as more intimately connected to apodeixis, arguing that definition according to our nature is specifically criticized by Aristotle as being for people who lack the intellectual capacity for syllogism. Yet, I would argue that Aristotle means something quite different in these passages from the Topics. Namely, that there is a way that one can form definitions in accordance with our nature, “according to us” (see, for example, Phys. I.1, 184a17–18), which is to say, in accordance with the cultural/linguistic

constitution in which we find ourselves. These derivative definitions do not enable us to break out of that cultural constitution and such breaking out is a requirement in the generation of definitions “according to nature.” These derivative definitions are formed by those who cannot or do not employ rationality wakefully and originally, but rather resemble the formation of definitions and games by those bounded souls in Plato’s cave allegory (516c–d), who hold contests and word-guessing games based upon the ruling cave prouparchousa gno-sis). In fact, there are ways in which even syllogism does not and cannot break out of its cultural constitution such that it can generate a comportment of knowing—as we recall from Aristotle’s assertion in Nicomachean Ethics that there are people (children and drunk people, for instance) that are able to string together scientific demonstrations, but do not know what they are saying (1147a20). In the case of children, we can see very clearly how they may rehearse the definitions (similar to my example of the Pythagorean theorem below) they have been habituated to state in support of a geometrical proof, but they do not have the reflected insight that comes from the intellectual experience of definition in its primary, noetic sense. Nevertheless, contrary to Bolton, I see these derivative forms of definition as important, perhaps even necessary, insofar as they are a part of the structure of preexistent knowledge out of which we come to know anything at all. “In right-angled triangles the square on the side subtending the right angle is equal to the squares on the sides containing the right angle. Let ABC be a right-angled triangle having the angle BAC right; I say that the square on BC is equal to the squares on BA, AC. For let there be described on BC the square BDEC, and on BA, AC the squares GB, HC. . . . Therefore the whole square BDEC is equal to the two squares GB, HC.”

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A F B

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(Heath, 1956, vol. 1, 349–50)

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The relation between nous and aisthe-sis in the reception of archai is not uncomplicated. They are both immediate perceptive capacities that when attuned in the right way toward their objects are never wrong: “sense perception when directed at its proper objects is always truthful” (De Anima, 427b11); “The thinking of indivisible things is one of those acts in which falsehood is not possible” (430a27). Despite this claim that nous and aisthe-sis are never wrong, there have been compelling readings that assert a certain possibility of a finitude or (even) fallibility of nous: for example, Brague, 1990; Bäck, “Aristotle’s Discovery of First Principles,” in Sim, 1999, 163–81; Baracchi, 2008. Aristotle’s conception of noetic perception is highly debated and controversial in the literature. A sustained meditation on nous would require an essay on its own and is, consequently, not possible here. One might attribute the difficulty of the interpretation of nous to the confused state of certain key manuscripts that include Aristotle’s reflections on nous, as Martha Nussbaum writes in “The Text of Aristotle’s de Anima” in Nussbaum and Rorty, 1992, 2. Or, one might also simply suggest, as Martin Heidegger has, that nous continues to elude Aristotle insofar as “it is the phenomenon that causes him the most difficulty” (Heidegger, 1997, 41). Further, one might try to offer an interpretation of certain difficult passages while still qualifying what one writes by saying, as K. V. Wilkes does: “I cannot understand this chapter [de Anima III.5], and none of the secondary literature has so far helped me to do so” (Nussbaum and Rorty, 1992, 125). I argue for a receptive (dektikon) conception of nous based upon the comparison of aisthe-sis and nous in De Anima (Winslow, 2009). We are reminded here again of that passage quoted earlier in Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics VII on the difference between a geometer and a child performing demonstrations. The demonstrations that they place on a black board are identical. However, the difference may lie in the intellectual perception of the geometer—he has seen, while the child is merely repeating the content of the demonstration (1147a20).

REFERENCES Apostle, H. (trans.), Aristotle. Physics, Grinnell, IA: Peripatetic Press, 1980. Baracchi, C., Aristotle’s Ethics as First Philosophy, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008. Brague, R., “Aristotle’s Definition of Motion and Its Ontological Implications,” Graduate Faculty Philosophy Journal, 13.2 (1990), 1–22. Bywater, J. (ed.), Aristotelis Ethica Nicomachea, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1894. Deslauriers, M., Aristotle on Definition, The Hague: Brill, 2007. Forster, E. (ed. and trans.), Aristotle. Topics, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1960. Gotthelf, A. and Lennox, J. (eds), Philosophical Issues in Aristotle’s Biology, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987. Heath, T. (trans.), Euclid. Elements Vol. 1 and 2, New York: Dover, 1956. Heidegger, M., Plato’s Sophist, trans. R. Rojcewicz and A. Schuwer, Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1997. Irwin, T., Aristotle’s First Principles, Oxford: Clarendon, 1988. Judson, L. (ed.), Aristotle’s Physics: A Collection of Essays, Oxford: Clarendon, 1991. Kant, I., Critique of Pure Reason, trans. J. Meiklejohn, London: Henry Bohn, 1855. Lynch, J. and A. McDermott (eds), Anniversary Essays on Johnson’s Dictionary, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005. 55

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ARISTOTELIAN DEFINITION —, Aristotle. Metaphysics, Santa Fe: Green Lion Press, 2002. Sim, M. (ed.), From Puzzles to Principles? Lanham: Lexington Press, 1999. Tredennick, H. (ed. and trans.), Aristotle. Posterior Analytics, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1960. —, Aristotle. Metaphysics, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989. Winslow, R., “On the Nature of ‘Logos’ in Aristotle,” Philosophie Antique V.6 (2006), 163–80. —, “On the Life of Thinking in Aristotle’s De Anima,” Epoché, V.13 (2009), 299–316.

Morrow, G. (trans.), Proclus. A Commentary on the First Book of Euclid’s Elements, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1970. Nussbaum, M. and A. Rorty (eds), Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. Owen, G. E. L., Logic, Science and Dialectic, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1986. Ross, W. (ed.), Aristotle. Prior and Posterior Analytics, Oxford: Clarendon, 1949. —, Aristotelis De Anima, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1956. Sachs, J. (trans.), Aristotle. On the Soul and On Memory and Recollection, Santa Fe: Green Lion Press, 2001.

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3 ARISTOTLE ON SENSIBLE OBJECTS: NATURAL THINGS AND BODY

of as an empirical examination of natural objects or as a phenomenological account of appearances requires an understanding both of Aristotle’s science of natural things and the basic criteria of these two types of accounts. In the text that follows, I shall first examine Aristotle’s account of nature and things that are by nature as it emerges against the background of Greek natural philosophy, especially the atomists, and on its own terms. With the force of this position clarified, I shall, in conclusion, turn briefly to issues of “empirical method” and “phenomenological method” in order to suggest how we can understand Aristotle’s project in such terms. The question of what sensible things are and how to explain them lies at the heart of Greek philosophy. Parmenides rejects the possibility of knowing sensible things at all and the atomists respond by asserting that “body,” defined as atoms, is a first principle of all things. Aristotle criticizes both positions. These criticisms assume a project shared across all philosophy: accounting for the phenomena that we experience in a way that is recognizable to everyone and open to evaluation by acknowledged standards. But what does it mean to account for sensation and sensible objects?

INTRODUCTION Aristotle’s works in physics, astronomy, and biology are remarkable for their appeal to natural phenomena. Bostock, for example, approaches Aristotle’s account of matter and change saying “Aristotle takes it to be an obvious fact of observation that. . . .”1 Throughout the corpus, Aristotle points to objects of everyday experience as being explained by or bearing witness to his account. Perhaps for this reason, Aristotle’s science is often conceived and so evaluated in terms of “the empirical method.”2 But an appeal to natural things and the development of a science to explain them is not necessarily “empirical”—however this notion is ultimately defined. A consistent turn to natural things as they appear to us within the sensible world could be thought of as akin to phenomenology, that is, an interest in the structure of appearances and a resistance to accounts relying on what is “invisible.” While concern with method, whether empirical or phenomenological, is clearly modern in origin, it is nonetheless legitimate to ask about Aristotle’s procedure. To answer the question of whether Aristotle’s natural science is best thought 59

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ARISTOTLE ON SENSIBLE OBJECTS This question may be answered by considering sensible objects first as the atomists define them, against Parmenides, and then as Aristotle redefines them. While the atomists define “what is” as body, Aristotle defines “what is” as substance, which includes “things that are by nature.” In Aristotle’s Physics, body seems to disappear replaced by natural things; it reappears only in the De Caelo. I shall first identify the basic principles of the atomists’ account of “what is” and then consider some possible criticisms of them. I shall then turn to Aristotle’s account of natural things and, ultimately, body. Examining these different accounts allows us to understand the differences between them regarding the definition of sensible objects (and our experience of them) and finally to evaluate what is at stake in these differences. Sensible phenomena may seem clear within experience, but these two accounts show that they are anything but straightforward. Aristotle explains sensible phenomena through causes that render these objects orderly and knowable. Here we shall see the relation of his project to phenomenology.

Parmenides distinguishes “what is,” which we should seek, from “what is not,” which we should abandon.5 “‘What is’ must necessarily be one. . . .”6 Furthermore, if there is to be motion, there must be a void; but there is no void; therefore, there cannot be motion.7 Consequently, “what is” must be one, motionless, and changeless. Parmenides’ conclusion, Aristotle remarks, rests entirely on logic, disregards sense-perception or the world as we experience it, and appears “next door to madness”: “for no lunatic seems to be so far out of his senses as to suppose that fire and ice are ‘one.’”8 Against Parmenides, Aristotle praises Leucippus and Democritus as developing the “most systematic and consistent theory, however, and one that applied to all bodies . . . and, in maintaining it, they took as their starting-point what naturally comes first.”9 The atomists, Leucippus and Democritus, assume “atoms” to account for both the generation and corruption and the multiplicity of sensible things.10 So Leucippus claims that “what is” is body, defined as an infinite number of invisible indivisible atoms; moving atoms come into contact with one another, either hooking together to generate perceptible things or pulling apart to destroy them.11 But atoms require a void “where” they can move.12 Therefore, atoms and the void are the two causes or “elements” of all things, themselves resulting from aggregates of atoms.13 The atoms differ in shape (sche-ma), arrangement (taxis), and position (thesis)— differences that remain unexplained.14 Placed in the void, atoms move because they differ from one another, producing an infinite series of collisions and entanglements that increase and decrease “body,” that is, the sensible bulks (τοῦς αἰσθητοὺς ὄγκους) that we experience.15 For Aristotle however, even though the goals of atomism are laudable, the account

“WHAT IS”: BODY AND THINGS THAT ARE BY NATURE BODY The rejection of sensation and sensible objects as real by the Eleatics, led by Parmenides, dominates much of ancient philosophy: “[Parmenides’] method and his impact alike have rightly been compared to those of Descartes’ cogito.”3 Affirming this view, Kahn calls him “[aside from Plato, Aristotle, and Plotinus] perhaps the most important and influential of all the Greek philosophers.”4 60

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ARISTOTLE ON SENSIBLE OBJECTS produce complex sets of collisions.24 Aristotle complains that “whence or how motion belongs to [the atoms]” remains unexplained.25 Worse still, the regularity of natural motion (for example, fire always goes up, the stars always go around) cannot be explained and might not even be recognized. In short, the skepticism that envelops sense-objects extends to their motions as well. According to the atomists, everything that happens depends upon contact among the indivisible atoms. Consequently, innumerable worlds could arise and pass away as atoms collide and entangle.26 This possibility gives rise to further unsolved problems. Possible worlds would require void “where” they are and so return us to the original contradiction.27 Furthermore, because motions exhibited by the atoms are unexplained, possible kosmoi resulting from such motion cannot be explained either. Lastly, perception too must be defined by the atoms and, according to Aristotle, must be traced back to the shapes of the atoms, an implication that he finds absurd.28 So if the atoms are infinite and something like flavor is traced back to their shape, then there should be an infinite number of flavors, which is clearly false.29 Aristotle concludes that atomism fails to provide an account of sensation, sensible objects, and knowledge of them. An apparently clear starting point, identifying “what is” with body defined as atoms, leads to conclusions that destroy the initial goal, forcing the atomists to support absurd implications. As I shall argue, Aristotle opposes the atomists in every regard. He denies that body is primarily “what is” and that motion requires a void; he rejects the view of body as a bulk of entangled atoms. For Aristotle, “what is” is primarily substance; natural things, comprising the domain of physics, are among

fails to explain sensible phenomena because it entails a contradiction. “What is” is body, that is, atoms; “void” means “empty,” that is, holds nothing, and since the void “receives” or “holds” body, it cannot be body.16 Since the atomists identify “what is” with body, and void cannot be body, the void fails to meet the definition of “what is”: void must be what is not.17 Aristotle is clear: for Leucippus and Democritus, the two elements of all things are what is full, that is, body, which is, and the void, that is, the empty, which is not; as the elements of all things, both body and void are and so “what is not” is no less than “what is.”18 This contradiction is just the first and most serious of several insurmountable problems. Atomism seems inevitably tied to skepticism in part because sensation varies from one individual to another and is uncheckable.19 Furthermore, no one experiences the atoms as such because they are so small;20 we experience only the outcome of their multiple collisions and entanglements.21 So the first principle posited to explain sensible experience, atoms, is itself unknowable. Setting out with the goal of accounting for sense-experience, the atomists posit first principles that cannot be experienced and so, a fortiori, cannot be confirmed within sensation. Objects within experience also become unknowable because there is no way to determine what is true outside individual perceptions.22 Sense-perception, such as “hot” or “cold,” differs from one person to another and is uncheckable; Democritus claims that such sensations are “by convention” (nomo-i), effectively acknowledging the atomists’ failure to explain sensation.23 The outcomes of the collisions and entanglements of the atoms are also unknowable and so unpredictable. Due to differences among them, atoms exhibit motions, which 61

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ARISTOTLE ON SENSIBLE OBJECTS primarily the shape or form specified in the definition; matter is a thing only secondarily, because form is the thing as actual whereas matter is the thing only potentially.34 And to have a man or a bed, it is not sufficient to have a potential man or bed; one must have an actual man or bed.35 Aristotle’s distinction between a natural thing as form (and so actual) and that thing as matter (and so potential) lays the foundation for his rejection of atomism. “Form” (eidos), or “shape” (morphe-), is a thing as specified by the definition and so intelligible. We define a thing by specifying what is unique to it, a uniqueness that it shares with all individuals of the same kind: John and Jane, like all humans, are first and foremost “rational” and we know “what each is” in a primary sense when we know the form, rationality. “What is” is not body at all: it is primarily form.36 This account agrees with modern sciences such as anthropology. The anthropologist, looking at a bone, does not say “this is body,” but “this bone is human.” Consequently, what the natural thing is primarily and what is primarily knowable to an expert are identical: form.37 But to identify the form, the scientist must examine an individual. The individual is “ἐκ τούτων,” from these, that is, form and matter, and it is “by nature.”38 Form, or shape—a thing as actual—is separable from matter (and hence the individual); for example, god is form without matter and the definition is independent of any given individual. But matter, the thing as potential, is not separable from form. Matter such as flesh or bone cannot be at all without presupposing form, such as human or canine. But here is a problem. “Form” or “shape” only becomes apparent in a shaped thing.39 The anthropologist, for example, must look at an individual bone in order to recognize the form and thereby

“things that are” because they are substance. Body is not substance but a predicate of substance that expresses quantity: body is perfect magnitude bounded by length, breadth, and depth. From this account of “what is,” Aristotle claims to account for sensation as a kind of knowledge, for sensible objects as known through sensation, and for the foundations of natural science. In short, he will claim to produce the universal account of sensation and its objects that the Eleatics claim is impossible and that the atomists try, but fail, to produce. In both its causal explanations and its commitment to the coherence of sensible phenomena, we can see why Aristotle’s project is akin to phenomenology. THINGS THAT ARE BY NATURE Where for Democritus and Leucippus the first principles of all things are invisible, for Aristotle the starting point for physics is obvious to everyone: things that exhibit motion, including plants, animals, their parts, and the four elements (earth, air, fire, and water).30 Such things are “by nature” and nature is a source or cause of being moved and being at rest in that to which it belongs primarily and in virtue of itself.31 Each thing that is by nature has this principle of motion and rest in itself and each of these things is a substance (ousia) and a subject (hupokeimenon).32 But an ambiguity about nature remains: some (whom Aristotle opposes) identify a thing’s nature, or substance, with matter, that is, the immediate constituent of the thing taken without reference to its arrangement or shape.33 Aristotle cites Antiphon, but he could also be thinking of the atomists for whom the atoms constitute things as primary while shape, arrangement, and position are secondary attributes. Others hold the opposite view (which Aristotle supports): nature is 62

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ARISTOTLE ON SENSIBLE OBJECTS form and as such is the same. John and Jane are both bipedal, both have opposed thumbs, etc. The same point follows for knowledge. The anthropologist looking at any part of either individual, for example, an eyelash, a drop of blood, sees the matter in relation to form and makes the same declaration for each: “this one is human.” Conversely, the matter of either John or Jane on the one hand and Fido on the other differs as individual and in the form to which it bears a relation. The hair, for example, is not only of different individuals, but of different kinds; consequently, in this case, the matter differs in every respect because the individuals “differ in form.” Aristotle uses vivid metaphors to express the relation of matter to form. Matter “is aimed at” form, the matter of the heaven is called “aether” because the heavens “run always” after perfect form, namely god.43 Natural form, which is separable from things, occurs always with matter because of matter’s active horme-, “tendency,” toward form.44 Insofar as they are potential, the elements, earth, air, fire, and water, from which all natural things are composed, possess rhope-, inclination, toward their respective natural place. That is, matter’s very character as potential is to be always ready, poised, to attach itself to form whenever possible. Natural form is always found together with matter—not because it is not separable or depends in some way on matter, but because form always provides matter with an opportunity to be and matter is always opportunistic. And when one sees a “thing that is by nature,” that is, the individual thing that exhibits motion and serves as the first starting point of physics, one sees the form, that is, shape, that is expressed clearly not “in” but “by” the matter.45 When the atomists make body, atoms, primary, shape, arrangement, and position

declare it “human” or “canine.” Even though natural form is by definition separable, in fact it is never found apart from individuals. To explain sensible phenomena as primarily form, Aristotle must solve this puzzle. Natural things are composed of both form (or shape) and matter.40 John and Jane are individuals that are by nature; as such, they are not just rational, but this rational individual and that rational individual. For Aristotle, matter and form taken together explain both that a sensible individual is and what it is and how it is knowable (or not).41 While form specified in the definition makes a thing unique, for example, John and Jane are rational rather than canine, matter is the thing as potential, for example, as flesh or bone, and makes a thing an individual.42 So if we compare two individuals of the same “kind,” John and Jane, they share a common definition, human, but differ as individuals, for example, these hands and those hands. That is, their form is the same, but their matter differs. If we compare individuals of different kinds, either John or Jane and Fido, then they not only differ as individuals but their definitions also differ; therefore, they differ from one another in a more profound way than do two individuals of the same kind. This difference appears clearly if we consider matter constituting individuals as potential. Because Aristotle gives “flesh” and “bone” as examples of matter, matter is often identified with body. But it is not body; matter is the individual as “potential,” that is, what can be and be known only in relation to form. “Flesh” or “bone” cannot be at all except by being of a certain kind, human or canine. Because John and Jane differ as individuals, each has matter that as potential produces these two hands and those two hands. But for every individual, the matter is only in relation to 63

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ARISTOTLE ON SENSIBLE OBJECTS must both know form and include a reference to matter within the account.49 Matter, not being separable, cannot be known apart from form and so there is no science of it as such. Consequently, the physicist resembles the doctor who must know the sinew or the smith who must know the bronze.50 Here we begin to see the distance between Aristotle and the atomists. First, where the atomists offers us body as “sensible bulk” formed by entangled atoms, Aristotle defines a natural thing as form specified by the definition and individuated by matter. In Aristotle’s Physics, body seems to disappear. When we see flesh or bones, we see not body, but an individual as potential. Form, by constituting a thing as actual, makes the individual knowable for the scientist, the physicist, or the anthropologist. Where the atomists begin with body and end up with skepticism—Democritus attributes sensation to convention—Aristotle starts out with things exhibiting motion and ends up identifying sensible phenomena with a principle of intelligibility, form. The account of the Physics finds confirmation in Metaphysics I.1:

become secondary attributes; consequently, body is independent of them. For Aristotle, form, or shape, is “what” a natural thing is primarily. The further point that there is no such thing as flesh or bone that is not “of a form” eliminates body taken independently of form and eliminates it as “what is” primarily. Matter is not “body”; it is a thing, itself primarily form but including matter, as potential and so individual. Body disappears from Aristotle’s account of natural things because it has been replaced with the individual, that is, the natural thing, constituted by form and matter. For physics, the individual, primarily form but also including matter, is the object of perception and knowledge: the “thing that is by nature.” Each individual has only one form and because matter can be only in relation to form, all matter is determined by it.46 In modern terms, we say “every cell” reveals “human” or “equine,” etc. Consequently, myriad individual parts relate to just one form and via this relation both are and are knowable. Indeed, for Aristotle’s physics—or science generally—the form is identified by the definition, but the individual is what is known by scientists. And the scientist knows the individual, for example, says “this bone is human,” when recognizing the form expressed by the matter. Aristotle asks whether in order to know natural things, we must know both form and matter, or only one, or only the other?47 The ancients seemed to think one needed to know only the matter.48 But this cannot be right because matter cannot be apart, it is secondary and the thing only potentially; form is separable, specified by the definition and required to have an actual thing—but for natural things, form is never found apart from matter. Because natural things always include both form and matter, the physicist

All men by nature desire to know. An indication of this is the delight we take in our senses; for even apart from their usefulness they are loved for themselves; and above all others the sense of sight. For not only with a view to action, but even when we are not going to do anything, we prefer sight to almost everything else. The reason is that this, most of all the senses, makes us know and brings to light many differences between things.51 In the psychology, memory resides in the faculty of sensation because it retains our contacts with sensible things.52 Sensation 64

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ARISTOTLE ON SENSIBLE OBJECTS further topics, namely the continuous and the infinite, place, void, and time. These topics, which are examined in Physics III and IV, are “common and universal” (κοινὰ καὶ καθόλου) and so must be considered first, while the examination of “proper things” (idio-n) comes later.59 Aristotle leaves the notion of “proper things” unexplained in this context but I shall return to it below. Against the atomists, Aristotle rejects the void in favor of “place” (topos) as “where” motion occurs.60 A recent review of work on Aristotle’s account of place notes: “It is wondrous that in the last twenty years at least five books have been substantially devoted to the five Bekker pages that constitute Aristotle’s account of place.”61 What stands out in his account is the order and regularity of natural things: all place (keeping in mind that Aristotle’s cosmos is geocentric and bounded by the sphere of the stars) admits of up (toward the heavens) and down (towards the center of the earth) while each of the natural bodies (earth, air, fire, and water) is moved toward its natural place, where it rests.62 Place can be understood as actual, that is, actually up and actually down, while the “natural bodies,” or elements, are potentially up and down. Since nature is an intrinsic source of being moved and being at rest, the potency of the elements is aimed at actual place and so Aristotle believes that his account explains why earth always goes down and fire always up, while water and air are relatively heavy and light between them. All natural things are composed of these elements and so all natural things are embraced by this regularity. All artistic things are made from natural things and as such they too exhibit this regularity. On all these counts, Aristotle concludes, the void is a failure. It fails to account for locomotion because in a void there is no

produces memory in some animals and “by nature” animals having memory are more apt to learn because remembering is linked to being teachable.53 Sensation is not, for Aristotle, private in regard to things that are by nature: it presents the natural object, constituted primarily by form but including matter, as immediately available to the one who is by nature teachable because the content of sensation can be retained in memory. Sensation is thus the lowest kind of knowledge.54 And the objects of this knowledge are sensible phenomena constituted as actual by form and as potential by matter. Further points of difference between Aristotle and the atomists are striking. Where the atomists make motion random and local situations of tangling or disentangling atoms unknowable, Aristotle explains motion in the same terms that account for natural things, the actual and the potential. Motion is the actualization of the potential as such by what is actual and so may be thought of as something indeterminate becoming determinate.55 Something made, such as a wooden bed, requires a maker to act on it from the outside so that the wood, which could become any number of things, becomes an actual bed.56 Nature is by definition an intrinsic principle of being moved and being at rest: a puppy, that is, a potential dog, is moved intrinsically to become a dog (assuming nothing intervenes or hinders development) and when there is an actual dog, the individual “rests” there.57 A natural thing has only one form and so there is only one thing a puppy can by nature become: a dog. When a natural thing is moved, form acts as its final cause and produces a knowable, predictable outcome.58 At Physics III.1, Aristotle could hardly be more explicit: if we are to understand what nature is, then we must also understand motion. And motion in its turn raises 65

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ARISTOTLE ON SENSIBLE OBJECTS But how is body related to natural things, that is, substance constituted by form and matter, what justifies its appearance in the De Caelo, and how are we to understand the larger coherence of Aristotle’s physics? These questions require a turn to Aristotle’s logic. In Physics II, natural things are substance and a subject; as a subject, a substance takes predicates.71 Predicates, or “categories,” are of different sorts, for example, quality or quantity. For physics, quantity is a crucial category.72 Quantity is divided into (1) what is discrete (dio-rismenon), for example, rice or atoms, and so indivisible and numerable, and (2) what is continuous (suneches), for example, lines, planes, or body, and so potentially infinitely divisible and measurable.73 Here then, for Aristotle, is body: continuous quantity that is a predicate of substance. But defining body as a predicate of substance fails to answer the question. How can body, which is a “predicate,” effectively replace natural things as the “subject” of physics? In order to answer this question, we require what in the logic Aristotle calls “counter-predication” (antikate-goreo-): the conditions under which a predicate becomes a subject. That is, “counter-predication” forms a subject from a predicate. But specific conditions apply. “Whenever a predicate attaches to every individual of a given kind and to no individual not of that kind, it can be counter-predicated,” that is, made into a subject.74 Aristotle’s example is clear: all humans are grammatical and no individual that is not human is grammatical.75 So “grammatical” is a predicate of humans that can (perhaps should) be made into a subject, that is counter-predicated and examined as a subject in order to understand “human.”76 Predicates meeting the conditions of counter-predication and so able to become a subject are called “proper” (idion) and

intrinsic “up” or “down” and so anything can move anywhere.63 Void fails to account for why motions start or stop and it fails to explain the regularity of motion.64 As a proposed principle—or explanation—for motion, the void is truly void.65 Aristotle replaces both principles proposed by the atomists: things that are by nature replace atoms and the void is rejected for a cosmos defined by place as up, down, left, right, front, and back. In the Physics, not only are atoms gone, but body is gone. Aristotle calls the elements “body” and refers to body in his account of the infinite.66 But he gives no account of body as such.67 For Aristotle, “what is” is primarily substance; things that are by nature are substance and they are constituted first and foremost by form but also by matter. Not body, but natural things are objects of knowledge for the physicist. Against the account of the Physics, the opening line of De Caelo I.1 comes as a surprise: the science of physics concerns “bodies and magnitudes and their affections and movements and further their principles as many as may belong to this sort of substance.”68 Things that are by nature along with form and matter disappear. Body, absent in the Physics, is examined in the De Caelo. At Physics II.1, Aristotle defines nature and things that are by nature; at De Caelo I.1, he defines body: a continuum that is in every way divisible.69 A magnitude (megethos), if divisible one way, is a line, if two ways, a surface, and if three, a body; beyond these three, there is no further magnitude; therefore, these three are all there are and to be divisible in these three ways is to be divisible in every way.70 Having defined body, Aristotle proceeds to an examination of the cosmos and the elements as body. Where the Physics gives us “things that are by nature,” the De Caelo provides an analysis of “body.” 66

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ARISTOTLE ON SENSIBLE OBJECTS express “properties” (ta idia).77 We saw what is proper above, where Aristotle distinguishes between what is common and universal, that is, motion, the infinite, place, void, and time, and what is proper, which remains unexplained.78 Body meets the conditions for being proper to natural things: as a predicate, it attaches to every individual that is by nature (or is made from natural things, for example, works of art) and does not attach to what is not “by nature,” for example, god.79 Consequently, the Physics gives us an account of what is common and universal, which should come first, while the De Caelo gives us an examination of what is proper, which should come later. A property must belong to a subject and we see this relation when the property is a predicate.80 But when the property belongs to every and only individuals of a kind, then, being universal, it needs to be examined in its own right.81 When the property is counter-predicated and so becomes a subject, the subject to which it belongs continues to be assumed but disappears from view. The account of body in the De Caelo follows the analysis of common and universal topics in the Physics because it at once presupposes things that are by nature and completes the analysis of them. In short, together these works constitute the science of physics.82 Body, as Aristotle argues in the De Caelo, is continuous magnitude bounded by length, breadth, and depth.83 As such it is complete and can be known, insofar as it can be measured, that is, as continuous quantity. Again, Aristotle’s opposition to the atomists is telling: the atomists are wrong not only in making body “what is” but in their very conception of body as atoms. According to the atomists, atoms are a plurality, indivisible, discrete, and so numerable (not measurable); body that we experience is “sensible bulk”

and as such unknowable (the atomists do not mention length, breadth, or depth). Because more atoms could always “hook on,” sensible bulk is indefinitely large in the sense of an ever increasing possible size (or number of atoms). For Aristotle, body is continuous, divisible, and measurable; it is by definition bounded—hence he argues that the cosmos must be bounded—and, as magnitude, body is completed by these boundaries and is infinite only in the sense of potentially infinitely divisible. From Aristotle’s perspective, the atomists have been routed.84 Bostock argues persuasively that they constitute a, if not the, major target of his physics.85 Their view of “what is,” body, is wrong; their view of body as a plurality, that is, atoms, is wrong; their notion of “sensible bulk” produced by atoms hooking together is unknowable; their account of experience, for example, body and perception, as dependent upon contact among individuals is wrong. Their skepticism marks the complete failure of their attempt to account for sensible objects or sensation. If we turn from the triumph over atomism to the reach of Aristotle physics, we can see how his view may be thought of as akin to phenomenology.

CONCLUSION For Aristotle, natural things are primarily form but also include matter—sensible individuals are “from these.” Because form is the object of the definition, sensible phenomena are directly and immediately knowable by natural science. Since matter, which constitutes the sensible individual as potential, can be only in relation to form, not only is the sensible individual, for example, a human or 67

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ARISTOTLE ON SENSIBLE OBJECTS appears as we immediately recognize it in sensible phenomena. We do not experience body as a “sensible bulk” composed of atoms; we experience body as magnitude, that is, continuous, measurable, and potentially infinitely divisible. Furthermore, Aristotle’s definition of body, that is, magnitude bounded by length, breadth, and depth, makes it knowable as a feature of all sensible phenomena. We measure the length, breadth, and depth of sensible individuals (we do not count their atoms). We experience an arm or a branch, for example, not as a collection of parts cohering through contact, but as a whole that is “by nature.” Body belongs within the domain of physics because as continuous it is a property that is knowable. In conclusion we may see why this account of nature and ultimately body may be thought of as akin to phenomenology. In a Kantian sense, the empirical content of experience must be based on inductive generalizations and as a posteriori empirical content can never be necessary. By this standard, Aristotle’s account of natural things and ultimately body cannot be empirical.87 When the [trained and competent] anthropologist says “this bone is human,” this statement describes an observable phenomenon as a matter of fact. Indeed, on Aristotle’s account, form (and matter) are causes that at once constitute and render knowable sensible phenomena that we experience as matters of fact.88 The importance of form as a cause constituting natural phenomena takes us to a further point. Form, by constituting natural things as unique, also makes such things knowable. The philosophical term for a thing as knowable is “essence.”89 In the history of ancient philosophy, Aristotle is the first thinker to identify the principle that constitutes a sensible thing’s being in the

a dog, knowable as form, but all its parts are also partly knowable in terms of this form, for example, this bone is human, that blood is canine. Since artistic things are made from natural things, they too are to this extent knowable. Knowledge embraces the list of natural things identified at Physics II.1: plants, animals, their parts, and the four elements, earth, air, fire, and water, and everything made from them.86 Because form constitutes a thing as unique and matter is knowable insofar as it enters into a relation to form, “to know” primarily means “to grasp what is unique,” that is, specific, about a thing. Body is not unique. It is a universal predicate that expresses “how much” for all things that are by nature. Insofar as it is common to all natural things, body does not express anything unique about any individual and therefore cannot bear a direct relation to form. For example, oak, with matter of leaves and branches, and human, with matter of flesh, blood, and bones, both have body, that is continuous magnitude that can be measured as length, breadth, and depth without reference to form. And the same is true of all things, individuals, that are by nature. Consequently, body is and is known in a way secondary to individuals and so secondary not only to form but also to matter. As a kind of quantity, magnitude, or body, can be only by presupposing a subject—a thing that is by nature—and becomes a subject only through counter-predication: as a subject, it can be examined as a property, silently presupposing the individual to which it belongs. Nonetheless because body is a universal property of all natural things (and of nothing else) it must be examined as part of physics if the science of nature is to be complete. Aristotle can claim that on his view the absurdities of atomism disappear while body 68

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ARISTOTLE ON SENSIBLE OBJECTS place, body is not perfect, bounded, continuous magnitude. But such observations tell us something not only about Aristotle but also about the standards of modern science. The success of current science emerges not from the world as we experience it—we might say “Aristotle’s world”—but from technical laboratories and constructed experiments, in short a highly specialized world, producing results that often bear little, if any, relation to the world as we experience it. Indeed, the apparent loss of the world as we experience it might give us more pause for thought about the standards of modern science than is generally recognized. Aristotle’s account of sensible phenomena spoke to his contemporaries to the extent that it answers to their common experience of these phenomena. And it continues to speak to modern readers for exactly the same reason: Aristotle offers an explanatory account of observable phenomena within the bounds of experience. Herein lies the ultimate mark of kinship between his account and the tradition of phenomenology originating in Kant and founded by Husserl. Helen S. Lang

primary sense with the principle that makes a thing knowable in the primary sense. And so by knowing a thing as form, we know its essence, that is, the thing according to its definition. For example, when we know that this individual is rational, we know what it is, that it must have flesh, blood, and bones, and that it cannot possibly have scales, feathers, hooves, branches, leaves, or an infinite number of other attributes. There is clearly much more that can be said on the problem of knowing form and knowing essence, but any examination of this problem starts from the form, along with a reference to matter, as the target of the definition.90 Natural phenomena are not only essences for Aristotle—they also include properties and accidents;91 but in a primary sense they are essences.92 Empirical accounts, insofar as they must be based on inductive generalization, in principle cannot arrive at essences. Again insofar as Aristotle’s account does arrive at essences, it cannot be empirical.93 Throughout the corpus, Aristotle emphasizes that his account accords with experience as everyone can recognize it.94 His account of natural science yields a descriptive science of observable phenomena. Anyone who possesses or turns to expert opinion, whether distinguishing a cat from a dog or visiting a doctor, can recognize the world of natural phenomena as it appears in Aristotle’s account. No consideration of this account would be complete without mention of an important fact: by the standards of modern science it is wrong about everything. Sensible things are not “by nature,” there is not one determinative form for each natural kind, the earth is not in the center of the cosmos, directions, for example, up and down, are not determined throughout the cosmos by

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Bostock, 2006, 34. Indeed a recent essay on the De Caelo characterizes his arguments as “physical”; Pellegrin, 2009, 163, passim. Kirk et al., 2002, 241 (henceforth referred to as KRS). At Parmenides 127a, Plato describes a meeting between Parmenides at about age 65 and Socrates, who was still “very young.” KRS (239–40) argue from this and other evidence that Parmenides was born about 515 bce. All references to Plato are to John Burnet (ed.), Platonis Opera, Oxford: Oxford Classical Texts, 1900–7, henceforth referred to as OCT. Kahn, 2009, 143.

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I proceed here to various problems of “what is”; but it should be noted that “what is not” is also problematic. For an interesting discussion of the problems involved in “what is not,” see Sanders, 2002, 87–104. Aristotle, De Generatione et Corruptione I.8, 325a2. All references to Aristotle are to the OCT except as noted. Aristotle, De Gen. et Corr. I.8, 325a5. Sedley, 1982, 176, suggests that the atomists’ account of the void is formulated “at least partly as a response to [the Eleatic] challenge.” He also considers the Parmenidean background to atomism, see 176–9. For a brief but intriguing reflection on “Parmenides and physics,” see Kahn, 2009, 207–17. Aristotle, De Gen. et Corr. I.8, 325a13–24. Aristotle, De Gen. et Corr. I.8, 324b36–325a3. Again, KRS conclude that “Atomism is in many ways the crown of Greek philosophical achievement before Plato,” 433. Aristotle, De Gen. et Corr. I.8, 325a24–7. For a classic study of this account as specifically directed against the view of Parmenides and his followers, see Furley, 1967, 79–103. Aristotle, De Gen. et Corr. I.8, 325a28–35; see Physics I.3, 187a1–3. “Atom” means “uncut” or “not compound”; in physics it quickly comes to mean “what cannot be cut” or “indivisible.” See Aristotle, Phys. IV.1, 208a27–32 and 6, 213a15–19. Sedley, 1982, 176, points out that the notion of a void surely had antecedents in sixth-century Pythagoreanism. KRS, 555. Aristotle, Metaphysics I.4, 985b4–20. Kahn, 1960, suggests that as principles atoms and the void represent a structural conception of nature that parallels the geometrical structure of the elements proposed by Plato in the Timaeus; see Anaximander and the Origins of Greek Cosmology, 129. KRS, 555; see 584. KRS, 565; 578–80; 583. Aristotle, Phys. IV, 213a27–213b2. Again, Sedley, 1982, is very helpful on this point; see 180–1. Aristotle, Met. I.4, 985b4–6. There is a problem in “lumping together” Leucippus and Democritus but it lies beyond the boundaries of this paper. For a persuasive argument that

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Theophrastus corrects Aristotle on this point, see Schofield, 2002, 253–63. KRS, 548; see Aristotle, Met. IV.5, 1009b7–15. The same problem is raised regularly by Plato; for one example, see Theaetetus 152b1–d1. KRS, 556. KRS, 548–50. KRS, 553–4. See Aristotle, Met. IV.5, 1009b1–16. KRS, 549. KRS, 578–9. Aristotle Met. I.4, 985b16–20; see also De Caelo III.2, 300b8. KRS, 563–5. We shall see Aristotle’s rejection of the void below. Aristotle, De Sensu 4, 442a29; b17–23; see KRS, 587. For a fuller treatment of this problem, see Ganson, 1999, 201–15. Aristotle, Phys. II.1, 192b9–10. see I.2, 185a13–20. In some texts, although not this one, Aristotle uses the phrase “the so-called elements” (τὰ καλούμενα στοιχεῖα); a recent article examines this phrase to reach the conclusion that Aristotle is reporting a view of the elements, which may or may not be his own. See Crowley, 2008, 223–42. The many references to the elements independently of this phrase and the role they play in Aristotle’s physics signals that they must indeed be part of his theory of the cosmos. Aristotle, Phys. II.1, 192b21–2. The force of this definition has been debated extensively in the literature. For a review of the central problems, see Lang, 1998, 34–65; many treatments of this problem refer to later arguments in Physics II and bring them to bear on these lines (see, for example, Kelsey, 2003, 59–72). I am suggesting here that the argument presents an integrity in its logic and progression that makes such a procedure illegitimate. Aristotle, Phys. II.1, 192b33–4. Aristotle, Phys. II.1, 193a9–12. Aristotle, Phys. II.1, 193a30–b8. Aristotle, Phys. II.1, 193a33–b2. On the identification of nature with form and shape, together with a number of issues raised by such an identification, see Thayer, 1975, 725–44.

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Form is clearly identified with actuality. A full discussion of the priority of actuality and its relation to potency is found in Metaphysics IX; on this text and the problems surrounding Aristotle’s claim here, see Lang, 1994, 335–4; Katz and Polansky, 2006, 233–42; Makin, 2003, 209–38. Aristotle, Phys. II.1, 193b5–6. I do not take up further problems here, but there are some. For example, there is being that is not a substance, for instance, accidents such as qualities. They are dependent on substance and in the case of things that are by nature, natural substance, that is, the combination of form and matter. For a clear sense of these issues, see Corkum, 2008, 65–92. Aristotle, Phys. II.1, 194a12. The relation of matter and form that underlies the claim that together they comprise the individual raises a number of related ontological issues. For a review of these and the secondary literature concerning them (although no mention is made of Physics II), see Loux, 2005, 81–123. Aristotle uses the examples of flesh and bone at Phys. II.1, 193a36. Aristotle, Phys. I.9, 192a20–5; DC I.3, 270b20–4. See Met. XII.6, 1072a5–18; 8, 1074a31–1074b13. Aristotle, Phys. II.1, 194b13. See also Phys. II.1, 192b18; Met. V.23, 1033a18–23. Matter and form working in this way can be seen as Aristotle’s solution to the problem posed by Parmenides’ rejection of the possibility of motion. As such, it is an alternative to atomism. See, for example, Hinton, 2005, 365–82. The mule is an apparent exception to the “rule” that natural things have only one form and Aristotle is at pains to explain it (away). Aristotle, Phys. II.2, 194a12–18. Aristotle, Phys. II.2, 194a19–20: Empedocles and Democritus touched on form and essence only very slightly. This problem also appears in Metaphysics IX. For a fuller treatment of it there, see Beere, 2006, 303–29. Aristotle, Phys. II.1, 194b12. Aristotle also takes up this problem in Metaphysics VII.5. For a consideration of the problems involved in his claim to include both matter and form in

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the definition of things that are by nature, see Lewis, 2005, 161–99. Aristotle, Met. I.1, 980a23–7. The point lies beyond the scope of this paper, but I want to note that sensation is the lowest form of knowledge; not all knowledge is identical with sensation. Aristotle, De Mem. et Rem. 1, 451a15–17 (I use the new edition, Bloch, 2007 that reconsiders the manuscript tradition). For an older but still widely cited article on the problems associated with Aristotle’s claims here, see Lang, 1980, 379–93. Aristotle, Met. I.1, 980a25–980b25. “Sensation” as I use it here is connected to a set of interesting problems. On these problems, including how they arise out of Metaphysics I.1, see LaBarge, 2006, 23–44. Aristotle, Phys. III.1, 201a11–14. For the problems traditionally associated with this definition, see Anagnostopoulos, 2010, 33–79. Aristotle, Phys. II.1, 192b16–19. Again, Aristotle, Phys. II.1, 192b12–13; 21–3; See Phys. III.1, 201a27–8; on hindrance, see Phys. VIII.4, 255b17–31. Aristotle, Phys. II.7, 198a25–6. Aristotle, Phys. III.1, 200b21–5. Aristotle, Phys. IV.1, 208a27–32. A full analysis of this problem lies beyond the bounds of this paper. Aristotle says that proponents of the void think of it as “a sort of place or vessel” (213a16). Sedley, 1982, argues that void for atomism is a “negative occupant of space” (180). Mendell, 2005, 325–66, gives an excellent review of the modern problems and literature associated with Aristotle’s account of place. For a consideration of early treatments of the problems associated with Aristotle’s account of place, see McGinnis, 2005, 140–61. Aristotle, Phys. IV.4, 211a2–5; see also DC I.4, 271a26–7. Aristotle, Phys. IV.8, 215a6–13. Aristotle, Phys. IV.8, 215a19–21. Aristotle, Phys. IV.8, 216a26–7. See Aristotle, Phys. III.4, 203b25–30. See, for example, Aristotle, Phys. III.5, 204a8: “Now it is impossible that the infinite should be a thing that is in itself infinite, separable from sensible objects (to-n aisthe-to-n).” Aristotle, DC I.1, 268a1–3.

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Aristotle, DC I.1, 268a7. Aristotle, DC I.1, 268a7–10. For example, see Aristotle, Categories 2, 1a16–1b9. The usual English terms associated with Aristotle’s categories, for example, “quantity” are Latin in origin. We may note that Aristotle regularly uses the expression “the how much” (to poson). For some examples see Cat. 6, passim. Aristotle, Cat. 6, 4b20–5a14. For this point and a fuller account of the conditions under which counterpredication legitimately occurs, see Aristotle, Topics V.3, 132a4–9; 4, 33a5–10; 5, 135a15–19. Aristotle, Topics I.5, 102a20. For problems that go beyond the bounds of this paper with the notion of “counterpredication,” see Barnes, 1994, 177–9. Although it is older, the best work on this topic remains Barnes, 1970, 136–55. See above, n. 59. At Physics II.7, Aristotle explicitly excludes god from the science of physics because god is unmoved. For a fuller account of this issue, see Aristotle, APo I.10, 76a37–76b11. Aristotle remarks that a property may be more familiar to us than the subject to which it attaches, implying that when it becomes a subject it makes the more familiar more knowable. See Aristotle, APr I.19, 82a15–20; 22, 83a36–83b12. The larger issues of these relations clearly lie beyond this paper. For a fuller discussion of them, see Bäck, 2000, 152ff.: “Aristotle’s science consists in ways to uncover the true nature of substances, and he cashes out this project by looking for their propria [APo 75a18–31; 76a4–7]. But then Aristotle insists that a thing’s nature, which includes its necessarily concomitant attributes, is not accidental to it [Phys. 192b20–3]. For him the accidental has no place in science. . . .” For a quite different treatment of issues concerning body in Aristotle, see Studtmann, 2002, 211–34. For a fuller account of the different texts reflecting Aristotle’s rejection of atomism, see Hasper, 2006, 121–55. Bostock, 2006, for example, 185.

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The problem, which lies beyond the bounds of this paper, is sometimes raised of how Aristotle’s natural world relates to his account of god. For a fairly recent example, see Matthen, 2001, 171–99 and Bodnár, 1997, 81–117. Bostock, 2006, 3, finds it “outrageous for him [Aristotle] to claim, in advance of any empirical enquiry . . .” as if only an empirical enquiry could solve certain kinds of problems. It should, of course, be noted that the positions of seventeenth-century physicists, including Galileo and Newton, are not clearly empirical. The entire situation is very complex. For an interesting comparison of Aristotle with later science, see Lennox, 2008, 149–86. On what is sometimes referred to as “Aristotelian Essentialism” and postmodern critiques of it, see Curran, 2000, 327–63. See, for example, Tierney, 2001, 149–70. Because of space constraints here, I have omitted discussion of accidents, an interesting and important topic, which points out that Kant in the Critique of Pure Reason gets his definition of accident from Aristotle, see Ebert, 1998, 133–59. Again, Thayer is very clear about the way in which the identification of natural things with form leads to a kind of “essentialism,” 1975, 725–44. One consequence of this issue is that knowledge in Aristotle does not readily fall into modern categories. On this problem, see Lesher, 2001, 45–55. See Aristotle, Met. XII.8, 1074b1–13.

REFERENCES Anagnostopoulos, Andreas, “Change in Aristotle’s Physics 3,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 39 (2010), 33–79. Bäck, A., Aristotle’s Theory of Predication, Leiden: Brill, 2000. Barnes, J., “Property in Aristotle’s Topics,” Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie, 52 (1970), 136–55. 72

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ARISTOTLE ON SENSIBLE OBJECTS Kahn, Charles H., Anaximander and the Origins of Greek Cosmology, New York: Columbia University Press, 1960. —, Essays on Being, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. Katz, E. C. and R. Polansky, “The Bad Is Last but Does not Last: Aristotle’s Metaphysics Θ 9,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 31 (2006), 233–42. Kelsey, S., “Aristotle’s Definition of Nature,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 25 (2003), 59–87. Kirk, G. S., J. E. Raven, and M. Schofield (eds), The Presocratic Philosophers, 2nd edn, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. LaBarge, Scott, “Aristotle on Empeiria,” Ancient Philosophy, 26 (2006), 23–44. Lang, H., “De Memoria: Aristotle’s Corrections of Plato,” The Journal of the History of Philosophy, XVIII (1980), 379–93. —, “Why the Elements Imitate the Heavens: Metaphysics IX, 8, 1050b28–34,” Ancient Philosophy, 14 (1994), 335–54; reprinted in Aristotle: Critical Assessments, ed. Lloyd P. Gerson, vol. 1, London/New York: Routledge, 1999, 318–38. —, The Order of Nature in Aristotle’s Physics: Place and the Elements, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. Lennox, James G., “‘As If We Were Investigating Snubness’: Aristotle on the Prospects for a Single Science of Nature,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 35 (2008), 149–86. Lesher, J. H., “On Aristotelian Ἐπιστήμη as ‘Understanding,’” Ancient Philosophy, 21 (2001), 45–55.

Barnes, J. (trans.), Aristotle. Posterior Analytics, with a commentary by J. Barnes, 2nd edn, Oxford: Clarendon, 1994. Beere, Jonathan, “Potentiality and the Matter of Composite Substance,” Phronesis, 51 (2006), 303–29. Bloch, D., Aristotle on Memory and Recollection: Text, Translation Interpretation, and Reception in Western Scholasticism, Leiden: Brill, 2007. Bodnár, István, “Movers and Elemental Motions in Aristotle,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 15 (1997), 81–117. Bostock, David, Space, Time, Matter, and Form: Essays on Aristotle’s Physics, Oxford: Clarendon, 2006. Corkum, P., “Aristotle on Ontological Dependence,” Phronesis, 53 (2008), 65–92. Crowley, Timothy J., “Aristotle’s ‘So-called Elements,’” Phronesis, 53 (2008), 223–42. Curran, Angela, “Form as Norm: Aristotelian Essentialism as Ideology (Critique),” Apeiron: A Journal for Ancient Philosophy and Science, 33 (2000), 327–63. Ebert, Theodor, “Aristotelian Accidents,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 16 (1998), 133–59. Furley, David J., Two Studies in the Greek Atomists, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1967. Ganson, Todd Stuart, “Democritus against Reducing Sensible Qualities,” Ancient Philosophy, 19 (1999), 201–15. Hasper, Pieter S., “Aristotle’s Diagnosis of Atomism,” Apeiron: A Journal for Ancient Philosophy and Science, 39 (2006), 121–55. Hinton, Beverly, “Elemental Matter and the Problem of Change in Aristotle,” Ancient Philosophy, 25 (2005), 365–82. 73

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ARISTOTLE ON SENSIBLE OBJECTS A. C. Bowen and C. Wildberg, Leiden/ Boston: Brill, 2009, 163–85. Sanders, K. R., “Much Ado about ‘Nothing’: μηδέν and τὸ μὴ ἐόν in Parmenides,” Apeiron: A Journal for Ancient Philosophy and Science, 35 (2002), 87–104. Schofield, M., “Leucippus, Democritus and the ou mallon Principle: An Examination of Theophrastus Phys. Op. Fr. 8,” Phronesis: A Journal of Ancient Philosophy, 47 (2002), 253–63. Sedley, David, “Two Conceptions of Vacuum,” Phronesis: A Journal of Ancient Philosophy, 27 (1982), 175–93. Studtmann, Paul, “The Body Problem in Aristotle,” Apeiron: A Journal for Ancient Philosophy and Science, 35 (2002), 211–34. Thayer, H. S., “Aristotle on Nature: A Study in the Relativity of Concepts and Procedures of Analysis,” Review of Metaphysics, 28 (1975), 725–44. Tierney, Richard, “Aristotle’s Scientific Demonstrations as Expositions of Essence,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 20 (2001), 149–70.

Lewis, Frank A., “A Nose by any Other Name: Sameness, Substitution, and Essence in Aristotle, Metaphysics Z 5,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 28 (2005), 161–99. Loux, Michael J., “Aristotle on Matter, Form, and Ontological Strategy,” Ancient Philosophy, 25 (2005), 81–123. Makin, Stephen, “What Does Aristotle Mean by Priority in Substance?” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 24 (2003), 209–38. Matthen, Mohan, “The Holistic Presuppositions of Aristotle’s Cosmology,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 20 (2001), 171–99. McGinnis, Jon, “Positioning Heaven: The Infidelity of a Faithful Aristotelian,” Phronesis, 51 (2005), 140–61. Mendell, Henry, “Putting Aristotle’s Physics in Its Place,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 28 (2005), 325–66. Pellegrin, P., “The Argument for the Sphericity of the Universe in Aristotle’s De Caelo: Astronomy and Physics,” New Perspectives on Aristotle’s De Caelo, ed.

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4 ON ARISTOTLE’S FORMULA Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ῎OΝ: PHYSICS IV.11, 14

the formula OPO introduces a clause in which the pronoun (ho) functions not as the subject, but rather as the predicate of the participial verb (on). Thus, for instance, in Physics 219a19ff.: “the prior-posterior is, in movement, that by being which, at a certain time, [movement] is movement.” As Brague points out in Sections 2 and 3, where he considers the antecedents of this linguistic behavior in Plato and Aristotle himself, the formula OPO introduces sentences of the type: “that by being which [OPO] x is such and such, that is, x is y,” or “that by being which [OPO] S is P.” These, in turn, answer questions of the type: “by being what is x such and such?” or “by being what is S P?” Thus, far from coinciding with the subject, the formula says what the subject must be in order to be what it is—it says, in other words, the very constitution of the subject as such, what/how the subject must be in order to be the subject of that predication. The phrase, thus, exposes that in virtue of which something is itself. At stake is the “act” of “subjectivization” (subjectivisation) of the subject—subjectivity (subjectivité) understood not psychologically, but as the becoming subject of the subject.

[The text that follows constitutes the last two sections of the long essay “Sur la formule aristotélicienne Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ῎OΝ (Physique IV. 11, 14),” first appeared in R. Brague, Du temps chez Platon et Aristote, Paris: PUF, 1982, 97–144. In its original form, the essay is subdivided into five sections and addresses the formula mentioned in the title (abbreviated as OPO) both in its grammatical difficulty and in its philosophical opacity. The overall orientation is toward realigning syntactic analysis and thoughtful interpretation. Indeed, the formula appears at crucial junctures in the discussion of time, and thinking through its implications proves to be of the utmost relevance. Section 1 delves into the syntactic construction of the formula, which appears seven times in Physics IV (six times in chapter 11 and once in chapter 14), twice in Parts of Animals II, and once in the treatise On Generation and Corruption. Through a painstaking examination of these passages, Brague calls into question those constructions and editorial stratagems that have allowed the unproblematic interpretation of the formula OPO as hupokeimenon, “underlying subject.” Far from being isolated and nominalized, 75

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ON ARISTOTLE’S FORMULA Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ῎OΝ enunciation of time. We might rigorously rely on the curious formula with which Aristotle ends the phrase just cited: τότε καὶ τοῦτό φαμεν εἶναι χρόνον (219a28f.). The expression might be translated: “we say then that this is time.” This borders on a zeugma, in which the verb is simultaneously used as an existential (then there is time) and as a copula (this is time). But the interest is to show that the now, and the time defined by it, as lapses of time (219a29f.), do not exist outside of the act of saying the now,2 and, for example, saying, “Now is the time to go,” etc.3 The “then” that I say is the very “that” that is the now. Take the phrase “it is now noon.” In Greek, one would tend instead to say, “now is noon.”4 This is in any case what we would suppose, on the model of “then was noon.” This phrase seems to us, at first glance, to be composed of a subject (“now”) and a predicate (“noon”) linked by a copula (“is”). The Greeks would doubtlessly have analyzed it according to a binary rather than ternary schema, and would speak of “now” as an onoma and of “is noon” as a rhe-ma. However that may be, if we look more closely at the phrase, we see that such a phrase has, properly speaking, no subject (or onoma), and that the term “now” occupies the place of the subject owing to a certain grammar, and not at all because of its meaning. It is for this reason that both elements of the phrase can occupy either place and are interchangeable: one could very well say, “now is noon” as “noon is now.” There is no veritable subject; aside from the verb “to be,” it is as if such sentences contained only predicates. Which is why they take, entirely naturally, the so-called impersonal form, “it is noon.” We might conclude from this absence of a subject, as a first consequence, that discourse about time, if it is made of propositions that do not involve a subject, should have certain characteristic properties. Such propositions

In this way the subject (that which is said to lie under) emerges as neither static nor inert. It may in fact be seized in light of temporality and enactment, and therefore as qualitatively evanescent. In light of this “expanded” understanding of the subject, Brague proceeds to discuss the relation between soul and time, the legein of the soul, and the logic thereof. This discussion takes place in Sections 4 (“Saying Time”) and 5 (“Arithmos”), which are presented here for the first time in English translation—Ed.]

SAYING TIME The sphere of logos, of “saying,” of predication, is here the natural locus for reflecting on time and the now. It is within such a reflection that the phenomenon of the now must be thought in connection with the formula “that by being which the now is the now” (OPO). This formula, indeed, allows for the expression of the substrate-function played by the now, even as the substrate is constituted by a predication, beyond which it has no consistency. THE STRUCTURE OF THE ENUNCIATION This paradoxical status holds for the very nature of the enunciation of time and its particular syntactical structure. It may be important here to bear in mind the phenomenon for which Aristotle is attempting to find a theory. We should therefore allow ourselves to be detached from what is explicit in the Aristotelian text in order to attempt to identify the thing itself, which other thinkers have already attempted to consider.1 Such an operation is risky, for nothing allows us to say that Aristotle had in view the phenomenon of the 76

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ON ARISTOTLE’S FORMULA Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ῎OΝ (exists) now (adverb).” This latter formulation is, no doubt, found nowhere in Greek, which in such sentences prefers to assign to the verb “to be” the function of the copula—which explains why it is omitted most of the time. Let us note, though, that this indecision in the verb tends toward what might be called the weakness of the subject. At best, one might consider “now” as a sort of quasi-subject, an evanescent reality, capable of furnishing a verb with a fulcrum, but one so weak as to be incapable of supporting a predicate. A quasi-subject is nevertheless a subject. I must therefore qualify what I have said about the absence of the subject. The subject is indeed there, but it is present in an entirely paradoxical way. It is this paradoxical mode of presence that usage of the formula containing the OPO expression must translate. The function of the subject is not purely and simply lacking. In effect, to the question “What is that by being which the now is?” one may give an answer. One can read this answer in full: τὸ πρότερον . . . καὶ ὕστερον . . . τὸ ἐν κινήσει (219b26f.).

define something as sophistry does. Sophistry thrives indeed by neglecting the substrate.5 We can thus better understand the passage in which Aristotle, in a perfectly unexpected, and even, in view of his constant critique of sophists, stupefying way, takes up without critique a sophism that he even seems to justify: at 219b20f., the Stagirite draws a parallel between the case of an object carried—which is in one sense identical, and in another sense different—and the sophism that consists in supposing Coriscus at the Lyceum is different from Coriscus in the Agora. This remark is made within the framework of a reflection on the now, and it is grasped fully only if one is aware of this basic point, that the now is the only case in which sophistry is correct. Or, rather, the phenomenon of the now contains, one might say, a sort of natural sophistry to which only sophistical discourse can do justice. Moreover, it ceases thereby to be sophistical and identifiable as such, and becomes simply philosophical, since it is true. It is for this reason that Aristotle no longer calls it sophistical: Coriscus remains the same because he is not constituted by his circumstances at a given moment. “Being Coriscus” is not the same thing as “being at the Lyceum.” In turn, the sophism is true (and ceases to be one) for the now, which has no consistency outside of a situation established by a logos that announces: “Now it is noon, one, etc.”6 This analysis could be pursued further: in phrases of the kind we have chosen as an example, the verb “to be” has a rather particular function. The distinction with which we are familiar between the function of the copula and the existential signification can hardly be maintained. The phrase, “it is now noon,” can be understood as “now (S) is (C) noon (P),” but also as “noon (S) is

THE PRIOR AND POSTERIOR The phrase just cited should indicate to us that by being which movement is. Yet this is itself hardly comprehensible. In order to understand it, we must make a detour upstream that will lead us back to the first occurrence of the expression presently occupying us, which we had already studied from the point of view of its construction,7 and of which we must now propose an interpretation. This presupposes that the phrase be appreciated in its context: after having posited in principle that movement lies in the wake of magnitude (megethos), and time in 77

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ON ARISTOTLE’S FORMULA Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ῎OΝ negative claim, and does not examine what is the being (einai) of this structure. His explanations are clearer when he deals with the phenomenon principally at issue, which is that of the now: that by being which the now is, is the prior-posterior structure, as it appeared in movement—rather than in general. We must undoubtedly understand Aristotle’s precision here as indicating that the relation of prior and posterior is marked by an irreversibility. It is from this point of view that we glimpse that by being which the now is. As for that by being which the now is itself, the now is something like a relation of prior and posterior; a passage (not an act of passing but a path) from the one to the other; a putting-into-contact of a “before” and an “after.” Supposing this to be the case, we might then be able to broach a controversial question concerning the nature of the now. The question is whether the now, for Aristotle, has perfect (ponctuel) or progressive (duratif) aspect. However, nothing is perfectly clear on this point in the text of Physics, although we might mark out a now in a primary sense, which is indivisible (VI.3, 233b33f.). But this distinction is put to use, here as everywhere else, in terms of a particular analysis, and outside of the treatment of time. Here we find the expression τὸ παρὸν νῦν ἄτομον (222b7f.). Yet it occurs in a passage of little doctrinal emphasis. On the other hand, indivisibility is not equivalent to the absence of dimension, but could simply indicate that the practice of division would change the nature of the object divided. Finally, the distinction carried out at 222a20f. does not have extension as a criterion, and the sense in which it claims the now is properly to be taken is susceptible to two interpretations. Where Aristotle gives explicit treatment of

turn in the wake of movement, Aristotle establishes the existence of the prior and posterior in magnitude (219a14ff.), then in movement (a17f.), and finally in time (a18f.). He then moves back a step in order to determine the mode of presence of the prior and posterior in movement (a19ff.). This model will also permit him to establish the mode of presence of the prior and posterior as concerns time. The better part of chapter 11 is devoted to this task. The presence in movement of the prior and posterior is precisely what defines the phrase that we tried earlier to restore. The expression τὸ πρότερον καὶ ὕστερον designates a single, unique phenomenon, as the absence of the article before the second adjective indicates. It is readily observable in every case—with the exception of 219a28, which is sufficiently explained by the context. As I understand it, the phrase has to do with something like a prior-posterior structure: the fact that movement is oriented according to a prior and a posterior. This structure is a relation: the two directions are inseparable, a movement always lets appear at once a before and an after—and it lets them appear precisely by putting them in relation. Aristotle thus claims: “The prior-posterior in movement is that by being which, at a given moment, it [movement] is movement; but for it being is different and is not movement” (219a19ff.). One might paraphrase this claim as follows: the prior-posterior structure is, in movement, that whose actualization at a given moment allows for movement to be movement, without this structure itself being movement. At each moment, movement puts into relation a “before” and an “after.” But the structure itself, the polarity of before and after, is not of movement. In this phrase, Aristotle nevertheless contents himself with a

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ON ARISTOTLE’S FORMULA Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ῎OΝ loses its pertinence. Whatever the duration of the now, extended or evanescent, the function it fulfills of assuring the passage between prior and posterior remains the same.11 We might take to heart an intuition of Heidegger, who offers a number of helpful insights on this point, and say that it matters little whether the now has dimension, provided it has what he calls die Dimension.12 We are now in a position to return to the “logical” examination of the now. In the phrase, “now is noon,” the prior-posterior structure plays the role of subject. This is why we had to qualify our first claim, which said that the subject was simply absent. But the function of the subject is exercised mediately. The structure that fulfills this function does indeed only receive its consistency as a subject from the predication itself. The predication, so to speak, subjugates its subject [s’assujettit son sujet]. In “now is noon,” the latter two words form a whole. The second predicate, “noon,” is a sort of accident, but it is the accident of no subject. It is a sort of accident of the verb, and an accident that, since it has no basis other than the verb itself, belongs inseparably to it. The sentence is thus binary. The words, “is noon,” the rhe-ma, furnish the content of the subject, “now,” since this word means: “that in relation to which there is a before and after.” In this sense, the now is nothing but that by being which it is itself. The quasi-substrate is a predicate. In other words, the subject is nothing other than what receives each time, from the verb, what it is. What it receives situates it, and thus merely allows it to be, after one thing and before another. If we now apply these considerations to the question what is it in the now that is permanent and what is it there that changes,

the instant, thus, nothing is clear enough to eliminate all discussion. Faced with such a situation, it is necessary to pose a principle of method: when a question that we are posing is undecided by an author, and in a given text, we must not decide the question for the author, but should seek to understand why a distinction that we make use of, or that the author himself or herself makes use of elsewhere, is not pertinent in a certain passage. And this is the case, it seems to me, with regard to the distinction between an extensional and a perfective now.8 It does not suffice to state (at the level of reality) that Aristotle did not distinguish them, even if this relieves us from having to supply as an explanation some hypothetical “mentality” or certain facts of the Greek language. We must rather (at the level of necessity) explain why he did not need to distinguish between them from the perspective adopted in a given text. As regards the question of the extension or nonextension of the now, it is not necessary to decide that the now is extended.9 Nor is it necessary to say that this idea “runs counter to what is said on every line of the Aristotelian treatment of time.”10 This is saying too much. What is necessary rather is to construe a focal point, external to the text, which can account for its coherence, to the extent that it can make apparent that the distinctions that Aristotle does not make use of are not practicable from the perspective he adopts at a given moment. In case, it must be that the doctrine of the now remains true whether it is perfective or ongoing. This is the case if the now, from the point of view of that by being which it is the now, is the prior-posterior structure in movement. For the question whether that before which the anterior takes place, and that after which the posterior takes place, is a point or a duration,

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ON ARISTOTLE’S FORMULA Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ῎OΝ earlier developments.”13 Conen, after having cited Carteron, correctly draws attention to the fact that the lines preceding the definition contain the requisite preparation.14 But Carteron conserves the merit of his having been surprised, and of having perceived that what the lines 219a22–b1 prepare is not what we understand usually by the notion of number, and that we should test what we commonly understand by number against the Greek term. The concept of number will not therefore be presupposed. The precise sense that the word arithmos takes for Aristotle in the treatise on time will, on the contrary, have to be deduced from the text itself. In other words, what the Stagirite understands by it is what he describes in 219a22–b1 and, at least at first, nothing else. He invites us quite explicitly to be careful with our spontaneous understanding of the term, by the prudence with which he introduces the topic. This in any event is shown in the 219b3–8 passage: after noting that time is not movement, but that ᾗ ἀριθμὸν ἔχει ἡ κίνησις (b3),15Aristotle offers an indication (se-meion) showing that this is the case: we regard movement as longer or shorter by means of time, in the same way that we regard more and less by means of arithmos. We have here a strong indication, not necessarily a demonstration, of the legitimacy of the use of this term. This indication is derived from common practice and opinion, not from the thing itself. It is for this reason that it shows only that time is something like an arithmos (ἀριθμός . . . τις, 219b5). The concept we are dealing with is provisional and imprecise. Hence the qualification that is immediately offered, and not at all as “a simple appendix”:16 But (δέ, b6), since arithmos is said in two ways, we must distinguish them. And the specification that is added results in saying that time is rather

we must make a correction to the traditional answer. According to that answer, in fact, it is the subject that remains and that receives changing predicates. But if it is the predicate that endows the subject with the heft that permits it to be the subject, one could then say that it is as a predicate that the now does not change: noon, one, two, is now, and what changes is, in a sense, the verb, “it is noon,” “it is one,” etc.

ARITHMOS These remarks however leave in the dark half of what we described as having a thoroughly “logical” nature. We should therefore presently examine how this other aspect of the now responds to this expectation. NUMERICAL STRUCTURE Aristotle indicates this other aspect of movement when he writes, in a text that is the counterpart to the one we have been examining, ᾗ ἀριθμητὸν . . . τὸ πρότερον καὶ ὕστερον, τὸ νῦν ἔστιν (219b28): the now is, inasmuch as the prior-posterior is susceptible to an arithmein. I have left the verb untranslated so as not to prejudge anything. For everything here depends on its meaning, in the same way that everything depends, in the definition of time, on the meaning of the corresponding substantive, which meaning, too, is not without its own problems. To begin from an external point of view, the word arithmos makes its appearance in the text rather surprisingly. Carteron, for example, remarks that “this result cannot fail to surprise. . . . The notion of number that appears here is not prepared for by 80

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ON ARISTOTLE’S FORMULA Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ῎OΝ (δή, b7) the arithmos counted, and not that by which we count. What is excluded here is the possibility of defining it as that by which we judge (κρίνομεν, b4). The indication first advanced is thus later superseded by a more precise determination.17 Supposing this to be the case, we must proceed to examine the term arithmos. And this is especially the case, curiously, as we are dealing with a term that has undoubtedly received the least attention from those who have discussed Aristotle’s definition of time.18 It is only relatively recently that attention has been paid to elucidating the meaning of the word arithmos in the Aristotelian treatment of time, in the wake of older works on the meaning of the word generally in Greek thought. Credit for this is owed to Wieland and Böhme.19 Both authors, although their works are of immense value, have the disadvantage of restricting themselves, in that they extract from the Greek word what lets itself be translated by “number,” or more exactly, as German allows for an essential distinction here, by Anzahl. However, it seems to me necessary to pursue the inquiry further, and to attempt to suspend in the first place trials of translation in order to grasp, above all, the phenomenon at issue. Translating arithmos as Anzahl—the “number of . . .,” in the sense in which one says that there are in some room a certain number of people—has the advantage of calling attention to the act of counting itself, of enumerating collections. It frees us from a nearly inevitable fixation on that with which we count and perform operations (Zahl). But we must go one step further and grasp the act of counting as consisting in stating and reproducing the structure of certain assemblages of unities: a pair, a triad, a quartet, a quintet,

etc. An arithmos is above all a structure, an assemblage.20 The phenomenon in question emerges in certain occurrences of the word, more ancient than philosophy itself—for example, in Homer. But there are still in Aristotle a certain number of texts in which the word arithmos is hardly susceptible to another interpretation, and where, in any case, to translate it by “number” would indeed be particularly strange. This goes, for example, for many texts in which Aristotle gives an account of the Pythagorean image of the world: it makes much more sense to understand that the Pythagoreans conceived of the universe as a “structure determined by number,” as a system of numerically expressible relations, than to say that for them, quite simply, the world is number. It is in this way that the word arithmos could be treated on a parallel with harmonia, and that it evidently designates a structure ordered by numbers.21 In the Posterior Analytics, the expression εἰς ἀριθμὸν θέντες (II.1, 89b25ff.) could be seen to say: reducing the question to a system of possible solutions, drawing out its structure—here the simplest one, the one which expresses the first number, two, that is, the alternative. Moreover, a difficult text, and one frequently corrected, in De Anima III.7, 431a22f., might receive new light if we were to suppose that arithmos designates there a numerical relation rather than a number. We need not neglect the occurrences in which the word takes the sense of the “rhythm” of verse or prose.22 Finally, the text presently occupying our attention contains, at the very end, a passage in which Aristotle returns to the concept of arithmos in order to clarify it one last time. The passage itself is clear only if one grasps the parallelism between figure (sche-ma) and arithmos. What is common to both is 81

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ON ARISTOTLE’S FORMULA Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ῎OΝ articulation that constitutes arithmos. An arithmos is an arrangement that is simultaneously one and plural. The existence of number constitutes the practical synthesis of the one and the many—which explains its interest as a paradigm for Platonic dialectic. Each arithmos is one in that it distinguishes itself from others: a pair is not a triad, etc. It distinguishes itself from others by the way in which it brings together, in a structure that is in every case a particular one, elements that are unities. An arithmos is one only because each unity is one.24 The unity of arithmos is a unity of unities. The resulting unity does not have the same properties as its constituent unities, which might be, for example, even or odd.25 An arithmos is one because its unities are each of them one, apart from the others and not to be confused with the whole. One might perhaps show the presence of these conceptual points in certain Aristotelian texts. For example, in a passage from De Anima where Aristotle speaks of the way in which we become aware of arithmos (III.1, 425a19): ὁ δὲ ἀριθμὸς [is perceived] τῇ ἀποφάσει τοῦ συνεχοῦς, καὶ τοῖς ἰδίοις.26 Sensation provides us with the unity that we use for measuring, by having us discern the eidos that assures the unity of the thing: before counting horses, one must know how to identify a horse as constituting a unity.27 As for the collection itself, it is furnished by a negation (apophasis) of the continuum, which produces something discrete (die-re-menon). But what is discrete does not deny the continuum in such a way that the elements are separated by having become disparate. They only appear discrete, on the contrary, owing to a basic, radical continuity that their division makes manifest: diairesis makes evident the common basis and horizon of what it cleaves apart.

the idea of an arrangement, a structure, an articulate whole. A sche-ma is the way something holds (echein) together. In this sense, an arithmos is like a figure. What does not change, with regard to arithmos when that of which it is the arrangement varies, and with regard to a sche-ma when, for example, in the case of a triangle, the length of its sides is modified, is precisely the law of the structure, the structural properties independent of that which the structure comprehends: in the first case, the relative length of the sides articulated in a triangle, and in the second, the nature of the unities articulated in a decad. One could find in Plato’s works certain occurrences of the word arithmos in which the proximity to the idea of the sche-ma is particularly visible. Thus a passage from the Timaeus concerning the transformation from one to another of three of the four elements, which are formed from different combinations of the same elementary triangle, where we read: “When in turn a quantity of small [combinations] is disseminated into triangles, by emerging in a single arithmos, they will realize another large figure, that of a unitary volume” (54d1f.). The term arithmos here designates not so much number as an expression of quantity, but rather the structure realized by the elements that draw together.23 ARTICULATION The fundamental fact bearing on numerical structure is in my view its articulation. Reflection on this feature makes it possible to avoid clumsily defining arithmos, something thus like number, by means of the idea of a numerically defined structure. We will be able here to avoid such a tautology only by reflecting on the nature of the 82

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ON ARISTOTLE’S FORMULA Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ῎OΝ of the now, that is, what the now is insofar as the prior-posterior is arithme-ton (219b25, 28). We might now translate this last term “articulable”—on the condition that we invest this word with the sense that we have so far seen it to bear. The Aristotelian definition of time should thus, if my approach has been legitimate, be understood in a modified way. By exaggerating its conciseness slightly, in order to render it clearer, we might translate the definition thus: “This is what time is: the prior-posterior articulation of movement.” The lines that precede the enunciation of the definition contain the description of what I have called articulation. They are placed indeed at a level at which the prior-posterior appears as one and many—in this case, as two.34 Similarly, articulation is both the act of unifying and the act of dividing. It could thus be characterized as pertaining to a unitary structure (219b25, 28) as well as pertaining to two elements (223a29: ταῦτα . . . ἀριθμητά). Arithmos is not viewed as what makes counting possible, but as what a collection must possess in order to be a collection, and thus in order to be counted. Articulation alone makes enumeration possible. The case of time casts this fact into relief particularly well—which is why the concept of arithmos appears there with exemplary clarity.35 In effect, when the question is raised what is “counted” in time, of what collection time is the number, it cannot be answered. It is not a matter of periods of time, of which one would have to assume a temporal character, in a circular way; nor again are they instants, for they do not exist.36 In general, it must be noted that nothing is counted except that which is previously ordered and structured by an articulation. Call this a “number,” if that is preferable, but only in the sense in which one speaks of a numerous verse, that

My conscious intention in making use of the term articulation, in order to name this complex structure of arithmos, has been, although not uniquely,28 to connect it to the linguistic domain. The term designates the way in which a meaning is produced by the combination of elements none of which is a bearer of the meaning in question—a fact well known to Plato and to Aristotle.29 If we are to consider articulation, we must juxtapose arithmos to logos. It is indeed only at the level of discourse (logos), and not simply of a word or a syllable, that a meaning (logos) arises from meaningful parts, whereas at the level of the syllable, meaning arises out of parts that have no meaning.30 Many meanings form another one, and in such a way that the total meaning supposes that the partial meanings remain distinct. Aristotle notes this parallelism when he compares definition (horismos) to an arithmos and when, very explicitly, he situates arithmos and logos—specifying that he is speaking of vocal discourse here—in the same class, namely that of discrete quantities.31 Now, we have spoken, with regard to Plato, of the “numerical structure of logos.”32 This formula could be generalized and extended to Aristotle. But it is necessary above all to understand that we could very well turn the formula around and speak of a “logical structure of arithmos.” In this sense, if I may be permitted this formulation, we should say that number is a logos whose meaning is unity.33 ONE AND TWO It remains now to see how these rather general considerations can be applied to the Aristotelian discussion of time. Our starting point was the question what is opposed to “that by being which the now is,” and therefore what the meaning is of the being (einai) 83

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ON ARISTOTLE’S FORMULA Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ῎OΝ of the prior and the posterior. What does it mean to speak of the “being” of the now? It is what we mean when we say: now, it is such and such time. The existence of the now is nothing but the fact that it receives (as a quasi-subject) a predicate—in simpler terms, a date. For the now, being is always being such and such a date (see 219b13). Being now is being situated, and in relation to a prior and a posterior. These in turn appear as such only in such a situation.37 The now is as the unity of a number that runs through and unifies the elements that compose this number. But this exists as a posited unity—which is why the image of a point presents itself naturally. It is posited in a polarized structure. This forces it to shatter into two all the while that it is one. Reciprocally, however, this positing of the one as two, by predicating the situation, and thus the duality of the now (or nows), of the subject constituted by the prior-posterior orientation, gives it the two poles it needs in order to be. The unity of the now is its unifying function (222a15). It is devoid of its own unity, which it attains only by unifying what it is not. By unifying that which is two, it passes into the two: the two become one, but the one passes into the two. This pulsation of gathering and division constitutes time. Time “advances” down the middle, through the present that simultaneously ejects the past and the future. The “movement” of time is centrifugal.38 Such is the way in which one might formulate the dialectic of the now. This dialectic is situated in the sphere of logos. The perspective from which the Aristotelian treatise on time is enacted seems thus to escape the alternative of the “physical” and the “psychological,” while in this revealing their common basis. Logos is indeed the only aspect under which the soul is present here. It is nothing

is, a unique verse, but well structured. In the case of time, Aristotle never speaks of what is counted, of what the plurality of enumerated elements is made of. He speaks rather of the “number” of movement, in the singular. We are given the impression, inasmuch as we remain with an understanding of number as something that serves to count, that it is one and the same thing that is counted—which is bizarre, to say the least. In fact, it is the articulation itself that “counts.” Time is that by which movement is structured according to the before and after, and thus the before and after receive a numerical structure, that is, that which allows them to be at the same time one and two. Arithmos in the sense Aristotle speaks of it with regard to time is above all the smallest number, the dyad—which explains the presence of a remark on the smallest number precisely after the section on the now (220a27). There is time when the now is at the same time one and two, simultaneously a unity of the before and after and an inner dimension, a tension of the before and the after. Time is the articulation of the prior-posterior structure of movement, that is, the fact that the coincidence of the prior and the posterior is their separation. Time emerges when we think the now(s) as two, although there is but one now, and because there is but one. Time holds them together as torn apart. To hazard a formula: time is the now of nows. The arguments that Aristotle devotes to the now contain clarifications made necessary by the definition of time based on arithmos. The way in which the now is simultaneously one and many makes explicit the idea of articulation. That by being which the now is, we have seen, is the simple polarity and orientation with respect to the prior and posterior. The einai of the now is the mutual articulation 84

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more than the site of logos. Without it, the articulation turning the prior-posterior into time would not exist; only the prior-posterior structure would exist, since there may very well be movement without soul.39 Yet, on the other hand, logos is also at the basis of movement, insofar as it is to logos that the potential as such, whose entelechy is movement, manifests itself.40 One might, at this level, draw between time and movement an analogy altogether more radical than the one appearing at the derivative level where movement shows itself as ἔκ τινος εἴς τι. The diairetic function of the now is only exercised dunamei (222a14, 18). Even if time is not movement, it is nevertheless possible to speak of a “movement” of time41 as the entelechy of the diairesis accomplished by the now, insofar as this is in potentiality. This reflection on the OPO expression has led us to a reading of the Aristotelian discussion of time that highlights the “logical” dimension of the concepts involved in it. I believe doing so has resolved certain problems, but has posed other, no doubt more numerous, problems, and in any event has furnished us with one of the keys of the interpretation of this inexhaustible text. Rémi Brague Translated by Erick Raphael Jiménez

5

6

7

8

9 10 11

12 13 14 15

NOTES 1

2

3

See Hegel, 1927–40, 83; Heidegger, 1977, §81, 416. I offer this as a possible interpretation. One could indeed understand the turn of phrase otherwise, by taking the καί in the sense, for example, of De memoria 2, 451b4. The zeugma that I am indicating is in any event not the most surprising one to be found in Aristotle. In the Physics compare III.4, 203b10f.; IV.2, 209b32f. See Plato, Meno 100b6f.; Protagoras 361e6.

16 17

See Plato, Symposium 220c5f. For more examples, see Kahn, 2003, 173f.; and Kühner and Gerth, 1976, vol. 1, 33. See the fine remarks in Aubenque, 1962, 135–40. It could be equally necessary that we ask how predication without a subject, and hence necessarily led to infinity (Metaphysics IV.4, 1007a33–b1), lends itself to the expression of the infinity of time (Phys. IV.10, 218a1). [The formula OPO appears for the first time at 219a20f. Brague examines the construction in Section 1 of the original essay. See Editor’s note above—Ed.] However, the treatment of time leaves undecided other questions that we might pose. For example, Aristotle does not allow for distinguishing between what we call the “content” of the now (that which is now) and the now itself, or again between the content of the prior-posterior (the unique object that is found before a point, then after it) and the structure itself. Thus Moser, 1932, 116. Wieland, 1992, 323, n. 6. By this is understood the habitual sense of “now,” which one employs in giving the precise time as well as in situating oneself within an extremely broad era. Heidegger, 1975, 351. Carteron, 1924, 67. Conen, 1964, 60, n. 71. This expression is understood by the commentators in diverse ways, which may be reduced to two: (1) that by which movement has arithmos (Moreau, 1965, 132; Wagner, 1967, 113), and (2) insofar as movement has arithmos (Torstrik, 1857, 466, who consequently conjectures ἢ ᾗ; Carteron, 1924, 151. But the translation of the latter, “is not inasmuch as . . .” supposes an ellipsis of the verb “to be” in the existential sense that is hardly plausible (see Kühner and Gerth, 1976, 40ff.); Wieland, 1992, 327; Conen, 1964, 59, but see 78). The second interpretation seems to me more probable. Conen, 1964, 60. This passage is infrequently mentioned by commentators. Conen, 1964, for example, passes over it fleetingly on page 59. Commentators prefer to focus on the distinction between the two, perhaps three, meanings of number. The text however is interested in showing that the

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22

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function of measuring played by number does not occupy pride of place in the concept of arithmos contained in the Aristotelian definition of time (see Conen, 1964, 60, 141). Even in Conen, 1964, who nevertheless has a chapter entitled “Number” (53–8), the word arithmos does not appear once. Others go so far as to consider Aristotle outright wrong for having used it. Thus Ross, 1960, speaks of “the original error that consists in defining time as the number of movement” (601). Or Moreau, 1965, who explains the cause of the error by way of the Stagirite’s deficient philosophical tools: “It is because he lacks, for the symbolic representation of movement, the graphical method of coordinate axes, that Aristotle is reduced to calling time a number” (126). Wieland, 1992, 317–21; Böhme, 1974, passim. This result has been progressively clarified by works in the last few decades, namely Stenzel, 1924, 24ff. See Becker, 1957, 21f.; Becker, 1963, which proposes the translation “zahlenmässig bestimmtes Gefüge” (136); Burkert, 1962, 245f. The most suggestive text on this problem is without a doubt Klein, 1934, 18–105, esp. chap. 6, 53–64. This work is more easily accessible in the English translation by E. Brann, Klein, 1968, 46–60. See Met. I.5, 986a2f., and De Caelo I.1, 268a10ff. Rhetoric III.8, 1408b28f. and 9, 1409b4ff. See also Problems XIX.38, 920b33. Taylor, 1928, identifies this passage with the Pythagorean idea that “things” are numbers (373). As to the passage cited, I see in the optative at d3 a reference to the future at c8, in the sense of a purely logical genesis (Kühner and Gerth, 1976, vol. 1, 235, n. 1) rather than a conditional (contra Rivaud, 1925, 174). See Met. I.6, 1056b23. Conen, 1964, seems to have glimpsed this fact (96). See Plato, Hippias Major, 301d5ff. I am taking the καί in a way different from Ross, 1961, 271, who supposes that Aristotle distinguishes two ways of receiving arithmos. For my part, as for Tricot, 1965, 149, n. 2, Aristotle associates two elements necessary to the perception of arithmos. In effect, the reminder καὶ τοῖς ἰδίοις is explained by the

27 28

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32 33

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35 36 37

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fact that Aristotle’s point is to destroy the idea of a common sense. And the idea that we perceive number by realizing the identity of what presents itself to our senses under diverse aspects conflicts with the fact that, for Aristotle, number can be perceived by a single sense alone (see De Sensu 1, 437a9, together with its context). See Phys. IV.12, 220b19–22. The Aristotelian doctrine of physiological articulation explains how it is what is one may be two. See Movement of Animals 1, 698a19, b1; 8, 702a23f., 30f. See Plato, Theaetetus, 203aff. and Aristotle, De Interpretatione 2, 16a20–6; and Met. VII.17, 1041b16f. See De Int. 4, 16b26–33. Respectively, Met. VIII.3, 1043b34ff.; Categories 6, 4b23, 32–7. See also Gadamer, 1972, 31. It would be meet here to pursue this reflection as far as making apparent the logos as the continuity of discontinuity as such, or, in more modern language, as the care (maintenance) of the fragmentary as such. 219b29, 32—on the latter text, see Conen, 1964, 55ff., and 219b26–8. See Klein, 1934, 53f. (47f.); Becker, 1963, 135. See Böhme, 1974, 164. There is in this characterization of the now as the act of situating itself in relation to a before and an after something like an approach to—or perhaps a residue of—the existential phenomenon of the instant in the sense of Augenblick, a glance of the eye so as to recognize one’s situation. The past and the future surround the present (see πέριξ in De Int. 3, 16b18). This may be what makes the image of the cosmic sphere necessary, as a translation of a somewhat Parmenidean circularity in which past and future are μὴ ὄντα (see 218a2, 221b31). I understand the οἷον εἰ at 223a27 otherwise than the “might be” one finds customarily in others, after Bonitz, 1955, 501b60f.; for example, Conen, 1964, 157, n. 4. Bonitz refers to Politics III.6, 1279a15. But the verb here is in a hypothetical mode. A translation with a conditional (Carteron, 1924, 160; Festugière, 1971, 198; Moreau, 1965, 162f.; Wagner, 1967, 122) inevitably encourages

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40 41

the idea of a world-soul (thus Wagner, 1967, 587). As ei with the indicative signifies “if it is true that, from the moment that . . .” (as at 223a25), I am tempted to see in the hoion a use analogous to the sense this adverb takes with the genitive absolute (Kühner and Gerth, 1976, vol. 2, 97)—as in the Latin quippe; a usage of which we may find a parallel in On Generation and Corruption II.5, 333a11. If we understand Aristotle’s phrase as saying: “since, in fact, it is possible for there to be movement without soul,” the phantom of a world-soul is definitively exorcised. See Phys. III.1, 201a16f., 33. Such a “movement” would be something altogether other than displacement. But is this not the case, in Aristotle, for kine-sis in general?

Carteron, H., “Remarques sur la notion de temps d’après Aristote,” Revue Philosophique de la France et de l’Etranger, 98 (1924), 67–81. Cassirer, E., Aristoteles Schrift Von der Seele, Darmstadt: Wissenschaft Buchgesellschaft, 1968. Conen, P. F., Die Zeittheorie des Aristoteles, Munich: Beck, 1964. Croiset, A. (trans. and ed.), Platon. Hippias Majeur, Charmide, Laches, Lysis, 3rd edn, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1949. Denniston, J. D., The Greek Particles, 2nd edn, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1950. Festugière, A. J., Études de philosophie grecque, Paris: Vrin, 1971. Gadamer, H. G., Platons Ungeschriebene Dialektik, vol. 3 of Kleine Schriften, Tübingen: Mohr, 1972. Hegel, G. W. F., Phänomenologie des Geistes, vol. 2 of Sämtliche Werke, ed. H. Glockner, Stuttgart: Bad Cannstatt, 1927–40. Heidegger, M., Die Grundprobleme der Phänomenologie, Gesamtausgabe 24, Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1975. —, Sein und Zeit, Gesamtausgabe 2, Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1977. Joachim, H. H. (ed.), Aristotle. On Coming-to-Be and Passing-Away, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1922. Kahn, C., The Verb “Be” in Ancient Greek, Indianapolis: Hackett, 2003. Klein, J., Die griechische Logistik und die Entstehung der Algebra, in Quellen und Studien zur Geschichte der Mathematik, Astronomie und Physik, Berlin: Springer, 1934. —, Greek Mathematical Thought and the Origin of Algebra, trans. E. Brann, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1968.

REFERENCES Aubenque, P., Le problème de l’être chez Aristote, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1962. Barreau, H., “L’instant et le temps selon Aristote,” Revue philosophique de Louvain, 66 (1968), 213–38. Beare, J. I. (trans.), On Sense and the Sensibles, in The Works of Aristotle, ed. W. D. Ross, Oxford: Clarendon, 1931, 436–49. Becker, O., Zwei Untersuchungen zur antiken Logik, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1957. —, Dasein und Dawesen: Gesammelte philosophische Aufsätze, Pfullingen: Neske, 1963. Böhme, G., Zeit und Zahl: Studien zur Zeittheorie bei Platon, Aristoteles, Leibniz und Kant, Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1974. Bonitz, H., Index Aristotelicus, 2nd edn, Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1955. Bröcker, W., Aristoteles, 4th edn, Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1974. Burkert, W., Weisheit und Wissenschaft: Studien zur Pythagoras, Philolaos, und Platon, Nuremberg: H. Carl, 1962. 87

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ON ARISTOTLE’S FORMULA Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ῎OΝ Ross, W. D. (ed.), Aristotle. Physics, Oxford: Clarendon, 1960. —, Aristotle. De Anima, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1961. Schleiermacher, F. (ed.), Platons Werke, Berlin: Reimer, 1855–62. Stallbaum, G. (ed.), Platonis Opera Omnia, Gotha: Hennings, 1833–40. Stenzel, J., Zahl und Gestalt bei Platon und Aristoteles, Leipzig: Teubner, 1924. Taylor, A. E., A Commentary on Plato’s Timaeus, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1928. Torstrik, A., “Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ῎OΝ: Ein Beitrag zur Kenntnis des aristotelischen Sprachgebrauchs,” Rheinisches Museum für Philologie, 12 (1857), 161–73. Tricot, J., Aristote. De l’âme, Paris: Vrin, 1965. Wagner, H. (trans.), Physikvorlesung, Aristoteles Werke in deutscher Übersetzung, vol. 2, ed. E. Grumach, Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1967. Wieland, W., Die aristotelische Physik, 3rd edn, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1992.

Kühner, R. and Gerth, B., Ausführliche Grammatik der griechischen Sprache, 2 vols, 3rd edn, Hanover: Hahn, 1976. Louis, M. P. (trans. and ed.), Aristote. Les parties des animaux, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1956. Moreau, J., L’espace et le temps selon Aristote, Padua: Antenore, 1965. Moser, S. (ed.), Grundbegriffe der Naturphilosophie bei Wilhelm von Ockham: Kritischer Vergleich der Summulae in libros Physicorum mit der Philosophie des Aristoteles, Innsbruck: F. Rauch, 1932. Mugnier, R. (trans. and ed.), Aristote. Petits traités d’histoire naturelle, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1953. Prantl, C. (ed.), Acht Bücher Physik, Leipzig: Engelmann, 1854. Riddel, J., The Apology of Plato, with a Revised Text and a Digest of Platonic Idioms, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1877. Rivaud, A. (trans.), Platon. Timée, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1925. Robin, L. (trans. and ed.), Platon. Œuvres complètes, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1970. Ross, G. R. T. (trans.), Aristotle. De Sensu et De Memoria, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1906.

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5 MIND IN BODY IN ARISTOTLE

explanations for all phenomena in nature, perhaps save one—thinking; and in this he prefigured “the mind-body problem,” how if at all to account for the interaction of intentional mind and mechanical body. At the same time he presupposed that mind was not subject to the same causal strictures as mere matter. If Aristotle, on the other hand, shared neither the mechanistic background notions nor Descartes’ specific conception of mind, then by putting the question to Aristotle how to convene these entities one is bound at best to find half-answers and at worst to find bad ones. We should not burden the Aristotelian text with questions it is not prepared to answer. Something is right of this second view, but it is not so right that the first problem should be dropped from consideration altogether. Like Descartes’, Aristotle’s questions about mind with respect to body are mediated by questions of explanation, and mind’s “separateness” and “immateriality” are features attaching to mind to show what sort of explanation for mind is possible. However, Aristotle’s and Descartes’ questions are quite different; for whereas the explanatory schemes bearing on the traditional question of mind-body relations ask merely to see an interaction and to have noted some species of

INTRODUCTION It is a doctrine frequently taken as Aristotle’s that the human mind is a faculty disembodied,1 and perhaps for good reason; for Aristotle speaks frequently of “mind” (nous) as “separate” (cho-ristos). Upholders of the Aristotelianism of a disembodied mind thesis point to general and specific considerations: Generally, some maintain, the soul is the form of the living thing, and as a form it is changeless, hence eternal, and all of its parts and potentialities are likewise changeless and eternal, not bound therefore to conditions of embodiment. Specifically, others maintain, mind has no essential attachment to physiological processes. Moreover it is a presupposition of the passive reception of intelligible forms by the faculty mind that the former exist and are produced as such by a corresponding active mind, which cannot, some claim, have a body or involve my, the passive thinker’s, body. Yet it has also been held that these concerns with the Aristotelian text are sideways on; for they saddle him with modern preoccupations that are not his.2 Descartes—if not the author of these preoccupations, then certainly their spiritual ancestor—famously thought that we could find mechanistic 91

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MIND IN BODY IN ARISTOTLE the heart of a little-appreciated but sophisticated detail in Aristotle’s philosophy of mind bearing on the directedness and sort of perception involved in thinking. Thus, while the mind-body question is indeed of some significance to Aristotelian psychology, Aristotle’s answer to that question, when properly understood, may also be seen to hold significance in circles of interest yet wider than Aristotelian ones.

contiguity of the parties involved, Aristotle’s explanatory scheme asks somewhat more rigidly to see a specific relation of a specific causality: that of natural or material necessity conducing to form or purpose. Investigating how Aristotle sees that explanatory scheme as applying to mind, I shall however not pursue detailed excurses here concerning Aristotle’s usage of the expressions cho-ristos and cho-rizein in De Anima, and whether it is (as I think it is not) a mere matter of pointing to the attribution of “separateness” to nous and regarding the mind-body matter as resolved. I shall also have nothing to say about the “immortality” of nous. These difficulties bear, I think, on a further and incidentally more complex question, how for Aristotle it is possible for mind to perceive essences, which are eternal, and what are the ramifications for mind in view of its identity with these its purported objects. I shall not deal here with the question of mind and body in its entirety then but will rather focus on two specific questions: whether Aristotle, when put to the question, conceived of mind as disembodied; and where in Aristotle we should find tools for thinking of the relationship or nonrelationship between mind and body concretely. As a consequence of careful attention to the question not whether but how mind is embodied, an essential point governing Aristotle’s conception of mind emerges—a point I shall develop under the rubric of what I call “the aesthetic interpretation.” This interpretation outlines, with a view to further inquiry, a different model for thinking in Aristotle than that to which perhaps we are accustomed or to which we customarily have recourse. It has importance beyond questions of mind-body relations and lies at

EXPLANATION IN PSYCHOLOGY Distinctive of the Aristotelian psychologist is the way in which she contrasts with (as Aristotle describes the matter in DA) the “physicist” and the “dialectician.” For the latter both define psychological phenomena, but they do so only partially: The physicist defines, for example, anger materially as a boiling of the blood, the dialectician formally as a desire for revenge; the Aristotelian psychologist, on the other hand, as a material consequence entailed by (“for the sake of”) some end, that is, a form.3 Aristotle’s psychology then, to put it summarily, involves such a juxtaposition of matter and form that the former is shown to exhibit whatever features it does for the sake of the fulfillment of the latter. The procedure toward achieving this sort of insight relies characteristically on discerning, relevant to some matter at hand, two sorts of necessity. The first sort relates to the apprehension of a universal “that” (τὸ ὅτι)—as in, for example, “that all humans are risible,” where the connection between terms “human” and “risible” must be a necessary one.4 This “that” then forms a basis for inquiry into its explanation or “why” (τὸ διότι);

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MIND IN BODY IN ARISTOTLE which I have outlined below. The second task is to show how, positively, Aristotle conceives of mind as embodied. To do so fully is more than this short essay can muster; therefore I have restricted myself to outlining the case, and with special attention to the relationship of mind to phantasia.

and we have achieved explanation, in psychology, when we can present our “thats” as following of necessity from the fulfillment of some purpose. Now, whereas the necessity that frames a universal is “unconditional” (haplo-s), the necessity joining a purpose to these and those specific material configurations is called “hypothetical necessity” (τὸ ἐξ ὑποθήσεως ἀναγκαῖον), for the material configurations are seen to be necessary only on the condition (“hypothesis”) that the purpose is to be realized.5 Success in Aristotelian psychological explanation consists in having established that this or that material configuration is as it is owing to its role in the realization of some purpose. It is obvious to see, even at this very general level, that even the image of success is biased heavily toward conceiving of all of psychological phenomena as being in some way “embodied,” supposing “embodied” means “material”; for to feature at all in psychological explanations requires some necessary relationship to materiality. Therefore it is not much of an exaggeration, at least at this admittedly very general methodological level, to say the very idea that mind should fit this explanatory model is itself a provocative one, notwithstanding prejudices to the contrary.

MIND IN BODY (A): THE NEGATIVE ACCOUNT Aristotle has, as I shall call them, a generic and a specific account for the claim that mind is not disembodied. They run as follows. The Generic Account It is claimed early in DA that, if there is some one of the soul’s acts or affects that is unique to it, then soul itself will admit of separation [from body]. If, on the other hand, there is nothing unique to soul, then it cannot be separate, but must be rather like straightness, which, as straight, involves many properties, such as touching a bronze sphere at a point, although in fact it will touch nothing at all if [straightness] is separated [from it]; for it is inseparable, since it is always in some way embodied (μετὰ σώματος).6 A remarkable feature of this comment is, although initially distinguishing in the obvious way between “embodied” and “separate” psychic acts and affects, it goes on to insist that the characteristics of the latter still nevertheless derive from conditions of embodiment. Features of a “separate” thing qua separate, says Aristotle, are dependent upon their association with a body: So and so may hold of, say, a form, but only inasmuch as it is a form instantiated in such and such matter.

MIND IN BODY The prejudices abound anyway. Still, in order to grasp how it is Aristotle conceives of mind at all, it is, notice, an Aristotelian imperative to ask in what way mind relates to body. Now to do this is to embark on two separate ventures. The first is to show that mind for Aristotle is not disembodied. Aristotle himself has two negative arguments to this effect,

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MIND IN BODY IN ARISTOTLE disjunction is true; then he will perforce have shown the disjunct on the right to be false, and mind to be embodied. And that is just what Aristotle says, at least in this elegant proposal: “The soul never thinks without an image.”11 From that it follows neatly that Aristotle concludes mind is embodied. We might, in a parity with the general account, formalize this argument thus:

Since nevertheless for Aristotle soul isn’t “separate” in the way described at the beginning of the above passage,7 then all the actions and affections of soul must also not be separate; it follows as a matter of course that mind could not be separate. Thus the generic account, which might be formalized thus: (1) Mind is a part of soul; and (2) if any part of soul is separate from body then all of soul is separate from body; but (3) soul is not separate from body; (4) therefore, etc.

(1) Mind, if it involves representation (phantasia), necessarily requires a body; (2) mind involves representation; (3) therefore, etc.

If it were not true one after another to say of psychic acts and affects that they are embodied, then embodiment would not be a feature of soul, and soul would as a consequence be its own ousia, having, as M. Frede puts it, “a life and a history of its own.”8 But that is, going by Aristotle’s conception of soul and his analyses of its parts or functions, strictly an impossibility. To the extent mind is a part of soul, it is related of necessity to the body. (Note again, however, that even if mind were “separate,” its features, according to the DA I.1 passage above, still would derive from the association it has to a living body.)

Since thinking involves representation and representation a body, thinking involves a body.12 MIND IN BODY (B): THE POSITIVE ACCOUNT These rather mechanical arguments really say nothing about the essential nub of the question of the embodiment of mind, but they do or should clear the way to thinking, in an Aristotelian vein, the link of mind to body. We have seen thus far how it is mind is not disembodied; the question that presses on us now is how precisely it is embodied. In thinking through the possible range of ways in which a psychological capacity like mind may be embodied, we should consider more than that way in which sensation (aisthe-sis) is embodied. For it is obvious that mind, the faculty for the perception of, for example, essences and principles, does not traffic in material (i.e. sensible) objects, just as it is obvious eyes and sight do not traffic in aural or gustatory objects. Therefore that mind does not relate physically to sensible objects is no grounds for regarding it as disembodied. Nor again is it a grounds for disembodying mind to claim that there is no

The Specific Account In the most pointed drafting of the question whether mind is embodied, Aristotle asserts that, “if thinking is a kind of phantasia, or impossible without phantasia, then thinking will be impossible without a body.”9 I take it this implies a strict disjunction: Either thinking is “a kind of phantasia, or impossible without phantasia,” or “it will be possible to have thought without a body.”10 In order to show that mind is embodied Aristotle thus need only show that the first half of the 94

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MIND IN BODY IN ARISTOTLE (2) simultaneous with the perception of an image or representation, and (3) causes the thinker to act.

organ of it as there is for sensation; there are plenty of clearly embodied actions and affections of soul that are not assigned to specific organs.13 A passage in DA I.1 that introduces the question of soul-body relations says first that most affections of soul, “like anger, courage, desire, and sensation,” “do not occur without the body’s being affected or acting.” That however all affects of soul are “embodied,” for Aristotle, is evidenced by the fact that, although external events may seem the sort to elicit reliably a given act or affection, one may, depending on psychic makeup and habituation, respond quite differently (consider courage and its lack in the face of fearful circumstances); or, on the contrary, although nothing externally is going on, one may suddenly experience affections (consider anxiety) that relate in no essential way to one’s present situation or environment.14 It is thus the incongruence, not the conformity, of psychic affection to external circumstance—the ability of the soul to bring about changes in the body irrespective of situation—that for Aristotle counts as the mark of the embodied. If then it can be shown mental acts bring about or depend upon bodily affections, mind will be embodied. One helpful way of simplifying this question is to see it as asking whether, according to the divisions of time, mind is preceded by some embodied process; whether mind is simultaneous with some embodied process; and whether mind anticipates some embodied process, in each case in terms of the notion of hypothetical necessity outlined previously. And indeed, as I shall show in the following three subsections, what in Aristotle we find is not just one way in which mind is embodied—but all three. For mind is embodied inasmuch as it is (1) necessarily preceded by sensation,

Mind and Sensation That there are embodied conditions of thinking is an unquestionably Aristotelian tenet; for Aristotle holds that thinking is always necessarily preceded by having sensed. Thus in Aristotle’s introductory account of mind he alludes first of all to the cognitive dependence of mind and phantasia on sensation, claiming that “[phantasia] does not come about without sensation, and without [phantasia] there is no judgment (hupole-psis),”15 where “judgment” means any of the several intellectual functions.16 To this may moreover be added the claim of DA III that “noe- ta are in sensible forms,” and that “no one would learn or understand anything without having first sensed.”17 APo I.18 makes the same claim in equally strong language.18 In addition we might bear in mind the claims of Met. I.1 and APo II.19: that thinking and understanding are forms of perception dependent on a history of sensation, memory, and experience. The psychological consequence of this doctrine should be evident: If thinking depends on “having sensed” then there is no thinking without sensing. Now there certainly is not sensing without having a body.19 Then, just as certainly, there is not thinking without having a body.20 We need allow this notion to mean nothing more than that thinking is always preceded by processes requiring a body, and that there is necessity conjoining the term having sensed with the term thinking. For in short if one is to think, then one must have sensed. Then if sensing is embodied, and only operative in living animal bodies, if one is to think, then one must have a living animal (=sensitive) body. 95

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MIND IN BODY IN ARISTOTLE standard interpretation and the aesthetic. According to the standard interpretation “images” (phantasmata) are things for mind to stare at, and the forms in images (which in turn are the forms in sensible things) are the things that mind thinks.25 So mind perceives not just second- but third-hand as it were. And something of the standard interpretation is indeed right: Mind in order to think must have sensed and phantasia does seem to mean a presentation of the form of something sensed or sensible. Yet there is an important asymmetry between the image and the thought that makes what is in the image and what is in the thought quite different, and in turn that makes a fundamental problem for the standard interpretation in describing the use of phantasmata in thinking. In De Mem., a text forming part of a family of treatises that claim to apply the lessons of DA,26 Aristotle describes the relationship in the following terms:

Mind and Imagination Thinking is always preceded by sensing, and it is always simultaneous with an image and some bodily disposition corresponding uniquely to the thought. Now Aristotle is, to be sure, somewhat vague on the question how imagination itself is “embodied,” and the relation too between mind and imagination is not entirely an obvious one; yet to grasp the relation between mind and imagination, considering its importance for Aristotle’s own conception of the link of mind to body, is an essential piece of the embodied mind question. First however it bears noting that, inasmuch as imagination is “a movement resulting from actual sensation”21 and plays an essential role in retention,22 it too evidently is in fact embodied in ways similar to the ways sensation is, differing from it inasmuch as it lacks the constraint that its objects must be simultaneous, external, and impinging on the imaginer in order for her to imagine. I have noted already Aristotle’s argument to the effect that mind depends on imagination and therefore is, as Aristotle puts it, “not possible without body.”23 In a telling expression Aristotle articulates the relation between thinking and phantasia in these terms: “Necessarily (ananke-) when someone studies (theo-rei) something they study (theo-rein) at the same time (hama) some representation (phantasma ti).”24 In the terms of the explanatory scheme explored above, we should read this as a classical sort of psychological explanation of thinking—that is, as an explanation of thinking in terms of what is necessarily (i.e. materially) entailed by it. In DA and in De Mem., among the psychological works, Aristotle has a fairly specific way in fact of talking about the relationship between mind and phantasia. It is here I should like to bring out a difference between what I have called above the

We have spoken of representation (phantasia) in DA, and [there it was said that] thinking (noein) is not possible without a representation (phantasma). Now, what happens in thinking (τὸ . . . πάθος ἐν τῷ νοεῖν) is the very same as happens in making a geometrical diagram (diagraphein): Making no use of the triangle’s being a determinate quantity, nevertheless we draw it as quantitatively determinate. Someone thinking does the same thing. Should she think of something that has no quantity, nevertheless she places before her eyes (τίθεται πρὸ ὀμμάτων) some quantity, except that she does not think it as a quantity. Should the nature [under consideration] count among those things that are quantities but indeterminate, then [the thinker] places before her eyes a determinate quantity, except that she thinks it solely as a quantity.27 96

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MIND IN BODY IN ARISTOTLE which are conceptual tools—what Aristotle calls noe-mata.31 The difference between the standard and the aesthetic interpretations may be grasped as follows. According to the standard interpretation the thinking of an “indeterminate quantity” would involve just the representation of—an indeterminate quantity. According to the aesthetic interpretation the thinking of an indeterminate quantity will be evoked by the representation of something else. Nussbaum’s interpretation comes closest to mine in this respect.32 Thus on the evidence of the De Mem. passage she describes a “symbolization” to go with thinking, the expression being no doubt deliberate. For it points out that the relation between phantasma and thought is not one of representation but of some wider notion of “association” or “coupling.”33 The point of the De Mem. passage is thus not to show how thoughts of forms are achieved through the thinking of the form represented by imagination, but to illustrate a peculiar “as” function of thinking that is always some step removed from the “materiality” of a mental image, and a peculiar “filling in” function of imagination that is always likewise some step removed from the thing thought. For every time I mean to think something, for Aristotle, I am always drawing an image that has a few too many details. “Think elephant,” says mind. “I’ll make it gray,” says imagination. Mind of course does not specify the color, is not even concerned with the color, but it must be of some color.34 Inasmuch as mind involves these acts of phantasia, and these acts of phantasia are not possible except for embodied perceivers, mind is an act too that is embodied. Intelligible contents, Aristotle is claiming, are made out only through sensible ones. In Aristotle’s description active and passive components in thinking are of a unique

According to my interpretation of this passage, thinking involves two separate acts: the representation of something and the arousal in a mind of something other than what is represented. Thinking for Aristotle is like geometrical construction: What one is staring at is not the thing one is thinking; the representation or image is figuratively meant to evoke a thought. In this way, Aristotle is claiming, thinking makes a use of images (phantasmata)—not in order to represent something but in order to elicit something other than what is represented. Of course the standard interpreter will object: “She is thinking the form of the thing.” The specific mechanics of the passage tell however quite against this objection. In the case of thinking an indeterminate quantity, Aristotle claims, we call to mind a determinate quantity; if something without quantity, then some quantity. The difference here to be sure is not intended to be representative or “a form of” at all. Consider, for example, the thinking of “an indeterminate quantity,” say, a bunch of chairs. In my mind I have pictured not a bunch of chairs, but in fact—as I count them—five chairs.28 Is an indeterminate bunch “the form of” five chairs? It seems extremely likely it is not.29 Perhaps “indeterminate” here means “without a specific content.” Then “thinking” five would imply the representation of five chairs—but I am hard-pressed to imagine five is “the form of” five chairs. For there is a great difference for Aristotle between “the number of” and “the form of.”30 If I intend “to think” some quality, say red, I place before my thinking a red ball; but again there is no decent evidence to suggest red for Aristotle is “the form of” red ball. Aristotle’s interest in the De Mem. passage is not to show what is the way to think forms, but what is the way to use representations in order to evoke thoughts, 97

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MIND IN BODY IN ARISTOTLE is said to be a sort of theatrical presentation. The “up to us” qualification means to point at the fact that who or what we put on stage, so to speak, is entirely under our control and at our whim. Doxazein by contrast is here treated as a form of judgment (which is an expression of intellectual virtue)40 whose contents are not “up to us” inasmuch as they are either true or false. Thinking, Aristotle claims, “is in one respect like phantasia and in another respect like hupole-psis.”41 It is like phantasia in that it is as we have seen not reliant on impingement, and is premised on a sort of theatricality and imagination. On the other hand it is like hupole-psis in that it makes a claim to represent things as they are—but not the contents of imagination. Consider Mr. Loman. Here the phantasia that is the play provides occasion for grasping some thought about some subject like the modern laborer, the modern subject, and so on. Now that to be sure is not Willy Loman’s “form” but (and here it must be recalled that he is not a real person) a particular intelligible feature occasioned by this character—a feature of or about the world, that is, real people. No one walks out caring about Willy Loman but they do walk out caring about something that is real. In this sense it is not just the “escape” or “fantasy” of phantasia that is at issue in thinking but the perception of a reality that is occasioned by an image—a “judgment” (hupole-psis) that so and so (which is not represented in the phantasma) is indeed the case. Mind is embodied inasmuch as it is preceded by sensation and simultaneous with imagination, but it is embodied in a further sense connected with its distinction from imagination—namely that “whenever we have thought (doxaso-men) something uncanny or frightful, immediately (euthus) we

embodied sort. He claims that one aspect of thinking will consist in the active representation (phantasia) of something associated in some way for the thinker with the thought. With this Aristotle joins a passive element: not just the contemplation of the image but the affection or undergoing (pathos) of something called thinking. Which is not the staring at the image or representation but a movement that follows as a result of it— and a movement according to DA III.5 that is not remembering (οὐ μνημονεύομεν). I have called this the aesthetic model owing not only to the fact that more (or something else) is thought than is represented but because moreover it is vividly exemplified in average aesthetic experience—the image, the piece, the film: They are occasions for thinking, and often (always?) not representative of the thing thought. No one leaves the theater saying, “Poor Willy Loman. How unique his plight!” There is an important respect in which thinking is not like imagining, and also not like pondering (but the two are different), namely that when we have thought something we have hit on some truth of it. “Pondering” (dianoeisthai) is any intellectual effort at running through steps of reasoning, and this may be false or true;35 “imagining” (phantazein) is, broadly construed, any sort of appearance or “anomalous” sensation36 and usually, according to Aristotle, false.37 In order to contrast the preceding Aristotle has recourse to the following difference: In the case of phantasia “its affect (τὸ πάθος) is up to us, whenever we like: We put something before our eyes (πρὸ ὀμμάτων . . . τι ποιήσασθαι),”38 whereas “doxazein is not up to us; for necessarily it is either false or true.”39 The operation of placing something pro ommato-n, “before the eyes,” puts us again in mind of the De Mem. passage: phantasia 98

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MIND IN BODY IN ARISTOTLE Mind and Action There is a third in addition to the precedent and the simultaneous forms of embodiment of mind, namely the embodiment of mind in terms of a consequent action. Since it may justly be objected that action results from thinking only in certain cases,44 I shall limit my remarks here. Even though to be sure mind of itself is insufficient to generate an action,45 nevertheless the agent who thinks is most certainly compelled to act as a result of having thought, and the relation of mind to action provides further clues to its place in the makeup of the thinking organism. In MA 6–7 Aristotle claims that mind in addition to desire is a fundamental sort of principle of action.46 In certain explicit—perhaps we might say “intentional”—practical cases mind conduces to the conclusion, which just is the action.47 The action-conclusion itself is not a further propositional state but the action.48 Aristotle articulates the contribution of mind to action in the following terms: “When one thinks (noe-se-i) that it is good for every human to walk, and that she is herself a human, straightaway (euthus) she walks.”49 That the action is a necessary entailment of the thought, is clear from Aristotle’s claim that “one acts from a principle: If there will be a cloak, there must be (ἀνάγκη εἶναι) this first, and if this, then that; and the latter they do straightaway (πράττει εὐθύς).”50 The hypothetical necessity stemming from the positing of an end is led in the practical syllogism back to the agent herself: The agent acts because her mind discerns she must act. Action—which of course is entirely embodied51—follows in these cases necessarily from having thought. Thus mind is not only embodied in that it is always preceded by sensation and simultaneous with imagination and some bodily disposition; it also necessarily implies in certain cases some

are affected with an approximating sentiment (sumpaschomen), just as [whenever we have thought something to give us] courage.”42 Bearing in mind Aristotle’s introductory notes on the question of the embodiment of mind, this perhaps more than anything else shows definitive commitment to the thesis that mind is embodied. For earlier Aristotle had said that being “embodied” (μετὰ σώματος) meant the body’s “undergoing something simultaneously” (ἅμα πάσχειν τι); and here it is claimed precisely that in thinking the body undergoes something simultaneously. The relation could not be more immediate: Again, the earlier question was whether it is possible to relate some act or affect in the body that correlates just to the influence of the psychic faculty. Mind—not imagination—is claimed precisely to be capable of that. The affection associated with thinking, Aristotle claims, is not like the affection of imagination, which is “indifferent,”43 but rather—in the precise terms of DA I.1—one of immediate affection of the body by what is going on in the soul (in this case the mind): the readying of the body for action. Mind, we have seen, is embodied inasmuch as it is preceded by sensation and simultaneous with imagination. In the first place this means just the use of the sensitive capacities in order to elicit a thought. Thus I am always making a use of embodied capacities—capacities that could not be disembodied—when I think. In phantasia I see a hand, hear a quartet, smell roses. But mind is embodied in a further sense, that is, with a bodily affection. For some embodied state corresponding to readiness for the actuality perceived by mind puts the body in a certain state. Inasmuch as the latter is not a “simultaneous” (hama) but a “straightaway” (euthus) affection we may also see it to result of necessity from thinking. 99

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MIND IN BODY IN ARISTOTLE embodied action as a result. These may even be seen to be not just isolated embodiments of mind but nodes along a continuous action. The connection of bodily disposition and mental act is given special emphasis in this remark in MA 8: “The principle of movement, as we were saying, is that which in point of action is to be pursued or to be fled; necessarily (ἐξ ἀνάγκης), then, a heating or cooling follows the thinking and imagining (ἡ νόησις καὶ ἡ φαντασία) of them.”52 In this way as a result of thinking (in certain cases) there will be a bodily disposition and a bodily action that are continuous productions necessarily entailed. The same claims about mind’s role in action are to be found in DA III53—yet in the latter there is special insistence that thinking inasmuch as it requires action will always be accompanied by desire.54 Hesitance is indeed in order here. For as I noted mind as a virtue is always an end or purpose. And explanations of mind to the effect of necessarily producing an action—in the efficient sense—would certainly seem near to flout that principle. Thus Aristotle’s insistence that mind has no essential link to praxis as a consequence; that mind may result either in action or not, is an Aristotelian way of maintaining the integrity of mind (in the sense of a virtue) as a goal—mind is an end, never a means.55 Nothing in a certain strict and all-encompassing (practical and theoretical) sense therefore follows from mind “necessarily” because mind is not the matter of some other function.

CONCLUSION I have attempted here to outline provisionally some ways in which to track Aristotle’s

attempts to concretize the relationship between mind and body. I have dwelled somewhat at length on the most conspicuous of these attempts, that is, the relationship between mind and phantasia. According to the thought developed above, mind’s embodiment has not only to do with the embodiment inherited from sensation and phantasia but also immediately to do with forms of affection specific to thinking. On this model, notice, the nature of the so-called active and passive “intellects” of DA III.5 should not be as mystifying as the commentary tradition would sometimes lead us to believe. In asking the question, essential to psychological inquiry, how thinking is actualized in matter, we were led to consider its dependence on other perceptual acts; and further in considering this dependence in detail we find that to thinking correspond not only sensitive and imaginative affections giving rise to mental contents but also affections following on and simultaneous with mental acts themselves. That to thinking then there belong not any but specific embodied affections is precisely the principle formalized in DA III.5 in terms of an active (or, better, a constructive) and a passive or affected component to thinking: here mind “active,” contemplating some image; there mind “passive,” apprehending some specifically mental (not merely sensitive or imaginative) content. And now, since mind is not merely for Aristotle imaginative, but grasps contents that articulate real states of affairs— onta—the thinking organism is disposed and behaves differently than before; now she perceives matters differently. All these acts and affections of mind are embodied then in ways remarkable and unremarkable. It is unremarkably evident, at the level of sensation, that the sources of thinking are living bodies; it is unremarkably true that

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MIND IN BODY IN ARISTOTLE nothing that thinks is without a body and that nothing that is without a body is capable of thinking. Yet it discloses something remarkable to try to conceive of in what way for Aristotle mind’s characteristic contents— principles and essences—are adequate to and at home with certain corresponding, and embodied, sorts of fulfillment. It contains potentially important insights, for example, into his conception of the human body. I have not reviewed in detail the language of DA problematic to the embodied-mind account, although it is my view that we should regard it, problematic or not, from the perspective of Aristotle’s broader theoretical commitments; for to do the opposite of that, and to infer theoretical commitments from isolated one-word claims, is irresponsible to the highest degree. It may nevertheless be said that there is in Aristotle a fairly consistent preoccupation with the remarkableness of nous, and this, to go by the thought of the previous paragraph, for reasons connected intimately to the following tension in his thinking. Mind itself is an object of thinking. Then, on the one hand, since thought relies always on sense perception, and sense perceptibles are all material things or attributes, it is strictly speaking only possible that mind itself, as an object of itself, bears necessarily on that sensible, hence material stuff—the embodiment of mind may on this argument be inferred from Aristotle’s basically empiricist program. On the other hand, since, as may also be shown for Aristotle, thinking consists in sorts of evidence or fulfillment irreducible to sensitive sorts, mind itself, an object indeed most appropriate to thinking, must needs be ontologically of a sort different from that of the sensible—and the insensibility, hence immateriality, of mind, along with that of all essences and principles, may

be inferred from epistemological prejudices of a different, say rationalist, sort. Supposing (which would be no less faithful to Aristotle) these arguments may go the other way, and the epistemological claims inferred from their corresponding ontological positions, the outmoded mind-body question may then really be seen as a more contemporary, pressing question about the role of sensation in thinking; about the character of contents of sensation and mind; about the relation between sensation and thinking in judgment. Far from irrelevant, far from anachronistic, the mind-body question—how, and no longer whether, mind relates to body— may be seen to be the problematic core of a tension characteristic in Aristotle not only of mind itself, but of the being of the things mind thinks. Let mind be embodied; in asking however about Aristotelian essences, about their relation to matter, we are put to questions perhaps more pressing, but in a way the same. Erick Raphael Jiménez

NOTES 1

2

3 4

Classic proponents of this view include Robinson, 1978 and 1983; Heinaman, 1990. Defenders of some such view (which may be seen to include the question whether Aristotle has a Cartesian conception of “consciousness”) include Kahn, 1966; Matson, 1966; Grene, 1963; Hamlyn, 1993; Sorabji, 2006. For the contrast, see DA I.1, 403a25–b7. Thus the definition of so-called commensurate universality in APo I.4, 73b25–8, that a universal is “what belongs to everything [of a certain class] in itself and as itself” and moreover “belongs of necessity (ἐξ ἀνάγκης) to those things.” As-such coextensivity means that

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terms A and B extend to the exact same class; there are no As that are not Bs and no Bs that are not As. B belongs “universally” (katholou) to the class to which A belongs “universally.” (On the relevant definition of universality, see APo I.2.) Note that “hypothetical” here does not mean stipulative or axiomatic in the Euclidean sense. In this context it describes a real, not a strictly logical relationship. DA I.1, 403a10–16. On which see DA II.1, 412b6–9, where Aristotle complains there is no reason even to ask whether the soul and the body are one; since the soul is the actuality of the body, they are one “in the most authoritative sense [of unity].” M. Frede, 1995, 106. DA I.1, 403a8–10: εἰ δ᾽ ἐστὶ καὶ τοῦτο (=τὸ νοεῖν) φαντασία τις ἢ μὴ ἄνευ φαντασίας, οὐκ ἐνδέχοιτ᾽ ἂν οὐδὲ τοῦτ᾽ (=τὸ νοεῖν) ἄνευ σώματος εἶναι. DA III.3, 429a1–2. Naturally this assumes phantasia involves workings of the body. DA III.7, 431a16–17. It may be, a detractor might claim, that thinking does not involve a body as such but does only because the thinkers we are talking about happen also to be animals and to have bodies. Thus Kahn, who seems to argue against the specific account that “[t]he requirement of phantasms is a direct consequence of . . . our existence as sentient animals,” whereas “the incorporeality of nous is for Aristotle an essential feature of . . . our access to the noetic domain” (Kahn, 1995, 362). Yet Kahn’s point here is about the explanatory scope of sensitive and noetic capacities; not about whether thinkers have bodies or not. And indeed he insists that so long as by thinkers we mean humans, then thinkers have bodies. The incorporeality of nous for Kahn is a property of it that explains certain sorts of acts and their contents. Thus the specific account does not violate Aristotle’s “general principle of non-reducibility: phenomena at the level of nous are not to be explained in terms of sense-perception” (376). Yet this does not touch on the question whether mind requires as a condition of its existence and exercise a living body, which according to Kahn Aristotle wholly endorses (ibid.).

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Charlton, 1987, 417, justly complains: “That there is no organ of thought may be agreed. We do not think with our brains, or use them in thinking, in the way in which we write with our hands or use them in writing. But what does that prove? There is no organ for turning over in bed; nevertheless, there could not be a turner-over-in-bed without a body.” See DA I.1, 403a3–24. DA III.3, 427b15–16. See DA III.3, 427b24–6. DA III.8, 432a3–8. APo I.18, 81a38f. It will be objected perhaps that sensation is not embodied inasmuch as it is a reception of form, and forms are the things that are thought. To that it is easily responded that for Aristotle to sense materially (with an organ) and to sense formally are numerically identical even if essentially different, so that there is no formally sensing without materially sensing. Of course this does not restrict at all my claim throughout that the contents of thinking are not contents of sensations, which anyway does not follow from the fact that thinking depends on having sensed. Thus DA III.3, 429a1–2. I take it the association is obvious in DA III.3; De Mem. 1; APo II.19; etc. See what I call “The Specific Account” above. DA III.8, 432a7–8. The most conspicuous recent representative of this way of thinking would probably be Modrak, 1987. My interpretive premise here may be taken from De Sensu 1, 436a1–6: “Since soul in itself and each of the potentialities of its parts have been defined, the next thing to do is to undertake an inquiry into living things and all things that have life concerning what are their unique and what their common actions. Let what has been said in DA [or ‘what has been said about soul’] be taken for granted, and now let us speak of the remaining questions.” Given this rule-and-application architecture we should, it seems, be in some position to assess from the vantage of the Parva Naturalia some of Aristotle’s own sense of the accomplishments of DA. De Mem. 1, 449b30–450a9.

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Here I am reminded of the exemplification of this feature of “Aristotelian categoricals” in the natural-historical documentary-inspired example from Thompson, 2008, 63, of a narrator’s claiming bobcats have “two to four” offspring, while the film shows “not just ‘two to four’ of them, but exactly three.” Perhaps a good question would be, Does Aristotle conceive of “forms of” determinate quantities? It would seem in the chair example that the relevant “form” would be either chair or some quantity, that is, in the sense of number. But the thinking of indeterminate quantity does not seem at all to be either of these. The contrary would amount to a sort of Platonism Aristotle rejects; thus Met. XIII–XIV, esp. XIII.6–9, XIV.6. Thus Caston, 2002, 284ff. Note I agree however with Nussbaum contra Caston that the use of phantasmata is not just for the purpose of “ignoring” certain features. Thus Nussbaum, 1986, 266: “There is no thinking (whether practical or thinking) that is simply abstract; I cannot think of a pure proposition. For every thought there is some episode of symbolizing or envisaging that, as it were, provides a concrete vehicle for the thought. I do not simply think of the Principle of Non-Contradiction, in all its abstract purity. At the same time I am also somehow symbolizing it to myself, whether by imagining an example of it, or a logical formalization, or even by saying some words. Another point made by Aristotle in this regard (Mem. 449b31ff.) is that usually my symbolization will convey other strictly unnecessary information: I want to think about the mathematical abstraction, Triangle, and my thought is accompanied by the envisaging of a particular kind of triangle, having a certain size.” However she then goes on to miss the point of the passage all over again, claiming that “a picture-like object . . . symbolizes in virtue of a similarity” (my emphasis) and that “[Aristotle] seems to say we can’t help picturing the triangle of some definite size” (her emphasis) drawing from Aristotle’s examples a prejudice for the visual (267). Frede, 1995, 285, in my opinion rightly stresses that phantasmata need be neither visual nor representative. I am agnostic on Frede’s larger

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(essentially Kantian) story about phantasia as “synthesizer.” Here I am alluding, as no doubt Nussbaum alludes, to the Greek notion of sumbolon as a token of a contract. But imagination does not return to mind and say, “You said an elephant, but of course an elephant is spatial and has surfaces and surfaces have color. But you did not say which color, so I have returned to ask you, What color elephant did you mean?” DA III.3, 427b13–14. Thus respectively Frede, 1995; Schofield, 1995. I have no special need to decide on these readings; for my interest is just in the function of phantasia with regard to thinking. Thus, for example, DA III.3, 428a10. The point of this doctrine seems to be that phantasia as a presentation of sensible things is “false” in that the sensible things represented by phantasia are not there, which is precisely how phantasia presents them. Interestingly in the same passage Aristotle claims that “the sensation of the unique objects is always true” (DA III.3, 427b11–12)—obviously in the sense not that my judgments about sensations are always true but that if I perceive red I am perceiving red and it is indeed red that I am perceiving—implying that sensation as such, at least of the idia, is not a presentative act. DA III.3, 427b17–19. DA III.3, 427b20–1. DA III.3, 427b24–6. DA III.3, 427b27–8. DA III.3, 427b21–3. DA III.3, 427b23–4: “In the case of phantasia the state we are in is as if we were staring (theo-menoi) at frightening or encouraging things in a painting.” This is not to say that I believe any such scission of the practical from the theoretical is ever entirely tidy in Aristotle; on which see above all Baracchi, 2008. Indeed, to speak just to the relevant context, especially in DA III.7 Aristotle is keen on emphasizing the continuity of mind in a practical mode (and not just after the model of MA) with mind as a state of excellence in theoretical pursuits, and his claim that mind perceives not just “the true” but “the good” as well (or in the sense of “correctness” [τὸ ὀρθῶς] the true as good) speaks directly

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against any attempt to conceive of mind strictly as a “theoretical” excellence in DA III. (Indeed it is not clear even that that would mean for Aristotle what it is taken frequently to mean, since for Aristotle theoretical activity is πρᾶξις τις, “a sort of action.”) The role of nous moreover in the explanation of action (in MA and in Met. for example) is well-known. In any event: In NE mind is called the state of excellence in principles both practical (vis-à-vis phrone-sis) and theoretical (vis-à-vis episte-me-). Thus the insistence of Nussbaum, 1986, 265, citing DA III.9 and MA 6–7. The strongest claim to credit this hesitance is in DA III.9–10. Thus DA III.9, 432b26–433a1: “Neither the calculative capacity nor so-called mind can be the mover [ὁ κινῶν, the efficient cause of action]; for theoretical mind studies nothing practical; it says nothing about what is to be fled or pursued. And [animal] movement is always a sort of fleeing or pursuing. But when one studies something of this sort, it does not yet urge them to flee or to pursue it. For example, one may frequently ponder (dianoeitai) something fearful or pleasurable, but this does not demand that one be frightened; rather the heart is moved.” MA 6, 700b19; 6, 700b24; 7, 701a7f. MA 7, 701a11f. For discussion of this ambiguity, and for a defense that the conclusion is not a proposition but an action, see Vigo (forthcoming). MA 7, 701b13–15. MA 7, 701b20–2. See, for example, the detailed excurses on animal movement as a cooperation of parts in MA, esp. MA 1–2, 8–9. MA 8, 701b33–5. This is incidentally strikingly contradicted by a passage of DA III.4 that I have argued elsewhere is not in propria persona. Aristotle claims: “Mind is nothing actually before thinking. Hence it was good to say it is not mixed with the body; for then some quality would come about, like a cooling or warming, or it would have some organ, like the sensitive faculty; but there is no such thing,” etc. (DA III.4, 429a24–7). One further attraction then for regarding the DA III.4 passage as incoherent and “dialectical” is that this remark in MA 8 makes sense. Thus DA III.10, 433a9.

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Thus DA III.10, 433a22–6: “Now mind does not seem to move without desire (for deliberation is desire, and whenever one is moved as a result of reasoning (logismos), they are moved as a result of deliberation), but desire moves even without (para) reasoning; for impulse (epithumia) is a sort of desire.” Indeed these same specifications will hold the other way round: For praxis has just as little an essential link to reason (that is one of the leading suppositions of Aristotle’s ethics), and (of course!) there is no inference forward to or backward from action that will connect it always or necessarily to full-blown thinking.

REFERENCES Baracchi, C., Aristotle’s Ethics as First Philosophy, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008. Caston, V., “Aristotle on Consciousness,” Mind, 111.444 (2002), 751–815. Charlton, W., “Aristotle on the Place of Mind in Nature,” in Philosophical Issues in Aristotle’s Biology, ed. A. Gotthelf and J. G. Lennox, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987. Frede, D., “The Cognitive Role of ΦΑΝΤΑΣΙΑ,” in Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, ed. M. Nussbaum and A. Rorty, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995. Frede, M., “On Aristotle’s Conception of the Soul,” in Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, ed. M. Nussbaum and A. Rorty, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995. Grene, M., A Portrait of Aristotle, Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1963. Hamlyn, D.W. (trans. and ed.), Aristotle. De Anima: Books II and III (With Passages from Book I), 2nd edn, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993. Heinaman, R., “Aristotle and the Mind-Body Problem,” Phronesis, 35 (1990), 83–102.

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MIND IN BODY IN ARISTOTLE Kahn, C., “Sensation and Consciousness in Aristotle’s Psychology,” Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie, 48 (1966), 43–81. — “Aristotle on Thinking,” in Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, ed. M. Nussbaum and A. Rorty, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995. Matson, W. I., “Why Isn’t the Mind-Body Problem Ancient?” in Mind, Matter, and Method: Essays in Philosophy and Science in Honor of Herbert Feigl, ed. P. Feyerabend and G. Maxwell, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1966. Modrak, D., Aristotle: The Power of Perception, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987.

Nussbaum, M., Aristotle's De Motu Animalium, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986. Robinson, H. M., “Mind and Body in Aristotle,” Classical Quarterly, 28 (1978), 105–24. — “Aristotelian Dualism,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 1 (1983), 123–44. Schofield, M., “Aristotle on the Imagination,” in Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, ed. M. Nussbaum and A. Rorty, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995. Sorabji, R., Aristotle on Memory, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006. Thompson, M., Life and Action, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2008. Vigo, A., Praxis and Action, Leuven: University of Leuven, forthcoming.

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6 PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA

If locomotion belongs more to beings that have more fully taken on their natures, then this motion would be first among others with respect to being. Aristotle, Physics VIII.7, 261a18–20

Aristotle’s hylomorphic account of substance often seems to follow from careful observation of phenomena, especially the observation of individual living organisms, rather than abstract theoretical reflection. However, Aristotelian science is governed by a very specific explanatory model that can be difficult to reconcile with observational study. The account of the living organism in De Anima is split between these two poles. On the one hand, the study of life aims at articulating the soul and its principal divisions, which is in line with the structure of scientific explanation, and on the other hand the account of soul depends on and derives from phenomenological observation of living things. I argue in this chapter that the Aristotelian explanatory model, which requires that the causal source of the animal’s life power be a-spatial and atemporal but also instantiated through the animal’s physiological capacities of locomotion, imagination, and common sensing, pushes in a phenomenologically rigorous direction by demanding that we do not privilege the animal over its environment but take both perceiver and perceived, broadly speaking, to be drawing

their separate identities from a single, physiologically dynamic actuality. The strategy of this chapter will be to take Aristotle as wrestling philosophically in the De Anima with the relationship between body and soul and, in book III, taking specific interest in the relationship between the living organism’s power of discrimination (to kritikos) and its power of movement with respect to place (τὸ κινεῖν τὴν κατὰ τόπον κίνησιν).1 Aristotle is asking, I propose, how these two powers can help us unify what analysis has apparently “broken up” (diaspan) (432b5) into parts. In the struggle to account for the unity of soul, phantasia plays a key role. I claim that phantasia is both a “motor” power, which frees a given state of affairs to be reconstrued as receptive of initiative, and a “discriminative” power that lets things present themselves independently of the desiring and therefore partial perspective from which they are sighted.2 These two sides of phantasia, discriminatory and motor, are reconciled in the account of phantasia as enabling a given actuality to be construed “as,” that is, as being of this or that sort, as turning toward this or that advantage, as

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PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA open to reconstrual pending deliberation and inquiry. One chief merit of this reading will be to unify the soul’s motor, perceptual, and discriminative powers. In the first section of the chapter, I address the strengths and limitations of some contemporary interpretations of imagination and the soul in De Anima, paying special attention to the difference I find between interpretations that look primarily toward the divisions of the soul and interpretations that look toward the unified soul reflected in the living organism. I read these as false, or unsatisfying, alternatives that prioritize either first or second actuality respectively when the aim should be, I claim, to see the two aspects of soul and its expression in a broader unity. In the second section of the paper I turn to phantasia, distinguishing between its “deliberative” (logistike-) and “aesthetic” (aisthe-tike-) sides (De Anima III.10) and interpreting phantasia as the power to grasp and participate in the distinction between first and second actuality.3 I argue that the soul’s power to orient itself toward the expression of first actuality affords it not only its capacity for greater initiative but, in its more developed form, the ability to recognize its participation in life.

REVIEW OF INTERPRETATIONS OF DE ANIMA BOOK III To date in the secondary literature, helpful work has contributed to our understanding the role that imagination and locomotion play in the exercise of the soul’s causal power.4 A major division in the work on Aristotle’s De Anima occurs between those who are primarily interested in Aristotle’s account of the causal power of the soul’s individual parts, aiming to distinguish the

soul’s powers from its parts, and those primarily interested in an account of the relationship between soul and body, focusing on the way powers facilitate the causal efficacy of the soul in the body. The structure of De Anima on the surface of it lends support to the former view. books II and III answer the methodological aim set up in book I of dividing the soul into appropriate parts, as signaled in II.2 where Aristotle says that if capacities are separable in account they name different parts of the soul. We might therefore take the ensuing study of the various powers of soul as a test of which powers qualify as parts properly speaking.5 Book III continues marking out parts of the soul, extending the book II discussion of the power of receiving form with matter, that is, nutrition, and receiving form without matter, that is, perception, into a discussion of the soul’s grasp of intelligible form. In this context, the study of phantasia is situated between the account of the unified sense power in III.2 and the account of thinking in III.4–5 because Aristotle is attempting to distinguish phantasia, here taken as a power, from the parts of the soul that make use of this power. Aristotle is free to return to investigate the role of imagination in locomotion (DA III.9–11), on this account, as an epilogue to the analysis of the soul’s parts. The order and organization of De Anima would therefore suggest a programmatic orientation toward the division of the soul into its proper nutritive, perceptive, and intellective parts. But the structure of book III also points to the alternative view according to which the aim of the study is not only to partition the soul into its parts but to understand the relationship between first and second actuality in the soul’s relationship to the body. First actuality is the principle governing the organized body, differentiating its complex structure

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PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA and relating its powers to one another in a way that supports its efficacy and explicit expression in all life circumstances. Aristotle calls soul the first actuality, or form, of an organized body with the potential or power for life. From this point of view, it is the life of an organism that most of all dominates Aristotle’s thinking about the soul and its embodied activity (hylomorphism). De Anima III begins with an analysis of the completeness of the five sense powers and their unifying principle in the account of the “common sensibles” (chapter 1), followed by a discussion of the perceiving soul’s self-awareness (chapter 2), and ends with a study of the unified life sense and locomotion. Aristotle’s focus on the basic sense power of self-aware orientation and the practical expression of this power through locomotion at the beginning and end of the book indicate his interest in the way the parts of the soul, separate in account, can be reconciled. If Aristotle were primarily interested in establishing the distinction between parts of soul, presumably he would not have said so little about the nature of intellect, and he would not have left the question of the unqualified separability of intellect undecided. The very brief and passing study of intellect in book III is subordinated, by its extreme economy if nothing else, to the larger and more encompassing study of the unified life sense. From these two points of view, we arrive at very different expectations regarding book III. On the one hand, the book presents itself as the project of identifying the parts of the soul separable in account; on the other hand, it presents itself as a study of how the separate parts of the soul, that is, nutritive, perceptive, and thinking, are reconciled with one another in animal life. I propose that these two interpretive directions in which De Anima III is taken

reflect a single, self-consistent account of the relationship between soul and body.

THE UNITY OF PERCEPTIVE POWER (AISTHEˉTIKON) AND THE PLACELESSNESS OF SOUL The main thesis put forth in this section is that the perceptive part of the soul, broadly speaking, is inseparable from the power of locomotion, and yet the conjunction of the two implies that the perceptive part of the soul is separable in account and not located in the animal.6 In other words, animal self-awareness is inextricably tied to the unity of its perceptual field, and the unity of the perceptual field implies a distinct part of the soul that governs the body’s relation to an intelligibly organized environment.7 In De Anima III.1 Aristotle uses two arguments to show that the perception of motion, rest, shape, magnitude, number are “common” to multiple sense powers and, therefore, must be grasped by a unified power of perception. The first argument is that he has already provided a complete list of the proper sense powers, that is, the three contact powers (touch, taste, smell) and the two distance powers (seeing and hearing),8 and as such there can be no further sense power. The second argument is that if these common objects of perception were to be grasped by a proper power, they would be known “accidentally” (κατὰ συμβεβηκός) in the way seeing “white” is seeing “sweet,” that is, seeing white is a perception of the thing that is also sweet. In the case of accidental perception, we are aware that two perceptions happen together (συμπέσωσιν ἅμα) (425a23–4), but, as Aristotle claims, this is possible because

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PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA we “already” have a common perception of the object. The connection between “white” and “sweet” is not inferred or added to them externally by a process of reasoning but is present in advance of the perception of color and taste. This advance perception allows the connection to be drawn between separate grasps we have on the thing through the proper senses.9 The common sensing power is not an additional sense but, prior in account to the proper sense powers, enables and situates the perception of primary qualities.10 Aristotle says that the senses perceive what is proper to each other “by what is one,” that is, a prior unified grasp of the perceptual object.11 There is one source to which all proper perceptions point and from which their differences and relations are apparent.12 All perception is a displacement from a proper ratio, or mean, which in the case of the proper sense powers is a ratio of high and low tones, wet and dry, rough and smooth, etc.13 When this ratio is stretched too far, the perceiving can be overwhelmed and shut down, and the perceptive organ can be damaged. The common sense power is also a “mean” but one that is directed toward those aspects of the environment relevant for initiative and action. The common sense power gathers the various aspects of perceptual experience toward a center; for example, Aristotle’s account of the common sensibles would allow us to say that a particular shape (e.g. round or square) speaks of motion and rest, for instance, as a square shape implies stability and a round shape implies instability.14 This correlation of aspects in things signals a shift in the level of description of perception from ratios that are visible, aural, olfactory, etc., to potentialities for the power of initiative. The common sensibles are the point of access the ensouled body has,

through objects, to its own potentiality for engagement with its environment. Aristotle says “it is necessary that one [thing] gather that they are different” (δεῖ δὲ τὸ ἓν λέγειν ὅτι ἕτερον, DA III.2, 426b20–1) and “it is the same thing that gathers [they are different]” (λέγει ἄρα τὸ αὐτό, 426b21).15 The common sensing power speaks of the unity of objects and circumstances. On their own, “it is not possible for separate senses to distinguish what is separate” (οὐχ οἷόν τε κεχωρισμένοις κρίνειν τὰ κεχωρισμένα, 426b22–3).16 Separate senses are no more aware of the difference between them than two people having separate experiences, and they are therefore unaware of the larger context in which any of the proper objects belong. In order for distinct aspects to be seized in their belonging together, they must be placed into a shared space, which means that they must be seized from a single source at a single moment. Aristotle says that the source and the “when” of the seizing must be one, just as the single act of distinguishing good and bad implies both that one differs from the other and that the other differs from the one. From this single act of discrimination the soul distinguishes opposite qualities. The act of discrimination is “an indivisible [act] in an indivisible time” (ἀχώριστον καὶ ἐν ἀχωρίστῳ χρόνῳ, 426b29), for instance, the act in which white is distinguished from black. Although the qualities are opposite and, therefore, would move the perceptive power in opposite directions, “one thing” discriminates the opposites at one time, and by its act the soul is open to, for example, white and black, sour and sweet, or good and bad. As Aristotle puts it, the thing that distinguishes is one in being but two in potency. As one in being, it distinguishes at one time in a single act. As two in potency, it has the

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PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA capacity to be moved in opposite directions by the opposites it marks out. Aristotle compares the distinguishing act to a point or boundary: the boundary divides an area and provides orientation within the overall field but, as a limit, is only per accidens an object in the field it demarcates. In III.2 Aristotle consolidates his basic point in the formula that “we perceive that we perceive” (425b12). The way an animal perceives itself is drawn from objects in the sense that the animal’s self-perception and awareness of motor potentiality cannot be separated from its perceptual intwining with objects. As he says, the actuality of the perceiver and the actuality of the perceived is “one and the same” (ἡ αὐτὴ μέν ἐστι καὶ μία, 425b26–7); they differ not insofar as their actualities are separate but insofar as “their being is not the same” (τὸ δ’ εἶναι οὐ τὸ αὐτὸ αὐταῖς, 425b27). Later in the text Aristotle calls this shared actuality “twofold” (ditton), similar in a sense to the twofold nature of the way up and the way down. To submit ourselves to the way, we must submit to a single path going from the Piraeus to Athens and from Athens to the Piraeus. The path is one, but its being is two. Similarly, when we submit to a perceptible, we submit to a certain self-awareness. The grasp the animal has of the object, however partial it is, is a grasp the animal has of itself. Things therefore in being perceived must speak of a perceiver.17 Furthermore, insofar as there is no object that cannot be better seen, there is no instance of seeing that does not imply potentialities of the perceiver, all of which are oriented toward the principle of completeness. The common perception of objects implies the potential for further clarity, and the cohesiveness of the perceiver is inextricably tied up with the perceptibility of things.

All this seems to point to the conclusion that perception is sourced in the animal body, positioned in a certain way, with a certain disposition, affordances, and so on. But Aristotle compares the source of the perceptive power to a geometrical point, which although it is “spatial” in a very important respect, it is not one of the things in space. The point has no dimensions of its own; it differentiates places from each other without taking up space of its own. As the line depends on the point as the source from which it arises and into which it terminates, so too the perceptive power (aisthe-tikon) is an a-spatial principle of spatiality, one which locates and gives orientation. We have seen in this section that the perceiver gains access to its self-perception through the perception of objects and that the principle of perception places without being subject to place. Importantly, we have seen that these are two sides of the same concept. There is an intimate correlation between the perception of things and the perception of self, which calls for a principle of place that, even if it is in some sense present in the body, for example, in the heart, would itself be prior to place similar to the way in which the point, which does not have size, is “present in” its context as the limit that defines that context. For the animal, the perceptive power divides the context in ways that matter to the animal. The perceptive power carves up and integrates its perceptual field. Although the animal is “in” its environment, the source of the power that divides and integrates the animal’s perceptual field is not subject to spatiality, carving up its perceptual field and giving the animal orientation. The common sensing power opens up the distance necessary for initiative and carves out lines of relevance within the unified perceptual field, illuminating place by the light of the qualities

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PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA revealed by the proper senses, for example, brightness, color, taste, pitch, etc., all unified in and answering to the demands of animal initiative. Thus, place is inherently something lived in. Ensouled bodies have the power to reveal differences in and among things of the world, specifically differences that are relevant to their self-aware engagement with things and circumstances in the context of their overall desiring project.18 In III.2 Aristotle extends the study of common sensing to show that the power of perception is a power of initiative, that is, a power that renders the world actionable. What we might loosely call the “empiricist” assumption that the perceptive principle is located “in” the perceiver ignores the a-spatial character of the explanatory schema. The principle of perception is the prior constitutive basis that saturates the environment without being subject to spatiality. If the perceptive principle is to be located at all it is “in” the appearance to the organism of a unified perceptual field.19 It is for this reason that perceiving a world is always already a process of discovering the position and disposition of the body from which the world is perceived and the motor-potentialities inherent in the actuality of a perceiving body. In other words, perception is fundamentally a motor-perceptual project.

LOCOMOTION AND PHANTASIA The account of the critical powers in book III, especially the characterization of the common sensing power as a mean of self-perception, dovetails nicely with the discussion of motor capacities in III.9–11. In III.1 Aristotle demonstrates the completeness of the five proper senses, which establishes a qualitative distinction between proper sense

and common sensing power. This shifts the book II analysis of embodied form to a new level of description. The means of perception is now no longer a part of the body, for example, eyes, ears, etc., but the ensouled body as a whole. In this section I will argue that the a-spatial character of soul makes room, as it were, for the ensouled body to act as a single mean of perception. Specifically, I want to show that the placelessness of soul as causal source requires a body with the powers of locomotion and phantasia. The relationship between locomotion and phantasia will enable us to see the intimate relationship between the opening part of book III, that is, the account of the unified perceptual field (DA III.1–3), and the concluding account of the locomotive power (III.9–11). In book II, the soul demands a certain bodily ratio (logos), capable of supporting a mean, in order to perform its functions. The form of the proper sense power was instantiated in a qualitatively determinate ratio of homoeomerous material components. The power of touch is a certain ratio of bodily elements capable of sensing tangibles, just as the powers of seeing and hearing, etc. are ratios of simple bodies capable of receiving form without the matter. The elements standing in ratio to one another are capable of sensing objects of qualitatively different kinds and are open to a qualitatively distinct arena of meaning, one which they support but in which they do not directly participate.20 At this level, the soul’s exercise of its causal power is an inflexible measure of qualitative determinacy, supported by a determinate ratio out of which bodily elements are composed. The inflexibility of the form-matter relationship in perception is carried over into the single mean of perception in animals with so-called hardened eyes, which are unable

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PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA to see colors except in terms of what is and is not threatening to their initiative. For such animals, colors simply are what either is or is not threatening to the soul’s overall project of self-maintenance.21 Colors are seen univocally as either frightening, that is, time to flee, or enticing, that is, time to eat or reproduce, or as irrelevant background noise.22 Everything that appears to the animal does so as either an aid or an obstacle in the projects of nutrition, self-defense, and ultimately reproduction,23 and action is just the process of sorting the given material situation in which the animal finds itself. Things are present insofar as they speak to the animal’s capacities and in terms of the animal’s characteristic style of responding. What is missing is a sense of the given as open to different, even opposing, construal, such that “red” could mean pleasure or pain, or that “threatening red” could be the occasion for a variety of different appropriate responses. What is missing, in other words, is the distance from the given that would allow room for ambiguity. We discover that room for ambiguity in the desiring perception of things discussed at the end of book III. In III.7–11 Aristotle repeats and extends the book II analysis of desiring bodies by introducing the distinction between sensory and deliberative phantasia. At first, the description of sensory imagination does not allow for greater degrees of ambiguity in the animal’s experience of things. The bodily awareness of position and disposition with respect to circumstances is subjected to a fixed reading of color, sound, taste, etc., in the terms set by the life sense. The perception of “green” is the desiring perception of “food” dictated by the perception of a unified context of bodily initiative and, ultimately, by the species form. The animal is oriented toward the good and the bad:

“being pleased or pained is the being-active of the mean state in the perceptive part in relation to the good or bad as such” (DA III.7, 431a10–11). Animals, with their very being focused into this single mean of perception, mark a primary distinction between “yes” and “no” in response to the world. The good and bad mark out the true and the false in terms relevant to the perceiver: “independently of practical matters, the true [thing] and the false [thing] are in the same class as the good and the bad; they differ in that the one is in the class simply, the other in relation to someone” (431b10–12). The good and the bad carve up the world in relation to the fate of the perceiving being. In sensory imagination there is perceived ambiguity but only at the level of the direction things are turned, that is, either toward or away from the animal’s advantage. There is no explicitly perceived ambiguity in the animal’s perceptive field. At the same time, there is always an implicit capacity for ambiguity in the animal’s experience of itself and the world. For instance, “sensory imagination” (αἰσθητικὴ φαντασία) allows the animal access to the plasticity of its surroundings for the sake of engaging those circumstances transformatively. In each imagining there is an implicit engagement with the reversibility and redirectability of given circumstances.24 Similarly, the locomotive body contains within it the power to reconstrue its limbs in self-motion. According to Aristotle, locomotion depends on the body’s power to oppose itself. Unlike earth, air, fire, and water, which are aggregates, a self-moving being must be capable of sustaining itself in opposition to itself, which implies the ability to let its limbs stand open for construal. The joint sustains the opposition in which motion and rest are drawn together into a center at which one

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PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA one pressed. For this reason those training holding [weights] leap further than those not holding, and runners run faster swinging their arms, for there occurs in extending the arms some pressing against the hands and wrists. (Progression of Animals, 705a12–18)

part of the body, resting, frees another part to be in motion. Explaining this work in the Motion of Animals, Aristotle says: For it is clear in perceptible objects, too, that it is impossible for there to be movement if nothing is at rest—and, above all, in animals, our present concern. For if one of the parts moves, there must be some part at rest; and it is for this reason that animals have joints. For they use their joints like a center, and the whole section containing the joint becomes both one and two, both straight and bent, changing potentially and actually by reason of the joint. (698a14–21)25 One part holds itself in place impassively so that the other part can express this impassivity in and through motion. For example, it is possible for a foot to be lifted forward for the purposes of walking as long as the other foot is fixed in place. The determinate impassivity of the part at rest is in some sense expressed by the determinate freedom of the part in motion. The body’s power of self-opposition is made more explicit in Aristotle’s description of jumping and running. The upper part of the body pushes against the lower part, and the body as a whole pushes against the solid earth below it. The upper part is free to move only insofar as the lower part is held fast, unmoved, and impassive. In turn, the upper part of the body can reverse its role and become the unmoved base from which the lower part is drawn up. As Aristotle describes it: . . . For the [animal] leaping makes the leap by supporting itself on both its upper part and on what is under its feet, for the parts [of the animal] have some mutual support in relation to each other in its joints, and generally the [part] pressing [finds support] in relation to the

Aristotle shows that the body is a composite made up of parts that are what they are in and through being other to one another. The body is a self-opposed relation; the body is held together at its joints, from which its locomotion springs. Not only are parts of the body opposed to other parts, but the parts themselves can switch between the role of being “squeezed” as the rest of the body pushes down on them, and being “pulled” as the body thus set in motion carries them forward. This clarifies what Aristotle means when he calls the joint a “center”: the joint is a point of rotation around which the parts of the body leverage each other in the motion of the whole. This brief consideration of animal motion has uncovered two things. First that it is necessary for an animal body to be articulated into parts. Motion is only possible insofar as a body can be in motion and at rest, that is, in motion with respect to one part and at rest with respect to the other. This is true of all locomotion.26 Second, the relationship between the part in motion and the part at rest is reversible. The jointed body is the one that is in the business of transforming its moving part into a part at rest and leveraging its newly fixed inertia in the process, the way we might push off the ground with a leg only then, quite naturally, to swing that same leg forward and let our momentum carry us forward. Motion teaches us not only that parts of the body can be differently construed, that is, as leveraging and leveraged, but that they

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PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA must be so construed. When I move, one leg remains at rest in order to propel the rest of me forward, and then that leg is taken up in turn and propelled forward. If I imagine what it is like for a bird to fly, the wings pull the body forward, drawing it up behind them, and then the body’s built-up momentum becomes a secure anchor for the wings to reset themselves as they reach forward and draw the body forward again. This process works because the animal is tacitly aware of itself as a limit, that is, as one and two: it is at one moment pulling itself forward, and in this moment it is “two,” self-opposed. In the next moment it is one thing resting in the inertia of the whole body. Neither attitude of opposition nor self-confirming inertia would be possible unless they both drew equally on the awareness of the body being both one and two. This awareness of self as limit expresses itself as locomotion.27 When I move, furthermore, I demonstrate that my inertia can carry my initiative into the world and serve me as the “launching pad” for further initiative. I learn to anticipate the way the situation will be given to me, that is, the pivot point I will establish for myself if I move in this direction at this speed, etc. The earth against which I push to launch myself forward is no longer simply something given. It is now something I give myself in one particular respect or another. The experience of jointed motion thus comes with the wisdom that what I now do prepares the conditions in which I will presently find myself acting. It shows me that “I” am both the one acting and the conditions from which I act, because it is through my body that I give rise to the conditions that make it possible to act. I am the one who disposes my body in such a way that my future comportment will enable me to take up my inertia and propel myself forward.

In the previous section of this chapter, we saw that the common sensing power is a perceptive mean by which the animal’s desiring project in the world is practically expressed. In the case of animals with “hardened eyes,” perception was seen to be locomotive in the sense that perception implied pleasure and pain, therefore pursuit and avoidance, and the animal’s power to turn circumstances to its advantage or away from its disadvantage. The animal inherits a situation that has been disposed either well or poorly by prior initiative and the givenness of circumstances, and it must take up in turn that inherited situation to propel it forward. In the case of nonrational animals, inherited momentum and individual initiative are reliably wedded by the soul. For instance, the power of walking is at home as the power to inherit momentum and turn it toward the animal’s aim, shifting itself in response to changing circumstances. The power to walk can then be understood not only in terms of the body and material cause, as if the animal needed to think explicitly about the reconstrual of bodily limbs necessary for locomotion, but in terms of the world as it appears to a “walker,” that is, the world appears as articulated with respect to place and position, that is, as accessible to a mobile perspective. It is the animal’s ability to reconstrue itself that is presupposed by the animal’s ability to see its world as open to being differently construed and receptive of initiative.28 In order to have a unified field of perception, the animal must be able to see the world in terms that are consistent with locomotion and initiative. If we were to take from our above discussion the lesson that phantasia is the power to make present what is absent, then imagination would be a precondition for our ability to see a situation is charged with potential.

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PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA For example, a cat seems to be imagining things when it waits attentively at the base of the wall waiting for something to emerge from the crack in the floorboard. Surely a dog is imagining things when it is asleep at the quietest hour in the middle of the night but its paws are twitching and its nose is flaring as if it were on the verge of a great victory. In both these cases, the animal is allowing the potentialities of a given circumstance to express themselves fully. They are following out the potentialities that are secretly present in actually existing circumstances. They do not need to wait for something to present itself to them. Actual circumstances point beyond themselves to the possibilities they contain not in virtue of any content other than the very determinacy of the circumstances. I am suggesting here that images (phantasmata) and imagination are best understood as possessing a potentiality to be otherwise that is rooted in their specific determinacy. I have in mind the sort of things Aristotle says about recollective images in On Memory and Recollection. Recollecting, he says, is not in one’s power, just as it is not in the power of those who throw something to make it stop. We get hold of a starting point that sets a process in motion, like ringing a bell; as soon as one note is sounded, the others seem to follow of their own accord, until finally the whole song emerges to situate each of its parts. Images and imagination, in my view, are volatile in the same way, that is, they point beyond themselves and turn given circumstances into a starting point for possibilities that are only implied. I take it that this is what Aristotle indicates when he says that phantasia is a “motion of a sort” (DA III.3, 428b11), that is, it implies an unfolding; it harbors a dynamic impulse.29 In III.1–3, we saw that the body capable of initiative, that is, desire and its expression

through pursuit and avoidance is a prior basis for the work of the proper sense organs. The proper senses perceive qualities, which means that in some sense this perceptual act can be abstracted from the larger whole of life, but this is true only in the specific instance of a rational soul. For the animal in the broadest sense, there are no detached and free-floating qualities in the world, and there is no perception of qualities not already situated within a larger, directed, horizon of engagement. Qualities appear as measured by the perceptual mean, and they appear abstracted on their own as qualities only insofar as the soul is capable of detaching itself from its practical engagements. This self-extraction requires, I contend, the ability to behold ambiguity in the object of perception, which requires the power of phantasia. The result of this power to behold ambiguity is “deliberative” phantasia, which operates in the context of hypothetical or conditional engagements. Deliberative phantasia is, in the context of practical intellect, the power not only to reconstrue the given in light of initiative but the power practical intellect has to draw a common measure from given circumstances and to reckon “for the sake of something” (νοῦς δὲ ὁ ἕνεκά του λογιζόμενος καὶ ὁ πρακτικός, III.10, 433a14). Aristotle emphasizes the variability to which deliberative phantasia gives rise: “whether one will act in this way or that is already the work of reckoning (logismos)” (III.11, 434a7–8). This variability and the animal’s presence to its productive ambiguity depend on the ability to establish a standard by which to measure circumstances and map them out, as it were. It is only on the basis of the power to gather circumstances in light of a governing standard that it is possible to orient toward the variability of action and, at the same time, “pursue the greater [good]”

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PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA (τὸ μεῖζον γὰρ διώκει, 434a9). Deliberative phantasia thus lets its object stand open to construal and remain to a certain degree undecided, so that the animal can stand back from actually given circumstances and engage them transformatively. Most importantly for the purposes of this chapter, deliberative phantasia allows the animal the detachment from circumstances requisite to perceive the gap between form and matter; that is, by taking the relationship between the governing form and its material expression, deliberative imagination allows for participation in the relationship between first and second actuality. Circumstances are no longer simply given but given as a material composition answering to the aims of action, evaluable according to a standard and expressive as well of a potential for recombination and new expression. Turning now from practical to theoretical intellect, we are in a position to see that it is in the context of the practical detachment provided by phantasia that the errors of thinking first arise. In the final section of this chapter I want to extend the point that the embodied soul is characterized by greater degrees of awareness of ambiguity in things and self-aware participation in life to the account of thinking and error in De Anima III.3.

THE PROBLEM OF TRUTH AND FALSEHOOD In this concluding section of the chapter I want to ask the question, which may seem naïve, why it is that perception and thinking are not always true. Given that animal life is for the most part successful at making a place for itself in the world, and given that we seem to have powers of proper perception suited to that world and suited to the things

we encounter, why should it not be that we are always correct, or at least never in error, in all our perceptions and judgments? The answer, I claim, is that for animal soul, especially in light of locomotion, disengagement from circumstances and a grasp of their objective ambiguities, that is, the power of phantasia, is the basis upon which errors of thinking can occur. I will thus be arguing that phantasia is constitutive of discrimination, that is, perceiving and thinking.30 As corollaries of this point, I will argue that certain types of perception in which there is apparently no phantasia, such as the perception of color as color (rather than as good or bad), and instances of phantasia in which there is apparently no perception, for example, dreams and images, presuppose a more fundamental power of phantasia at the root of its special exercise. Fundamental phantasia (1) evacuates perception of desire, (2) allows things to be taken up as undecided and open to reconstrual and, therefore, (3) allows ambiguity to become for the first time an object of thought. On the basis of this account, I will conclude by addressing Aristotle’s claims regarding falsehood, that is, that phantasiai are frequently and persistently false (DA III.3, 428a11), that deception is proper to living beings, and that the soul persists in it (427b1–2). True and false judgments are the work of theoretical, not practical, intellect. Aristotle’s analysis here begins from the animal’s simple presence to a state of affairs rather than the practically transformative engagement with circumstances through desire and locomotion. In order to be simply present to circumstances without being engaged in them, however, it is necessary first to carve out a space in which this is possible. The basic stance toward things is not one of detachment but engaged participation, as reflected

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PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA in supposition (hupole-psis, 427b16 and b28) and belief, which Aristotle says are not simply “up to us” but compelled. Phantasia enables us to suspend those commitments. In imagination, Aristotle says, we can be present to something terrifying without feeling terrified, as if the terrifying situation were in a painting (427b23–4).31 In the detached space provided by imagination we can participate in truth and falsity because we have temporarily suspended the good and the bad and, along with them, we have suspended the perspective “for me” from which things appear good or bad. In this way we can approach objects as a combination and division of qualities rooted in the nature of the object and take them up without reference to ourselves. To perceive error and participate in truth and falsity require that we first become aware that the measure we take of things might reflect more on our perspective than on the nature of the object known. Once a space is clear in which the nature of the object can appear, it becomes possible to see the qualities of that object as distinguished from one another and gathered toward a shared source. In this way, error is “always in an act of putting things together” (III.6, 430b3). In other words, truth and falsity require the ability to see combinations and divisions of things in light of being appropriate and called for by the nature of things. The power to see truth is accompanied by the constitutive possibility of falsehood, for the reason that what we take to be the gathering source, the nature of the thing, might be just an opinion of ours. Neither truth nor falsity can occur except on the basis of detachment from circumstances granted by phantasia.32 The account of imagination we are developing here thus explains the power human beings have to suspend the claim objects of our world have on us, such that we are

able to approach them as open to construal. What we might otherwise have taken to be the nature of things imposing itself on us presents itself on the basis of imagination as something construed, either truly or falsely. The knower may now, for instance, falsely suppose “yellow liquid” to be bile on the basis of being able to disengage from things and, by separating “yellow” from “liquid,” “viscosity,” and “odor,” let these qualities stand out as gathered together by the nature of bile. Judgment of this kind implies a disengaged presence to things, that is, a spectator who is accidentally a participant. Phantasia allows the embodied soul to extricate itself from the immediacy of the given not only for the sake of transformative initiative but in order to see the given as called for and ordered by the nature of things on the side of the known. Phantasia that reveals the actual state of affairs charged with potential is “deliberative” when it allows the soul a degree of transformative initiative. But phantasia only provides the possibility of detachment on the basis of engagement. Phantasia is irrevocably dependent on the practical commitment to a particular construal, that is, one that opens up other facets of things and the possibility of reconstrual. It is always possible that the “detached” and open presence to things that allows true judgment will turn out to have been guided by a prior commitment of ours, guided not by the nature of things but by the necessity of practical engagement. Thus, even while phantasia is what allows detachment from our partial perspective, Aristotle also calls phantasiai frequently and persistently false (III.3, 428a11), and he says that being deceived is “more proper to living beings” and that “the soul continues to persevere in this condition” (427b1–2). Things appear in light of judgments, but it is the world that we see and

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PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA know, so our judgments, when false, remain concealed from our view. Practical phantasia would be continuously in error in the sense that error is fundamentally disclosive and inexorably part of the appearing of things. That is, the falsity of one practical hypothesis opens the horizon for the practically engaged animal and provides the basis, in principle, for the detached presence that is required by theoretical imagination. The animal “reads” circumstances by inserting itself into them, jumping in the water as it were, and therefore always getting things partially right and partially wrong. Practical imagination would on this account be frequently in error because it finds utility in its errors. Animals “err” when they position themselves in the environment, assume a bodily disposition, and prepare themselves for a response. Sometimes animals must even insert themselves into the environment in such a way as to prompt a premature response for, for example, a predator or prey. These practical (bodily) decisions are often inadequately (or imperfectly) precise because situations can only be articulated by the animal through ongoing dialogue with its environment. It is only by virtue of first being inserted into the practical situation that the animal will be able to establish a more intimate relationship to things and afford itself new opportunities. This is the nature of practical life: truth is always a matter of doing, and doing is always a matter of correcting or clarifying. Falsity is therefore a condition for opening up a horizon of engagement, and it is required by the nature of initiative. As accurate as any hypothetical supposition may be, it always remains open to clarification as necessary. The imagination is often in error, but its errors are productive.33 They facilitate response. If, however, we take this to say that theoretical phantasia is often in error and persists

that way, the reading would be slightly different. For an animal that participates in truth and falsity, the “true” judgment cannot extricate itself from the possibility that the “nature” guiding its combination and division of aspects is merely a false opinion about the thing it is thinking. Imaginings are false insofar as the guiding principle is not a “nature” but false opinion or errant desire, and thus the way out of falsehood will always go through the work of recombining a perceptual field wrongly articulated by false opinion or errant desire. A knower gains access to knowledge insofar as she has the power to subordinate her desiring life to the nature of the known and, thereby, to combine and divide the aspects of perceptual life on their own terms; on this basis, the knower is able to distinguish between nature and accident. This requires seeing the essential character of a thing, its necessity and principle, and distinguishing this from its other features. The account I have offered of phantasia I hope has shown itself capable of accommodating both the practical and the theoretical imagination in one perspective. That is, whether phantasia is functioning within the context of practical engagement or in the context of theoretical judgment, it is the power that grants detachment from the given state of affairs and allows the animal to adopt a stance toward ambiguity in the actual, or toward its potential to be reconstrued. This account of phantasia draws together disparate elements of Aristotle’s thinking about animal locomotion, including the jointed motion of the body, the initiative expressed in circumstances of the animal with “hardened eyes,” the planning of all animals capable in relative degrees of deliberation, and the specifically human capacity for truth and falsity. In each of these separate exercises of phantasia we see a different sense in which

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PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA the animal is able to adopt a stance toward the possibility of things being otherwise by virtue of holding onto an unmoved center around which variation is possible.

CONCLUSION I have claimed in this chapter that the locomotive side of the imagination is a necessary resource for understanding Aristotle’s account of the soul as such. I am in fundamental agreement with interpreters who have been drawn to De Anima III.3 to understand imagination as a power of construing things as being of this or that sort, but I want to point out that the very experience the animal has of its own body, and the experience the animal has of that body in the context of other things and unfolding events, contains within it a material basis for thinking. Rather than assuming that mind can recognize images, it is my conclusion that body must first be able to experience itself imagistically, or in a way preparatory to the image, in order that the embodied soul can have an image in a way that would matter to it. The power to have an image is the very thing we should be trying to explain, not presuppose. I have tried to show that the power to have an image, and especially the power to understand an image as image, is consistent with locomotion. It is in locomotive life that the living body learns to reconstrue its own inherited momentum in such a way that my limbs carry my initiative forward into the world to become in turn the basis from which to launch new initiative. Perception should therefore be understood in light of the perceptual-locomotive nexus from which the locomotive body experiences the world as navigable. Because the animal moves itself in

the world, it has the power to manifest things independently of appetite, open to construal. Animals lacking theoretical intellect do not experience their construal of those events as construal any more than they reflect on their “good” explicitly and participate directly in what it means to have a life as a whole. Animals act along channels already demanded by their natures, and their actions are in most cases completely species-dependent. The determinacy of a perceived situation is inseparable from the potential of that situation to be turned toward the advantage of the desiring perceiver or to be turned against its interests as determined by its nature. At the same time, however, the gap between theoretical and practical intellect has now been lessened by virtue of their being conceived as distinct capacities for seeing things open to construal. With this gap closed, we are in a better position to see the extent to which phantasia is the necessary foundation for thinking. I started this chapter with the claim that the explanatory schema of Aristotelian science fits with his observational study of animal organisms. I tried to reconcile distinct interpretive approaches to Aristotle’s account of soul by showing that the soul is an a-spatial and atemporal causal source that expresses itself in a living bodily dialogue between animal and environment. Only by appreciating the centralilty of the power of phantasia to Aristotle’s account of animals is it possible to understand the sense in which the parts of the soul are causally prior to the life of the animal. Eric Sanday

NOTES 1

The distinction between the powers of movement and discrimination, which

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2

3

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is brought up in III.9 and introduces a three-chapter discussion of locomotion, also introduces the discussion of imagination in III.3. There Aristotle said not that soul is “defined” by movement and discrimination but that motion with respect to place, on the one hand, and intellecting, thinking, and perceiving, on the other, “most define the soul” (ὁρίζονται μάλιστα τὴν ψυχήν) (427a17–19). The opening remarks in De Anima III.9 show, I think, that Aristotle struggles with whether and in what sense talk about parts of the soul is appropriate to the soul itself. This reflects Aristotle’s distinction between the true and false and the good and bad, that is, the true/false differs from the good/bad in that the former are present “simply” and the latter are present “to someone” (431b12). I am in general agreement with Jennifer Whiting’s view that “the locomotive part of soul is constituted by the desiderative, perceptive, and imaginative capacities functioning together in something like the way in which the various senses function together to constitute the common sense” (Whiting, 2002, 143, n.1, emphasis included). Whiting sees these powers of soul as standing in a kind of functional unity. They form a single part of the soul that is analogous, Whiting claims, to the common sense power (Whiting, 2002, 172). Nussbaum and Putnam latch directly on to the unified account of imagination as a perceptual-locomotive whole toward the end of De Anima III, distinguishing between the perceptual-locomotive function of phantasia and its modification by nous in human beings: “DA 3.12 tells us that the most essential function of perception in animal life is to present to the animal’s awareness objects of pursuit and avoidance, so that it can survive (434b9–27). So the fact that Aristotle does not spend much time talking about what happens when an animal gazes at a mountain or smells a flower or hears a symphony is hardly surprising: animals’ perceiving is eminently practical, and their awareness of motivationally irrelevant parts of the world is bound to be limited. (This would presumably be true of humans as well, except insofar as we have nous in addition.)”

(Nussbaum and Rorty, 1992, 41). The distinction between the practical imagination and the potentially transformative effect of nous in the case of human beings traces out the distinction between perceptual and deliberative imagination. Jennifer Whiting also sees a perceptual-locomotive nexus at work in the soul, taking perception and locomotion to be “a single, functionally integrated part of the soul” divided into internal (representational) and external (behavioral) aspects, each inseparable from the other (2002). Christopher Long emphasizes the practical dimension of phantasia, resisting the translation into “imagination” for the reason that this restricts phantasia to a faculty of representation (2011, 82, n. 28). Claudia Baracchi, broadly interested in the question of the physiological foundations of intellection, notes the role imagination plays as intermediary between thought and desire (2008, 21, 202, n. 53). Let us call the account of phantasia attuned to practical perceiving the “embodied” account of imagination. Another group of interpreters tends to focus on the division of the soul into the parts separable in account. Terence Irwin distinguishes between the perceiving and the desiring parts of the soul as coordinated within a general system but not more tightly integrated to each other than either is to any of the other parts of the soul (1988). The treatment of the soul from the perspective of its parts lends itself to interpreting imagination as a representational power within the soul for coordinating behavior. Ronald Polansky argues that imagination is a power of presentation or representation that operates only occasionally, for instance, to complete imperfect perceptions, and that it offers its presentations to a unified sensing power of soul that, in turn, is free to take up this presentation as representative of an actual state of affairs (2008). For Polansky, imagination is not a discriminative power, like perception and judgment, so it does not underlie all perception but rather supplements perception (see also Hicks, 1907, 389). Corcilius and Gregoric argue, citing Whiting, that aisthe-sis and the aisthe-tikon refer to sense-perception, which has its own account not dependent on others and therefore is its own fundamental part of the soul (2010, 117). Let us call the

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view that takes imagination to be dependent on and derivative of the presentational power of perception the “representationalist” account. In general, this view is based on the interpretive assumption that the unity of soul, and therefore the object of inquiry in De Anima, is sufficiently grasped definitionally. I adopt the view of Whiting, 2002, and Corcilius and Gregoric, 2010, in distinguishing between parts of the soul and its capacities contra interpretations of De Anima II.2 that take the powers of soul to be parts. In this chapter I do not address the question whether Aristotle developed over time two distinct and incompatible accounts of the soul, one in the De Anima and another in the Parva naturalia (see Block, 1961, 82). I take the view that Aristotle did not see a contradiction between the soul as (1) the entelechy of the body as a whole, and (2) as being in some sense localized according to its main and subordinate powers. On the issue of the location of soul in the body, for instance, the soul being centered in the heart, I take the view articulated by Furley that the soul can be both the entelechy of the whole body while also being localized in some sense, as there is an entelechy of the whole axe that is in some sense localized in its cutting edge (1980, 57, n. 3). In my view, we might consider the heart to be the primary part called for by the soul as a form of the whole insofar as ensouled bodies have a world on the condition that they be present in, and vulnerable to, that world, and that they do work to maintain themselves in the world. Thus, the heart (like the edge of the axe) can be the location in which the work of the whole is most explicitly manifest (e.g. when we gather courage by calling on our heart to stand firm), but that part is still just a part subject to the whole. Aristotle is relatively silent on the subject of what explains the coherence of a systematically integrated field of individual things, but this need not imply a rejection of such an integrated field as an object of analysis. I am not distinguishing between “sense” and “perception,” using them interchangeably. The specific argument from the completeness of the elements (wet/dry, hot/cold) shows that the embodied, perceiving soul is not just “in” the world but “of” the world. Aristotle says that

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we have all the sense organs required for perception by contact and through all perceptual media, so that there would have to be other elements for there to be other organs and other perceptual powers. His discussion spans a continuum between a materialist account, according to which the powers of the soul are tied to specific material foundations, and a functionalist account, according to which the “job” of hearing can be done through interchangeable media, that is, water or air, while remaining formally identical. The functionalist freedom of form with respect to instantiating material foundation, although I will not pursue it in this chapter, is one of the first introductions of the soul’s detachability from the world. We cannot rule out the possibility that the common objects (koina) in the Theaetetus are reached by a process of reasoning, and that they are inferred. For Aristotle, it is important to stipulate that it is a power of perception that first accesses the commons, but of course he would be willing to accept that these objects can also be rendered explicit as objects of theoretical concern. Aristotle says that mistakes occur because, for example, what is yellow “is surmised to be” bile. It is the prior grasp of the unity of multiple aspects that allows for the inference of proper qualities that are not in evidence. I take Aristotle to be extending the insights Plato offers in the Theaetetus, where perception and thinking are clearly distinguished, and introducing the notion of certain types of common objects (koina) such as motion, same, different, which cannot be restricted to individual powers of perception, and which are accessed by some form of reflection or process of reasoning. There is no direct concern with the relationship between soul and body in the Theaetetus account of the koina. By contrast, Aristotle takes particular care in the De Anima to draw a distinction between deliberative and perceptive phantasia, which allows us to distinguish between objects that are accessed through a process of reckoning (sullogismos, De Anima 434a11), thereby objects that are constitutive of opinion (doxa) and subject to standards of judgment, and objects that subject the soul to the demands of pleasure and pain. It is the perceptual imagination in particular that is not a concern

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for the Theaetetus account. However, we might discover the same awareness of the way the perceiver contributes to the appearance and limits or enables access to the truth of appearances in certain parts of the Platonic corpus, including the analysis in the Parmenides of the apparent “one” taken up by the individual perceiver from afar and up close (Seventh Hypothesis, 165b7–e1), in the discussion of error in the Theaetetus (187d–190e), as well as in the distinction between eikasia and phantasia in the Sophist (235d6–236c7). I take the common sensing power to be prior in account to the proper senses in the sense that it is the power by which the functioning of the proper senses are distinguished and related within the animal. In “higher” animals, there is a greater degree of differentiation of function between the proper senses, with human beings demonstrating the greatest degree of isolability of sense power in their ability to enjoy the individual senses of seeing, hearing, and smelling, separately and for their own distinct power. In “lower” animals, by contrast, the senses are not noticed, or perhaps even capable of being noticed, as such but only that toward which they are directed in the world of the animal’s primary concern. The “one” of perception can be seen from the introduction of false judgment that something yellow is supposed to be bile in III.1. The common sensible allows access to the core of the spatio-temporal “one,” of which there can be distinct perceptible aspects (i.e. properties). It is perceptible openness to distinct perceptible aspects that introduces the possibility of error. Aristotle says the senses perceive what is proper to each other not by what each sense is but by what is one in them, and it belongs to something else “to say that one thing [e.g. bile] has both properties [e.g. bitter and yellow]” (τὸ εἰπεῖν ὅτι ἄμφω ἕν) (III.2, 425b1–2). The possibility of deception is opened up by seeing some “one” is yellow and supposing (oiomai) that it is therefore bile, that is, supposing that the yellow thing is bitter. Deception therefore stems from the occasion of seeing the proper sensibles as belonging to, being “of,” a subject. Having more than one sense, as Aristotle goes on to point out, would tend to clarify the distinction between what is proper to

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individual senses and what is shared between them. Aristotle leaves aside the discussion of the root and cause of judgment until III.6, where he adds to the account the claim that “what makes each thing one is intellect (nous)” (430b4–5). Aristotle argues that the difference between the separate senses cannot be apparent unless both are grasped by one thing, for if separate senses were grasped by separate things there would be no more recognition of their difference than if one were apparent to me and another to you. Furthermore, the distinction between separate senses must be apparent perceptibly (for they are perceptible objects that are being discriminated). So there is a perceptive power that is aware of the differences between proper sense powers, and this is the common sense power, that is, the unified life sense. See Bradshaw, 1997, 149–51. See Polansky, 2008, on III.1. Although the precise meaning of “motion” in the account for the common sensibles is difficult to determine, it seems plausible in the large context to read this motion as covering a range of possibilities, beginning with the motion of things, not only with respect to their surroundings and with respect to themselves but also the motion that obtains between perceptibles and perceivers as they address one another through placement and displacement within a shared context. Polansky surmises both that the motion of the perceiver in “sizing up” the object would be necessarily part of the process of coming to perceive, and that the object would contain within its articulation a set of differentials propelling perception from one part to the relevant other along lines of composition. I am arguing here that the common sensing power is a mean directed toward aspects of the environment relevant to initiative, specifically directed toward the plasticity of the environment and the potential in the environment to receive initiative. These aspects of common sensing are more relevant for action than, for example, sweet and bitter, insofar as the proper senses indicate an opening or opportunity, but the common sensing power establishes a context in which initiative can place itself. Unless otherwise noted, all translations are my own.

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The term “separate” in De Anima means, when it is not qualified as “separate in speech” etc., “separate in existence,” that is, capable of independent existence, or separate in place and number (assuming these latter two, place and number, are different from the former). So, when we ask whether intellect is “separable,” we mean either “capable of separate existence” or “exists in a separate place” or “in a separate time.” Again, in potential contrast to Plato’s Theaetetus, Aristotle is claiming that the soul’s access to common sensibles is at least in part perceptual, as opposed to a process of reasoning (sullogismos) in terms of which Socrates specifies access to “ta koina” (e.g. “is” or “same” or “different”). At the outset of the Metaphysics, Aristotle refers to the power that sight has in human beings to “reveal many differences” (πολλὰς δηλοῖ διαφοράς, 980a26) and calls this an object of affection or esteem. Aristotle both shows that the work of revealing differences is fundamental to soul, and that in human beings this power takes the special form of being able to reveal differences apart from need and utility. We should understand this to say that the work of the soul, in one aspect as least if not the whole, is to make discriminations, that this work is often performed in light of the needs and relevant utility of the particular type of animal species, and that human beings are characterized by the ability to see and enjoy seeing beyond the horizon of need. Aristotle’s analysis of the “mean relative to us” in the Nicomachean Ethics also reveals itself not as one thing among many but as the characteristic way things and situations appear to the moral agent. In order to “locate” the mean relative to us, we must learn by comparison of our ethical perception that our way of seeing is calibrated differently than that of others and, perhaps, the mean of things themselves. In order to change that mean, we have to put ourselves in a position that our ethical perception tells us is “false.” The difference between the mean of perception in De Anima and the mean relative to us in the Ethics is that the mean relative to us can be grasped as an object, albeit indirectly, and recalibrated.

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David Bradshaw points this out, “the qualities which combine to produce the ratio need not be the same as those perceived by the organ. In some cases they may be, but what is important is the value of the ratio they instantiate” (Bradshaw, 1997, 151). In order to perceive anything at all, the perceiving being must take a stand at a “when” (De Anima III.2). Just to say that two things are different, for instance, we must do so at a when, a now, a “now” that inherently means “now, time for. . . .” In the context of discussing moderation, Aristotle describes the distinction between human beings and other animals in terms of the power to stand back from the object of perception and enjoy the senses for their own sake: “For dogs delight not in the smells of rabbits but in eating meat—the smell brought about the perception; nor does the lion delight in the sound of the cow, but in its meat, but it perceived that the cow was nearby through its sound, and seems to delight in that, and likewise not in seeing ‘a deer or a wild goat,’ but because it will have meat” (Nicomachean Ethics 1118a18–23). The isolation of an individual sense power required for enjoying its discriminations is proper to human beings and reflective of the qualitatively distinct detachment from the immediacy of experience of which a being with logos is capable. However, as human beings are to other animals, I contend, so too are the higher animals (e.g. dog, lion) to the animals with “hardened eyes.” That is, the higher nonhuman animals are capable of taking the initiative and are not committed immediately to devour what presents itself as a meal; they are able to act in the most effective way. According to some interpretations of the claim “we perceive that we perceive” (DA III.2), the very act of perception cannot be separated from an active engagement in our surroundings, with the result that no division can be drawn between perceiving a situation and perceiving myself as a part of that situation. Miles Burnyeat believes that perception is already awareness; he writes that “perception is awareness, articulate awareness, from the start” (1992, 21). Nussbaum and Putnam claim that perceptual awareness cannot be separated

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from desire: “it is not perception itself that is realized in matter but perception-cum-desire. It is only in so far as desire enters the picture that the body must enter it too” (Nussbaum and Rorty, 1992, 41). Aryeh Kosman explicitly believes this awareness to be traced back to the animal’s total situational awareness; he writes, “It is only because the eye is part of a single living organism that it is the seat of a mode of sensitive awareness called seeing . . . the body, the ultimate organ of percipient sensibility, is one whole and connected organism” (1975, 518). While I agree with the tight connection drawn between perception and desire in the living organism, what we above called the embodied interpretation of imagination flirts with a modern, post-Cartesian set of philosophical assumptions when it takes the unity of subjective experience as the necessary “for whom” of appearance. Perhaps Aristotle is, in this respect, just the most “modern” of Greek philosophy. But we might want, when moderating our reading of Greek philosophy in light of our own modern starting point, to distinguish precisely the point at which the perceiving agent achieves access to what presents itself in perception. For instance, Nussbaum’s caution that there is no “innocent eye” in perception is well taken, for it helpfully reminds us that perception achieves access to what presents itself only after the object of perception has been colored by the experience of the perceiver (Nussbaum, 1978, 261). The assumption of an “innocent” perspective would be a mode of access possible for human beings at most, specifically human beings capable of virtue and receiving things well. In this respect, Christopher Long helpfully glosses Nussbaum, saying, “it is itself a matter of being moved by things encountered in such a way that they are permitted to appear as what they are” (2011, 136). It is on the basis of reading the power to receive things as they are as a positive achievement of the agent of perception that the embodied account can claim that imagination is fundamentally a power of discrimination. This interpretation is consistent with the aspect of the term “imagination” that Christopher Long advocates as appropriate to the semantic range of the Greek term phantasia: “the power to reach out beyond oneself in new and

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striking ways and thus to open new possibilities of thinking and acting in community with things” (Long, 2011, 82, n. 28). Nussbaum, 1978, 24. The parallel between this language and the model Aristotle uses to explain the way the common sensing power perceives difference is unmistakable: “the point, insofar as it is one and two, in this way it [the common sensing power] too is divided. So insofar as it is indivisible, the thing that distinguishes is one and once, but insofar as it is constitutively divisible, it at once uses the same mark (se-meion) as double. So insofar as it uses the boundary (peras) as double, and distinguishes two divided things, it ‘is’ dividedly, but insofar as [it uses] one, it is one and once” (DA III.2, 427a10–14). As Whiting points out in her essay, Aristotle describes the heart in the Parts of Animals as the primary part of a body possessing the principles of perception, locomotion, and nutrition. As such, the heart must be homoeomerous insofar as it receives the sensibles and anhomoeomerous insofar as it is capable of locomotion and is practical (Whiting cites PA 647a25–b8). In support of her claim that the perceiving, desiring, and imagining capacities are unified in (at least) nonrational animal souls, Jennifer Whiting points at Aristotle’s distinction between being “same” and being “different in being,” for instance, in these passages where Aristotle is relating the various sides of the same power: “what is capable of desiring and what is capable of fleeing are not different, either from one another or from what is capable of perceiving, but their being is different” (DA 431a12–14), and “What is capable of imagining is the same as what is capable of perceiving, but what it is to be is different for what is capable of imagining and what is capable of perceiving” (De Insomn. 459a15–17; Whiting, 2002, 154–5). The type of sameness here is analogous to the sameness of the stretch of road that differs in its being the road from Athens to Thebes or the road from Thebes to Athens, or the sameness of the tongue that differs in its being the organ of taste or the organ of speech, or the sameness of the limit that differs in its being a connecting or dividing limit, or the perception that differs in its being the perceivedness of the

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perceptible or the perceiving of the perceiver. Whiting hypothesizes that the importance of the formula “the same but different in being” is to show how it is that by one and the same thing, that is, the animal, differences between opposites and incompatibles can be perceived, such as the difference between white and sweet. Aristotle explains, “just as what some call a point, in so far as it is both one and two, is in this way [both indivisible] and divisible, so too in so far as it is indivisible, what judges is one and [it judges things] together, while in so far as it is divisible, [what judges] uses the same mark in two ways at the same time. In so far as it uses the limit in two ways, it judges two things and is [judging] separately; but in so far [as it uses the limit] as one, it is one [and judges things] together” (DA 427a9–14; Whiting, 2002, 165). We may, perhaps, say that phantasia is an “actuality of perception” insofar as phantasia resituates all perception at a higher level of description that actualizes lower level potentialities inherent in perceptive soul. The sense of “motion” here, as in the Physics, is as an actuality of potential qua potential, that is, it is the active being-open of an actuality to its potential to be otherwise. The common view is generally that phantasia is a power of representation and therefore not constitutive of the discriminative powers of sensation and thinking. For instance, Polansky writes “Phantasia depends upon sense perception, as was stated in 427b15–16 and soon again in 429a1–2, but aisthe-sis does not depend in the same way in turn upon phantasia. The causality goes generally in only the one direction” (2008, 415–17, esp. 417). Polansky reads the causal relation between sense perception and phantasia to be expressive of a dichotomy between them, which although not unbridgeable gives priority to the separate and occasional origination of phantasia in the absence of perception as a presentation of the perceived. Polansky underlines this dichotomy by referring to the “prior perception” on which a phantasm is based and from which it is drawn. This reading reinforces Polansky’s view that imagination is presentational as opposed to discriminative, merely “similar” to perception without being an actuality of perception, merely presentationally true and false rather than judgmentally true and

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false. But Polansky admits that imagination is sometimes simultaneous with perception, and that if the perception of the common sensibles, such as motion, implies anticipation, then phantasia “may have a prominent role even in the true perception of this common sensible” (429). I do not follow Polansky’s explanation for how present perception would eclipse phantasia even on the view that phantasia is basic to the perception of motion and, through motion, all the other common sensibles and accidental sensibles drawing on them. It seems that Polansky overlooks the way in which potentiality “appears” only indirectly through the presencing of sense but, albeit indirectly active, transforms that presence into a dynamically unfolding (and plastic) environment for desire. It is true that we orient ourselves more explicitly toward the edges of things when we are not sure of our perceptions, such that we feel more displaced by the object when we need to retest our relationship to it, but this would not entail I think that we are not fully engaged in a less apparent phantasia when we are fully certain of the practical circumstances of action. Indeed, phantasia’s tendency to conceal itself in favor of the present perceptual object would support the reading that phantasia is the power that allows potentiality to illuminate and inform our grasp of a given state of affairs. The present state of affairs would not be present even as something capable of being deliberated upon, understood, not to mention acted on or transformed, unless it were charged with potentiality, and imagination is the manner in which the soul orients itself toward this charge. Nonetheless, Polansky’s closing caution that modern philosophy tends to place imagination at the base of all sense perception is a welcome reminder. Aristotle seems to offer conflicting reports of this point. In On the Motion of Animals (701b18–22) Aristotle explains that imagination and thinking “have the power of experienced things” in the sense that they present objects to which we react emotionally. But he also says in the Poetics that we do not feel pain at the sight of the least estimable of beasts and corpses in imagination, whereas we do feel pain at the sight of these things in themselves (Poetics 4). Experience lends itself to the same ambiguity, for as Aristotle explains in the Rhetoric, it is not all things that inspire fear but only fearful

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things that are perceived as imminent (Rhetoric II.5). All know they have to die, but death is not experienced as fearful if it is far off. It is difficult to reconcile my account of imagination with Aristotle’s claim that “sensations are always true” (DA 428a10). In my view, Aristotle’s claim here is best understood in light of the questioning attitude of inquiry (in the case of animals with nous) and the probing attitude of practical engagement (in the case either of animals without nous or animals that have nous but are not acting primarily according to the orientation provided by nous). I interpret Aristotle to be saying that practical and theoretical truths are always the result of a decision, a judgment, made in response to a situation that presents itself to be decided. Sensations, on this view, are “always true” in the sense that there is always something there to be decided. Thus, a cat can inspect an interesting smell or become alert to an alarming sound and have these sensations be “true” in the sense that there is something present to be decided (i.e. Is this a threat? Is this a treat?). As Polansky notes: “Phantasiai cannot be false in the way suppositions are false, as believed, but rather as faulty presentations differing from the way a better criterion and more realistic presentation discloses them to be. . . . When an animal has phantasia presenting the object of desire, that is, some future attainment not now the case, and all such hypothetical or imaginary appearances, these can be called false” (2008, 417). Polansky generally holds the view that phantasiai are only occasional, not constitutive, aspects of perceptual experience, such as when we do not perceive clearly and fill out our incomplete perceptions with imaginings. He concludes, “we need not include phantasia in all cases of perception or take phantasia to be misperception or ‘perception as,’ but phantasia is a presentation due to sense perception that may contribute to inaccurate perception, misperception, or perhaps accurate perception. . . . as significant a role as phantasia plays for Aristotle, he does not extend it, as some have, to serve as a constituent of the whole realm of cognition. There is no need for phantasia to underlie the perception of proper sensibles” (420). Polansky, however, is emphasizing the self-awareness we

have as not having certainty or, alternatively, having an appearance, therefore our awareness of being at a deficit with respect to knowledge. The self-awareness of a motor-perceptual organism with respect to the object that eludes its grasp, or the grasp it is trying to elude, must also be aware of itself as at a deficit with respect to securing the moment, but its self-awareness expresses itself in the bodily probing and resituating with respect to things and other animals within a shared situation. Polansky does allow, however, that phantasia may “perhaps” be extended to perception of common sensibles that anticipate future stages of motion of a body in motion.

REFERENCES Baracchi, C., Aristotle’s Ethics as First Philosophy, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008. Block, I., “The Order of Aristotle’s Psychological Writings,” American Journal of Philology, 82 (1961), 53–72. Bradshaw, D., “Aristotle on Perception: The Dual-Logos Theory,” Apeiron, 30.2 (1997), 143–61. Burnyeat, M., “Is an Aristotelian Philosophy of Mind Still Credible?,” in Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, ed. M. Nussbaum and A. Rorty, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992, 15–26. Corcilius, Claus and Pavel Gregoric, “Separability and Difference,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, XXXIX (2010), 81–119. Furley, David J., “Self-Movers,” in Essays on Aristotle’s Ethics, ed. A. Rorty, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980, 55–68. Hicks, R. D. (trans.), Aristotle. De Anima, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1907.

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PHANTASIA IN DE ANIMA Irwin, T., Aristotle’s First Principles, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988. Kosman, A., “Perceiving that We Perceive,” The Philosophical Review, 84.4 (1975), 499–519. Long, C., Aristotle on the Nature of Truth, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Nussbaum, M. and H. Putnam, “Changing Aristotle’s Mind,” in Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, ed. M. Nussbaum and

A. Rorty, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992, 27–56. Nussbaum, M., Aristotle's De Motu Animalium, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978. Polansky, R., Aristotle’s De Anima, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008. Whiting, J., “Locomotive Soul,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, XXII (2002), 141–200.

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7 THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER: ARISTOTLE’S REFLECTIONS ON SLEEP1

Those who are asleep are fellow-workers in what goes on in the world. Heraclitus, fr. 75 Our history is the story of the awakened man: no one has yet imagined the sleeping man’s history. Lichtenberg Sleep shows the impossibility of stepping into mystery with open eyes. João Cabral de Melo Neto

Hermeneutic philosophy, as the art of understanding, preserves the old metaphor that considers philosophy as a transition from sleep to wakefulness. To understand the already said, the already thought, the familiar, to understand what in many ways is concluded “in-itself,” somehow seems to involve awakening the said, the thought, the familiar, the past, that which is “in-itself”—awakening from the impenetrability of sleep to a life that, if not truer, then at the very least is more alive. If understanding is awakening, and hence a relation to sleeping, how is one to grasp the phenomenon of sleeping in order to envision a hermeneutical awakening? According to Heraclitus the human beings without comprehension are those who “are oblivious of what they do awake, just as they are forgetful of what they do asleep.”2 Plato

compares the difference between one who philosophizes and one who does not with the difference that separates wakefulness and dreams in sleep.3 Comprehension, understanding, knowledge, and wisdom are all words signifying wakefulness, an alert consciousness, in contrast to sleeping and dreaming. But in what does this difference consist? If we return to the site of classical philosophy, paying particular attention to the way it has discussed the difference between sleep and wakefulness, what we find is that the meaning of this difference lies in the very ability to see differences: “Don’t you think he is living in a dream rather than a wakened state? Isn’t this dreaming: whether asleep or awake, to think that a likeness is not a likeness but rather the thing itself that it is like?” Socrates asks Glaukon.4 In contrast to being awake, someone sleeping and dreaming

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER cannot see differences; s/he thinks that things that are merely alike are identical. To see the difference is the primary attribute of a wakeful consciousness. For Plato, precisely this skill constitutes the distinctive trait of the philosopher. In this respect, the dog possesses as well the philosophical “sense,” the sense of differentiation, “because it differentiates (diakrinei) anything it sees to be either a friend or an enemy, on no other basis than that it knows the one and doesn’t know the other. And how could it [the dog] be anything besides a lover of learning (philomathe-s), if it defines what is its own and what is alien to it in terms of knowledge and ignorance?”5 The conception of this inquiring sense of differentiation—which in a strange way connects Plato’s Republic with Franz Kafka’s story about the “Investigations of a Dog”6— is one that has focused the Western consciousness on consciousness. Consciousness is what differs from sleep on account of the former’s ability to recognize, determine, and define differences. But how can the waking consciousness know that the human being does not see differences while sleeping? Does the waking consciousness have any access to sleep? Can we say of sleep that it is somehow still a conscious state? Sleep is nearly as self-contained as death; for those who are asleep, like the dead, withdraw into themselves, apparently breaking all bonds with the common world of the living. Homer’s famous formulation in the Iliad, that sleep is brother to death,7 both resonates with, and is further expounded in the words of Heraclitus: “the world of the waking is one and shared, but the sleeping turn aside each into his private world.”8 Here, it is said that what binds sleep as a brother to death is precisely a certain self-containment and separateness, which seems to be describable only in terms of a past condition. The dead are

those who have lived and who cannot rise again. Those who are sleeping, however, are those who can wake up and find themselves in a strange tense, the present participle— what grammarians also have called “radical present.”9 What those who sleep share with the dead is not really the past, but rather the past’s having passed away; for it is only after sleep has passed by, that it can be recognized as sleep. Perhaps it is no coincidence that the words for sleep (in Latin somnus, in Sanskrit svápiti, in the slavic languages the root sun-u) sound like gusts of wind, with their drawn out “s” sounds. Only when sleep is over can we approach it as a phenomenon. The phenomenon of sleep announces itself with the same paradoxical structure as the past: it is only when we no longer possess it that it appears as such. Whence the fact that sleep has mostly been discussed in negative terms: in sleep we have no impressions from exterior things, we have no knowledge of time and space, and we have neither will nor a focused interest. But, similarly to the past, those who sleep do live. The question, then, is how those who sleep live, or, put otherwise, what mode of life sleep (and, subsequently, the past) may be. To prepare a path toward these questions we shall turn to three short works by Aristotle, De Somno et Vigilia, De Insomniis, and De Divinatione per Somnum,10 which, taken together, constitute the first systematic study of the phenomenon of sleep in ancient philosophy. *** Much has been written about dreams. Freud’s Traumdeutung and Jung’s symbolic dream analyses have conspicuously contributed to our knowledge of the psychic mechanisms that lay behind the enigmatic dream-ability of

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER the living. Nonetheless, this should not make us forget how far back human endeavor to interpret dreams extends. Dreams follow us when we wake up, as the only tangible memory of this strange state of absence that sleep constitutes. Therefore, the phenomenon of sleep is often discussed either in relation to dreams or as an independent physiological phenomenon. The Aristotelian treatises differ from this tendency for, indeed, they ascribe the greatest significance to sleep. They regard dreams as something that can only be understood if sleep itself is understood. The Greek word for dream, to enupnion, literally says that dream is a being-in-sleep. In Aristotle’s analyses, we can follow a discussion treating sleep as a coming to pass, a state of passage, while dreams are rather regarded as a work, a work that can be analyzed and interpreted, something that can be seen and observed. Aristotle does not say that we “have” dreams, rather we “see” them (horao-). “Dreams are like an accomplished work, a work in itself,”11 as the Brazilian poet João Cabral de Melo Neto writes. The dream is, however, the work of sleep, and not the other way around. And sleep “is an adventure that can neither be narrated nor documented,”12 a dimension in which “the hidden life of unmoving things pulsates.”13 The aim of this chapter is to show how Aristotle’s reflections on the theme of sleep can contribute to the recent philosophical discussions on this phenomenon that still harbors much mystery.14 The starting point for Aristotle’s discussion on sleep is the intimate relationship between sleep and life. Only that which lives can both sleep and awaken. However, not all living things follow this pattern. Plants live, but we cannot say that they sleep or are awake. In Aristotelian biology, it is the nutritive function that differentiates living from dead things. Among living creatures

there are those, like plants, that do not need to move for sustenance, and those that must move and do so independently. Along with the ability to sense (aisthe-sis), autokine-sis, the faculty of self-movement, characterizes animal life. Life is for Aristotle an aesthetic movement, in the etymological sense of a sense-perceiving movement, meaning both movement presupposing sensation and sensation implying movement. It is precisely in relation to the ability of perception (or sensing) that Aristotle engages with the phenomenon of sleep. In several respects, Aristotle’s discussion seems to treat sleep solely as a biological function. It is said to be the salvation of life, so-te-ria, not a rest from the activities of life, but itself an active achievement serving to maintain and regenerate animal life.15 Even in the Gospel of Saint John we read that “If Lazarus is asleep [and not dead] he will be saved (so-the-setai).”16 In this context, the meaning of the Greek verb, so-zo-, to save, is rather to enliven life, making life even more alive. In the same work, Aristotle considers the treatment of sleep as rest (anapausis) to be just a metaphor,17 since sleep entails a vital activity. The vitality of animal life hinges, as previously said, on aisthe-sis, the ability to sense-perceive. But what complicates Aristotle’s reflections on sleep is that the faculty of sensory perception, aisthe-sis, even defines rational life, namely wakefulness, the alert consciousness, that is, the noetic part of the soul. Aristotle’s doctrine on sleep unfolds within an intricate web of problems. On the one hand, sleep is considered an active achievement to preserve the natural process of life. On the other, the natural process of life, the biology of life, is not a merely biological process, for what characterizes animal life—the faculty of sensibility—constitutes the inescapable and necessary condition for conscious and rational life. Shall sleep in this

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER respect also be regarded as an active achievement within conscious life? It is important not to forget that human rational life for Aristotle constitutes a necessary discontinuity with respect to the continuous cycle of life. Human rational life inscribes a historical biography within the natural biology of the living. Such a discontinuity appears as a kind of tear in the homogenous and continuous fabric of life—which could be compared to the way the Italian painter Lucio Fontana tears the canvas in his paintings. In this sense, human life is the only mortal life, because all other animal life is drawn into the immortality of nature, into its continuous cycle.18 In order to respond to the above question—namely, whether sleep is also an active achievement in the conscious, historical, mortal, and rational human life—it is important to maintain the complexity in Aristotle’s understanding about the relations between the life of humans and the life of nature. In the context of this question regarding the bond between nature and history, between the immortality of life (life as a continuous, “immortal” alternation between life and death) and the mortality of the human, and on account of such a question, Aristotle focuses on sleep, above all in De Somno et Vigilia, the first of the three above mentioned works.

However, sleep is not merely the opposite of wakefulness; sleep seems also to be the absence or lack of it.22 This important statement is expressed without any attempts to discuss to what extent this really is a lack, a privation, stere-sis. With an almost axiomatic force Aristotle further states that wakefulness (to egre-gorenai) is nothing other than aisthanesthai,23 that is, nothing other than the capacity to sense-perceive. What this argument implies is, broadly speaking, that sleep is a lack or absence of aisthe-sis, for the time being understood as faculty of sensibility. Further essential developments will be that sleep and wakefulness move both body and soul, since sensation presupposes both body and soul in their relatedness, and that, moreover, unlike other animals plants neither sleep nor are awake, since they cannot perceive anything. Decisive in Aristotle’s argument is his understanding of aisthe-sis, the ability to sense-perceive. In the famous passage in the Politics, where Aristotle defines the human as a living creature that has logos, he says the following about what logos consists in: [Human logos] is formed to show (ἐπὶ τῷ δηλοῦν) the advantageous and the harmful and therefore also the right and the wrong. For a proper trait of man in distinction from the other animals is that he alone perceives (αἴσθησιν ἔχειν) good and bad, just and unjust and similar qualities; and the belonging together in these is what builds a household and a city-state.24

*** We can summarize Aristotle’s trajectory in De Somno et Vigilia, in view of a definition of sleep, with the following observations. Sleep is the opposite (antikeintai) of wakefulness.19 Opposition only takes place when the positive and the negative determinations are within the same “subject,” within the same part of the living, within the same receiving material,20 and moreover when the same criteria are used to identify both determinations.21

Logos—in its wide meaning as reason, language, the ability to see relations—is here defined as aisthe-sis, and aisthe-sis, in turn as a sense of differentiation, as the capacity to discern between good and evil, the just and the unjust. Without being able to discuss

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER Aristotle’s doctrine of perception here, and how sensibility and rationality constitute a complex intertwinement in his work, it is nevertheless important to acknowledge the central role of that which, in everything that lives, we can call an aesthetic capacity as a capacity for seeing differences. What distinguishes the dog’s sense of differentiation from the human being’s perceiving reason, however, is not only the capacity to sense or perceive something, but the capacity to perceive or sense something as something. In De Anima, Aristotle defines aisthe-sis, the capacity to sense-perceive something as something (i.e. to see differences), as a being moved, kineisthai, and as undergoing an affection.25 To perceive involves the simultaneous movement of moving and being moved. Aristotle’s language moves within the diathesis of the middle—the so-called middle voice, which, with the words of Pierre Chantraine, can be defined as a verbal “voice” in which “the subject is felt as the place where process unfolds.”26 This double movement means that the subject is somehow “made” at the same time as it makes something. Thus, at this juncture in De Anima Aristotle adds that “sense-perception is held to be some sort of qualitative alteration.”27 For a more detailed discussion of what is meant by qualitative alteration (alloio-sis, “becoming-other”) Aristotle himself cites another work, De Generatione et Corruptione. In contrast to genesis, to the coming into being of something new, alteration is here defined as what happens when “the substratum (hupokeimenon) is perceptible and persists but alters in its own properties, the properties in question being either contraries or intermediates.”28 An alteration, alloio-sis, takes place, for example, when a healthy body becomes ill, since the opposition between health and illness has as its point of reference the same

body. That an alteration and not a coming into being (genesis) happens in perception is confirmed, according to Aristotle, by the fact that the body that senses and perceives by itself is perceivable as one and the same body, despite being affected by something external. What strikes Aristotle as strange is that we, as sensing and sensible life, cannot in turn sense-perceive the senses themselves, that is, the very perceiving. We cannot, for example, see seeing, we cannot listen to listening. This shows, according to Aristotle, that perception—aisthe-sis—has both a potential and an operative or active meaning.29 In other words: sense-perception appears both as potentiality and actuality, “even though it is at the moment asleep,”30 in such a way that it is never fully absent or lacking. The capacity to sense-perceive proves to be the capacity to sense-perceive differences qua differences, to perceive something as something rather than as something else. But even if sensation cannot sense-perceive itself and it seems possible to sense or perceive only what is located outside the sentient perceiving body, something nonetheless happens with the perceiving body in the course of perception. The sentient body is affected by that which is sensed. This reciprocal action between the one who senses and that which is sensed is expressed in the middle “voice,” in which the subject itself is the place where the alteration takes place. What appears as a certain passivity—that is, to be affected by something— necessarily entails a strange activity, an acting that happens in a kind of pause or rest, a kind of transformation in rest, or a rest in transformation, as is said in Heraclitus’ fragment 84a: “in changing it is at rest.”31 This strange relationship between rest and transition, between pause and activity, involving both moments, lies at the heart of Aristotle’s

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER teaching on potentiality and actuality, dunamis and energeia. It is further mirrored in the very capacity to sense-perceive, inasmuch as sensation perceives something without being able to perceive the very senses in the active mode of sensation. At the same time we know that we see, that we hear, that we feel, and so on. This knowing is as immediate as seeing, hearing, and touching something, but without there being some thing to be sensed and even without there being a sense sensing it. This knowing Aristotle calls a sensing through “common sense.” The common sense—the capacity to see that we see, hear that we hear, and so on—is regarded by Aristotle as connected to the heart. According to Aristotle all senses have specific functions and, in addition to them, one sense is common to all. The common sense perceives that we sense-perceive, constituting the center of what is generally called “consciousness.” It is precisely through common sense that we can “see” so-called abstract sensations, such as quantity and form. When we perceive something as large or small we also perceive magnitude as such. Sleep and wakefulness are defined as pathos; they affect common sense, and not just perception in general.32 Aristotle considers that common sense, that is, the sense able to see that we see, and therefore capable of perceiving degrees of a totality within the singular—is most often said to be related to touch. The common sense as a kind of sensibility for the abstract, for what is shared in common, is tied together with touching, haphe-—according to Aristotle the only sense which is common to all living creatures.33 “Common sense” appears, thus, as the sense that is common to all living creatures and, at the same time, as that sense through which the senses can be perceived, sensation can be sensed, and feelings can be felt.

The common sense is maximally “speculative” because perception is mirrored for itself, within itself. It is proximal to touching, as also Husserl observes in his phenomenological meditations, noting how a hand can sense itself when, for instance, one of the hands holds the other. According to Aristotle, sleep and wakefulness are affections of the common sense, of the ability to perceive perceptions and feel oneself as feeling. It is precisely this reflexivity that is affected in sleep or wakefulness. But the question is, in what sense are sleep and wakefulness a pathos or an affection of this common sense? Aristotle argues that sleep does not entail that the senses are inactive, or that the sensory faculty is incapacitated. Conversely, there is no sense perception when one faints (lipopsuchia),34 when one loses consciousness (eknoia), or when one is in a state of catatonia (pnigmos).35 Sleep, on the contrary, brings about the incapacitation of the common sense. To explain this incapacity (adunamia) regarding the common sense, Aristotle links his argument on the structure of perception with the nature of life and the life of nature.36 He reminds us that everything that is alive by nature moves, that is, moves itself by itself. But nothing living can move always and continuously in virtue of pleasure. Saying “in virtue of pleasure” Aristotle wants to point out that the movement of life is intimately tied to pleasure; life is defined as something essentially good. In this connection, sleep is defined as a recovering and saving power, as so-te-ria. The “incapacity” that occurs to common sense—sleep—carries the implication of restoring, of returning to life the strength to keep on living, a strength making life even more alive. This “incapacity”—adunamia—is defined as fetter (desmos) and as immobility (akine-sia).37 Both terms are used by Plato in his famous myth of the cave, in order to

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER describe the predicament of the inhabitants of the cave. Wakefulness, in contrast, is a sort of liberation and relaxation.38 Aristotle considers carefully that one who sleeps can be restless,39 that in sleep there is much movement within one’s body, a kind of endomorphosis, as Jean-Luc Nancy expressed it.40 The immobilization of sleep does not entail an absence of all movement. On the contrary, it holds a pulsating movement, a contraction, and an opening, a beating heart. Again, it is very important to recall that Aristotle connects common sense with the heart. This becomes even clearer once Aristotle has claimed that sleep is a consequence of the “hyperbolic excess of wakefulness.”41 When the adunamia (incapacity) of common sense is explained by way of an abundance of wakefulness, it becomes difficult to sustain the current translation of adunamia as lack of capacity. At any rate, the negation expressed here seems not to be merely negative. We are now approaching what Aristotle wishes to suggest, namely that the common sense does not simply rupture or disappear during sleep. It contracts, intensifies, and gathers itself in abundance. This shows itself even more clearly when Aristotle dedicates the remainder of this first work to investigate how sleep is essentially bound up with the process of digestion. The physiology of sleep is described by the process of densification that occurs in the absorption of exogenous matter, such as food. The natural tendency of warmth to move upwards and of cold downwards; the thinness of the veins, the function of which is to limit vaporization; the coolness of the brain as the cause of densification: all of this is described in detail in the rest of the work, to show how sleep is an expression of a process of absorption that causes a condensation and a concentration of activities and an accompanying weight,

forcing the body to lie down and sleep.42 In his physiological observations, Aristotle focuses on the role of the heart in the process of absorption of nutrition, thus following the pulsating movement of relaxation and tension, of opening and contraction, as a fundamental movement that bridges the gap between sleep and wakefulness. From such a physiological description of sleep, in this treatise we can observe that, if sleep constitutes an adunamia in common sense, this must be understood in terms of densification and concentration. Aristotle may write in the beginning of the text that sleep seems to be a lack of wakefulness; yet he subsequently maintains that it is not so. In the last line of De Somno et Vigilia we read that sleep is a pause, anapausis.43 Aristotle claims that perceptions do occur in sleep, even if, when somebody sleeps, an active sense-perception is not possible in the proper and unqualified mode.44 Perception through common sense is, in sleep, not “energetic,” that is, not fully active. This does not mean that sleep is lack or absence of activity but rather contraction, densification, and force of compression. To express this, Aristotle uses the word antiperistasis.45 Here, it is a matter of concentration of activity and abundance of wakefulness. The telos of life is wakefulness,46 Aristotle insists. *** In the further work entitled De Insomniis, Aristotle, having established that the general assumption is that no perception takes place during sleep, claims that while it is the case that, in a state of slumber, we are deprived of sight, this does not mean that during such a period our senses do not experience anything at all. On the contrary, Aristotle contends that even sight

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER experiences something during sleep, albeit in a different form from when we are awake.47 We have already pointed out that Aristotle associates the common sense with touching, haphe-, and that haphe- is considered the only sense common to all living things; it is the very sense capable of broaching the possibility of sensing sensation, of touching touch—even if, literally, it is impossible to see sight, listen to the act of listening, taste tasting, or smell the very sense of smell. In this respect, touch, haphe-, is speculative and reflexive; it possesses the capacity of relating to itself, of reflecting upon itself. And it is this capability that, in some way, “comes to rest” during sleep. Rather than being operative in an active sense, in sleep this common sensory power undergoes a contraction. Haphe-, touch, is intimately tied to the hands, and is enacted not only by way of touching but more as a gripping, seizing, grasping. The question then is whether Aristotle holds that, in sleep as well, haphestill occurs—touching, establishing contact, gripping, taking, albeit “in a different way.” In a very rich fragment, cited by Clement of Alexandria, Heraclitus says: A man strikes a light for himself in the night, when his sight is put out. Living, he touches the dead in his sleep; waking, he touches the sleeper.48 Here we may have an important resource to try to think through Aristotle’s discussion. There are many different interpretations of this particular fragment. But what concerns us specifically is the nocturnal touching, haptetai, in sleep. Thereby an utterly crucial element is introduced, namely the force of the night—where, to quote Epicharmos, the most excellent can find a home.49 It is the force of the night that saves Sleep (Hupnos)

from the wrath of Zeus, as we read in the following lines of the Iliad: Great Jove, awaking, shook the blest abodes With rising wrath, and tumbled gods on gods; Me chief he sought, and from the realms on high Had hurl’d indignant to the nether sky, But gentle Night, to whom I fled for aid, (The friend of earth and heaven,) her wings display’d; Impower’d the wrath of gods and men to tame, Even Jove revered the venerable dame.50 This power of protection the night offers is an invariant in both Aristotle and Heraclitus’ understanding of sleep. In Heraclitus’ fragments the human being is depicted as the being that can grasp darkness and watch over the nightly element. Eugen Fink, in a long discussion with Heidegger around this fragment, insists on the Promethean capacity of touching the obscure in sleep and in death.51 In the fragment itself, three dimensions of this nightly sense are discernible: the first is to catch the light; the second is to seize, while awake, the one who sleeps; and the third is, while asleep, to contact the dead. Leaving aside the important differences between touching, brushing with, gripping, grasping, capturing, what characterizes touch is that the distance between perceiving and perceived seems to fade into immediacy. Through this it becomes possible, at least to some extent, to touch touching itself (to perceive perception). As Fink observes: “touching is a sense of proximity and, as such, the way of an immediate neighborhood.”52 The fragment speaks to this immediacy and proximity characteristic of touch, addressing the nearness between day and night, between

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER sleep and wakefulness—a nearness that is “similar” to the closeness of a hand touching itself in touching the other. In Fink’s interpretation, sleep appears as a milder death, a deep absorption, a state in which nothing can be sense-perceived, distinguished or defined. Heraclitus’ fragment would corroborate this interpretation, showing as it does the human being’s power to light up the night and allow the light of night to come forth. Here a further question arises, namely, whether touching the dead while sleeping and touching those asleep while awake simply entails the capacity to “see” darkness in its obscurity. The question is whether this nocturnal touch may, instead, involve a moment in which transitivity is not a matter of proceeding from one state to another, but rather of a transition in and of itself obscure. In sleep, the spatio-temporal distances undergo a contraction. Here and there, before and after, earlier and later, are compressed in such a manner that one is in contact with the other as with itself. In an attempt to describe this transition in its event, not though as something that changes into another state, thought is forced to specify that which is impossible to specify. In this transition, that which is no longer present strangely enough endures and the not yet is already there. Both the past and what is to come are present at one and the same time. The transition seems like a compressed time, a temporal concentration where all times are contracted into only one center. Heraclitus’ fragments offer some suggestions about how we should understand certain discussions developed by Aristotle in his other works, De Insomniis and De Divinatione per Somnum. In the beginning of De Insomniis, which aims to investigate the being of dreams, Aristotle claims that the best way to study the origin of the dream is

to investigate the circumstances under which sleep occurs. What is said here about sleep amounts to the following: even when sleep envelopes us, we nonetheless keep sensing and perceiving, which confirms the interpretative direction we have been following so far. Aristotle claims we sense-perceive when we are asleep, however, we do not sense “something,” but rather something’s projective and projectile movement. What we sense during sleep is a movement that lingers after something has disappeared. At stake here is an experience other than mere sensation or perception. Aristotle compares certain sense-perceptions with the movement of a projectile through space, such as a comet, which continues to move when what was projected is no longer active. He writes explicitly how something similar takes place in a qualitative change or alteration.53 That which in a change is no longer, still is through its force, and continues to move. Because a sense-perception is a kind of change or alteration, as Aristotle defines it in De Anima, the perception continues in the persistence of that which is no longer perceived. Such is the case when we switch from light to darkness, or when we fix our gaze upon one and the same color for a long time, or, to give another example, when we observe a rushing river.54 Aristotle assumes that the senses are not only affected by external elements; complementarily, the senses affect that which is being perceived: “just as the eye undergoes [that which is seen], so also it produces a certain [affection on it].”55 This is something that Empedocles paid attention to as well; the same insight can be found in Goethe, serving as the starting point for his theory of colors.56 It plays also a crucial role in the so-called mystical experiences, for example, in Jacob Böhme. Aristotle discusses here the mutual encounter between two states or differences that, in

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER principle, exclude one another, where both states move around each other as if in one and the same body. He speaks of extremely subtle differences, of movements of extreme velocity usually imperceptible, but also of the surface of the mirror where such imperceptible movements or differences become visible. In this connection, Aristotle mentions that if, during her menstruation, a woman watches herself in a well-polished mirror, the mirror adopts the appearance of a blood-colored cloud, since during such periods women’s eyes take on a more reddish hue. This occurs, according to Aristotle, since not only are the eyes affected by external visible objects, but they also produce a certain affection with respect to the objects. Based on these observations, Aristotle investigates the remaining sense-perceptions, paying particular attention to their projective character. The dogmatic view that Aristotle himself defends in other writings, namely, that sense-perception can only be related to the here and now—so that that which no longer exists can only be recollected and what does not exist yet can only be imagined—is here put in question. Uncanny as they may be, Aristotle’s investigations on sleeping and dreaming contribute to a broadening of the perceptual field and the doctrine of sensation. Sleep moves within this broadened horizon of perception, and this may allow us to investigate sleep not as a diminished capacity, but rather as an enhanced one—as a perceptual dimension exceeding that which could possibly be mastered. This broadening of perception accounts for the lingering of sensation even after that which affects our senses has disappeared, and it is compared by Aristotle with other states where excess occurs, like fear and erotic pathos.57 He regards the onset of illusions as an important field of investigation for exploring different

dimensions of this expansion. And he realizes that illusions—for example, when someone in love sees the loved one even when she is not present, or when “the sun seems to be the size of a foot”58—occur because the visualization of the loved one happens not just with the eyes. The person in love discerns and makes distinctions through a different sense. This shows that an experience of something can also occur when this something is not here now. It shows that perception perceives, that the senses “sense” from within themselves.59 When these illusions emerge they always appear together with an intense movement. It is this experience in and of movement that Aristotle focuses on when describing the state of sleep. In an intense movement, consciousness latches onto certain more durable structures, thus allowing for the manifestation of extremely small, rapid, and transient events. Aristotle surmises that all these events and movements, which are nearly imperceptible in the wakeful state, linger as a projectile, and that it is such projective residues that form what we call dreams. Aristotle admits that the dream (enupnion) on the one hand is a sensible image (phantasma), although, on the other hand, not all sensible images that occur during sleep constitute dreams. This observation can be understood if we remind ourselves that all thoughts according to Aristotle occur through “fantasy,” through the play of the “imagination,” that is, through different degrees of sensible images. Therefore, Aristotle argues, it is possible to think in one’s sleep without these thoughts constituting a dream. A dream, on the other hand, is a sensible image (phantasma) that arises from the movement of perception during sleep, as he insists at the end of De Insomniis.60 Dreams are “fantasies” in the original sense of the word. For they present something to be known; they are presentations,

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER not just representations, that is, not merely images or figments. Dreams are formed from the prolongation of the remnants of images produced in a state of wakefulness.61 A more detailed discussion of Aristotle’s investigation of dreams and their divinatory aspect would exceed the aim of this essay. The conjunction between dreams and fantasies, in the sense of presentations that yield knowledge, is here discussed foremost in relation to the question whether those asleep can touch something, if they perceive, that is, if they can undergo an affection and, in turn, produce affections. Aristotle insists on the connection between sleep, dreams, and movement. It is movement, velocity, which erases the clarity of the dream, he claims.62 Dream images become unclear in the same way an image reflected on the surface of water becomes more indiscernible as water’s movement increases. When Aristotle admits that sensations imperceptibly small, nuanced, ephemeral and extremely fast continue to operate, appearing when wakefulness rests, he is admitting that in sleep that which was asleep during wakefulness wakes up, and the other way around. This means that sleep is but another form of wakefulness, a wakefulness for that which moves in movement, for that which flees in flight, transgressing in transgression, and so on. Sleep watches over that which evades the definable, the specifiable, the tamable, and which again will be forgotten whenever a waking consciousness wishes to seize and grasp it. The initially established difference between sleep and wakefulness— between a state in which it is no longer possible to experience something as something and a state where such distinctions are constantly made—loses in these works any immediate obviousness. When Aristotle, in an observation that resembles Plato’s in the Republic,63 claims that the similarities in dreams look as

if they were identities, adding that the power of sleep lies in forgetting that at stake here are similarities and not sameness,64 he situates sleep in an as-if structure. In sleep and in dreams, similarities and distinctions do not disappear; what happens is that they are no longer perceived as differences and distinctions, their nature is therefore forgotten. This forgetfulness constitutes in its own right an important topic and shows the importance of relating these short works to Aristotle’s writing On Memory and Recollection.65 But, even without turning the present discussion in that direction, we should note that when similarities no longer appear as similarities, it is because the very difference between the reality within us and that outside of us becomes blurred. When Chuang Tsu says he does not know whether it was him that dreamt that he was a butterfly or the butterfly that dreamt it was Chuang Tsu, he is describing this rare state of being inseparable with respect to what we do, know, and desire. What happens in sleep is that the presence is so intensified that any distance, separating the one observing and the one being, is obliterated. Thus, when life hits us with a sense of overwhelming joy or sorrow, we experience that “life is a dream,” vida es sueño, to recall Calderón de La Barca’s beautiful play.66 Failing to realize that at stake is a similitude, and instead perceiving it as if it were a sameness, does not reveal so much about the illusion-generating force of dreaming, but speaks first and foremost to a protection, a safeguarding of the indistinguishable. In sleep, all differences and similarities are contracted in an “antiperistatic manner,” that is, in a way that enfolds and compresses into a center. It is along these same lines that Schelling as well speaks of the magnetism of sleep.67 Far from distraction, dissolution, or dispersal, sleep manifests itself as a “deep intimacy with the center”—as

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER Maurice Blanchot so well expressed it.68 In sleep “I am, not dispersed, but entirely gathered together where I am, at this point which is my position and where the world, because of the firmness of my attachment, localizes itself.”69 Here, the I and space are no longer an inside and an outside. Here, the self is already spatiality and spatiality the self. Aristotle describes this indiscernibility of self and space in terms of being bound to a place, not leaving it other than through sleep walking. This bond to place shows itself even more clearly in insomnia, where anxiety is foremost manifest as the anxiety of not finding a position or a place to lay. The positioning of the world is, in actual fact, so determinant for the phenomenon of sleep that the Greek language designates sleep in distinctively spatial or positional terms and revolves around the contrast between the position of lying (katheudo) and the upright position (egeiro). In sleep, we fall asleep, “we fall from sleep into sleep,” quoting Jean-Luc Nancy.70 Aristotle’s discussion entails, in addition, certain erotic implications that would deserve their own study. That the erotic is easily awoken in connection to sleep is admittedly not something thematized by Aristotle, but it still presents interesting connections to certain Aristotelian observations. This eroticism of sleep, so to speak, affords moreover an opening toward an understanding of that state of indiscernibility—a point on which Aristotle insists—not as confusion or illusion but as the rare and complete presence in what we do. The indiscernibility Aristotle addresses characterizes the moment in which being and doing (thinking, acting, etc.) become one. This full presence describes the meditative state as well as the experience of the lover entering into indifference between self and other.

The dark light of Eros lies in the capacity to “lose” oneself in the other, in the sense of becoming the other limitlessly. To “lose oneself” is, however, a misleading expression. What is at stake here constitutes the etymological meaning of the Greek orgasmos, from orge-: impulse, natural movement, and passion, impetus, fury, ardor. At stake is blending with the other, being kneaded into the other in an unlimited devotion. In the indiscernibility Aristotle describes, the “world is present in me and I am absent in it,”71 to borrow Blanchot’s particularly pertinent formulation. Indiscernibility—the inability to distinguish something as something—entails such an intense concentration of different movements and dimensions that the obvious difference between the I and the world, the I and space, becomes blurred. Here, the world and the I are infinitely concentrated. From this perspective we might claim that Aristotle’s observations around sleep open the way to a critique of the widespread idea that sleep is absence of world, a sinking into the powers of oblivion. Heraclitus’ words quoted above (“for the waking the world is one and common, but each sleeper turns away to a world of his own”) do not claim that the sleeper loses the world. What Heraclitus says is simply that the world becomes the sleeping one’s own world. Certainly, in reading this fragment one has to ask how a world can be “one’s own.” Taking inspiration from Aristotle, we can at any rate intuit the possibility of understanding “the sleeping one’s own world” in the sense that, in sleep, the I is the world, for the self loses itself in the world at the same time as the world becomes altogether present in the I. Thus, we have to begin questioning the idea that sleep before anything else entails a loss. This idea still lives on in most philosophical discussions of sleep, even in what one could call the phenomenology of

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER sleep. The phenomenology of sleep is of great significance for phenomenological research, not only as an area for specialized investigation, but also in virtue of its methodological implications. For, indeed, Husserl regards sleep as a “natural epoché,” a natural loss of the world. When phenomenology searches for a way of thinking that does not immerse itself in the world, as the positive sciences do, but instead undertakes an epoché—losing the world “in order to be able to gain it again through universal self-reflection”72—it must obviously lead to a great interest in the natural epoché, namely sleep. Contrary to what Heraclitus’ words seem to say, Husserl and Eugen Fink assume that “sleep is the present loss of the world by the originary self.”73 This means that, in those sleeping, all capabilities are asleep, except for the one to be awoken. To Husserl, Fink, and, although starting from different presuppositions, Bergson as well, sleep entails a suspension of all interests, of all intentionality, of all constitution based on egoity. From this point of view, in sleep the world is lost, absent, rather than missed. Hence, sleep only has significance from the perspective of wakefulness, and can only be regarded by way of analogy and contrast with respect to this. Husserl’s occasional, yet significant, observations on sleep follow largely the same pattern as his treatment of the experience of the other self as other. Neither in the case of another consciousness nor in sleep is there any access other than by way of projection, analogy, and contrast. Sleep is, in this manner, as impenetrable as the other self. Husserl regards sleep as a pause, a suspension, a death in the middle of life, entirely inexplicable.74 Thus, he insists: “. . . in this immersion I am not a human being in the world, I am not for myself as I always am, I am not a self that senses, experiences, acts, can capable. . . About myself I don’t know anything. . . . This

would be sleeping’s dreamless construction.”75 Sleep is here presented as the zero-degree in the vitality of consciousness, an undifferentiated state that, as its mode of vitality, preserves the capacity to wake up. Based on this kind of description, Husserl as well as Fink maintain that sleep implies the will to leave the self and the world in order to abandon oneself to the uncontrollable. In an attempt to draw Husserl’s phenomenological position to its extreme consequences, Pierre Carrique suggests that one could read in Husserl’s reflections an understanding of sleep as a surrendering to the flesh of the present.76 Different studies, on a phenomenological basis, have tried to criticize the fundamental thesis in Husserl and Fink’s phenomenology of sleep, according to which sleep would be a radical pause equally deprived of intentionality and interest. Zahavi’s discussions, which take up certain problematic experiences like hypnosis, sleep-walking, and sleep-talking, endeavor to show that there is an element of wakefulness in sleep, an element of self-consciousness that, in sleep, appears as a double or split self.77 Aristotle’s investigations open the way for other dimensions of this discussion, for waking consciousness, and its being directed toward something, to a certain extent appear as dispersal, and not simply as focus. The directedness of wakefulness toward something differs from the “antiperistatic” movement of sleep, that is, from sleep’s concentrated and compressed movement. By centering his reflections on the relation between sleep and the vastness of that which (being richly nuanced, rapid, like a projectile) in wakefulness is imperceptible, forgotten, excluded from sight and hearing, Aristotle lets sleep appear as care for the transient, for that course of life that leaves no trace. During sleep the living takes care of that which gives life to life—namely the passages,

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER the transitions, the transient. In Homer sleep, hupnos, is enfolded within the unforeseen. Sleep, as we can read in the Iliad, all of a sudden looked like “a sounding mountain bird.”78 The winged sleep blows the transient breath of life and opens the empty space of openness to the living. Here nothing can be kept. Here only full presence is possible. The present reading of Aristotle’s investigations on sleep aimed to awaken a dimension of hermeneutical thought that, for the most part, has been neglected. The connection between sleep and the past is often understood as the obvious fact that the past is asleep and is to be awoken by life. The trouble with such a current representation is that much is overlooked, above all the active performance of nothingness, of that which is inadequately designated as privation, lack, absence. In its active performance, nothingness constitutes the horizon from which the transitions and the transient can manifest themselves in their evanescent, untouchable origin. A hermeneutics of sleep can show us that the access to the past—the already thought, the already said, the already familiar—in search for the unthought, the unsaid, the unfamiliar, entails the discovery of the past as the “antiperistatic” presence of the night in diurnal life, the coming to presence of life’s compressed and condensed multidimensionality. Marcia Sá Cavalcante Schuback Translation by David Payne

3

4 5 6 7 8 9 10

11 12 13 14

15 16 17 18

19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26

27 28

NOTES

29 30 31

1

2

An earlier version of the present chapter appeared in Swedish under the title “Den hermeneutiska sömnen,” in M. Sá Cavalcante Schuback, Lovtal till intet, Gothenburg: Glänta, 2006, 129–51. Kahn, 1979, 29, Fragment I.

32

33 34

Plato, Republic 476c. Here and throughout the essay, the quotations from Plato’s and Aristotle’s texts are based on the editions/ translations listed in the References. However, my renditions of the Greek often depart from those. Ibid. Plato, Rep. 376b. Kafka, 1996, 411–55. Iliad XIV, 231. Kahn, 1979, 31, fragment VI. Meillet and Ernout, 1951, 1121. Hett, 1986, 319–85. For a close reading of these treatises of Aristotle see the doctoral thesis of Wijsenbeek-Wijlers, 1976. Melo Neto, 1984, 686. Ibid., 687. Ibid. On the topic of sleep, more recents works published are Alter 5 (1997), Carrique, 1992, and Jean-Luc Nancy, 2007. De Somno et Vigilia, 455b22–3. John, 11.12. De Somno et Vigilia, 455b21. About the relation between nature and history in Aristotle’s thought see Arendt, 2000, 278–310. De Somno et Vigilia, 453b26. De Somno et Vigilia, 453b28–30. De Somno et Vigilia, 454a1–4. De Somno et Vigilia, 453b27. De Somno et Vigilia, 454a5–6. Politics, 1253a14–18. De Anima, 416b33. Chantraine, 1963, 175, § 261: “Si l’on veut serrer la définition du moyen, on pourrait le définir en disant que, dans l’emploi du moyen, le sujet est senti comme le lieu du procés. On pourrait aussi rappeler la définition de Panini, qui définit le moyen comme l’atmane pada, ‘le mot pour soi.’” See also Benveniste, 1950, 121f. De Anima, 416b34–35. De Generatione et Corruptione, 319b11–13. De Anima, 417a13. De Anima, 417a11. Diels-Kranz, 1989, 170, fragment 84ª (my translation). De Somno et Vigilia, 455a26f. I am considering that touto in this passage refers to common sense. De Somno et Vigilia, 455a27–8. De Somno et Vigilia, 455b5–6.

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER 35 36

37 38 39 40 41 42

43 44 45 46 47 48 49

50 51 52

53 54 55 56

57 58

59 60 61

62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69

De Somno et Vigilia, 456b10–11. For a path-opening interpretation of Aristotle’s discussion of nature’s adunamia, see Merleau-Ponty, 1995. De Somno et Vigilia, 454b11–12. De Somno et Vigilia, 454b28. De Somno et Vigilia, 457b3–4. Nancy, 2007. De Somno et Vigilia, 454b5–6. For a detailed discussion of the physiology of sleep in Aristotle’s reflection, see J. Wiesner, 1975. De Somno et Vigilia, 458a33. De Somno et Vigilia, 454b13–14. De Somno et Vigilia, 458a29. De Somno et Vigilia, 455b22. De Insomniis, 459a1–8. Kahn, 1979, 71, fragment XC. Diels-Kranz, 1989, 202, fragment 28: πάντα τὰ σπουδαῖα νυκτὸς μᾶλλον ἐξευρίσκεται. Iliad XIV, 289–96 (Pope’s translation). Heidegger, 1986. Ibid., 229: “Das Tasten und Berühren ist ein Nahsinn und als solcher die Weise eines unmittelbaren Anstehens und Anliegens, eine unmittelbare Nachbarschaft.” De Insomniis, 459b1–2. De Insomniis, 459b8–20. De Insomniis, 459b28. Goethe, 1840, 34: “If the eye were not sunny, how could we perceive light? If God’s own strength lived not in us, how could we delight in divine things?” De Insomniis, 460b5–6. De Insomniis, 458b28–9. In this text there are two references about the sun having the same size of a foot, as in Heraclitus’ fragment 3 (Diels-Kranz). De Insomniis, 460b16–27. De Insomniis, 462a30–2. Freud had read and studied these works by Aristotle. See Freud, 1948. De Divinatione per Somnum, 464b16–17. Rep. 476c. De Divinatione per Somnum, 461b30. Hett, 1986, 288–313. Calderon de la Barca, 2002. Schelling, 1985. Blanchot, 1955, 280, my translation. Ibid.: “Je ne suis pas dispersé, mais rassemblé tout entier où je suis, en ce point qui est ma

70 71

72

73

74

75

76 77 78

position et où le monde, par la fermeté de mon attachement, se localise.” Nancy, 2007, 3. Blanchot, 1955, 280, my translation: “Là est ma personne, empêchée d’errer, non plus instable, éparpillée et distraite, mais concentrée dans l’étroitesse de ce lieu où le monde se recueille, que j’affirme et qui m’affirme, point où il est présent en moi et moi absent en lui, par une union essentiellement extatique.” Husserl, 1992, 161: “Das Delphische Wort gno-thi seauton hat eine neue Bedeutung gewonnen. Positive Wissenschaft ist Wissenschaft in der Weltverlorenheit. Man muß erst die Welt durch epoché verlieren, um sie in universaler Selbstbesinnung wiederzugewinnen. Noli foras ire, sagt Augustin, in te redi, in interiore nomine habitat veritas.” Fink, 1966, 64, my translation: “Schlaf ist die gegenwärtige Weltverlorenheit des originären Ich.” The contemporary research on sleep tends to no longer consider sleep as a pause or a death in life. Through the registration of electric brain activity during sleep, and also by studies of the brain’s chemical processes, research has increasingly cast light on sleep as an intense physiological activity. The physical relaxation allows a huge internal activity. Sleep has been shown to accommodate the different phases that alternate cyclically, the shift from a so-called slow-wave sleep into rapid eye movement (also called paradoxical) sleep, etc. See Pringuey, 1997, 101–21. This passage is from the manuscript coded as E III.6, 6b–8b. The complete quote can be found in Alter, 1997, 85, n. 22. Carrique, 1997. Zahavi, 1997, 137–51. Iliad XIV, 290.

REFERENCES Arendt, H., “The Concept of History: Ancient and Modern,” in The Portable Hannah Arendt, ed. Peter Baehr, New York: Penguin Books, 2000, 278–310.

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THE HERMENEUTIC SLUMBER Barnes, J. (ed. and trans.), Aristotle. The Complete Works, 2 vols, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988. Benveniste, É., “Actif et moyen dans le verbe,” Journal de Psychologie, 43 (1950), 119–27. Blanchot, M., “Le sommeil, la nuit,” L’espace littéraire, Paris: Gallimard, 1955. Calderon de la Barca, P., Life Is a dream/ Vida es sueño, trans. Stanley Appelbaum, Mineola, NY: Dover, 2002. Carrique, P., Rêve, vérité. Essai sur la philosophie du sommeil et de la veille, Paris: Gallimard, 1992. Chantraine, P., Grammaire Homérique, Syntaxe, vol. II, Paris: Klincksieck, 1963. Conford (trans.), Aristotle. Physics Books I-IV, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1980. Diels, H. and Kranz, W., Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, Zürich/Hildesheim: Weidmann, 1989. Fink, E., “Vergegenwärtigung und Bild,” in Studien zur Phänomenologie, Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff, 1966. Freud, S., “Über den Traum,” in Gesammelte Werke II/III, London: Imago, 1948. Goethe, J. W., Theory of Colours, trans. Charles Lock Eastlake, London: John Murray, 1840. Heidegger, M., Seminare. Gesamtausgabe 15, Frankfurt: Klostermann, 1986. Hett, W. S. (trans.), Aristotle. On the soul, Parva Naturalia, On Breath, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1986. Husserl, E., Cartesianische Meditationen, ed. Elisabeth Ströker, Husserliana VI, Hamburg: Felix Meiner, 1992. Kafka, F., “Forschungen eines Hundes,” in Die Erzählungen Originalfassung, Frankfurt: Fischer, 1996.

Kahn, C. H., The Art and Thought of Heraclitus, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979. Meillet, A. and Ernout, A., Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue latine. Histoire des mots, Paris: Klincksieck, 1951. Melo Neto, J. C., “Considerações sobre o poeta dormindo,” in Obra Completa, Rio de Janeiro: Nova Aguilar, 1994. Merleau-Ponty, M., La Nature: Cours du Collège de France, Paris: Gallimard, 1995. Nancy, J.-L., Tombe de sommeil, Paris: Galilée, 2007; The Fall of Sleep, trans. C. Mandell, New York: Fordham University Press, 2009. Peck, A. L. and E. S. Forster (trans.), Aristotle. Parts of Animals, Movement of Animals, Progression of Animals, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998. Pope, A. (trans.), Homer. The Iliad, London: Penguin, 1996 [1899]. Pringuey, P., “Essai de psychobiologie du sommeil,” Alter 5 (1997), 101–19. Rackham, H. (trans.), Aristotle. Politics, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1977. Schelling, F. W., “Die Weltalter,” in Ausgewählte Schriften, vol. 4, Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1985. Wiesner, J., “Die Einheit der Schrift De Somno und die physiologische Erklärung des Schlafes,” in Aristotle on Mind and Senses: Proceedings of the Seventh Symposium Aristotelicum, ed. G. E. L. Owen, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975. Wijsenbeek-Wijlers, H., Aristotle’s Concept of Soul, Sleep and Dreams, Amsterdam: Hakkert, 1976. Zahavi, D., “Sleep, Self-awareness and Dissociation,” Alter 5 (1997), 137–51.

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8 FIRST PHILOSOPHY

THE SCIENCE OF THE FIRST PRINCIPLES AND CAUSES Aristotle recognizes the existence of different forms of knowledge, of both a prescientific and scientific character. In the case of scientific knowledge, there are, in addition, different particular sciences, each of which has its own sphere of competence, its own conceptual resources and its own proper methods. In addition to being a condition of possibility for philosophy itself, this fact raises certain challenges for philosophical reflection. In particular, how do we deal with the possible unity of knowledge, while maintaining the variety of its manifestations? In different contexts, Aristotle focuses on the thematization of the structure, reach, and limits of different forms of knowledge. In two texts of central importance, Metaphysics I.1–2 and Nicomachean Ethics VI, he also carries out a certain attempt at systematization, based on a kind of phenomenology of the principal forms of knowledge. Both texts are inserted in distinct thematic contexts and, additionally, there are significant differences of detail between them, which, in some cases, appear to be inexplicable other than by reference

to their different dates of composition and the evolution which the thought of Aristotle underwent.1 But there are also fundamentally important ways in which they coincide, especially in regard to the identification of a supreme form of knowledge, of a purely theoretical-speculative character, which in both texts is identified by the traditional name of “wisdom” (sophia). The treatment in Met. I.1–2 is of special importance, since it provides not only a more detailed characterization of wisdom but also an intent to explain how it comes about on the basis of other, more elemental, forms of knowledge. Aristotle begins with the assertion of the presence in human beings of a natural tendency toward seeking knowledge (see Met. I.1, 980a21: “by nature, all human beings desire to know”). Above and beyond its possible usefulness, knowledge is also sought as something desired in and of itself. This natural tendency to seek knowledge reaches its fulfillment precisely in wisdom, which no longer bears any relation to the satisfaction of immediate vital needs, but rather is always sought for its own sake. In order to show in what way wisdom comes about as a result of the radicalization of a tendency already in operation long before, Aristotle presents it in Met. I.1 as situated

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY in the highest place within a scale of fundamental forms of knowledge. This scale is constructed on the basis of two criteria, that is: (1) the criterion of universality and (2) the criterion of causality. In accordance with (1), a form of knowledge that facilitates access to universal connections will be superior to another that remains restricted to the sphere of particular objects; likewise, given two forms of knowledge that permit access to universal connections, that form will be superior which has as its object more universal connections. In accordance with (2), the knowledge of causal connections is superior to the mere knowledge of facts. Both criteria are closely connected: causal explanations, insofar as they habitually refer to determined types of things or events, are characterized simultaneously by bringing with them a claim of validity for all the cases of the same type; that is, they claim universal validity. On the other hand, insofar as the different types of objects considered in each case can be characterized in terms ever more all-embracing, the causal explanations referring to them can also be ordered in a sequence of increasing universality. Within the scale of Met. I.1 Aristotle considers five fundamental forms of knowledge, each of which comes about based upon the preceding form, that is: (1) perception (aisthe-sis), (2) memory (mne-me-), (3) experience (empeiria), (4) art or technique (techne-), which in this context, as opposed to the discussion in NE VI, is not clearly distinguished from science (episte-me-),2 and (5) wisdom (sophia), the characterization of which he takes up again and completes in the following chapter (see I.2). (1) and (2) are forms of knowledge referring to particular things, and which humans share with animals, and which do not provide access to causal connections (980a21–b25). (3) is

a type of uniquely human knowledge, which is already characterized by the presence of a certain type of generality, of a merely typological character, but which does not involve reference to causal connections: diverse particular memories are united in an empirical type delineated in a more or less approximate manner, which thereby permits recognizing their identity, in regard to some aspect relevant for guiding our actions (e.g. recognizing when someone has a cold and adopting habitual remedies in order to alleviate it) (980b25–981a1). (4) constitutes, conversely, a type of knowledge that possesses a causal character and, thereby, a universal reach, that is, for all the cases of a given type, adequately defined (e.g. the explanation according to which all the individuals who possess a determined type of constitution or bodily disposition are cured of a determined illness by means of a determined type of medication). Thus, the experience remains restricted to the knowledge of certain facts (τὸ ὅτι), while that which is proper to science or technique is to know the corresponding cause (τὸ διότι καὶ ἡ αἰτία) (981a2–30). Finally, (5) corresponds, within the sphere of scientific knowledge, to the idea of a maximally universal science, which, as such, should deal with certain causes (aitiai) and certain principles (archai) (981b27–982a3); more precisely, it should deal with the primary principles and causes (αἱ πρώται ἀρχαὶ καὶ αἰτίαι) of all things (see I.2, 982b8–9). Thus characterized, wisdom unites in itself the principal characteristics that the habitual use of language links to the usage of the term “wise” (sophos): the wise man knows all things, without having a particular knowledge of each one; he knows difficult things, which are not accessible to everyone; he possesses a more precise

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY knowledge; he is more capable of teaching the causes of things; he possesses a knowledge that is sought for its own sake; and he possesses the most directive or architectonic science, which is not subordinated to any other (see Met. I.2, 982a8–b10). It is thus a science that possesses a maximum dignity, both because of its object as well as its totally free and disinterested character. Its initial impulse derives from wonder (thaumazein), which permits a person to become conscious of her own ignorance and drives her to attempt to overcome it (982b11–28). Wisdom is the most divine science, in a dual sense: as the science that the divinity itself should possess and, at the same time, as the science that has as its objective the divinity, qua ultimate cause of the universe (983a5–11). In this way, the traditional notion of wisdom, which had a long and rich history in the preceding Greek culture,3 is reinterpreted via reference to the novel idea of a science of the causes and first principles of all things. And thus, it comes to designate the fundamental philosophical discipline, which the later philosophical tradition would know under the name of metaphysics. In fact, Aristotle never uses the term “metaphysics,” but rather makes use of other terms for this science. One of them is precisely that of wisdom, employed in I.1–2. To this term Aristotle adds others, employed in different contexts, such as first philosophy (πρώτη φιλοσοφία: VI.1, 1026a24, 30; XI.4, 1061b19), the sought-after science (ἡ ζητουμένη ἐπιστήμη: III.2, 996b2–3; 996b31–3; XI.1, 1059b1, 13, 22, 25; 2, 1060a4, 6), and theological science (θεολογικὴ ἐπιστήμη: VI.2, 1026a19; XI.7, 1064b3). This is a science that is, in a certain sense, new, given that it had never before been characterized in such terms. But since it

arises based on the natural attitude of wonder, this “novelty” does not impede us from considering this science, at the same time, as old or even the oldest of all: not only does it retain a certain natural continuity with the other forms of knowledge, but this science itself arises as the result of the radicalization and as the consummation of the natural tendency to seek knowledge that characterizes the human being. Furthermore, this science also has its own history. Therefore, after the predominantly synchronic explanation of the genesis of wisdom offered in Met. I.1–2, Aristotle adds in chapters 3–10, which complete the book, an attempt to reconstruct the history of the philosophy that precedes it. The main connecting thread for this attempt at reconstruction is provided by Aristotle’s own doctrine of the four causes (i.e. material, formal, efficient, and final): he attempts to show how the different philosophers that preceded him, beginning with Thales and the first natural philosophers up to Plato and his disciples in the Academy, progressively discovered each one of these causes, albeit in an unsure and hesitant manner. The history of the progressive discovery of the four causes can only be narrated in a coherent fashion from the perspective of someone, like Aristotle himself, who is already in possession of a unitary conception of causality. Nonetheless, it is this very history that explains, from its origins, the very possibility of the explicit formulation of this conception and, in addition, of the conception of wisdom as a science of the causes and first principles of all things. Thus, in a way comparable to that which would later characterize Hegel, Aristotle presents his own conception as the final goal of a historical development, which, at the same time that it culminates in this goal, also makes it possible.4

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY THE MEANINGS OF “BEING” The characterization of wisdom as a science that has as its object the first causes and principles of all things still does not make explicit the manner in which we should understand this latter expression. In chapters 1–2 of book IV of Met., Aristotle focuses on the same problem from a different perspective. To do so, he provides a more precise characterization of the object of this science: the science of the first causes and principles seeks to thematize “that which is insofar as it is” (τὸ ὂν ᾓ ὄν) and the attributes that belong to it in and of itself (see IV.1, 1003a21–2). Therefore, the causes and the first principles that this science studies will be, definitively, the causes and first principles of that which is insofar as it is (1003a26–32). There appears here the idea, formulated for the first time in an explicit fashion, and which would be dominant throughout the entirety of the later philosophical tradition, of a “science of being,” that is, of an ontology (τὸ ὄν: “that which is”), as it was termed beginning in the seventeenth century (Goclenius). So, while the particular sciences (e.g. mathematics, physics, biology, etc.) formally constitute their object by demarcating a determinate sector of that which is (e.g. quantity, that which is subject to movement, that which is alive, etc.), the science of that which is in insofar as it is does not carry out a similar demarcation (1003a22–6). The thematic field of the particular sciences remains, then, circumscribed by the unity of a genus (genos) or natural class of things (see Posterior Analytics I.7). Conversely, the science of that which is insofar as it is seeks to not be restricted to any particular sector of objects, and aspires, therefore, to maximum universality. Nevertheless, this very aspiration, which places it above the

particular sciences, results, at the same time, in certain difficulties. In the technical sense that Aristotle gives to the term, the genus always designates a universal predicate (e.g. “animal”) that is predicated of multiple species (e.g. “horse,” “dog,” “ox,” etc.), without varying its meaning from case to case: the predication of the genus with regards to its species (eide-) results in a case of synonymy or univocity (suno-numon, suno-numo-s) (e.g. “a horse is an animal,” “a dog is an animal,” “an ox is an animal,” etc., where “animal” = “living being possessing a sensitive soul”) (see Categories 1, 1a6–12). The contrary case to synonymy or univocity corresponds to homonymy or equivocity (homo-numon, homo-numo-s), which occurs when two or more things have the same name, but this name is not applied to all of them with one and the same meaning (e.g. “animal” applied to a living human being and to a painting on a wall) (1a1–6). Aristotle considers that there can only be genuine science where the terms that delimit the corresponding sector of objects are employed in a univocal manner, and not merely equivocal. Thus, for example, zoology has as its object all those beings that are univocally designated by “animal,” in its most strict sense (= a living being possessing a sensitive soul), since in this case one is in the presence of a genus, that is, of a genuine natural class of things. Turning now to the science of that which is insofar as it is, we encounter a peculiar situation. Indeed, while the predicate “is” appears to be applicable to absolutely all things, Aristotle expressly concedes that “being” is not applied in a univocal fashion to all things to which it is predicated: “that which is” (τὸ ὄν, see Met. IV.2, 1003a33–4), “to be” (τὸ εἶναι, see VII.1, 1028a10) and “is” (τὸ ἔστι, see VII.4, 1030a21) are said in multiple ways (λέγεται πολλαχῶς). This is equivalent to

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY saying that “that which is” cannot be considered a genus, a natural class of things (see III.3, 998b22–7).5 The term “being” evidently has different meanings. For example, a statement such as “Socrates is a man” provides a case of essential predication, in which the copula expresses a type of relation of identity between term S and term P, something that does not occur in the case of a statement such as “Socrates is white,” which corresponds to so-called accidental predication. “Man” designates the species to which the individual Socrates belongs, while “white” designates only an accidental determination of this individual, and the relation that the individual object maintains with its own essence, which constitutes its substantial form, is radically different from the relation that this same individual maintains with its accidental determinations, since these do not form part of its identity: the individual object may at some point cease to possess these accidental determinations and acquire others, without for that reason ceasing to be the individual object that it is.6 Something analogous occurs in the case of statements such as “white is a color” and “white is pleasant,” which exemplify the difference between essential and accidental predication in the case of something that, like the color white, is a quality, not a substantial object. Lastly, “being” in its existential use also does not have a unique meaning that is the same in all cases.7 For instance, we can say both that “men are (= ‘exist’, ‘there are’)” or “horses” or “rocks” are, just as we also say “numbers are (= ‘exist’, ‘there are’)” or “colors” or “places,” etc. but the mode of existence that corresponds to substantial objects such as human beings, horses, or stones is, in Aristotle’s judgment, different from that which corresponds to nonsubstantial entities such as mathematical determinations, qualities, or spatial determinations and

space itself. The attempt to reduce the evident multiplicity of meanings that “being” bears to the monolithic unity of one and the same meaning in each and every use of the term turns out to be, in Aristotle’s view, completely unjustified from the logical-semantic point of view, and would have, in addition, disastrous consequences for the science of being itself, since it would make it impossible to explain not only the multiplicity and diversity of the real but also the fact of movement and change, in general. Such would be the consequences of the position of Parmenides and his disciples Zeno and Melissus, to whom Aristotle attributes an ontological conception of a monistic character, which negates multiplicity and movement, and which was based, definitively, in a univocal conception of being (see Physics I.2–3). If “being” cannot be univocal, it would appear that the die is cast for a possible science of being, at least if we confine ourselves to the epistemology that Aristotle himself presents in APo. Nevertheless, in Met. IV.2 Aristotle introduces a logical-semantic model that is intermediate between the cases of pure univocity and pure equivocity, that is, the model of homonymy or equivocity with reference to some one thing (πρὸς ἓν), which, beginning with G. E. L. Owen, is also known technically as the model of focal meaning.8 This is, more specifically, a type of nonaccidental equivocity that is not considered in an explicit fashion in the treatment in Cat. 1, although it is a matter of discussion whether the alternative between univocity and equivocity outlined in that text excludes the possibility of the existence of nonaccidental forms of equivocity, in the way in which Aristotle discusses it in Met. IV.2 or, rather, turns out to be compatible with it.9 In Met. IV.2 Aristotle illustrates the case of homonymy pros hen (πρὸς ἓν) by means of

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY the example of the different uses of the predicate “healthy”: “healthy” is said in many ways with reference to many different things (e.g. taking a walk, the color of one’s face, a type of diet or food, etc.), but always, definitively, by reference to the health of the body, which provides the focal meaning that guides the use of the term (1003a34–5). In this case, it is the presence of certain real relations between the things designated by one and the same term—such as the relation of the cause to that which it causes, or vice versa, of that which is caused to its cause, as in the case of a natural sign and that of which it is a sign, etc.—which undergirds the transfer of meaning that makes possible the application of one and the same predicate, taken in different senses but not completely disconnected from one another, to different things or types of things. We have here, then, a case of homonymy or equivocity, but not merely accidental, insofar as the application of the same predicate to different things, with partially differing meanings, is supported by the relations that link these things on the ontological plane. Thus, Aristotle holds that the case of “being” is comparable to that of “healthy”: “being” is also said in multiple manners, but always “by reference to some one thing and to some single nature” (πρὸς ἓν καὶ μίαν τινὰ φύσιν), and not in an accidentally equivocal fashion (1003a33–4). In the case of “being,” that basic principle (arche-) by reference to which it is said that all else is, is nothing other than substance (ousia), since all the things that are said to be are either substantial objects, properties of substantial objects, or else processes that involve substantial objects (1003b5–10). Hence, “being” has its focal meaning there where it is predicated of substantial objects, while in all other cases “being” is taken in derived

senses, which refer, directly or indirectly, to the aforesaid basic meaning. And this semantic fact reflects the corresponding relations of dependence that exist on the ontological plane. We are, as a result, in the presence of equivocity in the case of “being” as well, but not a merely accidental equivocity, but rather equivocity or homonymy πρὸς ἓν. This discovery has decisive consequences for the possibility of a science of what is insofar as it is. This is because, as Aristotle explains, the type of logical-semantic unity that provides the foundation for the focal-meaning model also constitutes a sufficient basis for the unity of a science that seeks to thematize the totality of the scope of that which is designated by means of the predicate in question. Thus, for instance, there is a single science, medicine, which, via its different parts or disciplines, deals with all that which is designated as “healthy,” and even with that which is opposed to it as a privation, that is, the not-healthy; and in the same way, there will be a single science that deals with all that is insofar as it is (1003b11–12, 15–16). This solution to the problem implies, as is obvious, making the epistemological model of APo more flexible, since it is no longer required that the thematic field of a science always be delimited by the unity of a genus of things. In Met. IV.2 Aristotle alludes explicitly to this issue, when he declares that the unity of focal meaning (πρὸς ἓν) is, in a certain manner (τρόπον τινά), comparable to the unity of meaning that corresponds to the genus (καθ’ ἕν), and that its presence will be sufficient to guarantee the unity of the corresponding science (1003b12–15). There follow two consequences: on the one hand, that there will be a unitary science that studies all that is insofar as it is; on the other hand, this science will be necessarily focused on that which is said to be, in the

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY basic and primary sense of the term, that is, on substance, and will consider all else, which depends on substance, precisely in reference to it (1003b15–17), just as medicine focuses its attention in the health of the body, and considers all else that is said to be healthy only insofar as it is linked, in one or another manner, to the health of the body. If what is proper to philosophy is to seek the principles and the causes of what is insofar as it is, and if substance provides the basic principle on which all else depends which, in a derived sense, is said to be, it thereby follows that what is proper to philosophy will be, definitively, to study fundamentally the principles and the causes of substance (1003b17–19). The multiplicity of the meanings of “being” is, however, in Aristotle’s judgment, even greater than what is suggested by the argument of Met. IV.2. Indeed, in Met. V.7 Aristotle distinguishes four great domains of meaning of “being,” within each of which there are various meanings that differ among themselves, namely (1) “being” according to the categories, qua fundamental modes of “being per se”; (2) “being” according to potency and act; (3) “being” as the true, and “not being” as the false; and (4) “being” as accidental. With regards to (1), Aristotle explains that, considered in themselves, substance and the accidental categories together constitute the different modes of “being per se” (ὂν καθ’ αὑτό) (1017a22–7): all that exists and can be designated by means of a certain name will be per se either a substantial object or a quality or a quantity or a relation or else something pertaining to one of the remaining categories.10 This classificatory aspect is present at the base of any predicative act, independently of the fact of whether the connection between the term S and the term

P that a statement of the form S-P establishes is itself of an essential or accidental character. Indeed, in order to be able to predicate we must first designate by means of a name both the object that will be predicated of, and that will be represented by the term S in the statement, as well as the property or determination that will be predicated of it, and that will be represented by the term P in the statement. In fact, Aristotle mentions examples that correspond to accidental predication: “the man is healthy,” “the man walks (is walking)” or “the man cuts (is cutting)” (1017a27–30), where the relevant factor is not, then, the character of the link between S and P, but rather the fact that both that which is designated by S as well as that designated by P necessarily fall under a determined category. With respect to (2), it should be noted that both in the designative usage of the simple terms in order to name something, as well as in the predicative act that links the term S and the term P in the statement, we may indicate not only what the thing currently is but also the aspects of virtuality that it hosts. Thus, for instance, we can use the name “wheat” or else say “this is wheat” both in reference to the grown plant as well as in reference to the corresponding seed, such that in one and the other case the designation or the predication possesses, in Aristotle’s view, a different scope (1017a35–b8). (3) “Being” as the true alludes, fundamentally, to the truth value that the copula “is” has in the predicative statement, insofar as any statement of the form “S is P” can be paraphrased by means of a statement of the form “it is true that S is P”; in an analogous fashion, any statement of the form “S is not P” can be paraphrased in terms of a statement of the form “is is false that S is P” (1017a31–4). In the case of the affirmative

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY statement, the paraphrase highlights the fact that any use of the copula “is” in an apophantic statement brings with it a truth value; conversely, in the case of the negative statement the corresponding paraphrase highlights the fact that one of the functions of negation consists in the rejection of the pretension to truth carried by a statement that is considered false. (4) “Being” as accidental is connected, finally, with the difference, already mentioned, between essential and accidental predication. Aristotle illustrates the point by means of three types of statements, that is: (a) “the just is educated,” (b) “the man is educated,” and (c) “the educated is a man” (1017a7–13). Here, the statement (a) is, in the final analysis, a pseudo-statement of the form S-P, since it should be interpreted rather as an elliptical statement concerning one or many substantial objects not mentioned in the place of the subject, since both the term S as well as the term P here designate accidents of something different, that is, of a substantial object or else a type of substantial objects (1017a15–16), which would be formulated in terms of contemporary logic as follows: a statement with an existential qualifier of the type (∃x) [Jx ∧ Ex] or else a statement with universal quantifier of the type (X) [Jx → Ex], according to whether we take the pseudo-subject of the statement as either particular or universal, respectively. In both cases it is clear that we are not speaking, in reality, about that which is mentioned as the apparent subject in the pseudo-statement S-P taken as a starting point, but rather the predication is in reality of an object or else a set of different objects, of which the above-mentioned determinations are mere accidents. On the other hand, case (b) is that which most adequately reflects the underlying ontological

structure, since here the term S refers to the substantial object of which an accidental determination is predicated, and the term P refers to the accidental determination predicated of S (1017a16); and finally, case (c) presents, in inverted fashion, the underlying ontological structure, since the term S refers to an accidental determination of the substantial object designated by the term P (1017a17–18). In all three cases, the predication is possible because it presupposes reference to something that exists in the manner of substantial objects, which provide the substrate for the corresponding accidental determination (1017a19–22). Hence, that which is characteristic of accidental predication, as the examples mentioned—and, in particular that corresponding to case (b)—illustrate, resides in the fact that in this type of predication there is no identity between that which is designated by the term S and that designated by the term P, bur rather that one thing is predicated of another, in opposition to what occurs in essential predication—as occurs, for instance, in the case of a definition—in which, precisely, one thing is not predicated of a different thing, but rather there is identity between that designated by S and that predicated by P (see, for example, Met. VII.4, 1030a6–11; APo II.3, 90b34–5). This difference between essential and accidental predication does not coincide, simpliciter, with the categorial distinction between substance and accidents, for the simple reason that it is possible to predicate both essentially and accidentally of entities that belong to each and every one of the different categories. Aristotle explains this point in an important text from Topics I.9. It is possible to predicate essentially of the category of substance as well as of something that belongs to the accidental categories, provided that what is predicated of it is

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY either its species or its genus. For example, if we say of a man that “this (this man) is man” or else “this (this man) is animal,” we will have predicated in an essential manner of something that belongs to the category of substance; in analogous fashion, if we say of a particular white color “this (this white color) is white” or else “this (this white color) is color” we will have predicated in an essential manner of something that does not belong to the category of substance, but rather, to an accidental category like quality (see Top. I.9, 103b27–39).11 Of course, we can predicate accidentally of these same things, when we predicate of them determinations that are different from themselves, which do not constitute either their genus or their species. This necessarily occurs each time that we predicate of something that belongs to a determined category something that belongs to another category, or else, even within the framework of the same category, when we predicate of something belonging to a determined genus subordinated to the given category something belonging to a different subordinate genus. This is the situation in cases (a), (b), and (c) considered by Aristotle, since they correspond to statements that combine terms that designate things belonging to different categories or else to different subordinate genera within one and the same category. While it is true that the distinction between essential and accidental predication holds, in principle, in the domain of each and every one of the categories, Aristotle links essential predication, in a closer fashion, with the category of substance, and generally guides his discussion on the basis of examples of statements of type (b), in which the term S designates something that belongs to the category of substance. In any case, what is important to retain here is the fundamental reach possessed both by the opposition

between “being” by accident and “being” according to the categories and by the distinction between essential and accidental predication, within the Aristotelian treatment of the multiple senses of “being” and in connection with the development of the theory of the categories. In the explanatory model thus delineated, substance occupies the central place, corresponding to the basic sense of “being” according to the categories: it is on substance that a science that seeks to universally thematize that which is insofar as it is should focus its attention.

ONTOLOGY AND THEOLOGY According to the position sketched out in Met. IV.1–2, first philosophy is delineated as a universal science of that which is insofar as it is, that is to say, as a general ontology, although centered on the study of substance, which is its primary object. In this regard, in the framework of the introduction to the specific treatment of substance in Met. VII.1, Aristotle explains that the fundamental question of ontology, the question “what is that which is,” should be definitively understood in the sense of the question “what is substance” (VII.1, 1028b2–4). Here there takes place what has been characterized as a redirecting of ontology, as the science of being (on) in general, toward ousiology, that is, the science of substance (ousia).12 Nevertheless, in another context Aristotle provides a different characterization of first philosophy, which does not seem, at first glance, to be easily compatible with that which is offered in IV.1–2. According to this new characterization, introduced in the context of a classification of theoretical sciences in VI.1, first philosophy would be a science

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY that studies the divine substance, that is, theological science or simply theology (theologike-). Aristotle explains in this text that sciences can be of three types: practical, productive, or else theoretical, and within the scope of the theoretical sciences he distinguishes three fundamental sciences, namely: mathematics, whose objects are immobile but lack separate existence, physics, whose objects possess separate existence but are subject to movement, and theology, which studies those objects that are immobile and possess separate existence (1025b18– 1026a32).13 In this passage Aristotle speaks of a theological science which studies exclusively one particular genus of substantial objects: the most venerable genus of all, since it is of a divine character, with the result that the science that studies this genus of things would also be the most preferred and most venerable (1026a19–22). As the context shows—in which he also makes reference to the science that studies the stars (see 1026a26: astrologia)—Aristotle has in mind here a distinction between three types of substances, which also appears in other texts, namely: (1) sensible, corruptible substance, which corresponds to the substantial objects of the sublunar world, (2) sensible, noncorruptible substance, which corresponds to the case of the stars, and (3) nonsensible substance, which, as such, is immobile and eternal.14 These substances are linked by relations of causal dependence, such that type (1) depends upon type (2), and type (2), in turns, depends on type (3), with the result that everything depends, in a mediated or immediate manner, on type (3). However, this new characterization of first philosophy as theology is not easily compatible with the characterization in terms of general ontology introduced in IV.1–2, since the theological science of VI.1 appears

to be a particular science that studies only a specific type of substantial objects. The problem is made more acute when we consider that at the beginning of VI.1 Aristotle takes up again the characterization of first philosophy as a universal science of that which is insofar as it is, in exactly the same terms in which he had introduced this science in IV.1–2 (see VI.1, 1025b3–18). And Aristotle himself notes that the dual characterization produces a difficulty, since, after having introduced the reference to theology, he explicitly asks the question whether first philosophy thus characterized must be seen as a universal science or rather as a science referring to a determined genus and a single nature (1026a23–5). Shortly thereafter he offers a response, which consists of three steps, as follows: (1) first philosophy will study that which is first, and hence if there were no other substances than physical substances, physics would be first philosophy; however, if there are immobile substances, in addition to physical substances, the science that studies these substances will be prior to physics and will merit the name of first philosophy (1026a27–30); (2) this philosophy will be universal, because it is first (καθόλου ὅτι πρώτη) (1026a30–1); and (3) that which is proper to this science will be the study of what is insofar as it is, and the attributes that belong to it as such (1026a31–2). This response contains an attempt at a compatibilist mediation between both characteristics of first philosophy, expressed by (1) and (3), respectively; and it is also clear that the linking element in this attempt at mediation is expressed by the extremely concise and enigmatic sentence contained in (2). This attempt at mediation is far from convincing for all commentators. W. Jaeger considered it an unfruitful attempt to make compatible two mutually contradictory

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY conceptions of metaphysics, which would correspond, from the evolutionary point of view, to two different phases of Aristotle’s thought: the theological conception would belong to the early phase of adherence to Platonism, while the ontological conception would correspond to the mature phase in which Aristotle definitively marks a distance from the fundamental premises of Platonism.15 What this interpretation does not explain is why Aristotle evidently considered it possible to make both characterizations of first philosophy compatible. The interpretation of Jaeger appears to suggest, furthermore, that Aristotle’s mature conception did not concede any special relevance to the question of the divine substance, within the general design of the science of being, having abandoned the fundamentally theological conception of Platonism in favor of the idea of a general ontology. At the extreme opposite to the position of Jaeger is the interpretation of P. Merlan, who seeks to resolve the difficulty provoked by the dual characterization of first philosophy by eliminating from the Aristotelian conception the very idea of a general ontology, by interpreting the notion of “that which is insofar as it is” not as a reference to what the later Scholastic tradition would call ens commune, but rather, to the summum ens or ens absolutum: according to this interpretation, the science of what is insofar as it is would be, even in IV.1–2, the science of the divine being.16 This solution does not adequately account for the character of universality that, both in IV.1–2 as well as VI.1, Aristotle assigns to the science of being, and also does not do justice to the fact that the greater part of the discussion contained in the treatises that make up Met. are dedicated, in fact, to the study of sensible substance. As shown also by the treatment of the first mover in Phys. VIII, Aristotle always

proceeds in such a way that the reference to suprasensible being appears as a requirement derived from what is made manifest by the discussion relating to the principles of composite substance, which is the object of physics. The same is true even for the case of Met. XII, whose chapters 6–10 contain what has traditionally been known as the theology of Aristotle, since this treatment is preceded, once again, by a development referring to the principles of substance in general, which takes up again fundamental aspects of the theory of sensible substance. For this reason, the most recent research has strongly emphasized the fact that on the basis of its contents Met. XII does not constitute, as such, a treatise on theology, but rather, it is a treatment of substance in general, including nonsensible substance, which culminates in a succinct consideration of the divine substance.17 An adequate interpretation of the position of Aristotle should begin by recognizing, in the first place, that there are indeed two characterizations of first philosophy that are not equivalent simpliciter, and in the second place, that Aristotle did not consider them to be contradictory, but rather that his intention was to render them compatible. The attempt at harmonization in VI.1, whose nucleus acquires expression in the sentence contained in (2), seeks to found the pretension of universality of first philosophy on its priority, which, at the same time, is founded on the priority of its object. Indeed, the argumentation in IV.1–2 provides an indication of the type of solution that Aristotle may have in mind. In IV.1–2 Aristotle does not consider the relationship between different types of substances, but rather between substance, as the first category, and the accidental categories. And, via the application of the model of focal meaning or homonymy πρὸς ἓν, he shows that one single and unique science

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY thematizes all that is said to be, but it does so in such a way that in this thematization substance, as the basic meaning of “being” according to the categories, occupies the center of attention, with the result that the primary object of general ontology is substance, considered according to its principles and causes, while everything else is considered from the perspective derived from its relation with substance. Everything indicates that in VI.1, where he considers the relationship between the different types of substance, Aristotle has in mind an analogical model: the science of being is primarily a science of substance, but substance has, in turn, its primary object in the divine substance, precisely insofar as this is the primary substance, upon which depend, in mediate or immediate manner, all other substances. The diagram resulting from considering together the relations of priority established in IV.1–2 and in VI.1 would thus be the following: non-sensible substance incorruptible sensible substance corruptible sensible substance quality quantity relation action

passion

etc.

The horizontal plane of the diagram represents the relation of priority of substance with respect to the accidental categories discussed in IV.1–2; the vertical plane of the diagram, on the other hand, represents the relations of priority that Aristotle establishes in VI.1 between the different types of substances. There is a certain parallelism between both axes of the diagram, but the relations of priority considered are in no case identical: in IV.1–2 Aristotle is discussing the relation between substance and that which does not

possess substantial existence, while in VI.1 the discussion deals with the relations of priority and causal dependence between different types of substantial objects. To this first and fundamental difference we must add the fact that in the case of the three types of substance the relations of priority and dependence exist according to a model of succession (τῷ ἐφεξῆς) of the type C → B → A, while in IV.1–2 Aristotle does not at any time suggest that in the case of the accidental categories their reference to substance could be construed, at least in some cases, according to the model of a successive series.18 The parallelism is useful, nevertheless, since it permits us to see why Aristotle thinks that the science of being, understood fundamentally as a science of substance, could not be concluded, as such, without an explicit consideration of the divine substance, which constitutes, so to speak, the focal case of the notion of substance. Some prestigious commentators reject the possibility of translating the model of focal meaning to the plane of the relation existing between the different types of substances.19 Nevertheless, the most plausible interpretation appears to be that which affirms the possibility of also applying the model of focal meaning to the case of the relation between the different kinds of substances, although in a way that tries to do justice to the particular nature of the relations of dependence that Aristotle establishes in each case: in the case of the different types of substances, the relations of dependence cannot be assimilated, simpliciter, to those relations that govern the case of the relation between substance and the accidental categories.20 In sum, when Aristotle emphasizes the universality of the science of that which is insofar as it is, this does not involve, in any way, a universality founded on the reference to a kind of universal genus, which would

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY comprehend within itself the totality of that which exists, since, as Aristotle emphasizes, there cannot be such a genus, since “being” is not a genus. On the contrary, both in the plane corresponding to the relation between substance and the accidental categories (the horizontal axis) as well as in the plane corresponding to the relation between the different types of substance (the vertical axis), we have a special type of universality, founded on a common reference of a multiplicity of things to something considered basic and primary, namely: substance with respect to the accidental categories, and nonsensible substance and, more precisely, the divine substance with respect to the other types of substance, which are composite and are subject to movement. Precisely because “being” is not a genus, the reference to substance, in general, and to the divine substance, in particular, plays a decisive role in accounting for the possibility of the constitution of first philosophy as a unitary science: the thematic treatment of that which is insofar as it is will necessarily be centered on that which is in a basic and primary sense, and which thus constitutes the foundation for the existence of all else, that is, substance; for the same reason, the divine substance will occupy a central place here, insofar as it is this substance that, as we shall see, reveals in the most exemplary and paradigmatic way the particular features of substantial being, such as the capacity for independent existence, the identity of the object with its own essence, and existence in act. Ontology, as a universal science of being, will be concretely carried out fundamentally as ousiology, as a science of substance, and this science, in turn, will find its full realization in theology, the study of the divine substance. The tension between general ontology and theology that appears for the first time in the Aristotelian conception of first

philosophy, far from remaining restricted in its systematic importance to the writings of Aristotle, provides instead a fundamental connecting thread, which runs throughout practically all the later history of Western metaphysics, which, it would appear, owes not only its name but also basic aspects of its core structure to the Aristotelian conception: the question concerning being in general leads to the question concerning a particular type of being, substance, which is being par excellence and, more precisely still, to the question concerning God, the supreme being, as the paradigmatic case of substantial existence. On the basis of this particular path which, in different ways, the question concerning being has taken, over and over again, from Aristotle onwards, we can say that the basic and definitive feature of Western metaphysics resides, in a word, in its essentially onto-theo-logical constitution.21

SUBSTANCE In books VII–VIII of Met. Aristotle seeks to characterize substance by means of a recourse to criteria that permit distinguishing it from that which belongs to the accidental categories. In particular, he has recourse to the relation “to be said (to be predicated) of”: substance is that which is not said (predicated) of anything else. In VII.3 Aristotle presents a list of four senses in which “substance” is said. More precisely, these are four possible candidates for determining where the very “substantiality” of substantial objects is rooted, namely: essence (τὸ τί ἦν εἶναι), the universal (τὸ καθόλου), the genus (τὸ γένος), and, finally, the substrate (τὸ ὑποκείμενον) (1028b33–6). All of these candidates capture, in one or another

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY fashion, aspects that Aristotle himself wishes to retain in his own conception of substance. Nevertheless, not all of them provide equally adequate responses to the question of what is properly substantial in substantial objects. Of the four candidates mentioned, three— essence, universal, and genus—are linked, in one or another manner, to the formal determination of substantial objects, composed of form and matter, while the fourth—substrate—is linked instead with matter. In the course of the rest of book VII, that is, chapters 4–17, Aristotle examines the first three candidates, while in chapter 3 he discusses the range of the notion of substrate, which articulates a characteristic that, as is commonly believed, appears to correspond above all (malista) to substance (1028b37– 1029a1). “Substrate” is understood as that of which all other things are said or predicated, while it is itself not said or predicated of anything else (1028b36–7). From this characterization we derive a criterion of substantiality that could be termed the requirement of impredicability. Its application as the unique and exclusive criterion of substantiality in Met. VII.3 produces, nevertheless, an unsatisfactory result, because it results in converting into the sole substance something like a completely indeterminate matter, which cannot be identified or individualized by means of any description that corresponds to it per se. Indeed, if all formal determination is suppressed, there appears to remain nothing other than this indeterminate matter. Taking as an example of a substantial object, composed of form and matter, a bronze statue—in this case a statue of Apollo (1029a3–5)—Aristotle develops an argument in three steps, as follows: (1) of the composite object identified by reference to its form, taken as a subject, we predicate the accidental determinations of the

composite object (e.g. “the statue of Apollo is hard,” “brilliant,” “heavy,” “two meters high,” etc.); (2) the expression that refers to the formal determination of the object can be predicated, in turn, of the corresponding matter (e.g. “this piece of bronze is a (the) statue of Apollo”); finally, (3) the bronze is also an object comprised of form and matter, such that in this case as well we could pass the formal determination to the side of the predicate and predicate it of a different subject, possessing a simpler formal determination, which corresponds to the matter of the bronze, and so on, until we come to the level of the simplest bodies of all, that is, the four elements, below which there can only be postulated a prime matter, completely indeterminate. What the argument shows is: (1) that the object composed of form and matter better satisfies the requirement of impredicability than its accidental determinations, (2) that the matter of the composite object better satisfies it than the composite identified by reference to its form, and (3) that the poorer in formal determination matter is, the better it satisfies this requirement, such that it will be a completely undetermined matter, nonidentifiable per se under any definite description, which satisfies it to the greatest degree possible (1029a10–26): if we consider things in this way, pure and indeterminate matter will thus be the genuine and indeed only substance (1029a26–7).22 This conclusion is unacceptable (see 1029a27: ἀδύνατον δέ). Therefore, the argument shows that the notion of substrate, taken by itself, does not permit capturing all the defining features of that which constitutes a substantial object. Indeed, nobody seriously doubts that the composite objects of nature should count as substantial objects, although some thinkers also postulate the existence of other, different substances, in addition to

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY the objects composed of form and matter (see VII.2). It does not only pertain to substantial objects to be substrates but also, and in an equally essential fashion, it pertains to them to be capable of separate or independent existence (cho-riston) and to be identifiable as individual and formally determined objects (τόδε τι) (1029a27–8). Together with the requirement of impredicability, Aristotle introduces, therefore, a second complementary criterion of substantiality, which appeals to what could be called the requirement of separability and determination: substance is not a mere substrate, but always, at the same time, something capable of independent existence and, as such, also formally determined and identifiable under a certain description that corresponds to it per se. Insofar as pure and indeterminate matter does not satisfy this criterion, Aristotle concludes that both the object composed of form and matter as well as its formal-essential determination are substance to a greater degree than matter (1029b20–30). The position of Aristotle in VII.3 supposes, then, a balance between two criteria of substantiality, namely: (1) the criterion of “being a substrate,” expressed by the requirement of impredicability, and (2) the criterion of “being something possessed of independent existence and which is formally determined,” expressed by the requirement of separability and determination. At first glance, one might suppose that we are dealing with two different requirements, which do not maintain an internal linkage between them. Nevertheless, the argument developed in VII.3 shows, precisely, that a supposed substrate lacking all formal determination would definitively not be an independent object that is identifiable per se. As a result, neither could it constitute a genuine substrate that would give foundation to the existence of other entities, which could be

conceived as its accidental determinations, since any determination ultimately must be conceived of as the determination of something identifiable under a certain description that corresponds to it per se.23 The suppression of all formal-essential determination, insofar as such determination is constitutive for substantial objects, and its reduction to the status of a simple accidental determination of something different, of whose identity it no longer will form a part, would carry with it, definitively, the additional suppression of any genuine substrate (see Met. IV.4, 1007a20–b18).24 The criterion of separability and determination turns out, then, to be essential at the moment of characterizing substance. In this sense, Aristotle explains in Met. VII.1 that substance signifies something essentially determined, which constitutes a certain “this,”25 and is the only one among the categories able to exist independently. Conversely, all that which belongs to one of the other categories can only exist as an accident of something belonging to the category of substance, which constitutes the determined substrate (τὸ ὑποκείμενον . . . ὡρισμένον) for such accidents (1028a13–29). The fact that substance can exist independently of accidental determinations, while the latter, on the other hand, cannot exist independently of substance, implies that substance possesses what Aristotle defines as natural or ontological priority (πρῶτον φύσει or else πρῶτον οὺσίᾳ) (see Met. V.11, 1019a1–11; see also Cat. 12, 14a27–9, 14b10–22). Similarly, substance constitutes “that which is in a primary sense” (τὸ πρώτως ὄν) or “that which is, without other specifications” (ὂν ἁπλῶς), as opposed to the accidents, which only are in a relative sense (ὄν τι) (1028a30–1). But given that, just as in the case of “being,” “primary” is also said in many

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY ways (1028a31ff.), substance is primary in all the senses relevant here: in the definition (logo-i), in knowledge (gno-sei), and in time (chrono-i) (1028a32–3).26 On this basis, Aristotle concludes that just as “being” belongs in a basic and primary manner to substance, in the same way the essence (τὸ τί ἦν εἶναι) and the definition (horismos) also belong basically and primarily to substance; they belong to the other categories, on the other hand, only in a derivative manner (hepomeno-s) (see VII.4, 1030a17–32). In principle, this affects the relation between entities belonging to the category of substance, on the one hand, and entities belonging to the accidental categories, on the other, such that they are represented by terms such as, for instance, “man” and “white,” respectively. But something analogous also is valid for the case of the comparison between substance as such and the accidental unities that result from adding, via predication, a different accidental determination to a term that designates a substantial object. In this latter case, the relation that Aristotle has in mind is that which exists between simple terms such as “man,” on the one hand, and composite terms such as “white man,” on the other. Just as occurs in the case of accidents like “white,” it is also the case with accidental unities like “white man” that we cannot speak of essence and definition in anything other than a derived sense: insofar as they constitute the synthetic result derived from predicating one thing of another, different thing, accidental unities of the type “(substantial) object + accident” cannot indicate that which something is per se (1029b22–1030a7). Wherever there is accidental predication, there is no essence and definition, properly speaking. Therefore, the essence and the definition will correspond in a primary sense to that

which is primary, in the sense that it does not involve one thing being predicated of another, different, thing (1030a7–11). That is to say: there will only be genuine essence and definition in the case of an articulation of the genus-species type, which is not analogous to the type of synthetic articulation that constitutes an accidental unity: “rational animal,” as a supposed definition of “man,” thus constitutes a type of significative articulation completely different from that which is presented by accidental unities such as “white man” (1030a11–14). This is valid also for the case of those accidental unities in which the accident that forms part of them constitutes a type of determination that can only exist in a single specific type of substantial object, such that the substantial object need not even be explicitly mentioned, as such. This is the case of the so-called per se accidents or per se attributes (see VII.5, 1030b31: πάθος καθ’ αὑτό; see also V.30, 1025a30–4: συμβεβηκός . . . καθ’ αὑτό): hence, it is also not the case that unities of the type “(substantial) object + per se accident” provide examples of things that possess essence and definition in a primary sense (see VII.5).27 The logical and gnoseological priority of substance reflects, on the plane of discourse and knowledge, its ontological priority, and implies that only in the case of substance is there genuine identity between the thing and its own essence (see VII.6). In the case of accidental unity, conversely, such identity does not exist, since, definitively, there is no essence proper to accidental unity qua accidental unity. If we had to say, for instance, what the essence of “white man” is, we would have to say, definitively, that it is nothing other than the essence of “man”: “white man” is, hence, different from its own essence (1031a19–28). For its part, the accident, taken in isolation, is also not identical with

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY its own essence, since the accident cannot be defined in an independent manner: its definition will involve, in a mediate or immediate fashion, a reference to substance. The accident never exists per se in an independent manner, but rather always exists in a substance, which is equivalent to saying that, from the ontological point of view, there are no accidents apart from accidental unities, but the accidental unity of which an accident forms a part is not identical with the essence of the given accident (1031b22–8). The identity between something and its essence thus remains restricted to the domain in which there are essence and definition in a primary sense, which is nothing other than the domain in which “being” is said in a primary sense, namely: the domain demarcated by the category of substance. We have already seen that the argument of Met. VII.3 makes it clear that what is properly substantial in substantial objects cannot be given by the matter, since a genuine substrate is necessarily something capable of separate existence and, as such, something determined formally-essentially. The fundamental role of the moment that accounts for this formal-essential determination is thrown into new relief in the light of the priority of substance in VII.1 and, in particular, of the connection between substance and essence in VII.4–6. On this basis, Aristotle shows in VII.10–12 that the definition, which constitutes the statement that articulates the essence of the thing defined, has as its correlate just the form of the object defined in each case. Indeed, the genus-species articulation proper to a genuine definition accounts for the unity that corresponds to the constitutive elements of the form, and does not make reference, conversely, to the material parts of the object composed of form and matter (see VII.11). The unity of the definition is thus founded

on the unity of the object being defined, considered from the point of view of that formal-essential determination that makes it precisely what it is, and not some other thing. This unity is expressed in the relation between the proximate genus and the specific difference, and thus is not assimilable to the type of composition that gives rise to accidental unities (see VII.12, 1037b13–27). Thus it is not surprising that, upon concluding the discussion of substance in Met. VII, in chapter 17, Aristotle identifies the form (eidos), and neither the matter nor the material parts, as that which is properly substantial in substantial objects, given that it is the formal-essential determination of the object that explains, definitively, that the object, with its particular material constitution, is what it is, and not something else (see VII.17, 1041a20–b9). Similarly, Aristotle denominates the substantial form as the first cause of being (αἴτιον πρῶτον τοῦ εἶναι) of the object (1041b28).28 As is shown by Aristotle’s critique of the Platonic conception of the Ideas and, in general, of the attempt to erect universal entities at the level of independent substantial entities (see VII.13–16), this substantial form cannot, certainly, be thought of in the manner of generic universals, since the latter lack existence independently of the corresponding subordinated forms: for example, there is no “animal” outside or independently of “man,” “ox,” “dog,” etc., since the genus “animal” is predicated of each of the species that fall under it. These latter, conversely, are not predicated of other species, but only of the multiplicity of individuals that fall under them, and this occurs in the manner in which the form is predicated of matter, and not in the manner in which a genus is predicated of the species, or the way in which an accident is predicated of a corresponding substantial object

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY (see VII.13, 1038b5–6).29 Thus, specific substantial forms provide the means that permit identifying these individuals as substantial objects belonging to a natural type or class of things, such that later, identified in this way via the corresponding terms, they can function as subjects for the predication of other determinations, via statements of the form S-P. This identifying function permits, for the first time, the identification of entities that can function as genuine subjects of predication, and distinguishes the substantial form from all generic universals, without it being the case that the substantial form need be considered as something particular, insofar as it itself is the correlate of the definition and the element common to all the individuals of a given species.30

THE DIVINE SUBSTANCE In chapters 6–10 of book XII Aristotle presents us with a consideration of the divine substance. At least from a certain perspective, this consideration can be seen as the end point toward which the discussion leads and which was initiated with the presentation of the idea of wisdom as a science of the causes and ultimate principles of all things in book I. This point, nevertheless, can only be held to be valid while keeping in mind a series of restrictions, since, from the point of view of the compostion of the Met., there is no way to force a continuity that lacks any kind of fissures between the books mentioned. In particular, book XII originally constituted, in the judgment of the majority of commentators, an independently written treatise, and is, to a certain degree, self-contained; at some later point, it was integrated into the work we know today as the Metaphysics.31 And, in

regard to its date of composition, W. Jaeger already held that it should be considered as an independent text, prior, at least in its fundamental part, to books VII–IX.32 This position has been taken up again recently by certain commentators, who hold that, on the basis of its conception of first philosophy, the book would be close, in general, to the position reflected in book II,33 the authenticity of which, as is well known, is a point of contention. Whatever the case may be, in regard to the manner in which Aristotle discusses the existence and nature of the divine substance, there are nevertheless no substantive reasons to hold that the conception presented in XII.6–10 is, simpliciter, incompatible with the general lines of the position elaborated in the preceding books. On the contrary, we find here important fundamental aspects that coincide. This turns out to be completely reasonable. Indeed, even in the case that the chapters of XII dedicated to the divine substance were composed before books VII–XII, nothing would prevent the conception of the divine substance elaborated in these chapters from having later influenced the manner in which Aristotle himself elaborated his conception of sensible substance, composed of form and matter. Book XII, whose general title presents it as a treatment of substance, in general, is made up of three parts, namely: an introduction (XII.1), a summary presentation of the principles of sensible substances (XII.2–5), and finally a discussion of supersensible substance and, in particular, the divine substance (XII.6–10). In XII.1 Aristotle introduces the distinction between three types of substances: corruptible sensible substance, incorruptible sensible substance and nonsensible substance (see XII.1, 1069a30–b7). In the discussion of sensible substance that follows, in XII.2–5,

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY Aristotle first briefly presents his conception of substance subject to change, as composed of form and matter (see XII.2–3). Later, he turns to the important question of whether the principles of all sensible things are the same or different, a question to which he responds by way of the introduction of what would later be termed a doctrine of the analogy of the principles and causes. The principles and causes of sensible substances are not, for all of such substances, numerically the same, but rather they are analogically the same: both the triad “matter (substrate)”—“form”— “privation” and the four causes (see XII.4) as well as the opposition between “act” and “potency” (see XII.5) apply analogically to all sensible substances. Nevertheless, already here in this context Aristotle emphasizes that there is, in addition, one first principle in act (XII.5, 1071a36: τὸ πρῶτον ἐντελεχείᾳ), which is numerically the same for all things. On this basis, Aristotle develops in XII.6 an argument intended to demonstrate that there must be an immobile first mover, eternal and substantial, which exists purely in act, as the ultimate cause of the movement of nature as a whole (1071b4–5). The argument proceeds in the following manner: (1) substance is what is ontologically primary, upon which everything else depends for its existence, so that if all substances were corruptible, all things would also be corruptible (1071b5–6); nevertheless, (2) it is impossible that the movement of nature had a beginning or will have an end, since it is eternal (1071b6–7);34 and (3) the same is valid for time, which cannot have begun before nor cease afterwards, since “before and after” are only possible within time itself (see Met. XII.6, 1071b7–9);35 therefore, (4) movement and time, which is a determination of the former, must be continuous, in the sense of continuing without interruption

(1071b9–10), a condition that in the case of movement, nevertheless, can only be satisfied by the circular movement of the heavens, which provides, therefore, the only possible support for the extensive continuity of time (1071b10–11); nevertheless, (5) such an eternal and continuous movement can only be caused by a mover that is itself permanently in act (1071b12–20). As various commentators have emphasized,36 it is important to note that the argument does not pass directly from the eternity of movement to the existence of a first immobile mover, but rather, as an intermediate step, also proves that there is an incorruptible mobile substance, which is the subject of eternal circular movement, specifically, the stars. This intermediate step follows from the conjunction of the affirmation of the eternity of the circular movement of the heavens, contained in (4), and the thesis of the ontological priority of substance, contained in (1). It is certain that the formulation of XII.6 is not sufficiently explicit concerning this point, but this interpretation is confirmed by the fact that in XII.7, on taking the argument up again, Aristotle affirms that he has proven the existence of something that is always in incessant, circular movement, and explicitly mentions the first heaven (1072a21–3). However it may be, returning to the argument of XII.6, there can be no doubt that the final conclusion contained in (5), which refers to a motor that is permanently in action, no longer alludes to the stars, but to the first immobile mover, since Aristotle next explains that a substance of such a type would have to not only be eternal but also, in addition, be entirely lacking in matter (1071b20–2). The nature of this eternal and immaterial substance, which holds office as the first immobile mover with respect to the totality

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY of the cosmos, is studied in chapters 7 and 9, fundamentally. The movement of the stars, which is eternal and unceasing, is a concurrent cause of the motions and processes proper to the sublunar region of the world. This eternal movement must have, in turn, a cause, which cannot be moved by any other thing, since, to the contrary, we would have to suppose that it hosts within itself potentiality and contingency—as does everything that is subject to movement (1072b4–5)— and then the series of explanations would continue ad infinitum: such an ultimate cause must be, then, something that moves without being moved, and must be an eternal substance that is existent purely in act (1072a19–26). But how can something of this type move without being moved, on the supposition that every time something moves another thing by performing an action on the latter, it receives, in turn, an action on the part of the latter? Aristotle responds: in the manner in which the object of amorous desire does (ὡς ἐρώμενον), which moves without being moved (1072b3–4), in the same manner as the object of thought (1072a26–30). Although there are those who believe the contrary,37 it appears to be correct that the explanation of Aristotle seeks to suggest that the first immobile mover moves the stars in the manner of a final cause, and not as an efficient cause. As Aristotle makes clear, foreseeing a possible objection, everything occurs in such a way that the first mover does not itself suffer movement when moving, while objects of desire belonging to the realm of the sensible do experience change, when they are finally reached by that which desires them.38 On just such a principle, explains Aristotle, depend the heavens and, more generally, the entirety of nature (1072b13–14). And to that principle there belongs, in a continual

manner, that type of activity that is most perfect and also most pleasant, in which human beings only participate in an episodic fashion (1072b14–16; see also NE X.7, 1177b24–1178a8). More concretely, this is the activity proper to thinking (noesis) (see Met. XII.7, 1072b16–19). To this degree, God has life, since the activity of the intellect is life (1072b24–7). And further: the life of God is, per se, eternal and most perfect (1072b27–30). In XII.9 Aristotle completes the description of the essence of the first mover understood as pure thought. In so doing, he asks the following question concerning the object of this thought: what is it that the divine intellect thinks? And he responds by saying that it cannot think anything other than itself, since it can only contemplate that which is most divine and which is free of all change (see XII.9, 1074b15–34). In this sense, in the case of the activity of the divine intellect, what we have is a “thought of thinking” (νόησις νοήσεως), as Aristotle expresses the point in a formula that has become immortalized. This characterization of the activity of the divine intellect and its object leads, certainly, to a series of questions, such as whether Aristotle, in Met. XII excludes not only divine providence but also any knowledge of the world on the part of God, which would be a clear contrast with the vision of a provident god and which Plato had already presented at length in the Timaeus.39 Commentators have debated this and other questions connected with conception of the divine substance of Met. XII. But Aristotle says little explicitly in the text concerning the relation that links God with the world. In any case, in XII.10 Aristotle discusses, at least, one aspect of the more general problem, in asking the question concerning the manner in which the Good is present in the universe: is this

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY Good reduced to the order of the universe itself, or is it rather something separated and existing per se? (1075a11–13). Aristotle’s response suggests that it is necessary to link in one single explanation both alternatives, and compares the relation that links God, as an immaterial and separated substance, on the one hand, and the ordered totality of the universe, on the other, with the relation that exists between the general and the army that acts upon his orders. Indeed, the totality of the army acquires the order that is proper to it only in virtue of the common reference, be it direct or indirect, of all its parts to the general, which thus constitutes the cause of this order (1075a13–15). It is also in this way that all the things of nature are ordered, albeit in different manners and by means of multiple reciprocal relations, to a single end of the cosmic totality, which, in its entirety, constitutes an ordering comparable to a family dwelling, which serves the good of the family as a whole (1075a16–25). A last, difficult point has to do with the number of immobile movers. This aspect connects with the attempt at harmonizing metaphysics and astronomy that Aristotle introduces in XII.8, a chapter that W. Jaeger considered to be a later insertion, which Aristotle had composed later in his life, for the purpose of reformulating his theological conception in terms that would be compatible with the development of astronomical science.40 In this chapter, Aristotle upholds the thesis that the number of unmoved movers should be determined by astronomy, which would be the closest science to philosophy among the mathematical sciences, insofar as it has as its object a certain type of substance: sensible, eternal substance (see XII.8, 1073b1–17). More specifically, Aristotle determines the number of movers to match the number of spheres that account for the

movement of the stars, for which purpose he adopts a modified version of the astronomical system of Eudoxus of Cnidus and Callippus of Athens. Aristotle thus postulates a total of 55 spheres (47, if we leave aside those that correspond to the sun and the moon) (1073b17–1074a14), and holds that the number of unmoved movers will have to be the same, although he admits that this is only a reasonable conjecture (eulogon) (1074a14–31).41 On the basis of this association between the astronomical conception of the spheres and the theory of the unmoved movers, Aristotle recovers the core of the ancient tradition of astral theology, which sees the stars as divine entities, although his own conception would be stripped of mythological encrustations, of an anthropomorphic and zoomorphic character, which later tradition added on (1074a38–b14). Whatever the case may be, the introduction of this plurality of unmoved movers in XII.8 contrasts clearly with the conclusion of the discussion of the divine substance, where, after criticizing conceptions such as that of Speusippus, which did not account satisfactorily for the unity that the cosmic order must possess, Aristotle states that things do not wish to be badly governed, and introduces the famous citation of Homer: “the government of many is not good, only one should be king” (XII.10, 1075b37–1076a4).42 Alejandro G. Vigo

NOTES 1

The discussion in Nicomachean Ethics VI is habitually considered as belonging to the late phase of Aristotle’s philosophical production, whereas the treatment in Metaphysics I.1–2 belongs, without a doubt, to the earlier period, and corresponds closely to the conception presented in the Protrepticus, a document which

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY is an exhortation to the philosophical life. See Jaeger, 1923, 68–72; Dumoulin, 1986, 41–52. 2 Lines 981b25–9, which refer to the distinction established in NE VI, appear to be a gloss added later, as indicated by Jaeger, 1957, 3 in apparatu ad loc. The identification of techne- and episte-me- in Met. I.1 corresponds to the Platonic usage of both terms. See Dumoulin, 1986, 43 ff. 3 See Snell, 1924, 1–20. 4 For a comparison of Aristotle and Hegel in this respect, see Mondolfo, 1963, 33–54. 5 For a discussion of the scope of this position, see Aubenque, 1962, 222–36. 6 For a reconstruction of the connection between essential properties and identity in the light of the contemporary theory of sortal terms, see Rapp, 1995, 109–51, 433–68. A useful comparison of the Aristotelian position with essentialist positions of the type elaborated by S. Kripke is found in Witt, 1989, chap. 6. 7 For some of the specific problems which are presented by the Aristotelian treatment of the notion of existence, which does not occupy a central position in Aristotle’s ontological reflection, see Owen, 1965, and Rapp, 1995, 304–46. 8 See Owen, 1960. 9 The first position is defended by Owen, 1960, 173–9, and the second, conversely, by Irwin, 1981. For a systematic reconstruction of the different forms of equivocity considered by Aristotle, see Shields, 1999, 9–42. 10 See, for example, Kirwan, 1993, 140–3. 11 See Ross, 1924, I, 306–7. 12 See Reale, 1994, 33, 109–14. 13 See Décarie, 1954; Cleary, 1994 and 1995, 431–8. The classification in VI.1 presents both textual and systematic difficulties, in particular, in the case of physics. Indeed, the references to “separated” entities, though subject to movement, derived from line 1026a14, is based on a correction of the transmitted text, which gives the opposite reading “not separated.” The correction, introduced by A. Schwegler in 1847, was, in principle, admitted by the most important modern editors (W. D. Ross and W. Jaeger), but its legitimacy was strongly questioned later. 14 For this distinction, see Met. XII.1, 1069a30–b2; XII.6, 1071b3–5. 15 See Jaeger, 1923, 226–8.

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See Merlan, 1953, 160–220 and 1957. See Frede, 2000 and 2000a. For the model of unity by succession, a different type of nonaccidental homonymy, which constitutes a stronger variant of the πρὸς ἓν model, see IV.2, 1005a8–11, with the commentary of Alexander of Aphrodisias, In Met. 263, 25–35. See also Robin, 1908, 168–70, notes III–V. See Berti, 1975 and 1998. See Frede, 1987; Cleary, 1988, 70–5; and Vigo, 1991, 124–7. This line of interpretation goes back to Patzig, 1960–1. See Heidegger, 1957. For a detailed discussion of the argument in 1029a10–26, see Bostock, 1994, 76–80. For a good reconstruction of the connection between identifiability and formal-essential determination in Aristotle, in the light of the contemporary notion of a sortal dependency of identity, see Rapp, 1995, 408–32 and 433–68, where the connection between substantiality and identity is discussed in the light of the criteria of substantiality. For the problems linked with the relation between the substantial object and its matter, see also Lewis, 1994. For this point, see Liske, 1985, 300–2; Hafemann, 1998, 77–83. See 1028a11ff.: τί ἐστι καὶ τόδε τι. For different interpretations of this expression, which in composite form only appears in this passage, see Ross, 1924, II, 159ff. ad loc.; Frede and Patzig, 1988, II, 11–15 ad loc. Priority in definition establishes that that which pertains to the category of substance can be defined without reference to its accidents, while that which belongs to an accidental category cannot be defined without making reference to something that pertains to the category of substance (see 1028a33–6). Priority in knowledge establishes that the knowledge of that which is essential has priority with respect to any other knowledge referring to a given thing (see 1028a36–b2), with the understanding that only that which belongs to the category of substance has essence, in the most basic and primary sense of the term. Finally, contrary to what is suggested by the interpretation that has been most broadly accepted since Ps-Alexander, priority in time should not be understood as chronological precedence, but rather as the priority of that which is permanent with respect

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY

27

28

29

30

31 32

33 34

35

36 37

38

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to that which is transitory and variable due to change (see Vigo, 1999). For the different senses of “primary,” see Cat. 12 and Met. V.11, and the discussions in Cleary, 1988, 21–52 and Vigo, 1989. The famous example that Aristotle employs for this type of case is that of the “snub (nose)” (τὸ σιμόν = ῥὶς σιμή). These are attributes that already involve a reference to that in which they exist as in their proper subject. These cases illustrate the close relation that links formal determinations and the matter in which these determinations have their reality, in the case of composite objects that are the topic of sciences like physics and biology. These sciences do not study mere abstract forms, after the fashion of mathematics, but rather also consider the corresponding matter. For these aspects, see Mansion, 1969. For this treatment of the substantial form as cause of the being of the object, see Morrison, 1996. See also VII.3, 1029a1–5, with the commentary of Ross, 1924, II, 164–5 ad 1029a2. For an interpretation of the Aristotelian critique of the conception of the universal as substance in VII.13–16, at the line suggested above, see Rapp, 1996. The particularity of the substantial form is defended, on the other hand, by authors such as Irwin, 1988, 245–69; Frede, 1987a; and Frede and Patzig, 1988, I, 36–42, 48–57, among others. See Frede, 2000, 1–3. See Jaeger, 1923, 230–6. See also Düring, 1966, 39f., 202–24. See Berti, 1983, 289ff.; Donini, 2002, 198. For the demonstration of the eternity of the natural movement alluded to here, see Physics VIII.1–3. For a complementary argument concerning the impossibility of a beginning or end of time, see Phys. IV.13, 222a33–b2. See Oehler, 1955; Berti, 2000, 182–3. See, for example, Broadie, 1993; Berti, 1997 and 2000. See 1072b1–3, with the commentary of Ross, 1924, II, 376–7 ad loc. For a good, recent defense of the interpretation of the first mover as exclusively a final cause, see Natali, 1997. See, for example, Aubenque, 1962, 355–68; Owens, 1979, 219–22.

40

41

42

See Jaeger, 1923, 366–92. For the general question of the development of the theology of Aristotle, see von Arnim, 1931; Guthrie, 1933 and 1934. For a discussion of the entirety of the conception presented in XII.8, see Lloyd, 2000. For the citation from Homer, see Iliad II, 204.

REFERENCES Álvarez Gómez, A. and R. Martínez Castro (eds), En torno a Aristóteles. Homenaje al Profesor Pierre Aubenque, Santiago de Compostela: Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, 1998. Arnim, H. von, “Die Entwicklung der Aristotelischen Gotteslehre,” Sitzungsberichte der Akademie der Wissenschaften in Wien, philosophisch-historische Klasse, 212.5 (1931), 3–80; reprinted in: Hager, 1969, 1–74. Aubenque, P., Le problème de l’être chez Aristote, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 4th edn, 1977 [1962]. — (ed.), Études sur la Métaphysique d’Aristote. Actes du VIe Symposium Aristotelicum, Paris: Vrin, 1979. Barnes, J., M. Schofield, and R. Sorabji (eds), Articles on Aristotle, vol. 3: Metaphysics, London: Duckworth, 1979. Berti, E., “Logical and Ontological Priority among the Genera of Substance in Aristotle,” in Mansfeld and de Rijk, 1975, 55–69; Italian version: “Priorità logica e priorità ontologica fra i generi di sostanza in Aristotele,” in Berti, Studi aristotelici, L’Aquila: Japadre, 1975, 261–73. —, “La fonction de Métaph. Alpha Elatton dans la philosophie d’Aristote,” in Moreaux and Wiesner, 1983, 260–94.

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY —, “Da chi è amato il motore immobile? Su Aristotele, Metaph. XII 6–7,” Méthexis, X, 1997, 59–82. —, “Il concetto di ‘primo’ nella Metafisica di Aristotele,” in Álvarez Gómez and Martínez Castro, 1998, 131–48. —, “Unmoved Mover(s) as Efficient Cause(s) in Metaphysics Λ 6,” in Frede and Charles, 2000, 181–206. Bostock, D., Aristotle. Metaphysics Books Z and H, Oxford: Clarendon, 1995 [1994]. Broadie, S., “Que fait le premier moteur d’Aristote. Sur la théologie du livre Lambda de la Métaphysique,” Revue philosophique de la France et de l’Étranger, CLXXXIII (1993), 375–411. Cleary, J. J., Aristotle on the Many Senses of Priority, Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1988. —, “Emending Aristotle’s Division of the Theoretical Sciences,” Review of Metaphysics, XLVIII.1 (1994), 33–70. —, Aristotle and Mathematics. Aporetic Method in Cosmology and Metaphysics, Leiden/New York/Köln: Brill, 1995. Décarie, V., “La Physique porte-t-elle sur des ‘non-séparés’ (acho-rista)? Note sur Aristote, Métaphysique E 1, 1026a14,” Revue des Sciences Philosophiques et Théologiques, 38 (1954), 466–8. Donini, P., “Il libro Lambda della Metafisica e la nascita della filosofia prima,” Rivista di storia della filosofia, 57 (2002), 181–99. Dumoulin, B., Analyse Génétique de la Métaphysique d’Aristote, Montréal: Les Éditions Bellarmin; Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1986. Düring, I., Aristoteles. Darstellung und Interpretation seines Denkens, Heidelberg: Winter, 1966.

— (ed.), Naturphilosophie bei Aristoteles und Theophrast. Verhandlungen des 4. Symposium Aristotelicum veranstaltet in Göteborg, August 1966, Heidelberg: Stiehm, 1969. Frede, M., “The Unity of Special and General Metaphysics,” in Frede, 1987, 81–95. —, “Substance in Aristotle’s Metaphysics,” in Frede, Essays in Ancient Philosophy, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1987, 72–80. —, “Introduction,” in Frede and Charles, 2000, 1–52. —, “Metaphysics Λ 1,” in Frede and Charles, 2000, 53–80. Frede, M. and D. Charles (eds), Aristotle’s Metaphysics Lambda. Symposium Aristotelicum, Oxford: Clarendon, 2000. Frede, M. and G. Patzig, Aristoteles, Metaphysik Z. Text, Übersetzung und Kommentar, vol. I: Einleitung, Text und Übersetzung, vol. II: Kommentar, München: Beck, 1988. Guthrie, W. C. K., “The Development of Aristotle’s Theology—I,” The Classical Quarterly, XXVII (1933), 162–71; German version in Hager (1969), 75–95. — “The Development of Aristotle’s Theology––II,” The Classical Quarterly, XXVIII (1934), 90–8; German version in Hager (1969), 96–113. Hafemann, B., Aristoteles Transzendentaler Realismus. Inhalt und Umfang erster Prinzipien in der Metaphysik, Berlin/New York: de Gruyter, 1998. Hager, F. P. (ed.), Metaphysik und Theologie des Aristoteles, Darmstadt: WBG, 2nd edn, 1979 [1969]. Heidegger, M., “Die onto-theo-logische Verfassung der Metaphysik,” in Identität

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY und Differenz, Pfullingen: G. Neske, 8th edn, 1986 [1957], 31–67. Irwin, T., “Homonymy in Aristotle,” Review of Metaphysics, XXXIV.4 (1981), 523–44. —, Aristotle’s First Principles, Oxford: Clarendon, 1990 [1988]. Jaeger, W., Aristoteles. Grundlegung einer Geschichte seiner Entwicklung, Berlin: Weidmann, 2nd edn, 1955 [1923]. —, Aristotelis Metaphysica, Oxford: Clarendon, 1957. Kirwan, C., Aristotle. Metaphysics Books Γ, Δ and E, Oxford: Clarendon, 2nd edn, 1993. Lewis, F. A., “Aristotle on the Relation between a Thing and Its Matter,” in Scaltsas, Charles, and Gill, 1994, 247–77. Liske, M. T., Aristoteles und der aristotelische Essentialismus. Individuum, Art, Gattung, Freiburg/München: Alber, 1985. Lloyd, G. E. R., “Metaphysics Λ 8,” in Frede and Charles, 2000, 245–73. Mansfeld, J. and L. M. de Rijk (eds), Kephalaion. Studies in Greek Philosophy and its Continuation Offered to Professor C. J. de Vogel, Assen: Van Gorcum, 1975. Mansion, S., “Tò simón et définition physique,” in Düring, 1969, 124–32; reprinted in: Mansion, 1984, 347–55. —, Études Aristotéliciennes. Recueil d’Articles, ed. J. Follon, Louvain: Éditions de l’Institut Supérieur de Philosophie, 1984. Merlan, Ph., From Platonism to Neoplatonism, The Hague: Nijhoff, 1953. —, “Metaphysik: Name und Gegenstand,” Journal for Hellenic Studies, 77 (1957), 87–92; reprinted in: Hager, 1969, 251–65. Mondolfo, R., Problemas y métodos de investigación en la historia de la filosofía,

Buenos Aires: Eudeba, 3rd edn, 1969 [1963]. Moreaux, P. and J. Wiesner (eds), Zweifelhaftes im Corpus Aristotelicum. Studien zu einigen Dubia. Akten des 9. Symposium Aristotelicum (Berlin, 7.-16. September 1981), Berlin/New York: de Gruyter, 1983. Morrison, D., “Substance as Cause (Z 17),” in Rapp, 1996, 193–207. Natali, C., “Causa motrice e causa finale nel libro Lambda della Metafisica di Aristote,” Méthexis X (1997), 105–23. Oehler, K., “Der Beweis für den unbewegten Beweger bei Aristoteles,” Philologus, 99 (1955), 70–92. Owen, G. E. L., “Logic and Metaphysics in some Earlier Works of Aristotle,” in Düring and Owen, 1960, 163–90; reprinted in: Barnes, Schofield and Sorabji, 1979, 13–32 and Owen, 1986, 180–99. —, “Inherence,” Phronesis, 10 (1965), 97–105; reprinted in: Owen, 1986, 252–8. —, Logic, Science and Dialectic. Collected Papers in Greek Philosophy, ed. M. Nussbaum, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1986. Owens, J., “The Relation of God to world in the Metaphysics,” in Aubenque, 1979, 207–28. Patzig, G., “Theologie und Ontologie in der Metaphysik des Aristoteles,” Kant-Studien, 52 (1960–1), 185–205; English version in: Barnes, Schofield and Sorabji, 1979, 33–49. Rapp, C., Identität, Persistenz und Substantialität. Untersuchung zum Verhältnis von sortalen Termen und Aristotelischer Substanz, Freiburg/ München: Alber, 1995. —, “Kein Allgemeines ist Substanz (Z 13, 14–16),” in Metaphysik. Die

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FIRST PHILOSOPHY Substanzbücher (Z,H,Θ), Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1996, 157–91. Reale, G., Il concetto di “filosofia prima” e l’unità della Metafisica di Aristotele, Milano: Vita e Pensiero, 6th edn, 1994. Robin, L., La Théorie Platonicienne des Idées et des Nombres d’après Aristote, Hildesheim/Zürich/New York: Olms, 1984 [Paris: Alcan, 1908]. Ross, W. D., Aristotle. Metaphysics, vol. I: Books I–VI, vol. II: Books VII–XIV, Oxford: Clarendon, 1924. Scaltsas, Th., D. Charles, and M. L. Gill (eds), Unity, Identity, and Explanation in Aristotle’s Metaphysics, Oxford: Clarendon, 1994. Shields, C., Order in Multiplicity, Homonymy in the Philosophy of Aristotle, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999. Snell, B., Die Ausdrücke für den Begriff des Wissens in der vorplatonischen

Philosophie, Hildesheim / Zürich / New York: Olms, 1992 [Berlin: Weidemann, 1924]. Vigo, A. G., “Prioridad y prioridad ontológica según Aristóteles,” Philosophica, 12 (1989), 89–113; reprinted in: Vigo, 2006, 23–54. —, “Prioridad y proyecto ontológico en Aristóteles. A propósito de una interpretación reciente,” Méthexis, IV (1991), 115–127; reprinted in: Vigo, 2006, 407–21. —, “Aristóteles, Pseudo-Alejandro y la prioridad temporal de la sustancia (Metaph. Z 1, 1028a32-b2),” Elenchos, XX:1 (1999), 75–107; reprinted in: Vigo, 2006, 185–212. —, Estudios aristotélicos, Pamplona: EUNSA, 2006. Witt, Ch., Substance and Essence in Aristotle. An Interpretation of Metaphysics VII–IX, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1994 [1989].

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9 FIRST PHILOSOPHY, TRUTH, AND THE HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS

ψελλιζομένῃ γὰρ ἔοικεν ἡ πρώτη φιλοσοφία περὶ πάντων, ἅτε νέα τε καὶ κατ᾽ ἀρχὰς οὖσα. For the earliest philosophy is, on all subjects, like one who lisps, since in its beginnings it is but a child. Arist. Metaphysics I.9, 993a15–16 εἰ μὲν οὖν μὴ ἔστι τις ἑτέρα οὐσία παρὰ τὰς φύσει συνεστηκυίας, ἡ φυσικὴ ἂν εἴη πρώτη ἐπιστήμη· εἰ δ´ ἔστι τις οὐσία ἀκίνητος, αὕτη προτέρα καὶ φιλοσοφία πρώτη, καὶ καθόλου οὕτως ὅτι πρώτη· καὶ περὶ τοῦ ὄντος ᾗ ὂν ταύτης ἂν εἴη θεωρῆσαι, καὶ τί ἐστι καὶ τὰ ὑπάρχοντα ᾗ ὄν. If there is no substance other than those which are formed by nature, natural science will be the first science; but if there is an immovable substance, the science of this must be prior and must be first philosophy, and universal in this way, because it is first. And it will belong to this to consider being qua being—both what it is and the attributes which belong to it qua being.1 Arist. Metaphysics VI.1, 1026a27–32

I What has come to be known as Aristotle’s Metaphysics is a collection of 14 treatises edited and arranged in order by Andronicus of Rhodes in the first-century bc.2 Andronicus, the head of the Peripatetic school in Athens, was not a mere grammarian. By placing the collection of those 14 treatises after the Physics in his edition of Aristotle’s esoteric works Andronicus left it to posterity to know the collection as Ta meta ta phusika or “The after the Physics.”

It is certainly not due to an accident of history that the collection of Aristotle’s metaphysical treatises is so named. The title of the work implies a transcendence of the domain of nature and of the perceptible things contained therein. Aristotle himself believed that the study of what he called “first philosophy” (or “theological [i.e. science]” or “wisdom” and even simply “philosophy”), that is, the science of which his Metaphysics is a sketch, should begin after the completion of the study of physics. First philosophy

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS comes last in the curriculum of the philosopher because it is first in the order of nature. And it is first in the order of nature because it deals (1) with the principles and causes of everything, (2) with being qua being, and (3) with divine substance. How these different subjects are related to each other is a hotly debated issue of interpretation, and we shall give a few hints toward its solution below. Of all theoretical sciences Aristotle’s first philosophy had the aspiration of being the most universal, even more universal than mathematics or physics in their various subdivisions. But first philosophy was also the most speculative science because even its legitimacy as a science was a debatable issue.3 The Metaphysics shows us the philosopher in his workshop, struggling with perplexities that are not less enduring for being formulated in such clear-cut ways for the first time in Western thinking. The contents of the work as a whole and the form in which it has been transmitted constitute an invitation for us to actually think the topics raised in it rather than passively listen to results already reached by another. Perhaps more than any other extant work in Aristotle’s corpus the Metaphysics engages the reader in the task of interpretation. We may suppose that this is an effect intended by Aristotle himself—not unlike the purpose behind Plato’s composition of philosophical dialogues. In what follows we shall accept the invitation presented by the structure of Aristotle’s Metaphysics and give some preliminary answers to the question about the relation of first philosophy to the history of being. Our primary focus will be selected chapters from books I, II, VI, and IX of the Metaphysics. The peculiarities of the Metaphysics can be seen against the background of Aristotle’s standard method of dealing with the past,

philosophical or otherwise, and his explicit views on history.4

II One of the methods of philosophical inquiry that Aristotle is famous for is that of investigating the reputable opinions handed down to the present. Reputable opinions (endoxa or, elsewhere, hupole-pseis) are defined as those opinions “which are accepted by everyone or by the majority or by the wise.”5 In most of his surviving works Aristotle begins his exploration with a survey of views held by previous Greeks either collectively or individually. In the first book of the Nicomachean Ethics, for instance, he delves into the problem of human well-being (eudaimonia) through a collection of the attributes that human thriving is assumed to possess by sages such as Solon and Plato, communities such as the Pythagoreans, and the common people at large. In the first book of his work On the Soul he raises the question of the essence of the soul as principle of life in all animate things with an investigation of the doctrines about psuche- put forward by Greek philosophers from the archaic age to his own time. “For our study of soul it is necessary,” he writes, “while formulating the problems of which in our further advance we are to find solutions, to call into council the views of those of our predecessors who have declared any opinion on this subject, in order that we may profit by whatever is sound in their suggestions and avoid their errors.”6 Aristotle conducted inquiries into the history of Greek philosophy and science in order to find solutions to clearly formulated questions. His aim was not the history of a certain subject as such but the truth of the subject-matter itself. “[I]n the case of all

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS discoveries,” he writes toward the end of the Sophistical Refutations, the results of previous labours that have been handed down from others have been advanced bit by bit by those who have taken them on, whereas the original discoveries generally make an advance that is small at first though much more useful than the development which later springs out of them. . . . This is in fact what has happened in regard to rhetorical speeches and to practically all the other arts. . . . Of the present inquiry, on the other hand, it was not the case that part of the work has been thoroughly done before, while part had not. Nothing existed at all.7 The self-admiring joy that these lines convey is the result of the fact that in the subject of argument and valid inference Aristotle found no legacy to base his inquiries upon. He had, rather, to create the theoretical framework of logic all by himself. The view of history that the above quotation implies seems to be that of progressive evolution. But the progress that Aristotle had in mind was neither the linear nor the endless progress of the modern Age of Reason.8 It was not meant to be endless because Aristotle believed that the full truth of whatever is to be known is an achievable goal rather than a constantly approachable but never realizable ideal, and sometimes his words betray the optimism that the goal really stands close by. Aristotle abhorred infinity as the sign par excellence of incompletion and imperfection.9 Time and again, his arguments rest on the claim that the opposite view would involve an infinite regress, a result considered to be conclusive refutation of the thesis that entailed it. What is more, “nobody would attempt to do something,” he writes in the Metaphysics, “if they were not to reach the end.”10 The

very finitude of Aristotle’s universe and the priority of actuality over potentiality in all domains and ultimately in all respects11 logically implied that there are no latent possibilities in the world at large. But the progress to which history testified was not meant to be linear either. In several passages Aristotle, possibly influenced by Plato’s idea of mankind’s past destructions by conflagration or deluge, speaks of an infinite number of times in which a total or quasi-total annihilation of all human arts and sciences occurred.12 Only some remnants of ancient wisdom have, according to Aristotle, survived, and they are often camouflaged in myths about anthropomorphic or zoomorphic deities and other such traditional beliefs. We may therefore reach the conclusion that Aristotle believed that there is indeed progress in history and that this progress consists in the preservation, accumulation, and enhancement of past knowledge, but only when history is on the ascending phase of its essentially palindromic or cyclical movement. This is a far cry from unreserved faith in linear progress. Although we find discussion of reputable opinions in almost all surviving works of Aristotle, still it is a distinctive mark of book I of the Metaphysics that such an inquiry is conducted in a way that shows awareness of, and respect for, chronology and historical influence of one thinker on another. In this treatise Aristotle approached his predecessors and their doctrines with a singular emphasis on the development of philosophy and its possible completion, at least with respect to the discovery of the causes and principles of all that is. This observation is rather surprising since the acknowledged aim of the treatise is the foundation of a still unnamed but sought-for science that would be the trunk or even root of all particular branches of knowledge.13 And it becomes a

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS little more surprising once we realize that Aristotle did not entertain a particularly high opinion of historiography. In a well-known chapter of the Poetics the word historia, which originally meant personal inquiry and empirical research into any subject whatsoever, acquired, for the first time in our sources, the modern sense of “history” as narration of human events in the proximate or distant past. Aristotle famously claims that “poetry is something more philosophic and of graver import than history.”14 He bases the claim on the distinction between universal and particular statements. Philosophy (a term used by Aristotle to include empirical science) aims at statements of universal truth whereas the truths of history are always singular. In this view, history does not teach us anything other than what a particular individual has done or suffered at a particular time and place. Thucydides’ claim that history teaches us how people generally behave toward one another and how they think, individually and collectively, especially in times of crisis where the rather stable human nature manifests its hidden potential for evil all the more vividly,15 would not have gained the approval of Aristotle who never even mentions Thucydides in his vast surviving corpus. History, according to Aristotle, teaches particular actions and passions that are not susceptible to generalization. Hence history is not a science (episte-me-) in the proper sense of the term since all sciences aim at some universal knowledge.16 To approach a singular event, such as the battle of Salamis, in the light of some universal rule or law of human behavior would be, for Aristotle, to compose a tragic drama like Aeschylus’ Persae rather than a truly historical account. Poetry focuses on the internal unity, hence the intelligible wholeness, of the narrated or staged action whereas history, interested as it is to keep the order of temporal

sequence, is forced to narrate events with no other intelligible connection with one another than that provided by the unity of time in which they occurred.17 In short, there are no proper laws of historical development to the discovery of which an hypothetical historical science could aspire. A different but compatible picture emerges from the first book of the Politics. The evolution of human associations from household to political society via the intermediary stage of the village is said to be based on nature. The view that “every polis exists by nature”18 does not mean that political society came into being by a kind of natural spontaneity like the growth of a tree. It is rather the view that humans, upon becoming aware that they need self-sufficiency in order to flourish, have created the polis as a social organization in which their natural end, that is, happiness and the good life, could be accomplished. What we would definitely call a historical development is, in Aristotle’s mind, a natural rather than a conventional or fortuitous evolution. This is even more evident when Aristotle thinks that the historical development that led tragic drama to its formal perfection in Sophocles’ art of playwriting was a process that reached an end when “tragedy found its own nature.”19 In Aristotle’s thought, history and nature were not juxtaposed to one another as in most modern discussions. The domain of human freedom or ingenuity was not seen as the opposite of physical compulsion and natural necessity. Aristotle could put forward the famous evolutionary scheme of human associations described above not because he had conducted comprehensive investigations into the historical evolution of all human societies but because he espoused a particular view of what human nature is and what it desires. To understand his claim about the naturalness of the polis (or the naturalness

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS of tragedy’s formal perfection, for that matter), we must bear in mind Aristotle’s own distinction between potential and actual being. But this is a fundamentally metaphysical distinction not only because its theoretical articulation is discussed in book IX of the Metaphysics but also because it is a distinction assumed to be applicable not solely to a particular domain of being but to being qua being. The foundation of Aristotle’s thought is to be found in his metaphysical thinking. There are therefore reasons to think that if a particular conception of the history of philosophy, and by implication of history more generally, appears in this thinking, then that conception, in its implications about the relationship between eternal and temporal being, would be an idea that was perhaps left explicitly unthought by Aristotle himself, but which deserves to be thought by means of the signposts that Aristotle left on his way to the thought of being qua being. It seems that Aristotle believed that being has no history. The universe, with all the essences of natural and immaterial substances contained therein, is for him no less eternal and immutable in its totality than the monolithic being (eon) of Parmenides from which all kinds of change were excluded as a result of the absolute unthinkability of nonbeing.20 It follows that the very title of the present essay that speaks of the history of being in Aristotle’s Metaphysics must be profoundly misleading. But contrary to Parmenides who relegated change to the false opinions of mortals, thus making it apparent rather than real, Aristotle believed that change in all its manifestations is a real occurrence—and he devoted a great deal of effort to the explanation of its mechanism. Even though Aristotle nowhere hints at the possibility that the historical growth and

diminution of knowledge in human minds, for him a particular kind of qualitative change, would make any difference in being as such, nevertheless his treatment of past philosophers in Metaphyics I, if seen in connection with his notion of truth in Met. II and with his treatment of potentiality, actuality, and truth in Met. IX, may modify the prima facie correct belief that there is no history of being.

III In the first two chapters of Metaphysics I Aristotle undertakes an exploration of the characteristic features of wisdom (sophia). His aim is to lay the foundations of a new science that will share with traditional notions of wisdom the latter’s claim to universality. And so he begins by exploring what can be deduced from common opinions about the sage. Master craftsmen, he writes, are deemed wiser than manual workers in the same field because they know the causes of what they make.21 Craftsmanship or art (techne-) differs from experience (empeiria) in terms of knowledge. Aristotle acknowledges22 that in some cases experienced workers produce better results than learned technicians, artisans, and craftsmen: a practical healer, for instance, may treat a particular case of illness more successfully than a certified doctor of medicine. Yet only the latter possess a knowledge of what they do and are able to give an account of it and teach others.23 Moreover, the inventors of fine arts (such as poetry or painting) are more highly esteemed than the inventors of useful crafts, and the inventors of pure sciences (such as mathematics or physics) are considered wiser than either of the former.24 The implication to be

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS found in common opinions about wisdom is that wise people know the causes (aitiai) and starting points, origins, or principles (archai) of things without any concern for practical use or applicability. But Aristotle is interested in this implication in order to deduce from it that the science (episte-me-) he is after and calls here by the name of “wisdom” is a science of first principles and causes (περὶ τὰ πρῶτα αἴτια καὶ τὰς ἀρχὰς).25 The only usefulness of this sought-for science, we may conclude, is that it fulfils the universal human desire for knowledge, a desire provided by nature.26 In the following chapter, Aristotle seeks to determine with more precision the characteristics of this science of wisdom. He explicitly considers reputable opinions (hupole-pseis)27 from which he deduces some important features that this science must possess.28 They can be briefly enumerated as follows. The sought-for science must be (1) the most universal science: its results must be applicable to everything (panta). (As we learn from a later passage,29 the most universal science should be contrasted not only with particular sciences such as medicine or geometry but also with dialectic and sophistic that speak or presume to speak about everything as well.) It must also be (2) the most difficult science since (3) it should deal with the highest universals (τὰ μάλιστα καθόλου), which are the most difficult subjects for human cognition because they are furthest removed from the testimony of the senses. From (1)–(3) it would follow that the sought-for science must be the most abstract of all sciences. Surprisingly, however, Aristotle adds that this science must be (4) the most precise (akribestate-), as well as (5) the most instructive (διδασκαλικὴ μᾶλλον). He accounts for the former claim by stating that sciences are more precise when they deal with more primary things. Arithmetic,

for instance, is regarded as more precise than geometry because, of all mathematical sciences, it alone deals with the primary objects of mathematics, namely numbers, whereas geometry adds other objects, such as points, lines, and planes, in order to determine its proper field.30 Since the point is defined with reference to the monad, which is the primary constituent of number, as “an indivisible monad in place,”31 and the line and the plane with reference to the point, it follows that geometry depends on, and is more complex than, arithmetic; hence less precise too. Precision is a matter of simplicity. The most primary things are the simplest. They are also the starting-points, and therefore the causes, of things dependent on them. And since instructors are capable of giving the causes of what they teach, it follows that the most precise science will be the most instructive since it will be best equipped to explain things with reference to their ultimate causes and starting-points. Moreover, since first things and causes are said to be the most knowable things, the science we are in search of must be (6) the science of the most knowable things (μάλιστα ἐπιστητά). To understand this paradoxical claim we need to bear in mind Aristotle’s distinction, repeatedly stressed,32 between things that are more known with reference to nature (γνωριμώτερα φύσει) and things that are more known with reference to us (γνωριμώτερα ἡμῖν). Human knowledge, Aristotle claims, begins with things that are more known to us (such as sensible objects and their perceptible attributes) and proceeds to things that are more known by nature or in themselves (such as universals and their intelligible attributes). The end of the cognitive process is reached when the human mind grasps things more known by nature (namely starting-points, elements, and causes) and

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS realizes that the objects of sense perception are, contrary to appearances, more obscure than their naturally intelligible causes. The purpose of human cognition is to render the more known by nature also better known to the knowing mind. Since the sought-for science is the science of the most knowable things it must be, Aristotle adds, (7) the most authoritative of all sciences (ἀρχικωτάτη τῶν ἐπιστημῶν) as well as (8) the science of the best in the whole of nature (τὸ ἄριστον ἐν τῇ φύσει πάσῃ). As such it is (9) the only free science (μόνην οὖσαν ἐλευθέραν τῶν ἐπιστημῶν). For, presumably, the science that possesses the most authority and studies the best domain of being cannot be subservient to any other science, nor are its practitioners dependent on hypotheses borrowed from another science that they themselves cannot demonstrate. Not bound by any kind of ignorance or dependence wise men are cognitively free in the highest degree. Last but not least, the sought-for science must be (10) the most divine and precious science (θειοτάτη καὶ τιμιωτάτη). And this last feature must be understood, according to Aristotle, in a dual sense: it is, on the one hand, (10’) the science which god possesses and, one the other, (10’’) the science of (=about) divine things. So far Aristotle has given us a formal sketch of how the desired science should be conceived. “We have seen,” Aristotle concludes, “what is the nature (phusis) of the sought-for science and what the end (skopos) which our search and whole methodical enterprise must attain.”33 Aristotle’s arguments are based on the assumption that the quality of a science is determined by the quality of its objects such that the more precious, universal, intelligible, authoritative, etc., the objects of cognition are, the more

precious, universal, intelligible, authoritative, etc., the science that deals with them will be. This assumption is further based on another: that knowledge is a kind of assimilation of the mind to the contemplated object of thought.34 But for the object of thought to be so able to affect the mind as to transmit its own qualities to it, the object of thought must be a kind of activity itself.35 We shall see how this understanding of knowledge as a kind of action by the intelligible object on the contemplating mind has affected Aristotle’s conception of philosophical history. Prior to that, we must gather additional information about the sought-for science from other books of the Metaphysics. In book II (traditionally called “alpha minor” since it is a kind of appendix to the first book called “Alpha”), philosophy is said to be rightly called “science of truth” (ἐπιστήμη τῆς ἀληθείας).36 The author (whether Aristotle himself or a certain Pasicles who wrote down an oral lecture by Aristotle, hence Aristotle mediately) claims that “the contemplation (theo-ria) of truth is in one sense difficult and in another easy”: while no one ever manages to adequately come into full contact with truth and say it, yet no one ever completely fails.37 We always already stand in the horizon of truth so that it is impossible to miss it entirely. The difficulty of the full attainment of truth lies in the fact that, though we possess, or are (so to speak) immersed in, its whole, we are still unable to grasp its parts. Aristotle thinks of the whole of truth as the very manifestness of things-that-are, which constitutes a target too big for anyone to miss, and of its parts as the very precise reasons behind what obtains in each case, reasons that, like minute points in the overall target, are too small for everyone to hit. Yet he acknowledges that the sum total of individually minor successes amounts to a significant magnitude. Aristotle is thinking of

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS the accumulation of knowledge provided by a living tradition. As he later explains,38 gratitude should be paid not only to those earlier thinkers whose views one espouses but also to those who expressed things in more superficial ways: for they have contributed to the exercise and development of our mental faculty. For Aristotle the cause of the difficulty of attaining truth does not lie in things (ἐν τοῖς πράγμασιν); it lies in us (ἐν ἡμῖν): “As the eyes of the bats are to the light of the day, so the mind of our soul is to the things that are, of all things, the most evident by nature.”39 In this powerful simile, we are not supposed to be merely short-sighted. We are said to be blind like bats. And we are blind to the brightest or most shining (phanero-tata, rendered “most evident” above) of all things. The opposition that we have already seen between things more known by nature and things more known to us recurs in this passage with a particular force: we are bathed in truth as in an ever-present and overwhelming blaze, and yet truth we do not perceive. The radiance of truth is first in the order of nature but last in the order of human cognition. A little later,40 Aristotle states that since each thing must itself possess the quality that it manages to impart to another (like fire, which manages to heat other things precisely because it is itself hot), those things must be most true (ale-thestata) which are the causes of other things’ being true. “It follows that it is necessary for the principles (archas) of eternal beings to always be most true (ale-thestatas).”41 The principles of eternal things cannot be temporary propositions that have their truth-value changed as time goes by. The reason that Aristotle gives for the immutable truth of eternal things is that there is nothing that causes eternal things to be but, conversely, it is the eternal things

themselves that are the causes of the being of other things. It seems that the higher a thing stands in the causal concatenation of events and the more causal power it possesses, the more true it is. At the end of the chapter, Aristotle draws a symmetrical relation between being (einai) and truth (ale-theia) by stating that “as each thing is in respect of being so it is in respect of truth too.”42 The conclusion to be drawn is that the contemplation of truth, with which our inquiry began in this chapter, is a contemplation of being—difficult and easy at once. Being and truth are the two sides of the same coin. What is rather astonishing in this account is, first, that truth is supposed to be an attribute of things rather than of statements, beliefs, or mental states. Truth exists out there as a kind of unperceived brightness in which each and every thing-that-is participates according to its kind. Secondly, truth is assumed to possess degrees: things are more or less true according to their relative place in the “great chain of being.” The culmination of truth is to be found in the most eminent domain of being, that of eternal and unchanging beings. Last but by no means least, truth is supposed to possess a causal power: like the hotness of fire that is the cause of the heat of all hot things, it is the truth of the most eminent beings that is the cause of the truth of all other things. In conclusion, we may say that since the gradation of truth reflects, and is reflected by, a corresponding gradation of being,43 the science of truth par excellence must be the science of being par excellence; and since being is eminently present in the most eminent beings, the one science of truth-and-being par excellence is the science of divinities, the theological science. The word “divine” does not occur in Metaphysics II.1. But it is not difficult to

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS supply it from other passages of Aristotle’s Metaphysics. Already in book I we have seen that the sought-for science is a science which god possesses as well as a science about the attributes of godhead (features 10’ and 10’’ in the above enumeration). In Met. VI, the intuition is spelled out. Aristotle divides the theoretical sciences into three distinct categories according to the nature of their objects.44 Physics studies things that are at once separate, changeable, and material (i.e. natural substances such as plants and animals); “some branches of mathematics study things that are unchangeable but perhaps inseparable from matter”;45 and the first theoretical science, which is now called theologike- (or “theologics,” if we are permitted a neologism), studies things that are at once separate, unchangeable, and immaterial. Aristotle hastens to add that “it is necessary for all causes to be eternal, and these causes must be eternal in the highest degree (malista); for these are the causes of the manifest divine things (τοῖς φανεροῖς τῶν θείων).”46 As Metaphysics XII makes plain,47 the hidden causes Aristotle has in mind here are divine intellects, and the manifest divine things that are the visible results of their causal power are the heavenly bodies. The divine, therefore, consists of a whole hierarchy of things, some of which are most evident to the senses and others most evident to the mind. Immaterial intellects are meant to account for the orderly movements of the planets (including the sun) and the daily revolution of the sphere of fixed stars. Their postulation is a rational necessity stemming from the empirical observation of the sky, and as such it belongs to physics or the study of nature.48 But what physics uses as an unproven hypothesis it is the task of first philosophy to study in itself and in all its possible consequences.

Aristotle’s divine intellects are fully determined beings that have no share whatsoever in potentiality. They act as the final causes of the whole universe. As pure activities (energeiai) of intellection (noe-sis) they can only be grasped by a similar activity of the human mind and more precisely of that part of it that is divine.49 The science of truth is, ultimately, a science that contemplates the simple activity of uninterrupted divine intellection. In Met. VI.1, theoretical sciences are ranked above the practical. They are themselves graded according to their objects so that the most precious science (timio-tate-n) should be the one that deals with the most precious kind of being (περὶ τὸ τιμιώτατον γένος),50 which we have seen to be the pure activity of divine intellection. We must now see how such a particular science with such a limited, albeit extremely eminent, object is also meant to be universal. The question is raised and very briefly answered by Aristotle himself.51 His answer is that this science is universal precisely because it is first (καθόλου οὕτως ὅτι πρώτη). What this brief answer means to say is that by studying the first cause or causes of everything-that-is one studies not only a particular kind of being but also being qua being and its attributes. To be sure, being qua being is to be found in any kind of being whatsoever, in potential, undeveloped and imperfect faculties as well as in active, mature, and fully-perfected substances. For all things, be they actual or merely potential, are what they are. This last statement, however, need not mean that things are what they are to the same extent or in the same degree. After all, we do not call an acorn an “oak-tree” but think of it as an oak-tree to be. Aristotle’s view of being is fundamentally determined by his view of nature (phusis) as a process of limited, and hence potentially perfect, development.

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS Aristotle thinks that being qua being is most eminently present and most fully active in the first causes of everything that is. The first causes of being are themselves actual beings in the most eminent sense. By studying them one studies a privileged domain of being in which the most universal of all questions, the perennial and always unresolved question “what is being?”52 can come to its own. The science of being qua being or science of truth has, therefore, a focal reference,53 and this is to be found in the causes and origins of being, which are the same as the causes and starting-points of truth. The brightest things in whose effects we constantly live are those to which our untrained minds are the least attuned. The Metaphysics as a whole is a training field to the end of their cognition. To come back to book I, from which we started: after the enumeration of the features of the sought-for science of wisdom in I.2, Aristotle proceeds, in the following chapter, to mention the kinds of cause that an independent investigation of his has reached. Since the sought-for science is a science of causes we must know how many kinds of cause there are. After mentioning what are now commonly known as the formal, material, efficient, and final causes—Aristotle’s own terminology is much more vivid and revealing54—Aristotle makes a backward reference to Physics II.3, where he had distinguished those four kinds of cause.55 He then announces a historical exploration of past views on the subject,56 a project that will occupy him for the main part of the rest of the book.57 His explicit aim is to find out whether or not another kind of cause, besides his four, has ever been proposed. If not, we will be more confident, he says, that no other kind of cause exists.58 Although (or rather because) Aristotle seeks to set up a still-unknown science, the

most universal science of being qua being, his historical investigation is not restricted to those past philosophies (such as the Pythagorean, Eleatic, and Platonic) that could be said to have initiated the metaphysical quest. He explores the philosophers of phusis no less than the philosophers of logos. His sought-for science of being qua being is a science that must necessarily include and, if necessary, surpass the domain of nature. In Metaphysics I Aristotle approaches the philosophical past not as a disinterested historian of ideas but as an active philosopher on his way to establishing the new discipline of first philosophy. The history of philosophy is for him a repository of accumulated wisdom against which one may test the validity of one’s own discoveries. Aristotle addresses to his predecessors a particular question (“how many kinds of cause are there?”), and the “history of philosophy” he delineates for the first time in extant Greek literature is a history of philosophical doctrines conducted in the light of a particular conception of philosophy. That is why he feels free to omit views that have no relation to the question of causality,59 and to disregard the symbolic mode of expression that is characteristic of mythology. To be sure, Aristotle does not overlook the insights hidden in the poetic myths of Hesiod and Homer.60 But he hesitates as to whether or not he should include poets in his account of the philosophical past. In what is, in all probability, an allusion to views expressed in some Platonic dialogues,61 Aristotle writes: “there are some people who think that even the ancients who lived long before the present generation and were the first to speak about the gods had a similar view of nature.”62 But he continues by casting a doubt as to whether one should retrospectively read in some Homeric myths the belief that water

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS is the origin of everything.63 By considering Thales to be the founding father of a kind of rational speculation about nature unknown to earlier poets, as Aristotle clearly did,64 we still adopt a version of the history of Greek philosophy that is fundamentally Aristotelian in conception. In Aristotle’s account of the development of Greek philosophy we may discern some prominent predilections that, to a certain extent, still dominate the history of philosophy as we practice it to date. First, Aristotle loved to stress the temporal priority, originality, and possible influence of one thinker over another even when he was not entirely certain about dates.65 Second, he grouped together thinkers with similar views even when they happened to be distant from one another in terms of time.66 Third, he was interested in presenting the best case that can be made of a particular doctrine by finding out what its truly philosophical significance is, quite irrespective of whether or not the philosopher who held it was able to see the full import of his own utterances.67 Last but not least, he thought that truth is an active power that somehow forced philosophers to advance in knowledge and to surpass the discoveries of their predecessors unless they were defeated by the difficulty of the required labor.68 We shall come back to this. The first two features of the above list may seem to contradict each other. But they are perfectly compatible. At one and the same time, Aristotle was viewing the philosophical past according to its own intelligible features and as a temporal succession of doctrines.69 He believed of course in temporal progress. But he realized also that the order of time does not always exactly coincide with the order of intelligible development. And so he felt free to occasionally disregard the former in favor of the latter. Since he was

neither a skeptic nor a relativist, Aristotle could see beyond the actual formulations and utterances of past philosophers, beyond even their idiosyncratic and often eccentric articulations, to the truth that they meant, however inadequately, to convey. Aristotle approached the philosophical past not so much as a domain of errors about, but rather as a field of important insights into, the nature of being. He found, for instance, premonitions of efficient and final causality in those thinkers who spoke of a cosmic mind,70 and the dim beginnings of the discovery of the formal cause in the Pythagorean search for definitions and the Platonic theory of Forms.71 All in all, Aristotle thinks that the four causes of his system were, dimly or fully, anticipated by his predecessors.72 The material cause, in particular, was fully discovered by Ionian natural philosophy,73 and the efficient cause was more or less clearly conceived by thinkers such as Anaxagoras and Empedocles.74 As for the other two causes, Aristotle denies that any of his predecessors had an adequate understanding of them.75 However, by hindsight he was able to see where they were heading. The potential of a certain doctrine, he implies, can be fully appreciated only from the vantage point of the actual. And the present, the sole fully actual dimension of time, casts a retrospective light on the past and renders it intelligible. Aristotle uses three equivalent expressions to denote the active power exerted by truth on thought.76 The first is found at 984a18–19: “as they [sc. past philosophers] advanced, the very facts (αὐτὸ τὸ πρᾶγμα) opened the road for them and joined in forcing them to search the subject.” Here, what is actually the case in the world is seen as a force opening ways in unknown territories and coercing thinkers to step in. The second expression is the most straightforward of all

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS (984b8–11): “since those causes were not adequate to generate the nature of beings, men were compelled by the truth itself (ὑπ´αὐτῆς τῆς ἀληθείας ἀναγκαζόμενοι), as we have said, and searched for the next cause.” Here it is truth, rather than facts, that acts as the coercive force for further research. The backward reference (“as we have said”) indicates that Aristotle conceived the two expressions αὐτὸ τὸ πρᾶγμα and αὐτὴ ἡ ἀλήθεια as strictly identical. The third expression speaks again of a coercing power. But the coercion is now exercised on thinking by things-that-shine-forth (phainomena, 986b31), and Parmenides is said to have been compelled by them to admit that there is motion. As in book II, the conception of truth that Aristotle envisages in all three passages of book I of the Metaphysics is one that highlights the active manifestness of things, the very conspicuousness and brightness of observable and experienced facts. In a later book Aristotle defines truth and falsity with reference to human speech: “to say of what is the case that it is not the case or of what is not the case that it is the case is false, whereas to say of what is the case that it is the case and of what is not the case that it is not the case is true, so that the speaker who is saying that this is or is not the case will be saying something true or something false.”77 In this passage truth and falsity become properties of sentences, and, more particularly, of uttered propositions. As such truth and falsity cannot belong to the senses of being qua being that are appropriate for first philosophy to investigate. In Met. VI.4, 1027b25–1028a3 Aristotle indeed denies that being qua truth is a legitimate subject of first philosophy, on the reasonable assumption that truth is an affection of the mind (διανοίας τι πάθος) rather than an objective aspect of external being itself. Nevertheless,

at the very end of the central books of the Metaphysics we find, surprisingly,78 a chapter on truth. Met. IX.10 begins with the astonishing claim that the most authoritative sense of being is truth. In view of the earlier rejection of being qua true from first philosophy, editors have been at pains to alter the received text of the manuscripts in order to make it compatible with the whole discussion of being qua substance, potentiality, and actuality that dominates books VII–IX (up to, and including, chapter 9).79 But in IX. 10 Aristotle no longer speaks of truth as mental affection or propositional property, as he had done in IV.7 (briefly repeated in IX.10, 1051b3–5) and VI.4. He, rather, considers a sense of truth that can act as the cause of the truth and falsity of propositions, beliefs, and mental states. “It is not the case,” he writes, “that you are white because we think of you as white, but because you are white we who say so stand in truth (ale-theuomen).”80 What this statement means is that the real cause of the truth and falsity of propositions is being. And as the previous chapters have shown (IX.6–9), the innermost core of being is activity (energeia). In the same chapter Aristotle discusses the kind of truth that pertains to noncomposite essences and simple activities.81 He claims that since the being of those things is different from the being of composite things their truth must be different too. In the case of composite things truth consists in the being-compounded of the subject with all the (necessary or contingent) predicates that belong to it, as well as in its being-separated from all the properties that do not pertain to it.82 Therefore, the truth of a composite thing consists, in reality, in the being-one or unity of a substance with all its (necessary or contingent) properties. In the case of noncomposite

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS essences neither truth nor its opposite can be the same, however. Since the being of a noncomposite essence is not such as to allow for a statement to pick it up (in the naming act) and ascribe to it a predicate that belongs to it (in the predicational act), its truth must be a nonpropositional grasping of it—much like touching. The opposite of truth must, correspondingly, be complete ignorance rather than falsity or propositional deception. For noncomposite essences do not possess a propositional structure like composite substances. Noncomposite essences are always actually, never potentially.83 Their being is activity.84 And activity is always at work: it radiates. To avoid a more technical discussion of the details of this most difficult of chapters, we may say that the ground of Aristotle’s metaphysical conception of truth is his conception of being as active radiation. In view of what we have seen from Metaphysics I and II, this active radiation of being must be the ultimate ground of the compelling force that truth possesses to open the road for new discoveries and to effect a gradual disclosure of being in the course of historical time. The cumulative effect of the eternal radiation of being is the revelation of being in time.

IV Aristotle inscribes his metaphysical project in a tradition that begins with Thales and ends with himself, passing through various phases (Ionian materialism, Pythagorean dualism, Eleatic rationalism, Anaxagoras’ conception of cosmic Mind, Empedocles’ pluralism, and Plato’s philosophy of Forms). First philosophy, the only free science, is a product of history. As the last and highest development of the philosophy of nature, first philosophy

manages to overcome the domain of nature and succeeds in opening up a vision of eternal reality that is totally unaffected by coming-into-being and passing-away, the everlasting processes of nature. This eternal reality is immaterial through and through. For the ultimate cause of generation and destruction is potentiality. And the real ground of potentiality is matter. Divine intellection as the case par excellence of the pervasive activity of being is not just a kind of being among others. It is the focal reference of being with respect to which all other kinds and particular instances of being acquire their ontological status and corresponding level of truth. Paradoxically enough, the discovery of the immaterial, eternal activity of divine intellection is the outcome of historical time. For historical time manages to accumulate insights into nature, and the causality inherent in it, and by so doing it may achieve a final overcoming of nature. “History of being” is doubly ambiguous: it means either the investigation or the historical development of being. And again “of being” may be taken either as the object (the “what”) or as the agent (the “who”) of investigation and development. Aristotle who never used the phrase “history of being” would most probably have taken it in the objective sense: it is we, human beings endowed with logos, and above all the philosophers as distinguished from the dialecticians and sophists, who conduct inquiries into the different kinds of beings and their attributes; and it is the philosopher, and above all the first philosopher, as distinguished from the physicist and the mathematician, who investigates the primary senses and focal reference of being and its attributes. Nonetheless, between the lines of his account about the historical development of Greek philosophy, in Metaphysics I, we can read how Being, in its mode of being

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS as active truth, has guided Greek investigations and determined the historical development that led to its own manifestation as formal and final cause, as activity and intellection, in the last ascending phase of an axial civilization. Spyridon Rangos

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Unless otherwise stated the translations of Aristotle’s passages are mine. The two epigraphs of the present essay are given in W. D. Ross’ translation as reprinted in Barnes, 1984, II, 1569 and 1620, respectively. Plut. Sulla 26; see Strabo XIII, 1.54. See Metaphysics VI.1, 1026a27–32 quoted as second epigraph at the beginning of the present essay. Cherniss, 1935, forcefully argued in favor of the thesis that Aristotle was an incompetent historian of philosophy who regularly misrepresented his predecessors, on the ground that his main concern was to show that earlier philosophical speculations were inadequate attempts at the construction of a philosophical system such as Aristotle’s own. The thesis is extreme since it blurs the important distinction, repeatedly stressed by Aristotle himself, between the actual sayings of a thinker and the implications of his views, or historical accuracy and critical interpretation. See the fine critique by Guthrie, 1957, as well as the more balanced accounts by Aubenque, 1962, 71–93; Collobert, 2002; and Frede, 2004. Topics I.1, 100b23. On the Soul I.2, 403b20–4 in J. A. Smith’s translation as reprinted in Barnes, 1984, I, 643. Sophistical Refutations 34, 183b16–36 in W. A. Pickard-Cambridge’s translation as reprinted in Barnes, 1984, I, 313–14. For a general assessment of ancient Greek views on progress see the very balanced account by Dodds, 1973; see Edelstein, 1967. See Physics III.6, 207a1–32. Met. II.2, 994b13–14. Met. IX.8, 1049b10–1051a3.

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38 39

40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48

Meteorology I.3, 339b27–30; Politics VII.10, 1329b25–27; On the Heavens I.3, 270b16–25; Met. XII.8, 1074a38–b14; see Pl. Timaeus 22c, 23a–b; Critias 109d. Met. I.1, 981b27–982a6. Poetics 9, 1451b5–6 in I. Bywater’s translation as reprinted in Barnes, 1984, II, 2323. Thuc. I.22.4; III.82.2. Posterior Analytics I.31, 87b38–88a7; I.33, 88b30–35; Met. III.6, 1003a13–15; VII.15, 1039b27–1040a7. Poet. 23, 1459a17–29. Pol. I.2, 1252b30. Poet. 4, 1449a15. See Met. IX.10, 1051b29–30. Met. I.1, 981a30–b2. Met. I.1, 981a12–15. Met. I.1, 981b5–10. Met. I.1, 981b17–25. Met. I.1, 981b27–982a3. The passage 981b25–29 is athetized by Christ, 1903, 4, followed by Jaeger, 1957, 3, as a later interpolation. (Jaeger curiously claims that the interpolation is by Aristotle himself!) Ross, 1924, ad loc. rightly retains it. Met. I.1, 980a1. Met. I.2, 982a6–8, 19–21. Met. I.2, 982a20–b10, 982b24–983a11. See Reale, 1980, 19–22. Met. IV.2, 1004b16–26. See APo I.27, 87a31–7. Met V.6, 1016b25–6. APo I.2, 71b33–72a5; Phys. I.1, 184a16–23; Met. VII.3, 1029b1–12. Met. I.2, 983a21–3. See On the Soul III.4, 429b22–430a5. See Met. XII.7, 1072b19–24. Met. II.1, 993b19–20. Met. II.1, 993a30–b7. The direct quotation is from the very beginning of the book. Met. II.1, 993b11–14. Met. II.1, 993b7–11. The bat simile occurs at b9–11. Met. II.1, 993b24–30. Met. II.1, 993b28–9. Met. II.1, 993b30–1. See Owens, 2007. Met. VI.1, 1025b26–1026a32. Met. VI.1, 1026a15–16. Met. VI.1, 1026a16–18. See especially Met. XII.6–7, 1071b3–1073a13. See Phys. VIII.5–6, 10; On the Heaven I.7.

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS 49

50 51

52 53 54

55 56 57 58 59 60 61

62 63 64 65

66

67 68

See Nicomachean Ethics X.7, 1177a12–17, 1177b26–1178a8; On the Soul III.5, 430a22–5. Met. VI.1, 1026a19–23. Met. VI.1, 1026a23–32. Part of this passage is quoted as the second epigraph of the present essay. Met. VII.1, 1028b3–4. Met. IV.2, 1003a33–b19. Aristotle’s designation of the formal cause is the Platonically inspired ousia (“being” or “essence”) explained in terms of Aristotle’s own highly artificial construction τὸ τί ἦν εἶναι or “the what it was to be” that distinguishes the required sense of ousia from ousia in the sense of “substance”; his designation of the material cause is hule-, which originally meant simply “forest” or “wood” but was turned into a technical term by Aristotle himself, as well as hupokeimenon (literally “what lies underneath”); his designation of the efficient cause is the periphrastic locution ὅθεν ἡ ἀρχὴ τῆς κινήσεως or “whence the beginning of change”; and his designation of the final cause is his own technical phrase τὸ οὗ ἕνεκα or “that for the sake of which” coupled with the Platonically inspired tagathon or “the good” (Met. I.3, 983a24–32). Since they are, for the most part, coined phrases, Aristotle’s terms of causation dynamically reveal their meaning in a markedly originative way. Met. I.3, 983a24–b1; see I.7, 988a21–2. Met. I.3, 983b1–4. Met. I.3, 983b6; I.7, 988b21. Met. I.3, 983b5–6. Met. I.5, 986b10–14; 17–18. Met. I.2, 983b30–3; I.4, 984b23–31. Pl. Cratylus 402b, Theaetetus 152b, 160d, 180c; see Philebus 16c, Phaedrus 274c. Met. I.3, 983b27–30. Met. I.3, 983b33–984a2. Met. I.3, 983b20. Met. I.3, 984a1–13, 984b8, 17–20; I.4, 984b23, 985a29–30; I.5, 985b23–4, 986a27–30, 986b21–2, 987a20–2; I 6, 987a29–b14, b22–32, 988a15–17; I.9, 991a16–18. Met. I.3, 984b18–20; I.4, 984b23–32; I.5, 987a2–19; I.7, 988a23–b16. Met. I.4, 985a4–10; I.5, 986b4–7. Met. I.3, 984a18–19, a27–31, 984b8–11; I.5, 986a6–8, 986b31; see Physics I.5, 188b29–32; Parts of Animals I.1, 642a18–20, 27–9.

69

70 71 72 73 74

75 76 77 78

79

80 81 82 83

84

See Aubenque, 1962, 81–3; Collobert, 2002, 289–93. Met. I.3, 984b15–22; I.7, 988b8–11. Met. I.5, 987a20–7; I.7, 988a34–b6. Met. I.7, 988a22–b16. Met. I.3, 983b6–984a18. Met. I.3, 984a19–b22; I.4, 984b23–985b3; I.5, 987a2–13. Met. I.7, 988a34–b8. See Long, 2011, 67–71. Met. IV.7, 1011b26–8. Both Christ, 1903, 196 and Jaeger, 1957, 192 in their critical apparatuses suggest that the chapter is misplaced by an incompetent ancient editor. Christ goes as far as to hold that the same editor inserted a whole sentence in VI.4 (1027b28–9) as a forward reference to IX.10. In his earlier publication Jaeger, 1948, 205 thought that the chapter was placed by Aristotle himself “at a fitting place, namely between the end of the doctrine of potentiality and the beginning of that of the reality of the supersensible which was intended to follow immediately.” See Ross, 1924, II, 274. In his edition of Aristotle’s Metaphysics Ross obelizes the phrase κυριώτατα ὂν that occurs at 1051b1 because, as he explains in his commentary, “being as truth and not-being as falsity are elsewhere treated as emphatically not the primary or strictest senses of being and not-being” (Ross, 1924, II, 274–5). See Jaeger, 1957, 192 in app. cr. ad loc. Met. IX.10, 1051b6–9. Met. IX.10, 1051b17–1052a4. Met. IX.10, 1051b9–17. Met. IX.10, 1051b28. I accept Ross’ correction ἐνέργειαι instead of the manuscripts’ reading ἐνεργείᾳ. Met. IX.10, 1051b31.

REFERENCES Aubenque, P., Le problème de l’être chez Aristote, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 2009 [1962]. Barnes, J. (ed.), The Complete Works of Aristotle: The Revised Oxford

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HISTORY OF BEING IN ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS Translation, Bollingen Series LXXI.2, 2 vols, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995 [1984]. Cherniss, H., Aristotle’s Criticism of Presocratic Philosophy, Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1935. Christ, W., Aristotelis Metaphysica, Leipzig: Teubner, 1903. Collobert, C., “Aristotle’s Review of the Presocratics: Is Aristotle Finally a Historian of Philosophy?” Journal of the History of Philosophy, 40 (2002), 281–95. Dodds, E. R., “The Ancient Concept of Progress,” in The Ancient Concept of Progress and Other Essays on Greek Literature and Belief, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988 [1973], 1–25. Edelstein, L., The Idea of Progress in Classical Antiquity, Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1967. Frede, M., “Aristotle’s Account of the Origins of Philosophy,” Rhizai, 1 (2004), 9–44.

Guthrie, W. K. C., “Aristotle as a Historian of Philosophy: Some Preliminaries,” Journal of Hellenic Studies, 77 (1957), 35–41. Jaeger, W., Aristotle: Fundamentals of the History of his Development, 2nd edn, Oxford: Clarendon, 1948. —, Aristotelis Metaphysica, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989 [1957]. Long, C. P., Aristotle on the Nature of Truth, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Owens, J. C., Aristotle’s Gradations of Being in Metaphysics E-Z, ed. L. P. Gerson, South Bend: St. Augustine’s Press, 2007. Reale, G., The Concept of First Philosophy and the Unity of the Metaphysics of Aristotle, trans. J. R. Catan, Albany: SUNY, 1980. Ross, W. D., Aristotle. Metaphysics: A Revised Text with Introduction and Commentary, 2 vols, Oxford: Clarendon, 1997 [1924].

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10 ARISTOTLE ON HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS, WITH AN ADDENDUM

The whole race is a poet that writes down The eccentric propositions of its fate. Wallace Stevens, “Men Made out of Words” And language he has taught himself And thought swift as the wind And city-dwelling inclinations. Sophocles, Antigone

Aristotle repeatedly mentions human nature in connection with ethical questions. Appeals to facts about our nature as human beings enter at crucial junctures into ethical arguments of various types, as if they did some sort of ethical work. But it is difficult to determine what sort of work they are intended to do, and how they do it. Take one example. Toward the beginning of Nicomachean Ethics I, Aristotle tells us that the best life would seem to be one that is self-sufficient, autarke-s. This might naturally call to mind the solitary contemplative self-sufficiency of the Platonic philosopher. But now Aristotle adds a qualification. “By self-sufficient I mean not for the person himself, leading a solitary life, but for the person along with parents and children and a wife and in general his friends and fellow citizens, since the human being is by nature a political being” (1097b7–11). A fact about human nature is used to defend an ethical conclusion, the conclusion

that we should prefer a communal conception of the good life to a more solitary conception. How does this work? For it seems that a serious opponent could object to Aristotle’s proposal in at least two different ways. First, he could concede that Aristotle is correct about the facts of human nature, but deny that they have the alleged normative implications. So it is a fact about us that we need to live with others. This gives us no reason not to try to climb above our nature and repudiate these parts of it. Certainly it gives us no reason to ascribe to social pursuits any positive value. Or, second, he could deny that Aristotle has correctly described the human, saying, for example, that our true nature as human beings is to be pure intellectual souls, only contingently bound up with the elements (viz., the emotions and appetites) that give rise to our need for community. What can Aristotle now say in defense of his argument?

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS My purpose here is to ask how the idea of human nature works inside Aristotle’s ethical arguments. Where does this idea come from, and what sort of idea is it? What is its relationship to ordinary beliefs and to science? And how, if at all, does it yield normative conclusions? How, if at all, can it escape the charge that such accounts substitute for experience a useless abstract theory, which cannot really resolve any practical dilemma? Answering this question in some detail will contribute, I hope, to the larger inquiry pursued in Williams’ Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy.1 For Williams suggests that, among the attempts to give a foundation to ethics, the Aristotelian approach is the most promising. And yet he holds that it fails, for several reasons. So a clear look at his charges and at Aristotle’s arguments may shed light on the larger question: is there any coherent way of establishing a foundation for our attempts to answer the question, “How should one live?”

WILLIAMS’ ARISTOTLE I shall be arguing that some of Williams’ criticisms of Aristotle fail because the account he gives of Aristotle’s human nature project (an account that he shares with numerous other influential writers, past and present)2 is, in some important respects, inaccurate. Aristotle’s actual position is stronger than the position Williams describes and then attacks, and is not vulnerable to all of his criticisms. Williams does not give a detailed textual exposition of Aristotle’s arguments on this issue; so I shall be reconstructing his interpretation both from the general account of Aristotle in Ethics and the Limits and from some revealing statements in the concluding section of his article published in 1986, “Hylomorphism,”

an article in which he appears more sympathetic to Aristotle’s ethical use of the concept “human being” than he does in the book, but in which he offers approximately the same account of what Aristotle is attempting to do.3 Williams’ account of Aristotle makes, as I understand it, three claims: (1) Questions about essential human nature are, for Aristotle, matters of natural scientific fact, not of ethical value. They can be grasped from outside practices and the point of view that guides them, from the totally external viewpoint of a neutral observer—from, as ELP puts it, “an absolute understanding of nature” (52); and they are entirely independent of ethical conceptions and judgments. Nothing human beings do, believe, or choose can alter the status of some putative element in our human nature.4 (1a) It seems to be a corollary of this claim that the Aristotelian account of human nature is not based (or not primarily or solely based) upon the endoxa, upon ordinary beliefs and conceptions. Such facts about nature are what they are independently of what ordinary people believe, and ordinary belief will probably not even be a very reliable guide to such facts.5 (2) Questions of essential nature are (for Aristotle) uncontroversial in a way that ethical questions usually are not. Although the answers to such questions may be difficult to discover, the fact that they are matters for scientific inquiry means that they can, in principle, be settled in a more satisfyingly decisive way than questions of ethical value judgment.6 (3) The discovery of the essential nature of the human being does important work in reaching normative ethical conclusions. Its source in the external viewpoint provides us with fixed points that effectively rule out certain ethical alter-

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS natives, and perhaps also give positive support for certain others. In this way, a human nature inquiry contributes to the resolution of our most troublesome normative disputes.7 This seems to be the core of Williams’ account of Aristotle, and the common ground between the article and the book. There are differences, of emphasis at least. The article thinks of the concept “human being” as providing hard value-neutral constraints against “atrocity”—so that, for example, a theory of human nature will tell us what we may not do to the helpless, handicapped infant, or to the senile elderly.8 The book seems to envisage a richer and more ubiquitous role for the account of nature, thinking of it as giving us a full story of human natural perfection, from which a rather full account of ethical conduct would straightforwardly flow.9 There are also differences of evaluation. The article (written earlier, though published later) seems favorable to the Aristotelian project, and, in particular, to the idea that we might find, in an external account of humanness, the foundation for some absolute prohibitions that could not be altered by our choices. The book is more pessimistic, concluding that the strong assumptions on which the Aristotelian project is based “have collapsed,” and that the project of grounding ethics in this sort of “outside view” has collapsed with them (53). But these three claims are clear enough, in both versions; and it is clear, too, that for Williams it is precisely the alleged externality of the account of human nature that makes it (at least initially) promising as a starting-point for ethics, and as a source of solutions to difficult ethical problems. Williams’ objections to Aristotle’s account, as set out in the book, seem to be of two kinds. First of all, he suggests that Aristotle’s

external account of human capabilities and perfections is not available to us—is not one that we can plausibly believe. Furthermore, he suggests that it is very likely that no such external account of human nature will fill the gap left by Aristotle’s: there seems to be no way of plausibly linking facts of nature to ethical considerations, at least in a way that “will adequately determine one kind of ethical life as against others” (47). Second, he suggests that such external accounts may, in any case, be of dubious relevance to human ethical choice. If they do not already contain ethical thought, it is not at all clear what relevance they have to ethical thought, or why we should care about them.10 There is, I believe, a considerable tension in Williams’ thought on just this issue— a tension revealed, as well, by the juxtaposition of article and book, published at almost the same time. On the one hand, Williams appears to be deeply drawn to the idea that an external account of what we are might tell us what we should and should not do. The article approves of this idea, appealing to it (and to Aristotle) to criticize the grounding of ethics on an explicitly internal and ethical concept, the concept “person,” which can, on account of its internality as part of a structure of human evaluative beliefs, be applied or withheld according to our ethical judgments. The book, again, shows considerable sympathy for the project of moving to an external view in order to ground ethical choices; it offers an attractive and detailed account of what such an external theory of human nature would have to look like if it were to offer us the foundation we want.11 And it suggests that when this project fails it is a considerable loss, the loss of a significant hope. On the other hand, the book’s objection about relevance, repeated in more than one section, seems, to me at least, to cast

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS doubt not only on some particular projects of giving ethics a scientific foundation (such as sociobiology, in connection with which Williams makes the objection), but on the whole idea that ethics could be meaningfully and convincingly grounded on an account given from the external perspective, or from what Williams calls the “absolute view of nature.”12 I shall argue here that such an external account is not the account that Aristotle offers us; but that this is no great loss, because the external account, as Williams characterizes it, is neither necessary nor sufficient for providing ethics with a foundation. A foundation of a different and more promising kind is given in the account that Williams actually develops.

THE GENERAL STRATEGY A series of connected passages in which Aristotle appeals to questions of kind membership and essential nature will provide a starting-point, giving us a sense of his general approach. During the discussion of philia in NE VIII, Aristotle observes that, in general, friends wish for one another very great goods. But, he adds, perhaps we should not go so far as to wish our friends transformed into gods: for then they would be too far away from us to be our friends. He then makes a further, most significant remark about such wishing: If it is well said that a friend wishes goods for his friend for that person’s own sake, then that person will have to remain the type of being he is (hoios pot’ estin ekeinos). Then it is to him as a human

being [or: on condition of his remaining a human being] (anthro-po-i onti) that the friend will wish the greatest goods. (1159a8–12) A later passage makes the same point in connection with well-wishing for oneself: Being is a good thing for the good person, and each person wishes good things for himself. But nobody would choose to have everything on condition of becoming other (genomenos allos)—as, for example, the god right now has the good. He will wish to have the good while continuing to be whatever he is (ho ti pot’ estin). (1166a19) These passages restrict ethical aspiration by bringing in considerations of personal identity and kind membership. How do they do this? When I imagine a picture of the good or valuable life, and think of wishing it for myself or for another, I ought to get clear about the relationship between that valuable life and the conditions of my (my friend’s) continued existence. I ought, that is, to ask closely whether this imagined life is a life that could be lived by a being such as I am—by a being, that is, who shares with me all those characteristics that I consider to be truly constitutive of my (my friend’s) identity. For it might emerge that the life was so remote from mine that I could not imagine in it a person whom I could accept as identical with myself. Certain changes in a person and a way of life are compatible with continued personal identity; others are not. Certain changes make me better; certain other changes, however apparently splendid, bring into existence a new being who is not me. Aristotle assumes that ethical well wishing is aimed at realizing a good life

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS for me and my friends, not at the realization of some ideal situation in which none of us exists. So our views about who we essentially are and what changes we can endure while remaining ourselves set limits of a kind upon what we can wish, on what our ethical theories can commend. As Aristotle remarks elsewhere, “It would be peculiar (atopon) if someone chose for himself not his own life, but that of someone else” (NE 1178a2–3). Strictly speaking, there might seem to be two separate questions here: (1) What are necessary and sufficient conditions of my continuing to exist as a human being? (What lives are and are not human lives?) and (2) What are necessary and sufficient conditions of my continuing to exist as myself? For there might be changes that would be sufficient to make me other than the individual I am, without making a creature of a different species come into being. Our first passage clearly focuses on the first question; and our second, though less explicit, appears (from its example) to have the same focus: the imagined transformation is to a different species. Now for Aristotle—and this seems plainly true—continued existence as a member of the species one is in is at least a necessary condition of continued personal identity.13 For Aristotle it is probably (if we add a fuller account of “continued”) a sufficient condition as well14—though here he might encounter more opposition. In any case, it is with the fulfillment of this necessary and central species condition that Aristotle is concerned in these passages; and it is this condition that we shall be examining in the balance of this chapter. He is asking what transitions are such that they create a form of life that is not human at all, and so, a fortiori, not livable by a person whose identity

includes humanness as (at least) a necessary element. Certain lives that gods cherish are unavailable as human lives. We can link these passages with others in which Aristotle cryptically contrasts the human form of life with the lives of both gods and beasts: for example, with Politics 1253a1ff. (to be analyzed in detail later), in which he states that it is part of the nature of a human being to have social or political concerns, and that a creature who totally lacks such concerns must be “either a beast or a god”; and with the similar passage in NE VII, in which Aristotle insists that ethical assessment itself is a part of the human form of life, poised as it is between the beast and the god:15 “And just as there is no ethical excellence or deficiency for beasts, so not for gods either: the one is above the excellences, and (the deficiency of) the other is not the same thing as ethical deficiency” (VII.1, 1145a25–7). Here Aristotle is, once again, pursuing our first question, but in a slightly different way, asking what forms of life, and what creatures, we count as human, and on what basis; what distinctions between the human and other kinds we employ when locating a creature or a life. The question about essential human nature, having been asked from the point of view of the subject who wishes to continue in existence, is now asked from the point of view of the classifier of lives, who wishes to know what beings or putative continuants of beings to count as beings of the same kind. It would be getting ahead of our argument to try to determine where the account of human nature comes from in these passages, and whether it is or is not independent of ethical beliefs. For the arguments that in the end explain these judgments are arguments that we shall examine later, concerning the

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS political nature of the human being. But we must at least try to give these statements some philosophical motivation, asking what genuine human problem or problems they address, and how. Is there anyone who might have wished for a transformation into a godlike condition, not fully realizing that this condition is incompatible with his own continued existence as just the sort of being he is? Who might have made theoretical statements that clash with some of his deeper beliefs about identity and continuity? The answer is not simple: for many human beings, in many ways, at many times, have been guilty of some such incoherence. But one prominent opponent of Aristotle’s, in the passage from NE VIII–IX, is certainly Plato. And, if we try to see how considerations of our human species nature might be brought to bear against some of Plato’s arguments, we will be in a better position to begin to see that Aristotle has identified a serious problem here, and what sort of problem it is. Let us, then, consider the following passage from the Phaedo: My friends, I have not convinced Crito that I am this Socrates here, the one who is now talking philosophy with you and setting in order each item of our discussion. He thinks that I am that being that he will shortly see as a corpse; he even asks how he should bury me. But I have already given you a substantial argument to the effect that, when I drink the drug, I shall not remain with you, but depart to the happy life of the blessed. . . . When you see my body being either burned or buried, you must not fret as if I am undergoing something fearful. And at the burial you must not say that Socrates is being laid out, or carried out, or buried . . . You must be confident and insist that you are burying my body, and bury

it in whatever way you like and consider most appropriate. (115c–e) Socrates here expresses the view that death, which he has defined as the separation of soul from body, is something that he can perfectly happily wish for himself; he urges his friends to wish it along with him. Aristotle’s remarks about continuing press us to ask, however, whether this future post-mortem state is one in which the human being Socrates who is wishing, and whom his friends love, will continue to exist. We might ask, for example: how could Socrates talk philosophy and set the discussion in order without a body? But if he could not, and if the interlocutors believe that the ability to participate in the give and take of dialectic is essential, as part of being human, to the Socrates they know (as even Socrates strongly suggests), then we must concede that there is some incoherence in the wish that Socrates go off from his body to the happy life of the blessed. The wish for this event might seem to have just the peculiarity mentioned by Aristotle: Socrates is wishing not for his own life, but for someone else’s, the life of an intellectual substance that is nonidentical with him.16 In order to resolve this question we need an account of what it is to be a human being. But what we require from such an account, if it is really to speak to what troubles us, is an evaluation of elements of lives, one that will tell us what among the properties and doings of Socrates are the most important, the truly essential ones, the ones without which he could not continue. But it would seem that there is no answer to this question from a totally external perspective. A certain entity, let us grant to Plato, continues to exist— namely, an intellectual soul. The question is, whether this soul and its life contain enough of what makes Socrates Socrates to count,

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS for us, as him. This is an evaluative question, and in the broad (Aristotelian) sense of the word, an ethical one; it is the question of what are the most important things in human living. And, if there is a resolution of the difference between Plato and Aristotle here, it will not come from the decree of an external judge, who will say, “Yes, that’s right, this thing is (or is not) still human.” It can only come by one party’s showing the other (for example) that the internal view he actually has, on which he relies in life and action, is, taken as a whole, not consistent with his theoretical claims about the sufficiency of intellect for human survival. In any case, the inquiry, to be productive, will have to be internal (i.e. conducted in and through human conceptions and beliefs) and evaluative, if it is to be at all relevant to the concerns Simmias and Cebes have when they consider whether they ought to wish their friend well on these terms. This idea that an account of what it is to survive as a human being (or: as a person) is an evaluative matter, requiring an evaluation of the elements of lives as to which are the most important, may appear alien to a dominant tradition in modern discussion of these problems—according to which questions of personal continuity are metaphysical questions. I think that, even where this philosophical tradition is concerned, matters are complex. For the best and deepest of the metaphysical arguments brought forward seem to contain an evaluative component: that is, they ask us (implicitly or explicitly) to consider which functions of an alleged human being are so important, so central, that their absence will mean the absence of a human being or human life. One could, I believe, support this claim by the analysis of many such arguments—including, probably, those of Williams himself. Furthermore,

whenever such accounts are called upon actually to play a role in human practices— as, for example, in current debates about the definition of death and about the lives of severely demented or damaged patients, the evaluative nature of the arguments involved becomes especially clear—as medical ethicists and doctors ask themselves whether the functions we see before us constitute enough of what we value to count for us as the life of a human being (or: a person).17 The ancient tradition, then, is not only closer to the modern tradition than it might seem, it is also the one that emerges when people actually start to talk about their lives.

THE TRADITION Aristotle’s concern with species and their ways of life does not arise in a vacuum. His appeals to the reader’s beliefs about beasts and gods suggest that he is arguing in a tradition of reflection about identity that is old and pervasive in Greek ethical thought. This tradition tells stories about transformations from and to the human, appealing to the imagination of the audience to judge which are the features whose presence or absence makes the difference between humanness and its absence.18 It tells stories, too, of our near-relatives: of nonhuman anthropomorphs whose form of life is sufficiently different from our own that we judge that these beings do not share a “nature” with us. Such reflective stories are a preoccupation of Greek myth: they take their bearings from the traditional idea of phusis, “nature,” the idea, that is, of a being’s essential nature or character (that of its kind in almost all cases), as revealed in its characteristic activities.19 They are stories of communal self-definition

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS and self-clarification, told to humans (especially to young ones) in order to initiate them into, or to keep them within, or, for those securely in, to promote reflective understanding of, the way of life that is constituted by the boundaries that the stories display. By the beast on the one hand, the god on the other. On the side of the god we have the countless stories of the Homeric gods, anthropomorphic beings rather similar to humans in their desires and characteristic activities, but differing only in their power and, above all, in their invulnerability to death. These stories (and related stories of transformations of former humans into gods) ask us to imagine for ourselves how much of what is important for us is inseparable from our mortality and our finitude. They ask us to what extent love, friendship, and the virtues could have a place in a nonfinite life that would, accordingly, lack certain opportunities for risk, effort, and sacrifice. (Aristotle attaches himself explicitly to this tradition when he speculates in NE X about whether gods could have the human virtues, concluding that characteristics such as justice and moderation would have no place in the context of such a life.)20 By these means the stories lead us to grasp the extent to which limits make us who we are, and to see the importance of the practices and values constituted by these limits in making a life that we can call our own. On the side of the god, again, we have a more radical and severe tradition of reflection about divinity, present in Xenophanes and continued in Plato’s Republic, which criticizes the gods of the stories for being more like us in their ways of life, than a being among whose essential characteristics are immortality and self-sufficiency could possibly be. These story arguments ask us to imagine a being who is truly perfect and complete; they then argue that such a being would

surely not perform the recognizable human actions and motions ascribed to Olympian gods, such as telling lies, changing shape, travelling from place to place.21 Such a being would have no reasons for motion from here to there at all, no motive for self-change. These stories ask us to see that even the idea that one might retain a recognizable (partial) individual identity (say, as Heracles) while passing from the realm of finitude to the realm of the god is suspect. The boundary is starker, more complete than that; our needs and limits explain far more about us, even, than popular legends acknowledge. The popular legends—which might themselves have helped many young people to avoid the incoherence of wishing for immortality while cherishing as essential the parts of human life that cannot survive immortalizing—this is now itself charged with incoherence, in that it seems both to assert and to deny that mortality and related limits are essential in making us who we are. The side of the beast is equally revealing— and, in a sense, even more so, since downward movement is possible in a way that upward movement is not. Thus the description of this boundary affirms as essential what might possibly have been discarded had humans decided not to accord it much importance. That beasts lack reason and language is proverbial and, in a sense, too easily seen to serve as the stuff of myth (though we shall see its function later in a very significant kind of story). More dramatic and more central to moral education are thought experiments in which the bestial creature is hypothetically granted speech and a kind of reasoning, and in which the story explores the difference between even this sort of reasonableness and a fully human use of practical reason. These stories usually focus on the importance of ethical awareness itself, and

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS a responsiveness to the claims of others, in making a being that is truly human. Odysseus encounters Cyclopes, anthropomorphic creatures who live in isolation from community. “They have no assemblies that make decisions, nor do they have binding conventions, but they inhabit the summits of lofty mountains . . . and they have no concern for one another” (Od. IX, 112–15). Above all, they entirely lack sensitivity to the most solemn or binding conventions that, in the human world, link one being with another. For they have no awareness that if you have received a man as a guest-friend you ought not to eat him. As Euripides says, they have no paideia (Cycl. 493)—nor do they have, it appears, the responsiveness to others that would enable them to receive a human paideia. Although these creatures look like humans, neither the characters nor the audience of Homer’s poem classify them as human. In Aeschylus’ Oresteia, the Erinyes begin the final play as strange hybrids of the human and the bestial (or bestial/divine), both in appearance and in action. Although in form they resemble human women, they also resemble dogs, sniffing after their prey with dripping eyes, thrilled by the scent of blood. Their deeper beastliness shows in their speech, rational yet solipsistic, impervious to community, obsessed with revenge. When they allow themselves to engage in social and ethical discourse, giving and receiving promises, yielding their revenge to the “holy honor of persuasion,” taking their place in the city and wishing its people well, they are physically transformed in analogous ways. Now Eumenides (so named for their kindly intentions) they cease to growl, to crouch, to sniff after blood. Standing erect, they “depart according to nomos” (1033), robed in human clothing, a gift from the citizens whom they promise to protect.

This process has its inversion. In Euripides’ Hecuba, as I have argued elsewhere, the story of Hecuba’s transformation from woman to dog serves as the occasion for an exploration of the dark side of the Aeschylean reflection about the connection between humanity and social/political concern.22 Stricken by betrayal, immured within her solitary scheme of vengeance, cut off from all love and trust for others, Hecuba becomes, morally, a dog. The forecast that she will become a bitch with fiery eyes has already, in its deeper meaning, been fulfilled. For to become a being who trusts nobody, who accepts no promise and hears no persuasion, is already to be something other than human. The human being is by nature a political being. These stories call for ethical reflection, connecting the reflection with our related questions of species membership and personal continuity. They ask us to evaluate the role of promising, of other-related responsiveness, of trust and sociability, in our sense of our identity. We should imagine these tragedies as they were staged, in a theater in which each spectator looks across the staged action to the faces of his or her fellow citizens, as the assembled group, imagining, thinking, and feeling together, seeks to teach its identity to the young and to affirm it in themselves.23 The communal nature of this reflective process, and the fact that it works through emotional responses to tragic events, suggests that the process of participating in the exercise is already an affirmation of its content. If you care about this civic festival and respond to the events staged before you, you are responding as a political/social creature, and thus affirming the importance of the political in your own life. It would be peculiar to engage in a reflective exercise of this sort and yet to conclude that Cyclopes can

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS be humans after all, that the political is nonessential to one’s sense of the being one is. The “argument” is self-validating in a deep way; you cannot withdraw your assent from its conclusion, without withdrawing from the entire form of life that, as a procedure, it embodies.

ONE PHILOSOPHICAL PRECEDENT: THE PHILEBUS One example of the philosophical development of this tradition of argument will prove illuminating. For, as our literary cases focused on the role of sociability and responsiveness to others in human nature, so this one focuses on practical reason, Aristotle’s other primary focus. Its concern with a hedonistic opponent and its strategy against the opponent make it appear to be the direct ancestor of Aristotle’s argument in NE I.7. And its explicit argumentative structure will show us, even more clearly than our literary cases did, exactly what is at stake in arguments of this sort, what type of foundation for ethics they do—and do not—provide. The argument occurs toward the beginning of Plato’s Philebus. Its interlocutors are Socrates and the young Protarchus (“first-beginner”);24 Protarchus has initially been drawn to the extreme hedonist position of Philebus, who asserts that pleasure is the (the only, the complete) good for human beings. Socrates, defender of reason and intellect, now attempts to adjudicate between the claims of pleasure and intellect, respectively, to provide the good life for a human being. (The specifically human nature of the subject matter is stressed at 11d5 and 19c). The interlocutors have agreed that the good life for a human being must be complete

(teleon), sufficient (hikanon), and choiceworthy (haireton). Socrates now asks Protarchus to join him in a thought experiment. Let us imagine, he says, you, Protarchus, living a life full of large pleasures, but altogether bereft of reason and intellect. (Socrates stresses that the test will be carried on “in you”; it is important that Protarchus should try to see himself living the life.) This looks appealing to Protarchus at first glance, sympathetic as he is to the claims of hedonism. He says he would gladly accept such a life, and he would think himself lacking in nothing if he had it (21a). Even if all reasoning and thinking were omitted, “I would have everything, having pleasure” (21b2). Socrates now reminds him that, by omitting reasoning, they are also committed to omitting from Protarchus’ life such things as the belief that he is enjoying himself, the memory of pleasure, the ability to calculate for future pleasure (21b6–c6). In fact, Socrates now suggests, what Protarchus has left on his hands is “not the life of a human being, but one belonging to some jellyfish or some one of the living creatures in the sea with bony bodies” (21e6–8). He now asks Protarchus “A life of this kind isn’t choiceworthy for us, is it?” (21d3) Protarchus replies, “Socrates, this argument has left me altogether speechless.” The claims of practical reason have been acknowledged. What has happened here? Clearly some significant ethical work has taken place. Protarchus has been rapidly moved from a complacent acceptance of extreme Phileban hedonism to a state of uncertainty; after a parallel thought-experiment concerning intellect, he is ready to concede that any good life for a human being must contain both pleasure and intellect. Clearly, too, the work has been done without moving outside Protarchus’ own system of beliefs about himself and his life: the question is always what

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS he would say, choose, accept. Furthermore, the responses elicited from Protarchus look more like judgments and evaluations than like statements of fact: for he is asked “Would you receive” such a life; and “Is this life choiceworthy?” In all of this, the role played by considerations of personal continuity and species membership seems to be as follows. Protarchus has been asked whether he would choose for himself a certain sort of life; he is asked to imagine himself living it. It now develops that Protarchus really believes (though, not being sufficiently reflective, he did not realize it) that this life is really not one that could be lived by a human being at all. It can be lived by, it is the life of, anyone who would have to be a lower sort of animal. But if this life cannot be lived by a human being, it cannot be the object of Protarchus’ own self-wishing and self-choosing. The good life for him (for us) must first of all be a life for him (for us). Protarchus has been brought to see that he really has believed all along that any life that could be a life for him must involve certain uses of practical reason. Even the life of pleasure, if it is to be properly human, cannot do without thought and memory. Protarchus’ Phileban position had not taken account of some beliefs that he, Protarchus, deeply holds. Socrates’ appeal to identity and species nature gets him to realize both that he holds them, and what this means for his ethical choices. He is left speechless by the surprise of self-discovery. No attempt is made to correct his beliefs by appeal to some fixed point on the outside; the aim is simply to adjust the totality of his beliefs. We could go further. The success of Socrates’ argument seems to depend not just upon the nature of Protarchus’ beliefs, but, more specifically, upon the nature of his evaluative beliefs. It would, in principle,

be open to Protarchus to choose the life described by Socrates: no external barrier and no matter of fact seems to prevent this. What prevents Protarchus from seeing himself in such a life is the value that he attaches to matters of the intellect: to argument, to calculation, to memory. (Philebus might have tried, at least, to answer differently.) The life described seems too impoverished to be human because of what he cares about and thinks to be good, because he cares about these things so much that anyone who lacks them could not, he thinks, be identical with him, and would have to rank as a lower form of life. The question, “Could you accept,” is a way of asking him about his values; and the statement, “This is not a life for a human being,” is an evaluative judgment. In one respect, this argument seems different from the dramatic cases we have considered. For here, consistently with the customs of Socratic elenchus, the argument is with a single individual and not a group, and it works with this individual’s beliefs, rather than the group’s endoxa.25 (Here, as so often, we will find Aristotle returning to tragic traditions, in reaction against some aspects of Plato’s procedure.) This difference is significant—and would be even more so if the content of the argument concerned sociability rather than individual practical reason. (An elenctic argument on that issue would not be self-validating in the way the communal argument is, since the mere fact of participating in personal self-examination would not by itself imply acceptance of the fundamental importance of ties to others.) But we should not overpress it. For Protarchus defines himself as a human being (see 11d5, 19c), and thinks of the shellfish life as a life “not choiceworthy for us” (21d3). He seems to accept the (tacit) premise that the humanness of a form of life is a necessary and central

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS condition of its being a life for him, a life in which he could see a being identifiable as him. Conversely, the members of a tragic audience reason and respond as individuals, though aware of the group’s presence; they must decide, one by one, what the tragic events mean in relation to their own lives and beliefs. The responsive imagination of the spectator works within and alone, however helped by, and committed to, the presence of others.26 The Philebus argument has the same self-validating character as the tragic arguments. For its procedures embody a respect for practical reason; they acknowledge the importance of practical reason to living humanly well. So, although it is, in principle, open to Protarchus to reject its conclusion, he cannot consistently do so without opting out of the form of life that the Socratic procedure exemplifies. Philebus does opt out, so he is to that extent not refuted. (No doubt he could be by a more extensive scrutiny of the role he implicitly accords to practical reason in his discourse and activity.) This self-validating structure, in addition to the argument’s concern with basic considerations of personal identity and continuity, commends the argument as a good “foundation” for ethical inquiry. If we now return to the questions with which we began, we can see that the tragic and Platonic arguments do not try to move outside of ordinary evaluative belief to an external perspective of scientific fact. In speaking of human nature, they deal with beliefs that are both evaluative and, in the broadest sense, ethical—beliefs about what is worthwhile and worthless, liveable and not liveable. They are matters for communal judgment and decision, not for independent investigation and discovery. They are thoroughly internal to the community, and they

serve to explain it to itself. They are less controversial than most ethical propositions—in particular, one cannot opt out of them without opting out of the procedures of inquiry that support them. And they are embodied in stories that have shown their ability to move the imaginations and hearts of people in many different times and places. Their age and historical depth is part of their authority. Yet they can be disregarded and denied, especially on account of theoretical prejudices or political interests. In this sense, important work is done by reaffirming them: and in this sense, affirmed, they provide a foundation for further work. Now let us see where Aristotle stands in this tradition, examining his two most famous appeals to human nature: his claim that the human being is by nature political, and the “human function” argument in NE I, which defends the role of practical reason.

THE POLITICAL NATURE OF HUMAN BEINGS Williams claims that Aristotle’s view of human nature, appealing as it does to a natural teleology, attempts to take up an extra-ethical, and even an extra-human, perspective on the human situation. We can begin to respond to this claim by pointing out that Aristotle’s metaphysics of nature, and his biology, are neither value-free nor external. There is nothing anywhere in Aristotle’s work precisely corresponding to a modern distinction between fact and value; and, furthermore, science, as well as ethics, is “internal” for Aristotle in the sense that it is the attempt to give an intelligent account of human experience of the world. Aristotle explicitly announces that his method in ethics

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS is just the method he uses in all other areas: to preserve the greatest number and the most basic of the “appearances”—human perceptions and beliefs—on the subject.27 I am far more sympathetic with this as an account of what science achieves than Williams will, no doubt, be. His own distinction between the methods and results of science and those of ethics seems to me far too strong; but this is not the place to argue that point.28 Even the unsympathetic should, it seems to me, grant that a philosopher who does advance such an internal account, even for science, is rather unlikely to have sought a completely external foundation for the ethical. But even if this point is accepted (and, since it is controversial, it may well not be), we still need to say much more about whether the view of human nature in the ethical works is built upon beliefs that are specifically ethical in character—beliefs, that is, that concern the general question of the worthwhileness of various forms of life. And we need to see precisely what work the account of nature does in Aristotle’s ethical project. “The human being is by nature a political being.” With this claim, in the first book of the NE, Aristotle defended his ethical choice to make the self-sufficiency involved in human eudaimonia a communal and not a solitary self-sufficiency. That choice was controversial: for example, it might be rejected by Plato. We want now to determine how and from where it is defended. The social or political nature29 of the human being is brought forward against a Platonic account of self-sufficiency in two further contexts: in the accounts of the value of philia in the ethical works, and in the account of the naturalness of the polis in book I of the Politics. We will have to look at these texts closely, in order to grasp the nature and tone of Aristotle’s procedure.

In the passages in the friendship books, it is abundantly clear that Aristotle takes himself to be setting down pervasive ordinary beliefs (which some philosophical views ignore); and that these are taken by him to include, prominently, evaluative beliefs, beliefs concerning what is worthwhile in a human life. In NE VIII, for example, he defends the claim that philia is “most necessary” for life in the following way (emphases mine): For without friends nobody would choose to live, even if he had all the other goods. For even rich people and people who hold offices and the power of rule, it seems (dokei), have a particularly great need for friends. For what good are all those goods, if benefitting is taken away? But this happens above all, and in the most praiseworthy way, towards friends. And how could such a person be protected and saved without friends? For the greater he is, the more danger he is in. And in poverty and other misfortunes they think that the only refuge is one’s friends. (1155a6–12) Shortly after this, Aristotle defends the claim that friendship is a part of human nature: It seems likely (eoiken) that it belongs by nature (phusei enuparchein) to the parent towards the child and the child towards the parent; not only among human beings, but even among birds and most animals; and that it belongs also to members of the same nation towards one another, especially among human beings. That is why we praise those who love and benefit other human beings (tous philanthropous). And one might also observe in one’s travels to distant countries the sense of recognition and affiliation that links every human being to every other.

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS It seems likely that philia hold cities together as well. (1155a16–23) In these passages, which defend the claim of philia and, in general, of interpersonal responsiveness, to be a necessary and natural part of human life, Aristotle leaves us in no doubt that he is recording and examining ordinary beliefs. The italicized phrases attest to this clearly. And, furthermore, it is rather clear that the naturalness of friendship is put forward not as a matter of detached discovery, but as a matter involving evaluation and judgment. It is, of course, in some sense physically possible to live without others. Aristotle simply points out that we do not choose that way and we do not approve of people who move in that direction. Furthermore, whereas we see ourselves as sharing with other animals a certain part of philia—the tendency to love and care for one’s children or partner—we think that the human as such is distinctively characterized by a broader concern—by the ability to recognize and respond to the humanness of every other human. This is not a knock-down argument against someone who would insist on denying the claims of philia. But it raises considerations that might make such a person hesitate and ask himself whether he had explored all of his relevant beliefs about what makes a life humanly liveable. The reference to travel, with its “one might observe,” looks like an invitation to the interlocutor/student to engage in a Protarchan thought-experiment. Before you say that you can do without others, remember what it is like to travel to a strange place, and how terrifically glad you are, in such circumstances, to see any human face at all. If this were put forward from the outside, as a neutral anthropological observation, it would have little force or relevance

for an interlocutor whose behavior exhibits a different pattern. But as an invitation to each reader to consider, within him or herself, the depth of certain evaluative beliefs, and their implications for his project of continuing as a member of a certain kind, it has considerable force. The nature of Aristotle’s argument becomes even clearer when, in book IX, he argues against an opponent who has claimed that the best life is a solitary life, insisting that the eudaimo-n, the flourishing person, has no need of friends. This is how Aristotle replies: It seems rather peculiar (eoiken d’atopo-i) to give all good things to the eudaimo-n and to leave out friends, which seem (dokei) to be the greatest of the external goods . . . And surely it is peculiar (atopon) to make the happy person a solitary; for nobody would choose to have all good things in the world all by himself: for the human being is a political creature (politikon gar ho anthro-pos) and naturally disposed to living-with (suze-n pephukos). (1169b8–10, 16–19) Here we find, quite explicitly, an appeal to the essential nature of the human being, called in, as in NE I, to do some work in an ethical argument. The context, however, once again stresses the dialectical and “internal” nature of the procedure. Eoiken and dokei indicate the nature of the support Aristotle is claiming for his argument. And the emphasis on the word “peculiar”— which we have already seen once before, in a similar context—suggests that we have here not so much a knock-down proof of something from some fixed area of external fact, but rather an appeal to the reader to consider whether the opponent’s project does not deal in an odd sort of incoherence, promising the eudaimo-n life to us, while

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS depriving the eudaimo-n person of something without which we (including the opponent) believe no human life would be possible or worthwhile.30 The connection between the possible and the worthwhile here is of considerable interest. I have said that Aristotle’s general strategy is to show that certain ethical proposals go against our deep beliefs about identity, asking us to choose a life in which (we really believe) no person identical with us could be. I have also shown cases in which the ethical proposal is ruled out by pointing out that no human being would choose such a life. We might think that these are two quite different strategies: for surely to ask whether I survive in a life is not the same as to ask whether I consider that a life worth the living. Now these would be two very different strategies if questions of personal identity were matters of fact that had no connection with judgment and choice. But is this so for Aristotle? (Is it so in any account of personal identity that has philosophical power?) Surely it was not so in the Philebus passage: for what told Protarchus that he would not survive in that life was just the fact that he would not consider that life worth accepting; it would not contain activities that he values so highly that he cannot regard himself as himself without them. What was really at stake, earlier, in our questions about the Phaedo passage, was, once again, an evaluative matter. The answer to the question whether that disembodied intellect is or is not Socrates will depend upon how highly the interlocutors rank those philosophical and human functions that Socrates could not do without his body: on whether they rank them highly enough that they are going to dig in their heels and insist that any being who lacked them could not be Socrates. In these two

cases we are invited to imagine that some living being is living the life in question, a being that has at least a prima facie claim to be identical with the being doing the thought-experiment. In a case like this, the answer to the question about survival seems to require, and to rest upon, evaluative judgments. And in these Aristotelian passages the same thing seems to be going on. The claims that friendship is necessary and natural are joined to, and supported by nothing beyond, claims about our preferences and choices. Could we discover tomorrow that the opponent is telling the truth, that the human being is really by nature solitary and that the good life is therefore a solitary life? It seems that the nature of Aristotle’s procedure here effectively rules out this possibility, short of a total change of beliefs and ways of life. Could we turn out to be naturally fitted for a life that none of us would find worth the living, and in which none of us would feel that the concerns and values with which we identify ourselves survive? This seems impossible, since to find out what our nature is seems to be one and the same thing as to find out what we deeply believe to be most important and indispensable.31 If the opponent really did not care at all about other people and happily opted for a solitary life after considering Aristotle’s arguments, Aristotle could only say to him that he is not like us and will not be included by us in our community. He is asked to assess, in himself, the depth of a concern that most of us share. We must now turn more briefly to the most famous appeal to the political nature of the human being, the one in Politics I. It seems to me to tell the same story, though the ethical work it does against rival positions is less clearly set out. In this passage Aristotle advances two supportive considerations for

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS thinking that to be politikon is part of our nature. One is a straightforward appeal to deeply rooted ordinary beliefs: It is evident that . . . the human being is by nature a political animal, and that the person who is citiless through nature (apolis dia phusin) and not through luck is either an inferior creature or greater than a human being: just like the person denounced by Homer as “without fraternal ties, without customs, without a hearth”—for this person is in his very nature (hama phusei) of such a sort and a lover of war, being “unyoked” like a piece in the dice-game. (1253a1–7) Shortly before this, Aristotle had made reference to Homer’s Cyclopes, whose specific difference from us is constituted by their lack of social and interpersonal concern alone. He thus reminded his audience of the depth of a tradition of thought about the human being, according to which an anthropomorphic being who lacked social concerns would not be classified as human. Now he goes a step further, considering a Homeric line32 that refers to a being whom an external scientist would classify as a member of the species homo sapiens—not, then, a mythical hybrid like the Cyclops—and reminds his audience of the way in which their hero Achilles (or their great poet Homer) denounces this being and relegates him to a distant place of inferiority. If it is really his nature to be a solitary and to love war for its own sake, not just as a means, then, Aristotle says, he is either below or above our kind, but he is not of it. If we encountered such a being, we would not count him as one of us, accord him the treatment we accord to our fellow humans. This passage clearly works within traditional beliefs, and emphasizes this fact by appeal to the fount of tradition, Homer

himself. It works with beliefs that are clearly “internal” and evaluative: Achilles judges that he hates and despises this creature; and this, not some scientific inquiry, is the source of the judgment that he is less than human. The obscure reference to the dice-game33 suggests a further evaluation. The suggestion is that a human life is so thoroughly a life among others that it gets its meaning from those practices. Just as a piece in a game is not even itself, has lost its point and identity, when severed from the rules of the game, so the solitary human will be pointless and meaningless, bereft of her identity. This, once again, can only make sense as an internal and evaluative judgment. It is only from the point of view of social practices, and human immersion in, concern for, them, that the “unyoked” human looks incomplete. The argument that follows this one might initially seem to give more hope to the searcher for an external perspective: for Aristotle now defends the claim that our nature is politikon by pointing to the fact of the presence among humans of a language equipped to express ethical conceptions. Surely, he suggests, that language would not be there without some function; its presence testifies to the importance of the social in our lives. Now, first of all, this argument does not really appeal beyond ordinary belief to science or metaphysics. As Newman stresses in his commentary on the passage, Aristotle, in referring to the fact that the human being alone uses language, is referring to an extremely common topos in contemporary rhetoric;34 this, no doubt, reflects a widespread ordinary belief about the importance of language as essential trait and differentia. Does the argument refer, even so, to a natural fact that can be established independently of ethical beliefs? It seems doubtful. For the beliefs about language to which Aristotle points already

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS contain, it seems clear, an evaluative (and, broadly speaking, ethical) component. The claim that language is idion to the human reflects a rhetorical tradition in which language is made the important thing, the valuable gift that lifts us above the beasts. To a person who says or believes this, Aristotle’s argument says that it is implausible not to acknowledge, also, the deep importance of interpersonal and social concerns: the two go together, they are “made for” each other;35 and it is implausible to exalt the one and deny the other. But, to a person who does not give language any special importance or value, it is not clear that Aristotle’s observations would have, or ought to have, any force at all. There are many natural items that are idia to the human species, without becoming elements in an account of our essential nature; for many of these are trivial. It is only because language is esteemed that the activities with which it is associated have a claim to a high ranking. So this argument, like the others, seems simply to show a connection between two traditional evaluative beliefs. Aristotle’s arguments, then, ask us to recognize the depth and pervasiveness of certain human beliefs and practices, claiming that they are constitutive of humanness, as we conceive it. Once we recognize how thoroughly sociability permeates our lives we will, Aristotle thinks, acknowledge that any search for the good life must go on inside a context of relatedness. The defender of solitary self-sufficiency is given a challenge: she must either show that our conception of our identity is not what Aristotle says it is—that it does, after all, accommodate Cyclopes and totally nonsocial anthropomorphs; or she must persuade us that other aims and beliefs require us to revise these deep beliefs about identity; or she must grant that the proper sort of self-sufficiency for us to aim at is

Aristotle’s sort; or, finally, she must dissociate herself from the other parties to the argument, announcing that her conception of identity and nature is truly and deeply not the same as theirs, and acting, henceforth, accordingly. This means that, from the group’s viewpoint, she too must be or become the sort of being that Achilles shuns, apolis dia phusin, unresponsive to human cares. The fact that she had embarked as student or reader on this course of ethical lectures, whose goal is the communal clarification of ideas about the human good for the purposes of advancing the aims of the political—whose job it is to give a good life, in community, to all who are equipped to receive it—makes it unlikely that she will take this most radical of the alternatives. Thus, as in the tradition, the procedures validate their conclusion. But does this argument do any real work? It seems clear that it does. For the claim that each of us has, and lives by, a conception of personal identity according to which each of us is not only a “this” and “separate” (claims that Aristotle has already in a similar way established), but also a being essentially related to others by ties of recognition and concern, is a claim that a great deal of philosophical theorizing in ethics has not really taken to heart. If it is accepted, it follows that many philosophical projects and a great part of economic writing about human motivation and behavior will need to be rewritten. For even the opposition to mainstream economic thinking, and to its focus on rational self-interest, usually accepts the opposition’s characterization of the boundaries of self and other; but it is Aristotle’s claim that in real life selfhood is much more other-entwined and other-identified than these theories let on. The claim made to (let us say) the economic theorist is that, even while defending a theory that treats the self as something

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS essentially isolated from others, he or she actually has, and lives by, a different conception, a conception that he could not give up without understanding what he himself is in a new way. The shape of the argument is similar to that used by John Rawls against utilitarian moral theory.36 (Rawls himself distinguishes his own use of an ethical “concept of the person” from Aristotle’s use of a theory of human nature; but his Aristotle resembles Williams’; and if Aristotle is understood as he has been here, he is doing something very close to what Rawls is doing.)37 Rawls argues that utilitarianism requires denying the moral salience of the separateness of persons and treating all desires and satisfactions as fusable into a single system. This, he then argues, is at odds with deeper beliefs about the person that the utilitarian himself shares and lives by, beliefs according to which a person is a separate unit, as Aristotle would say, a “this” and “one in number.” Once again, the argument is claiming that the acceptance of a theoretical position entails a cost that the proponent of the position will be unwilling to pay—for these are beliefs in terms of which he defines himself. (Whether the argument has the self-validating character of Aristotle’s is less clear, though there would certainly be something to be said in favor of the conclusion that it has.)

THE HUMAN FUNCTION ARGUMENT38 Now we arrive at the material that is most often used to support the picture of a move from natural fact to ethical value, the material on which most accounts of Aristotle’s allegedly metaphysical view of human nature

most prominently rely. This is the famous “human function” argument in NE I.7. This argument bears a striking resemblance to the Philebus argument that we have examined— though it is cast in the communal form of Aristotelian dialectic, rather than in the one-to-one form of the elenchus. We notice, first, that the context of Aristotle’s argument is similar to that of the Philebus argument. It occurs toward the very beginning of a work concerning the good life for a human being, a work that will concern itself with the critical evaluation of proposed constituents of such a life and the construction of a best life out of the available constituents. It occurs prior to any detailed discussion of the life’s content. It is also closely associated with the rejection of an extreme form of hedonism that would attempt to construct the good life out of pleasures alone. Aristotle has been telling us that one very popular view about the good life is that it is a life of pleasure: This, he says, is tantamount to “choosing the life of dumb grazing animals” (1095b20). This suggests that there is, in his view, something less than fully human about a life devoted to pleasure alone, the life that many people claim, at least, to want. It seems to leave out something that we think a human life should have; this something is hinted at in the word “choosing,” prohairoumenoi—the exercise of practical reason. There appears to be something paradoxical in the choice to live without choice, just as in the Philebus there was something odd about addressing Protarchus’ practical intellect with the question, “Would you choose a life altogether without reason?” This oddness suggests that the opponent’s picture of the good life may be not only deficient by our lights but also internally inconsistent: in his way of considering and going about things, he implicitly ascribes to practical reason a

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS value that his argument denies it. This would give us a way of appealing to such a person and persuading him to revise his position;39 as with Protarchus, we might be able to bring him into some measure of agreement with those he opposes, simply by working within his own beliefs about who he is. I shall now argue that the “human function” argument does this same sort of work in much more detail, attempting to establish some such basis of agreement from which people of diverse opinions can proceed to further work on the difficult matter of specifying the good life. The passage is introduced by a revealing observation: we agree in saying that eudaimonia is the best (to ariston), “but there is a strong desire (potheitai) that something clearer should be said about what it is.” This remark about the limits of our agreement refers back to 1095a19ff., where Aristotle told us that both the “many and the refined” agree on the name for “the top (akrotaton) of practical goods,” namely that it is “eudaimonia”; and they agree that living well and doing well are the same thing as eudaimonein. “But concerning eudaimonia, as to what it is, they are in disagreement”—both with one another and, Aristotle points out, each person with himself. This situation of extreme disagreement as to the very “what it is” of the end in view seems to pose grave problems for an ethical inquiry that is going to pursue this “what is it” question, basing itself upon people’s beliefs. It is no wonder, then, that in the passage before us Aristotle speaks of a pothos for a more substantial agreement. A pothos is a strong desire for an absent object.40 He now continues in a more optimistic vein: “This [sc. the clearer account] might in fact perhaps come into being, if the function of the human being should be grasped.”

Aristotle’s optimism is, apparently, justified by his discoveries in the ensuing passage. For he concludes it with the claim that it has provided an “outline sketch” for the inquiry into the human good (1098a20–1). We shall return to this conclusion later; for it is very helpful in getting an understanding of how Aristotle sees his accomplishment. But first we must consider the passage itself. An assumption stated at the outset is that if anything has a function or activity, then its good acting will consist in doing that thing well (1097b25–8). This assumption needs scrutiny, since it has sometimes been taken to be the locus of a troublesome sort of slide from fact to value. The examples given are from the crafts: the aulos-player, the statue-maker, etc. What is being said about these craftspeople is, then, that if E is the function of the E-craftsman, then to be a good E-craftsman would be to do E well. So, presumably, a search for the specification of what good activity is for that sort of craftsman would do well to begin with an account of E; and a clear account of E would help such a search along. Now what does Aristotle mean by this notion of function or activity (ergon kai praxis)? Presumably he does not mean a task assigned to the person from without. The craft examples support no such suggestion, and an examination of Aristotle’s use of function talk elsewhere would strongly tell against it.41 What would most naturally be meant by “the function or activity” of a certain sort of craftsman would be that craftsman’s characteristic activity qua that sort of craftsman—the activity or activities in virtue of which he is, and is counted as, a craftsman of that sort. The ergon or praxis of an aulos-player is aulos-playing; this means that aulos-playing is that without which he would not be, or be counted as, an aulos-player.42 To say that the good activity

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS of an E-craftsman is to do E, that characteristic thing, well, is not to say anything very surprising. It is just to make our by now familiar point that the search for the good for anything must remain within the confines of an account of what that thing is. It could not, logically, turn out that the good activity of an aulos-player as such was to make beautiful shoes or to play the lyre. This looks like a trivial point; but our previous examples have prepared us to consider that in certain circumstances such a trivial point might do important ethical work. Here it tells us that the search for the good activity (eudaimonia has already been identified with eu ze-n) of a human being must begin with an account of characteristic human functioning, just in the way that a treatise on the art of aulos-playing had better begin with an account of what the aulos is, including the ways in which it differs from other related instruments. A good active life for a being must first of all be a life for that being—that is, it had better include those activities that are essential to, definitive of, that sort of being. Aristotle now asks, rhetorically, does the human being as such have a function or activity, or is this creature idle by nature (argon pephuken)? In other words, would someone say (theie- tis an) that there is something that we, as humans, characteristically (by nature) do? He is asking (in a way that strongly suggests an interest in ordinary beliefs) for a specification of a characteristic way of being active that belongs to the human being by the nature of what it is (rather than, say, by command from without)—something lacking which, then, the human being would not have its own nature, would not be itself. He now considers and rejects two rival candidates. We must study this passage with considerable care, for it has been understood in two quite different ways:

What in the world might this be, then? After all, to live appears (phainetai) to be common to plants as well, and what we are looking for is something peculiar to the human (to idion). Then we must exclude the life of nutrition and growth (te-n te threptike-n kai te-n auxe-tike-n zo-e-n). Next after this would be a life of perception (aisthe-tike- tis); but this appears likewise to be common to the horse and the cow and to every sort of animal. There is left, then, the practical life of that which has reason (praktike- tis tou logon echontos). . . . And this being said in two ways, we must set down the one according to activity (te-n kat’energeian). (1097b33–1098a6) So the ergon or praxis of the human being as such turns out to be “activity of the soul in accordance with reason or not without reason” (psuche-s energeia kata logon e- me- aneu logou, 1098a7–8). To understand Aristotle’s argument and its conclusion, we must, above all, clarify the force of the expressions “the life of E-ing” (in Greek, the -ike- zo-e-). For these have been taken, in the literature, in two importantly different ways, and the question does not yet seem to have received the kind of attention that would be necessary to resolve the issue. (A) “The life of E-ing” means the part of a total life that consists in E-ing: the threptikezo-e- is the self-nutritive part of a total complex life. Based on this story, Aristotle would be arguing that the life-activities that we share with plants and animals—nourishing ourselves, reproducing, perceiving—are no part of the essential, characteristic activity of a human being. We could have a properly human life altogether without these, and the good way of living for a human being does not involve doing these things well.43

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS (B) On this interpretation, “the life of E-ing” means a life organized around E-ing, a life in which E-ing is the distinctive and guiding feature that gives the life its characteristic overall shape. On this reading, an E-ike- zo-emight well include G and H as well. What makes the life E-ike-, as opposed to G-ike-, is that E is in some way its distinctive organizing principle; around E the other component activities are structured, or by E they are infused. G and H are done in an E-ish way, or according to E.44 There are some very strong reasons for preferring reading (B): (1) It is what Aristotle’s conclusion actually says: he says, not that the ergon of the human being is the activity of reason, but rather that it is the activity of the soul according to reason or not without reason. This more inclusive formulation is captured by (B) and not by (A). (2) To opt for (A) would entail a revision of the understanding of ergon kai praxis earlier in the argument. We had, following the suggestion of the examples, understood this phrase to mean “characteristic, defining activity”: that is, everything essential and not incidental, everything without which a being of a certain sort would not be a being of that sort. This would include both genus and differentia, both the shared and the nonshared elements. Reading (A) tells us that only the differentia is to be considered. (For there is ample and unequivocal evidence that self-nutrition, growth, reproduction, and perception are generically essential activities of the species anthro-pos and parts of its logos.)45 This is tantamount to saying that an attempt to understand good clarinet-playing (to take the nearest contemporary relative of the aulos) can best begin not with an understanding of the entirety of the clarinet-player’s activity, but rather with

a narrow focus on just the elements of it that are not shared by other instrumentalists. In other words, we would have to omit mention of blowing or fingering or reed-making, not to mention more general aspects of musicianship, and focus narrowly on the properties of certain types of mouthpieces, etc. This would be an odd way to understand Aristotle’s craft examples; and, so understood, they would be saying something blatantly false and rather absurd about where the search for good craft activity should begin in each case. Reading (B), on the other hand would allow us to consider all the generic musical activities of the clarinet player, in so far as they are done according to the particular requirements of the clarinet, or in a way that is informed and shaped by the particular characteristics of the clarinet. This gives a much more reasonable picture of what a treatise on good clarinet-playing would naturally take for its starting-point. (3) (B) is the solution that fits best with what Aristotle goes on to do in the rest of the NE. For he very clearly does concern himself with good ways of nourishing oneself and reproducing. The virtue of so-phrosune-, as Aristotle emphasizes, is concerned with the appropriate way of doing these shared things. “So-phrosuneand akolasia are concerned with those pleasures in which the other animals also partake” (1118a23–5; see also 1104b34–5). And, in discussing that virtue, Aristotle even remarks that a creature who did not find pleasure in these activities or did them too little would be “far from being a human being” (1119a9–10). His point here is that to be human at all, to be part of a human life, they would have to be done according to, or not without, some reasoned plan or other, however bad or haphazard. (Akolasia, we recall, is a reasoned disposition.) To be done well, they would have

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS to be done in accordance with practical wisdom. Since, as I hope we can agree, Aristotle makes activity according to so-phrosune- an end of intrinsic value in the best human life, in NE I–IX at least, it is clear that he does not omit the nutritive and reproductive life—insofar as it is pursued in a reason-infused manner. (4) The philological evidence concerning the meaning of an expression such as “the E-ike- zo-e-” strongly supports (B) against (A). It will be necessary to consider this evidence in two stages, arguing, first, that parallel expressions with bios conform to (B), not (A), and, second, that the use of zo-e- is not in this respect different from the use of bios. We consider bios first because the evidence is more ample and because we can contribute, in the process, to the solution of a debate between John Cooper and David Keyt.46 Cooper has argued that expressions like “the E-ikos bios” or “the bios of E-ing” always indicate a total way of life in which E is in some way a dominant function. (He takes this to imply two further facts: (1) that an individual can have only one bios at a time, and (2) that the livers of different bioi must be different people.) Thus, to leave aside the apolaustikos bios would not be to leave enjoyment out of a life altogether; it would be only to leave out a life focused on this, a life that has this as its dominant or organizing principle. In other words, his interpretation is our interpretation (B). Keyt has argued against this, claiming that certain passages permit a single individual to conduct, at different times, or in one case at the same time, different bioi. But Cooper has made a convincing reply about these passages; and in general, if one examines the evidence, both in Aristotle and elsewhere, Cooper is correct about what these expressions normally

imply: an E-ikos bios is a total way of life organized around E. No evidence, even anomalous, indicates that bios can be used in a way that supports (A).47 Is zo-e- different? Cooper conjectured that it might be:48 but since this was not pertinent to his argument he did not study the question extensively. The only evidence he put forward came from this very passage, and from a twelfth-century Byzantine author whose linguistic practices are not significant for our question.49 In fact, if one comprehensively surveys the evidence, one discovers that zo-e- and bios function in exactly the same way: when they are used of a type or manner of life, they always designate a total mode or way of life, organized around the item named. This is very clear in Aristotle’s usage elsewhere, and also in other fourthand fifth-century prose authors.50 With all this in place, reading (B) seems strongly supported.51 If it stands, then the ethical work done by the human function argument is similar to that done by the Philebus argument. Since no life will count as a good life for us unless it is first of all a life for us, and since a life for us must be a life organized, in some fashion, by practical reason in which all functions are informed and infused by reason’s organizing activity, then eudaimonia must be sought within the group of such lives, not in a life totally given over to bodily pleasure without reason, not in the sleeper’s life of nonguided digestive functioning. To say so much is not to rule out much. But the example of the Philebus and of the earlier NE page on hedonism shows that it is to rule out a serious ethical position, and one that Aristotle believes to have serious backing. Or rather, it is not so much to rule it out as it is to show the defenders of it an incoherence in their thinking. They say that they like this life; but at the same time they

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS really believe (if they are like most of us) that a life without the guidance of reason is not a human life. Aristotle is aware that the defender can reply by refusing to value reason the way Aristotle believes most of us do. A passage early in the EE, which appears to be closely related both to this passage and to the Philebus argument, tells us that the life of bodily pleasure without reason would seem a worthwhile life, a life worth choosing, only to someone “completely slavish: for it is clear that to a person making such a choice there wouldn’t be any difference between being born a beast and a human being” (1215b28–37). (And if “choosing” is really what is going on, the person’s endorsement of mindlessness is not consistent; it would be consistent only if, perhaps after an initial decision, choosing were renounced and drifting adopted as a procedure of selection.) The mindless life is not ruled out by external facts of nature; anthropomorphs might lead it consistently, though most of Aristotle’s actual opponents certainly do not lead it consistently with the rest of their values. For this argument, like the political argument, is self-validating; by participating at all in Aristotle’s inquiry about eudaimonia, an inquiry that explicitly announces that its results will be drawn from the active practical reasoning of each participant, the interlocutor grants implicitly the importance of practical reasoning in a human life. And, even for a person who does not participate in Aristotle’s discussion, it will be very hard in daily behavior and speech not to validate practical reason’s claims. But still, as we have said, the mindless life is not ruled out; what is established is the cost of the choice, and how deeply it is at odds with some of our firmest convictions concerning who we are.

The argument establishes, furthermore, that an anthropomorph who does lead the mindless life will not be regarded by us as fully human. This does not exclude many types of irrational people, who live “with” practical reason, though not “according to” it. A bad plan is still a plan; bad reasoning, even haphazard, careless reasoning, is still reasoning. It excludes only people who live without planning and organizing their lives at all: the sort of creature, we might say, who would be the survivor of a frontal lobotomy. Such creatures are discussed by Aristotle: they are the so-called natural slaves, anthropomorphic beings who “completely lack the deliberative faculty” (holo-s ouk echei to bouleutikon, Pol. 1266a12, see 1280a32–3). In virtue of this natural lack, they are said to be different in nature from the rest of us (1254b20–1), and, importantly, to lack a share in eudaimonia (1280a33), as well as in philia.52 They are said to be as far apart from normal humans as a human being is from a beast (1254a17). These people are, presumably, people who suffer from some severe degree of mental retardation. (Aristotle may believe that many barbarians are like this. This is a somewhat appalling flaw in his perceptions, but it should not prevent us from grasping his argument.) Aristotle is saying that they are, therefore, not really human; that no human individual could survive the change to such a state; and that they are, therefore, owed an ethical treatment that is different from the treatment we owe to members of our own species. Similar judgments are at work in Aristotle’s treatment of “monstrous births” and in his policies concerning abortion and the exposure of severely handicapped children.53 And here we notice that Aristotle’s actual judgments do not employ the concept “human being” in the way suggested in Williams’ “Hylomorphism,”

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS drawing in a nonevaluative way an absolute line around all offspring of human parents. According to Aristotle it is possible to cease to be human and still to be survived by a living something; or to be born of two human parents and not to be human at all. In what sense does this argument provide a foundation for ethical inquiry? We have already said that it rules out certain extreme ethical positions, for example, Phileban hedonism. But we can now say more. Aristotle’s ethical writing aims to provide instructions for the future legislator. The job of such a legislator is to give to the people in his city the necessary conditions for choosing a flourishing human life. The city aims at making people capable of such choices. A life that is not even human at all is, a fortiori, not a good human life. And it is Aristotle’s claim that many conceivable political and economic arrangements do, either wholly or in part, remove the humanity from political life by removing choice from people—either in a single sphere or across the board. Schemes in which a Platonic state holds all the property remove choices of citizens with respect to property. Schemes in which certain classes are debarred by poverty from sharing in central civic institutions remove from them the choice to exercise civic virtue. Schemes that devote too little attention to education deprive all citizens of choice in a more fundamental and general way, depriving them of a development of practical reasoning that is necessary in order for adult rational choice to be possible at all.54 In such cases the individuals involved may not end up leading a life so devoid of practical reason as to be truly animal: for in many cases other associations— the family, religious organizations, and so forth—will bring the lives of individuals over the threshold of mere (human) life, if not all the way to good life. Even in circumstances

of great constraint, practical reason and virtue can frequently find an outlet, as Aristotle stresses. But we can still criticize the form of government for its failure to promote the humanity of its citizens (or its people who ought to be citizens, but are not).55 The focus on practical reason as an essential necessary condition of humanness, and, therefore, a basis for political assessment, provides political thought with a direction strikingly different from that provided by a focus on wealth and commodities as primary objects of the legislator’s concern.56 For it tells the legislator that these commodities have their place in a human life as means to the activities of practical reason. No good is done by giving people food, money, and medical care, unless government also promotes the truly human use of these objects, in a life governed by personal choice of the good. It is no use giving poor people what they need, if one at the same time maintains repressive forms of government, or alienating structures of labor that pretty well guarantee that this food will be used for mere “grazing,” the medical assistance for merely animal hearing and seeing. Feeding, hearing, and seeing are parts of a human life only insofar as they figure in the praktike- zo-e- tou logon echontos. As Marx, reflecting on these Aristotelian arguments, wrote: It is obvious that the human eye gratifies itself in a way different from the crude, non-human eye; the human ear different from the crude ear, etc. . . . The sense caught up in crude practical need has only a restricted sense. For the starving man, it is not the human form of food that exists, but only its abstract being as food; it could just as well be there in its crudest form, and it would be impossible to say wherein this feeding activity differs from that of animals.57

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS Marx and Aristotle would differ in some ways concerning the concrete implications of this emphasis on practical reason; but in some especially important areas they agree. In particular, they agree in condemning societies that promote money and commodities to the status of ends in themselves, on the grounds that this confuses and inverts values, debasing humanity to the status of a mere means, and alienates individuals from the truly human understanding of goods. “Assume man to be man,” wrote Marx, “and his relationship to the world to be a human one: then you can exchange love only for love, trust for trust, etc.”58 Aristotle would agree. And it seems likely that one could press this sentiment about the noncommensurability of valuable things in human practical reason further, criticizing as hostile to humanness any ethical or political system based upon the idea that values are all commensurable according to a single standard. This would involve a complex interweaving of the appeal to practical reason with the appeal to social/political nature. I shall not pursue the argument further here, but this should suffice to show in what ways the human nature arguments, though neither external nor value-free, are both foundational in a perfectly respectable sense, and also capable of yielding substantive results.

HUMAN NATURE AND HUMAN LIMITS It will by now be obvious that in my account of these two arguments I have not pursued every part of Aristotle’s project regarding human nature. I have focused on his attempts to show how we divide ourselves from the beasts, rather than on his equally important

reflections concerning our distance from divine and self-sufficient beings. In reality, a full account either of our social responsiveness or of our practical reason would include both elements, since the gods have no need either of social bonds or of the practical use of reason in planning a life. Aristotle is explicit on this point, insisting that the characteristic operations and excellences of practical reasoning, and of our sociability, are inseparable from the particular ways in which we find ourselves in the world, as both capable and limited.59 That we are mortal; that we have bodies of a certain sort; that we need things that we do not control; that we feel pain and pleasure; that we have a certain range of bodily desires and appetites—all this is not, so to speak, external fact, but rather a more or less permanent part of the internal perspective of human beings in many times and places. The traditional emphasis on “biped,” “featherless,” and so on has great point here, in reminding us that some forms of life are open to us and others not. In another related paper60 I have addressed this part of Aristotle’s human nature project, arguing that Aristotle’s attempt to found a theory of the virtues on a description of these “grounding experiences” of human life is not at odds with, and can incorporate whatever is true in, the cultural relativist’s claim that even these basic experiences have, to some extent, been differently constructed in different societies. Valuable though this historical insight may be, we are nonetheless left with a great deal of overlap and convergence among cultures at the level of these experiences. We can see ourselves in their accounts of fear and grief and hunger and delight, and they themselves in ours. Aristotle, we recall, said, “One might also observe in one’s travels to distant countries the sense of recognition and affiliation that links every human being

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS to every other.” This seems true, and permits the human nature project, here again, to have broad applicability. Nature comes into the ethical enterprise, here again, not as an external fixed point, but as a humanly experienced context for human lives, evolving in history, yet relatively constant, presenting certain possibilities and foreclosing others, our sphere of hope and finitude.

INTERNAL AND EXTERNAL Williams will have many questions to press about this account. Let me try to anticipate just three of them, and to sketch the outline of an Aristotelian reply. First and most obviously, Williams will point out that in making the conception of human nature internal and evaluative, we have lost the independence and externality that give such an account its value as a foundation for ethics. We have already tried to argue that this internal account, because of its broad acceptability across time and place, and its self-validating structure, does provide a foundation for further ethical inquiry. Now we can add that it is just because it is internal that it can provide a foundation that is really pertinent to the lives human beings are actually trying to lead. Williams vigorously insists that ethical reflection is as natural as anything else for humans—and, indeed, even a part of our selfhood (ELP, 47–8). And he eloquently and sympathetically describes a kind of ethical discourse whose “politics” are not authoritarian, imposing something on people from above, and whose aim is to “help in continually creating a community held together by that same disposition”—viz., the disposition to listen to ethical reasoning.61 This is precisely the sort of “foundational”

discourse that we have found in Aristotle’s text. It seems to me strange, then, that the idea of the external viewpoint and the externally dictated basis has such appeal for him, so that he at times suggests that ethics would have a foundation only if it had a basis of this sort. I want to say that this sort is neither available nor of any interest. It matters a great deal what we ourselves think about our selfhood and our possibilities; what a being who stands apart from our experiences and ways of life thinks seems to matter little, if at all. Human nature cannot, and need not, be validated from the outside, because human nature just is an inside perspective, not a thing at all, but rather the most fundamental and broadly shared experiences of human beings living and reasoning together. But, even if we accept the relevance of the internal perspective and grant, as well, that Aristotle’s results will be wisely and deeply shared in many times and places, still, we must ask whether there is anything in the account that prevents its being applied in morally objectionable and unequal ways to different classes of beings. Aristotle, for example, excludes many beings whom he judges to be incapable of practical reasoning. For his so-called natural slaves there is no foundation for ethics in human nature; and, in a more limited way, this is so for all women, because these beings are held not to exhibit (full) human nature in the first place. They are held to lack a set of basic capabilities to function that must be present if a being is going to count at all as a reasoner and to be enrolled in our enquiry, which validates practical reason. Should not an ethical foundation guard against these abuses, preventing those in power from arbitrary exclusions by setting up some hard barrier of fact? This objection comes from the Williams of “Hylomorphism,” who wanted to avoid a

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS “slippery slope” along which, without such externally fixed points, we would be carried to atrocity. Biological fact must inform us that certain creatures just are human, and worthy of our attention. To this we can only say, once again, that points fixed externally by some matter of extra-human fact do not seem to be the action-guiding criteria we need; nor are they all we can find. If we are going to avoid a certain course of action, it ought to be because atrocity is what it is—that is, for ethical reasons—and not because some wall of scientific fact has blocked us. And it seems perfectly correct in Aristotle to hold that an ethical theory of human nature should force us to answer for ourselves, on the basis of our very own ethical judgment, the question, which beings are the fully human ones and the members of our community. It seems reasonable, furthermore, that people with very severe mental handicaps should not have exactly the same political and ethical rights as people whom we all regard as fully human. Aristotle is wrong because he makes silly and unfounded judgments about barbarians and women; but the question he raises is a perfectly legitimate one. Raising it will not license wholesale slaughter of the deformed and the elderly, as Williams seems to suppose. For there will be another account of our obligations to the varied levels of beings in the world around us; and this account, which in Aristotle will be based on the level of capability of each creature, is well equipped to generate an attractive story of the moral foundations for our treatment of all animate beings. Nor is it ruled out that we may be ethically entitled to give a special place in our account to our own parents and children, no matter what their level of capability. Our social nature might well support this conclusion. The important

point, however, is that the conclusion will be reached, if at all, by an ethical argument and not because a biologist has discovered something. Finally, Williams will surely object that too little has been done by this account. It is so indeterminate in its results, so general in its conclusions, that it does not go far toward solving our most troublesome ethical perplexities. I have tried to show that, in fact, a surprising amount has been accomplished for moral, and even for political, theory. But we must now grant that, even so, the results are, in two ways, indeterminate: they do not talk about the whole of human life; and the key concepts (social responsiveness, practical reason) are susceptible of multiple specifications. Now the question is, is this a bad thing? Aristotle explicitly presents his results as a “sketch” that can be filled in later: So much for our outline sketch for the good. For it looks as if we have to draw an outline first, and fill it in later. It would seem to be open to anyone to take things further and to articulate the good parts of the sketch. And time is a good discoverer or ally in such things. That’s how sciences have progressed: it is open to anyone to supply what is lacking. (1098a20–6) This verdict seems appropriate, since we have in mind here (interpreting Aristotle) a historically evolving project of self-perpetuation/ inquiry/creation that can only be done well if room is left always for the play of the imagination and for improvisatory responsiveness to the concrete flow of history. Heraclitus said, “You would not find out the boundaries of the soul, even if you should travel along every path: so deep is its account.”62 This idea of an ongoing journeying and an ever deeper searching into

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS ourselves is appropriate as an image of the Aristotelian search for human nature. For what is proposed here is a scrutiny that seeks out, among our evaluative judgments, the ones that are the deepest and the most indispensable, the ones that lie at the heart of the ways in which human beings over time have defined themselves to themselves, through the play of the story-making imagination and in countless other activities of self-expression and self-perpetuation. Such a search is truly unending, since, as Heraclitus elsewhere reminds us, the story of human life is “ever-flowing” in history, and the soul has a way of “increasing” its own logos.63 Such a logos may seem too elusive, too open-ended, to serve as a foundation—if what one wants from a foundation is a once-for-all hard-edged solution to matters that actual human communities find perplexing.64 The Aristotelians claim, however, that no other sort of foundation is truly deep or truly pertinent. Much though at certain times we may long to be told from outside what to do and to be, it is only from ourselves that we can find (or rather, go on searching for) the answer to the question that we have actually asked. It is only if it remains rooted in the human and the ethical that our search can be about, and toward, the human soul—that is, about what is deepest and most essential about human living.65 Martha C. Nussbaum

ADDENDUM This chapter appeared in a volume entitled World, Mind, and Ethics: Essays on the Ethical Philosophy of Bernard Williams, edited by J. E. G. Altham and Ross Harrison (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,

1995). Williams contributed a reply to the essays in the volume that is remarkable for its range, depth, and subtlety. It includes, among other things, a detailed reply to John McDowell on the topic of “external reasons” and a nuanced account of the relationship of his own philosophical project to that of Wittgenstein (whom he carefully distinguishes from what he calls “vulgar Wittgensteinianism”). And it contains a detailed reply to my article, which occupies nine pages, and thus can hardly be summarized, much less adequately discussed, here. Williams discusses several different points in my article: its treatment of questions of personal identity as evaluative; the relationship between such an evaluative account and the role of luck in making it possible to have a life of the valuable kind; the relationship between “life in accordance with reason” and a life characterized by virtues rather than vices. I shall focus here, all too briefly, on just one question, and it is the central theme that runs throughout: can we appropriate Aristotle’s ethics without believing in Aristotle’s biology, indeed while accepting the truth of evolutionary theory, which gives us a very different world-view? Before we can go far with this question, we need to state what Aristotle’s biology is. Williams does not do so, but I have spent some time on this question in Aristotle’s De Motu Animalium (1978), and I shall simply take that account as my starting point. We can all agree, I believe, that if Aristotle had accepted a universal teleology of nature, as the Stoics did, this would have had large consequences for ethics (the reason why Stoics insisted that pupils must study physics before moving on to ethics). Stoic physics tells us that nature is providentially ordered and that everything that happens in it is good. It also tells us that the order of

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS things is morally admirable and wonderful, far more deserving of our love and attachment than anything else. This account has large consequences for ethics, which they are at pains to emphasize. When something happens that we are inclined to think unfortunate, or even morally bad, we must withdraw that judgment, because we must understand that whatever has happened was fated to happen and that whatever happens by fate is good. It was for this reason that the Stoics insisted that a major job of moral development was the extirpation of emotion, since emotions are forms of appraisal that deem chance events either good or bad for the person to whom they occur. There is no room for the judgment that something actual is bad, and it may be judged good only insofar as it is seen as part of the overall ordering of the cosmos. So, if one loves one’s children morally, one loves them in the peculiar way epitomized in Cicero’s account of the Stoic father who remarks, hearing of his child’s death, “I was already aware that I had begotten a mortal.” All along, the love is qualified by an awareness of how nature works. Williams and I can agree that Stoic ethics is deeply problematic, and we can agree, too, that Stoic physics is at least one important prop for Stoic ethics. Take that away, and some Stoics may still try to defend the emotionless life on practical grounds (as some of the Romans appear to have done); but at any rate, accepting the physics makes it very difficult to have an ethical view that attaches a normal degree of importance to particular love. Aristotle’s biology, however, involves no universal teleology of nature. As I argued, agreeing with most interpreters, his teleology, applied to living things and to these alone (as I argue), is something like a notion of inclusive

fitness: it is a way of thinking about the integrated character of self-maintaining systems in nature, which are adjusted to perpetuate and reproduce the characteristic activities of the species. Although Aristotle does not have an evolutionary understanding of how fitness comes about, his outlook has been judged by some very distinguished biologists (Max Delbrück, for example) to be closely related to that of modern biology; others deny this, but only because they accept an erroneous and antiquated account of what Aristotle was doing (Francesco Ayala, for example, who defends Aristotelian teleological explanations as applied to living things, and then objects to Aristotle’s alleged extension of teleology to the lifeless). Of course the details of his account differ from what a modern evolutionary view would tell us, but on balance there is, I believe, nothing there that derails the autonomy of ethics as I have understood it. What does a biological account of the innate equipment of human nature do for ethics, if anything? First, it tells us what resources we have to achieve our ends. Thus, recent work by Frans de Waal and other primatologists on the animal origins of compassion and altruism help us gain a better understanding of hereditary resources in our nature on which we can draw—although Daniel Batson’s fine experimental work on human altruism comes to similar conclusions without turning to biology. Second, and very important, such an account can tell us about problems we have to overcome on the way to our ethical ends. For example, this same work on compassion emphasizes the narrowness and partiality of untutored human compassion, certainly a part of our evolutionary heritage, and an obstacle for moral education to address, if we decide we want to promote concern for global justice, or human rights.

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS Sometimes the obstacles biology creates for ethics have been overrated: ideas of “natural” male dominance and aggression are to say the least not fully convincing, given the substantial evidence of early cultural influence on ideas of gender, and a turn to biology can often serve as a bogus defense of an unjust status quo. Well used, however, biology can help us see what stands in our way. Third, biology can make us aware of talents or propensities that we have that might be judged valuable, with the result that we may judge the failure to develop them a waste— either to society or to the individual, or both. For example, understanding the equal aptitude of women for learning and arguing put people in a position to see that the failure to educate them and develop their talents was something bad. Had they continued to think that women just could not do these things, they would have lacked a crucial ethical insight. In one way, our evolutionary view does affect the way in which we will deploy such arguments, in the area of “obstacles” particularly. For we now know that many things evolved because they were useful at one time, but are not necessarily useful now. The burgeoning field of behavioral economics uses evolutionary theory (not always well!) to explore gaps between the way we actually reason and the way that it might be normatively good to reason. Research on disgust tells us that we are stuck with a set of responses to our bodily nature that were no doubt useful when we had no other way to steer ourselves away from dangerous substances, but that often get in the way of respect and reciprocity in our current world. Aristotle lacked such insights, because he did not have the idea of a historical gap between the world for which our abilities were “designed” and the world in which

we live today. So to that extent we need to move away from Aristotle, but I do not think that this limits the scope of the deliberations involved in Aristotelian ethics; if anything, it widens that scope. Williams granted many of my points in this area, but then he worried about what he saw as the “looming vacuity” of the enterprise of talking about human nature, if it was what I say it is. If all the appeal to human nature does is to suggest some constraints, where does the content of ethics come from? Here we get yet another example of what I call the “tension” in Williams’s thought—and indeed he candidly says, in his Reply, that he thinks I am right that there is such a tension. He seems to long for an account that will settle tough ethical questions—while at the same time insisting that such accounts are irrelevant to ethics. I (and John McDowell, whose account of the function argument is very similar to mine) reply that we get ethical results from ethical argument, which is exactly where we ought to go for such results. There is no “vacuity” here, unless one assumes that ethical arguments that go on entirely within the ethical domain are all vacuous. But why should one assume that? Martha C. Nussbaum

NOTES 1 2

Williams, 1985 (hereafter ELP). Elements of this account can be found in T. H. Irwin, 1980; in MacIntyre, 1981, 50ff., and 1988; in Wiggins, 1980, ch. 6. There are numerous earlier accounts that present a similar picture; some of these were discussed in essay 5 of Nussbaum, 1978. I discuss MacIntyre’s Aristotle in detail in a review article on Whose Justice? Which Rationality? (Nussbaum, December 1989).

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS 3

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Williams, 1986. This paper was originally presented, in very much the same form, at the Princeton Conference on Ancient Philosophy, December 1978; thus it actually predates the writing of ELP. See also ELP, 43, 45–6. Compare Wiggins’ claim that the substance concept human being is something that is “determined from outside of us” (Wiggins, 1980, 181), something that gives “answers independent of ourselves to the question what we are or even who we are and what matters to us” (186). What it is to be human cannot “be freely reconceptualized and reinterpreted at any time” (181). On this see especially Irwin, 1980, who argues that the role played by extra-ethical considerations in Aristotle’s ethics shows that Aristotle’s own explicit claim that philosophy must both begin from and return to the ordinary beliefs can be “at best a half-truth.” The metaphysical doctrines brought to bear in ethical argument do not themselves derive from ordinary belief, and are said by Irwin to be “beyond” and “more than” the common beliefs. The pages of ELP to which we have already referred indicate that Williams shares this view. Contrast the general claim about method made by Aristotle in Nicomachean Ethics 1145b2–7, and about ethical method in particular at Ethica Eudemia 1216b26ff.—and see the discussion of these issues in Nussbaum, 1986, ch. 8. See especially Williams, 1986, 198–9 and Wiggins, 1980, 181–7. See especially Williams, 1986, 198, where the clear boundaries of the concept “human being” are said to avoid the “slippery slope” that might lead to moral atrocity against the elderly, apparently because it is a biological and not a (disputable) ethical concept. In a similar way, Wiggins claims that the boundaries that come with the concept human being will settle some tough ethical problems and protect our otherwise vulnerable ethical dignity: If freedom and dignity are what we crave, we shall find more promise of these things in the Heraclitean prediction, “You would not find out the bounds of the soul, though you traversed every path: so deep is its logos” than in the idea that it is for men to determine the limits of their own nature, or mould and

remake themselves to the point where they can count as their very own creation. (187) 8

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Williams, 1986, 198–9. There are actually two different contrasts made in Williams’ brief discussion. One seems to be the one I have emphasized: that “person” is evaluative and “human being” is not. (Thus, on page 198 “person” is connected with “capacity for higher mental functions”—where the determination that some are “higher” than others is surely an evaluative matter.) The other point is that “person” is a “scalar” concept, like “dwarf” or “giant”: whether something is a person is a matter of degree, and the place where the boundary is drawn is to some extent arbitrary. “Human being,” on the other hand, is held to pick out a genuine natural kind that is either all there or not there. I suspect that these two contrasts are to some extent connected: that it is in part because the question is an evaluative one, involving further questions such as, “how high are these faculties?” and “how many of the really high ones are in operation?”; that its answer seems likely to involve differences of degree; and it is because “human being” is understood to be a matter of scientific fact that it does not appear that a being can be more or less human. For Aristotle, as we shall see, “human being” is not implicitly comparative to an average, like “dwarf” or “giant”; but it does involve marking off a certain segment in the continuum of nature in a way that would admit of dispute. ELP, 43ff. See, for example, 26–7, 45–51. ELP, 45–6. See, ibid., 26–7, 51. See Wiggins, 1980, passim; and also Wollheim, 1984, ch. 1. For an account of what needs to be added, see Wiggins, 1980, ch. 3. Compare ELP, 51. See the commentary on this passage by Gallop, 1975. See, for example, Brock, 1993. Elsewhere, Brock sometimes uses “person” as a strong evaluative concept, “human being” as implying only a lower, animal level of functioning: a senile patient who lacks (permanently and irreversibly) all sensation of pleasure and pain and all consciousness, but who still has enough

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brain function to be legally alive, but not a person. Both concepts are, it seems, evaluative here, since even the legal definition of death requires the judgment that mere cardiovascular function is not sufficient to constitute a human life. I am not clear what the purpose of having two such concepts is; and Aristotle would, I think, be right to prefer a single concept. See Kirk, 1970, 162ff.; Vernant, 1981. (This theme recurs often in Vernant’s work, as in related work by P. Vidal-Naquet and M. Detienne.) See also Burkert, 1966. See Benveniste, 1948; Holwerda, 1955; Kahn, 1960. On the complexities of Aristotle’s position on this issue, see Nussbaum, 1986, ch. 11 and Appendix to ch. 12. See Plato, Republic, books II–III; the same point is made by Xenophanes, Diels-Kranz B25. See Nussbaum, 1986, ch. 5. On this, see Nussbaum, 1986, ch. 13, with references. See Burkert, 1966: the particularly close connection between tragic themes and the initiation of the young is brought out in Winkler, 1985. On the Athenian democracy as a self-interpretive community, in which ethical reflection influences, and is influenced by, immersion in social practices, see the excellent discussion in Farrar, 1988. This name, being, as seems likely, fictional, underlines the dialogue’s concern with the theme of moral initiation and education. See Vlastos, 1983. Thus it will be seen that I think that Vlastos’ account of Aristotle in “The Socratic Elenchus” is not sufficiently complex, and assimilates Aristotle’s procedure too much to one that proceeds by majority vote; see also Nussbaum, 1986, ch. 8. One can further support these claims by pointing to the insistence on the inner activity of emotions and imagination— both in Aristotle’s ethical thought and in the Athenian moral tradition that he develops; see Nussbaum, 1990, and 1986, ch. 10. On appearances, see Nussbaum, 1986, ch. 8. See, for example, the arguments of Putnam, 1981. Neither of these words is precisely appropriate for Aristotle’s politikon, which, as the passages we are discussing make clear, refers to the full range of the human being’s other-related

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concerns, familial and friendly as well as civic and social. See also Magna Moralia 1208b5: “We see that friendship stretches through the entirety of life and is present on every occasion, and that it is a good thing”; and EE 1235a1ff.: “Our entire life and voluntary association is with [sc. people with whom we have a relation of philia]: for we lead our day-to-day lives with our family or relatives or friends, or children or parents or wife” (emphasis mine). A related type of connection between ethical truth and judgments of worthwhileness is made by Aristotle in discussing views about the role of luck in the good life: see Nussbaum, 1986, ch. 11. Homer, Iliad IX, 63–4; see Newman’s astute comments on Aristotle’s reinterpretation of the passage: he compares NE 1177b9 (Newman, 1887–1902.) See Newman, 1887–1902, for references and discussion. See, for example, Isocrates, De Antid. 253–7, Nicocl. 5ff. This also reflects a popular belief: see, for example, Xen., Mem. 4.3.12. Rawls, 1971. On human nature and the concept of the person, see Rawls, 1971 and 1980. I first discussed this argument in Appendix 1 to Essay 1 of Nussbaum, 1978; but I do not find what I said there satisfactory. Some aspects of the argument are discussed in a companion paper to this one, Nussbaum, 1988. The literature on the argument is by now very large, and I shall be referring only to some representative items, including: Cooper, 1975; Irwin, 1980; Keyt, 1978; Nagel, 1980; Stewart, 1892; Wilkes, 1980. On persuading the interlocutor to revise his position as a central task of an Aristotelian ethical inquiry, see EE 1216b27–30. Aristotle uses this strongly affective word of his relation to the object of inquiry in only one other passage: in Parts of Animals 644b27, he speaks of our pothos for unavailable knowledge of the divine heavenly bodies, comparing our situation to that of a lover yearning for an unavailable beloved. On this, see Nussbaum, 1978, essay 1. See Wilkes, 1980, 343. (A) is defended by: Cooper, 1975, 160, n. 16; Stewart, 1892, II.443–5; Nagel, 1980, 8.

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(B) is defended by: Irwin, 1980, 48; Wilkes, 1980, 343ff. See, for example, DA 415a23ff., 416b9ff., 434a22, 434b23, 435b4, 435b16. Cooper, 1975, 159–60; Keyt, 1978. The debate is carried further in Cooper, 1987, and in Keyt, 1989. It should be noted that Cooper’s interpretation is our interpretation B only where the word bios is concerned. Because NE I.7 uses zo-e- instead, Cooper is inclined to prefer reading A for that passage: see notes 42 and 47. Some of the most pertinent Aristotle passages are: NE 1095b17, EE 1215a4ff., 36ff., Topics 102b18, Politics 1254b30, 1256a10, 30, 1265a25, 1295a25, 1324a15, 27, 30, 1328b40; De Partibus Animalium 694a6, 682b7, 693a11, Historia Animalium 487a11, 14, b33, 588a17; De Generatione Animalium 736b13, 753b28, 779a2, 750a5; there are many others. Keyt brings forward several passages as counter-evidence: Pol. 1256a40ff., and Plato, Laws 733d7 are alleged to show that a single individual can live different bioi at different times, or even, in the case of the Laws passage, at the same time. But these passages do not support reading (A) against (B). The Politics passage actually stresses that the shift from one bios to another is a shift from one mode of life to another, with a different focus and organizing principle. The Laws passage is anomalous because it deals with the unity of the virtues. It is not paradoxical for Plato to say that one person can, at one and the same time, combine the bios of temperance with the bios of wisdom and the bios of courage, only because it is precisely Plato’s point that the virtues all supply a life with the same guiding principle or principle of organization, so that a life according to one virtue is also, of necessity, a life according to, guided by, the others. For other observations on these passages, see Cooper, 1987. Cooper, 1975, 160, n. 16. Cooper also mentions Metaphysics 1072b27, he- gar nou energeia zo-e-; but clearly this case does not tell either way, since for the god the activity of nous is both a single life-component and a total way of life. Besides, zo-e- here may mean simply “life” or “lifetime.”

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I have scrutinized the use of zo-e- in the following authors: Homer, Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, Herodotus, Thucydides, Lysias, Isaeus, Isocrates, Plato, and Aristotle. (It is not, in fact, a common word.) The verdict is clear and unequivocal: (A) cannot be correct and (B) must be. To be somewhat more precise: Zo-e- has a number of uses that do not concern us. It can mean “life” (as opposed to “death”); it can mean “quantity (length) of life” (as in the expression polle- zo-e-); it can mean “lifetime” and be used interchangeably with aio-n; like bios, it can also mean “livelihood” or “income.” But when it is used of a type of life it always designates a total mode or way of life, organized around the item named. The following represents a complete list of uses of zo-e- apart from the meanings I have set aside above; and I would submit that all support (B): Herodotus 1, 157; 2, 77; 2, 105; 4, 112; 4, 114. Aeschylus, fr. 401. Plato, Republic 344e3, 521a4; Laws 712c3, 944c6; Epist. VII, 330b5. Aristotle, HA 584a3 (though this may be in the sense “lifetime”); 612b19; PA 680b30 (though some editors find this text corrupt, I see no reason to emend); EE 1215a5 (where bios and zo-e- are used interchangeably; Pol. 1260a40, 1278b16, 1280b34, 1281a1, 1283a24–5, 1288a27, 1323a23. One representative example must stand for the whole list: Herodotus 4, 114. The Scythian men have succeeded in seducing the Amazon women. They are living with them near the battlefield; the Amazons have not shifted from their previous warlike way of life. Herodotus tells us that, although the Scythians prove unable to learn the women’s language, the women soon learn the Scythians. The Scythians now make the following proposal: “We have parents and property. Let us live this sort of life (zo-e-n toie-nde) no longer. Let us return to live with our people.” The women reject the offer, saying: We and the women of your nation could never live together; our ways are too much at variance. We are riders; our business is with the bow and the spear, and we know nothing

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS of women’s work; but in your country no woman has anything to do with such things; your women stay at home in their wagons occupied with feminine tasks, and never go out to the hunt or for any other purpose.

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(2) The other objection comes from NE I.13, where Aristotle denies to the threptikedunamis te-s psuche-s a role in human

The Amazons’ understanding of their new language is good. They get the point that the proposed change in zo-e- is not the innocuous adding or subtracting of one component activity: it is a total change in mode and organization of life. Two potential objections suggest themselves; both can be met. (1) At 1098a2, the aisthe-tike- zo-e- is held to be common to the horse, cow, etc. as well as (apparently) to the human being: phainetai de kai aute- koine- kai hippo-i kai boi kai panti zo-io-i. Surely only on reading (A) could this be true: for humans precisely do not share a total mode of life organized around aisthe-sis (as (B) would read it). We may reply: (a) It is not in the least clear that the kai before hippo-i does refer to human beings (. . . “as well”). It could just be coordinate with the two other kai’s that follow: so the life would just be common both to the horse and to the cow, and to every (nonhuman) animal. There would then be no problem. (b) Furthermore, it is true, according to Aristotle’s biological views, that there is a time when a human being leads a threptike- zo-e-, and also another later time when it leads an aisthe-tike- zo-e-: both are clearly marked stages of fetal development. At first, all embryos are said to ze-n phutou bion (GA 736b13, 753b27, 779b33ff.); it becomes an aisthe-tike- zo-e- when the embryo has acquired aisthe-sis (GA 779633ff., Pol. 1335b19ff.). Finally, with the advent of reason, if development continues along normal lines, it becomes a fully human life. Since these distinctions are important in Aristotle’s political thought, one may suspect that the shifting use of koinon here reflects these concerns. (Embryos are mentioned in a similar context at 1102b1). These two replies cannot be used together; but either one would dispose of the objection.

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excellence (1102b2–12), on the grounds that digestion goes on during sleep, but ethical distinctions are not applied to what goes on during sleep. This, I believe, does not tell against reading (B) for the earlier passage. Reading (B) does not require that the good human way of life includes the good functioning of the threptike- dunamis, except insofar as this functioning is a part of a life organized and guided by practical reason. In other words, it leaves in the chosen self-nutritive and reproductive activities that form part of a reason-guided human life, but not the unguided functioning of the bodily system in sleep, which could hardly be said to be either kata logon or meta logou (see also MA ch. 11). Aristotle tells us elsewhere that the sleeper’s life is the life of a plant, nothing more (NE 1176a34–5, EE 1216a5): we are not ourselves when we sleep, we do not live the characteristic life of a human being. On the complicated passages dealing with slavery and friendship, see Nussbaum, 1980, 434, n. 54 (the first reference should read, MM 1194b). Pol. 1335b19ff. suggests that it should be mandatory to expose severely handicapped children, and permits abortion for the sake of population control up to the time when the fetus has developed aisthe-sis. It is worthy of note that the merely aisthe-tike- zo-e- of an older fetus gives it a claim not to be aborted (Aristotle even says that to abort it is not hosion), whereas a living child that was handicapped in such a way that it would not progress beyond this level of life would probably be a candidate for exposure. It would be beyond the scope of this chapter to try to reconstruct the views about potentiality and actuality, as well as the views about the late thurathen entry of nous, that support these distinctions. What is of most importance for us is that these policies are based upon functional capability, not upon human parentage alone.

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56 57 58 59

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On all of these issues, see Nussbaum, 1988. On the extent of the lawgiver’s responsibility, see the discussion in Nussbaum, 1988. See ibid. From Marx, 1978, 88–9. Ibid., 105. See Nussbaum, 1986, chs. 11–12 and Appendix; and especially Nussbaum, September 1988. Ibid. ELP, 26–7. Heraclitus, DK B45, see Nussbaum, 1972. Notice that Wiggins appeals to Heraclitus in defense of his rather different position (above n. 7). We can agree that the humanness sought is not a function of people’s immediate desires and preferences, and that people, according to Aristotle, are not simply free to remake themselves in any way at all. But I would argue that the idea of a human and internal account of depth is more true to Heraclitus (as well as to Aristotle) than is Wiggins’ external account. Heraclitus, DK B115. Included among these will be problems concerning conflicts among goods; and it is one of Williams’ charges against Aristotle that he underestimates the amount of such conflict. I agree with this to some extent (see Nussbaum, 1986, chs. 11–12), though I do think that Aristotle does allow for some possibilities of conflict. But I believe that the larger measure of conflict permitted in Greek tragedy (see Nussbaum, 1986, chs. 2–3) is a reasonable amount to live with, and inseparable from a certain sort of richness of life. A much earlier version of this chapter was presented at a conference on Aristotle’s metaphysics at Florida State University; I would like to thank those present on that occasion, and many others who have read versions of this chapter since, for illuminating criticism. I am particularly grateful to Julia Annas for helpful discussion of the issues, and to J. Altham for most helpful written comments. After finishing this chapter I have found that some closely related ideas about self-interpretation are lucidly worked out in recent works by Charles Taylor: see especially Taylor 1985 and 1993.

REFERENCES Benveniste, Émile, Noms d’agent et noms d’action en indo-européen, Paris: Adrien Maisonneuve, 1948. Brock, D., “Quality of life measures in health care and medical ethics,” in The Quality of Life, ed. M. Nussbaum and A. Sen, Oxford: Clarendon, 1993. Burkert, W., “Greek Tragedy and Sacrificial Ritual,” Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies, 7 (1966), 87–121. Cooper, John, Reason and Human Good in Aristotle, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1975. —, “Contemplation and Happiness: A Reconsideration,” Synthese, 72 (1987), 187–216. Diels, H. and Kranz, W., Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, Zürich/Hildesheim: Weidmann, 1989. Farrar, Cynthia, The Origins of Democratic Thinking, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988. Gallop, David, Plato’s Phaedo, Oxford: Clarendon, 1975. Holwerda, D., Commentatio de vocis quae est phusis vi atque usu, Groningen: Wolters, 1955. Irwin, T. H., “The Metaphysical and Psychological Basis of Aristotle’s Ethics,” in Essays on Aristotle’s Ethics, ed. A. Rorty, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980, 35–54. Kahn, Charles, Anaximander and the Origins of Greek Cosmology, New York: Columbia University Press, 1960. Keyt, David, “Intellectualism in Aristotle,” Paideia, special Aristotle issue (1978), 138–57. —, “The Meaning of Bios in Aristotle’s Ethics and Politics,” Ancient Philosophy, 9 (1989), 15–21. Kirk, G., Myth, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970.

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HUMAN NATURE AND THE FOUNDATIONS OF ETHICS MacIntyre, Alasdair, After Virtue, London: Duckworth, 1981. —, Whose Justice? Which Rationality? London: Duckworth, 1988. Marx, Karl, Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844, trans. Martin Milligan, in The Marx-Engels Reader, ed. R. C. Tucker, New York: Norton, 1978, 88–9. Nagel, T., “Aristotle on Eudaimonia,” in Essays on Aristotle’s Ethics, ed. A. Rorty, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980, 7–14. Newman, W. R., Aristotle’s Politics, 4 vols, Oxford: Clarendon, 1887–1902. Nussbaum, M., “ΨΥΧΗ in Heraclitus, I,” Phronesis, 17 (1972), 1–17. —, Aristotle’s De Motu Animalium, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978. —, “Shame, Separateness, and Political Unity: Aristotle’s Criticism of Plato,” in Essays on Aristotle’s Ethics, ed. A. Rorty, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980, 395–436. —, The Fragility of Goodness, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986. —, “Nature, Function, and Capability: Aristotle on Political Distribution,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, Supplementary Volume 1 (1988), 145–84. —, “Non-Relative Virtues: An Aristotelian Approach,” Midwest Studies in Philosophy, 13.1 (September 1988), 32–53. —, “Recoiling from Reason,” New York Review of Books, 36 (December 1989), 36–41. —, “The Discernment of Perception,” Love’s Knowledge, Oxford: Clarendon, 1990.

Putnam, Hilary, Reason, Truth, and History, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981. Rawls, John, A Theory of Justice, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1971, 189–92. —, Dewey Lectures, Journal of Philosophy, 77 (1980), 515–72. Stewart, J. A., Notes on the Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle, Oxford: Clarendon, 1892. Taylor, Charles, Philosophy and the Human Sciences: Philosophical Papers, II, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985. —, “Explanation and Practical Reason,” in The Quality of Life, ed. M. Nussbaum and A. Sen, Oxford: Clarendon, 1993, 208–31. Vernant, J.-P., “A la table des hommes,” in La Cuisine du sacrifice en pays grec, ed. M. Detienne and J.-P. Vernant, Paris: Gallimard, 1981. Vlastos, Gregory, “The Socratic Elenchus,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 1 (1983), 27–58. Wiggins, David, Sameness and Substance, Oxford: Blackwell, 1980. Wilkes, K. V., “The Good Man and the Good for Man in Aristotle’s Ethics,” in Essays on Aristotle’s Ethics, ed. A. Rorty, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980, 341–58. Williams, B., Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1985. —, “Hylomorphism,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, 4 (1986), 189–99. Winkler, John J., “The Ephebes’ Song,” Representations, 11 (1985), 26–62. Wollheim, R., The Thread of Life, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984.

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11 THE VISIBILITY OF GOODNESS

1 The main objective of the Nicomachean Ethics is to examine how one should acquire and actualize the appropriate intellectual and ethical virtues in order to accomplish morally good actions (praxeis). In this line of argument, book VI is devoted to explaining how practical wisdom (phrone-sis) and ethical virtues depend upon each other and furthermore, not to say principally, how they constitute the necessary and sufficient conditions for a good action to be performed: if the agent possesses ethical virtues and practical wisdom, the actions he brings forth are necessarily good. A complementary approach is, however, required, since moral action does not merely constitute the outcome of a deliberate choice (prohairesis) of the agent occurring within his psuche- but, at the same time, an “event in the world”1 accessible to external observers who are invited to appraise “from without,” so to speak, whether an action is really and fully good or not. If this appraisal were not possible, no genuine kind of praise and blame— which are, according to Aristotle, core constituents of moral experience—would be possible either.2

The question as to whether or not moral actions are susceptible of being properly appraised “from without” underlies the much-debated distinction between agent-centered and act-centered virtue-ethics that is grounded in the following assumption: two actions can share the same external side, though they represent the outcome of two different intentions (motives, desires, etc.) or, more accurately, characters. True moral intentions involve questions of moral decision implicating the principles to which the agent adheres and, consequently, depend on what kind of character he really has (1144a18).3 Therefore, decisions, motives, desires, etc. are not taken to be detectable from the objective side of a single action; instead, in order to correctly appraise moral actions, one should also know “the motive[s], intention[s], emotion[s] and desire[s], [that is to say] the agent’s inner moral life.”4 As far as this picture goes, the character of the agent cannot be displayed and recognized, let alone evaluated, unless one observes him acting several times (or rather, throughout his whole life) and in difficult circumstances (or rather, in circumstances in which he encounters serious dilemmas and experiences inner conflicts).

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THE VISIBILITY OF GOODNESS In what follows, I will argue that the previous account is out of tune with Aristotle’s ethics. Needless to say, I do not mean to maintain that external observers can unambiguously recognize whether a moral action is “really and fully good” or not. I only mean to clarify the nature of this ambiguity, by demonstrating that, according to Aristotle, the goodness of moral actions does not display any specific kind of ambiguity or invisibility. To support my thesis further, I will conclude by highlighting the way in which the visibility of goodness is thematized and praised by Aristotle as a practical desideratum met by two major ethical virtues related to others (pros heteron), namely, by friendship (philia) and magnanimity (megalopsuchia).

25 Accessibility to external observers becomes puzzling inasmuch as one is usually inclined to dissociate the alleged goodness of actions from the goodness of the agents themselves: Actions are called just or temperate when they are the sort that a just or temperate agent would have realized, whereas the just and temperate agent is not the one who realizes these actions, but the one who also realizes his actions in the way in which just or temperate agents do. (1105b5–9) In other words, the goodness of actions cannot be appraised in its full and real significance unless one takes into consideration the intellectual virtue of practical wisdom and the ethical virtues of the agent. Conversely, these virtues are defined not by reference to the actions themselves (which would be

circular), but by reference to deliberate choice (prohairesis), the latter being defined as “desire combined with thought” (1139b5). It is worth emphasizing that what Aristotle is envisaging here is the confusion about the goodness of actions (namely, its being true or merely apparent) to which the external observers of actions fall prey. By contrast, from the first-person perspective, the distinction between true and apparent goodness is formulated in terms of “apparent good” (phainomenon agathon). Once this confusion has been clarified (i.e. once it has been explained that nonfully virtuous agents do not accomplish really good actions), however, accessibility to external observers becomes more and more awkward, since it is at odds with the undeniable empirical truth that external observers have no access to the practical principles and the ends taken into consideration by the agent himself when he acts (of course the agent too may have defective access to his ends and principles but for different reasons). But is an appraisal of the genuine goodness of actions by external observers really possible? It should be possible precisely because the goodness of deliberate choice and, hence, the actuality of intellectual and ethical virtues,6 evaporates once deliberate choices are dissociated from the corresponding actions. True, Aristotle often detaches deliberate choice from actions in order to maintain that the former, rather than the latter, constitutes the proper criterion certifying the actuality of ethical virtues: “[deliberate choice] seems to be a better criterion to discern (krinein) ethical characters than the actions are” (1111b6; see also 1163a22–3). Nevertheless, it is equally true that disconnecting deliberate choices from the corresponding actions induces serious misunderstandings since deliberate choice

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THE VISIBILITY OF GOODNESS itself has moral relevance only as the efficient cause of action: deliberate choice is the starting-point (arche-) of action—that from which and not that for the sake of which (hou heneka) the motion is. (1139a31–2) Consequently, deliberate choices themselves are morally relevant only as embodied in actions, since goodness is not an attribute to be assigned to mere deliberate choice irrespective of the action accomplished.7 The ultimate practical end, that is, the good proper to the moral realm, is acting well (1140b7). By contrast, according to the previous passage, deliberate choice is not an end and, thus, cannot count as an action either. Hence, neither deliberate choice per se (which proves to be morally irrelevant) nor action per se (conceded that the goodness of action presupposes the goodness of the correlate deliberate choice), but only actions as the vehicle for deliberate choices instantiate the goodness one ascribes to the virtuous agent. Thus, the real target of Aristotle’s argument cannot be that deliberate choices, instead of actions, attest to the goodness of character.8 Actions fail to constitute evidence of the actuality of goodness, therefore, only if one falls prey to the error of conceiving the goodness of actions in dissociation from deliberate choices. That is to say, only insofar as one assumes that actions that originate in different deliberate choices may, nonetheless, share the same objective side. In reality, the objective sides of two actions that originate in different deliberate choices are only apparently the same. Once this confusion is dispelled, actions do constitute the requisite sort of evidence. Likewise, the passage about temperate and just men (1105b5–9) should not be considered to show that just agents realize actions that meet two conditions, namely, to be externally good and to be

also fully good. Aristotle rather says that just agents are just only if they realize actions and realize them on the basis of a correct deliberate choice. Significantly, Aristotle concludes his argument by blaming whomever abstains from action “by taking refuge in arguments” (1105b13). Hence, the previous passage does not mean to define what a good action is but to explain how good actions are possible.9 And they are possible only by being realized by virtuous persons.

3 Obviously, morally different outcomes might seem to be identical. Nonetheless, so I will argue, that apparent sameness does not constitute a peculiarity proper to moral actions (i.e. a peculiarity due to the implication of “invisible” intentions, desires, motives, etc.) but holds true of productions (poie-seis) too. I begin by quoting two well-known passages that might seem to provide a basis for the misleading interpretation I intend to revise: Moreover, the case of crafts is not similar to that of the virtues. For what is generated by the crafts has its goodness in itself, since it is enough if it is generated to be in a certain state. By contrast, what is generated in accord with the virtues is not an action of justice or temperance if it is in a certain state, but under the further condition that the agent is in a certain state when he acts: first, that he acts with knowledge, second, that he has deliberately chosen the action and deliberately chosen it for its own sake, and third, that he acts while being in a solid and unchangeable state. (1105a26–33) As some people, we maintain, perform just actions and yet are not just (for

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THE VISIBILITY OF GOODNESS instance, those who do [poiountas] what the law enjoins either unwillingly or in ignorance or for some ulterior goal and not for the sake of the actions themselves, although they are as a matter of fact performing the actions they ought to perform and what the good person should), likewise there is a state enabling the agent to act in each case in a way that renders him good. (1144a13–19) At first sight, it seems that Aristotle demarcates a radical distinction between action and production, since two moral agents, although they each are in a different ethical state, might accomplish a seemingly identical action. Hence, it is not sufficient for observers to certify that one has accomplished what the virtuous person should have done in the same circumstances but, in addition to that, one should also know the kind of character the agent has. Consequently, judgment about actions cannot restrict itself to observing external outcomes, since these are ambiguous and cannot display in themselves the moral worth either of the agent or of the action. Furthermore, this ambiguity appears to be a point of difference vis-à-vis products. Thus, one commonly reads that the aforementioned passages either mirror “Kant’s distinction of legality and morality” (by presupposing that different intentions result in similar worldly actions, as the reference to justice and law might also imply), or testify to the “doctrine of the two components of virtuous action, that is, the subjective intention and the objective work” and, in more neutral terms, that the virtuous and the nonvirtuous person “(in a sense) do the same thing but with a different intention.”10 The previous formulations are, however, misleading in that they take for granted the sharp disparity between actions and productions with respect to their ambiguity or invisibility from outside the agent.

To refute that alleged sharp disparity, one should first refute the hypothesis that products are unambiguous and univocal entities manifested as such before our eyes. Even though our recognizing them as products is equivalent to our detecting in them the actuality of the process from which they spring, Aristotle clearly maintains that the same beings might constitute either products of craft (techne-) or the outcome of chance (tuche-) and of nature. The previous passage from book II provides us with a clear testimony in this direction: it is possible to produce something grammatical either by chance (apo tuche-s) or by following someone else’s instructions. Someone will be a grammarian, then, if he both produces something grammatical and produces it grammatically—that is to say, produces it in accord with the craft knowledge of grammar internal to him. (1105a22–6) Hence, the whole discussion of ethical virtues and their being accessible to external observers begins by pointing out not the disparity but the continuity between actions and productions.11 Indeed, “chance is the cause of some things of which craft is equally the cause” (Rhetoric 1362a2; see also NE 1140a18–20). In order to illuminate the theoretical thesis lurking under this strange affirmation we must turn to a discussion in the Physics. There Aristotle says that we treat chance and spontaneity (automaton)12 as if they represented a purposive activity if and only if their results might have also been the outcome of human activities. In case someone comes to the market for some other reason and then happens to meet his debtor and recover his debt, we should say that “the recovering of his debt was not an end involved in the causes themselves of

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THE VISIBILITY OF GOODNESS the action, but was yet of the class of things that may be the result of deliberate choice and reason” (Phys. 197a1–3). That is why chance and spontaneity are accidental causes regarding what might also have been done of its own sake. By which he means that they are not genuinely explanatory per se causes (haplo-s) of the result we attribute to them. All this is familiar ground to the readers of Aristotle’s Physics. Nevertheless, as far as I know, no one has sufficiently exploited the idea that the products of craft do not bear in themselves any sign that could prove without a shadow of doubt that they are the outcome of production and craft. A correct harp performance, for example, consisting of the skillful production of certain sounds and the accidental production of exactly similar sounds as a result of chance may be indistinguishable. Hence, a correct series of sounds produced on the harp is not necessarily a correct product of craft. The resulting ambiguity inherent in products culminates in the fact that they harbor their goodness in themselves, thereby making room for two different sorts of correctness: the correctness of harp performance in general (which is attributable, indifferently, either to production or to chance) and the poietical correctness of the same performance. The first resides in the product irrespective of how it has been generated, whereas the second necessitates the reference to a possessor of the relevant craft.13 Aristotle claims that, although the general notion of correctness derives its meaning from the technical one, the difference between these two crystallizations of goodness is not detectable in the things themselves. The previous point may be strengthened. There is a large amount of evidence showing that the ambiguity in how one can recognize technical products from without permeates the

realm of the crafts. Let me give, indicatively, three such cases expressly thematized by Aristotle: First, when an observer encounters a product already accomplished, he cannot be confident either about the skills actually displayed by the particular producer14 or about which kind of skills and which kind of craft is really the efficient cause of the goodness of the product in question. As Aristotle puts it, “a badly constructed ship often sails better though not because of itself but because it has a good steersman” (Eudemian Ethics 1247a25–6). Second, a glimpse at the previous passage from the NE (1105a22–6) proves that when one encounters a certain product already accomplished, one cannot judge whether the possessor of the required craft coincides with the actual producer of the product in question. That is to say, although the actualization of craft is a sine qua non for a genuine poie-ton to be brought forth, the actual producer of this particular product may not necessarily possess the required craft-knowledge:15 he may be a learner or a low-level-artisan guided by the craftsmaster or he may act under compulsion. Third, when one encounters a product already accomplished, one cannot always be in a position to certify its being the outcome of craft at all. This time, ambiguity is not the result of the intervention of chance but of the way we apprehend nature in terms of causality. In the Metaphysics VI.9, we are told that certain products of craft could have been generated by nature. Aristotle’s example is that health might be either the product of medicine or the product of nature itself (1034a9–10; see also Physics VIII.2, 199a12–13). When viewed from the outside, therefore, products of craft do not unambiguously display the skills of their producers. Nevertheless, external observers experience

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THE VISIBILITY OF GOODNESS this ambiguity without assuming that it is somehow due to the invisibility of the “inner self” of the producers. Instead of invoking impediments of psychological nature,16 the ambiguity in question testifies to a world harboring chance as accidental cause and supplying nature and human beings with a shared scene to generate their products. On the basis of the previous analysis of the realm of craft, I will argue that the ambiguity as to how external observers appraise whether a morally relevant action is fully or only seemingly good is not different in kind from the ambiguity proper to our understanding of products of craft and, hence, is not due to the alleged exceptional invisibility of the intentions of the agents either. I will begin by recalling the parenthetical clause appearing in the passage from book VI (1144a13–19). It is plain that Aristotle names here two kinds of outcomes that do not constitute fully good actions, namely, involuntary actions, such as actions performed under compulsion or through ignorance, and actions that are performed for the sake of a different end, such as a just action performed for the sake of pleasure. Although these two kinds of actions are morally different and merit a totally different assessment, they enjoy here a common status in that they represent accidental outcomes. In fact, in opposition to the enigmatic formulations of 1144a, book V.8 establishes a neat distinction between adike-ma, that is the proper outcome of voluntary actions, and adikon, that is what only seems to be the result of a voluntary action without really being one. In this context, Aristotle demarcates further distinctions that nicely mirror the parenthetical clause previously quoted. On the one hand, One does injustice or justice whenever one does these actions voluntarily. For

when one does these actions involuntarily, one does neither justice nor injustice except accidentally (kata sumbebe-kos). (1135a16–18; see also 1135b5–6) What matters here, as it concerns the accessibility to external observers, is that the outcomes of the involuntary actions are accidentally good actions, as Aristotle repeats five times within the same paragraph (1135a18; a26; b3; b6; b7–8). Seemingly good (or bad) states of affairs may be the outcome of involuntary activities and, hence, although “something unjust may happen” (1135a22–3), there is no true case of injustice and no reason to blame the agent. On the other hand, [If one acts] in knowledge but without previous deliberation (me- probouleusas), he does an action of injustice. . . and his actions are actions of injustice, but he is not thereby unjust or wicked, because the harm is not out of wickedness. By contrast, whenever his action is out of deliberate choice, he is unjust and wicked. (1135b19–25) This time, the distinction being drawn holds true within the category of voluntary actions. An unjust outcome corresponds to an action of injustice, but an action of injustice is not unambiguously the action of an unjust agent (that is to say, it may be termed unjust only homonymously). The agent is unjust when injustice is something he decides on (“out of deliberate choice,” 1136a1) in order to accomplish his ends. It is true that book V identifies actions that are not done from deliberation as being motivated “by anger or other passions” (1135b20–1). These actions, however, are opposed to actions done out of deliberate choice, that is, to actions done “for the sake of the actions themselves”—an opposition that is again reminiscent of the

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THE VISIBILITY OF GOODNESS previously quoted parenthetical key-phrase from book VI.17 The actions of injustice that are not done “out of deliberate choice” are accidental too, in the sense that they do not originate in the true character of the agent. That is why, even though he has performed them, the agent is not considered to be unjust or wicked, since we cannot explain the action in question by reference to the agent’s character as being its origin. Admittedly, Aristotle’s analysis of the distinction between really good actions and seemingly good actions is not carried out in terms of chance but of accidental causes and results and, hence, it might appear that the ambiguity proper to actions is different in kind from the ambiguity proper to products of craft. But these two approaches are anything but irreconcilable, since chance is an accidental cause. More importantly, similar distinctions are employed by Aristotle when he considers the role of chance and of nature in the realm of moral actions. I am referring to the well-known passage from the EE 1246b37–1248b7.18 Here, first, Aristotle envisages a natural disposition that makes people hit on the right action from impulse, though they lack practical wisdom (aphrones). In such cases, one should say that people are not eutucheis (lucky) in the literal sense of the word but rather of good nature (euphueis). On the basis of the comparison between moral action and craft figuring in the text (EE 1247a21ff.), it is legitimate to argue that, in parallel with what happens in the case of health, Aristotle examines here how natural processes and human actions may result in the same effect. In both cases, namely, in action and in production, nature is considered a cause “in” things (namely, in agents and products respectively). But whereas in the case of productions nature denotes the

way in which matter might initiate its own motion without any intervention of the producer, in the realm of actions nature seems to denote the way in which ethical states initiate deliberate choice without any intervention of practical wisdom. Second, Aristotle also refers to the case of someone who acts contrary to any natural good disposition and, nevertheless, realizes good actions only by chance (apo tuche-s or dia tuche-n), even though “he wanted another good, or a smaller one, than he got” (EE 1247b32–3). Beyond the strong differences in style, concepts and arguments, it is easy to recognize that the latter case corresponds to what the NE takes to be an action done by accident. It is also revealing that chance is here explained by reference to the case of crafts and, in particular, to the example of shipbuilding I pointed to earlier. For the purposes of my present argument, it is enough to emphasize that in the EE Aristotle explains the implication of chance in the realm of morally relevant actions in the same terms in which he often explains the role of chance in our understanding of products as well as the role of accidental causes in our understanding of seemingly good actions. Hence, there is no critical difference between actions and productions here— their only critical difference regards the role of compulsion that I put aside for reasons of space. The crucial issue is that the inconclusiveness or ambiguity proper to the way we understand the outcomes of production and action does not mirror our incapacity to unfold, respectively, the skills of the producers and the intentions, desires, motives, etc. of the agents—thereby crediting the invisibility proper to the “inner moral life” of moral agents with a distinct status—but reflects an ambiguity of the world, in that it harbors accidental causes and chance.19

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THE VISIBILITY OF GOODNESS 4 In order to strengthen my thesis, I will subsequently bring the focus on the visibility of the goodness proper to ethical virtues, a sort of visibility that is already implied by Aristotle’s conception of the good in terms of the fine, to kalon: “to kalon is the end (telos) of [ethical] virtue” (1115b13).20 Actually, Aristotle’s ideals of friendship (philia) and magnanimity (megalopsuchia) constitute a praise of visibility. This is hardly astonishing. Visibility to external observers presupposes a relation to others grounded in the recognition of their ethical virtues—whereas justice does not always take the agent’s virtues into consideration—and, furthermore, a kind of politics inherent, so to speak, in the ethical life. 4.1 Notwithstanding the deep perplexities of the matter, I assume that there is not much doubt about a critical feature that Aristotle attributes to perfect friendships, namely, reciprocal visibility. In fact, Aristotle defines perfect friendships in terms of a mutual access friends have to the true principles upon which their actions are grounded. Let us briefly examine how visibility is implicated in this context: (1) friendship is distinguished from goodwill (eunoia), their difference being precisely reduced to the fact that goodwill entails a deficient visibility, since it is directed even toward strangers or since it might not be perceived by the person concerned (1166b31) or even lack any mutual awareness (1156a2–5). This deficiency is inescapable to the extent that goodwill gets growing irrespectively of whether one observes or not the actions of the other. (2) Perfect friendship is defined as mutual access to the true moral identity of friends,

that is, to the principles by which their deliberate choices and actions are motivated and, what is more, this true access is what Aristotle again and again reminds us of in order to distinguish perfect friendship from the lower kinds of friendships: within perfect friendships, friends are visible in themselves (1156a11), in what the friend consists in (a16), for being what precisely he or she is (a18). Throughout, perfect friendship presupposes that friends mutually display and recognize their true selves; furthermore, this visibility proves to be even more perfect than what the isolated agents might have ever attained in privacy (1170a1–8). (3) Flourishing by definition only between virtuous persons, perfect friendship appears to be not only grounded upon common principles (this seems to hold for every kind of friendship; 1156a9–10), but upon the principles only virtuous persons unmistakably and permanently recognize (1156b7–9). This unequivocal visibility, not to say transparency, of principles hinges on the identity of the principles virtuous friends are inspired by. This Aristotelian thesis culminates in the assumption that, provided that they share the same principles, it is indifferent which among the friends will bring forth the very realization of a particular action (1169a32–4). (4) Perfect friendship is a kind of a broad common space of shared actions (1167a1–2) displaying the common principles their friendship is guided by. Once these principles become invisible or disappear, that is, once the virtue of friends becomes doubtful, perfect friendship cannot be sustained any more and vanishes (1165b). That is to say, perfect friendships exist inasmuch as they live up to the expectations nurtured within a space of mutual visibility; by contrast, not visibility but utility is the criterion for lower forms of friendship to uphold or vanish.

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THE VISIBILITY OF GOODNESS (5) Visibility in friendship is a genuine source of pleasure: “someone’s own being is choiceworthy because he perceives that he is good, and such a perception is pleasant in itself. Therefore, he must also perceive his friend being (existing) and this will come about through living together and sharing conversation and thought” (1170b8–12). Waive for now all reservations as to this much-disputed passage;21 it is at least clear that visibility within perfect friendships presupposes or consists in the visibility of goodness, in the sense that the actions and the sayings of my friend constitute definite embodiments of goodness. Admittedly, Aristotle’s analysis fosters the impression that perfect friendship ascertains the accuracy of the claim—commonly made by virtue-ethics—that goodness is fully visible only when we know in advance or verify over and over again the character of the agent. On this account, perfect friendship flourishes only on the ground of an already established shared life of actions and is conditioned by the common—already established too— good principles, intentions, motives, etc. of the friends. Part of the problem here is that, by considering ethical goodness as being the foundation of perfect friendship (i.e. of visibility), one relegates friendship to a simple supplement to goodness and deprives it of any critical ethical worth.22 To mitigate the effects of this undesirable conclusion, the issue of the philosophical friendship put aside, one should qualify the aforementioned prevailing interpretation.23 Indeed, it is possible to argue that visibility itself, far from being reduced to an external addition to goodness, is rather raised by Aristotle to a criterion for goodness, by which I mean that only whoever is visible in his or her true self (1156a11, 16, 18; see also EE 1237b3–5) can be virtuous too (while the inferior forms of

friendship give access to a mere aspect of our friend’s self on account of what appears to be the present-circumstantial source of the benefit we are after). Besides, perfect friendship does not require the friends to be perfectly good. Otherwise, friendship could never fulfill its mission to serve as a source of mutual assistance with a view at correcting the ethical imperfection of the friends (1165b19). What is required between perfect friends is their being recognizable (i.e. visible) in themselves (1165b20–2). According to this reading, friendship delineates the space within which visibility and, hence, complete goodness becomes possible in the first place. As far as this picture goes, a shared life is not necessary for friends in order for their true character to be progressively unveiled but in order for visibility to be constantly actualized. In other words, visibility and goodness depend on each other. 4.2 And yet perfect friendship represents neither the only topos wherein visibility of goodness is tangible nor the most prominent one. Aristotle’s demand for visibility is paradigmatically satisfied by the virtue of magnanimity. This virtue is much-debated too, attached as it is to a variety of interpretive questions.24 It is, however, prudent to take Aristotle’s words at face value when he says that magnanimity “is a sort of ornament of the virtues” (1124a1–2). Indeed, magnanimity is a very odd virtue, since it refers to the other virtues and not to further incidents of action. This becomes apparent once we realize, on the one hand, that magnanimity is conditioned by the acquisition of the other virtues and even, no matter how rare it might be, of the “complete virtue” (1124a28–9; 1123b29)

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THE VISIBILITY OF GOODNESS and, on the other, that its function consists in “making them (i.e. the virtues) greater” (1124a2). That is why it is closely connected with the fine, to kalon. Before I venture to cope with the inner perplexities of magnanimity by reducing them to the inner logic of visibility, let me clarify in advance that magnanimity exemplifies Aristotle’s praise for visibility not to the extent that it demonstrates an alleged unambiguous access to goodness, but insofar as it clarifies that visibility is both a necessary feature of goodness and an achievement goodness should aspire to. It is now time to proceed in describing magnanimity in five steps: (1) It is worth noticing that magnanimity refers to a claim and not to an object or an external good: “magnanimous persons claim (axiousin) to be worthy of honor” (1123b23).25 Claiming the honor they deserve (honor being the Greek equivalent of public recognition) is tantamount to claiming public visibility. Given that the reference to a claim (1123b2) is reiterated by Aristotle at several places, it would really be an astonishing error (recurrent though it is) to maintain that magnanimity is in search of honor: not only is honor the proper object of another virtue, namely of philotimia—not only is it something given and, therefore, dependent on the honor-giver—but also magnanimity is always tied in with the awareness that honor is relegated to an external good that a truly virtuous agent could not evaluate as something praiseworthy (1124a6–9). Hence, magnanimity treats honor neither as an end nor as a means conceived in terms of utility (1233a7), but claims the right to honor,26 that is, it claims that the agent’s goodness be recognized and praised by the community. (2) Honor means recognition by external observers and “great honor” (EE 1232b17–18) may only be conferred by

virtuous observers. From this point of view, magnanimity seems to be inescapably located within perfect friendships (1124b31– 1125a1). However, there is a crucial difference: while perfect friendships illustrate the effective visibility virtuous friends really have the benefit of, magnanimity depicts a mere claim to visibility without presupposing the effective virtue of the observers involved. That is why, puzzling though it is, the magnanimous person is indifferent toward the effective honor conferred upon him (1124a6–7) or even seems to be arrogant (a20) and ironical (b29–30). Consequently, the demand for honor is tantamount neither to the desire for honor nor to the need for an external witness certifying the agent’s merits. Honor, far from being a certificate or a means toward self-affirmation, merely represents a prize the agent deserves and claims (1123b20, 35). (3) It is legitimate to presume that, in the absence of magnanimity, moral agents remain defective insofar as they lack visibility, that is, what greatness, by essence, claims. This visibility is not reduced to a mere luxury virtuous persons might care for without however being obliged to. By contrast, its lack is identical with a sort of moral mistake (1125a19) witnessing both a lack of self-knowledge and a lack of energy. Small-hearted persons (mikropsuchos) “turn away from fine actions and accomplishments” (1125a25–6) and, then, greatness reflects the quintessence of morality, insofar as it mirrors agents’ readiness to perform fine actions. (4) Being reduced to a claim rather than to an effective recognition, and being compelled in front of any observer rather than in front of virtuous persons, magnanimity cannot demand the effective understanding of its principles. In fact, the community may not be

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THE VISIBILITY OF GOODNESS in a position to understand, let alone to adequately evaluate, the real principles displayed by virtuous actions. Let me illustrate what the magnanimous person affirms: the virtue of my actions (axios o-n) claims (axioi) to be recognized and honored (time-) by the community, that is, my actions ought to be provided with a visible stand, even though this same community may not be able to grasp their true worth. So we arrive at the threshold of magnanimity that proves to coincide with the core of the paradoxical status assigned to visibility: visibility is a necessary constituent of goodness virtuous persons should aspire to and, retrospectively, should be considered a piece of evidence testifying goodness. Greatness, goodness, and visibility are intrinsically tied up with one another. The subterranean passages that make this connection possible are grounded in the assumption that great actions enjoy a privileged kind of visibility, precisely because greatness is a favorable condition for something to be visible. Even a community that has no real access to the principles motivating the magnanimous person is compelled to accept that goodness is effectively detectable, if anywhere, within great actions and, hence, to blame on itself the inability to recognize what is in reality out there. In other words, the case of great actions crystallizes par excellence the idea that the visibility of goodness is not a question of psychological factors impeding our access to the inner life of the agents but rather a question of recognizing what is actually harbored in the actions themselves. (5) That is the reason why, unless based on complete virtue, this claim to honor is a sign of conceited and foolish persons. On behalf of what evidence might external observers distinguish between claims to honor laid by magnanimous persons and similar claims laid by conceited persons? Aristotle copes

with this challenge by drawing a detailed image of the actions and attitudes a magnanimous person is designated to perform. No doubt, this image might not be exhaustive. Nonetheless, Aristotle is quite pedantic in introducing sufficient delicate distinctions and sophisticated criteria in order for observers to discriminate the true magnanimous persons from those who merely pretend to be. This is why the magnanimous person’s attitude has been presented as a tremendous and thorny everlasting balancing between seemingly incompatible activities performed under the permanent risk of deviations that, no matter how slight they might appear, prove to be sufficient to render this comportment an object of ridicule: interest and disinterest, sociability and privacy, activation and retreat, willingness and reluctance, memory and oblivion, truthfulness and irony, etc. This extremely detailed picture, unique as it is within books II–IV on ethical virtues, aims at inserting external criteria in order for magnanimity to be correctly appraised and for the actions of the magnanimous person to be considered as trustworthy witnesses of the principles they are guided by. The conviction underlying this long description proves to be that conceited persons, even though they try to imitate the comportment proper to magnanimity, fail to deceive us because of the inner complexity of magnanimity: “If we examine particular cases, the magnanimous person would appear altogether ridiculous if he were not good” (1123b33–4; my italics). It is not an exaggeration to claim that magnanimity provides Aristotle with the most suitable pattern for establishing the connection between chance, goodness, and visibility: for without virtue it is hard to handle good fortune (eutuche-mata) in a suitable way

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THE VISIBILITY OF GOODNESS . . . [those who lack virtue] act in a random way (tucho-si). This is so because they imitate the magnanimous person without being like him and imitate him only in what they can. (1124a30–1124b4)

7 8

In other words, imitation and deceit are hardly possible within the ethical realm and this state of affairs becomes obvious each time we focus on particular actions, let alone on great actions. ***

9

10

11

12

By focusing on the visibility of goodness from outside the agent, one establishes a new point of view, that of the external observers of morally relevant actions, and thereby counterbalances the current tendency to exclusively examine Aristotle’s ethics from the first-person perspective, that is, in terms of moral psychology. It would be a major project to attempt to show that the pattern of the visibility of goodness also provides the most reliable bridge connecting Aristotle’s ethics to his Poetics and his Politics.27 Pavlos Kontos

13 14

15

16

17

18

NOTES 19 1 2 3

4 5

6

Natali, 2004, 155. See Pakaluk, 2005, 119. Where there is no other indication, quotations are from the NE. Translations are mine. Nussbaum, 1999, 170. I have developed with more argument the claims made in paragraphs §§2–3 in Kontos, 2011, 9–31. Ethical virtues should not be considered inner traits inaccessible to external observers. On the one hand, they are expressed in our actions. On the other, as Reeve nicely points out, “pleasure and pain, and not action alone, should be taken as the sign of someone’s state of character,” that is to say, of someone’s virtues. But pleasure and pain are effectively

20

21

22 23 24

detectable in how enthusiastically, hesitantly, etc. we act (Reeve, 2012, 47). See Stewart, 1892, 27. My insistence on the priority of actions is in continuity with the incompatibilist account of character, education, and responsibility, offered by Destrée, 2011. Contrast Williams, 1995 and Taylor, 2006, 94–6. See, respectively, Ando, 1965, 196–8; Gauthier-Jolif, 2002, 549; Broadie, 1991, 87. Hardie, 1968, 105 and Pakaluk, 2005, 104 have also drawn attention, though only in passing, to this point. Chance and spontaneity differ in that the former is restricted to what concerns the human affairs, that is, to the realm of actions (Physics 197b4). Contrast Wolf, 2007, 68. The same holds true about the indistinguishable results of experience and craft (see Metaphysics I.1). This is why the ultimate cause of certain products might be taken to coincide either with the producer himself or with the relevant craft (Phys. 195b22). I take my suggestions to further and partially amend Broadie’s thesis that “craft is nonpsychological” (Broadie, 2007, 100). Compare Sherman, 1999, and Pearson, 2006, with the second of which I am sympathetic despite some differences. In disagreement with Woods, 1992, 168–9, I concur with Dirlmeyer’s interpretation of the core section 1247b28–1248a19. My analysis has purported to present the case of an Aristotelian argument that “bears a vital relation to models supplied by the technai” (Angier, 2010, 1), without being however—in opposition to the models examined by Angier—“philosophically problematic.” I meet thereby the remarks by Lear, 2006, 122–3, and the challenging analysis by Burger, 2008, 68–92, who understands the fine (beautiful) as an “independent principle” of goodness. See, indicatively, Kraut, 1989, 139ff. and Kosman, 2004. Cooking and Kennet, 1998. See Kontos, 2002, 90–3. Gauthier’s 1951 prominent study remains an authority on the subject. Nonetheless,

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THE VISIBILITY OF GOODNESS

25

26 27

I do not adhere to the identification of magnanimous men with philosophers, a claim he reaffirmed in his comments on NE (Gauthier-Jolif, 2002). I do not share either the suggestion that we should “unterbewerten” magnanimity (Dirlmeyer, 1969, 371) or Howland’s 2002 assumption that Aristotle’s description should be read as conveying an objection against the very possibility of magnanimity. I believe that these interpretations “rest on the assumption that Aristotle could not have meant what he said about greatness of soul” (Crisp, 2006, 175). In his challenging book, Faulkner, 2007, 15ff., makes a number of points in line with my reading: he opposes magnanimity to courage (since the latter aspires to nobility, whereas the former “involves a more comprehensive prudence”), points out the strong affinity between magnanimity and truth/ truthfulness, and nicely explains the kind of honor the magnanimous claims. A brief word about translation is in order here: I prefer to render axiousin as “claim to be worthy of” on the ground that the Greek term points to both, namely, to claiming and to worthiness. Contrast Schütrumpf, 1989, 19–20. I read earlier versions of this chapter at the Oxford Workshop in Ancient Philosophy and the Roma Tre University. I am grateful to David Charles, Riccardo Chiaradonna, Terence Irwin, Michael Pakaluk, and Michael Weinman for their insightful comments.

REFERENCES Ando, T., Aristotle’s Theory of Practical Cognition, The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1965. Angier, T., Techne- in Aristotle’s Ethics, London/New York: Continuum, 2011. Broadie, S., Aristotle and Beyond, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007. —, Ethics with Aristotle, New York/Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991.

Burger, R., Aristotle’s Dialogue with Socrates, Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 2008. Cooking, D. and J. Kennet, “Friendship and the Self,” Ethics, 108.3 (1998), 502–27. Cordner, C., “Aristotelian Virtue and Its Limitations,” Philosophy, 69 (1994), 291–316. Crisp, R., “Aristotle on Greatness of Soul,” in The Blackwell Guide to Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, ed. R. Kraut, Cambridge, MA/Oxford: Blackwell, 2006, 158–78. Destrée, P., “Aristotle on Responsibility for One’s Character,” in Moral Psychology and Human Action in Aristotle, ed. M. Pakaluk and G. Pearson, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011, 285–318. Dirlmeyer, F., Aristoteles. Nikomachische Ethik, Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1969. —, Aristoteles. Eudemische Ethik, Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1984. Faulkner, R., The Case for Greatness, New Haven/London: Yale University Press, 2007. Gauthier, A. R. and J. Y. Jolif, Aristote. L’ Éthique à Nicomaque (vol. II), Louvain-la-neuve: Peeters, 2002. Gauthier, R., Magnanimité, Paris: Vrin, 1951. Hardie, W. F. R., Aristotle’s Ethical Theory, Oxford: Clarendon, 1968. Howland, J., “Aristotle’s Great-Souled Man,” The Review of Politics, 64.1 (2002), 27–56. Kontos, P., Aristotle’s Moral Realism Reconsidered, New York/London: Routledge, 2011. —, L’ action morale chez Aristote, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 2002.

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THE VISIBILITY OF GOODNESS Kraut, R., Aristotle on the Human Good, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989. Kosman, A., “Aristotle on the Desirability of Friends,” Ancient Philosophy, XXIV.1 (2004), 135–54. Lear, G. R., “Aristotle on Moral Virtue and the Fine,” in The Blackwell Guide to Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, ed. R. Kraut, Cambridge, MA/Oxford: Blackwell, 2006, 116–36. Natali, C., L’action efficace, Louvainla-neuve: Peeters, 2004. Nussbaum, M., “Virtue Ethics: A Misleading Category?,” Journal of Ethics, 3 (1999), 163–201. Pakaluk, M., “The Meaning of Aristotelian Magnanimity,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, XXVI (2004), 241–75. —, Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005. Pearson, G., “Aristotle on Acting Unjustly without being Unjust,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, XXX (2006), 211–33.

Reeve, D. C., Action, Contemplation, and Happiness, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012. Schütrumpf, E., “Magnanimity, Megalopsychia, and the System of Aristotle’s NE,” Archiv für die Geschichte der Philosophie, 71 (1989), 10–22. Sherman, D., “Aristotle and the Problem of Particular Injustice,” Philosophical Forum, 30.4 (1999), 235–48. Stewart J. A., Notes on the Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle, Oxford: Clarendon, 1892. Taylor C. C., Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics, Books II-IV, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006. Williams, B., “Acting as the Virtuous Person Acts,” in Aristotle and Moral Realism, ed. R. Heinaman, London: UCL Press, 1995, 13–23. Wolf, U., Aristoteles Nikomachische Ethik, Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2007. Woods, M., Aristotle. Eudemian Ethics, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992.

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12 ˉ S LEGETAI: TO KAKON POLLACHO THE PLURIVOCITY OF THE NOTION OF EVIL IN ARISTOTELIAN ETHICS

Evil takes various forms (τὸ μὲν . . . κακὸν πολυειδές), where good has only one. Aristotle, Magna Moralia I.24, 1192a10–111 Error is multiform (τὸ μὲν ἁμαρτάνειν πολλαχῶς ἔστιν). Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics II.6, 1106b28–92

INTRODUCTION This paper examines the very broad notion of moral evil3 in the Aristotelian ethical treatises.4 This inquiry is rendered problematic, however, by the fact that in the opening of Nicomachean Ethics, the notion of evil is, de jure, removed by the statement that everything aims to the good.5 Analogously, in other passages of the ethical treatises, the Stagirite reminds us that human beings are naturally inclined to the Good, and that this is seen in the natural virtues.6 A second issue concerns the interpretative koine- on this topic, inclined, on the one hand, to affirm the Philosopher’s limited interest in the topics of evil and the negative,7 and, on the other hand, to describe Aristotelian ethics as “pacified ethics,” or rather as a “non-conflictual”

morality, in which the agent does not experience turmoil and interior “disorders.” Notwithstanding these two problems, it can be shown that de facto the theme of moral evil is extremely pervasive and absolutely relevant, both historically8 and conceptually. Moreover, evil, described by Aristotle as disorder and lack of measure,9 plays a crucial role on several levels: on the level of the soul, on the level of the moral subject, and on that of human life, which strives for a harmonious, measured, and happy existence, but is forced in daily life to face innumerable disharmonizing elements. In fact, despite its apparent exclusion from ethical inquiry, moral evil receives particular attention precisely in this specific field10 and presents a series of very interesting repercussions in psychological, anthropological, epistemological, and political-juridical debates, which, in

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ˉ S LEGETAI TO KAKON POLLACHO this article, can only be mentioned en passant, beyond the field of ethics stricto sensu. Thus this work seeks to examine the multifaceted notion of evil, analyzing the words used by Aristotle in the ethical treatises to name it, and then noting how these words are linked to each other and probing their semantic specificities. The second step of the inquiry consists in the attempt to work out the conceptual distinction between the two fundamental sides of evil that emerge from the Aristotelian opus: in a certain sense, evil can be “suffered,” and in another sense, it can be “acted” or “caused.”11 Within this multiplicity of semantic levels, furthermore, we can find other fundamental articulations of the question that demand the research be expanded to include identification and comparison of two very crucial figures of evil: the notion of vice (kakia) and that of lack of self-control or incontinence (akrasia). In addition, our inquiry should include the study of the links between the notion of vice and the very complex and amply studied one of ignorance (agnoia).

GRAMMAR OF EVIL To observe the words used by Aristotle to designate the notion of evil and to note their use in his Ethics and, more in general, in his corpus, it is necessary to have recourse to the lexicon,12 focusing, in particular, on three fundamental lemmata: kakos,13 phaulote-s,14 and mochthe-ria.15 Besides these lemmata, it is also fruitful to consider other fundamental expressions used by Aristotle to speak of evil, more or less technical nouns and adjectives that have a very rich background.16 Using these expressions, Aristotle seems not to indicate a particular kind of evil, but the

moral evil qua talis. In other words, human beings can be bad in many ways, as we read in NE II.6, 1106b35: “good men in one way, but bad in many” (ἐσθλοὶ μὲν γὰρ ἁπλῶς, παντοδαπῶς δὲ κακοί). However, it seems that when Aristotle uses one of these terms, and the respective adjectives, he refers to the notion of evil without qualification. In this sense it can be said that human beings who are kakoi, phauloi, or mochthe-roi can be considered generically bad or evil17 and that, as has been rightly observed, these words (to which can be added pone-ria18 as well), must be considered synonymous.19 Kakia,20 phaulote-s, and mochthe-ria,21 in fact, represent the opposite pole to the good (agathon): in the Aristotelian lexicon, as in the Greek language there is a dynamic of references and oppositions between the sphere dominated by agathos and “the negative determinations that coagulate themselves . . . in phaulos.”22 This polarity also concerns things, given that wickedness, or nastiness (meant here as inadequacy) can also concern inanimate entities. There are excellent persons or houses that function at their best and achieve their task, their specific function (i.e. their ergon),23 and there are evil persons and things, inadequate to their function, that is, “un-functioning,” “unsuccessful.”24 But within this polarity that crosses without distinction both the animate and inanimate universe, some important differentiations can be found. There are many ways to be wrong, and each of these ways represents a kind of evil, as confirmed, for instance, by the wide range of evil passions and actions, linked, in NE II.6, 1107a9–13, to the general notion of phaulote-s: Not every action or emotion however admits the observance of a due mean.

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ˉ S LEGETAI TO KAKON POLLACHO Indeed the very names of some directly imply evil (phaulote-tos), for instance malice (epichairekakia), shamelessness (anaischuntia), envy (phthonos) and, of actions, adultery (moicheia), theft (klope-), murder (androphonia).25 And, as there are many ways to be phauloi, there are also many ways to be kakoi, vicious. Every vice, as excess or defect in comparison with the right measure (i.e. with the good), is an evil, but there are many ways to realize vice, many ways to be excessive or defective. It is no accident that Aristotle attributes different names to the modalities of realization and externalization of evil:26 [excess]

[defect]

Irascibility (O’ ργιλóτης)

Spiritlessness (ἀναλγησία)

Rashness (θρασυ′ της) Cowardice (δειλία) Shamelessness (ἀναισχυντία)

Diffidence (κατάπληξις)

Profligacy (ἀκολασία)

Insensitiveness (ἀναισθησία)

Envy (φθόνος)

(nameless) (ἀνώ νυμον)

Profit (κέρδος)

Loss (ζημία)

Prodigality (ἀσωτία)

Meanness (ἀνελευθερία)

Boastfulness (ἀλαζονεία)

Self-depreciation (εἰρωνεία)

Flattery (κολακεία)

Surliness (ἀπέχθεια)

Subservience (ἀρέσκεια)

Stubbornness (αὐθάδεια)

Luxuriousness (τρυφερότης)

Endurance (κακοπάθεια)

Vanity (χαυνότης)

Smallness of Spirit (μικροψυχία)

Extravagance (δαπανηρία)

Shabbiness (μικροπρέπεια)

Rascality (πανουργία)

Simpleness (εὐήθεια)

However, this chapter does not focus on these specific forms of moral evil, but on the notion of moral evil before its specification. It can be seen that this notion is intrinsically polymorphic, and that evil can be spoken of in many ways not only because many forms of evil exist27 but also because moral evil itself is, for Aristotle, a πολλαχῶς λεγόμενον.

EVIL “SUFFERED” Evil destroys and does not build; it rips and it does not mend; it cuts and it does not bind. It strives always and everywhere to annihilate, to turn to nothing.28 As indicated in the introduction, the first fundamental distinction in the notion of evil is that between “evil suffered” and “evil acted.” Evil “suffered” can be understood as the evil a human being happens to suffer involuntarily and unexpectedly (paralogo-s), something a person happens to experience independently of his will29 and, therefore, of his responsibility. It is a kind of evil that, as we read in Rhetoric II.7, 1386a5–15,30 moves us to pity: They are all painful and distressing things that are also destructive, and all that are ruinous; and all evils of which fortune is the cause, if they are great. Things distressing and destructive are various kinds of death, personal ill-treatment and injuries, old age, disease, and lack of food. The evils for which fortune is responsible are lack of friends, or few friends (wherefore it is pitiable to be torn away from friends and intimates), ugliness, weakness, mutilation; if some

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ˉ S LEGETAI TO KAKON POLLACHO misfortune comes to pass from a quarter whence one might have reasonably expected something good; and if this happens often; and if good fortune does not come until a man has already suffered. The wide and extremely varied gradations of “evils that happen” all share the fact that the person who suffers them is not responsible for their occurrence. This is an evil that, stricto sensu, lies outside the ethical field and concerns, instead, the physical or biological one. Certainly, in some specific cases, as Aristotle points out, one puts oneself in the conditions of suffering evil (e.g. when one becomes sick because he has not sufficiently taken care of himself31), but in general, “evil that happens,” like pain, suffering, and death, can be counted among those “guiltless” evils that in German are expressed as Übel, distinguishing them from the various ramifications of “acted evil,” of “bad evil,” namely of Böse.32 Among the forms of “suffered evil” we can find death, pain (which Aristotle defines as “disintegration,”33 an evil to avoid34), and the passions that Aristotle deems neither good nor evil35 in and of themselves; they are something that human beings cannot help but suffer, as the term pathos itself says. It would be like trying to persuade someone not to feel warmth, pain, or hunger.36 The individual happens to suffer these evils; people are in a certain way possessed by them,37 and cannot avoid them. In fact, Aristotle reminds us in Eudemian Ethics VII.2, 1238a16–17, that such evils are by nature under the influence of fortune and misfortune.38 Whether these human evils are the product of an opposing tuche- or of an inescapable Ate sent by the superior powers, according

to the ancient Greek religious conception, or whether they are sent by God himself, according to the hypothesis offered in MM II.8,39 in any case, they lie beyond the horizon of praxis and, therefore, outside the sphere of the human being’s responsibility.40 However, in the Aristotelian view, seeing that the human being is not responsible for the occurrence of a certain kind of evil does not mean that the person is completely exempt from all responsibility. On the contrary, asserts the Stagirite, it is precisely in the face of the greatest evils that the human being is called upon to show his caliber. This does not mean being courageous regardless of the cost, or not fearing the evils at all. In fact, it would be absurd not to fear some evils,41 given that they are terrifying for anyone who has the use of reason. These evils exceed the capacity of human endurance42 and are so awful that, faced with them, it is better to die or not ever to have been born: For many of life’s events are such that they cause men to throw life away, for instance, diseases, excessive pains, storms; so that it is clear that on account of these things any way it would actually be preferable, if someone offered us the choice, not to be born at all.43 There is no doubt that, faced with the devastating chances of life, not even the wise person is able to stand. In fact, the phronimos, the person able to build a good life and to provide it with stability, to base it on solid foundations, is certainly capable of handling little misadventures44 and of harmonizing them within a happy existence,45 but he is not able to be happy when faced with devastating misadventures. In the face of terrible evils, Aristotle teaches, wisdom itself is helpless:

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ˉ S LEGETAI TO KAKON POLLACHO malicious passions, by which one always goes wrong:

The happy man can never become miserable; though it is true he will not be supremely blessed if he encounters the misfortunes of a Priam. Nor yet will he be variable and liable to change; for he will not be dislodged from his happiness easily, nor by ordinary misfortunes, but only by severe and frequent disaster, nor will he recover from such disaster and become happy again quickly.46

Thus, among the various forms of suffering, understood as evil that occurs, we find both pain (problematically defined by Aristotle as passion and what follows it47) and passion,48 the nature of which is intrinsically polymorphic and shifting.49 While (1) passion, in itself, is neither good nor bad but is something that unavoidably occurs, it is also true that Aristotle asserts that there are both (2) intrinsically good50 passions and (3) intrinsically bad ones. Thus:

(1) In the first case, the person in whom such passions occur cannot be considered culpable for them or responsible for experiencing them, given that, as we read in NE II.5, 1105b31–2, “nor are we either praised or blamed for our emotions.” (2) The second case regards passions explicitly defined as “praiseworthy” (see EE III.7, 1234a24–7: “None of these middle states, though praiseworthy, are virtues, nor are the opposite states vices, for they do not involve purposive choice . . . each of them is an emotion”). (3) The third and most interesting case deals with absolutely blameworthy and inherently malicious passions. An emblematic passage is found in Nicomachean Ethics II, which offers a list of irreparably

Not every action or emotion however admits the observance of a due mean. Indeed the very names of some directly imply evil, for instance malice, shamelessness, envy . . . All these and similar actions and feelings are blamed as being bad in themselves; it is not the excess or deficiency of them we blame. It is impossible therefore ever to go right in regard to them–one must always be wrong (ἀεὶ ἀμαρτάνειν).51

EVIL “ACTED” While, as we have briefly outlined, the first form of evil, “suffered evil,” is almost completely excluded from the horizon of responsibility, of what is up to us and then, more in general, from the moral horizon stricto sensu, the second form, the “evil we do” presents a very different picture. The Aristotelian texts identify subtle but fundamental distinctions between various kinds of “acted evil.” Each of these elements will be reviewed briefly below. VICE52 Vice as Chronic Disease A first and fundamental form of “acted evil” is vice. Aristotle compares a person marked by vice, in particular the vice of intemperance, to a consumptive. Consumption, unlike more or less short-lived or episodic evils, is a durable disease and thus all the more serious. The psychological state of the wicked person is worsened by the fact he does not even know he is “ill,” that is, in the wrong: All wicked men are ignorant of what they ought to do and refrain from doing,

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ˉ S LEGETAI TO KAKON POLLACHO and this error is the cause of injustice and of vice in general. . . . The ignorance (agnoia) that makes an act blameworthy is not ignorance displayed in moral choice (that sort of ignorance constitutes vice).53 The complex theme of ignorance will be addressed below. It should be noted that the ignorance that characterizes the wicked person, far from rendering the action involuntary and void of responsibility, is precisely the constitutive emblem of the vice itself. The person marked by vice, in fact, acts not only completely voluntarily,54 without compulsion,55 but also by means of choice: in fact, he or she does what is evil, and his rational Principle consents thereto, and he believes that he ought to do what he does, the guide within him is diseased.56 The wicked person knowingly chooses to behave in a certain manner (the wrong one), but since he does not know that57 he is wrong, does it without regrets and without contrition; in fact, Aristotle notes, he “does not feel remorse (οὐ μεταμελητικός), for he abides by his choice (ἐμμένει . . . τῇ προαιρέσει).”58 The wicked, therefore, does not experience internal conflict, the quarrel between reason and desire,59 given that in him reason and desire travel in the same direction: the wrong one. The wicked person, in fact, sees badly, since what is evil seems good to him. So though he does not want evil,60 he is directed to it. Aristotle explains: The thing desired and wished is either the good or the apparent good (ἢ τὸ φαινόμενον ἀγαθόν).61

The good that the wicked person thinks he aspires to is only an apparent good, but he does not know that, because his habitus, his capacity to “see” an end rightly has been corrupted by wrong choices, by giving in to desire and passions, all factors that irreversibly distort the ends.62 Expressed in other terms, in the course of doing wrong actions, perhaps initially obtorto collo, or simply by imitating other people’s behavior, one comes not to recognize the wickedness of that action. Completely unaware of the possibility of another reason,63 the person marked by vice chooses in an incorrect way and acts badly, like an archer aiming for the wrong target. The fact that the archer aims for the wrong target depends, precisely, on the fact that his reason is ill and disposed incorrectly (kako-s).64 The wicked person, therefore, does not zero in on the right target because he sees and will always see evil: the rooting of the wrong habitus, the permanent acquisition of a wrong perception of reality, prevents him from taking other views and, by means of desire, aiming, for other targets. INCONTINENCE65 Incontinence as an Episodic Disease The wicked person, therefore, is ill, and his/ her disease is chronic, like consumption or dropsy.66 The incontinent, on the contrary, who knows that what he is on the point of doing (or even what he is doing) is wrong, and yet does it the same, is compared by Aristotle to the person affected by grand mal, or to the drunk person, one who can “go off his head” for a short period, but once he comes to his senses, is absolutely and perfectly judicious. The incontinent, therefore, at least to a certain degree, knows,67 while the

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ˉ S LEGETAI TO KAKON POLLACHO intemperate, the wicked in a strict sense, does not know (though, as we have seen, this ignorance does not remove the responsibility). Notwithstanding the apparent exterior similarity between incontinent and intemperate behavior (seeing that both are mistaken and directed in a wrong direction), they are based on radical anthropological differences. In fact, while the reason of the intemperate person is diseased and prevents him/ her from making the right choice, that of the incontinent person is healthy, solid, and “uncorrupt.”68 This explains why Aristotle holds that though the intemperate person is more curable than the incontinent69 one, he is in a worse condition than the person affected by akrasia, because “the most precious part of him is corrupted,”70 and he believes he is acting rightly, and does not repent for his actions. In fact, though the wicked person is not divided in his inner being, and though, exactly like the virtuous person, he is endowed with a soul at peace,71 Aristotle is of the mind that he is irreparably malicious, because he has definitively acquired a habitus he can no longer change.72 This habitus is so deeply rooted and has so spoiled his phusis, his perception of the world, that unlike the incontinent who “repents (metamele-tikos),”73 he does not perceive the wrongness of his choice. The incontinent, on the contrary, sees the true target well, given that his principle, his reason, is in good condition, but desire, aiming toward a different direction from that indicated by reason, does not allow him to aim rightly and makes him miss his aim.74 In this sense, as has been observed: “in Aristotle’s view . . . the incontinent does not think he ought to do the incontinent action before he is influenced by his passion.”75 Reason conducts him in one direction and

desire in another, exactly as occurs with a person whose limbs are paralyzed: In continent and incontinent people we approve their principle, or the rational part of their souls, because it urges them in the right way and exhorts them to the best course; but their nature seems also to contain another element beside that of rational principle, which combats and resists that principle. Exactly the same thing may take place in the soul as occurs with the body in a case of paralysis: when the patient wills to move his limbs to the right they swerve to the left; and similarly in the incontinent person their impulses run counter to their principle. But whereas in the body we see the erratic member, in the case of the soul we do not see it.76 In this sense, the incontinent is of course ill, given that he is unable to control himself. He is unable to resist the impact of desires, but his illness has not yet become chronic. In other words, the incontinent person is intimately divided and dissociated, experiencing the interior laceration between the dictates of reason and the inability to follow them, because he “did not succeed in transforming his life’s ideal in an e-thos.”77 Therefore the incontinent person is wrong and knows he is wrong but, according to the subtle distinctions of Aristotelian discourse, he does not choose to do the wrong thing. On this issue, Aristotle is very clear: An incontinent person acts from desire but not from choice;78 For incontinence acts against deliberate choice, vice in accordance with it.79

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ˉ S LEGETAI TO KAKON POLLACHO The element of awareness of the act, in fact, does not imply in itself the choice,80 since proairesis, in Aristotle’s opinion, implicates that synergy of reason and desire that, instead, the internal divorce of the incontinent excludes totally. Virtue, on the contrary, just as vice, involves choice (see NE VII.8, 1151a7: κατὰ τὴν προαίρεσίν ἐστιν), namely the cooperation between desire and reason toward the attainment of the goal. In this sense, it can be said81 that the incontinent is in some way in an intermediate position between the temperate and the intemperate, between one who chooses rightly (and he chooses rightly because, being virtuous, “he sees the truth in each kind”82) and one who chooses wrongly. In fact, the incontinent person does not choose to do evil, yet he does it, pressed by desire to a situation different from the one indicated by reason.83 Incontinence is not vice, because it does not involve choice, but also because vice is what corrupts reason (“virtue preserves the fundamental principle,84 vice destroys it [phtheirei]”85), the reason that, instead, in the incontinent is solid and in good condition, as we have seen.86 In this sense Aristotle must emphasize that

can be useful in beginning to examine this notion: There are then three ways in which a man may injure his fellow. An injury done in ignorance (μετ’ ἀγνοίας) is an error (ἁμαρτήματά ἐστιν), the person affected or the act or the instrument or the result being other than the agent supposed; for example, he did not think to hit, or not with this missile, or not this person, or not with this result, but it happened that either the result was other than he expected (for instance he did not mean to inflict a wound but only a prick), or the person, or the missile. When the injury happens contrary to reasonable expectation (paralogo-s), it is a misadventure (atuche-ma); when, though not contrary to reasonable expectation, it is done without evil intent, it is a culpable error (ὅταν δὲ μὴ παραλόγως, ἄνευ δὲ κακίας, ἁμάρτημα); for an error is culpable when the cause of one’s ignorance lies in oneself (ἁμαρτάνει μὲν γὰρ ὅταν ἡ ἀρχὴ ἐν αὐτῷ ᾖ τῆς αἰτίας), but only a misadventure when the cause lies outside oneself (ἀτυχεῖ δ’ ὅταν ἔξωθεν). When an injury is done knowingly but not deliberately (εἰδὼς μὲν μὴ προβουλεύσας), it is an act of injustice or wrong; such, for instance, are injuries done through anger, or any other unavoidable or natural passion to which men are liable; since in committing these injures and errors a man acts unjustly, and his action is an act of injustice, but he is not ipso facto unjust or wicked, for the injury was not done out of wickedness. When however an injury is done from choice, the doer is unjust and wicked.

It is the intemperate who cannot be cured, whereas the incontinent man can.87

EVIL AS ERROR A third form of “acted evil,” namely evil as error, requires a much closer examination because, in a certain way, it bridges the two figures of “suffered” and “acted” evil. A fundamental passage of NE V.8, 1135b11–25

The three kinds of damage or injury (τριῶν δὴ οὐσῶν βλαβῶν) can be visualized in the following table:

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Misadventures (ἀτυχήματα) Agent not guilty [suffered evil]

Errors (ἁμαρτήματα) Agent guilty but not wicked [acted evil]

Unjust acts (ἀδικήματα) Agent guilty but not wicked [acted evil]

(1) Contrary to reasonable expectation (παραλόγως)

(1) Performed in state of ignorance (τὰ μὲν μετ’ ἀγνοίας) (2) Not contrary to reasonable expectation (μὴ παραλόγως) (3) Without evil intent (ἄνευ κακίας)88

(1) Acts performed knowingly (εἰδὼς) (2) But not deliberately (μὴ προβουλεύσας)89 (3) Acts of injustice but not wicked90 (ἄδικοι διὰ ταῦτα οὐδὲ πονηροί)

Error91 lies somewhat midway between misadventures, which are unexpected and for which one is not responsible (and which, therefore, lie within the notion of “suffered evil”) and unjust acts (for which one is fully responsible, and must therefore be counted as one of the “acted evils”). Like unjust action, error is certainly something voluntary, and therefore something for which the person must answer (and so, it is an “acted evil” as well), but its connection to the notion of ignorance makes it a very particular object, sui generis. On the other hand, the link between the fundamental question of not knowing92 and the notion of error, a link that raises many important ethical and juridical questions that cannot be addressed here,93 poses the following question: if someone makes an error because he does not know it is an error, how is it possible to consider him responsible? Concerning this, the Stagirite establishes a fundamental distinction for the notion of ignorance, because of its implications for the question of responsibility. (1) An action can be performed in a state of ignorance, in the sense that the

person puts himself in a condition of not knowing. This kind of mistake, which is unforgivable,94 depends on who does it. This person, being the cause of his own ignorance, is fully responsible for the ignorance itself: “when ignorance is the cause of an action, the agent acts involuntarily and so is innocent; except when he is the cause of his own ignorance. In that case, when he acts in self-caused ignorance (ἀγνοίας αὐτὸς ᾖ αἴτιος) [and harms another] he inflicts a wrong, and will rightly be termed unjust.”95 (2) But it can also be said that an action has been done out of ignorance, that is, due to ignorance.96 The person who does an unjust action due to ignorance, namely “without knowing either the person injured, the instrument used, or the end aimed at,”97 “is only unfortunate (ἀτυχεῖ δέ).”98 In fact, when ignorance is the cause of doing an action, this action is not done voluntarily, and thus one does not commit an injustice.99 Here we see in play again the question of “suffered evil” that is not imputable to the agent, and see how the various profiles of the notion of evil interweave.

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ˉ S LEGETAI TO KAKON POLLACHO EVIL “ACTED”: CONCLUDING REMARKS Summing up briefly, evil can be performed for a number of reasons. (1) Because there is the choice (proairesis) to perform it, and, in this case, one is “bad” and “wicked,” namely, one has acquired the habitus of vice (kakia). This kind of person is faulty, from Aristotle’s perspective, not only because he performs evil, but because he has acquired that specific bad disposition (hexis).100 (2) Because one does not manage to control himself, namely because one is characterized by akrasia, a lack of self-control, incontinence, and, in this case, goes wrong and is aware of it. This person does not so much choose to act wrongly as he is swept into doing the wrong action by passion; (3) There are evils and errors done by one who acts in state of ignorance (agnoia) (a complex notion that requires many distinctions). Such a person is considered responsible for his own actions, but his responsibility must always be calibrated secundum quid. In this brief overview of the notion of moral evil in Aristotle it emerges that, in every case, evil in and of itself is not desired because, as indicated in the beginning of the NE and, more in general, the overall teleological shape of the Aristotelian view, everything aims for the good. By nature (φύσει)101 the end is always a good . . . but in contravention of nature and by perversion (παρὰ φύσιν δὲ καὶ διαστροφὴν) not the good but the apparent good is the end.102 Evil, therefore, cannot be wanted by anyone, and in fact it is wanted neither by the

wicked, who is inclined to it believing erroneously that it is good, nor by the incontinent, who does not want it (given that the incontinent person acts against his will and performs an action that he himself thinks he should not to do103 but, because of his weakness, is attracted by it and so performs it, though knowing it is evil). It is no accident that Aristotle underlines that: By nature good is the object of wish (ἡ βούλησις φύσει μὲν τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ ἐστί), but evil is also its object in contravention of nature (παρὰ φύσιν δὲ καὶ τοῦ κακοῦ), by nature one wishes good, against nature and by perversion one even wishes evil.104 Nevertheless, Aristotle sees evil as a reality to measure oneself against, to examine analytically in its different forms and facets, yet a reality that in many aspects is “insubstantial.” For the Stagirite, “there is nothing that is good in itself or evil in itself; good and evil can be applied to every category of nature.”105 In other words, evil is experienced, in many forms and in many ways, but Aristotle refuses to make it an “autonomous” reality. In this sense, (1) Evil does not have a substantiality on the ontological level. Given that there is no principle of evil (and given that “evil does not exist apart from things (οὐκ ἔστι τὸ κακὸν παρὰ τὰ πράγματα,” as we can read clearly in Metaphysics IX.9, 1151a17–18106), evil is reduced to privation107 or to defect. (2) At the logical level, as well, it depends on the notion of good.108 (3) Thus, on the ethical level, the question of evil, as we have said before, is at once formally excluded (because it is totally extraneous to the teleological horizon to which the human being belongs) and

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ˉ S LEGETAI TO KAKON POLLACHO rooted strongly and in myriad ways in the ground of “human philosophy.” It is true, according to Aristotle, that there are no human beings who want evil,109 but it is also true that there are many bad human beings, and that human beings are wrong in many ways. When one reads Aristotle, it is important not to yield to the temptation to simplify all the articulations and variables of his discourse. Instead, one should try to let the polychromy of his discourse live and respect it as such, integrating the various components in order to delineate as much as possible the extreme variety and richness of reality. “Each thought structure, or truth system, is an instrument through which the world can be understood and integrated . . . Perceptions of reality are multiple, and truth systems are multiple. Multiplicity produces a view of the world that is rich and broad. This attitude toward truth means the rejection of all reductionism.”110 So in Aristotle evil can be “said in many ways,” and not only because it has many facets, but because moral evil itself is many things. In fact, evil is each of the vices, but not only,111 for some evils exceed the strict horizon of vice (as in the case of “bad” passions, or incontinence and—a question not examined here—of brutishness112), yet they are and remain evils. Evil can be committed because one does not know, or because one is not capable of restraining oneself, or because one does not succeed in avoiding the excess or the defect, failing to follow the fundamental rule of the golden mean, or one can be wrong even by simply acting or by feeling a passion, given that, as we have seen, there are intrinsically malicious passions and actions, to which one cannot apply the rule of the golden mean

since these are always wrong.113 In any case, at least “acted” evil—given that there is and there can be no responsibility for “suffered” evil—is voluntary, albeit not wished for (but per accidens). To come back to the initial quotation, then, evil has many forms (polueides), or in other words, it is a πολλαχῶς λεγόμενον. But these different forms are united, avoiding dispersion and, at the same time, the equivocity or homonymy of the term kakon, by the fact that all these forms of evil (both moral and, more generally, linked to the ontological, physical, or logical spheres) concern a common term, pros hen.114 Evil, in fact, in every case and in the different meanings that it assumes, indicates a bad functioning, a failed realization of one’s ergon, of one’s nature (phusis). The soul of a wicked man115 who does not know what good is functions badly. The soul of an incontinent person, who does not control his desire and channel it into a right end functions badly. In terms of ontology, a being that does not direct itself completely toward its ultimate end,116 that is hindered in the process toward the realization of its form and toward the good, functions badly. Aristotelian thought does not have a principle of evil;117 evil as separate substance is not envisioned. But evil is inside the substance when it fails to realize itself, when it lacks the capacity to follow its nature118 and, therefore, to realize it.119 Because if it is true that Man is one of the things that are excellent by nature,120 it is also true that A bad man can do ten thousand times more harm than an animal.121

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ˉ S LEGETAI TO KAKON POLLACHO 7

In this sense, according to Aristotle, evil not only exists, but exists in many ways. Indeed, even more, in endless ways.122 Arianna Fermani

NOTES 1

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The translation of Magna Moralia is (with some alterations) by G. C. Armstrong, 2006. From now on the work will be cited as MM. The translation of Nicomachean Ethics is (with some alterations) by H. Rackham, 1962. The notion of evil has many shades of meaning: ontological, metaphysical, gnoseological, but also anthropological and political. It is obviously impossible to examine all these meanings and their implications in this paper. There is the notion of stere-sis (approached, specifically, in Metaphysics V.22), the fundamental articulation of the notion of evil in ontological-metaphysical terms. Another fundamental question for the understanding of evil in ontological terms is matter (see Fitzgerald, 1965, 59–78 and Owens, 1965, 79–93). For an overview of the fundamental articulations of the notion of evil in the three ethical treatises, consult the heading Male/ Mali in my Indice ragionato dei concetti, in Fermani, 2008, 1295–6. There is a great debate about the authenticity of the three ethical treatises and, in particular, about MM, which is generally held to be doubtful. I cannot pursue the question here, but encourage the reader to see my Saggio Introduttivo, in Fermani, 2008, XCVIIIff. See NE I.1, 1094a3: “Good is that at which all things aim” (τἀγαθόν, οὗ πάντ’ ἐφίεται). See, for instance, besides NE VI.13, 1144b4ff., MM I.34, 1197b37–1987a1: “in every province there is a kind of excellence which arises spontaneously by nature; irrational impulses towards what is brave and just”; MM II.3, 1199b38–1200a1: “we have stated that in the case of those virtues which arise by nature, the mere impulse towards what is good exists apart from reason.”

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It is no coincidence that Russell, 1977, 149, n. 16, considers it best not to dwell on Aristotelian’s thought at all: “I do not treat the work of Aristotle here for two reasons. First, the influence of Aristotle upon subsequent thought before his revival in the twelfth century was minimal in comparison with that of Plato. Second, Aristotle for the most part turned back from Plato’s dualism in the direction of monism. All motion comes from the First Cause and is directed toward the Final Cause. Good and Evil are not separate forms.” It is viewed differently by Bolotin, 1999, 159–69. “Although Greek has no word that quite corresponds to the English word ‘evil,’ Aristotle speaks clearly enough of what we have in mind when we say that Hitler and Stalin were evil” (159). In this context, the very important figure of Socrates cannot be examined; we can only refer, among others, to Burger, 2008. See NE II.6, 110b29–31. This theme would have had in Aristotle, differently from other philosophers, “a sort of eclipse” (Brogi, 2006, 43, my translation). Naturally this is only one of the possible articulations of the theme. Russell suggests an analogous distinction: “A distinction is conventionally made between ‘natural evil’ and ‘moral evil.’ Natural evil consists of destructive ‘acts of God’ or of nature, such as tornadoes or cancer, and moral evil proceeds from the will of a human or other intelligent being” (Russell, 1977, 24). Another division is that offered in the work Divisions (I do not deal here with the wide and debated question of the authenticity of this work; see E. Berti, in Rossitto, 2005, 5ff.). Division 57 distinguishes, in fact, in accordance with the division of the goods, evil of the soul (as injustice), of the body (as disease), and exterior evils (hard luck). Radice and Bombacigno, 2005. The adjective kakos means: “of person: bad”; “of things: evil, pernicious,” while as substantive, it means: “evil, ill” (Liddell-Scott, 1961, 863). Phaulote-s: “badness, of persons and things” (Liddell-Scott, 1961, 1920).

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“Bad condition; mostly in the moral sense: wickedness, depravity” (Liddell-Scott, 1961, 1149). Consider, for example, the term kakia (which occurs 122 times in the whole corpus, 40 in NE, 15 in MM, and 15 in EE), or the adjectives phaulos (384 total occurrences, of which 71 in NE, 73 in MM, and 26 in EE) and aischros (meaning: causing shame, dishonoring, base; 107 total occurrences, of which 38 in NE, 3 in MM, and 5 in EE). Mochthe-ros: in bad condition . . . knavish, rascally (Liddell-Scott, 1961, 1149); phaulos has, among the other meanings, mean, bad (Liddell-Scott, 1961, 1919). On the social-political level, all these figures, as observed by Silvia Gastaldi, 1987, have in common the fact of being excluded by the (very restricted, to tell the truth) circle of the best men (see, in particular, Gastaldi, 1987, 69–70). Pone-ros: “in moral sense, worthless, knavish” (Liddell-Scott, 1961, 1447). The a-specific meaning of pone-ros is attested by Rhetoric II, 1401b, in which we read that “all thieves are bad (pone-roi).” See Gastaldi, 1987, 70. Others view it differently, for instance, Develin, 1973, 71–9, 76–7; Irrera, 2008, 289–313, 293, n. 10, who does not think that phaulos can be considered synonymous with kakos (although Irrera reminds us, rightly, that phaulos, in EE VIII.3, 1249b16–21, is opposed to kalos, beauty. For more on the topic of beauty and its links with the notion of good, we refer to Irrera, 2011, in particular 48ff. “Badness in quality, opp. ἀρετή (excellence) . . . moral badness, vice” (Liddell-Scott, 1961, 861). Mochthe-ria: “mostly in moral sense, wickedness, depravity” (Liddell-Scott, 1961, 1149). Gastaldi, 1987, 65. See Gastaldi, 1987, 91. The same can be said for the notion of mochthe-ria, which, in addition to the already mentioned meanings, also means “lack of skill, incapacity” (Liddell-Scott, 1961, 1149). Speaking of the different kinds of evil actions and of their various implications on the juridical level, in NE IX.3, 1165b12, the term

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kakourgia also appears, a term that in English can be translated as “wrongdoing.” EE II.3, 1220b4–1221a12. The translation of Eudemian Ethics is by H. Rackham, 1971. See Fermani, 2012, chapter “Modulazioni della nozione di vizio,” 135ff. Russell, 1977, 23. On the widely discussed topic of will and of its link with the notion of freedom and of free will, see Gauthier-Jolif, 2002, II, 1, 218ff. I share fully the opinion of Berti, expressed in “Ragione pratica e normatività in Aristotele” (Berti, 2008, 25–38): “The rational desire of the end, that is of the Good, for Aristotle is the ‘will’ (βούλησις), which is not free, because whether it has as its object a real Good or an apparent Good depends on character (ἦθος): the will of the virtuous person has, in fact, as its object a real Good, while the one of the vicious man has as its object an apparent Good” (37, my translation). The translation of Rhetoric is by J. H. Freese, 1959. NE III.5, 1114a4–7: “men are themselves responsible for having become careless through living carelessly, as they are for being unjust or profligate if they do wrong or pass their time in drinking and dissipation. They acquire a particular quality by constantly acting in a particular way.” See X. Tilliette, 2001, 11. “Pain is the destruction (ἡ λύπη φθορά)” (NE X.2, 1173b7). NE X.2, 1172b19: “pain is intrinsically an object of avoidance at all.” All pain, in fact, “is either absolutely evil, or evil as being in some way an impediment to activity” (NE VII.13, 1153b1ff.). In reality there are various articulations of the notion of passion, as we have seen well above. NE III.5, 1113b28–30: “nobody tries to encourage us to do things that do not depend upon ourselves and are not voluntary, since it is no good our being persuaded not to feel heat or pain or hunger or the like, because we shall feel them all the same.” “When I am afraid, something is frightening me; when I am angry, something is angering me. When in general I am experiencing an emotion or feeling of the sort which Aristotle

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would call a pathos, something is affecting me” (Kosman, 1980, 104–5). While in EE VIII.2, 1247b3–4 it is stated that luck is “a cause of goods or evils.” MM II.8, 1207a7–8: “we look to God, as controlling good and evil things.” See, for instance, Vegetti, 1996, 26. NE III.5, 1115a22–4: “nor yet is a man cowardly if he fears insult to his wife and children, or envy, or the like; nor courageous if he shows a bold face when about to undergo a flogging.” “There are some terrors which we pronounce beyond human endurance, and these of course are fearful to everyone in his senses” (NE III.10, 1115b6–7). Those who, faced with these evils, go wrong, must be excused, since these evils are unbearable for human nature: “in some cases again, such submission though not praised is condoned, when a man does something wrong through fear of penalties that impose too great a strain on human nature (τὴν ἀνθρωπίνην φύσιν), and that no one could endure” (NE III.1, 1110a23–6). EE I.5, 1215b18–22. “The accidents of fortune are many and vary in degree of magnitude; and although small pieces of good luck, also of misfortune, clearly do not change the whole course of life, yet great and repeated successes will render it more blissful, since both of their own nature they help to embellish it, and also they can be nobly and virtuously utilized” (NE I.11, 1100b18–33). “The happy man therefore will possess the element of stability in question, and will remain happy all his life; since he will be always or at least most often employed in doing and contemplating the things that are in conformity with virtue. And he will bear changes of fortunes most nobly, and with perfect propriety in every way, being as he is ‘good in very truth’ and ‘four-square without reproach’” (NE I.10, 1100b18–22). NE I.11, 1101a6–13. Even if these evils cannot be endured and even if in the moment in which the wise person experiences them he cannot be happy, he, unlike other human beings, has the possibility of looking toward the recomposition of that ordered whole that is the good life. For further development of this idea, see Fermani, 2006, 102ff.

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In fact, both in EE II.2, 1220b12–14, NE II.5, 1105b21–3, and in MM I.7, 1186a12–14, a list of passions is proposed and identified as those phenomena followed by pleasure and pain. Elsewhere, instead, pleasure is identified with pathos. In NE II.3, 1105a1–3, in fact, we read that “the susceptibility to pleasure has grown up with all of us from the cradle. Hence this feeling (τὸ πάθος) is hard to eradicate.” Also more clearly, in MM I.8, 1186a33–4, we read that “the affections are . . . themselves pains or pleasures (τὰ δὲ πάθη ἤτοι λῦπαί εἰσιν ἢ ἡδοναὶ).” On this topic see Konstan and Rutter, 2003. I am not able here to focus on the different articulations of the notion of pathos . See the chapter “La passione come nozione ‘in molti modi polivoca’” in Fermani, 2012, 155ff. They are passions that arise in some way already good and measured: see NE II.7, 1108a30–1: “there are also modes of observing a mean in the sphere of and in relation to the emotions (εἰσὶ δὲ καὶ ἐν τοῖς παθήμασι καὶ περὶ τὰ πάθη μεσότητες).” NE II.6, 1107a8–15. For a comment on this passage, similar to EE II.3, 1221b18–26, see Gauthier-Jolif, 2002, II, 2, 151–2. For a deep analysis of this notion see, among others, Brickhouse, 2003. NE III.1, 1110b31–2. Vice is something voluntary, as is written in NE III.5, 1113b16–17; 1114a21–2. This is one of the fundamental criteria for considering an action voluntary. MM II.6, 1203a27–9. Choice, in addition to awareness and disposition, constitutes for Aristotle the mark of virtuous and wicked actions. See NE II.4, 1105a28–33 “acts done in conformity with the virtues are not done justly or temperately if they themselves are of a certain sort, but only if the agent also is in a certain state of mind when he does them: first he must act with knowledge; secondly he must deliberately choose the act, and choose it for its own sake; and thirdly the act must spring from a fixed and permanent disposition of character.” In this sense it can be said that the temperate and the intemperate person act knowingly, on the basis of a choice and of a sound habitus and that, therefore, their action is deeply different from those of the enkrate-s and of akrate-s. But it is a difference that, as it

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has been rightly stated, is only interior, since their exterior behavior proves identical (see Gould, 1999, 377: “The enkrate-s and the sophron differ internally but not in their external behaviour”). “L’ignorance du vicieux est en réalité une erreur, ἁμαρτία . . . lorsque nous disons qu’il ignore ce qu’il doit faire, nous devrions dire en réalité qu’il se trompe sur ce qu’il doit faire; le mot grec, ἀγνοεῖ, a les deux sens, ce qui permet à Aristote de passer facilement de l’un à l’autre” (Gauthier-Jolif, 2002, II, 1, 183). NE VII.7, 1150b29–30. This is the most characteristic sign of the incontinent. As stated by Woods, 1990, 229: “Thus, the phenomenon of akrasia is associated by Aristotle, as by many other philosophers, with the possibility of a struggle or conflict between the rational and the non-rational elements in a human being. The outcome of the struggle may be that reason fails to maintain its position.” The topic of will is discussed further at the end of the paper. EE VII.2, 1235b25–6. See Natali, 1989, 92. Cupido, 2002, 142, says that, differently from the incontinent, “the akolastos . . . is bad and not tragic because he . . . ignores totally the possibility of ‘another reason,’ and therefore the experience of the conflict” (my translation). See NE VI.12, 1144a34–6: “vice perverts the mind and causes it to hold false views about the first principles of conduct.” The very widely studied issue of incontinence obviously cannot be examined in depth here. For more on this notion and its problematical links with that of kakia consult Fermani, 2009, and the chapter “Lungo i sentieri della continenza e dell’incontinenza” in Fermani, 2012, 101–25. Some of the contributions I have found especially helpful are Vigo, 2011, 325–57; Irwin, 2008 (this is a very interesting essay because it is one of the few taking into account the important contribution given by the Magna Moralia). NE VII.8, 1150b33: “vice resembles disease like dropsy and consumption.” The awareness of the incontinent is a moot point. Some scholars, as for instance Price, 1995, suggest introducing a distinction

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between hard akrasia and soft akrasia (see Cupido, 2002, 165). MM II.6, 1203a17. “‘Ακρασία . . . is a defect affecting part of the soul, not the whole of it.’ More specifically, ‘the uncontrolled person does not have his entire soul corrupt, but in a way possesses reason’ . . . In the acratic the desires are corrupted but reason is not, in contrast both with the ἀκόλαστος, in whom both parts are corrupt, and with the virtuous person, in whom both parts are uncorrupted” (Sedley, 1999, 164). “For if a rational Rule were set up within him which showed him that his deeds were evil, he would cease to do them; whilst the self-indulgent possesses that Rule or Principle and yet does evil; so that one might regard him as incurable” (MM II.6, 1203a9–12). The same question of “curability,” moreover, acquires further articulations in connection with the notion of incontinence. Aristotle, in fact, in NE VII.10, 1152a27–31, reminds us that “reformation is more possible with that type of unrestraint which is displayed by person of an excitable temperament than it is with those who deliberate as to what they ought to do, but do not keep to the resolution they form. And those who have become unrestrained through habit are more easily cured than those who are unrestrained by nature, since habit is easier to change than nature; for even habit is hard to change, precisely because it is a sort of nature.” MM II.6, 1203a12–13. In this sense, if on the one hand, it can be said that both the soul of the temperate and that of the intemperate are characterized by harmony (as has been observed by Woods, 1990, 232), on the other hand it is correct to say that “the akratic agent is not the only one who confronts an enemy within. For, like the akrate-s, the enkrate-s struggles with unruly desires, but unlike him, successfully enlists the force of rationality to subdue them” (Gould, 1999, 369). As stated by Achtenberg, 1991, 70, the continent person is one who acts according to the right logos without desiring it. See Vigo, 2011, in particular 351ff. NE VII.7, 1150b30–1. “Several times in Book 7 Aristotle affirms that the incontinent has the right decision

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(προαίρεσις) and acts against it. The MM describes what is sound in the incontinent person by saying that he has correct reason that opposes his going after the things that his appetite leads him toward” (Irwin, 2008, 35). Irwin, 2008, 34–5. NE I.13, 1102b14–24. Vigo, 2011, 338: “el incontinente no ha logrado transformar su ideal de vida en un ἦθος, sino que carácter e ideal de vida permanecen en él ampliamente disociados.” On the importance of the process of formation of dispositions (hexeis) and for a correct interpretation of the complex figure of incontinence see Vigo, 2011, 338ff. NE III.2, 1111b13–14. NE VII.8, 1151a8–9. Or at least, clarifies Aristotle, with the extreme suppleness that always characterizes his thought, does not exclude it (see NE II.5, 1106a4–5: “the virtues are certain modes of choice, or at all events involve choice”). As done, for instance, by Vigo, 2011, 354. NE III.4, 1113a32–3. “For the good man judges everything correctly; what things truly are, that they seem to him to be, in every department” (NE III.4, 1113a29–31). “En atención a esta particolar disociación interior, puede decirse que el incontinente ocupa, desde el punto de vista sistemático, una suerte de posición intermedia entre el temperante y el intemperante. Tanto el temperante como, paradójicamente, también el intemperante revelan, cada uno a su manera, una integración unitaria de ἦθος e ideal de vida” (Vigo, 2011, 354). The identification between principle and logos is attested unmistakably by MM II.6, 1203a15–16: ἔτι ἐστὶν ὁ λόγος ἑκάστου ἀρχή (“each possess a rational Principle as his guide”). NE VII.8, 1151a15–16. “That is why he takes the claim that the incontinent has correct reason to be equivalent to the claim that he has the correct principle (ἀρχή, 1203a15)” (Irwin, 2008, 36). NE VII.8, 1150b32. Literally “without vice.” Probouleusas, the aorist participle of probouleuo-, implicates directly the notion of bouleusis, that is of evaluation. The latter constitutes precisely the discriminating element in

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relation to the notions of virtue and vice and, more in general, of “habitual state.” In fact, only if there is choice can one strictly speak of vice. On the contrary, as pointed out in the passage in question, one can act with awareness, for example, on the basis of heat and of the other passions, but if there is no choice, there cannot be vice stricto sensu. In fact, one can act unjustly without having the habitus of vice, namely without being wicked. And as it is confirmed by other analogous passages. See, for instance, Rhet. I.13, 1374b5–10. We have partly focused on the question, analyzing the notion of vice. On the question of responsibility inside the juridical field, see Villers, 1989. “In the case of the intoxicated, for example, those who do harm under the influence of drink inflict a wrong; since they are the cause of their own ignorance (τῆς γὰρ ἀγνοίας αὐτοί εἰσιν αἴτιοι). They were free to refrain from the excess which robbed them of their wits, and allowed them [for example] to strike a father. And so it is with all other kinds of self-caused ignorance. Those who inflict injury therein, are unjust; while those who act in ignorance of which they are not the cause–whose ignorance, on the contrary, is of itself the cause of their acting as they do–are not unjust” (MM I.33, 1195a31–7). It is very interesting to notice how the distinction, on the ethical level, between two forms of ignorance has an exact confirmation on juridical ground. As Aristotle reminds us in Pol. II.12, 1274b18–23, the ancient legislator Pittacus made a law contemplating the fact that one who commits a crime because of drunkenness, not only must not be absolved, but must be doubly punished: “a special law of his is that if men commit an assault when drunk they are to pay a larger fine than those who offend when sober; because since more men are insolent when drunk than when sober he had regard not to the view that drunken offenders are rightly held less guilty, but to expediency” (the translation of Politics is by H. Rackham, 1959). MM I.33, 1195a28–31. For more on the nexus between ignorance and injustice refer to Fermani, 2007, in particular 183 ff. On the distinction between action done out of lack of knowledge and not knowing see Bertrand, 2004, 33–41.

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MM I.33, 1195a. MM I.33, 1195a24. 99 MM I.33, 1195a28–9. A similar picture is provided in NE V.8, 1136a5–9: “Of involuntary actions some are pardonable and some are not. Errors not merely committed in ignorance but caused by ignorance are pardonable; those committed in ignorance, but caused not by that ignorance but by unnatural or inhuman passion, are unpardonable.” On the question of ignorance and of its links with error, a theme that cannot be pursued here, refer to my paper “L’errore, il falso e le scienze in Aristotele” (forthcoming). 100 NE III.5, 1114a10–11: “only an utterly senseless person can fail to know that our characters are the result of our conduct.” 101 On the topic of nature we will return before long. 102 EE II.10, 1227a18–22. 103 NE V.9, 1136b6–9: “the incontinent man . . . acts contrary to wish, since no one wishes for a thing that he does not think to be good, and the incontinent man does what he thinks he ought not to do.” 104 EE II.10, 1227a28–30. 105 Russell, 1977, 149, n. 16. 106 Metaphysics IX.9, 1051a17–18. The translation of Metaphysics is by H. Tredennik, 2003. 107 See notes 3 and 118. 108 As seen clearly in Topics, in which we read that evil must be defined in relation to good, and not the contrary (see Topics VI.9, 147b17–25). 109 There are neither technologies nor sciences that aim for it. See, for instance, the already quoted passage of the beginning of the NE (I.1, 1094a1ff.): “every art and every investigation, and likewise every practical pursuit or undertaking, seems to aim at some good”; MM I.1, 1182a34–5: “no science and no faculty exists for the sake of an evil end (οὐδεμία γὰρ οὔτ’ἐπιστήμη οὔτε δύναμις ἕνεκεν κακοῦ ἐστίν).” 110 Russell, 1977, 37. 111 There are those who, like Bolotin, 1999, 160, reduce the theme of evil to that of injustice: “Aristotle does, of course, discuss the theme of evil, or injustice, in his political writings” (my italics).

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On this topic refer to Fermani, 2012, chapter “L’eccesso nel vizio: l’esempio della bestialità,” 138ff. See NE II.6, 1107a8–15. For more on the very complex topic of pros hen or focal meaning, see Owen, 1986; Ferejohn, 1980. “The function of man is the active exercise of the soul’s faculties in conformity with rational principle” (NE I.7, 1098a7–8). See, for instance, Riconda, 2011, 26–7. Russell, 1977, 149: “The thought of Aristotle . . . did not admit a principle of evil.” “There was nothing in the thought of Aristotle to encourage the concept of a principle of evil, or its personification. Unformed matter as such, hule, may hinder progress toward the ultimate goal, but it cannot be considered a principle of evil” (Russell, 1977, 149, n. 16). Privation, in fact, means precisely the incapacity of something to be and, therefore, to realize itself: “We speak of ‘privation’: a) in one sense, if a thing does not possess an attribute which is a natural possession” (Met. V.22, 1022b22–4). The notion of nature has, in Aristotle, both descriptive and normative value. EE VII.2, 1237a16. NE VII.6, 1150a7–8. “Evil is a form of the unlimited (τὸ γὰρ κακὸν τοῦ ἀπείρου)” (NE II.6, 1106b29–30).

REFERENCES Achtenberg, D., “The Role of the Ergon Argument in Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics,” in Essays in Ancient Greek Philosophy IV: Aristotle’s Ethics, ed. J. Anton and A. Preus, Albany: SUNY Press, 1991, 59–72. Armstrong, G. C. and H. Tredennick (trans.), Aristotle. Metaphysics X–XIV, Oeconomica, Magna Moralia, Cambridge, MA/London: Harvard University Press, 2006 [1935].

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ˉ S LEGETAI TO KAKON POLLACHO Berti, E., Nuovi studi aristotelici, III Filosofia pratica, Brescia: Morcelliana, 2008. Bertrand, J. M., “La rhétorique de l’ivresse en Grèce ancienne,” in The Ways of Life in Classical Political Philosophy, ed. F. Lisi, Sankt Augustin: Academia Verlag, 2004, 33–41. Bolotin, D., “Aristotle on the Question of Evil,” in Action and Contemplation. Studies in the Moral and Political Thought of Aristotle, ed. R. C. Bartlett and S. Collins, New York: SUNY, 1999, 159–69. Brickhouse, T. C., “Does Aristotle Have a Consistent Account of Vice?” The Review of Metaphysics, 57 (2003), 3–23. Brogi, S., I filosofi e il male. Storia della teodicea da Platone ad Auschwitz, Milano: FrancoAngeli, 2006. Burger, R., Aristotle’s Dialogue with Socrates: On the Nicomachean Ethics, Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 2008. Cupido, G., L’anima in conflitto. “Platone tragico” tra Euripide, Socrate e Aristotele, Bologna: Il Mulino, 2002. Develin, R., “The Good Man and the Good Citizen in Aristotle’s Politics,” Phronesis, 18 (1973), 71–9. Ferejohn, M. T., “Aristotle on Focal Meaning and the Unity of Science,” Phronesis, 25.1 (1980), 117–28. Fermani, A., Vita felice umana. In dialogo con Platone e Aristotele, Macerata: Eum, 2006. —, “Un tentativo di esplorazione dei molteplici nessi delle nozioni aristoteliche di giustizia e ingiustizia, vizio e virtù, tra piano etico e piano giuridico,” Educação e Filosofia, 21.41 (2007), 169–212. —, “Tumulti dell’anima. I possibili nessi tra ἐγκράτεια e ἀκρασία, vizio e virtù nelle Etiche di Aristotele,” in Attività e

virtù. Anima e corpo in Aristotele, ed. A. Fermani and M. Migliori, Milano: Vita e Pensiero, 2009, 147–77. —, L’etica di Aristotele, Brescia: Morcelliana, 2012. —, “L’errore, il falso e le scienze in Aristotele,” Ordia prima, 10 (2011), 123–158. Fermani, A. (ed.), Aristotele. Le Tre Etiche, Milano: Bompiani, 2008. Fitzgerald, J., “‘Matter’ in Nature and the Knowledge of Nature: Aristotle and the Aristotelian Tradition,” in The Concept of Matter in Greek and Medieval Philosophy, ed. E. McMullin, Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1965, 59–78. Freese, J. H. (trans.), Aristotle. The Art of Rhetoric, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1959 [1926]. Gastaldi, S., “Lo ‘spoudaios’ aristotelico tra etica e poetica,” Elenchos, 8.1 (1987), 63–104. Gauthier, R. A. and J. Y. Jolif (eds), Aristote. Éthique à Nicomaque, 4 vols, Louvain-la Neuve: Éditions Peeters, 2002. Gould, C. S., “A Puzzle about the Possibility of Aristotelian Enkrateia,” in Aristotle Critical Assessments, 4 vols, ed. L. P. Gerson, vol. III, London/New York: Routledge, 1999, 369–80. Irrera, E., “Le ragioni dell’utile e quelle del bello in Aristotele (Politica III, 10–11),” Il pensiero politico, XLI.3 (2008), 289–313. ––, Il bello come casualità metafisica in Aristotele, Milano: Mimesis, 2011. Irwin, T., “Aristotle Reads the Protagoras,” in Weakness of Will from Plato to the Present, ed. T. Hoffmann, Studies in Philosophy and History of Philosophy, 49, Washington: The Catholic University of America Press, 2008, 22–41.

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ˉ S LEGETAI TO KAKON POLLACHO Konstan, D. and N. K. Rutter (eds), Envy, Spite and Jealousy: The Rivalrous Emotions in Ancient Greece, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2003. Kosman, L. A., “Being Properly Affected: Virtues and Feelings in Aristotle’s Ethics,” in Essays on Aristotle’s Ethics, ed. A. Rorty, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980, 103–16. Liddell, H. G. and R. Scott, Greek-English Lexicon, Oxford: Clarendon, 1961 [1843]. Natali, C., La saggezza di Aristotele, Napoli: Bibliopolis, 1989. Owen, G. E. L., “Logic and Metaphysics in Some Earlier Works of Aristotle,” in Aristotle and Plato in the Mid-Fourth Century, ed. I. Düring and G. E. L. Owen, Gothenburg: Almqvist & Wiskell, 1960, 163–90. Owens, J., “Matter and Predication in Aristotle,” in The Concept of Matter in Greek and Medieval Philosophy, ed. E. McMullin, Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1965, 79–93. Price, A. W., Mental Conflict, London/New York: Routledge, 1995. Rackham, H. (trans.), Aristotle. Politics, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1959 [1932]. —, Aristotle. The Nicomachean Ethics, London/Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1962 [1926]. —, Aristotle. The Athenian Constitution, The Eudemian Ethics, On Virtues and Vices, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1971 [1935].

Radice, R. and R. Bombacigno, Aristoteles. with CD-ROM. Milano: Biblia, 2005. Riconda, G., Bene e male, Bologna: Il Mulino, 2011. Rossitto, C. (ed.), Aristotle et alia. Divisioni, Milano: Bompiani, 2005. Russell, J. B., The Devil. Perceptions of Evil from Antiquity to Primitive Christianity, Ithaca/London: Cornell University Press, 1977. Sedley, D., “Aspasius on Akrasia,” in Aspasius. The earliest extant commentary on Aristotle’s Ethics, ed. A. Alberti and R. W. Sharples, Berlin/New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1999, 162–75. Tilliette, X., “Del male,” in Del male e del bene, ed. G. Riconda and X. Tilliette, Roma: Città Nuova, 2001, 11–34. Tredennik, H. (trans.), Aristotle. Metaphysics, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003 [1933]. Vegetti, M., L’etica degli antichi, Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1996. Vigo, A., Estudios aristotélicos, 2nd edn, Pamplona: EUNSA, 2011. Villers, R., “Responsabilité pénale et responsabilité civile dans les droits helléniques,” in La responsabilité à travers les âges, ed. M. Boulet-Sautel et al., Paris: Economica, 1989, 47–73. Woods, M., “Aristotle on Akrasia,” in Studi sull’Etica di Aristotele, ed. A. Alberti, Napoli: Bibliopolis, 1990, 227–61.

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13 EDUCATION: THE ETHICOPOLITICAL ENERGEIA1

INTRODUCTION: EDUCATION AND THE UNITY OF ETHICS AND POLITICS AS ONE FIRST PHILOSOPHICAL INQUIRY This essay joins a body of work2 arguing that—for Aristotle and not only for him—(1) ethics and politics are one inquiry, and (2) that inquiry is first philosophical, and that these two claims are true because of the first philosophical character of this inquiry’s governing concepts. To speak of this inquiry as first philosophical is likely jarring. What is meant by the term here is that the proper object of this ethico-political inquiry rests beyond the limits of all actual or possible arrangements of civic institutions, even as it is always pursued through the consideration of such institutions. It is in this sense that I shall here argue for the first philosophical dimensions of education as the primary mode by which human beings fulfill their nature as political animals within the polis as an “organic whole” and not as the aggregation of natural beings and artificial products. Following this interpretive approach, my conclusion is that education uniquely effects this being-toward-an-ordered-whole

of the polis. For this reason, I will argue that it is in education that we must seek the first philosophical ground of Aristotle’s thinking about the ethical and political, on the ground of the orienting claim to be enunciated and defended here: the first philosophical character of ethics and politics as one inquiry is the result of the context independence of education.3 My ultimate contention that education is the ethico-political energeia will bring to light just what about the governing concepts of Aristotle’s ethics and politics makes them first philosophical.4 The case for education’s status as the political activity that underwrites the first philosophical character of the inquiry into the political is based on the following three claims. (1) To take on a virtue is to actualize with respect to the universal that which has already been actualized with respect to the particular in one’s own soul.5 This claim is the focus of the next section, where I turn to the analysis of learning as an alteration (in Physics VII.3, 245b–248a) to argue that learning, a unique kind of change or motion (kine-sis), is the energeia of an energeia, and not the energeia of a dunamis. Calling attention to the aporetic element of this

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EDUCATION: THE ETHICO-POLITICAL ENERGEIA claim—namely, that the great explanatory power of the energeia-dunamis model comes from the fact that each energeia is the energeia of a dunamis;6 while Phys. VII.3 claims that when one learns, one actualizes an actuality rather than a potency—I shall also make a brief case for the uniqueness of education as the “actualization of an actuality,” in distinction from the account of first and second actuality in De Anima. On the basis of this understanding of education from Phys., I will put forward the second and third claims; viz: (2) music has a very profound function in this learning; (3) such learning comes to be in and through the cultivation of phrone-sis. These claims form the focus of the concluding section, where the anomaly of education as the actualization of the actualization of the universal in the particular, in one’s own soul, is explained through a close reading of key moments in Aristotle’s account of education in Politics VII and VIII. Here we will see how the intricate interrelation of the attunement of the part of the soul that takes on virtues of character and the actualization of the universal constitutive of the virtues of intellect is itself conditioned on, or at least most likely to occur through, the institutionalization of an education that is both common to all citizens and grounded in music.

UNDERSTANDING LEARNING AS ENERGEIA OF AN ENERGEIA: PHYSICS VII.3 Phys. VII is concerned with the relation of mover and moved. It is in this context, somewhat surprisingly, that Aristotle provides his most sustained account of learning as a unique activity, as an energeia of an energeia.

Our surprise might arise from an expectation that such an account should be found in the Organon, the works devoted to a theory of knowledge and of scientific method.7 If not there, we might suspect, then in some one or other of the “political” works, where the practice and institutionalization of learning is discussed at length. In concluding this section, we return to the significance of the account’s textual origin; for now, let us come to terms with its details. Phys. VII.3 elucidates the difference between coming-into-being (genesis) and alteration (alloio-sis). The heart of the matter is this: coming-into-being involves the first creation of something in some other thing, while alteration is merely the morphing of something already present in a thing into something else in that thing. Without losing ourselves too much in this argument, itself subordinated to other arguments concerning the relationship between movers and that which they move, what is of interest to us is the example that Aristotle chooses to make this distinction clear. His example is virtue acquisition, making quite clear that any discussion of the human good and its cultivation through education is ultimately an instance of a natural process. Aristotle begins (246a10–17) by arguing that—since (1) it is when each thing is “most in accord with its nature” (μάλιστα ἔστι τὸ κατὰ φύσιν) that it is “complete” (teleion), and (2) when each thing is complete it “takes on its virtue”—virtue is “a certain completion” (teleio-sis tis), just as a circle is “complete” (teleios) when it has most of all become a circle and is “best.” For this reason, no hexis can be an alteration, neither those of the body nor those of the soul. What is most immediately striking here is the fact that the achievement of completion or perfection in a human being when they act virtuously is

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EDUCATION: THE ETHICO-POLITICAL ENERGEIA said to be “just like” when a circle has been drawn completely, and achieves the inner completion and perfection of being a circle. This is especially striking as it contradicts what Metaphysics says about the actuality of mathematical entities: a geometric figure, and that of which it is composed, never actualizes a potency precisely because such entities are not by nature, but abstractions from nature. Is Aristotle simply being sloppy here in Phys. VII? I suggest that the actualization of a potency he has in mind here is compatible with the account of the mathematicals in Met.; while he is there concerned with the being of the thing known in itself, he is here addressing the connection between the circle-as-universal in the soul of the knower and the circle-as-universal in the soul of the learner, and not the circle-as-universal as such. In this sense, the completion of the awareness of the circle as universal in the learner, occasioned by that learner’s becoming-aware of their existing awareness of some particular circle, does involve such an actualization of a potency. Here, though, and unlike in the discussion of the completion of the circle in Met., the alteration is not in the ontological status of that which is known, but in the taking-on of (intellectual) virtue in the learner’s soul. To illustrate the need of this conclusion’s necessity, Aristotle evokes (in 246a18–b3) one of his favored images, comparing the acquisition of virtue to the building of a house: just as we would never call the completion (teleio-ma) of a house an alteration, so too virtues are “completions” (teleio-seis) and not alterations. Here, too, Aristotle compares unlike things—though a house being built and a human being taking on virtue are less unlike than the latter and a circle “coming-into-being” are. But again, our surprise is meant to be aroused. Aristotle is

saying here—in Phys., recall—that all these ways of coming-into-being are alike precisely in that each involves an internal completion of a potency within the thing (the circle, the house, the human being) itself. Having asserted that the virtues come into being and are not alterations, Aristotle (in 247a5–9) asks how they come into being, concluding that it must be through the alteration of the perceptive part (of the soul), and that such alteration must be brought about in the perceiver’s soul by the perceptible things themselves, specifically by causing the perceiver to perceive this same thing in a different way. This is so because “all virtue is involved with pleasures and pains,” and it is through the alteration of perception that the human being comes to perceive the proper objects as pleasurable and painful, and thus to be capable of virtuous action.8 Those familiar with the definitive account of virtue acquisition in Nicomachean Ethics II–IV will see that Aristotle is here a bit fast and loose about the nexus of pleasure, perception, and virtue. What NE works out in detail, though, is the hint provided here that the hinge on which the taking on of virtue depends is that which is perceived, what is sometimes called the “common sensible.”9 The crucial principle is that in order to “take on virtue,” the human being must go to work on their own soul, so as to bring about a “change of state” in the manner in which a certain memory, expectation, or immediate sensation is perceived by the part of the soul that can listen to, but does not authoritatively possess, logos. There is a change in the way the object of ethical interest (the memory, the action, the expectation) is perceived by the soul, and this change in the soul is a new perception of pleasure or pain, possible only when a memory—a state of the soul shared with animals—is refined in a recollection that is accessible to logos

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EDUCATION: THE ETHICO-POLITICAL ENERGEIA proper.10 This “proper perception of pleasure” brings about the hexis that is responsible for virtuous action. What remains mysterious here is that this coming-into-being (of virtue), by means of alteration (of perception), is the energeia of an energeia, and not of a dunamis, and how such an account can be compatible with the understanding of the completion of a circle as the actualization of a potency advanced above. Before trying to explain this mystery, however, let us follow Aristotle as he accounts (in 247b1–15) for the cultivation of intellectual virtue, which turns out to be even trickier, since there is neither alteration nor a coming into being for such virtue. And yet, to be sure, it is nevertheless the case that there are times when a human being takes on virtue. Indeed, the perhaps surprising premise of Phys. VII.3, is that learning something—like, say, the definition of a circle—is a moment of virtue acquisition. Here Aristotle is dealing with the same impasse that he refers to—in Met. IX, 1049b3211—as “the sophistical objection that someone who does not have knowledge would be doing the things that the knowledge is about, since the one learning does not have knowledge.”12 Socrates, in his famous account in the Meno—itself a dialogue devoted to the question of whether or not virtue can be taught—solves (or fails to solve) this impasse in terms of the soul’s “recollection” of what was dormant within from prior lives. For Aristotle in the passage from Met., this problem is cast in terms of the motions of the soul—where we look for any energeia: But since something of what comes into being has already come into being, and in general something of what is in motion has always already been moved (which is made clear in the writing about motion), presumably the one learning

must also already have something of the knowledge. But then also it is clear from the same considerations that being-atwork takes precedence in this way too over potency, in respect to coming into being and time. (1049b35–1050a3) This is Aristotle’s attempt to refine the Socratic story that learning is a moving from passive knowledge to active knowledge—that learning is “somehow” about recollection; specifically recollecting as energeia a knowing that is at this moment just a potency in the learner’s soul. How, exactly, is “the writing about motion” helpful here? Aristotle has in mind, I believe, the statement that follows where we left off our discussion of virtue acquisition (Phys. VII.3, 247b4–6), namely: “what is potentially knowing becomes knowing not by being itself moved in any way, but by the becoming-present of something else.”13 For there to be a genuine coming into being when a human being learns it would have to be the case that something previously not present in the soul somehow came to be present through a kind of motion. But this is not the case. Therefore it must be a kind of rearrangement, where some other thing comes to be present, rather than something new within itself. But what is this new arrangement of knowing soul and known object that was not before but is now, but yet is not something newly existent as an independent something? Aristotle (247b7–8) clarifies: “For whenever a particular thing has happened, the thinking part of the soul somehow knows the universal through the particular.” This is a one-sentence version of one of the most complicated ideas in the corpus,14 and hence it likely will remain at least somewhat ambiguous in this treatment. What we must not fail to understand

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EDUCATION: THE ETHICO-POLITICAL ENERGEIA is this: nothing new is generated, nor is anything already present altered, when a human being acquires knowledge. Rather, a new relation is established between a universal and a particular that are already in the soul. It is not that a genuinely new bit of a data (a new particular) has forced itself into the soul where it was not already, nor that a new framework for that knowledge has moved outward from the soul. Instead, the soul—or rather the intellectual virtue of nous as a hexis of the soul—has made the universal present in the particular in some way that Aristotle does not expand on here. This is how we should understand Aristotle’s claim (at 247b2–4) that: “Most of all by far do we say that one who has knowledge does so by holding in a certain relation.” The hexis—note the etymological link to echein—of knowledge, shows that the taking-on of virtue is not about some “what” that must come to be, but about “how” the soul is arranged. This is telling because it shows how this knowledge acquisition, a special kind of virtue acquisition, is a natural process unfolding through the would-be knower, but is also more. As Aristotle states (247b12–13, 17–18) in providing further evidence for his thesis that knowledge acquisition is about achieving a relation, and not either creating or altering something new: “It is by the coming to rest and standing still of the thinking part that we are said to know and be mindful (phronein),” for “it is by the soul’s calming down out of its natural disorder that it becomes something understanding (episte-mon) and mindful (phronimon).” Here we see, in the quasi-passivity of the would-be learner coming to be who she is, both the naturalness of the activity—the soul “calms down” and “comes to be” something that has understanding and knowing—and how the creation of a new relation between universal

and particular (i.e. how learning) is a natural motion. The arrival of phrone-sis here is crucial. While one cannot take for granted that the ethical content associated with phrone-sis is at work here, as one would presume that it is not (for instance) in the uses of phrone-sis and cognates with respect to bees in the opening chapter of Met. (980b22f.), I do insist that such content is at work here, though I cannot fully speak for this. One can see at least reasons to suspect this might be true since this chapter combines instances of intellectual achievement with instances of moral development, and this is precisely the kind of joint phrone-sis serves as in NE VI. We see from this that the one who would learn anything must choose to be a certain way in order to learn, and thus that nature alone, that by which a dunamis comes to be at work as energeia, is not enough to account for the unique way of being in the world that the maturing human being presents to analysis. Such an understanding of this chapter from Phys., and even the very project of relying on this chapter to illuminate what is meant by the claim that learning is the actualization (of the universal) of the actual (particular) in the learner’s soul, occasioned by a particular object of knowledge, through the work of an educator, is not obvious. Having said what I have on its behalf, I will ask the reader’s patience in presuming this note on which we have ended—namely, the sense that phrone-sis is a necessary condition for the possibility of such learning— for the sake of now arguing both why this is true, and how this is related to education in music. (These being the second and third of the claims noted in the introduction as the basis for the central conclusion of this chapter.) On this interpretation, education cannot come to be outside the natural setting of all the motions of the human soul, but neither

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EDUCATION: THE ETHICO-POLITICAL ENERGEIA is it an exclusively natural phenomenon. The unique feature of the educated being-at-work as something that was already at-work, rather than as something that was once in potency, then, is the mark of the deeper uniqueness of education: it is the ethico-political energeia. Education alone involves the energeia of energeia because education alone is the political institution that effects change in the conditions of the possibility for living souls. This vivid representation not only enriches our understanding of Aristotle’s concern about the relation of mover and moved, it also helps us see the expressly political character of the more-than-natural process of being a learner. Aristotle holds, across the corpus, that children are incomplete human beings, incapable of virtue as such. Here (248a2–7) we are told why: since the child’s soul is naturally disordered, and “its motion is great”; every child needs for their soul to be calmed and brought to rest, and this happens for some from their own nature, but for others by means of others. This calming is precisely the work of those responsible for their education, and both the nature of that responsibility and the manner of its discharge are matters for the rational deliberation of the child’s community. While it is a natural process for the individual human being to move from a chaotically arranged soul without knowledge to an orderly soul with knowledge, this nevertheless (1) will not always be done in the same way from child to child and place to place, and (2) however it is to be achieved, it can only be done through a kind of habituation of the body. A child can only learn about the incommensurability of the diagonal of the square if she is attending to a conversation with the person charged with her education. This habituation of the soul, as a bodily phenomenon, into the careful and caring context of shared inquiry

is accomplished only through the settling down of the soul, both natural and political, and it is also necessary for intellectual virtue. The details of just how the period in which children’s souls are “settled down out of their natural disorder” makes such a difference are at the heart of the analysis of education in Pol. VII–VIII, to which we turn now.

PRACTICING LEARNING AS ENERGEIA OF AN ENERGEIA: POLITICS VII–VIII We begin our account of the intertwined importance of music and phrone-sis for learning by noting with Nussbaum that education is required for “each of the major functionings” of the human being and “choice itself.”15 Our charge is to think through exactly how and why. An answer begins to emerge when we reflect that the former (“each of the major functionings”) is a gloss on the human as political animal, and the latter (“choice itself”), the human as rational animal.16 Education thus emerges as the central junction of ethics and politics as a first philosophical inquiry. We see, that is, why some account of both the content and the aim of education as that which “settles the soul out of its natural disorder” is necessary for Aristotle’s understanding of knowledge, which itself is necessary for the articulation of his understanding of what it is to be as such, and the place of the human in the cosmos. Here we are immediately faced with the paradox that right education, embracing the inculcation of virtue leading to the fulfillment of human nature, is actually achieved by very few (if any) human beings. It appears, then, that the nature of the human being is to fail to acquire the nature of the human being.

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EDUCATION: THE ETHICO-POLITICAL ENERGEIA This is what Davis has called “the problem” that Pol. is about, namely: how “to reconcile the polis as a product of growth with the polis as a product of human freedom.”17 Thus understood, Aristotle’s project is first and foremost an attempt to reconcile nature and freedom—perhaps the greatest problem for theoretical speculation, as it intersects with matters human. While Pol. is a very problematic text, I will not be able to address the various controversies that face its readers.18 Moreover, I will not attempt some definitive statement of what Pol. has to say about education, as Simpson has done;19 I do hope, however, to engage profitably in the “speculation” he acknowledges is necessary, concerning questions about education and the best life that arise in the first four books but remain unanswered in the text as we have it. Others have, in recent times, stressed the connection between education and citizenship in Aristotle, in connection to the institution of democracy in particular.20 Thus, my central contention concerning education’s centrality is not itself new.21 What is novel here, to the best of my knowledge, is the attempt to ground this centrality of education not only in the broader concern for virtue and living well as the that-for-the-sake-of-which the polis exists, or even in Aristotle’s account of character and the virtuous human being, but in the “first philosophical” ground of education, as the energeia of an energeia. We begin by noting how Aristotle, in the course of an argument concerning the “necessary classes and functions” of the polis (1328b–1329a), reaffirms that the best polis is one in which the whole of the community is turned to virtue. Aristotle (1329a21–4) states: “For as is clear from what was said, it is together with virtue that happiness necessarily arises, but a polis is said to be happy not

with respect to a part of it, but with respect to all its citizens.”22 Aristotle is emphatic that anyone who is to be a citizen must receive the same education as any other citizen. This view, that there should be one education for all the citizens, and that it should be public was, as Kraut notes,23 so far from commonplace that there was no extant example of such a program, nor was there any extant theorization quite like it. It is true, of course, that Aristotle was often in conversation with Plato’s views in the Laws and Republic, not least with respect to the importance of music for the cultivation of virtue, about which more as we continue. But why is it, exactly, that the happiness belongs to the city as a whole, and that it consists of the general cultivation of virtue (among the citizens, at least)? Aristotle answers (1331b24–1332b10) this question with another: what is the end of a human life? Citing the famous definition of the ultimate good from NE, Aristotle (1332a9) claims that: “happiness is the complete energeia and use of virtue, not with conditions but simply (haplo-s).” As in the ethical writings, though, it is far from clear what “complete virtue” is: is it some one of the virtues—presumably, the highest of them, sophia—or is it the cultivation of all the virtues together?24 Aristotle first asserts (1332a20–35) that the virtue of the polis—actually its capacity for “seriousness” (spoude-)—is not the work of fortune, but of “knowledge and choice,” specifically the “knowledge and choice” that constitutes the being-serious of the citizens, that is, their virtue. Aristotle then turns (1332a36) to discuss “the question we must now chiefly consider,” namely, “how does a man25 become spoudaios?” The transition here from areteto spoude-, as I have argued with respect to a similar movement in NE,26 signals that however superior its inherent content, the pursuit

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EDUCATION: THE ETHICO-POLITICAL ENERGEIA or possession of intellectual virtue alone cannot be understood to constitute the ultimate end of a human life. Indeed, strictly speaking such an “energeia and use” of intellectual virtue, independent of virtuous character, is not even possible.27 Aristotle moves on to the content of the education in the best polis. He begins (1332b10–25) with the reminder that what remains to be said is how such education will be carried out, for “of those who learn, some do by habit (ta ethizomenoi), while others by instruction (ta akouontes).” This contrast echoes the ambivalent contrast with which NE II begins (1103b11f.). This ambivalence concerning what is the same and what is different in the education of citizens who are to be spoudaioi, so that the polis might acquire virtue and thus be happy, anticipates the ambivalence that drives the remainder of the detailed account of the education system in the best city: is the education of the ruler and the ruled to be the same or different? To decide this question, it appears, we must decide to what extent the citizens, rulers and ruled, are equal. Aristotle (1333a1) answers this by saying that, just as the rulers and the ruled are both the same (as citizens) and different (as commanding and obeying, respectively), so too must their education be both the same and different. Ultimately, though, the sameness of the citizens—their basic equality—is the defining feature of the best polis, since, in this city, the same person ought first to be ruled and then to rule (1333a13). This necessitates an answer, first in those who will educate this citizen, and then in the one educated, to two mutually implicative questions: (1) how does a good man come to be? (2) what is the end of the best life? (1333a14–15). The presumed mutual implication of these two questions that the education in the best city must address suggests

that Aristotle believes that “even” the life of political virtue, for which the citizens are being educated in the best city, is impossible without the cultivation of intellectual virtue; political life, then, would be impossible without the life of theo-ria.28 The difficult interpretive question remains: of what precisely does the life of theo-ria, the so-called contemplative life, consist? Aristotle here (1333a37–b4), at least, is clear that the citizen who would lead the best life is one “more able” to live at peace and in leisure than at war, and should “more do” what is beautiful than what is useful, and thus the education in the best city will not, as the Spartan education, privilege military discipline and manly virtue above all. This is so, Aristotle continues (in the partially corrupt text of 1334a5–15), because the best life is only possible if the human being begins from the best possible beginning, which is itself a “natural end.” This rather oblique statement is then parsed as meaning that the body must be trained for the sake of the soul, and the two parts of the soul, the desiring and the reasoning turned together toward nous. More precisely, Aristotle (1334b25–7) concludes that the body must be trained before the soul, and desires before the intellect, but that both kinds of “education by habit” must be for the sake of the intellect. Political virtue involves, indeed, begins and ends, with nous. How does this help us to see the unique work of education as energeia? And how does this relate to the unity of ethics and politics as one first philosophical discourse? Put differently, what does the need to cultivate intellect, as integral to the project of education for life of theo-ria, have to do with the context-independence of the governing concepts of political inquiry? For this we turn to Politics VIII. Aristotle begins (1337a21) by stating more emphatically

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EDUCATION: THE ETHICO-POLITICAL ENERGEIA than he had earlier that, insofar as the “whole polis is one,” the education of the citizens must be “the same for all” and supervised in a manner that is “common (koine-n), and not private (idian).” Any remaining ambiguity about the wisdom of dividing the management of the education of the citizens, for instance, along the lines that the labor of the citizens is so divided, is hereby expunged. So, too, is any question concerning whether it is better for the young citizen to be educated privately or in public. That completed, Aristotle turns (1337b4–8) to address the obvious question of what the content of such “commonly supervised” education ought to be, beginning with the foundational claim that, while the young (citizens) “must be taught those of the useful arts which are absolutely necessary,” they must not be taught all the useful arts, since it is absolutely vital to keep “works” that are “free” separate from those that are “unfree,” such “slavish useful arts” being those that are (merely) mechanical, and have no share of anything other than production (poie-sis). Noteworthy here is the discussion of ergon, the cognates of which appear four times in 1337b5–18, beginning with this division of works into free and unfree, and concluding with the rejoinder that even the pursuit “of the free kinds of knowledge (τῶν ἐλευθερίων ἐπιστημῶν)” can lead the youth away from virtue, if the ends of the study are not right. From the outset, then, we see that the education of the citizens has everything to do with the way they are to be set-to-work in the world. The unique way of being is, as Aristotle describes in the following passages, to be at leisure, scholazein, which so far from being restful or slack, involves the near constant stimulation of the highest part of the soul. Music, as Aristotle goes on to discuss at length here, is of such vital importance

precisely because it molds the soul, from the earliest age, so as to take on just this kind of “leisurely” activity. Summarizing the “main conclusions” of these first forays into the nature of education in the best city, Aristotle concludes (1338a30–5) that the youth—“the sons” perhaps emphasizing the common interest in the citizens, even when taken as family members—“are to be educated . . . as is free and beautiful (kale-n),” as is “made clear by the musical arts (hai mousikai).” No argument is given here for the assertion—and, sadly, our text ends while Aristotle is in the middle of an extensive account of the nature of the musical education in the best city—but what is clear from what Aristotle sets down as the basis of education is that being educated in the musical shows us what it means to be educated for freedom.29 Thus, pace Nichols,30 who stresses the instrumental character of education, and especially musical education, I, like Davis31 and Lord,32 believe that the deep and rich account of education in music is meant to illuminate the way in which education, as the sole means for polis-dwelling human beings to achieve our logos-holding form of life, is at work in every moment of a child’s development from their first rattle (1340b26–9) through the age of responsible citizenship. This is so because it is not the content of the subject matter that makes the education proper for freedom, as Aristotle makes clear by next (1338a35–1339a10) describing how and why this education includes drawing, literacy, and numeracy, and gymnastic training (but, again, not in the manner of the Spartans, which is faulty in many respects). It is, rather, the manner in which one cultivates one’s knowledge that matters. Education for freedom is concerned with the way the knowledge is at work (in energeia) in the

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EDUCATION: THE ETHICO-POLITICAL ENERGEIA learner’s soul. Both the deep intimacy of musical education and freedom, and the ultimate (relative) indifference of the subjects taught in general, point to the deeper truth exposed through our reading of Phys. VII.3 above: the taking-on of virtue, that is to say the learning that embraces the training of the body and the instruction of the soul, is about the work (ergon) of the human being; a unique natural end that, rather than being the energeia of a dunamis, is the energeia (of the universal) of an energeia (of the particular). Let us state for the moment that this account of learning is right, and that there is this kind of education that uniquely prepares a human being—a citizen, crucially—to be what a human being most fundamentally is, namely, free. We are left with a pressing question: how does that happen, actually? Aristotle’s answer is: phrone-sis. Burger—who reads phrone-sis in NE VI as the joint of the various virtues (of intellect, and of intellect and character) that make it possible to speak of virtue in the singular, and of the human soul as such—argues that what is most fundamentally at stake in the account of the energeia of the human soul as the human ergon in NE I.7 is that this account is fundamentally incomplete, precisely in its being an outline (tupos) that will only be filled out with time as a coworker (sunergon).33 That to which the ergon account reaches out, insofar as it secures the single wholeness of the soul that is in energeia when the human ergon is fulfilled, Burger argues, is phrone-sis.34 The details of Aristotle’s account of musical education, I claim here, confirm Burger’s view, and demonstrate what I have called learning as the energeia of an energeia. That is, if the mature human being is to live virtuously, she has to have, somehow, taken on all the virtues, as the famous definition of the good life

in NE I.7 entails. This seeming impossibility is actually possible through phrone-sis, which alone constitutes and is constituted by the cultivation of the other virtues of intellect and character. Setting this potency to work vitally depends on “how a child is brought up from earliest youth”; this early experience, Aristotle says, “makes a great difference; or rather all the difference” (NE 1103b23–5). Such a beginning, Politics shows, is made most likely by a common education for all citizens, grounded in music, which from the beginning of life has the power to tune the soul toward virtue, or virtuosity. Making more clear the ultimate ends of musical education, Aristotle begins (1339b30–40) by saying that we need to reflect on how it has come to pass that the pleasure of experiencing musical performance is seen as its own end—since, on the one hand, “perhaps some pleasure and the end are the same,” but the pleasure people “these days” are seeking for its own sake does not appear to be this pleasure. Aristotle (1340a1–4) next argues that music’s “nature is more honorable than” that of which he has spoken, for “everyone has an aisthe-sis of this common pleasure” in music, since “music is pleasurable by nature,” but it is necessary “to see (horan) if music is in some way directed to the character and the soul.” I flag the occurrence of perception and seeing here, as it echoes a consistent pattern throughout the corpus, in which Aristotle figures phrone-sis as a kind of perception.35 Thus, we ought not be surprised that Aristotle does find something “to be seen” by way of music’s being directed to the soul and to character, and that that something has to do precisely with the education with respect to pleasure and pain, that is, with phrone-sis. Aristotle concludes (1340b12–14): “It is clear that it is possible for music to bring about a character in the

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EDUCATION: THE ETHICO-POLITICAL ENERGEIA soul, and if this is possible, then one must bring this to the education of the young.” Far from being merely instrumental to future education, music serves precisely as the “settling down of the soul out of its natural disorder” that Phys. VII.3 asserts is necessary for learning to begin. It does so, this passage tells us, by shaping the soul’s attunement to the true pleasure of the musical encounter; by bringing about a harmony. And, after all, “many wise men” say that “the soul either is a harmony, or holds a harmony” (1340b20). But again, we are left with the question of how. The mystery here is not so great, since such “finding the right note,” throughout the corpus, is identified with phrone-sis. Here too, music’s ethical mode must be the result of the soul’s taking-on this virtue, or else be an early indicator of future emergence. We do not find a clear statement of this—say, in the conclusion of the account— perhaps because there is no conclusion of the account. The text does end, however artificially, with a rebuke of the Socratic position36 that “relaxed” modes were not to be enjoyed, as they undermine virtue. Consonant with his repeated repudiations of Spartan culture throughout the text, Aristotle here endorses the principle of enjoining the young to find the proper pleasure in all harmonies and rhythms, so long as they are not inherently base. This learning begins precisely when the young take pleasure in the natural pleasure of music in the right way. In this way, harmonizing the soul through musical education is integral to the virtues of character: virtues related to self-governance, understood in Aristotle’s sense. We come now to what we must accept as Politics’s last words (1342b34–5), which state: “It is clear that these three are the limits for education: the middle, the possible and the suitable.” While not named here, these limits

surely point to the cultivation of phrone-sis, that hexis of the soul that makes it possible to find the middle, to know what is possible, and to determine how things are suited to be. The preservation, indeed the very inauguration of the soul’s harmony, the capacity to enjoy true pleasure in musical performance and in every act, inquiry, choice, and knowledge, then, is the end of the best education. This is so precisely because to take on this virtue is to actualize, with respect to the universal, what has already been actualized, with respect to the particular, in one’s own soul. That might be the universal of a particular object of perception (the site of the virtues of character) or a particular object of intellect (the site of those of intellect). The nature of learning, as the change in the relationship of the universal and particular, is the energeia of the human ergon, and it begins, under the proper conditions of educational institutionalization, with the cultivation of the reasoning and desiring parts of the soul, jointly, in music. This comes to be in and through the cultivation of phrone-sis, which underscores both why ethics and politics are one inquiry for Aristotle, and the first philosophical nature of the true education, itself the source of the being of the true citizen of the true polis. Michael Weinman

NOTES 1

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The author gratefully acknowledges the helpful comments of Andrew German, Jacob Greenstine, Pavlos Kontos, Matthew Linck, David McNeill, and Russell Winslow on earlier drafts of this chapter. Aubenque, 1980, 1988, 1993; Baracchi, 2008; Burger, 2008; Davis, 1996; Heinaman, ed., 1995; Kontos, 2002, 2011; Kraut, 1989, 2002, 2007; Long, 2004; Nussbaum, 1986, 1994, 2002; Vergnières, 1995; Winslow, 2007; Yack, 1993.

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EDUCATION: THE ETHICO-POLITICAL ENERGEIA 3

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Tessitore, 2002, emphasizes, against MacIntyre, the natural, rather than historical, source of education, but does not insist on the first philosophical valence of this claim. This makes good on a promise expressed but unfulfilled in Goodman and Talisse, 2007, 9–10, who note that it is “perhaps” with respect to education that “Aristotle can be the most informative to our political thinking,” but offer no substantial thematic discussion of education. Winslow, 2006, 164–7, reading Nicomachean Ethics, provides a parallel account of the energeia of virtue in logos. Metaphysics IX is another site for the dilemma of “energeiai of energeiai.” Witt, 2003, provides a comprehensive treatment. Indeed, Posterior Analytics I.1–2 offers a hint of the argument presented here, in response to the problem of “Meno’s paradox,” with which the treatise begins. Winslow, 2012, offers a sympathetic account of this treatment of the problem. See Nussbaum, 2002, 58–9, 95n32, where she notes that this is why education is intricately connected with desire. While this is not made explicit anywhere in the corpus, Kontos, 2011, 43–53 provides a very persuasive account of how virtue is brought about through the proper perception of the “common sensibles” that are given to “phronetic perception.” See De Anima (414b–415a) and On Memory and Recollection for more on this. Translations of Metaphysics are my responsibility, though I benefited from a careful consultation of Sachs, 1999, and Apostle, 1979. APo, 71a30 provides another formulation of this false paradox. Translations of Physics are my responsibility, though I benefited from a careful consultation of Sachs, 1995. The same idea is at work in the famous account of epago-ge- in APo II.19, with its image of the “falling-back-into-ordered-ranks” of a (previously) routed army, such order being the source (arche-) of their being an army at all, in anything but name. See Nussbaum, 2002, 79. See Davis, 1996, 5–9 for what serves as my understanding of the human as the

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logos-holding being conditioned by its being of-the-polis. See Davis, 1996, 2. Simpson, 1997, 1998, provides a definitive account of these difficulties, as well as controversial solutions. See Simpson, 1998, 231–83. Also of note here are the relevant portions of the commentaries of Kraut, 1997, 123–213 and of Davis, 1996, the latter especially in conjunction with his commentary on the Poetics (Davis, 1999). See, for instance: Tessitore, 2002; Yack, 1993, 2002; Nussbaum, 2002; Vergnières, 1995, 257–80; Nichols, 1992; Woodruff, 2005; Johnson, 2007, 115–40. Curren, 2000, offers a book-length treatment of the issue. Translations of Politics mostly reproduce that of Kraut, 1997, though there are occasional deviations, undertaken in consultation with Lord, 1984; Apostle and Gerson, 1986; and Simpson, 1997. See Kraut, 2002, 206–10. White, 1992, 6–15—especially nn. 13 and 18—provides a critical review of this “intellectualist vs. inclusivist” debate. Here, and throughout this discussion, it is ane-r, the male human being. Weinman, 2007, 105–10, 112–17, 133–5, in response to the account of pleasure that follows the discussion of akrasia in Nicomachean Ethics VII and that which opens Nicomachean Ethics X. Kraut, 1997, 123–8 also understands these passages, together with the “intellectualist chapters” of NE X, as expressing just one view about the “primary, but not entirely self-sufficient” nature of theo-ria as the life of virtue. Simpson, 1998, 237–9 presents a different, but compatible, attempt to harmonize Aristotle’s views on the ultimate decision of the shape of the best life with those found in the “theo-ria chapters” of NE X. This “being educated for freedom” echoes what Salkever, 2002, 345, 354–6 calls the human capacity for raising “natural questions” for deliberation within a community. See Nichols, 1992, 51–63. See Davis, 1996. See Lord, 1982.

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EDUCATION: THE ETHICO-POLITICAL ENERGEIA 33 34

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See Burger, 2008, 35–6. See ibid., 42–3, 124–5. Davis, 2003, 176–7 offers a substantially similar account. See my discussion of Kontos, 2011, on “phronetic perception” above. Argued in Republic 338e.

REFERENCES Apostle, H. G. (trans.), Aristotle. Metaphysics, Grinnell, IA: Peripatetic Press, 1979. Apostle, H. G. and L. P. Gerson (trans.), Aristotle. Politics, Grinnell, IA: Peripatetic Press, 1986. Aubenque, P. (1980), “Politique et éthique chez Aristote,” Ktèma 5 (1980), 211–21. Aubenque, P. and A. Tordesillas, Aristote politique, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1993. Baracchi, C., Aristotle’s Ethics as First Philosophy, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008. Burger, R., Aristotle’s Dialogue with Socrates: On the Nicomachean Ethics, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2008. Burnyeat, M. F., “Aristotle on Learning to Be Good,” in Rorty (1980), 69–92. Curren, R. R., Aristotle and the Necessity of Public Education, Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2000. Davis, M., The Politics of Philosophy: A Commentary on Aristotle’s Politics, Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 1996. —, The Poetry of Philosophy: On Aristotle’s Poetics, South Bend, IN: St. Augustine’s Press, 1999. Douglas, R. B., G. M. Mara, and H. S. Richardson (eds), Liberalism and the Good, London: Routledge, 1990.

Goodman L.E. and R. B. Talisse (eds), Aristotle’s Politics Today, Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 2007. Johnson, C. N., Aristotle’s Theory of the State, New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1990. Keaney, J. J., The Composition of Aristotle’s Athenaion Politeia, New York: Oxford University Press, 1992. Keyt, D. and F. D. Miller (eds), A Companion to Aristotle’s Politics, Oxford: Blackwell, 1991. Kontos, P., Aristotle’s Moral Realism Reconsidered: Phenomenological Ethics, New York: Routledge, 2011. Kraut, R. (trans.), Aristotle. Politics, Books 7 and 8, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997. Kraut, R., Aristotle: Political Philosophy, New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. Kullmann, W., “Man as a Political Animal,” in Keyt and Miller (1991), 94–117. Lear, J., Open Minded: Working Out the Logic of the Soul, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998. Lord, C., Education and Culture in the Political Thought of Aristotle, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1982. Lord, C. (trans.), Aristotle. The Politics, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984. Miller, F. D., Nature, Justice and Rights in Aristotle’s Politics, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995. Nichols, M., Citizens and Statesmen: A Study of Aristotle’s Politics, Savage, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 1992. Nussbaum, M. C., The Fragility of Goodness, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986. —, The Therapy of Desire: Theory and Practice in Hellenistic Ethics, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994.

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EDUCATION: THE ETHICO-POLITICAL ENERGEIA —, “Aristotelian Social Democracy,” in Liberalism and the Good, ed. R. B. Douglas, G. M. Mara, and H. S. Richardson, London: Routledge, 1990, 203–52; reprinted in Aristotle and Modern Politics: The Persistence of Political Philosophy, ed. A. Tessitore, Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2002. Polansky, R., Aristotle’s De Anima: A Critical Commentary, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007. Rorty A. (ed.), Essays on Aristotle’s Ethics, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980. Sachs, J. (trans.), Aristotle. Physics, New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1995. —, Aristotle. Metaphysics, Sante Fe: Green Lion Press, 1999. Salkever, S., “The Deliberative Model of Democracy and Aristotle’s Ethics of Natural Questions,” in Aristotle and Modern Politics: The Persistence of Political Philosophy, ed. A. Tessitore, Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2002, 342–74. Saxonhouse, A. W., “Democracy, Equality and Eide: A Radical View from Book 8 of Plato’s Republic,” American Political Science Review, 92 (1998), 273–84. Simpson, P. L. (trans.), The Politics of Aristotle: Translated with an Introduction,

Analysis and Notes, Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1997. —, A Philosophical Commentary on the Politics, Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1998. Tessitore, A. (ed.), Aristotle and Modern Politics: The Persistence of Political Philosophy, Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2002. Vergnières, S., Éthique et Politique chez Aristote: phusis, ethos, nomos, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1995. Weinman, M., Pleasure in Aristotle’s Ethics, London: Continuum, 2007. White, S. A., Sovereign Virtue, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1992. Winslow, R., “On the Nature of Logos in Aristotle,” Revue Philosophie Antique, 6 (2006), 163–80. —, Aristotle and Rational Discovery, London: Continuum, 2007. Witt, C., Ways of Being: Potency and Actuality in Aristotle’s Metaphysics, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2003. Woodruff, P., First Democracy: The Challenge of an Ancient Idea, New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. Yack, B., The Problems of a Political Animal: Community, Justice, and Conflict in Aristotelian Political Thought, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993.

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14 TOWARD THE SUBLIME CALCULUS OF ARISTOTLE’S POETICS

“Nothing too much,” not even righteousness. F. L. Lucas1

HISTORICAL JUXTAPOSITIONS Gotthold Ephraim Lessing once compared the Poetics to Euclid’s Elements for its analytical clarity, which acted as a force of law upon dramatists and literary theorists alike.2 Today the Poetics’ claim to fame assumes a different—rather fittingly tragic—description: its grandness is that of an “indomitable ‘survivor,’” in Stephen Halliwell’s words, reaching us through a history of reception that has alternated between admiration and demonization ever since the text’s rediscovery in the Renaissance (Halliwell, 1995, 21). Even more pointedly, F. L. Lucas reminds us that its allegedly infallible laws proved so fragile as to be eventually broken, one by one, in the history of theater (1958, 33). “But though they have been broken, their history is the history of Tragedy” (34), Lucas concludes, intimating that both admirers and critics recognize the impact of this book in asking the most pertinent questions about literature and its effects, even if it does not always provide the most adequate answers.3

Incomplete yet indispensable, the Poetics. bequeaths us a “foundational strategy” for approaching literature even as it also withholds some of its meanings in a Sphinx-like manner, provoking an ongoing history of critical debates.4 Here are some of the questions that have continued to preoccupy commentators: Was the tragic effect meant to convey a direct moral lesson to the audience, or to represent life’s adversity in a manner that elicited and enriched human feeling? How should we understand the scope, and thus translate properly the meaning, of eleos and phobos (usually rendered as “pity” and “fear”) in view of temporal and cultural shifts in the psychology of emotions? Do these feelings arise in and resolve themselves at the level of the tragic plot, or involve primarily the emotional state of the audience? And finally, and directly related to the tragic emotions, does catharsis signify the psychological purification or bodily purgation of excess emotions in the audience, or does it refer to the plot’s structural fulfillment through the processes of reversals and recognitions?

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TOWARD SUBLIME CALCULUS OF ARISTOTLE’S POETICS While most Enlightenment thinkers opted for the strictly moralist approach to the first question, recent theorizations—some inspired by Nietzsche’s antididactic view of tragedy5—have abandoned this explicit Enlightenment moralism. This does not mean, however, that the Poet. considers art as a purely formal enterprise, and much contemporary scholarship recognizes that Aristotle’s refusal to reduce art to a moral handbook hardly makes of him a proponent of l’art pour l’art. Tragedy, and art in general, has an ethical thrust for Aristotle, but he prefers to think of its impact in more nuanced terms than his overtly moralistic mentor did. Art can enrich us emotionally and morally because, according to Aristotle, our emotions are not exclusively relegated to the darkness of unreason as Plato thought. Instead, feelings often agree out of their own accord with reason’s judgments, thus serving virtuous purposes. While Plato feared the incendiary character of art for exciting irrational appetites, his pupil gave a more psychologically realistic account of the emotions, considering them to be both educative and educable, capable in themselves of following and expressing good judgment.6 How Aristotle aligns the tragic emotions with the expectations of reason, and how he manages more generally to adjoin art and moral conduct without compromising aesthetic freedom, are what I call his “calculus.” Furthermore, because this is a psychological calculus—a logos that reveals the measure of something as dynamic and unpredictable as the human soul—I call it a “sublime” calculus.7 The ensuing discussion of the tragic emotions begins to manifest signs of this calculus, but I will further address this issue in the next section of the essay. I will do so with Gerald Else’s stately monograph on the Poet. in mind, since its analyses of several

tragic categories also attest to the sense of measure and proportion the ancient philosopher found even in the genre of excess par excellence. For now, however, it will suffice to repeat Else’s cautioning remark that to consider these emotions as being “amenable to reason” does not mean that they “can be made acceptable to reason afterwards, by some ulterior means. Rather they are brought before the bar of reason to begin with, by the spectator himself, and his emotional commitment is given or withheld in accordance with its judgment” (1957, 374–5). This passage stresses again the spontaneity of the feelings’ coherence with reason. “Without recourse to metaphysics or theology,” writes Else, Aristotle shows that it is inherent in the mechanism of the tragic emotions to conform to reason’s demands (374). The logic of the emotions, in other words, is not all that illogical. Consequently, a good tragic plot incites our feelings of pity and fear in a way that reason also finds agreeable and justifiable. Thus the mention of pity and fear brings us to the next debated topic in our list. Concerning the proper translation of these tragic emotions, Lessing’s contributions in the second part of his Hamburg Dramaturgy have garnered significant theoretical attention. In his quarrel with Corneille and French Classicism in general, Lessing enlisted the Poet. to legitimize his own dramatic practice of bürgerliches Trauerspiel (bourgeois, or domestic tragedy). He insisted on Aristotle’s stipulation that undeserved affliction elicits the spectators’ pity, while fear connects them to the hero or heroine by way of resemblance: we feel compassion for those who suffer disproportionately and we fear for them because their similarity to us (homoios) reminds us that we could be in their shoes (Poet. 13, 1453a3–6). Yet, it should be noted that Aristotle qualifies this similarity as being

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TOWARD SUBLIME CALCULUS OF ARISTOTLE’S POETICS not too close: while the hero should not be completely blameless (for this would produce revulsion rather than pity at his disproportionate sufferings), he should undoubtedly be of higher stature than the average spectator. Aristotle’s hero lies in between (metaxu) the perfect and the average (13, 1453a7), and contra Lessing, the Greek philosopher’s explicit preference is for a hero approaching the higher rather than the lower boundary of this range: “a character either like that stated [similar to us], or better rather than worse” (13, 1453a13–16). Lessing’s emphasis on the resemblance of spectator and tragic sufferer has been viewed as a creative mistranslation that resulted, for better or for worse, in the democratization of theater.8 In other words, by highlighting resemblance while downplaying Aristotle’s equally relevant caveat of heroic distance, Lessing could attack the Classicists for producing grossly outdated heroes with whom no one could identify or sympathize in the modern era. Such anticlassicist polemic simultaneously authorized the novel conventions of his own Miss Sara Sampson, where the stage became a bourgeois household and the heroine was no longer like an ordinary person, but herself an ordinary person. Of course, it is arguable that Lessing’s democratization constitutes an innovation only in a narrow sense, as it also misses a crucial psychological insight behind Aristotle’s requirement that the hero be well above average though below perfect. By interpreting homoios to mean “same” instead of “similar,” Lessing indeed showed tragic experience to be the mortal share of the social majority no less than of the aristocracy, but such a realist, egalitarian concept was already nascent in Euripides, who famously brought characters in rags on the tragic stage. Furthermore, if we bracket the pronounced social realism

of Lessing’s stage for a moment, we can still see that a certain democratic feature lies at the core of all tragic plots, and that Aristotle underscored rather than understated this feature by insisting precisely on the hero’s idealized distance: for what better reveals the democracy of suffering than the recognition that even persons better than ourselves cannot avoid life’s terrible misfortunes? How can one express more poignantly the fact that death and bad luck do not care for social status than by juxtaposing the ordinary with the illustrious and showing that both meet the same end? Aristotle’s double requirement of just enough resemblance and just enough difference between hero and spectator respects a rather common psychological fact that underlies the process of identification: because we all would prefer to see ourselves reflected in an idealizing mirror rather than one showing us as we merely are, we also become more intensely affected when seeing the nobler images of ourselves unable to avoid suffering. Hence, Aristotle compares the good playwright to good portrait painters who “produce likenesses, yet enhance people’s beauty” (15, 1454b8–12). If, on the contrary, the hero were merely average, his fate would not be significant one way or the other, as Else remarks (377): we would hardly be riveted by his life’s experience, which is no more than a reduplication of our quotidian existence. There would be neither pleasure nor learning in this kind of imitation, since it does not take us beyond ourselves nor does it reveal anything more than what we already know. Aristotle postulates heroic elevation as key to tragic pleasure neither because of a sociopolitical bias against ordinary people, nor because of a metaphysical fixation on valor. Instead, he is brought to this conclusion by the sound psychological observation

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TOWARD SUBLIME CALCULUS OF ARISTOTLE’S POETICS that the arousal of tragic emotions requires an element of sublimity toward which most of us, if not all of us, are drawn. Certainly, the distance is there to be collapsed, but in the process of this collapse our sympathetic feelings emerge even more intensely and meaningfully. Distance facilitates the heightening of the emotions and amplifies the tragic effect. Regarding the final, twofold issue of the rise and resolution of these sentiments on either side of the divide—stage or audience—Goethe’s 1827 essay “On Interpreting Aristotle’s Poetics” is a significant stop on this historical journey. Convinced that Aristotle was exclusively interested in the formal structure of tragedy, and that he would not digress from such an objective description to speculate about audience psychology, Goethe argued that pity and fear arise from the tragic action and resolve themselves in it. He thus translated the last part of Aristotle’s famous definition of tragedy9 to correspond with his interpretation. In it, he renders the controversial term “catharsis” as neutralization, or resolution: “after a certain course of events which evoke pity (Mitleid) and fear (Furcht), the tragedy concludes by neutralizing those emotions (Ausgleichung solcher Leidenschaften)” (198). Goethe departs from the standard explanation that the catharsis of these emotions takes place homeopathically through their arousal in the spectator. Furthermore, he avoids the medical and ritual translations of catharsis as purgation or purification, opting for a mathematical and economic metaphor: Ausgleichung as equalization also applies to the balancing of a bank account, and it is used here to convey tragedy’s internal restoration of order, its self-adjusting economy and conciliatory mechanisms. Still, Goethe’s definition is somewhat at odds with his actual examples of tragic

resolution. On the one hand, the definition suggests that resolution involves the balancing out of the emotions themselves (solcher Leidenschaften), albeit on stage and not in the hearts of the spectators as it was traditionally thought. (It is worth noting that Goethe, like many others, assumes Aristotle’s pathe-mato-n to mean emotions rather than sufferings—the latter being Else’s translation, which, as we will see, allows him to fulfill more systematically Goethe’s reading.) On the other hand, Goethe’s example of apotheosis as restitution for extreme suffering at the end of Oedipus Coloneus, and his claims that reconciliation is often “accomplished by some type of human sacrifice” in tragedy, and in comedy by “marriage as a means of disentangling all sorts of predicaments” (198), imply that resolution is a question of structure and not simply of emotional restoration.10 It is this route of structural rather than emotional resolution that Else, the most notable recent proponent of this theory of catharsis, follows. Else questions the tautology of the homeopathic argument according to which pity and fear reconcile or purify themselves through pity and fear. Even though the term “catharsis” is never repeated or explicitly clarified in the extant part of the Poet., Else takes his cue from the words adjacent to it: τὴν τῶν τοιούτων παθημάτων κάθαρσιν (the catharsis of such passions). After a sustained analysis of the meaning and typology of τὰ πάθη that Aristotle employs in the Poet.— namely, of the tragic ordeals resulting from deliberate, necessary, or accidental acts and of the relative degree of pollution attached to them—Else concludes that catharsis must be understood as an inextricable part of a cluster of auxiliary terms and ideas: “pathos, hamartia, recognition, pity and fear, and (perhaps) the tragic pleasure” (441).11 In fact,

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TOWARD SUBLIME CALCULUS OF ARISTOTLE’S POETICS the necessary and exclusive relation catharsis bears to these terms leads Else to reject the customary notion that all tragedy (and even all successful art) is in essence cathartic: “The total nexus to which catharsis belongs is defined so tightly by the interlocking of its parts—pathos, hamartia, recognition, and catharsis—that it will actually fit only a few tragedies” (445). Apparently, it will not fit even all the tragedies that are based on complex plots, the kind of plot Aristotle commends: while all complex plots rely on peripeteia qua change of fate,12 they do not necessarily presuppose tragic error (hamartia) or recognition—those other elements to which catharsis is closely tied, and which also happen to heighten the tragic effect (445). This said, ancient theater did not have curtains, as Lucas cautions, thus making it harder to distinguish so neatly between the pathos of the stage and the emotions of the bleachers. On the contrary, the seats of the koilon curved around, embracing half of the circle of the orchestra (Lucas, 1958, 165). Even Nietzsche, who viewed the chorus as a kind of curtain between audience and suffering heroes, thought of this separation as a precondition for fusion: in the image of the Satyr, the Greek remembered his origins in the natural world and recognized his own primordial being. While in section 7 of the Birth of Tragedy Nietzsche speaks of the chorus “as a living wall” that tragedy builds between itself and the surroundings (58), in section 8 he stresses the fact that “there was at bottom no opposition between public and chorus” (62). Thus, the chorus divides only in order to precipitate fusion. And thus, even if catharsis, strictly speaking, refers to processes internal to the work, it may not be outlandish to think that the structural resolution of the play is mimetically reflected and refracted in the emotional relief of its audience.13

We have begun tracing only the faintest outlines of a long, rich, but also fraught and potentially obfuscating history of debates, elaborations, reappraisals, and so forth. Let alone that all these complications eventually return to that one short passage in chapter 6, where Aristotle offers a summary definition of tragedy. In his intent to distill the essence of tragedy, the philosopher—as if by some tragic irony, it seems—has left us with more questions about the nature of tragedy in this definition than in his entire Poet.14 How then to approach the Poet. with fresh eyes, as fresh as the eyes of its author when he first reflected on the nature and purpose of these early tragedies? Can we engage Aristotle with the same unflinching clarity he afforded to the tragedians so as to find something unexpected but not obscurantist in his work—something impossible yet plausible instead of something possible yet implausible? This would mean to model our reading after his own specifications for what makes the best plot—namely, ingredients that are necessary and probable, compelling but coherent.15 Can we attempt to elucidate him even at the risk of being charged with an anachronistic insistence on clarity? Conversely, can we resist obfuscating him in our wish to satisfy the theoretical demand for nuance that has rendered disclosure virtually synonymous with concealment?16 Perhaps not. After all, it is possible that even the most enduring works can be sometimes exhausted of their greater significance, and then they risk becoming empty screens onto which the critic freely projects his or her interpretive fantasies in the name of theoretical novelty. Perhaps the time is ripe then for such works to go into oblivion, to rest in darkness for a while as the Poet. did before the Renaissance. There they can be kept safe from the aggression of rhetorical hairsplitting

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TOWARD SUBLIME CALCULUS OF ARISTOTLE’S POETICS and the formalism of professional commentary, so that when they resurface, they can be read not only anew but as of old, for their plausible meanings. After years of forgetfulness, their old, strong meanings can be given back to them once again, appearing to us as fresh because of this interlude. Perhaps we need a break from these works if we are to reconstitute our interpretive courage and speak their splendid patency. Still, with this fraught history in mind, and with the humble dream that I may illuminate rather than obscure, I will offer some preliminary reflections on Aristotle’s passion for measure.

PAN METRON ARISTON, OR NATURE IS BELIEVABLE It was the poet Friedrich Hölderlin who first proposed a tragic calculus for modernity, after having studied the “mechane of the ancients” (1988, 101), by which he meant not only the rhythmic mechanism of the Sophoclean caesura17 but also the stress on proportion and “lawful calculation” (ibid.) throughout Aristotle’s theory of tragedy. I argue that Aristotle assembles a constellation of terms including nature, imitation, necessity, probability, and plausibility in a manner that guarantees immanently a sense of purposeful measure to the tragic work and to the audience response as well. These concepts explain the internal logic of drama in view of its optimum tragic effect and compel the tragedian to produce teleonomic works—works whose plot construction heightens the tragic effect and thus fulfills the essence of the genre. At the same time, the aforementioned concepts account for the universal capability of tragedy to arouse certain emotions that are aesthetically pleasurable (even though

painful) and potentially morally enriching (most likely because they are painful). Much like Else’s cluster of terms that explained the mechanism behind catharsis, this cluster issues forth the “laws” of tragic verisimilitude and of the universality of the tragic effect: the terms interrelate so as to provide tragedy with the yardstick by which its fiction must be measured against reality; in short, they ensure that the tragic plot depicts life sufficiently intensely but always believably. Let us begin with the importance of nature and natural observation in Aristotle’s understanding of tragedy as mimesis. I suggest that the naturalism inherent in his concept of mimesis serves as the precondition for the other terms of this cluster to be efficacious in lending measure to tragedy and its effects: for what might be considered necessary, probable, and plausible in the tragic plot so as to make us shed tears and fear for our fate presupposes a natural or normative common sense. It is this naturalness that makes necessity, probability, and plausibility the laws of plot structure such that we may say that this turn of events is believable by everyone with common sense, whereas that one is not. Surely, this way of thinking is very distant from ours. Modern thought often critiques Aristotle’s appeal to normativity as an outdated and potentially coercive gesture, which naturalizes the exclusion of other logics that fall outside his own preconceived median range. It is as if our age of subjectivity can only project extreme subjectivity onto Aristotle as well, as if this range were his speculative figment with no reference to empirical reality (but then again, this reality is now also at stake, considered entirely in terms of our mental construction), as if the natural were only an ideological misnomer for what is actually naturalized. Hence, modernity has proposed a cult of exaggeration—an

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TOWARD SUBLIME CALCULUS OF ARISTOTLE’S POETICS obsession with what lies always at the limit, with the exception to all rules. But it is precisely this dismissal of the middle for the embrace of subjectivity’s extremities that has contributed to the notorious lack of measure in modernity, and to the concomitant philosophical conclusion that modernity cannot produce tragic works. It seems that writing tragedies requires a culture that understands lawful restraint above all else, that representing excess requires poets and listeners who can conform to measure. Aristotle’s reliance on natural observation, which shows imitation to be part of the human Gestalt, sets the epistemological ground for developing such a calculus of tragedy—that is, for developing a logic that pervades even what is extreme and unpredictable. In defining tragedy as a form of imitation, Aristotle compares it to painting’s representation of nature. However, his description of the imitative thrust of painting does not stop at the fact that painters copy the outer world. What intrigues him is the equal pleasure we all take in the precise rendering of both beautiful and repulsive objects: For it is an instinct of human beings, from childhood, to engage in mimesis (indeed, this distinguishes them from other animals: man is the most mimetic of all, and it is through mimesis that he develops his earlier understanding); and equally natural that everyone enjoys mimetic objects. A common occurrence indicates this: we enjoy contemplating the most precise images (eikonas) of things whose actual sight is painful to us, such as the forms of the vilest animals and of corpses. The explanation of this too is that understanding gives great pleasure not only to philosophers but likewise to others too, though the latter have a smaller share in it. (4, 1448b4–14)

No matter what its object, mimesis is our natural comportment in the world. We are born to imitate, and imitation is born in us: “τό μιμεῖσθαι σύμφυτον τοῖς ἀνθρώποις ἐκ παίδων ἐστὶ” (4, 1448b5). Furthermore, it is through the practice of imitation that we live and learn in the world. But living and learning in this world means also brushing against its sufferings, confronting its bitter truths. It now becomes evident how Aristotle’s insistence on our natural appreciation even of horrible images bears on his consideration of tragedy: the painter’s fascination with the corpse is directly related to the tragedian’s portrayal of the abominable, which is nonetheless enthralling and perhaps even instructive for human beings. The moral capacity of tragedy involves this paradoxical attraction we feel when presented with the lifelike image of suffering, since at this moment an unlikely convergence occurs between the instinct for pleasure and hard-hitting reality, between enjoyment and bitter truth. As Lucas succinctly puts it, “Some other forms of art may be merely beautiful; by Tragedy . . . we imply also something fundamentally true to life. It need not be the whole truth, but it must be true” (73–4). It is important to note at this juncture the etymological connection between the mimetic image (eiko-n) and Aristotle’s term for what is probable in the tragic plot: eikos. Aristotle privileges the figurative image because it furnishes us with a probable and plausible version of the world, one that everyone can relate to without delving into the private idiom of its creator. Similarly, a tragic change of fate is probable and plausible when it is true to life, when it depicts calamities that could be reasonably expected to happen, even if they have not yet actually happened or will never happen. The iconic likeness of mimesis is thus intimately linked

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TOWARD SUBLIME CALCULUS OF ARISTOTLE’S POETICS to the likelihood of tragic events, for what is likely is also lifelike. Certainly, imitation has undergone a long history of critical reception that is beyond the purview of this essay. Indeed, after the advent of modern art, we have learned to appreciate the conceptual strides of abstraction to the point that we might dismiss figurative artworks as being less theoretically complex, perhaps even as being facile subordinations of the medium to the message. Still, Aristotle might well have countered that this is only a theoretical response on our part—an acquired, cultivated taste, which is not necessarily bad for that, but which does not exhaust or explain away the inborn human impulse to represent the world and to be attracted to its figures. That we have learnt to appreciate the flat monochrome does not mean that modern children have stopped trying to paint animals, flowers, or their house on the prairie, just as much as they might smudge a surface with colors most likely because they are not yet physically adept at producing a contoured image. Aristotle may have had interesting, even positive, things to say about modern art’s experiments with abstraction, but when he insists that mimesis is our natural predilection, there is little evidence we can present to counter his observation outside our stubbornness, which, theoretically and only theoretically, registers an unease that imitation should be viewed as a grounding psychological reality. Aristotle’s acknowledgment of this spontaneous tendency is what allows him to generate his tragic calculus—to produce a theory of literature that is cognitively and emotionally tangible because it is universally believable in its iconicity—while we risk being left with the paralyzing effects of our hyperbolic problematizations of nature.

But let us briefly return to the remaining concepts of necessity, probability, and plausibility, which have already been signaled earlier in this discussion. These terms work together to ensure the believability of the plot’s change of outcome (metabole-). They preside over the conditions the poet contrives to bring about this tragic turn: How intense should the plot twist be before it becomes sensationalist? What type of accident can be reasoned retroactively to be necessary rather than an obviously artificial plot device? The success of the tragic effect depends precisely on such fine-tuning: we are moved by ineluctable necessity, by what is probable and convincing, not by hyperbole, caricature, and indulgence; otherwise, we have passed from tragedy to soap, from the serious to the ridiculous. In a sense, the calculus of the Poet. aims to identify the proper conditions under which one is said to deserve one’s tragic fate and the audience is said to deserve its tragic emotions. Aristotle discusses at length the possible plot twists in relation to the emotional effect they produce (13, 1452b27–1453a10). Here they are schematically: (1) a good person ending in unhappiness; (2) a bad person ending in happiness; (3) a bad person ending in unhappiness. Else remarks that a fourth possibility—a good person ending in happiness—is so obviously untragic that Aristotle omits it altogether (367). Through a process of elimination, however, Aristotle shows that none of the above kinds of plot construction is truly tragic either. In the first case, the disaster of an upright man produces in us revulsion rather than pity at his fate (for instance, the plot of Job is not a tragedy). The second option, fate’s rewarding of a wicked person, is utterly unjust, arouses neither pity nor fear, and is ruled out as the “least tragic of all” (1452b37). In the third scenario, where

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TOWARD SUBLIME CALCULUS OF ARISTOTLE’S POETICS a villain is punished, we may feel a “philanthropic” sympathy toward him, but philanthropy is not exactly pity. Philanthropy is a feeling of regret directed potentially at every suffering person—even at those who suffer justifiably—but it lacks that singular ingredient of relenting sorrow we reserve for those who endure punishments far bigger than their crimes. Pity, then, seems to be located somewhere between our outrage at the injustice perpetrated against the righteous and our philanthropy that extends to all suffering creatures. Though it must somehow have a hint of the outrage resulting from the injustice of the first scenario, in order for pity to be pity, this injustice should not be so disproportionate as to appear like fate’s utter whim visiting an entirely innocent person. This is why pity requires as its only plausible object someone who is decent enough, but not inculpable, so that his misfortune appears undeserved, but not utterly capricious. Thus Aristotle reveals the truly tragic shift of fortune to lie between the two limits, between options (1) and (3) in our schema: neither a thoroughly good nor a thoroughly wicked person, but a person of good renown, suffering undeserved misfortune—hence, Oedipus, the transgressor who duly atones for an unwitting error. In other words, the unexpected turn, which involves hamartia (a tragic error), should never be arbitrary or fantastical: it should retroactively appear as necessary if the plot is to give a serious but feasible representation of life. The operative term is “appear.” Aristotle does not say that the probable is the actual or even the possible. While the possible is speculatively imaginable, it is not always practically (thus naturally, spontaneously) believable. The possible is a legitimate thought-construct; it obeys formal logical laws, but does not necessarily convey a credible eventuality. The probable, on the other

hand, is the feasible, what could potentially occur in actuality even if it never comes to be actualized. In sum, the possible can be thought, but the probable could take place. Tragedy, then, as imitation of action, must rely on what can happen, not only on what can be thought. This is also why Aristotle clarifies that in tragedy transpires the fearful (τὸ φοβερὸν), not the monstrous (τὸ τερατῶδες), for fear refers to reality whereas monstrosity to fiction (14, 1453b9).18 Following a similar logic, Aristotle determines the type of acts the plot should unravel if it is to achieve the maximum tragic effect: the acts cannot involve outright enemies, since any harm incurred would seem rather justifiable; nor should the action be between neutral agents, since this does not carry enough pathos. Rather, genuine tragic action involves the unexpected, and often unwitting, harm brought upon one’s own (14, 1453b15–21). This subtle psychological calculus aims not simply at producing a prescriptive manual for aspiring tragedians, which is how the Poet. has been at times misrecognized. To assume this is to reduce the normativity of the Poet. only to prescription. But this is not the case: Aristotle’s theory on what a successful tragedy should be relies on what human emotions normally are, and thus, the tragic norm refers both to prescriptive and descriptive registers. The Poet. is above all a systematic effort to respond philosophically to Plato’s indictment of tragic poetry and the passions it fuels. Plato objected to poetry’s espousal of immorality, examples of which he found in stories that promoted an unjust vision of reality with good men ending in misfortune and bad men receiving rewards. He critiqued the tragic poets, more specifically, for appealing to the irrational desires of the soul, and for exacerbating

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TOWARD SUBLIME CALCULUS OF ARISTOTLE’S POETICS the emotions of grief and fear that are particularly dangerous to the welfare of a city: no city can defend itself if its citizens are overtaken by grief at war losses or by fear at confronting their own death in battle. It is no surprise, then, that pity and fear take center stage in Aristotle’s theory of tragedy. In developing the psychology of these specifically contested emotions, Aristotle meets Plato’s objections: If we survey the list of the four possible modes of the tragic μεταβολή, we find that those to which Plato most objected [namely, (1) and (2)] are ruled out immediately—not for metaphysical reasons, however, but simply because they are not really tragic, they do not arouse the tragic emotions. . . . Thus, Aristotle implies, the unaided moral sense of the ordinary man performs the duties of censorship which Plato had laid upon the philosopher. We do not need to be saved from immoral stories by decree or revelation, because our own consciousness screens the reversals of fortune presented by the drama and accords pity and fear to some but denies them to others. For—and this is the nub of the whole matter—the emotions are not merely irrational, as Plato had made them out to be, they also have their rational side or at least are amenable to reason. (Else, 1957, 374–5) As Else later clarifies, the tragic emotions are amenable to reason because they are themselves effects of reasonable causes. In Else’s words, fear and pity are the respective emotional expressions of two “judgments” that “a normal spectator or hearer or reader” is called to make “when confronted with a tragic story”: “(1) that the hero is ‘like himself,’ and (2) that he does not deserve his misfortune. These judgments are not after-effects of the spectator’s feeling, they are the

prerequisites to it. The condition which must be satisfied before his psyche (that is, the rational element in his soul) will allow the emotions to be felt” (436). The presupposition of a “normal,” “average” spectator can hardly be overestimated at this point: in the symmetrical relation Aristotle draws between the reception and production of tragedy, the normality demanded of the audience mirrors the necessity and plausibility demanded of the plot structure. The average spectator is a barometer for the tragic effect. He/she provides the tragedian with a good sense of what is fearful but not sensationalist, of what deserves tragic pity and not mere charity. Just as genuine fear is produced only when the horrible arises out of unexpected but plausible (i.e. normal and not fantastical) circumstances, so the average spectator exemplifies a median emotional range: he/she is located somewhere between utter frenzy (the option that really worried Plato) and utter apathy19 (the option that also worried Plato, at least in the Phaedrus). Tragedy shown to an audience of sociopaths, for instance, might well result in complete lack of sympathy and fear, perhaps even in an overidentification with the transgressor to the point that the spectators are provoked to reduplicate the crime in the real world. But if this is what most distressed Plato about art’s contagion, the other alternative is no better, Aristotle seems to say: an audience whose emotional capacities have atrophied makes for a morally and socially impoverished populace, lacking all empathy for others and fear for itself. Aristotle’s insistence on the average spectator forms the ultimate reference point of his calculus, thus offering itself as the most appropriate but also most challenging conclusion, particularly in our post-Freudian world that thinks of normalcy only in relation to neurosis.

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TOWARD SUBLIME CALCULUS OF ARISTOTLE’S POETICS HOI POLLOI In a relatively neglected chapter of the Poetics on tragic diction, Aristotle offers a piece of advice concerning language embellishment that I find especially pertinent to our discussion of measure and the average spectator: he notes that a good tragedy should use neither too many metaphors, for this would render the work a riddle, nor too many foreign words, for this would render it a barbarism (22, 1458a23–4). If we bracket for a moment the offensive connotations the term “barbaric” has for us,20 we begin to see that Aristotle’s concern is the universal comprehensibility of tragedy. In both these cases, an extremity in language usage prevents the average spectator from properly entering the tragic space. To the untrained ear, a work that piles up figurative tropes ends up sounding no less foreign than a work that is regularly interspersed with foreign words. It is arguable that such illegibility verges on comic absurdity and directly contravenes tragedy’s purpose. The average spectator is thus disoriented: the more language overwhelms him, the more likely he is to miss the tragic effect, and thus the universality of tragedy is compromised. Indeed, for the tragic effect to take place, the spectator must feel the tragic emotions of pity and fear, and he cannot tap into these emotions unless the plot is legible. This is the reason why for Aristotle it is plot above all else that matters in the tragic work: plot ranks above spectacle, language, character, thought, and diction. Pity and fear can be shown by spectacle, but it is better to be shown in the plot, the philosopher states, adding that the tragic effect can occur even when the plot is read or narrated rather than staged (14, 1453b1–5). Similarly, it is not the craftiness of language—the puns, neologisms, and other embellishments—that ultimately

determines the tragic effect. The tragic effect rests in the architectonics of the plot. Used in proportion, figurative language and spectacle can certainly enhance the tragic effect, but they cannot save a poor plot structure. Put differently, formal and rhetorical convolutions cannot compensate for the lack of tragic content, for insufficient meaning in the tragic act. In fact, Aristotle’s warning against too many figures and loan words suggests that excessive rhetoric undermines rather than heightens the tragic effect. Aristotle’s assumption of an average audience as qualitatively and quantitatively representative of tragedy’s universality constitutes for us moderns an interesting political—if not also epistemological—quandary. How can we know what is average or in-common in our complex world, and furthermore, what are the ethico-political problems of conforming to social attitudes that designate themselves as “normal” in various historical epochs? In trying to answer these questions, modern thought has steadily moved away from the logic of the middle and the search for measure to embrace instead the logic of polarity, excess, and exaggeration. In our emphatic concern with singularity, any appeal to the median and any expectation that “common sense” may at all impinge upon our notion of universality have been discarded as ruins of a foregone and deluded belief in Reason. With the notions of majority and common sense reduced to being synonyms for “dominant normativity,” modern and postmodern ethical theory simultaneously legitimizes its critique of Aristotelian (and Enlightenment) reason as being exclusionary, while safeguarding its own taste for the marginal against charges of elitism. I invoke elitism because contemporary theory’s “margin” refers at least as much—if not more—to its own aestheticized posture of intellectual difficulty as it does to

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TOWARD SUBLIME CALCULUS OF ARISTOTLE’S POETICS actual constituencies experiencing historical oppression. Thus, in a certain scenario—and I concede that my scenario is itself exaggerated here for heuristic reasons—we authorize ourselves to question Aristotle’s assumption of a normal audience as a risky naturalization that caters to the lowest common denominator, and at the same time to remain blind to our own error. For we, who are too politically sensitive to admit the word “barbaric” into our vocabulary, and who, contra Aristotle, advocate for the incomprehensibility of the artwork, we too need our own “barbarians”: the philistines, those unsophisticated masses who, for instance, do not understand the nuances of the aesthetic avant-garde. Indeed, for an aspiring Adornian, let us say, it is not only the average person unable to grasp “high art” who must be condemned to the ranks of the philistines but also anyone preferring Mozart over Schoenberg, or Tolstoy over Beckett. Namely, preferring high mimetic art over the so-called difficulty of abstraction is incriminating. Those barbarians seem to remain forever a kind of a solution.21 What would it be like—after the exhausted modernist and postmodernist experiments with self-referentiality and exaggeration—to pause for a moment and contemplate Aristotle’s suppler sense of poetry? Respecting poetry’s immanent laws, and acknowledging that its purpose is not overtly pedagogical, Aristotle nonetheless refused to divorce poetry’s universality from its relative comprehensibility. The modern arguments that language should not be a means of communication, or that communication should be more than comprehensibility, can only take us so far. After all, if tragedy communicates, it does so not by relating dry information, but by pointing us toward the enigma of our very existence. Yet it does so intelligibly. It

is precisely in this communication of something—even if this something turns out to be the void of human existence—that poetry ranks for Aristotle higher than history (9, 1451b5–6). Poetry relates to us truths that are ahead of us, truths that have not shown and may never show themselves through actual events. But if it did not manage to make these truths somehow palpable, to transmit their meaning in a manner legible to most of us, what else would be the worth of art? In what would its universality consist except its empty, formal solipsism? The universality of poetry, Aristotle would exhort us, might still be thought in terms of content and common appeal without itself becoming a common—that is, vulgar—matter. Could we not imagine a poetry that reaches and touches the core of (most of) us because of its sparseness of affectation? A poetry that, without embellishment, even as the simple kernel of a prodigious act, is so compelling as to speak across the vastness of human types and experiences? Most probably this is a question to which I should be wise not to expect any consensus, but I think that this is the vision of poetry Aristotle had in his Poet., for the Poet. treats not only a genre that has been ever since recognized for its profundity but also a genre that was popular. This may indeed have been the greatest of tragedy’s enigmas that Aristotle tried to unlock theoretically: a sublime art offered up equally to the philosopher as to the layperson. Kalliopi Nikolopoulou

NOTES 1 2

Lucas, 1958, 55. “I do not however hesitate to acknowledge (even if I should therefore be laughed to scorn in these enlightened times) that I consider the work as infallible as the Elements of Euclid” (1962, 263).

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“The truth is that we should go back to Aristotle not so much for the right answers as for the right questions,” writes Lucas (12), adding that “there is to this day no better starting point for the study of serious drama than the Poetics—regarded as a questionnaire” (13). Although Lucas somewhat overstates the failure of the Poetics to address the issues it raises, his insistence on a skeptical reading is not entirely misplaced: in questioning Aristotle’s text, we remain faithful to that element of “unfaith” that marks Greek philosophical inquiry (12). The Poetics aimed at a comprehensive theory of literature for the main Greek genres (epic, tragedy, and comedy), but since its treatment of comedy is lost, and since it subordinates epic to tragedy, the work is chiefly considered as a theory of tragedy. I borrow Halliwell’s term “foundational strategy” from his introduction to the Poetics (1995, 6). According to Halliwell, such strategy relies on a “rational procedure” to analyze the formal components as well as moral and psychological effects of the literary arts, and it is exactly this analytical quality that has “elicited admiration in some readers, and discomfort in others” (7). All citations from the Poetics refer to the Loeb bilingual edition with translation by Stephen Halliwell. They include chapter as well as paragraph and line numbers. In his eagerness to critique Enlightenment classicism, Nietzsche identified Aristotle with the moralism of his modern readers. As a result, Nietzsche couched his own antididactic approach to tragedy in terms of an anti-Aristotelianism as well. For a more recent elaboration of Aristotle’s favorable treatment of the emotions, see Martha Nussbaum’s The Fragility of Goodness. That the emotions are educable led some scholars to infer that their cultivation in the theater could translate over time into the acquisition of good moral habits, nurturing a person’s overall ethical improvement. For an interpretation of catharsis as a cultivation of moral habit, see Richard Janko. Following Goethe, who thought of good literature as implicitly pedagogical, Lucas writes: “Tragedy may teach us to live more wisely; but that is not why we go to it; we go to have the experience, not to use it” (75).

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See Heidegger on immeasurable measure in “. . . Poetically Man Dwells . . .” (220–1). This is in reference to Friedrich Hölderlin, who tried to develop a modern “tragic calculus” through his translations of Sophocles. K. A. Dickson maintains that Lessing’s misinterpretation of Aristotelian resemblance “paves the way for the democratization of tragedy” (57), engendering much great European drama (58). For the reader’s sake I provide Aristotle’s complete definition of tragedy in the original, followed by Halliwell’s translation as an example of the standard rendering: “ἔστιν οὖν τραγῳδία μίμησις πράξεως σπουδαίας καὶ τελείας μέγεθος ἐχούσης, ἡδυσμένῳ λόγῳ χωρὶς ἑκάστῳ τῶν εἰδῶν ἐν τοῖς μορίοις, δρώντων καὶ οὐ δι᾽ἀπαγγελίας, δι᾽ἐλέου καὶ φόβου περαίνουσα τὴν τῶν τοιούτων παθημάτων κάθαρσιν” (6, 1449b24–8). [Tragedy, then, is mimesis of an action that is elevated, complete, and of magnitude; in language embellished by distinct forms in its sections; employing the mode of enactment, not narrative; and through pity and fear accomplishing the catharsis of such emotions.] That the two might be interwoven is shown more clearly in Goethe’s entry “On Greek Tetralogies.” Here Goethe describes the climaxing and dénouement that took place over the duration of a trilogy of tragic works and was followed sometimes by the release of a satyr play: “The first part offered exposition, background and the central theme of the entire work. In the second, frightening consequences assumed monstrous proportions. In the third, however, despite additional developments, a reconciliation occurred in some manner or other. It was optional, and sometimes quite inappropriate, to add a fourth, more cheerful part, so that the audience, simple people in need of peace of mind and domestic comfort, could go home happy” (195–6). What I find philologically satisfying about Else’s analysis is that it accounts for the meaning of “τοιούτων,” a word that has also posed a number of interpretive problems, being translated sometimes as “of those emotions [of pity and fear],” and other times as “of such emotions.” However, if it were meant to denote those exact emotions Aristotle might have

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used “τούτων” instead, and if it were meant to describe suchlike emotions we are left to wonder why Aristotle leaves those unnamed. The choice of “τοιούτων” is vindicated by Else’s interpretation and subsequent translation, which refers it back to all those tragic acts capable of arousing pity and fear: “Tragedy, then, is an imitation of an action . . . with persons performing the action rather than through narrative carrying to completion, through a course of events involving pity and fear, the purification of those painful or fatal acts which have that quality” (221, my emphasis). Simple plots also rely on the change of fate (metabole-), but peripeteia is a special kind of shift germane only to complex plots: it is “an unexpected yet logical shift in the events of the play” (Else, 344). For a concise but poignantly sampled exposition of the various debates on catharsis, see Halliwell’s Appendix 5 in his Aristotle’s Poetics. In chapter 6 of this book (especially 184–201), Halliwell offers his own theory drawing on both Aristotelian and pre-Aristotelian concepts. Else maintains that part of the problem in interpreting this definition, and the meaning of catharsis more specifically, has to do with the critics’ insistence on importing Aristotelian notions from outside the Poetics to explain it. It is Else’s stated aim to elucidate as much as possible of the Poetics from within its own logic (443). “Poetic needs make something plausible though impossible preferable to what is possible but implausible” (25, 1461b11–12). George William Foote writes of Lessing’s similar worry concerning the critical obfuscation of Aristotle: “The glosses and interpretations of Dacier and Curtius, Corneille and Voltaire, he regarded as a sort of Talmud, overgrowing and hiding the original body of Holy Writ” (333). Hölderlin uses this term to describe Sophocles’ way of distributing the action over the duration of the play. Hölderlin considered the entrance of Teiresias as such a turning point: if the weight of the action falls on the later part of the play, Teiresias appears early on (as in Oedipus Tyrannus); if it falls on the first part, Teiresias appears later on (as in Antigone).

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This statement begs a comparison between Aristotle’s plot specifications and Kant’s mathematical sublime as awe-inspiring but not monstrous (Critique of Judgment, 109). Additionally, the Aristotelian distance between audience and tragic hero recalls the safe distance Kant requires between the spectator and the dynamic sublime in nature (121). However, such a comparison deserves independent treatment. I am in complete agreement with Dickson on this point: “Despite the organized hysteria of Nazism or race-hatred, and the commercial emotionalism of the modern teenager, is not the most apparent threat to our culture precisely a lack of spontaneous feeling, a blunting of our emotional awareness?” (60). Without delving into the question of how foreignness was dealt with in Aristotle’s time and by Aristotle himself, it is worth noting that the term “barbaric” referred primarily to the Greeks’ incomprehension of non-Greek tongues. Greeks, particularly the Athenians, would also use it to deride other Greeks. Aristotle was a metoikos (a resident alien) in Athens, and thus his own experience was marked by some sense of foreignness. A playful borrowing from the last couplet of C. P. Cavafy’s “Waiting for the Barbarians” (19).

REFERENCES Cavafy, C. P., “Waiting for the Barbarians,” Collected Poems, ed. George Savidis, trans. Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard, revised edn, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992, 18–19. Dickson, K. A., “Lessing’s Creative Misinterpretation of Aristotle,” Greece & Rome, 14.1 (April 1967), 53–60. Else, Gerald F., Aristotle’s Poetics: The Argument, Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1957. Foote, George William, “Tragedy: Aristotle and Lessing,” Progress, 3–4, London: Progressive Pub. Co., 1884, 332–9.

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TOWARD SUBLIME CALCULUS OF ARISTOTLE’S POETICS Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von, “Greek Tetralogies,” Essays on Art and Literature, ed. John Gearey, trans. Ellen von Nardoff and Ernest H. von Nardoff, New York: Suhrkamp, 1986, 195–7. —, “On Interpreting Aristotle’s Poetics,” Essays on Art and Literature, ed. John Gearey, trans. Ellen von Nardoff and Ernest H. von Nardoff, New York: Suhrkamp, 1986, 197–9. Halliwell, Stephen, Aristotle’s Poetics, London: Duckworth, 1986. Halliwell, Stephen (ed. and trans.), Aristotle. Poetics, Longinus. On the Sublime, Demetrius. On Style, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995. Heidegger, Martin, “. . . Poetically Man Dwells . . .” Poetry, Language, Thought, trans. Albert Hofstadter, New York: HarperCollins, 2001, 211–27. Hölderlin, Friedrich, “Remarks on ‘Oedipus,’” Essays and Letters on Theory,

ed. and trans. Thomas Pfau, Albany: SUNY Press, 1988, 101–8. Janko, Richard, “From Catharsis to the Aristotelian Mean,” in Essays on Aristotle’s Poetics, ed. Amélie Rorty, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992, 341–58. Kant, Immanuel, Critique of Judgment, trans. Werner S. Pluhar, Indianapolis: Hackett, 1987. Lessing, Gotthold Ephraim, Hamburg Dramaturgy, trans. Helen Zimmern, New York: Dover, 1962. Lucas, F. L., Tragedy: Serious Drama in Relation to Aristotle’s Poetics, New York: Macmillan, 1958. Nietzsche, Friedrich, The Birth of Tragedy and The Case of Wagner, trans. Walter Kaufmann, New York: Random House, Vintage Books, 1967. Nussbaum, Martha, The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986.

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15 ARISTOTLE ON THE NATURAL DWELLING OF INTELLECT

Übersetzung ist eine Form. Sie als solche zu erfassen, gilt es zurückzugehen auf das Original. Denn in ihm liegt deren Gesetz als in dessen Übersetzbarkeit beschlossen. Walter Benjamin, Illuminationen1

PROLOGUE Just as a translation is a mode governed by a law of translatability, so also is transmission a mode governed by a law of transmissibility. The mode in which the law governing transmissibility is understood and expressed as intrinsic or extrinsic to the original determines the mode in which its past will appear and affect the present either as governed by necessity and hence justified, even if not just, or as capable of being otherwise. The interpretation of the law of transmissibility is as true of traditions, in this case the philosophical tradition, as it is of individual books; it determines the mode in which the tradition is received and hence decides the intelligibility—in fact, legitimacy—of other possible modes of transmission. Nowhere in my view is such a decision more evident and more authoritative than in what has come to be understood as the tradition of Aristotelian epistemic and moral psychology, whose determination in the West culminated during the Renaissance in the appropriation

of Aristotle’s work, especially De Anima, Nicomachean Ethics, and Metaphysics, into a Christo-Platonic framework. The overwhelming success of this process, a success greatly aided by the ecclesiastico-political attempts to silence all aspects of the Latin Averroist so called heresies, foremost among which was the denial of human individual immortality, inevitably assured the occlusion or loss of another Aristotelian tradition, the Arabic and Judeo-Arabic one. Notwithstanding the important, if ironic, light that this occlusion sheds on the role played by religious/political forces in the shaping of what comes to be understood as the single history of the philosophical tradition, in this essay I seek to retrieve an occluded, materialist tradition of the DA and NE, especially in their inseparability. For it is the indissoluble relation between these two major expressions of Aristotle’s thought that both establishes the political dwelling of the human “soul” and accounts for the heretical status of an other Aristotle and Aristotelian tradition, the repression of which,

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ARISTOTLE ON THE NATURAL DWELLING OF INTELLECT owing to its spectral afterlife, must be continuously repeated. Ironically, and in inverse proportion to the disappearance of the materialist readings from the single philosophical canon, the rage against them is glaring. Foremost among those targeted for condemnation in the Islamicate tradition are Averroes, Maimonides, and Gersonides whose works inform my reading of Aristotle in this paper.

READING AND REREADING ARISTOTLE THROUGH A MATERIALIST LENS The uncanny silence characterizing the various Christo-Platonic appropriations of the NE not only renders possible its incorporation into Scholastic moral philosophy but, in turn, is also rendered necessary by the appropriation of the DA. My concern in this essay is with three distinct but closely related aspects of this silence. First, Aristotle’s “strange” or uncanny definition of the human being as a principle, an arche-, which is a desiring intellect or thinking desire (ὀρεκτικὸς νοῦς . . . ἢ ὄρεξις διανοητική)2 is ignored by the Christian commentators and, furthermore, this ignorance is, in my view, an exemplary deliberate forgetting. Second, such a forgetting makes possible the elimination of desire qua desire, that is, qua embodied and finite, from the discussion of nous in the DA. Third, this concomitantly makes possible the assertion that the agent intellect (νοῦς ποιητικός), and as a consequence the human intellect in act, is not only analytically separable but can become ontologically separate. Succinctly stated, the ignoring of desire qua desire is at the same time the affirmation of the ontological immateriality

of the human intellect, an immateriality that renders possible individual immortality. In this light, it is not surprising that the desire motivating and inaugurating Aristotle’s inquiry in the Metaphysics, expressed in the opening statement (“by nature all human beings desire to know”),3 is either ignored or dematerialized. It is striking, nonetheless, that in contrast to the materialist Aristotelian tradition, the embodied nature of this desire, embodied insofar as it belongs to the human as anthrōpos, that is, as a natural desiderative animal (rather than the human as anēr, the rational entity and political construct, who is other than an animal), is entirely ignored, transposed into an extra-historical and extra-political realm. More precisely stated, then, not only does the doctrinal concern with individual immortality occasion the repression of the originary desiderative, bodily nature of human activity, including the activity of knowing in Aristotle, but also, and more important, it thereby, even if only implicitly, abandons the human realm, as distinctly human, to destitution by severing the dialectical relation between nature/ reason and convention, between the understanding of the necessary and the orienting of desire toward the possible. In striking contrast, the specific materialist Aristotelian tradition exemplified by Averroes, and vilified as Averroist, reads the DA in tandem with the NE or, more precisely, these readings of the DA are fully (in)formed by the NE and vice versa. Hence, just as Averroes, Maimonides and Gersonides devote extended portions of their diverse discussions of the DA to desire and appetition, rather than narrowly restrict their consideration of desire to their readings of the end of book III (as it appears in Aristotle), so also they recognize that the discourse of the DA is devoted to the physics of psuchē rather

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ARISTOTLE ON THE NATURAL DWELLING OF INTELLECT than to accounts of cognition, which cognition is but one of the possible motions of the soul. Conversely, they approach the NE as arguably the most extensive account of the physics of knowledge, the other being the Posterior Analytics.4 Since the philosophical locus classicus of the claims to individual immortality is book III of DA, I shall focus my re-reading of Aristotle on two short passages crucial to the polemical debates—precisely because, unlike their materialist predecessors and against them, the narrow, indeed myopic, concern with the immortality of the individual soul not only deliberately brackets off all other discussions pertaining to human phusis including the Physics and NE, but also entirely ignores the fact that appetition ends the discussion of psuche- in the DA. Insofar as the consideration of principles of motion studied in the DA, especially the locomotion characteristic of all modes of existence that are capable of some degree of self-motion, is the primary concern motivating the discourse, the question of knowledge for Aristotle (and his materialist heirs) is a secondary or subsidiary one, and one that can be addressed only after a clarification of the complex motions characteristic of sensible, temporal finite entities. Moreover, insofar as, and to the extent that, the question of human knowing belongs to the study of phusis, it is a question whose ongoing clarification cannot be examined abstractly or independently of the concrete, that is, ethical/political conditions of the habituation of desire in which it may come to be or be prevented from so becoming. The natural motions that express diverse modes of individual becoming—being moved and self-motion—reflect a complex web of motility, including the motions peculiar to distinct modes of learning and

coming to know. Accordingly, mathe-sis, episte-me-, and dianoia in relation to hexis, that is, having “knowledge,”5 are motions from determinate powers to their actualization. Complete actuality is a termination of motion and time as temporalities and, hence, of finite life. For even if we take the “agent intellect” or νοῦς ποιητικός of the DA to be some actualized a-temporal, infinite entity and even if its a-temporality and infinity are unrelated to sensibility, in fact, especially if we do, its relation to finite motion, in particular finite self-motion, remains entirely opaque. For, from an Aristotelian perspective, all motion from potency to act is appetitive and appetition cannot come about without sensation, sensibly-based memory, and imagination. As I already indicated, the primary differences between the two Aristotelian traditions of concern in this paper are (1) the finitude or immortality of the individual human soul and (2) the materially or immaterially desiderative origin of knowledge. The latter question constitutes the key link between the DA and the NE, and the responses to it determine the respective understanding of all normative categories. Hence, I must now turn to a consideration of the text whose interpretation is most disputed: Intellect in this sense is separate (cho-ristos), impassive, and unmixed, since in substance it is an actuality; for the agent is always superior to the patient, and the origin to the matter.6 And: Separated (cho-ristheis) it is as such just that, and only this is immortal and eternal. But, we do not remember because, although this cannot be affected, the intellect which is affected is destructible and without it cannot think.7

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ARISTOTLE ON THE NATURAL DWELLING OF INTELLECT Since these are the proof texts for claims for individual immortality, since they are the bases for claims to the real separability of the human intellect, and since the Greek terms for separation, here, “cho-ristos” and “cho-ristheis,” do not distinguish between “the separate” and “the separable,” I must first consider the problem of separability in the Physics in order to shed light on this difficulty as it appears in the DA.8 After briefly addressing the difference between things that are by nature and those that are not, and roughly sketching the many senses of nature at the beginning of Physics II.1, senses that in retrospect should make evident the fact that science/knowledge depends upon separability, Aristotle turns to a consideration of the different ways in which the mathematician, the astronomer, and a physicist study “physical bodies.” Notwithstanding their differences, each of these modes of inquiry requires that the scientist regard what is composite by nature as incomposite or separate, although it neither does nor can exist as such. The discussion makes evident not only that separability is possible in virtue of thought rather than in re, but also that even with respect to the same “object,” the “object” is objectified, that is, identified as such an isolated “object,” in virtue of the inquiry in question. To do so, however, is to separate natural bodies from the motion that defines them as natural. Thus, indeed, lines and magnitudes are separate from the bodies in which they inhere and without which they do not exist, as are the different attributes of living, moving bodies. What is especially noteworthy in Aristotle’s discussion is that separability literally depends upon the elimination of what is common to all natural bodies, namely, motion. In contradistinction to the mathematician, however, even when she ignores the moving principle that identifies/

unifies all natural bodies as natural, the physicist seeks to understand the causes of motions, which not only exist in composition and cannot cause motion except in the composite but also are intricately connected and can be designated as distinct only in thought from that whose motions they “cause.” Most succinctly stated, causes of motion become such “causes,” that is, separate from their “effects,” in virtue of the inquiry, whereas in re they are concurrent. Having stated that, so long as the scientist does not believe that what is separable in thought is separable in re, nor investigates on the basis of such a belief, no falsity is entailed by the separation of what is separable in thought, Aristotle draws an astonishing comparison between the procedures of the mathematicians and those of the Platonists. “Those who posit [i]deas, too, are doing the same but are unaware of it; for they are separating the physical objects, although these are less separable than the mathematical objects.”9 What is important about this statement and why I regard it as astonishing is not at all the claim that the Platonists, and perhaps Plato, were unaware of what they were doing, but the implicit claim that they may not have regarded the ideas as separate in re, especially Plato, precisely insofar as these are ideas of “physical objects,” whereas the mathematical are not. Note that Aristotle does not claim that they are wrong, or draw wrong conclusions but only that they are unaware of the nature of their procedure. It cannot be overemphasized that most of Aristotle’s statements about Plato or the Platonists are presented in the form of either praise for, or criticism of, their mode of speaking “well” or “badly.” Moreover, in these discussions Aristotle distinguishes between the form of speech and conclusions that may be derived from it, irrespective of whether

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ARISTOTLE ON THE NATURAL DWELLING OF INTELLECT the form is proper or improper. That is why most of Aristotle’s inquiries begin with the way things are either said to be or believed to be.10 Thus, in the DA Aristotle praises the Platonists’ mode of speaking about forms, whereas in the NE he criticizes the mode of speaking about the “form of the good.” Despite its brevity, Aristotle’s statement in the DA succinctly makes evident his procedure: “So those who say that the soul is the place of forms speak well, except that it is not the whole soul but only the thinking part of it, and that is not actually but potentially the forms.”11 So, indeed, they speak well, but their speaking may be understood in two radically different ways with radically different consequences. If, as I argue, the DA is a physics specific to those natural entities capable of some degree of self-motion, then the question of the separability of the intellect must be investigated as a question of physics. Now, it should be evident, but is surprisingly overlooked in this context, that, from the beginning, the discussion of the soul, any soul, including that of the plant and of the reptile, already depends upon separability; for the soul qua soul, that is, qua the actuality (entelecheia) of a living body is an abstraction from the matter/subject of which it is the form. Soul is the specific difference of generic natural bodies, for “every natural body which partakes of life (zo-e-n) would be a substance of the composite kind (sunthete-).”12 Now, it cannot be overemphasized that to be a living body is to be a composite of dunamis and entelecheia.13 Stating that plants have organs, even if simple ones, Aristotle further specifies the definition of soul. “If, then there is something common to be said about every soul this would be: the first actuality of a natural body which has organs.”14 Insofar as soul qua actuality defines this substance as

the unique this, it is the formula and what is investigated in the primary sense. However, again Aristotle explicitly dismisses questions such as whether or not body and soul are one. For to be a soul is to be a soul of some natural body and, as its actuality, that is, as its principle of life/self-motion, the soul is the subject of inquiry of this physics, a physics concerned with the sameness and difference of living entities, of which the human is only one. In light of the fact that discussions not only of diagonals and angles but also of motion, sensation, and imagination do not give rise to controversies about whether or not Aristotle maintains that they can exist as separate, the fact that the separation of the intellect is attributed to him is especially revealing of the manner of the incorporation of his thought into the Western canon. In fact, it is no exaggeration to claim that the Western canonical Aristotle depends upon the forgetting or abolition of Aristotle’s prohibition against metabasis and the striving for a mathesis universalis that can reduce phusis to mathematics, forgetting that triangles do not exist as such by nature. Now, just as the relation between a power of sensation, that is, the potential sensible, and the sensed, namely, actual sensible, requires that the power “not be blended” so that it can receive the “sensible forms” and become an actual sensible, so also the potential intellect qua potential cannot be any of the intelligibles if it is to receive them so as to become an actual intellect. In both cases the “form” is the agent/actuality (energeia) that actualizes the potential power. The determination of the status of the human intellect or of its separability depends upon the interpretation of the status of the potential intellect, or rather on the nature of that potentiality. Situating the discussion

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ARISTOTLE ON THE NATURAL DWELLING OF INTELLECT of intellect in nature, Aristotle distinguishes between its two natural aspects, and identifies one aspect as the matter that is potentially each intelligible, and the other as the productive intellect that causes their intelligibility. Just as light is productive of actual color, so the actual intellect produces actual intelligibles. In light of the very compact nature of the text, let alone its radically different appropriations,15 I shall first quote it and then comment upon the difficulties. Since in each genus of things there is something, e.g., matter, as in every case of nature (and matter is that which is potentially each of these things), and also something else which, by producing those things, is the cause and is capable of acting, as in the case of art in relation to its material, these different [aspects] must belong to the soul also.16 The compactness of the passage notwithstanding, it is clear that from the beginning Aristotle emphasizes the fact that the inquiry about the intellect and intellection, knowledge and knowing, in their sameness and difference, is an inquiry into nature regarded specifically rather than generally; for the discussion is delimited not so much by its being by nature (κατὰ φύσιν), but by its being by generation (κατὰ γένεσιν). Materially stated, the question of knowledge is always already a question of its generation and corruption simultaneously as it is a question of permanence/eternity. Nonetheless, insofar as both aspects belong to the soul by nature, it is also clear that coming to be (and thereby also destruction17) and permanence are not contradictories but rather natural contraries, or that nothing that comes to be by nature can exist outside nature.18 That is, to the extent that the discussion of intellect and intellection belongs to nature, to that same

extent, at least with respect to the human psuche-, it must be concerned with change and permanence, mortality and immortality. Insofar as nature is always, that is, permanent and immortal, so also there is always actual knowledge, separable from the potential knowers whose knowledge it generates. In this sense the agent intellect can be said to be separate, rather than exist as such, since where there is no sensibility, there is no imagination, no memory and no intellection.19 The best gloss on this is provided by Aristotle in a paragraph preceding the discussion of the intellect that is “immortal”: . . . the intellect itself is intelligible like the other intelligibles. For, in the case of immaterial “things” that which thinks and that which is being thought are the same, for theoretical knowledge and its knowable are the same, and as for the reason why it does not think always, this matter should be examined.20 What this passage makes amply evident is that Aristotle is speaking about a single intellect, namely the intellect that, when it thinks, is also an actual intelligible, and when it does not is not an actual intellect or intelligible. More succinctly stated, knowable natural “things” qua material, are not intelligible but are only potentially so, which potentiality of being thought is “the intellect” prior to thinking (for “it does not always think”). Later, in book III.7, Aristotle emphasizes the temporal priority of potential knowledge to actual knowledge, a priority that makes manifest the fact that the sensible image is the “unmoved” moving cause of thinking. For, in that respect in which the sensible image is not as itself affected by thinking, its actuality/motion is complete, whereas in that same respect in which the thinking is affected, or is caused by the sensible image, that is, insofar as it is

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ARISTOTLE ON THE NATURAL DWELLING OF INTELLECT moved, neither its motion nor its actuality are complete. This is where desire comes in. So long as Aristotle discusses the physics of the intellect’s becoming, so long as he discusses it theoretically as intelligible, that is, as separate, the discussion is limited to one of its motions, a motion abstracted from its belonging to the psuche- that is the principle of concrete, material, living animals, whose preservation depends upon locomotion. To this extent, the discussion is not only partial but may also be misleading. For, insofar as the intellect is the intelligible, insofar as it thinks of intelligibles as separate from matter, its knowledge is not only impassible and always true, but also, properly speaking, it involves no affirmation or denial, pursuit or avoidance. Just as actual sensation, insofar as it is actual, is always true, so also is intellection; it either is or is not and in this sense can be said to be divine. In contradistinction, as soon as intellect is concerned with affirmation or denial about something that is not itself, that is, something that has matter and is a potential intelligible, it is also affected by pleasure or pain, is concerned with pursuit or avoidance, and its principle of motion is desire (orexis). Likewise, the discussion of the intellect as separate is partial and may be misleading in another and more important sense, namely, since it omits a consideration of the central role of the imagination in the becoming of intellect, even though imagination is one of the necessary conditions of its becoming. “The thinking part . . . thinks the forms in the images.”21 And this is the aspect of intellect in virtue of which the human animal is a political animal. Aristotle’s discussion of the actual intellect may be misleading only if we view it in isolation from the discussions of sensibility in DA II, and the discussions of imagination and appetition that follow the few

paragraphs devoted to separability.22 Even independently of biases arising from strictly doctrinal concerns, the persistent difficulty encountered by all attempts at translations into English (which has lost its inflection, or whose inflected forms are grammatically awkward) cannot be entirely eliminated. For, to discuss intellect and intelligibility as separable is also to isolate them from the psuche- whose powers they are, powers that exist only as composite and whose different aspects, as aspects of the same powers, are literally lost in translation. For the “thinking part” that cannot think without images, the noe-tikon, is the same power underlying theoretical (separable) intelligibility and practical, materially concrete and desiderative intelligibility. In other words, the material inseparability of the two aspects of knowing (the “theoretical” and the “practical”) can only be occluded if and when both are regarded as capable of separate existence from the beginning or when the theoretical is regarded as divine and immortal, the practical as human and corruptible. In both cases the purported separation is substantial, and originates in an onto-theological distinction between divinity and animality that constitute the contradictory existence of the Christo-Platonic human, whose desire is divided against itself. Differently stated, the desire for God as the human end, as the only mode of human flourishing, is, at best, indifferent to the preservation of the animal and therefore, to human suffering. Indeed, the intelligible intellect, as separate, is divine insofar as it is separated, whereas the desiderative intellect, the intellect that affirms or denies, suffers pleasure or pain, pursues or avoids, is bodily, human, and necessary for corporeal preservation; for the divine is permanently “preserved.” Hence, if and to the extent that desire is necessary

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ARISTOTLE ON THE NATURAL DWELLING OF INTELLECT for the self-preservation of any animal, and if and to the extent that in the human animal it is related to thinking—the reason why human beings by nature live in the polis— deliberation and judgment about what is or may be, that is, what exists by/as nature, is either inseparable from what is always or related to it as a principle of local-motion. For, again the intelligible intellect is always and as such is “preserved.” Conversely, insofar as, for Aristotle, it does not exist as separate, its condition of existence quite literally depends upon locomotion whose human flourishing or restriction depend upon political circumstances. Now, although Aristotle never explicitly states, let alone discusses, the ways in which the very possibility of thinking can be prevented or undermined by the enforcement of the dogmata of the polis, whether in the DA or the NE, most of his Islamicate heirs, most notably Al-Farabi, Maimonides, and Averroes, discuss this issue at length with the help of Plato, whose political works served to supplement the first part of political science, that is, NE, in the absence of the Politics.23 Nonetheless, insofar as the discussion of desire (orexis) and the appetitive “part” (orektikon) of the soul constitutes the last part of the DA, and insofar as this discussion establishes an essential relation between appetition, locomotion, and living well, its political nature is made fully evident here and is not only confirmed but reinforced by the reintroduction of desire in NE VI precisely in relation to intellect and the authoritative arche- of human motion, which is also the precise concern of latter part of DA III. Having considered the possible causes of locomotion in relation to different individual psychic powers, dismissing all of them as lacking authority or possessing insufficient

or the wrong kind of authority, Aristotle concludes that “[t]here appear, then, to be at least two movers here, desire and the intellect, provided that one were to posit imagination as a kind of thinking.”24 Insofar as locomotion is necessary for the preservation and well-being of most animals, and insofar as locomotion extends much further than to animals endowed with intellect, if some form of knowledge is to be one of the causes of motion or at least partially authoritative, it would have to extend to all other animals, for whom locomotion is the condition not only of self-preservation stricto sensu but, more important, of thriving. That imagination provides the link between human locomotion and that of other animals is not surprising. It may, however, be misleading, were intellect to be considered as the specific human difference pertinent to this discussion. For, although all animals capable of locomotion share (albeit in different forms) an imaginative power, it is also the case that many, perhaps most humans, possess “knowledge” strictly limited to the imaginative forms. Differently stated, at the moment at which concrete well-being is considered in the DA, desire and imagination provide the material continuity between human and other forms of animal locomotion; for, it is this motion, a motion oriented by the material and singular, whose origin is imagination, that is attractive or repulsive for the sake of both self-preservation and living well. More important, whereas animal desire and imagination are unaffected by normative dogmata, nor do they require the polis for living-well, the discussion of human locomotion cannot ignore the differences among human animals whose habituation determines what they regard/imagine as desirable (τὸ ὀρεκτόν), that is, as the good or bad that are to be pursued/desired

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ARISTOTLE ON THE NATURAL DWELLING OF INTELLECT or avoided/repelled. Thus, as Aristotle is quick to acknowledge, properly speaking, “what always causes motion is the object of desire.”25 Nowhere is the aspectival relation between passion and action, being moved and moving that constitutes a natural power, more evident than in the discussion of locomotion, that is, appetitive motion. Insofar as the desirable always appears in the form of an image, the power of the soul that can be moved by it in a manner such that the image gives rise to locomotion, that is, to pursuit and avoidance, is desire.26 Viewed in this light, one of the specific, constitutive differences between the human and other animals is that human desire can be destructive. For, whereas the nonhuman movement of the animal’s desire is always and only according to nature (κατὰ φύσιν), the human animal’s desire may not be and, in fact, rarely is. The mode in which desire is not κατὰ φύσιν will determine the extent to which the movement of desire is generative or destructive. In short, properly speaking, the NE is the physics of the specifically human psuche-, a physics that is always already political. The beginning of NE II brings into sharp relief not only the radical difference between theoretical and ethical virtue but also the important respect in which the polis is simultaneously κατὰ φύσιν and not κατὰ φύσιν, that is, the respect in which habituation is a directing of natural desire, as well as the generation of “unnatural” ones, in a manner such that may either promote or harm living well. Its disappearance from the philosophical canon notwithstanding, Aristotle’s claim that ethical virtue is not by nature is explicit: “. . . it is also clear that none of the ethical virtues arise in us by nature, for no thing which exists by nature can be changed into something else by habituation.”27 Not even repeated

force, that is, contrary motion, could change something that exists by nature into something else without destroying it. Conversely, the “generation” of ethical virtues (and vices) is by human art rather than nature. That is, habituation is the generation of habits through repeated activities, the exercise of which can be excessive or deficient and hence, destructive of the very power that habituation seeks to establish. Moreover, insofar as ethical virtue not only comes about by means of activity but also is manifest only in/as right action, it cannot be universal nor can a universal be formed about it. More precisely, qua universal, statements are always mistaken about ethical virtue because they fail to take into account the concrete material conditions that determine “the rightness” or “wrongness” of any action whatsoever.28 Properly understood, then, ethical virtue is nothing but a direction of desire, the coming to regard certain “things” or modes of being and acting as attractive or repulsive. For by nature nothing is good or bad. Whereas a virtue κατὰ φύσιν is an actuality (entelecheia, energeia) preceded by a natural power (dunamis), whereas the power precedes activity, the power that is ethical virtue comes about only after repeated activity. The former cannot be changed into another power, let alone be lost, the latter can be changed into its contrary, or become a “vice,” and can be lost. It is not surprising, therefore, that Aristotle considers the political art, the art of legislating and governing to be the architectonic art.29 “For it is by making citizens acquire certain habits that legislators make them good, and this is what every legislator wishes, but legislators who do not do this well are making a mistake; and good government differs from bad government in this respect.”30

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ARISTOTLE ON THE NATURAL DWELLING OF INTELLECT Insofar as ethical virtues are orientations of desire, insofar as pleasure or pain govern all animal activities, Aristotle’s claim that legislators who fail to make citizens good are making a mistake is no naïve assumption about human nature. On the contrary, insofar as good and bad are not by nature, the legislator is she who determines what should be regarded as good or bad, that is, what should give rise to pleasure or pain. For in all cases what is pleasurable is what is pursued as a good even when it may not be or may harm the human animal, since bad can only mean harmful to the animal’s well-being. It is not surprising, therefore, that for Aristotle “the whole study of virtue or of politics is concerned with pleasures and pains; for he who uses these well will become good, but he who uses them badly will become bad.”31 Nor is it surprising, then, that in the second part of political science, that is, the Politics, Aristotle examines different regimes of pleasure and pain in order to determine what the best one may be.32 Insofar as the formation of habits is the orientation of desire(s) in and of the polis, the NE is concerned simultaneously with action and belief; for action always aims at that which is deemed to be good, where the good is what is desired. Having defined the mean at which ethical habituation aims as the dictate of “right reason” (ὀρθὸς λόγος), Aristotle turns to a consideration of what this strange hybrid entity, an entity half ethical half theoretical, may be. In order to do so Aristotle returns the discussion to the physics of psuche-. In addition to the distinction between the a-rational and rational powers of the soul Aristotle draws a distinction within reason, between the “scientific”(episte-monikon), whose concern is the necessary and unchanging, and the

“estimative” (logistikon), whose concern is what can be otherwise, which is the “reason” governing action and the polis.33 For, no one deliberates about what cannot be otherwise. Moreover, its nobility or “divine” status notwithstanding, the thought that is theo-ria and is a complete and self-sufficient activity ironically is powerless per se or has no independent authority. As Aristotle explicitly states, “[i]t is not thought as such that can move anything, but thought which is for the sake of something and is practical, for it is this that rules productive thought also. . . .”34 In this respect, practical thought, especially that whose end is good action (eupraxia) and is unqualified, is more powerful and authoritative than theo-ria. In this light, noble and divine as theo-ria may be, its place in the polis and the leisure or even permissibility of its pursuit depend upon the practical, which is the proper, that is, authoritative, human difference from both animals and gods. Thus, the general concern with and debate about the esteem with which Aristotle (and Plato) held the theoretical life over the practical/political life is, in my view, misguided; indeed, the theoretical life is held in the highest esteem, but this life is not a human life. As Aristotle explicitly states, “[s]uch a life, of course, would be above that of a man, for a man will live in this manner not insofar as he is a man, but insofar as he has something divine in him. . . .”35 And, having described the activity of a god, contemplation, as most blessed and happy, Aristotle returns to the human domain, stating that unlike gods who indeed are without need, humans are not self-sufficient even for that aspect of contemplation that is human, which requires “a healthy body and nourishment and other services.”36 Returning the discussion to the specifically human realm, the thinking that determines what and how human needs are

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ARISTOTLE ON THE NATURAL DWELLING OF INTELLECT best met, in short political thinking, concerns what can be otherwise and what should be desired materially and concretely. Since the concern of the NE is the specifically human motion named “action” (praxis), which is the human mode of complete, self-sufficient activity, an activity that is its own end, Aristotle lays down the three powers of the soul that may have authority (kuria) over both action and truth: sensation (aisthe-sis), intellect (nous), and desire (orexis), and concludes that only the latter two are principles of action. Indeed, in all animals sensation has authority but it cannot be regarded as a principle of self-motion, let alone of action, in animals capable of pursuit and avoidance; on the contrary, were sensation to have authority with respect to motion, pursuit and avoidance will not be possible. In addition, it immediately becomes evident that, properly speaking, intellect and desire are not two principles of action but only one, unified by intention (proairesis), which Aristotle defines as “desire through deliberation.”37 Insofar as intention is the principle or cause (arche-) of the specifically human motion named “action,” being a cause only of motion, it is insufficient to account for its completeness and self-sufficiency; that is, intention cannot provide the reason why an action is desirable or should be pursued or avoided. The latter principle, which is the cause of intention understood strictly as choice (worthiness), is the composite unity of desire and reason, a composite whose loss to a great extent accounts for the Western fate of the NE. “Now the principle of action is intention (as a source of motion rather than purpose), whereas the principle of intention is desire and reason for some purpose.”38 The hybrid named right reason, the measure of ethical virtue, in fact reflects the hybrid that is specifically the human who is not

self-sufficient, either in the manner of gods, whose activity is without desire, or in the manner of other animals, whose well-being and self-sufficiency do not require deliberation and whose form of appetition is not intention.39 That is why as a principle of action the human being is itself the hybrid that is intention, which/whom Aristotle names “a desiring intellect or thinking desire.”40 And, in light of the DA, it cannot be overemphasized that the intellect that has some authority with respect to locomotion includes imagination. In fact, I want to suggest that, were it not for imagination, the desired sensible will have complete authority with respect to pursuit and avoidance, nor would there be a practical intellect, which intellect deliberates only about the concrete, material, and singular, not as it is sensed but rather as it is represented; for as sensed the sensible cannot be other than it is. In light of the radical distinction between the human and the divine, it is not surprising that the NE ends with a reminder that theoretical knowledge per se is inadequate to human well-being. More important, Aristotle explicitly says that human beings are not inclined to ethical virtue by nature, and that education and arguments, that is, reason, is inadequate to ethical habituation, that is, the habituation of the affects, of the nobly and basely disposed alike. The difference between the former and the latter is not a matter of reason but rather a matter of which affect exercises greater power over them, shame or fear. Since most people are guided by passion rather than thought, especially the young whose habituation is in question, and since passion is common to all whereas thought is not, Aristotle’s NE ends with a discussion of the laws and lawgiver. For laws and customs are indeed the means by which what is viewed as noble and ignoble, desirable

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ARISTOTLE ON THE NATURAL DWELLING OF INTELLECT and undesirable, comes to be experienced as pleasurable or painful, to be hoped for or feared. In sum, the lawgiver is a physician of the psuche-, whose knowledge is a physics of the affects and whose art is their guidance. The different forms that this guidance may assume are studied in the second part of political science, and is beyond our concern here. Idit Dobbs-Weinstein

9

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NOTES 1

2

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5

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Benjamin, 1955. “Translation is a mode. To comprehend it as a mode one must go back to the original, for that contains the law governing the translation: its translatability” (Benjamin, 1968, 70). Nicomachean Ethics 1139b4–6. References to NE in Greek are from Rackham, 1926. Metaphysics 980a22. References to Met. in English are from Apostle, 1966. This formulation is somewhat inadequate and misleading, since questions of knowledge, as well as affective obstacles to it, appear in all of Aristotle’s texts as well as those of his materialist readers. Still, with the exception of the NE, Posterior Analytics, and Topics, whose discussions are concerned with knowing simpliciter, in the other texts the questions differ according as they are limited by the specificity of the subject matter. Nonetheless, that the APo is a physics of knowledge is evident from its first sentence whose concern is precisely the becoming of knowledge. Awkward as this formulation may be, as will become evident below, it is essential for understanding the differences between theoretical and ethical virtue in the materialist Aristotelian tradition. 430a18–20. References to De Anima in English are from Apostle, 1981. 430a23–5. Translation modifies and omits Apostle’s additions. Emphases in the English are mine. Again, since my concern is with appropriations of Aristotle’s DA and NE, my consideration of separability will be limited to the Physics, of

14 15

16 17

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which the DA is a specific, consequent inquiry, as stated above. I am not concerned here with the question whether or not there exists something separate in re, or with the question of the divine, except in the limited way as it pertains to or is said to affect human beings, for example, in the NE. Hence, I forego discussion of separability in the Met. Phys. 193b36–194a1. References to Phys. in English are from Apostle, 1980; my emphases. The role of language in belief cannot be overemphasized although its discussion is beyond the scope of this paper. DA 429a27–30; my emphasis. DA 412a15–16. This discussion is still an oversimplification owing to the limits of my current concern. Still, it must be noted that “a natural body” is already a composite and a determinate subject. That is why soul belongs to a subject whereas the body is a subject. Nonetheless, it is only in composition that they form a substance and a this. DA 412b4–6. The most notable differences are those between the Christian Latin tradition and the Islamicate one. But even within each broad tradition the interpretations vary significantly. Nonetheless, broadly speaking, in the Islamicate tradition the potential intellect is a hylic intellect and the agent intellect is single, whereas in the Latin Christian tradition a “hylic intellect” is inconceivable, the potential intellect is separable a parte ante and hence capable of self-subsistence. It is no exaggeration to argue that the denial of individual immortality, explicitly in Averroes but implicit also in Al-Farabi and Maimonides, is the foremost motive of the ecclesiastical condemnations of philosophy beginning in 1272. Book 1, 2 of Gersonides’ Wars of the Lord and several questions in Thomas Aquinas’ Questions on the Soul provide excellent glimpses into the extent of the differences. DA 430a10–14. Properly speaking, it is not knowledge that is destroyed, but rather this or that knower who ceases to be. Contradictories cannot be other than they are. The positing of the one entails the immediate negation of the other. For example, being and

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20 21 22

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24 25 26 27

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nonbeing, necessary and impossible, and finite and infinite. See DA 432a4–14, where Aristotle explicitly states that since nothing exists without magnitude, there can be no learning or understanding without sensing, nor speculation without images, which are “like sense impressions except without matter.” DA 430a1–7. Translation modified. DA 431b2–3. The inverse proportion between the length of the discussion of what I shall henceforth name the intelligible intellect as distinct from the desiring intellect, and the rest of the investigation of psuche- is so clear as to render further remark either superfluous or polemical. Insofar as the Islamicate philosophers regard Plato and Aristotle as friends, I have no doubt that even had the Politics been available to them, they would still have supplemented it with Plato’s political writings, especially since it made possible the identification of the prophet with the lawmaker and philosopher-king. DA 433a10–11. DA 433a28. DA 433a31–2. NE 1103a18–21. With occasional variations, the references to NE in English are from Apostle, 1975; my emphasis. See NE 1137a32–1138a3 where Aristotle draws the key distinction between legal justice and equity, on which basis he argues that insofar as laws are general, they may be unjust. NE I.1. NE 1103b4–7; my emphasis. NE 1105a10–13. Aristotle’s conclusion that aristocracy is the best form of government is not only irrelevant to my concern but also concern about it is, at best, anachronistic. What I seek to emphasize here is the nature of the inquiry and its material, concrete, that is, nonuniversalizable, subject matter. Note that neither here nor elsewhere does Aristotle claim a real separation constitutive of the soul. Rather it is the “object,” unchangeable and changeable, which determines the nature of the specific reasoning activity. NE 1139a35–1139b1. NE 1177b26–8.

36 37 38 39

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NE 1178b33–5; my emphasis. NE 1139b24. NE 1139a32–4. The relation between self-sufficiency and self-motion in Aristotle is worth emphasizing, although a discussion of their relation and distinction is far beyond the present context. NE 1139b5–6.

REFERENCES Apostle, H. (trans.), Aristotle. Metaphysics, Grinnell, IA: Peripatetic Press, 1966. ––, Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics, Grinnell, IA: Peripatetic Press, 1975. ––, Aristotle. Physics, Grinnell, IA: Peripatetic Press, 1980. ––, Aristotle. On the Soul, Grinnell, IA: Peripatetic Press, 1981. Bouyges, M. (ed.), Al-Farabi, Risala fi'l-'aql (De Intellectu), Beirut: Imprimerie Catholique, 1938. Benjamin, W., Illuminationen, Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1955. ––, “The Task of the Translator,” in Illuminations, trans. Harry Zohn, New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1968. Gersonides, L., Chapters 9–12 of Gersonides’ Supercommentary on Averroes’ Epitome of the De Anima: The internal Senses, trans. J. Mashbaum, Ann Arbor: University Microfilms International, 1995. ––, The Wars of the Lord, vol. 1, trans. Seymour Feldman, Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society of America, 1984. Hett, W. S. (trans.), Aristotle. On the Soul, Parva Naturalia, On Breath, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1975. Ivry, A. (trans.), Averroes. Middle Commentary on Aristotle’s De Anima, Provo, UT: Brigham Young University Press, 2002.

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ARISTOTLE ON THE NATURAL DWELLING OF INTELLECT Maimonides, M., The Guide of the Perplexed, trans. Shlomo Pines, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1963. Rackham, H. (trans.), Aristotle. Nicomachean Ethics, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1926.

Thomas Aquinas, Questions on the Soul, trans. James Robb, Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 1984. Wicksteed, P. H. and F. M. Cornford (trans.), Aristotle. Physics Books I-IV, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1980.

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16 THE PERIPATETIC METHOD: WALKING WITH WOODBRIDGE, THINKING WITH ARISTOTLE

. . . thinking and walking are different ways of getting about in a common world which has a makeup agreeable to each of these ways. Woodbridge, The Realm of Mind, 19261

PREAMBLE Walking the streets of the Greenwich Village on a rather bitter, early January day, a year after defending my dissertation and months before receiving my first job offer, I stumbled upon one of those inconspicuous little bookstores tucked away from the bustle of things, just below street level. Descending three stairs, I entered, drawn more by the promise of warmth than by the hope of inspiration. As I made my way toward the Philosophy section, I was prepared to feel my reigning mood of uncertainty augmented by the daunting quantity of words to be read, new ideas somehow to be digested. Almost immediately, I found myself addressed by a rather pathetic looking little volume: it seemed to be a photocopy of a text, bound in plastic with a spine of burnt orange and nothing to identify its content. Pulling it from the shelf, I was at first put off by its announced title, Aristotle’s Vision of

Nature, so critical as I was at the time of the metaphysics of vision. And yet, there was this name, Woodbridge, and another, Randall, that seemed to give the thing a kind of weight. Someone had taken care to photocopy these pages, to bind them together, to preserve them for posterity, perhaps, indeed, for me. Plus, it only cost a dollar. And so it was, with a certain hesitation, and yet in wonder, that I opened the book and began to read. “This small volume is offered,” wrote Randall in the introduction, “in the conviction that it is the most important writing on Aristotle’s thought since the revolutionary study of Werner Jaeger in 1923.”2 The statement comes as a shock and one is tempted initially to dismiss it as nothing more than yet another one of those generous, but hyperbolic gestures of respect students tend to bestow upon their teachers. However, somewhere along the paths of thinking Woodbridge traverses in these

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THE PERIPATETIC METHOD lectures, this initial impression gives way to the growing realization that Woodbridge, drawing upon his own great mentor, George Santayana, has indeed charted a methodological approach to Aristotle’s thinking that surpasses that of Jaeger’s developmentalism. Although Woodbridge offers only a rough topography of what I have elsewhere called Aristotle’s peripatetic legomenology, to pursue the tack Woodbridge takes in these lectures is to be led back to an Aristotle who brings his thinking to life by allowing life to animate his thinking.3

*** PERIPATETIC LEGOMENOLOGY To say more than human things with human voice, That cannot be; to say human things with more Than human voice, that, also, cannot be; To speak humanly from the height or from the depth Of human things, that is acutest speech. Wallace Stevens, “Chocorua to its Neighbor”4 These lines from Wallace Stevens articulate something of the spirit in which Aristotle’s thinking unfolds; for his philosophical endeavor involves precisely that “acutest speech” that attempts “to speak humanly from the height or from the depth of human things.” But as the Stevens poem itself brings to language, the realm “of human things” is bound intimately up with the realm of natural things.5 This intimacy between human-being and natural being is at the very root of Aristotle’s thinking. Thus, although Aristotle has sometimes been accused of seeking “to say more than human things with human

voice,” in fact, everything he says is said in an attempt to give voice to the nature of things.6 The manner in which nature expresses itself is, for Aristotle, so deeply integrated into the power of human articulation that each genuine attempt to articulate the truth concerning the nature of things touches upon something of that nature however ultimately elusive.7 The attempt to speak humanly from the height and depth of human things is, then, to embark on a path of speaking and thinking that uncovers something of the highest and deepest truths of nature itself. This is precisely the path toward which Woodbridge’s engagement with Aristotle points; it is the path that Randall recognizes as on par with the contributions of Jaeger, but it is also a path so deeply rooted in Aristotle’s thinking that it remains discernible in Jaeger’s own developmental approach. In his seminal book, Aristoteles, Grundlegung einer Geschichte seiner Entwicklung, Werner Jaeger shows that “at the root of [the Aristotelian texts], there is a process of development.”8 His great insight is the recognition that Aristotle’s texts give voice to a thinking that lives and develops.9 The book’s appearance in 1923 might best be traced along a line of scholarship that extends back through F. A. Trendelenburg to Hegel, who, a century earlier, argued in his Vorlesungen über die Geschichte der Philosophie that Aristotle is not to be read as a “unspeculative empiricist” but rather as a great idealist whose thinking was alive to the life of thinking itself.10 If Hegel’s interpretation excited his students because it challenged the “the axiom defended by Locke to Kant up to Schleiermacher, that Aristotle was an unspeculative empiricist,” Trendelenburg, challenging Hegel’s own tendency to privilege pure thinking, emphasized the organic interaction between the human mind and

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THE PERIPATETIC METHOD the environment.11 As Rosenstock puts it, Trendelenburg “views the role of reason in the context of its genesis and operation in nature.”12 Situating Jaeger in this tradition at once accounts for a central tension in his reading of Aristotle and connects him to a tradition that had a deep influence on Frederick Woodbridge.13 The central tension in Jaeger’s work is between a certain tendency toward systematicity and an affirmation of the living context in which Aristotelian thinking unfolds. The developmental approach to Aristotle’s work resolves the tension beautifully by turning a specific biographical story about Aristotle into the organizing principle of his philosophy. More specifically, Jaeger appeals to Aristotle’s relationship to his teacher, Plato, and his alleged struggle to come to his own terms with the world in the shadow of Plato’s “unlimited genius,” in order to explain away the inconsistencies one encounters if one reads Aristotle’s work as the articulation of fully developed system.14 But the developmental approach, despite its great recognition of the living nature of Aristotelian thinking, ultimately reinforced the seduction of hermeneutical consistency: it remains animated by an attempt to explain away the apparent contradictions in Aristotle’s thinking. However, the appearing of contradiction is for Aristotle the very sort of diction that announces the presence of a matter for thinking. Aristotle attends to such dictions carefully, not as intractable contadictories, one side of which must be destroyed to allow the other to reign, but as indications of impasses to be navigated, oriented always by the beacon of the appearing of things.15 His is a thinking on the way. It is peripatetic, just as those who followed him as he walked the grounds of the Lyceum were called “peripatoi,” the ones who walk.

Although Woodbridge does not speak of Aristotle’s thinking as peripatetic, the great insight of his own engagement with Aristotle is precisely this attempt to walk with him as he “goes directly without preliminary to the subject-matter involved and follows where it leads him.”16 Like Jaeger, Woodbridge recognizes the living dimension of Aristotelian thinking; but unlike Jaeger, for Woodbridge, the deepest expression of this living thinking is experienced in Aristotle’s philosophical methodology. Here, “methodology” speaks with a decidedly Greek accent: it names a way of following along after, meta-hodos, the logos of things.17 But the logos of things expresses a structure accessible to the powers of the human soul, even if our finite powers can never capture the full depth of nature’s expression. John E. Smith at once articulates the meaning of the term “expression” that should be amplified here and emphasizes the dimension of inaccessibility that cannot be eclipsed: In any present, something is expressed or made manifest, but much is not expressed. I do not mean that the manifest or surface is “appearance” and the depth “reality,” since both are equally real in relation to the individual expressing itself; it is rather that with respect to the expression of any individual in any specific situation, there is always “more to come.”18 For Smith as for Aristotle, the surface and the depth are part of the same reality at work expressing itself. Human access to the depth of things is, however, mediated by the power of human articulation that itself, as Smith rightly suggests, “is integral to Being.”19 Thus, the way to the depth of things is mediated by the human capacity for articulation that itself ought not to be understood to fundamentally distort the nature of things, but rather,

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THE PERIPATETIC METHOD to correspond to and with the expression of nature in ways that bring meaning to life. This sense of correspondence—Woodbridge speaks in terms of “cooperation,” “correlation” and even “conformation”—between the human power of articulation and the natural expression of things is at the root of Aristotle’s methodological approach.20 In an early passage from the De Anima, Aristotle articulates the manner in which his investigation into the soul follows along after the things said beautifully about it:

be metaphysicians to claim mind and body as our rightful possessions. For just as it is natural for us to speak of a man who walks far and lustily, as a great walker, and to endow him with a strong body, so it is natural for us to speak of him who thinks profoundly, as a great thinker, and to endow him with a great mind. Thus common speech condenses into single words meanings which require many sentences for their full expression. Such words economize speech and give to language its wealth of significance.23

While inquiring concerning the soul, going through the impasses (diaporountas) concerning which there is a need to find a way (euporein) in order to move forward, it is at the same time necessary to take up along the way the opinions of those who came before, however many showed forth (arephe-nanto) something concerning the soul, in order that we may take hold of the things said beautifully, but, if any are not said beautifully, that we may beware of these.21

From this perspective, it is unnecessary to posit two separate methodological approaches in Aristotle, the one empirical, dealing with the appearances of sense, the other, dialectical, dealing with the common manner in which people speak.24 Rather, Aristotle’s naturalistic understanding of language roots the things people say in the very nature of things in a way that undercuts the standard dichotomy between naturalism and conventionalism. That dichotomy is predicated on a conception of human-being and human language fundamentally uprooted from the world of nature.25 The wealth of significance endemic to human language is itself an expression of the wealth of significance endemic to nature. Woodbridge emphasizes this deep correlation between language and nature in his lectures on Aristotle when he writes:

The peripatetic methodology is thus a legomenology: the things said, τὰ λεγόμενα, open a path into the nature of things. In this passage the appearance of words related to the Greek, poros—road, passage, way—testifies to the dynamic nature of Aristotle’s thinking as a thinking on the way. In the Physics, Aristotle has famously designated his way of thinking as a “natural road from what is more familiar and clearer to us to what is more familiar and clearer by nature.”22 In practicing a peripatetic legomenology, however, Aristotle recognizes that this natural path to nature is itself made possible by the nature of language. Woodbridge puts it this way: Metaphysics thus follows and may refine the uses of common speech. We need not

But [Aristotle] will not let the naturalness of language be natural in admission only. He makes it natural in nature. It becomes one of nature’s supreme products, the product in which all other products find articulated linkage. For things to go into language is a going, just as much of a going on their part, and just as natural, as their going into air or water, up or down, or from seed to flower.26

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THE PERIPATETIC METHOD Thus, when Aristotle speaks, again and again, of how things are said, when he attends carefully to the various ways they are said and when he rehearses what others have said about them, his manner of speaking must be heard as organically bound to a way of thinking rooted in the natural community of communication between the powers of the soul and things of nature. Aristotle’s phenomenological attunement to the ways things express themselves and his assiduous attempts to get things said beautifully are thus two dimensions of a peripatetic legomenology that speaks with and attends to the language of nature in an attempt to do justice to the nature of things.

THE SURFACE OF THINGS It is as if being was to be observed, As if, among the possible purposes Of what one sees, is the purpose to be seen, The property of the moon, what it evokes. Wallace Stevens, “Note on Moonlight”27 Peripatetic legomenology is rooted in Aristotle’s naturalistic understanding of the relationship between the powers of the soul and the things with which they cooperate. Woodbridge puts it this way: “The correlation between the powers of the soul and the natural conditions of their exercise is, perhaps, the one dominant and outstanding characteristic of Aristotle’s psychology.”28 Yet, what Woodbridge identifies as the key to Aristotle’s psychology, is in fact the organic enabling condition of Aristotelian thinking itself. His peripatetic legomenology is predicated on the recognition that the logos at work in nature is also somehow at work in the soul.

In DA II.5, Aristotle pursues a legomenology of perceiving, “τὸ αἰσθάνεσθαι,” in order to lend determination to the precise manner in which the power of perceiving cooperates with that which can be perceived. Attending first to the things said about aisthe- sis, Aristotle identifies the limits of understanding perceiving in purely passive terms.29 He proceeds then to consider the way perceiving itself is said. The articular infinitive that designates the activity of perceiving, “τὸ αἰσθάνεσθαι,” speaks in the middle voice and so points to perceiving as an active condition of the soul, a hexis with the power to actively receive what presents itself in perceiving. By attending to the way perceiving is said, Aristotle is himself able to hear the manner in which perceiving is itself the expression of a cooperation between the power of the soul and the nature of the thing perceived. He begins by delineating the two ways perceiving is said: Since we say perceiving (τὸ αἰσθάνεσθαι) doubly (for what has the potency of hearing and seeing we say hears and sees, even if it happens to be asleep, as well as what is already at-work [τὸ ἤδη ἐνεργοῦν] seeing and hearing), so too should the power of perceiving (ἡ αἴσθησις) be said doubly, on the one hand, as in potency, and on the other, as being-at-work; also similarly that which is perceived (τὸ αἰσθητόν) is a being both in potency and at-work.30 The way we speak about perceiving suggests something decisive about the nature of the phenomenon itself: namely, that it must be twofold. Not only is the Greek word itself articulated in the middle voice, suggesting already that it is not simply passive, but we also speak about hearing and seeing as active powers even when they are not actively

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THE PERIPATETIC METHOD at work. The cascading structure of this passage that moves from “τὸ αἰσθάνεσθαι,” to “ἡ αἴσθησις” and ultimately, to “τὸ αἰσθητόν” itself illustrates beautifully the manner in which the way we speak about “τὸ αἰσθάνεσθαι” uncovers something of the truth about the power of perceiving in its relation to what is perceived. By the end of II.5, Aristotle is thus in a position to recognize on the basis of his legomenology of “τὸ αἰσθάνεσθαι” both the limits of our ways of saying things and the insights we gain from attending carefully to the ways things are said: But since these differences [with respect to the senses of potency] are without names, though it has been marked out that they are different and how they are different, there is a need to use the words “to be acted upon” and “to be altered” as though they were appropriate. And the ability to perceive is in potency such as the perceived thing is already in its being-at-work-staying-itself (ἤδη ἐντελεχείᾳ), just as has been said. So it is acted upon when it is not like [the perceived thing], but when it has been acted upon (peponthos), then it has become likened (ho-moio-tai) to it, and is such as that is.31 Although the double nature of perceiving finds articulation in the ways perceiving is said, still, our ways of speaking about things do not always articulate clearly the differences heard in our ways of saying things. Aristotle here remains willing to use the common way of speaking about the nature of perceiving as a kind of being acted upon, but he emphasizes the limitations of understanding the encounter between the power of perceiving and what is perceived in purely passive terms. Indeed, his own careful language—and

here particularly his use of the perfect tense—gestures to the moment of perceptual encounter between the power of perceiving and what is perceived that cannot quite be captured in purely passive terms. The perfect tense—“peponthos” and “ho-moio-tai”—articulates the moment of perceptual encounter as having already happened; this Aristotle is forced to do here because as he himself says: “there is a need to use the words ‘to be acted upon’ and ‘to be altered’ as though they were appropriate.” The need to use these words that amplify the passive dimension of perceiving require Aristotle to speak in the perfect tense in order to give voice to the active side of the cooperative relationship that enables perceiving itself.32 A legomenological reading of Aristotle as he himself pursues a legomenology of perceiving uncovers his teaching on the nature of perceiving as a cooperative activity between the power of perceiving and what is perceived. This teaching on the cooperative nature of perceptual encounter finds its correlate in Aristotle’s teaching on the nature of thinking itself. Woodbridge rightly makes the correlation between perceiving and thinking central to his own reading of Aristotle’s account of the soul. Thus, according to Woodbridge, the most significant sentence of the DA extends the correlation between the powers of perceiving and the perceivable things with which they cooperate to what Woodbridge calls the realm of mind: “just as the power of perceiving is to that which is perceptible, so too is the intellect (τὸ νοῦν) to that which is intelligible.”33 Aristotle puts it this way in DA III.4 on the so-called passive intellect: [Thinking] must be unaffected (apathes) but capable of being receptive (dektikon) of the form and in potency it must not

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THE PERIPATETIC METHOD or man could not think at all, just as he could not see at all if nature in its own right were never visible.36

be the form, but such as it is, and it must hold similarly (ὁμοίως ἔχειν), with the result that as the ability to perceive is to the thing perceived, so too is thinking to the thing thought.34 Although Aristotle here speaks of thinking as “unaffected,” he immediately refers to the specific capacity thinking has—it is “dektikon”—and indeed, to the manner in which it holds itself as similar—“ὁμοίως ἔχειν”—to the form in order to explain how thinking is itself possible. The model to which he gestures as he attempts to articulate the nature of thinking is, in fact, that of perceiving. Woodbridge emphasizes how this analogy between the powers of perceiving and the power of the intellect articulates the manner in which each of these natural powers of the soul operates in “realms of being congruent with their exercise.”35 Thus, just as vision may be said to operate in the realm of the visible, intellect is said to operate in a realm of the intelligible. Such realms, for Woodbridge, are not separate worlds independent of one another—the one bodily, the other mental— rather, they are different ways the natural world expresses itself, each of which is discernible to and by a corresponding power of the soul. Thus, Woodbridge writes: Men think and reason as well as perceive and take nourishment. Both are equally natural activities on man’s part. But just as the taking of nourishment involves a field of food or food objects, so the exercise of reason involves a field of ideas or ideal objects. In other words, the rational life of man is not something superimposed on his other lives or growing out of them, but is life in a realm of being different from theirs. Nature in its own right must possess such a realm of being,

What the mind thinks and what the eyes see are different aspects of the same natural world operating in what Woodbridge calls distinct “realms of being.” But for Woodbridge, a “realm” does not fragment the integrity of the natural world. Although an idea can no more nourish our physical bodies than a carrot can feed our mind, still the idea and the carrot remain natural expressions of a natural world to which our human digestive and intellectual capacities correspond. Even so, however, in speaking the language of “realms,” Woodbridge risks introducing a chasm between the nutritive, perceptive soul and the intellect that is nowhere present in Aristotle.37 For Woodbridge, inquiry begins with the things we encounter in the world. He writes: “So men find rocks and trees, seas and stars, memories and fancies, and look to see what these things are and what can be said about them. All inquiry starts in this way and not with ‘phenomena’ or ‘experience’ or ‘sense-data.’”38 To use the Aristotelian language of the Metaphysics, we begin “wondering about the strange things at hand.”39 Yet for Aristotle, these are precisely the wholes “better known by perceiving” that lead somehow along a natural road to the nature of each thing.40 By insisting that these things we encounter are not “phenomena” or “experience” or “sense-data,” Woodbridge seeks to emphasize that these encountered things are not at first encountered in philosophical terms. And even if this point resonates with Aristotle’s own starting point in the world of common human interactions, Aristotle’s thinking always already takes the things encountered themselves as phenomena;

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THE PERIPATETIC METHOD not, indeed, as phenomena disjoined from being, but as appearances in and through which being expresses itself. Thus, although Woodbridge follows Aristotle in his attempt to begin with the things encountered, he nevertheless parts ways with Aristotle insofar as he refuses to pursue the manner in which thinking does in fact grow somehow out of perceiving even if perceiving and thinking operate in distinct, albeit parallel, “realms.” Spinoza, it seems, has exerted a bit too much influence on Woodbridge in this regard, for the sort of parallelism Woodbridge seems to advocate is more at home in Spinoza than in Aristotle who, despite Woodbridge’s claims to the contrary, sought to weave perceiving and thinking together into the fabric of nature.41

A PATH PHANTASTIC The imagination loses vitality as it ceases to adhere to what is real. Wallace Stevens42 In The Realm of Mind, Woodbridge argues that walking, perceiving and thinking are thoroughly natural and yet also, that they belong to different “realms” within one “realm of being.”43 Woodbridge is careful to insist that to speak of a realm of mind found within the realm of being is neither to exclude nor to devalue the other realms in which being expresses itself differently. Yet his own tendency to insist that the realm of mind is incommensurable with the other realms of being threatens the organic coherence of nature. To put this in terms of the history of philosophy gestured to above, there remains in Woodbridge a residual segregation of mind and body that seems to be more the result of a Spinozistic response to Cartesian

dualism than that of a genuine engagement with Aristotle. Although Woodbridge does not speak of nature as an expression of God’s infinite attributes, two of which are thought and extension, nevertheless, like Spinoza, Woodbridge insists that thinking can be neither derived from nor reduced to the operations of the body. If Spinoza calls thinking an attribute of God, Woodbridge designates it as an operation at work in a realm of mind as part of the overarching realm of being. Yet, by introducing the spatial metaphor of the “realm,” which itself, according to Woodbridge, names “neither a place nor an event” but rather a “region inhabited,” Woodridge reinforces the impression that the life of the mind is in some fundamental way divorced from the life of walking and perceiving.44 This impression is augmented by Woodbridge’s tendency to emphasize precisely the difference between the realms in which walking, perceiving, and thinking operate. In the Realm of Mind, for example, even as Woodbridge insists that thinking is also an embodied activity, nevertheless, he writes: “But when these bodies think, they do something incomparable with what they do when they walk.”45 The impulse to emphasize the difference seems animated by Woodbridge’s desire to insist that what the mind discovers by means of its operation is not a mere construct of the mind, but a genuine discovery that belongs to the logical structure of nature itself.46 In his admirable attempt to avoid the pitfalls endemic to the modern conception of the constructive, agent mind, however, Woodbridge relinquishes something of Aristotle’s powerful but difficult understanding of the life of the mind as organically bound up with the perceiving life and the walking life. Although Woodbridge insists, rightly, that the life of the mind is not superimposed upon the life of perceiving and walking, and

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THE PERIPATETIC METHOD further, that there is in Aristotle no evolution of the powers of the soul, still, however, Aristotle himself is driven to account for the manner in which what is given in perceiving is itself ultimately also given to thinking, not as something expressed differently in different realms, but as something that emerges from or indeed grows out of our most rudimentary encounters with things. This can be felt already in Aristotle’s account of perceiving, which is said to operate at its deepest level both according to a certain logos and indeed with a kind of discerning (krinein).47 It can be heard in Aristotle’s various attempts to delineate the operation of the phantasia or imagination as rooted in but somehow also different from perceiving even as it enables thinking. Somehow this community of powers operates according to a logos that belongs as much to them as to nature itself. Indeed, this is a community of communication, a joint accomplishment of the soul and the things it encounters made possible by a logos that lives an amphibious life, at home in the body as much as the mind. To pursue this living logos as it makes the passage from perceiving through imagining to thinking possible is a longer, more complicated and yet more beautiful path than it is possible to take here.48 Woodbridge, however, in his 1940 book, An Essay on Nature, has gone some distance down the path and has left us the following words that trace the contours of a difficult itinerary: The only magic worth having is that born of a happy marriage of sense and intellect, the touch, not of Midas, but of metaphor, which so transmutes existence into speech that what things are and what they are said to be become increasingly a profounder intimacy with Nature. She is metaphor, pantomime punctuated with sounds, and is not out-of-doors waiting

to be admitted to conversation. She is jointly translating and translated.49 Aristotle’s peripatetic legomenology is rooted in nature’s metaphorical power, and one of nature’s most powerful metaphors is the human imagination. If, as Aristotle says in the Poetics, “a good metaphor is to theorize things that are similar,” then the phantasia in Aristotle is a good metaphor indeed, for it enables Aristotle to theorize the manner in which that which is encountered in perceiving nevertheless gives itself to be thought.50 The enigmatic account of the phantasia in Aristotle is enigmatic precisely because it attempts to articulate the manner in which what is given in perceiving can and in fact does become a matter for thinking.51 To understand the phantasia as a metaphor is to theorize it as that which carries perceivings over into thinking—metapherein—thus enabling a passage from one dimension into another without either reducing thinking to perceiving or perceiving to thought. On the one hand, the phantasia in Aristotle is rooted in perceiving. Aristotle calls it “a certain motion and not to come into being without the power of perceiving.” And he goes on to claim that “this motion would be neither possible without the power of perceiving nor present in beings that do not perceive. . . .”52 On the other hand, there is no thinking without an appearance (phantasmatos), as Aristotle says repeatedly.53 As a metaphor in the sense suggested here, the phantasia is somehow capable of translating what is encountered in perceiving into the vernacular of thinking. In Aristotle, the metaphor that accounts for the metaphorical activity of the phantasia is that of the lever or joint. The intimate connection between the joint and articulation is heard in the Greek word “arthron,” which means first of all, “joint,”

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THE PERIPATETIC METHOD but then also “to articulate,” “arthroun.”54 The joint, which for Aristotle functions like a lever insofar as small movements on one side of the fulcrum can cause greater movements further from the fulcrum, offers a powerful way to understand the manner in which two phenomena as different from one another as perceiving is from thinking can, nevertheless, be intimately and organically connected. The analogy would go something like this: just as the lever manifests the intimate connection between distance and weight or force, two phenomena that seem disparate and disconnected, so too, the phantasia manifests the intimate connection between perceiving and thinking.55 That something like this is at work in Aristotle may be heard in this passage from the De Motu Animalium: But appearances (phantasia) and senseperceptions and ideas are ways of becoming-other. For on the one hand, sense-perceptions arise straight away, being a kind of becoming-other, on the other hand, being-appeared to (phantasia) and thinking (noe-sis) have the power of the things (τὴν τῶν πραγμάτων . . . δύναμιν). For the form (eidos) that is thought of [the warm or cold] or pleasant or fearful happens to be in some way like each of the things themselves; and because of this those who are just thinking [these things] shudder and are frightened. All these things are affections (pathe-) and ways of becoming-other. And when body parts become-other, some become larger, some smaller. It is not unclear, then, that a small change generated in the origin produces great and numerous differences at a distance— just as, if the rudder is briefly shifted, a great shift of the prow is generated.56

can widely alter the course of the ship. In this passage, Aristotle connects the phenomena of the rudder, which functions here on the lever principle, with the origins of perceiving, being appeared to (phantasia) and thinking in the things encountered in the world. Indeed, it is the power of the things themselves that moves us to shudder and be frightened not only when we perceive them but also when we imagine or think them. The vitality of the imagination and the life of thinking itself is rooted in the power of things expressing themselves. Ultimately however, it is not simply, as the above passage suggests, the form or look, the eidos, of things that is taken up by perceiving, imagining, and thinking, but the logos expressing itself in and through the eidos that enables the cooperative connection between the powers of the soul and the power of things to move us in certain ways. This logos too is at work in the things encountered in perceiving, and it can be translated by the imagination into the vernacular of thinking precisely because it belongs to things as an expression of nature itself. To borrow from Woodbridge, perhaps it might be said this way: for things perceived to go into thinking is a going, just as much of a going on their part, and just as natural, as their going into air or water, or up or down, or from seed to flower, or, indeed, for a winter walk in the city. Thus, by attending to the logos of things, Aristotle’s own imaginative thinking is able to chart a path to a profounder intimacy with nature in which the things said are heard to give voice to the nature of things.

*** POSTAMBLE

The example of the rudder illustrates the point that small shifts close to the fulcrum

The longer, more difficult and more beautiful path toward which I point here but

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THE PERIPATETIC METHOD cannot follow further in this chapter has been marked by the words and poetry of Wallace Stevens. Stevens’ writing gives voice to the recognition at the root of Aristotle’s peripatetic legomenology and Woodbridge’s naturalism: human-being is at home in nature even if nature remains always also alien to us. Stevens emphasizes the connection between human-being and natural being by focusing on the power of the imagination: “. . . absolute fact includes everything that the imagination includes. This is our intimidating thesis.”57 The thesis, however intimidating, implies that even the human imagination must be experienced as a way, perhaps as an extraordinarily powerful way, nature expresses itself. The thesis may indeed be intimidating precisely because it requires us to consider the degree to which we are bound intimately up with—now to use Woodbridge’s words—the “whole vast scheme of things,” which “seems to be engaged in expressing what it is.”58 The dialogue between the guitarist and his audience that opens Stevens’ poem “The Man with the Blue Guitar” suggests the depth of the human connection with the things that are, even as it articulates the impossibility of reducing the reality of things to our attempts to articulate them well:

Play, we must, a tune beyond us, yet ourselves: this indeed articulates something of the path along which Aristotle’s thinking unfolds. And if the tune he plays attempts assiduously to say things exactly as they are, we too must recognize that things as they are are changed upon the blue guitar, not indeed by being rendered other than what they are; but rather, things are exactly what they are in relational dialogue with the things they encounter. One path toward this recognition was marked for me on that bitter January day when I encountered a strangely bound burnt orange volume on a walk through the streets of Greenwich Village. Christopher P. Long NOTES 1 2 3

4 5

The man bent over his guitar, A shearsman of sorts. The day was green. They said, “You have a blue guitar, You do not play things as they are.”

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The man replied, “Things as they are Are changed upon the blue guitar.” And they said then, “But play, you must, A tune beyond us, yet ourselves,

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A tune upon the blue guitar Of things exactly as they are.”59

See Woodbridge, 1926. Ibid., xvi. The idea of a phenomenology of the things said is developed in Long, 2006. The term, “legomenology,” however, was introduced first in an essay on Aeschylus and Hesiod as a way to articulate the methodological approach to reading the Theogony and the Oresteia. See, Long, 2007, 68. See Stevens, 1997, 266–7. Gyorgyi Voros mentions “Chocorua to Its Neighbor” when he speaks both about the degree to which Stevens “joyfully affirms human nature, while allowing nonhuman Nature its own integrity and domain” and, later in his life, “more and more sang of a self subsumed under a greater natural order.” See Voros, 1997, 113, 151–2. For one poignant example, see Dewey, 1958, 48. For a more detailed discussion of Dewey’s misreading of Aristotle and of why Dewey, of all people, should have known better, see Long, 2011, 15–19. A passage from book II of the Metaphysics, 993a30–b3, emphasizes at once the accessibility and the elusiveness of the nature of things. For a discussion of this passage, see Long, 2011, 50–6.

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THE PERIPATETIC METHOD 8 9

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See Jaeger, 1923, 5. The translation is my own. Ibid., 4. The formulation seems to have been borrowed from Goethe. Hegel thus writes in typical fashion: “The Platonic is the objective in general, but the living principle, the principle of Subjectivity is missing; and the living principle, Subjectivity, not in the sense of an accidental and merely particular Subjectivity, but rather pure Subjectivity is proper to Aristotle.” See Hegel, 1986, vol. 19, 153. Michelet reports that the students in Hegel’s seminars on Aristotle were eager to hear this new, living Aristotle. See, Michelet, 1837, 686. See Rosenstock, 1964, 20. Trendelenburg is the connection between Woodbridge and Jaeger. As Suzanne Marchand notes: “Upon Jaeger’s induction into the Prussian Academy of Sciences in 1924, Gustav Roethe claimed that the philosophically oriented philologist represented a link to the tradition of Schleiermacher and Adolf Trendelenburg as well as an unswerving defender of text-critical accuracy.” See Marchand, 2003, 320. Woodbridge’s own interest in Aristotle was cultivated during the period he spent in Berlin studying with Friedrich Paulsen. See, Lachs and Talisse, 2008, 345. In his book on the character and development of German Universities, Paulsen speaks in compelling and personal terms of the way Trendelenburg, “the restorer of Aristotelian philosophy,” gave “his pupils heart for the study of Aristotle.” See, Paulsen, 1895, 69, 147. There is, then, an important line of scholarship stemming from Trendelenburg that connects American pragmatic naturalism to a German philosophical and philological tradition that includes not only Jaeger but also Dilthey, Brentano, and Heidegger. The American tradition of naturalism can be traced from Trendelenburg to Paulsen to Woodbridge, George Santyana and George Sylvester Morris, and thus to Dewey and John Herman Randall. For its part, the philological side of the German tradition might be traced from Trendelenburg to Wilamovitz and Hermann Diels to Jaeger, while on the phenomenological side it might be traced from Trendelenburg to Dilthey, Brentano, and Heidegger. For an

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attempt to bring the tradition of American naturalism back into dialogue with German phenomenology via a reading of Aristotle that is informed by that German tradition of close philological attention, see Long, 2011. See Jaeger, 1923, 11. There is no question that Aristotle was influenced by Plato and, indeed, that their relationship must have been a profound and perhaps, at times, a tense one. The issue is that reading Aristotle in the shadow of Plato eclipses the extent to which Aristotle, as Woodbridge insisted, sought always to address and pursue the things at hand (Met. I.1, 982b13). Joseph Owens draws upon precisely this recognition of the important role such impasses or aporiai play in Aristotle’s thinking in his seminal study of Aristotle’s Metaphysics. See Owens, 1978. See Woodbridge, 1965, 17. See Long, 2011, 6–8. Smith, 1971, 599. Ibid., 605. The difference between expression and articulation is important. Articulation, following Smith, “means the making of something distinct so that it stands out as an identifiable unit with its parts arranged in significant patterns. On the other hand, articulation means that the manner of making something distinct requires its being set in precise relations to other things. The term, therefore, focuses attention on what is individual and on the fact of its belonging to a system or world at the same time.” Ibid., 602. For a more detailed discussion of expression and articulation, see Long, 2011. Woodbridge writes: “The correlation is . . . between an act and a field of action, and an act and a field of action are as different as can be, but it is only the cooperation of the two that is ever effective. The effect of this correlation in operation is the ‘conformation’ of the soul to what is perceives.” See Woodbridge, 1965, 46. See De Anima 403b20–4. All translations are my own. See Physics 184a16–8. For a further discussion of Aristotle’s path of inquiry in relation to the things said, see Long, 2006, 253–9. See too, Long, 2011, 1–20, 49–71. See Woodbridge, 1926, 6.

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25

26 27 28 29 30 31

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34 35 36 37

See Irwin, 1988, 29–30. John Cleary argues the case for a unified methodological approach in Aristotle along the lines of the legomenology developed here. See Cleary, 1994. Deborah Modrak calls the traditional dichotomy into question when she insists that Aristotle advocates a conventionalism with respect to the relationship between phoneme and meaning and a naturalism with respect to the relationship between meaning and reference. See Modrak, 2001, 19. See Woodbridge, 1965, 24. Stevens, 1984, 449. Woodbridge, 1926, 45. DA 416b32–417a9. DA 417a10–14. DA 418a1–6. The translation of entelecheia as “being-at-work-staying-itself” is drawn from Joe Sachs. See Sachs, 2001. For another example of the use of the perfect tense to gesture to that moment of transformation that is difficult to articulate, see the discussion of praxis in Met. IX.6, in which Aristotle speaks of complete actions as actions in which we can say, at once, the same thing is seeing and has seen, or is thinking and has thought. Met. IX.6, 1048b30–5. For a discussion of that passage along lines similar to those pursued here, see Long, 2004, 98–103. See Woodbridge, 1965, 136, 45–6. Woodbridge calls this an “algebraic sentence,” but it is more geometric than algebraic insofar as, on Woodbridge’s own account, it establishes an analogy between terms that are correlated without being connected. DA III.4, 429a15–18. See Woodbridge, 1965, 46. Ibid., 47. To be sure, Aristotle distinguishes between various parts of the soul, but he thinks of these “parts” most often in terms of capacities or powers that may best be articulated in terms of various dimensions of the soul as opposed to segregated parts. Aristotle articulates the various dimensions of the soul, for example, in DA II.2, by talking about the various senses in which we speak about living: “thinking, perceiving, motion and stasis with respect to place, and the motion that results from nourishment, that is, perishing and growth.” DA 413a23–5. In II.3,

38 39 40 41

42 43 44 45 46

he speaks more explicitly of the “powers of the soul” (τῶν δὲ δυνάμεων τῆς ψυχῆς) as he delineates its nutritive, perceptive, locomotive and deliberative capacities (DA 414a29–32). To be fair, Woodbridge himself argues eloquently against the modern tendency to divorce the mind from the body. In his 1926 book, The Realm of Mind, Woodbridge draws on precisely this vision of nature in order at once to critique and explain the origins of the modern dichotomy between mind and body. There he shows how the modern assumption that the mind is an agent separable from but operating with the body, specifically the brain, leads to the notion that the immediate objects of the mind are “nervous processes in the brain.” But, he argues, this is patently untrue for although the tree may stimulate a brain, what the mind thinks is not these brain processes, but the tree. The recognition that the idea of the tree is different from the processes of the brain leads, on the assumption of the mind as agent, to the positing of a dichotomy between mind and body. See Woodbridge, 1926, 13–15. See Woodbridge et al., 1937, 163. Met. 982b13–14. Phys. 184a31–3. Spinoza recognizes thinking and corporeality as two attributes of God’s infinite substance. This leads to a strict parallelism between ideas and things as expressed clearly in Ethics, book II, proposition VII: “The order and connection of ideas is the same as the order and connection of things.” See Spinoza, 1985. Stevens, 1997, 645. Woodbridge, 1926, 35. Ibid., 29, 34. Ibid., 137. Emphasis added. Woodbridge writes: “If, however, our thinking is to be wise and sane and correct, it is not the body which makes it so, but a genuine coherence among the things we think about. It is something we discover. We discover, that is, that there is in the realm of being a structure by virtue of which one fact or event in it may lead our thinking on to other facts and events what are involved, and opens us to the reaches of space and time and what they contain. This structure cannot be described as physical. It is logical.” Ibid., 46.

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THE PERIPATETIC METHOD 47

48

49 50 51

52 53

In an unpublished 1973 paper entitled “Aristotle on the Ontology of the Senses,” John M. Cooper traces the connection between aisthe-sis and krinein in order to account for the active dimension of perceiving in Aristotle. I am grateful to Professor Cooper for sending me a copy of this paper. See, Cooper, 1973. For a detailed discussion of the role of krinein in Aristotle’s account of aisthesis, see Long, 2011, 127–31. There are a number of important passages in which Aristotle introduces the capacity to discern— krinein—into the logic of perceiving. See, for example, DA II.10, 422a20–1, III.2, 425b20–2, 426b12–14, and 426b17–22; in Parts of Animals, Aristotle insists that animals too can discern the pleasant in what they taste. See, Parts of Animals 678b8–9. This is, in fact, the longer path that was pursued in Chapters 4 and 5 of Long, 2011. See Woodbridge, 1940, 242. Poetics 1459a7–8. The nature of the phantasia in Aristotle has given rise to a long tradition of rich scholarship. In calling it a metaphor here, the intent is decidedly not to suggest that, as Philoponus has insisted, the phantasia is that which “carries off from things that are and constructs a representation of that which is not, for instance a centaur.” See, Philoponus, 2000, 497, 24–6. Rather, metaphor here draws on the original Greek meaning of “metapherein,” to carry from one place to another. DA III.3, 428b10–19. See, DA III.7, 431a16–17 and III.8, 432a13–14. Freudenthal suggests that the difficulties associated with interpreting the meaning of the phantasia in Aristotle result from its position between perceiving and thinking. See, Freudenthal, 1863, 53. Wedin has suggested, to name only one scholar who has taken up the question of the phantasia as situated between perceiving and thinking in a serious way, that the phantasia ought not be understood as a “full fledged faculty” at all, but rather, it should be understood to serve the full faculties of aisthe-sis and noe-sis. See Wedin, 1988, 46–52. For a detailed discussion of these issues, see Long, 2011, 79–89.

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ἄρθρον, τό, see Liddell, 1968. For a discussion of this connection, see Whitney, 1981. For a discussion of the “lever principle” on which this analogy depends, see De Groot, 2008, 46. See Nussbaum, 1985, 701b16–23. For a justification of the translation of phantasia as “being appeared to,” see Long, 2011, 82. See too, Lycos, 1964. Stevens, 1951, 61. For a detailed discussion of this passage, see Critchley, 2005, 53–4. Woodbridge, 1926, 62. Stevens and Stevens, 1984, 133.

REFERENCES Cleary, John J., “Phainomena in Aristotle’s Methodology,” International Journal of Philosophical Studies, 2.1 (1994), 61–97. Cooper, John M., “Aristotle on the Ontology of the Senses,” Princeton University Conference on Ancient Philosophy (1973; unpublished). Critchley, S., Things Merely Are: Philosophy in the Poetry of Wallace Stevens, London/ New York: Routledge, 2005. De Groot, J., “Dunamis and the Science of Mechanics: Aristotle on Animal Motion,” Journal of the History of Philosophy, 46.1 (2008), 43–68. Dewey, J., Experience and Nature, New York: Dover Publications, 1958. Freudenthal, J., Über den Begriff des Wortes Phantasia bei Aristoteles, Göttingen: Verlag von Adalbert Rente, 1863. Hegel, G. W. F., Werke in Zwanzig Bänden, Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1986. Irwin, T., Aristotle’s First Principles, Oxford: Clarendon, 1988. Jaeger, Werner Wilhelm, Aristoteles: Grundlegung einer Geschichte seiner Entwicklung, Berlin: Weidmann, 1923.

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THE PERIPATETIC METHOD Jaeger, W. (ed.), Aristotelis Metaphysica, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1957. Kassel, R. (ed.), Aristotelis De arte poetica liber, Oxford: Clarendon, 1966. Lachs, J. and Robert Talisse (eds), American Philosophy: An Encyclopedia, New York: Routledge, 2008. Lennox, J. G. (trans.), Aristotle. On the Parts of Animals, Oxford: Oxford University Press 2001. Liddell, G. H., and Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon, Oxford: Clarendon, 1968. Long, Christopher P., The Ethics of Ontology: Rethinking an Aristotelian Legacy, Albany: SUNY, 2004. —, “Saving ta legomena: Aristotle and the History of Philosophy,” The Review of Metaphysics, 60 (2006), 247–67. —, “The Daughters of Metis: Patriarchal Dominion and the Politics of the Between,” The Graduate Faculty Philosophy Journal, 28.2 (2007), 67–86. —, Aristotle on the Nature of Truth, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Lycos, K., “Aristotle and Plato on ‘Appearing,’” Mind, 73.292 (1964), 496–514. Marchand, Suzanne L., Down from Olympus: Archaeology and Philhellenism in Germany, 1750–1970, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003. Michelet, Karl L., Geschichte der letzten System der Philosophie in Deutschland von Kant bis Hegel, Berlin: Verlag von Dunder und Humbolt, 1837. Modrak, Deborah K. W., Aristotle’s Theory of Language and Meaning, Cambridge/

New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001. Nussbaum, M., Aristotle’s De Motu Animalium, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985. Owens, J., The Doctrine of Being in the Aristotelian Metaphysics, Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1978. Paulsen, F., The German Universities: Their Character and Historical Development, New York/London: Macmillan, 1895. Philoponus, J. and William Charlton., On Aristotle’s On the soul 3.1–8, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2000. Rosenstock, Gershon G., F. A. Trendelenburg, Forerunner to John Dewey, Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1964. Ross, W. D. (ed.), Aristotelis Physica, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1950. —, Aristotelis De Anima, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1956. Sachs, J., Aristotle. On the Soul and On Memory and Recollection, Santa Fe, NM: Green Lion Press, 2001. Smith, John E., “Being, Immediacy, and Articulation,” The Review of Metaphysics, 24.4 (1971), 593–613. Spinoza, Benedict de, The Collected Works of Spinoza, vol. I, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985. Stevens, W., The Necessary Angel: Essays on Reality and the Imagination, New York: Vintage Books, 1951. ––, Collected Poetry and Prose, New York: Library of America, 1997. Stevens, W. and Holly Stevens, The Palm at the End of the Mind: Selected Poems and a Play, Hamden: Archon Books, 1984.

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THE PERIPATETIC METHOD Voros, G., Notations of the Wild: Ecology in the Poetry of Wallace Stevens, Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1997. Wedin, Michael V., Mind and Imagination in Aristotle, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988. Whitney, W. D., “What Is Articulation?” The American Journal of Philology, 2.7 (1881), 345–50. Woodbridge, Frederick James Eugene, The Realm of Mind: An Essay in Metaphysics, New York: Columbia University Press, 1926.

—, An Essay on Nature, New York: Columbia University Press, 1940. —, Aristotle’s Vision of Nature, New York: Columbia University Press, 1965. Woodbridge, Frederick James Eugene, et al., Nature and Mind: Selected Essays of Frederick J. E. Woodbridge, Presented to him on the Occasion of his Seventieth Birthday by Amherst College, the University of Minnesota, Columbia University; with a Bibliography of his Writings, New York: Columbia University Press, 1937.

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17 WHAT REMAINS OF ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS TODAY?

INTRODUCTION It is widely agreed that there exist today a number of notions, distinctions, axioms, and even theories used by many contemporary philosophers that may be teased out of Aristotle’s metaphysics by means of a “deconstruction” of the Heideggerian sort. To take just a few examples: the notion of being qua being, taken up by the scholastics, and recently by Heidegger himself; the theory of the polysemy or homonymy of being, employed by analytic philosophers (Austin, Ryle, Owen), and by postmodern philosophers as well (Derrida, Lyotard); the notion of being as ale-thes (taken up by Brentano, Husserl, and, again, Heidegger); the individual character of substance, resurgent in Strawson and Wiggins; the notions of matter and form employed in contemporary physics, chemistry, and biology; and the distinction between potentiality and actuality, shared by many philosophers, and most recently by Paul Ricoeur.1 Pierre Aubenque, on the twenty-third centenary of Aristotle’s death, added to these the principle of noncontradiction, the schema of the categories, and the affirmation of the divine as a foundation, so

that “we are still today frequently Aristotelian without knowing it.”2 Moreover, as Aubenque, again, underscores admirably, the lesson in methodology that Aristotle has given us remains with us still, that is, the investigation of language as an intermediary, an instrument, or a “filter” for knowing and comprehending reality; the reflective use of language or the conception of philosophy as a “metalanguage.”3 On this point Aubenque cites Heidegger (Unterwegs zur Sprache, 106), who says: “Philosophy is understood to be metalinguistic; which sounds like metaphysics, but these are the same.” One might also cite Gadamer (Wahrheit und Methode): “The only being that we can understand is language.” Contemporary hermeneuticists are not the only ones in agreement on this point; after the “linguistic turn” (Rorty), all analytic philosophers are too, and in particular that branch of analytic philosophers occupied with the question of ordinary language. There is, however, another aspect of Aristotle’s metaphysics about which few people agree, but that persists no less as a precious legacy for contemporary philosophy, namely the very idea of metaphysics, or, better

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WHAT REMAINS OF ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS TODAY? yet, a certain idea of metaphysics. This idea is not to be confused with the neo-Platonic and medieval notion of metaphysics as natural theology, or with the modern idea of ontology (or, to put it otherwise, of metaphysica generalis), or with the notion, critiqued by Heidegger, of an “onto-theo-logy” that would reduce Being (être) to a particular being (étant).4 On the contrary, at issue is the idea of a completely original discipline, one different from all other forms of metaphysics, ancient as well as modern and contemporary. It is an idea of metaphysics that neither has been outstripped nor has achieved its completion. We cannot say it has exhausted all its possibilities, for it has not yet harnessed them. It is not even the idea of metaphysics as “first philosophy,” that is, as a form of research unsatisfied by the level of problematization attained by the particular sciences, aiming instead at knowledge of “first causes,” or rather the final conditions of all that exists, by placing all of reality into question, as I have elsewhere argued.5 For this latter idea is, effectively, the idea of philosophy itself and, as such, had already been conceived by the first philosophers, that is, the pre-Socratics, who sought after the arche-, the archai, or the elements of each thing. This idea was, furthermore, taken up by Plato, who conceived of the Ideas as causes of the visible world, of the Idea of the Good as the cause of all the Ideas and—in his “unwritten” philosophy—of the One and the indefinite Dyad as the supreme principles of ideal numbers, of Ideas, and of sensible things. The originality of the Aristotelian conception of metaphysics consists, in my view, on the one hand in the identification of the object with regard to which one investigates first causes, hence in the formulation of the problem of metaphysics, and on the other

hand in the determination of the nature and functions of first causes, hence in the type of solution that Aristotle gives to this problem. I shall attempt to illustrate these two points briefly, rehashing and developing what I have had the occasion to write several years ago.6

THE FORMULATION OF THE PROBLEM Of what is it necessary to investigate first causes? Aristotle’s response is well known: of being qua being. There is no difference, in this regard, between saying “Being (être)” and “being (étant).” The purported “ontological difference” between Being and being, which Heidegger speaks of, does not exist for Aristotle. “Being” and “being” are two modes of the same verb, which may be used respectively to indicate the fact (or, if you prefer, the act) of being, as well as the subject that is, but to which are connected, for Aristotle, exactly the same considerations. Both, in particular, are “said in many ways” (legetai pollacho-s), that is, they have several meanings that do not fall under a common genus. Being, for Aristotle, is an irreducible multiplicity of kinds, and radically heterogeneous.7 This follows from analysis of the ways in which we use the verb “to be (être)” in common language, in accordance with the method underscored by Aubenque as well as by analytic philosophers (Austin, Ryle, Owen, Grice, Hamlyn). It matters little whether this polysemy concerns existence, as Owen argues, or rather the copula and hence predication, as Grice argues;8 in every case, polysemy entails that being is a problematic object, for a multiplicity absolutely deprived of unity would be completely unintelligible; consequently the problem arises of knowing

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WHAT REMAINS OF ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS TODAY? whether being possesses any sort of unity, a condition without which the science of being, that is to say, metaphysics, would be impossible. The reason why being—as well as the one, which for Aristotle is no less important than being9—is not a genus, and therefore is radically heterogeneous, is that it is said not only of all things but also of their differences, which is impossible for genera.10 And the reason why genera cannot be said of their differences is very clearly indicated by Aristotle (in spite of the critiques that have been recently addressed to him on this point by Christopher Shields)11 where he says that, if this were the case, differences would be reduced to the rank of species or even individuals, that is, that they themselves would range under the genus, on a par with species, without being able to be distinguished from one another or from other species.12 This means that being and the one, in contrast to all genera (which merely express common aspects of their species), do not merely express aspects common to all things, but their differences as well. This characteristic of being, the fact that it is irreducibly heterogeneous, was noticed neither by the pre-Socratics nor by Plato. Among the pre-Socratics, Parmenides, the only one to explicitly thematize the notion of being, clearly conceived of it as univocal—as Aristotle often stresses—and consequently denied the existence of differences as well as of movement. Yet Plato, too, who nevertheless championed, contra Parmenides, the existence of differences and movement in being, achieved the same result, according to Aristotle, thanks to his introduction, alongside of being, of another principle, non-being, even if this is to be understood as “different” rather than as absolute nothingness, and in this continued “to formulate the problem in an archaic fashion” (apore-sai archaiko-s), that

is, ignoring, as Parmenides had, the polysemy of being.13 The proof that Plato had conceived of being and the one as having a single signification, and hence as genera, may be found, according to Aristotle, in the fact that Plato conceived of being and the one as ousiai, that is, as essences or substances, by referring to them as “being itself” or “being in itself” (auto on) and “the one itself” or “the one in itself” (auto hen): substances having as their proper essence the fact that they are and the fact that they are one. Such a conception, according to Aristotle, has as a consequence the impossibility of making sense of how some one thing can exist apart from being and the one, that is, how there are multiple beings.14 In sum, if being is the essence of anything, it has a single signification and it signifies the fact (or the act) of being; it follows that it can only be said of that which is, in the most proper sense, that is, of that which has as its essence the very fact of being, and cannot thus be said of other beings, which in consequence cease to exist. Whether this critique is valid or not, it marks quite clearly the difference posited by Aristotle himself between his own metaphysics and all other metaphysics that admit a “being in itself” or a “one in itself.” The chief representative of such a metaphysics is neo-Platonism, which in Plotinus’ or Proclus’ version admitted as a principle of all things the One, conceived of as “beyond being” (and in this reviving, perhaps, a suggestion by Speusippus, Plato’s first successor at the head of the Academy), and in Porphyry’s version—if we follow the work of Pierre Hadot—accepted as that principle the One identical with Being (seemingly reviving the position of Plato and Xenocrates). In both cases one hypostatizes respectively the one and being, in conceiving of them as “the one in itself” or “being in itself,” in explicit

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WHAT REMAINS OF ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS TODAY? opposition to the prohibition introduced by Aristotle, and in such a way as to create a metaphysics completely different from his. It goes without saying that this conception was reprised by Christian philosophers of a neo-Platonic persuasion, such as Augustine and Pseudo-Dionysius. Yet medieval philosophy itself, too, in both its Muslim and Christian or scholastic varieties, in spite of its Aristotelian persuasion, led in the same direction. Arab philosophers (and, in particular, Avicenna) as well as Christian philosophers (including Thomas Aquinas) conceived of God as self-subsisting Being (Esse ipsum subsistens), that is, as a being having as its essence the very fact or act of being, in ignorance of Aristotle’s prohibition and his critiques of Plato. I do not know, let me repeat, whether these critiques are valid, that is, whether this conception of God truly risks leading to the negation of the existence of other things, which would result in monism or pantheism. I know only that this metaphysics cannot be called Aristotelian, because it contradicts Aristotle’s position on a fundamental point. One might say the same thing about certain modern metaphysics, those of Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, and Wolff, all of which were profoundly influenced, as Jean-François Courtine has shown, by the metaphysics of Suarez, that is, by a form of scholasticism. It is this Platonic-scholastic-modern metaphysics that has given rise to what Heidegger calls “onto-theology”; for it reduces being (être) to a particular being (étant), namely God, even if he has being-itself as his essence. However, one could direct the same remark to Heidegger himself, at least in his youth, when, following Brentano, he reduces being to ousia, or when, following Duns Scotus, he conceives of being as univocal. However, if one opposes being (être) to being (étant),

establishing in this way the alleged ontological difference, one risks making an essence of being (être), different from that other essence that is a being (étant). For these reasons one could say that no one after Aristotle conceived of being as a veritable multiplicity of genera or essences, that is, essentially as difference. I believe that it is thanks to this conception of being that a postmodern philosopher, one committed to difference, of the likes of Jean-François Lyotard, could say: “The philosopher I feel closest to, in the end, is Aristotle!” (Le différend). He is most likely referring to Pierre Aubenque’s Aristotle, the most well known in France, by whom the polysemy of being, and thus the importance of difference, is rather forcibly underscored. This formulation of the problem of metaphysics as the question of knowing how it is possible to retrace the first causes of being qua being, if being has many meanings, which is equivalent to saying being is not a genus (where being a genus is the indispensable condition, according to Aristotle, for being the object of a science)—this formulation is the most radical that has ever been given, because it underlines more than any other that which I shall call, using an expression that certainly does not exist in the French language (nor even in Italian [or English— Trans.]), the “problematicity” of being. For, if being has no unity, it is in no way intelligible. To understand anything means to lead a multiplicity back to a unity, to a unity whatsoever. Such is Socrates’ teaching on the discovery of concepts: one may be said to possess the concept of a thing if one can perceive that unity back to which can be led the many examples, cases, or instances of that thing, which one discovers in the world of experience. If being has no unity, the science of being qua being, that is, metaphysics, is

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WHAT REMAINS OF ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS TODAY? not possible. This is the meaning of the first four aporias developed by Aristotle in book III of Metaphysics.

THE ORIGINALITY OF THE SOLUTION The solution that Aristotle provides to the problem of being is exhibited in three successive moments: (1) the discovery of the dependence of the categories relative to one among them, that is, to ousia; (2) the investigation of the first causes of ousia, and thus of all being, by means of the distinction between matter and form; (3) the completion of the investigation of the first causes of ousia by means of the distinction between potentiality and actuality. In each of these three moments, as we shall see, characteristic of Aristotle’s solution is its originality in comparison with all other given forms of metaphysics. FIRST MOMENT The diverse significations of being correspond, as is well known, to the categories, that is, to different types of predication and hence to the supreme genera of beings. But all the categories are said to be thanks to a certain relation they have to ousia; ousia is first among the categories, that on which the others depend, from the ontological point of view, that is, as concerns their existence, as well as from the logical point of view, that is, as concerns their notion, definition, and essence. The categories other than ousia—for example, quantity, quality, and relation— in effect cannot exist, that is, have being, or be said to be, that is, return to the notion of being, unless they appertain to an ousia or unless they contain in their definition some relation to ousia. This is the celebrated

theory of pros hen homonymy—homonymy relative to some thing—that J. L. Austin has called the theory of nuclear meaning and G. E. L. Owen has definitively consecrated as the theory of focal meaning. Owen moreover deserves credit for having shown that this relation not only implies an ontological, that is, existential priority of ousia in relation to the other categories but also a logical, or logico-linguistic, priority. This is well explained by Aristotle himself in a passage from the Eudemian Ethics concerning the homonymy among forms of friendship. “In every case,” says Aristotle, “one seeks the primary sense, but because the universal is the primary sense, one believes that the primary is the universal; yet this is false.” Aristotle is here alluding to the position of the Platonists, according to which the only thing that is primary, that is, the only principle, the only cause capable of explaining multiplicity, is the universal or the concept, the indication of the common essence that is applied in the same manner to all the particular cases. Such is the case with univocal terms, which have a single signification; if one applies this to being, one obtains, as the principle of being, being in itself, auto on. However, Aristotle notes, in the case of homonyms, that is, in the case of terms that have many significations, as much in the case of friendship as in the case of being, “what is first is that of which the notion (logos) is found in all: for example, the medical instrument is one that a medical doctor would use, but the notion of the medical instrument is not implicit in that of the medical doctor,” while the notion of medical doctor is implicit in that of the medical instrument.15 The unity established in this way, which differs from that of a universal but is equally a true unity, renders possible, according to Aristotle, the science of homonyms.

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WHAT REMAINS OF ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS TODAY? This theory is the result of a logico-linguistic analysis, consisting in the examination of the definitions of different meanings of a term and in the discovery of relations among them, which, further, consists in the implication of the one in the other, but in the special manner we have seen. It is for this reason that the Aristotelian theory of focal meaning has attracted the attention of analytic philosophers; it gives, in effect, an intelligibility to the term “being” by means of an entirely particular sort of analysis, which is neither a reduction nor a deduction. (By a reduction I understand the reunion of a plurality of particular cases under a common case, that is, under a universal, whose notion is applied directly to every particular. By a deduction I understand the inverse operation, which consists in extracting the particular case from the universal.) These two operations are only possible, as Aristotle has shown, in the case of univocal terms, that is, of genera. However, this is not the case with homonymous terms, where the ontological and logical priority of the first signification in relation to the others does not allow for a reduction of the others to the first or a deduction of the others from the first. Nevertheless, this has to do just as much with an ontologico-logical connection, that is, a unity that confers intelligibility on homonymous terms, and consequently on being. One might call this a unity that does not destroy multiplicity, or an intelligibility that does not completely efface the problematicity of being. SECOND MOMENT At this moment the investigation of the first causes of being is transformed into the investigation of the first causes of ousia. This is carried out in the celebrated book VII of the Met., one of the most difficult of Aristotle’s

texts. One has the impression that there are two methods of investigation intertwined in the text: one is simply logical and consists in remarking that ousia, too, is homonymous, that is, has many significations, and at stake is discovering the first; the other method is on the contrary also ontological and consists in discovering the cause of the being of the ousiai. The result, however, is the same: in both cases, in effect, Aristotle ends up with form, either as the first signification of ousia, on which the others—that is, the substrate and the composition of form and matter— depend logically, or as the formal cause, that is, as the cause of the being of the ousiai on which each ousia depends in its existence. In both cases, the form at issue is not a separate form, as are Plato’s Ideas, but a form immanent in material ousia. The first of these two methods, again, is a logico-linguistic method, which resembles the analysis carried out by the theory of focal meaning, thanks to which one could say that, in the same way that ousia is the focal meaning of being, form is the focal meaning of ousia. In any event, this is the interpretation of book VII given by certain specialists of a Thomistic persuasion (J. Owens) as well as of an analytic persuasion (G. Patzig and M. Frede). If, in effect, following Aristotle, one identifies the form, that is, the first ousia, with the specific or ultimate difference, as book VII seems to suggest, one could say that this is contained in the definition of all ousiai. But the second method is an ontological method, which consists in investigating causes and, if we then apply to it the Aristotelian distinction between the different types of causes (material, formal, final, and efficient), we can conclude that by means of this method Aristotle comes to identify, in books VII and VIII of the Met., the first material cause of the ousiai, namely

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WHAT REMAINS OF ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS TODAY? their substrate and, in the final analysis, the elements of which it is constituted; the first formal cause, namely the form or specific difference of the ousiai, whose supreme genera are the categories; and the first final cause, which is the form itself of the ousiai, conceived as the terminus of their development, that is, as their final actuality or perfection (entelecheia). Even in this case, the method employed by Aristotle does not permit a reduction of ousia to its causes, nor a deduction of ousia from its causes, because the causes envisaged are not universals, not Ideas, not forms of sensible ousiai considered as separate from them. Yet it assures an intelligibility to the ousiai, which does not destroy their multiplicity, and that is in every case only a partial explanation, because none of the causes thus discovered, not even all of them, will suffice to explain the ousia of which they are causes. In books VII and VIII of the Met., in effect, Aristotle has not yet indicated the ultimate cause of the becoming of the ousiai, of their generation and corruption, that is, the motive or efficient cause. THIRD MOMENT The necessity of an efficient cause is established in the course of book IX by means of the distinction between potentiality and actuality, and by means of the demonstration of the priority of actuality with regard to potentiality—a priority that is, again, both logical, that is, concerning a notion or an essence, and ontological, that is, concerning being or existence.16 However, in book IX, Aristotle never determines the ultimate motive cause of the ousiai. This is, as is known, the task of book XII. Here, having implied that the generation and corruption of terrestrial ousiai depend on the eternal movements of

the heavens (which has been demonstrated in the works on physics), Aristotle asks what is the motive or efficient cause of the latter. He uses the terms kine-tikon and poie-tikon, which properly designate the motive cause, and affirms that this cause cannot be constituted by Ideas, as the Platonists claim, because the Ideas do not involve a principle capable of bringing about change. “It is of no use,” says Aristotle, “to admit eternal substances, such as those committed to the Ideas do, unless they contain a principle capable of bringing about change (tis dunamene- arche- metaballein).” And immediately before this he claims: “Yet, if there is an efficient or motive cause that does not act (me energoun), there will not be movement, since it may happen that what has the potentiality does not actualize it.”17 Hence the necessity of a mover that would be entirely and solely active. It seems to me that Aristotle denounces the insufficiency of a simply logico-linguistic consideration, of the sort elsewhere called logiko-s and here attributed to the Platonists. Indeed, at the beginning of the same book, he had said: “Our contemporaries (hoi nun) posit that universals are substances. For the genera are universals, which they call principles and even substances on account of their logical investigation (dia to logiko-s ze-tein).”18 In lieu of this method, Aristotle elects for a method he elsewhere describes as phusiko-s, that is, “physical.” It is on this basis that he affirms the necessity of a cause external to the ousiai whose movement is to be explained, that is to say, external to the heavens, a cause which is no longer their form, but a further ousia, individual and completely heterogeneous in relation to its effects. It suffices to recall here the celebrated passage where, evidently addressing one of his students, Aristotle claims that “the principle of an individual is, indeed, an individual;

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WHAT REMAINS OF ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS TODAY? from the human in general could only come the human in general, but there is no human in general; rather, Peleus is the principle of Achilles, and your father is the principle of you.” A little before, he had also mentioned “the sun and ecliptic, which are neither the matter of a human nor its form . . . nor of the same form.”19 And again, before, he had mentioned “that which, being first of all beings, moves all things.”20 Those who bring together this metaphysics and that of Plato do not see the abyss that separates them. To be sure, both philosophers affirm the necessity of transcendent principles, but this is characteristic of all metaphysics. However, whereas Plato conceived of these principles as causes that are formal, universal, homogeneous with their effects, and inert, Aristotle by contrast conceived of them as causes that are efficient, individual, heterogeneous with their effects, and active. One might at this moment object that Aristotle’s unmoved mover is an efficient cause because it is final cause, and even that it is, moreover, an exemplary cause, inasmuch as it is the object of an imitation on the part of the heaven, which moves in a circular motion in imitation of the unmoved mover’s immobility. This is the traditional interpretation of the prime mover, introduced by the middle Platonists for the purpose of reconciling Aristotle and Plato, renewed by Alexander of Aphrodisias under the influence of the middle Platonists, and continued by neo-Platonists of all epochs with the same intention, but an interpretation that Theophrastus had already denounced for being of a Platonic origin.21 However, Plato himself, in his last dialogue— composed perhaps after the dialogue On Philosophy by the young Aristotle, where the theory of the prime mover must already have been presented for the first time—seems to allude to this theory, speaking of a soul that

moves the heavens from without, due to its “marvelous powers.”22 Plato sees in this theory neither final causality nor a form of imitation (which for him would not involve marvelous powers), and it is perhaps for this reason that he does not identify with it. This last moment, which consists in the demonstration of the necessity of a first unmoved mover as the efficient cause of the movements of the heavens and hence of the transformations of the ousiai, is not a simple logico-linguistic explanation; it is not based on the theory of focal meaning, as Owens and Patzig and Frede claim, for it is impossible to call the unmoved mover the primary signification of ousia, or to claim that the definitions of other ousiai contain in themselves a reference to the prime mover. The priority of the prime mover in relation to other ousiai is not at all a logic priority; it is only a priority of a causal, hence ontological sort, and, I would add, of a physical sort as well. The difference between Aristotle’s and Plato’s metaphysics consists in this, the very difference that stands, according to Aristotle, between simple dialectic, that is, explanation logiko-s, and the true science or philosophy, which is an explanation phusiko-s.

FINAL CONSIDERATIONS If what I have claimed so far is true, one might say that the solution offered by Aristotle to the question of being does not eliminate the problematicity of being itself. This is neither to say that Aristotle does not resolve the problem of being, nor, on the other hand, that he gives an insufficient or unsatisfactory solution. It is simply to say that Aristotle’s solution does not eliminate the multiplicity of meanings, or polysemy, of being, or

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WHAT REMAINS OF ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS TODAY? the multiplicity of meanings of ousia, which therefore remain homonyms, that is, differentiated, nuanced, varied notions. In the case of Parmenides, and also, to a certain extent, in the case of Plato, there is a principle, being itself or being in itself, that eliminates, or risks eliminating, the polysemy of being, making of it an essence that is applied in the same way to all beings (étants), or that forms the essence of a single being (étant), denying the being (être) of all the others. By contrast, the ultimate principle of being and of the ousiai admitted by Aristotle is not, in the first place, the only cause of being but simply one of four causes, in such a way that, considered in isolation from the others, it is entirely insufficient for explaining all of being. Secondly, it is not at all the formal cause, that is, the essence of other ousiai, but an individual having an essence completely different from others (i.e. as everybody knows, pure intellectual activity), hence transcendent with respect to them. Third, and in consequence of the first two points, it is not possible to reduce other beings to this principle, or to deduce them from it. Aristotle does not even allow for a participation of other beings with this ultimate principle; participation (methexis), indeed, is a Platonic notion that expresses the relation between Ideas and sensible things and that implies a homogeneity, or at least a resemblance, between the two terms. Aristotle’s prime mover, as we have seen, is completely heterogeneous with respect to all other beings. This does not mean that the prime mover is not a being. Aristotle, to be sure, says that it is a being, the first of beings (pro-ton to-n onto-n), as well as an ousia, the primary ousia. The prime mover is not beyond being, even as it is completely heterogeneous in relation to other beings, since being is not a genus, but embraces rather an irreducible plurality

of genera, and since ousia is not a genus, but itself embraces rather an irreducible plurality of genera of ousiai, which are all ousiai and hence beings. On this point, one might also mention the multiplicity of unmoved movers allowed for by Aristotle, corresponding to the multiplicity of celestial spheres. Yet this does not alter his position at all, for the reason that, among the unmoved movers, there is one, the first, that is completely heterogeneous from the others, even as it is an ousia and hence a being. It is probable—although Aristotle said nothing on the subject—that only this unmoved mover is thought thinking itself, for there is nothing superior to it. Finally, one might observe that the prime mover, inasmuch as it is pure act, realizes in itself the first of the significations of being— indeed, Aristotle once says that among the multiple significations of being, actuality is the first23—and hence constitutes the focal meaning of being, having a priority that is ontological as well as logical over all other beings. However, when Aristotle claims that actuality possess a logical priority as well over potentiality, he is referring to the actuality of a potentiality, that is, to the actuality of something that is yet in potentiality—for example, the actuality of constructing for someone who is capable of constructing, or the act of seeing for someone who is capable of seeing. It is beyond doubt, in effect, that in this case being in potentiality is defined in relation to its actuality; that the former’s definition thus contains a reference to actuality; that it depends on actuality in a way that is logical. But the prime mover, which is pure intellectual activity, is not the actuality of some other thing; it is in no way the realization, the achievement of a being in potentiality; hence there is no other being whose definition refers to the prime mover or to pure intelligence.

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WHAT REMAINS OF ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS TODAY? For these reasons, I am inclined to support the view that Aristotle’s metaphysics is completely original in relation to all other forms of metaphysics, and that it therefore cannot be implicated in the critique or in the condemnation that has been addressed to metaphysics in general. Moreover, thanks to its attention to multiplicity, variety, differences, and mobility, Aristotle’s metaphysics does not attempt to extinguish the problematicity of being, and reveals in this an extraordinary actuality. Obviously, today it would make no sense to reason in terms of celestial spheres, eternal movements, and unmoved movers. Nevertheless, the questions “What is being?” “What does being mean?” or “How do we explain being?” can still make sense without leaving to one side the multiplicity, the variety, the problematicity of the world in which we live. Certainly, we could cease to pose such questions, but in this case it would be difficult to claim to be philosophers. If therefore I were to respond to the question, “What remains of Aristotle’s metaphysics today?” I would say that, in addition to the notions, distinctions, axioms, and theorems mentioned at the outset, there remains an idea of metaphysics that has not yet been exploited and that may yet prove to be a contemporary one. Enrico Berti Translated by Erick Raphael Jiménez

5 6 7 8 9

10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21

22 23

to Sein in Heidegger. French, like German, distinguishes orthographically between the infinitive “being” (or “to be”) and the participle “being.” Attempts to duplicate this distinction in English are awkward. Above and below, unless otherwise noted, “being” translates the infinitive, être. Exceptions and ambiguities are noted with the expressions bracketed. With the exception of the present passage and passages in the first paragraph of the second section below, all capitalizations (e.g. “the One”) are the author’s.—Trans.] Berti, 1996. Berti, 1981. I shall forgo citing well-known passages. Grice, 1988. On this point I am entirely in agreement with Lambros Couloubaritsis, who has frequently underlined the “henological,” and not only “ontological,” character of Aristotle’s metaphysics. Metaphysics III.3, 998b22–7. Shields, 1999. Topics VI.6, 144a31–b3. Met. XIV.2, 1088b35–1089a6. Met. III.4, 1001a29–b1. Aristotle, Eudemian Ethics VII.2, 1236a20–5. Met. IX.8, 1049b12–7. Met. XII.6, 1071b12–6. Met. XII.1, 1069a26–8. Met. XII.5, 1071a15–16, 19–22. Met. XII.4, 1070b34–5. For a justification of these remarks, allow me to refer the reader to Berti, 1998. Plato, Laws X, 899a. De Anima II.1, 412b8–9.

REFERENCES NOTES 1

2 3 4

For a more detailed illustration of Aristotle’s legacy in the twentieth century, see Berti, 1992. Aubenque, 1988, 20. Ibid., 323. [In order to reflect custom in English translations of Heidegger, I have capitalized the first of these terms, “Being,” for être, which refers

Aubenque, P., “La philosophie aristotélicienne et nous,” in Aristote aujourd’hui, ed. M. A. Sinaceur, Paris-Toulouse: Érès, 1988, 320–5. Berti, E., “Origine et originalité de la métaphysique aristotélicienne,” Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie, 63 (1981), 227–52.

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WHAT REMAINS OF ARISTOTLE’S METAPHYSICS TODAY? ––, Aristotele nel Novecento, Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1992. ––, “La Métaphysique d’Aristote: ‘onto-théologie’ ou ‘philosophie première’?” Revue de philosophie ancienne, 14 (1996), 61–86. ––, “De qui est fin le moteur immobile?” in Essais sur la théologie d’Aristote, Actes du colloque de Dijon, ed. M. Bastit and

J. Follon, Louvain-la-Neuve: Éditions Peeters, 1998, 5–28. Grice, P., “Aristotle on the Multiplicity of Being,” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 69 (1988), 175–200. Shields, C., Order in Multiplicity: Homonymy in the Philosophy of Aristotle, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999.

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18 WOULD ARISTOTLE BE A COMMUNITARIAN?

In the rather lively contemporary debate, and especially in the United States, between communitarians and liberals, it is well known that, if liberals in general support the political philosophy of the moderns, and in particular Rousseau’s theory of the social contract, the better part of communitarians—from Michael Sandel and Alasdair MacIntyre to Michael Walzer and Charles Taylor—lay claim to Aristotle’s practical philosophy, to such an extent that communitarianism has even been considered one of the forms of contemporary “neo-Aristotelianism.”1 Communitarianism is, in a general way, a reaction against the universalism of modern theories of human rights, to which it opposes the specific rights of humans who belong, above all, to a determinate community, the first of these rights consisting in the affirmation of one’s own cultural identity and the refusal to dissolve it in a universal, however rational. It is easy to recognize not only the philosophical but also the social-political contemporaneity of this debate animating the discussion and contributing to the determination of social practice, within developed societies as well as in the third world. Inasmuch as Aristotle today remains an authority as much for

progressives as for conservatives (this division not in any way reflecting the preceding distinction, although in a way exhausting the field of the positions concerned), it is perhaps not without interest to ask, even if the question is in many ways anachronistic, on what side of the debate between communitarians and liberals Aristotle would fall. In order to make the terms of the discussion more precise, I shall appeal to a rather precise characterization of communitarianism to be found in Carlos Thiebault (1993, 143).2 According to Thiebault, communitarian thinkers, in their critique of the liberal program, hold the following presuppositions in common: (1) “The priority of notions of the good with respect to agreements of justice”; (2) “The critique of the I without attributes of liberal atomist thought”; and (3) “The inevitability of contextual and historical determinations in the form of communitarian values and of traditions.” My intent then is to examine whether and to what extent these three theses may be claimed about Aristotle’s practical philosophy. I shall examine first the second and then the third,

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WOULD ARISTOTLE BE A COMMUNITARIAN? leaving for the end the essential question of justice.

1 With respect to the status of the individual in relation to a political community, one must inevitably turn to several definitions or characterizations of the “proper” trait of the human that we find in Aristotle. The most celebrated of these are found in the beginning of the Politics, where it is said that “the human is by nature a political animal” (I.2, 1253a3) and that, for this reason (my emphasis), the human is “of all animals the only one to possess language (logos)” (1253a10). The relation of finality between the possession of language and the political nature of the human being is clearly affirmed: it is in order for a human being to be able to participate in political life that nature, which “does nothing in vain” (1253a9–10), has given language to humans. Language is distinguished from simple voice (pho-ne-), which one may find in certain other animals as well: voice makes possible the expression of pleasure and pain, but only language (logos) allows for “signaling what is advantageous and what harmful, hence the just and the unjust” (1253a15). If it is true that language is an essential characteristic of the human being, we should also bear in mind that it is an essential characteristic of a human being that they have “perception of the good, of the bad, of justice.” For “having these notions in common is what makes a family and a city (polis)” (a18–19). It is thus because humans possess language that they possess a perception of moral values, and it is because humans have this perception in common with other humans that they together constitute a community, whether familial or political.

But the question posed here is that of knowing what the nature of the link, of which logos is the expression, between political community (to which familial community is subordinated) and the common perception of values is. Is it a matter, for the human being, of adhering to values that belong to the community within which by chance they were born? In this case, it is impossible to tell what the role of logos would be, except passively and uncritically to record the customs of one’s tribe as norms for individual action. But it seems rather that Aristotle attributes to logos a higher function, namely that of deliberating, and of deliberating in common, about what it is good or just to do or not to do. This is not clearly said here, but follows from the fact that belonging to a community, which is also a community of values, is never automatic; this implies in effect two conditions: need and capacity. An autarchic individual who, like a god, suffices for herself would not be in need of the mediation of a community in order to be who she is or to realize who she is potentially. However, inversely, an individual incapable of “communicating” (koino-nein) cannot form a part of a community. Belonging to a community implies, on the part of the individual, the will and the capacity to communicate, to share, to have in common, and to participate.3 To be sure, it is human nature that makes a human a political and communal animal, but this nature is entirely contrary to a mechanistic determination; it is a potentiality that demands to be actualized and, in the case of human nature, it cannot be actualized without an active attitude on the part of the human. This explains the apparent paradox that, however natural it is, a community must be founded and instituted by a “first legislator” (1253a30). This is “the cause of the greatest good” if and only if this institution of the city bows

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WOULD ARISTOTLE BE A COMMUNITARIAN? to considerations of justice; for justice is “the order of the political community,” politike-s koino-nias taxis (1253a34). The interpretation of this last expression puts us squarely within the ambit of contemporary debate. Should it, taking the genitive in the subjective sense, be understood to say that the just is the order that emanates from the political community, every political community thus possessing its own characteristic sort of order, eventually differing from other communities of the same kind? Or should it, taking the genitive in the objective sense, be understood to say that justice puts a political community into order, this order thus resulting not from the historical and contingent nature of this community, but from a higher, universal, and rational principle, imposing itself on this community just as, in the same way, on all others? It seems rather that the context, which insists on the active character of the citizen’s participation in the city and of the institution of the city by a just legislator, tends in the direction of this second sense, that of an intentional, hence rational and universalizable, determination of the norms of justice that ought to instill order in a city. Besides, it is in this very same sense that Aristotle, as we shall see, defines the “virtue” of justice in book V of the Nicomachean Ethics. Thus, it is clear that, for Aristotle, the polis is not an artificial aggregation of naturally solitary individuals who achieve political life through a contract where each would surrender their independence only on condition of the representation of a higher utility: thus Aristotle is not a liberal in the modern sense. For him, what is “natural” is participation in a community, not solitude (as in Rousseau). Yet this participation is active and voluntary: the proof lies in the fact that the individual can be free of it, either by excess, if they are a

quasi-divine being, “a god among men,” who would be the Law itself;4 or by deficiency, in which case they fall within the domain of beasts. For the most part, the human being, who is “by nature” a communal animal, actualizes their natural tendency; but this actualization must be aided and oriented by logos.

2 The second trait of communitarianism is the affirmation of the particularity of diverse concrete communities, inevitably subject to contextual and historical determinations. For Aristotle, too, there is certainly a particularity and an individuality of different cities. The community is by definition finite. The community brings together, although within limits, which are the very conditions of sharing: one cannot share everything with everyone. The idea of an open community is contradictory. But what are the limits of community? What constitutes the identity of a community? Aristotle raises this question explicitly, most notably in book III of the Politics. Territory seems to be the first condition of the unity and identity of a community. Political community is, in the first place, holding territory in common. Territory, which is by definition limited, cannot be too big, nor can it be too small. If it is too small, it will not suffice economically for itself. If it is too big, it leaves the citizens no awareness of belonging to the same community: such a community might be a people (ethnos), but not a polis. Aristotle cites the example of Babylon, an agglomeration so immeasurably large that after three days of being besieged an entire part of the city was not yet aware of

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WOULD ARISTOTLE BE A COMMUNITARIAN? what was happening. Territorial continuity thus does not suffice for assuring a communal fate without which there cannot be one city. The ideal is a “territory that one can see with a single glance of the eye.”5 Territorial unity is thus a necessary condition of the existence of a city, but it is not sufficient. Is it, then, ethnic unity that makes for political community? Aristotle raises this question at Pol. III.3, 1276a33: “May a city be composed of a single people (ethnos) or many?” Yet he attaches little importance to the question, for it is clear that the individuals who populate a city are born and die, that there is then a continual renewal, which has no effect on the continuity of the city. Should we then say that family relation should at least constitute a criterion of belonging to a determinate community? But Aristotle speaks with irony of what today we could call the law of blood, according to which one is a citizen whose two parents are themselves citizens. This criterion is strictly inapplicable, for at which forebear or ancestor is one to stop? Proving the citizenship of a given citizen would lead to an infinite regress, which reduces the standard of family relation to absurdity: “It is not possible to apply to the first inhabitants or founders of a city the definition of citizen as being born from a citizen father or citizen mother” (III.2, 1275b33). Greek cities knew and practiced a different means of access to citizenship: naturalization. But Aristotle (who was himself a foreigner in Athens) does not appreciate without moderation the influx of foreigners in an already instituted community, for “those who are brought up under other laws are not advantageous to good legislation, nor for the size of the population” (VII.6, 1327a14). Aristotle refers to heated discussions in Athens raised by the decrees of Cleisthenes, who, after the expulsion of the tyrants and in reaction to

their politics, “naturalized many foreigners as well as resident slaves” (III.2, 1275b36), thus creating a great mass of new citizens (neopolitai). Aristotle says that one can think what they like of Cleisthenes’ decrees, but, insofar as they were juridical acts, they should be adhered to and their effects complied with. What is essential is not knowing who is a citizen, but whether they are a citizen justly or unjustly, that is, in virtue of the law or not. Citizenship is thus not founded on race, but on the law. Ethnic considerations are not absent from Aristotle’s political reflections, but they are a posteriori and nonnormative. Living memory attests to the fact that certain peoples live in certain regions and that these peoples each have a certain character. People in the North are courageous, but have little intelligence, so that they are incapable of command. People in Asia are intelligent, but without courage, which predisposes them to living in slavery. Between the two, there are the Greeks, “a people halfway,” who possess the qualities of the one and the other, which renders them more apt than others to lead free lives in the best political institutions. Still, they would have to give themselves these good institutions and, notably, surmount their tendency to dissolve their cities and adopt a single constitution, mia politeia, for all of Greece: only then could they legitimately command others (VII.7, 1327b19–33). When he wrote this, Aristotle deplored that this was not yet the case.6 One finds nothing here that justifies, in view of the plurality of ethnicities and national characters, a plurality of communities adhering to systems of different values, but all equally legitimate in their differences—which is today the thesis of communitarians. Aristotle thinks that there are forms of political organization better than others,

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WOULD ARISTOTLE BE A COMMUNITARIAN? even if it is true that people are more or less predisposed to achieve them. The political problem is that of investigating, without any notion of ethnic membership, the best constitution possible for all people, which each community would be capable of realizing. What makes for the unity, hence the self-identity, of a community is thus its constitution (politeia). Aristotle examines this point in detail, together with the consequences that follow from it, in chapter 3 of book III of the Politics. When a democracy, for example, is established in the place of an oligarchy or a tyranny, we are no longer dealing with the same city, even though the inhabitants remain the same. Inversely, the city is the same even though it is inhabited by other human beings, so long as the constitution remains the same. Aristotle is thus skeptical—a question that has not lost its contemporary urgency—whether a democratic regime succeeding a tyrannical regime has to honor the debts incurred by the preceding regime, since the identity of the city has changed. What, then, is a constitution? It is not a contract drawn for purposes of utility, as the sophist Lycophron maintained; it does not suffice for a polis when humans gather together in order to barter or to exchange commercially or again in order to combat an enemy: “the city is not a commonality of place, established for the sake of avoiding mutual injustice and allowing for exchanges” (III.9, 1280b30); the city is more than that: it is “a community of living well (eu ze-n)” (1280b34), that is, a city the end of which is a perfect and autarchic life for the families composing it. “The end of a city is living well” and the relations it allows to establish are “the task of friendship, for friendship is the deliberate choice (prohairesis) to live together” (1280b38–40).

This determination of political justice as an ensemble of rules freely posited by the political institution in view not only of living together but also of the happiness of its citizens, is perfectly universal or universalizable. It takes no account of local particularities, which, based on territory, may be a necessary, but are not a sufficient, condition of political community. Aristotle nowhere says that a community has its own history that might give it a distinct identity; community is defined rather by its telos, its finality, and this telos is the same for all, that is, their happiness. Where then do we get the idea that Aristotle, in opposition to modern theories of natural right, grounds political norms and morals, not in an abstract idea of the human being, but in the effective historical reality of morals as are realized in a people, articulated differently by Hegel under the name of Sittlichkeit—concrete morality as distinct from universal and abstract Moralität? Certainly it is true that Aristotle rejects the idea that the polis is just an aggregate of individuals, a sort of artifact, justifiable only inasmuch as it is an indirect instrument of individual utility or even of individual moral purpose. Hegel himself remarks rightfully that Aristotle “is directly opposed to the modern principle, which begins from the individual, and according to which the individual votes and solely by his vote a community can be born.”7 To put it in the terms of contemporary debate between liberals and communitarians, the good of the city is for Aristotle a substantial good, not a procedural one, and in this respect it is very distant from modern liberalism. Moreover, it is this whose absence Hegel deplored in the Greek conception of the state: “Civil liberty is . . . a necessary moment that the ancient states did not know.”8

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WOULD ARISTOTLE BE A COMMUNITARIAN? The polis is thus for Aristotle an organic and natural totality. But it is necessary to add—which Hegelian-minded commentators frequently forget—that the nature that founds the reality of the polis is, as all of phusis is, a telos and not a historical given that produces necessary effects. Human nature participates in this general teleology of nature, but, further, the element of indeterminacy that human liberty introduces renders human nature a nature unachieved—natura inchoata, Cicero calls it9—which demands culture in order to yield its most perfect fruits.10 In the order of common life, the instrument of this culture is logos, spoken exchange, and more specifically deliberation (bouleusis), which makes it possible for assembled citizens to make, after an examination of arguments for and against, the most reasonable decision for the greatest good of the community.11 It is only by way of these rational mediations that human nature can realize its highest potentialities. This nature, even if it is perfectible and achieved by degrees more or less here and there, is, inasmuch as it is an end, the same for all humans: there is thus no place here for the recognition of natural differences that would yield diverse, mutually incompatible, and equally legitimate constitutions and juridical systems. Certainly there are differences between communities, but Aristotle strives only to classify them, and in a sense to play them down, in pursuing above all the best possible constitution (ariste- politeia), which would make it possible not to eliminate borders between communities, but to give each one of them an identical structure and mode of government, or, at least, an analogous one. One might object that Aristotle frequently invokes the diversity of opinions that arise in the practical domain. Hence he tells us in the NE (I.1, 1094b14f.) that “beautiful and

just things that are the object of politics give rise to so many divergences and uncertainties that they seem to exist solely by convention and not by nature.” But this last point is only apparently true. The political philosopher should guard against proceeding apodictically, in the manner of mathematicians, but nothing prevents her from reasoning, even if still schematically (tupoi), about that which happens for the most part (hos epi to polu) (1094b19–21). Moreover, people profess different opinions about happiness, which some place in pleasure, others in wealth, others in honor, and others in a transcendent Good (NE I.2). But all opinions are not equal, and Aristotle in any event confines his account to those “which are most prevalent and seem most to have a rational foundation (echein tina logon)” (1095a30). Aristotle then manages to define happiness in a way liable to common agreement: happiness “consists in an activity of the soul in conformity with the excellence (arete-) characteristic of the human being and, in the event of a plurality of excellences or virtues, in conformity with the most excellent and perfect of them” (NE I.6, 1098a16).

3 The preceding analysis shows that, contrary to MacIntyre’s suggestion, nothing indicates that Aristotelian virtues correspond to models or paradigms relative to a particular civilization and susceptible to variation in space and time from one community to another. Here I will only consider the example of justice, which is important for our purpose, since justice is the virtue of order and, in particular, of political order. Without being able to enter here into the details of the analysis

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WOULD ARISTOTLE BE A COMMUNITARIAN? given by Aristotle in book V of the NE, I would like to insist on the universal—universal because natural—scope of Aristotle’s definition of the species of justice. It is true that, contrary to what is claimed by modern liberals, justice for Aristotle is a substantial virtue, and more fundamental than the agreements to which it might give rise. Norms of justice are not the result of a contractual procedure, by means of which humans establish norms for living in common. These norms do not derive from convention any more than they do from spontaneous consensus or again tacit contracts—that is, in any case, from a procedure that would found their relative validity, a validity itself revocable by the very same procedure (e.g. the procedure of voting). The norms of justice are norms, nomoi, but they derive from phusis, that is, from the nature of things, and from the nature of human being. This natural, hence universalizable, character follows clearly from the fact that justice, in its two properly political forms, is founded on mathematic principles: geometrical equality or proportion in the case of distributive justice, and arithmetical equality in the case of so-called commutative or corrective (diortho-tike-) justice.12 In the first case, at issue is a principle according to which the goods of the city and its social functions, as well as the honors attached to them, should be distributed among the citizens in proportion to the value (axia) of each of them. This principle is obviously mathematical, but an uncertainty about its application seems introduced by the variable of “value.” Rather than giving an objective definition of this, Aristotle seems to leave the definition of value to the different conceptions that one finds in different political regimes. “Democracies have it that value consists in liberty, partisans of oligarchy that it consists either in wealth or

in the nobility of the race, and defenders of aristocracy that it consists in virtue” (NE V.6, 1131a28). This passage might seem to tend toward a relativism of norms of justice, as MacIntyre has emphasized; one might then ask with him, since at stake are justice and the rational laws of right: Whose Justice? Which Rationality? Then one might defend the following thesis, that “no tradition can claim rational superiority to any other. For each tradition has internal to itself its own view of what rational superiority consists in in respect of such topics as practical rationality and justice, and the adherents of each will judge accordingly. . . . [A]t any fundamental level no rational debate between, rather than within, traditions can occur.”13 But this is not what Aristotle thinks: If one takes the crucial example of the traditions relating to political regimes—democracy, oligarchy, aristocracy—it is possible to compare, in the name of a superior point of reference that is the logos, these different traditions and to evaluate their respective rationality. In the present case, it is probable that Aristotle grants a superiority—independent of all particular traditions—to aristocracy, the government of the best, which defines value by virtue. Even if in the Politics Aristotle balances this judgment by granting preference to a mixed regime, the polity, a mixture of aristocracy and democracy, still his purpose is to establish an objective, universally valid hierarchy of constitutions, detached from all prejudice relating to history and custom. There is another problem of knowing whether the plurality of opinions need not be respected in a society that we call democratic. The legitimate plurality of opinions and of the interests that they reflect finds the place of its expression in a deliberative assembly (boule-). Yet deliberation (bouleusis) allows for the superseding of this plurality: Assembly consists

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WOULD ARISTOTLE BE A COMMUNITARIAN? not just in exposure to adverse opinions; after having understood and compared the arguments for and against, the assembly proceeds to a choice (prohairesis), a univocal decision for doing what seems to be most reasonable. In the case of commutative or corrective justice, the mathematical determination of the norm is yet clearer. In relations between people, every injury of right should be repaired by a judge in the form of an equalization: restitution in the case of theft, indemnity in the case of bodily harm or murder, and, in both cases, punishment for guilt in order to compensate for the suffering inflicted on another. Aristotle notes by way of clarification that, in order to apply this rule strictly, the judge should judge in the same way regardless of the quality and social standing of the victim and of the perpetrator (V.7, 1132a1–6). He should not be a respecter of persons and should treat the parties “as equals,” that is, as equals before the law. While the distribution of goods and honors might be arithmetically unequal, since it takes into account the unequal value and merit of the persons, there exists a sphere, that of private life, where all humans are intrinsically equal, bearers of the same individual rights, and, in particular, of an equal right everyone has to possess (and to see acknowledged) a certain number of basic goods: physical integrity, life, health, property, good reputation, self-respect. With regard to the right to possess these basic goods, there is no legitimate discrimination, which prohibits privileges based on family relations or wealth as well as the pretension, advanced today by communitarians, to accord “positive” discriminations to individuals belonging to minority groups. It remains to analyze a passage frequently invoked by those who believe themselves to find in Aristotle a theory of concrete natural right, respectful toward the diversity of

traditions and circumstances, one that promotes diversity in opposition to abstract and universal natural right invoked by modern theories of human rights. The passage is taken from chapter 10 of book V of the NE, which distinguishes political justice or right (dikaion politikon) from natural justice or right (dikaion phusikon). Some claim that there is only political justice, that is, proper to every city, since juridical norms are variable from one country to another and thus appear to be posited by convention (nomoi) rather than founded in nature (phusei). Against this thesis, Aristotle objects that variability is not opposed to nature but that, inversely, universality may not be a sign of nature: if ambidextrousness were universal among humans by the constraint of an education in contrast to nature, it would not for all that be natural. Inversely, the laws of right, universal in principle, may be particular in their formulation at the level of rules of application, without ceasing for that reason to be natural. Aristotle seems to mean that positive right, if it may not be deduced from natural right, still must never be in opposition to it. Positive right legitimately occupies the space that natural right does not determine, since this space is indifferent to nature and is therefore abandoned without inconvenience to custom: thus, for example, the amount to pay in ransom in order to free a prisoner or—to take a more contemporary example—the form or amount of taxes. But the diversity of fiscal regulations from one country to the next does not contradict the principle of natural right according to which the citizen should contribute, in proportion to her wealth, to charges incurred by the defense and administration of the State. One thus understands, Aristotle concludes, that “the laws of right that are not based on nature, but on the will of the human being,

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WOULD ARISTOTLE BE A COMMUNITARIAN? are not everywhere the same, since the form of government is not the same.” Aristotle thus admits as a fact the variety of constitutions, which depend in part on the customs and histories proper to different people, but he emphasizes this above all, that “there is only one form of government that is naturally the best of all” (V.10, 1135a3–7).14 Where here he recognizes a certain natural diversity—since it is based on natural differences in character and situation—among forms of organizing social life, Aristotle maintains the teleological demand of a single excellence, which transcends at least tendentially any factual diversity. Aristotle’s political philosophy is a philosophy of a naturalist persuasion, which is clearly opposed to the formalism or proceduralism of modern political philosophers. Yet his naturalism does not necessarily lead to relativism. For nature is not only a given, which would entail that it is in effect diverse, but also a telos, which in the human, the reasoning human, takes the form, of an end to attain in common, of a collective task to accomplish. This task and the logos that is its instrument are the same for all humans. Yet Aristotelian logos—and this is its originality in relation to the modern notion of reason—only grasps the universal by means of spoken exchange, by means of deliberation in common concerning means, by means of reasonable discussion. It is logos itself that is diverse and plural, owing to the diversity of acceptable aretological models and forms of constitution. Thus, it would be contrary to the spirit of Aristotle to want to stall this properly dialectical plurality in a juxtaposition of insular, monological, and mutually exclusive identities; for the plurality is intended by logos itself. Pierre Aubenque Translated by Erick Raphael Jiménez

NOTES 1 2

3

4

5 6

7 8 9

10

11

See Volpi, 1996, 1136. See also the very clear presentation of the debate in Altable, 1995. I translate the verb koino-nein at 1253a28 as “communicate” and not, as other translators have done, by “belong to a community” (P. Pellegrin) or “live in a community” (J. Aubonnet). Taking koino-nein in this way, Aristotle’s point would be tautological: Only a human capable of belonging to a community could belong to a community. Aristotle is saying more than that: Only a human capable of communicating with other humans, who share the same capacity, can constitute a community with them. Communication constitutes community, not the opposite. Belonging is the consequence, not the cause, of participation. Politics III.13, 1284a10–14. This is one of the reasons why “a god” has no need of living in a community (Pol. I.2, 1253a28–9). Pol. VII.5, 1327a2f. On the problem of the constitutional unity of Greece, such as Aristotle desired, see Ehrenberg, 1938; and Weil, 1960, esp. 411–15. Hegel, 1979, 19, 225. Ibid., 228. Cicero, De Finibus IV.3 (here Cicero is expounding a Peripatetic point of view). Cicero, here following Theophrastus, first among Aristotle’s disciples, illustrates this point by means of the example of a vine: a vine, a natural being, but whose nature is unachieved, is in need of culture and care (cura) in order to bring about the highest potentialities of which its nature is capable. In the same way, the human being is in need of wisdom (sapientia) and reason (ratio) in order to realize its nature (De Finibus IV.14 and V.14). We may thus understand that the city is situated at the intersection of nature and culture: natural institution (a human is by nature a political being) is no less in need of the will and intelligence of human beings in order to become what it is. No preambular deliberation is necessary for the founding of a city. Aristotle thus rejects Antiphon’s thesis that the laws are the result of a contract (homologia) (87 B 44, 1–2). However, if the city’s structure is naturally

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12 13 14

well founded, particular decisions that the city has to make would be the object at least of a majority consensus consecutive with deliberation. See Aubenque, 1998. See Aubenque, 1995, 35–47. MacIntyre, 1989, 348. In this passage, from here on I understand “everywhere” (pantachou) in the obvious sense of “in every place.” I had tried to give pantachou the distributive sense of “in each place” (which would justify a plurality of constitutions, each of which would naturally be each time the best for the people considered). Yet I recognize now that this interpretation agrees poorly with the context, which allows for the variability of the natural, but affirms the teleological unicity of what is naturally the best. See Aubenque, 1995, 44, n. 13, and, in the same volume, the commentary of Troers Engberg-Petersen, 55–6 (who sees in this passage “one of the clearest statements in Aristotle of his moral realist position”).

REFERENCES Altable, M. P. G., “Liberalismo vs. Comunitarismo (John Rawls: una concepcíon política del bien),” Doxa, 17–18 (1995), 117–135. Aubenque, P., “The Twofold Natural Foundation of Justice According to

Aristotle,” in Aristotle and Moral Realism, ed. R. Heinaman, London: University College London Press, 1995. —, “Aristote et la conception délibérative de la démocratie,” in The Concept of Democracy and Its Problems, Acts of the VII Symposium of the FISP, ed. I. Kuçuradi, Ankara, 1998; reprinted in Problèmes aristotéliciens, II, Paris: Vrin, 2011, 195–200. Ehrenberg, V., Alexander and the Greeks, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1938. Hegel, G. W. F., Vorlesungen über die Geschichte der Philosophie, vols. 18–20, Werke, ed. E. Moldenhauer and K. M. Michel, Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1979. MacIntyre, A., Whose Justice? Which Rationality? Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1989. Thiebault, C., Los límites de la comunidad, Madrid: Centro de Estudios Constitucionales, 1993. Volpi, F., “Philosophie Pratique,” in Dictionnaire d’éthique et de philosophie morale, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1996. Weil, R., Aristote et l’histoire, Paris: Klincksieck, 1960.

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS

The prospect of compiling an Aristotelian glossary, even such an extremely abbreviated one as is here presented, is daunting for two reasons. The first is that Aristotle employs a lot of technical language, and technical language frequently referencing and defined by other technical language. The second is that the language he employs, or, more strictly, that he appropriates, is by his own lights often highly ambiguous, and his attempts at disambiguating it at times resemble the sculpting of water. It will suffice to mention the distinction between ποίησις and πρᾶξις; or the variability of the adjective (here left untouched) ἔσχατος, which may be inflected to signify any moment of a movement or change; or, finally, the many expressions, most notably ἀριθμός, whose evident meanings will shift from descriptions of things to the things so described. These are outliers. The better part of Aristotelian terminology is limned with precision—not stiffly but with sensitivity to the matter at hand, and nuance. For the purposes moreover of understanding that terminology it is rarely necessary to look beyond the treatises themselves. Aristotle is explicit in his meanings and given to candid definition of central terminology. The degree of consistency in usage across the corpus moreover is impressive; taking this consistency for

granted will nearly always yield an advance in clarity. Aristotle himself should be one’s first and last resource for inquiry into Aristotelian terminology. To begin with, no one interested in Aristotle will fail to benefit from close reading of Met. V, the so-called “philosophical lexicon.” The disambiguations there are as a general rule consistent with Aristotle’s use across the corpus. It should be borne in mind that these chapters are not merely lists but frequently arguments as to the primacy of certain basic meanings and the derivativeness of others. Additionally, it would do to be on the lookout for definitions of essential terminology at the beginning of most treatises, at the beginning of the discussion of any topic, or in the sections immediately following the aporetic discussion of a topic (for Aristotle will frequently describe a topic very broadly, discuss the difficulties pertaining to that topic, and thereafter define it strictly— caution about initial definitions being thus in order). The best external sources for inquiry into Aristotelian terminology are Bonitz’s Index Aristotelicus and, for more broadly contextualized inquiry, the Greek-English Lexicon of Liddell, Scott, and Jones. Both are available online; the latter is searchable, the former is not. The Index, included in the fifth volume

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS of Bekker’s edition, is available wherever Bekker’s edition is available; LSJ is available through the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae and Perseus web sites (see “Resources”). Each of the below entries has five parts: (1) the expression(s) in Greek; (2) a transliteration of the expression(s); (3) translations of the expression(s), in some cases including Latin equivalents (“eq. L”); (4) a discussion of Aristotle’s use of the expression(s); and (5) some references to places in Aristotle where the term is discussed, as well as cross-references to other terms discussed here. Expressions are marked with an asterisk if they are elsewhere defined in this glossary. In only one case have I included some detailed remarks on etymology, namely in the case of οὐσία, notoriously poorly translated “substance.” The purpose of this glossary is to present some of the more philosophically important Aristotelian locutions. Emphasis has been laid on the main terminology of Aristotle’s physics, psychology, metaphysics, and ethics, and secondarily on his logic and poetics. I have attempted to bring out for each term, where relevant, three things: (1) the main meaning of the term; (2) the connection this term has to other terms or topics in Aristotle’s philosophy; and (3) questions and difficulties commentators have attempted, or are attempting, to parse that bear on the term at hand. The goal in sum has been to present something of use to the philosophically inclined; the glossary is meant not as an authority but as a prolepsis of further Aristotelian inquiries.

distinguishes his view of the good from Plato’s by claiming that there are many goods specific to different things. However, he shares with Plato the distinction between real and apparent goods. The good is not thus merely relative but relative to the kind (εἶδος*) of thing at issue. The good for humans, for example, is the same good for every human. To the vexation of commentators, in Met. Aristotle seems to suggest there is however a single science of being, because being is said πρὸς ἕν (with a view to one central meaning or sort of thing) (Met. IV.1–2), and later suggests “the good” similarly orders the cosmos πρὸς ἕν (Met. XII.10). See NE I.6–7 for Aristotle’s account of the human good (i.e. happiness); Met. XII.10 for Aristotle’s account of the good in the cosmos generally; and see ἀρετή* and εὐδαιμονία* below. αἴσθησις, αἰσθάνεσθαι (aisthe-sis, aisthanesthai) n. sensation, perception; v. to sense, to perceive

ἀγαθός, τὸ ἀγαθόν (agathos, to agathon) adj. good, noble; n. the good; eq. L adj. bonus; n. bonum According to NE I, the good is that at which all things aim. Aristotle

Sensation for Aristotle is perception by means of the five senses. The action of sensation consists in a three-way relation between the capacity to sense (of the sensitive organ, τὸ αἰσθητήριον), the capacity to be sensed (of the sensible thing, τὸ αἰσθητόν), and the actuality or movement (the αἴσθησις itself) relating the one capacity to the other (on which see also ἐνέργεια* and κίνησις* infra). Thus sensation is the actuality of the sensible and the sensitive, or the movement of the sensitive by the sensible. Aristotle seems to waver between a conception of sensation as a mere material event and as a formal act like that of consciousness. (On the sense in which αἴσθησις is a λόγος*, see the entry on the latter below.)

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS truth (i.e. what is as what is true). Thus, while Aristotle frequently insists truth and falsity pertain only to meaningful and declarative propositions (e.g. De int. 1), and even once declares that truth is “in the intellect (διάνοια), not things” (Met. VI.4), the truth of incomposites is said to consist in non-propositional “uttering” (φάσις) and their being to be “the same” as thinking them (Met. IX.10); actual understanding (ἐπιστήμη*) is moreover said frequently to be identical to the “things” (πράγματα) it grasps (e.g. DA III.5 and III.7). Truth in the case of intellectual virtue (ἀρετή*) consists in part in the revealing of theoretical truth and in part in the revealing of practical truth. To the former relate ἐπιστήμη*, νοῦς*, and σοφία* and to the latter τέχνη* and φρόνησις*. Just what it means to say these are modes of ἀληθεύειν may be seen to turn on the above-mentioned ambiguity. On propositional truth, see Cat. 10 and De Int. Aristotle discusses the intellectual virtues in NE VI. See also Met. VI and IX.

See DA II.5–III.2 for Aristotle’s treatment of sensation, as well as De Sensu; and see νοῦς* and φαντασία* below. αἰτία, αἴτιον (aitia, aition) n. cause, explanation; orig. responsibility, blame, guilt (see αἴτιος, culpable), accusation or charge; eq. L n. causa A cause for Aristotle is a factor in the simple or qualified being of something. Thus a cause may be what produces something as such or what produces it in some particular way it happens to be. There are four sorts of cause: material (see ὕλη*); formal (see εἶδος*); efficient or motive (κινοῦν; see κίνησις*); and final (see τέλος*). The difference between the sorts of cause bears on the nature of the feature of the thing they relate to: A material cause causes something to be however it is because it is its matter; a formal cause because it is its form; etc. There is generally speaking no distinction in Aristotle between “causes” and “explanations.” The material, formal, efficient, and final causes are thus not only sorts of things with causal characteristics, but also sorts of accounts, and respectively associated with the expressions ἐξ οὗ (“From what?”), τί ἐστι (“What is it?”), ὅθεν (“From where?”), and οὗ ἕνεκα (“For the sake of what?”). On causes, see Phys. II; Met. I; and the relevant expressions below characteristic of each of the four causes.

ἁμαρτία (hamartia) n. error, mistake

ἀλήθεια, ἀληθές, ἀληθεύειν (ale-theia, ale-thes, ale-theuein) n. truth; adj. true; v. to tell/to reveal the truth, to be true; orig. n. sincerity; eq. L n. veritas, verum; adj. verus; v. verum dicere Truth for Aristotle is a notion that fluctuates between true description and the

The sort of act, characteristic of tragic plots, proceeding from a good character and productive of a bad fortune, is called an “error.” In tragedy, the protagonist’s “error” drives the “reversal” in fate characteristic of its plot (Poet. 13). “Errors” also take place in art (τέχνη*) wherever an astute practitioner errs in and through the practice of their art. Inasmuch as nature and art are similarly ends-oriented, “errors” in nature are also possible. Aristotle gives the example of “monsters” (τέρατα), which he describes as “errors in purpose” (Phys. II.8). In all these cases “in which the right way [to do

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS ἀναγνώρισις (anagno-risis) n. recognition

something consists in the achievement] of some purpose, in the case of errors there is a purpose in what was attempted but that has been failed at” (ibid.). See also ἀναγνώρισις*, περιπέτεια*, τύχη*.

Ἀναγνώρισις, or “recognition,” is one of two possible transformative elements in the construction of a “complex” (as opposed to a “simple”) “plot”; the other is περιπέτεια*, or “reversal” (Poet. 10). Both transformations are intended to occur “from the very structure of the plot (ἐξ αὐτῆς τῆς συστάσεως τοῦ μύθου), so that what happens comes about from what preceded it either necessarily or in all likelihood” (ibid.). Such transformations are distinctive of tragedy. “Recognition,” for its part, is “a change from ignorance to knowledge [bringing about] affection or enmity between those destined for good or bad fate” (Poet. 11). The sorts of recognition possible are enumerated and described in Poet. 16. See περιπέτεια* below.

ἀνάγκη, τὸ ἀναγκαῖον (ananke-, to anankaion) n. necessity, the necessary, adj. necessary; orig. force, constraint, compulsion; eq. L n. necessitas, adj. necesse, necessarius Aristotle conceives of necessity as “what cannot be otherwise” (τὸ μὴ ἐνδεχόμενον ἄλλως ἔχειν). Aristotle distinguishes between “simple” or “unconditional” (ἁπλῶς) and “hypothetical” (ἐξ ὑποθέσεως) necessity; on the rudiments of the distinction, see Phys. II.9. Hypothetical necessity is the necessity that, if something is to achieve some end (τέλος*), it must achieve certain intermediary stages; such necessity is exemplified in all natural and artificial coming-to-be and identified by Aristotle with matter (ὕλη*). “Simple” or “unconditional” necessity on the other hand entails no procedure or progress from one to another stage. One of the more notorious and difficult questions in Aristotelian interpretation concerns the question of future singulars in De Int. 9. It is not clear whether Aristotle’s position is, to use the well-known example, (1) that the disjunction sea battle or no sea battle tomorrow necessarily holds, although neither member is yet necessarily true; or (2) that one of (a) sea battle tomorrow or (b) no sea battle tomorrow is necessarily true, even if we yet know not which. See Met. V.5 for the disambiguation; for remarks of an introductory nature on logical necessity, see APr I.1–3; and see τύχη* and ὕλη* below.

ἀνάλογον, ἀναλογία (analogon, analogia) n. analogy, proportion; eq. L n. analogia “Analogy” is one of the forms of unity (ἕν*) (Met. V.6); it is implied also to be one of the forms of “sameness” (τὸ αὐτό) (Met. V.8). In both cases, analogy seems to indicate the weaker of the forms of unity and sameness; for while analogical unity is implicit in all of the other forms of unity (numeric, specific, generic), analogies do not themselves imply other forms. In Poet. Aristotle treats analogy as a form of metaphor (μεταφορά), “whenever a second term stands to a first in a manner similar to the fourth term’s standing to the third,” allowing for certain inversions of terms (Poet. 21). The function of metaphors rhetorically is “to put [something] before [the listener’s] eyes” (πρὸ ὀμμάτων ποιεῖν); Rhet. III.10–11 351

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS “Simple” is an expression of general usage by Aristotle. What is “simple” is opposed to what is τινί, “for something [or ‘someone’]” or “[qualified] in some respect.” It may characterize something ontologically, that is, whether it is thus and so “without qualification,” in which case it is thus and so essentially (καθ᾽ αὑτό*) rather than accidentally (κατὰ συμβεβηκός*); or it may characterize knowledge, that is, whether one knows something “unconditionally,” in which case it is a matter of knowing something necessarily, as for example in the case of ἐπιστήμη*. Something, further, may be produced “simply,” that is, as such; or it may come to be “simply.” See also ἀνάγκη* above.

contains a discussion of the attaining of this goal, with copious examples and commentary. See ἕν* below. ἄνθρωπος (anthro-pos) n. human, human being; eq. L n. homo The expression ἄνθρωπος is, for all practical intents and purposes, a gender-neutral term; a γυνή is a woman; an ἀνήρ is a man; an ἄνθρωπος is a human. Physically, Aristotle seems to find the uprightness of humans their essential trait (see HA I.15). Aristotle’s explanations as to why humans possess this trait emphasize the divinity, articulateness, intelligence, and heat (relating to foot and brain size) distinctive of human beings. Other forms of distinctiveness abound as well—to wit, these: (1) In Pol. I.2 Aristotle famously describes humans as “animals having λόγος*.” This evidently relates to another epithet there, that humans are more political than other animals. (2) An interesting related qualification is that humans “fall on either side” of the distinction between gregarious and solitary animals. (3) Humans are also described in HA I.1 as the only animals that are deliberative and (4) in De Mem. 2 as the only animals capable of recollection (ἀναμιμνήσκεσθαι). (5) In Poet. Aristotle claims that humans are “most imitative” of all animals and attracted by nature to “harmony and rhythm” (Poet. 4). (6) Finally, in PA III.10 Aristotle claims only humans are subject to tickling and laughter. See Pol. I.2, HA I.1; and λόγος* below.

ἀπόδειξις (apodeixis) n. demonstration

ἁπλῶς (haplo-s) adv. simply, without qualification, unconditionally; eq. L adv. simpliciter

A demonstration is a συλλογισμὸς ἐπιστημονικός, “a scientific deduction,” that is to say, a deduction “by the grasping of which we understand” (APo I.2). Now understanding for Aristotle means necessary knowledge (see ἐπιστήμη* below). Therefore a demonstration may be seen to differ from other sorts of arguments in that its premises are necessarily true and, in turn, that the sort of knowledge gained is necessarily true knowledge (see ἀνάγκη* above). It has stirred debate in recent decades whether (1) Aristotelian demonstrations are possible; and whether (2) Aristotle himself adheres to demonstrative practices, say, in his physical writings. Much turns on the question whether the famously stringent demand for distinctively demonstrative premises—those namely that are “true, primary, immediate, and better known than and prior to the conclusion” (APo I.2)—is a demand that can be realistically met.

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS Note that De Int. is, in Aristotle’s estimation, a theory of ἀπόφανσις (see De Int. 4). See also λόγος*, φωνή*.

The premises of demonstrations must be indemonstrable (see APo I.3). Whether it is possible to grasp such principles is one way of parsing the nub of question (1) above. Aristotle gives an elliptical answer in APo II.19, that the principles are grasped by “mind” (νοῦς*). Further complicating this answer are ambiguities about the role in this process of experience and induction (see ἐμπειρία* and ἐπαγωγή*). See ἀνάγκη*, ἀρχή*, ἐμπειρία*, ἐπαγωγή*, ἐπιστήμη*, νοῦς*, συλλογισμός*.

ἀρετή (arete-) n. virtue, excellence; eq. L n. virtus

ἀπόφανσις, ἀποφαντικός, ἀποφαίνειν (apophansis, apophantikos, apophainein) n. assertion, declaration; adj. assertional, assertive, declarative; v. to assert, to declare, to make clear, to claim, to opine An ἀπόφανσις, an “assertion,” is a proposition in which one term is affirmed or denied of another (τὶ κατά τινος ἢ τὶ ἀπό τινος) (De Int. 5), and the adjective ἀποφαντικός describes a proposition that is “assertional” in this way. The “assertional” criterion thus distinguishes a proposition as one “in which there is a conveying of truth or a deceiving,” that is, truth or falsity (De Int. 4; see ἀλήθεια* and ψεῦδος*). An assertional proposition must moreover join terms through a “verb” (a ῥῆμα), that is to say, through an expression indicating action, change, or, in general, time (see De Int. 3 and 5). An assertion is either a denial (ἀπόφασις) or an affirmation (κατάφασις), that is, an assertion that S is/was/will be/etc. P (an affirmation) or an assertion that S is not/was not/will not be P (a denial). Where S and P are the same terms and the modality of the connecting verb is the same, the affirmation and denial constitute a contradictory pair. For discussion of these matters, see De Int. 6–14.

A “virtue” or “excellence” in the strict sense is a habit or tendency to exhibit the most complete and exemplary performance of a function (ἔργον*). There are “virtues” of any of the natural constituents of a thing whose capacities or functions are subject to improvement. Aristotle’s account of virtue turns on three ideas: first, that human happiness (εὐδαιμονία*) consists in performing the human function (ἔργον*) well; second, that this function relates in some way to reason (λόγος*, νοῦς*); and, third, that the psychic capacities relevant to performing this function well are intellectual ones as well as desiderative/ sensitive ones. (On these points, see especially NE I.7 and I.13.) In humans there are “ethical” and “intellectual” virtues, the first relating to the quality of one’s “character” (ἦθος*), or habits for acting (in ways relevant to capacities that can be influenced by reasoning), and the second to the quality of one’s intellect. Virtues of character are “decisionary states” (ἕξεις προαιρετικαί) for acting in accordance with the means and ends prescribed by correct practical reasoning (see NE II.5–6). Intellectual virtues are those states through which one espies the correct mark determinative of the appropriate ethical virtue (see especially NE VI.1). See generally NE I–II. The ethical virtues are discussed in NE II–V; the intellectual virtues in NE VI. See moreover τὸ ἀγαθόν* above, ἕξις*, εὐδαιμονία*, προαίρεσις* below.

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS ἀρχή (arche-) n. principle, ground, beginning, origin, rule, power; eq. L n. principium In Met. V.1 Aristotle outlines six meanings of ἀρχή. It is common to all of these meanings, Aristotle claims, to indicate “the first thing from which something is, becomes, or is known,” and they are distinguished broadly by their “being immanent” (ἐνυπάρχουσι) or being “external” (ἐκτός). “All causes are principles” (Met. V.1), but not all principles are causes; thus the notion of principle is for Aristotle the wider and more elastic. A principle generally in Aristotle is any factor responsible for any sort of change or knowledge of something. Debate concerning how to understand the knowledge and provenance of principles with respect to perception (αἴσθησις*, νοῦς*), experience (ἐμπειρία*), induction (ἐπαγωγή*), and understanding (ἐπιστήμη*), has admitted generally of two extremes: an empiricist interpretation (principles are grasped through induction [ἐπαγωγή*]); and a rationalist interpretation (principles are grasped by the mind [νοῦς*]). It has been wondered secondly what the relationship is of principles to dialectic (διαλεκτική*), that is, whether dialectic serves any sort of justificatory or epistemic role in the discerning of first principles. See APo II.19 on first principles; on principles in natural philosophy, see Phys. I.1; see Top. I.1 on dialectic; see αἰτία* above and, below, διαλεκτική* and νοῦς*.

in the realm of rational action, and to “nature” (φύσις*), in the realm of movement and change. This double meaning is encompassed in the Met. V.5 formula τὸ παρὰ τὴν ὁρμὴν καὶ τὴν προαίρεσιν, “that which is contrary to impulse and choice,” where violence is treated as a form of necessity (see ἀναγκή*). Βία may be seen then to be opposed to persuasion in the influencing of action and to natural movements (i.e. those either self-generated or ἐν τοῖς οἰκείοις, “into proper places”) (see κίνησις*). See φύσις* below. βίος (bios) n. life; eq. L n. vita

Excluding ψυχή*, which has a fairly specific meaning in Aristotle, βίος is one of three expressions Aristotle has recourse to for description of an activity more or less adequately translated as “living,” the other two being διαγωγή, “lifetime,” and ζωή*, “life” in a most basic sense. Βίος in the first place is measured by time; thus βίοι may be shorter or longer (GC II.10). Secondly, a βίος will be inflected in accordance with the states and capacities of the individual or of the individual’s species or form: For a plant, living is nourishing (DA II.3; see GC II.3); for an animal, reproduction and feeding (see HA VIII.1), in ways uniquely inflected owing to its capacity for self-movement (see DA III.9–13). Lives are shaped moreover (especially for humans) in relation to one’s habituation and action. The question of life in the distinctively human domain may be posed in two registers, a constitutive and a normative one. Humans in the constitutive sense are, according to HA’s mode of

βία (bia) n. violence; eq. L n. violentia Βία in Aristotle almost always has meaning as a negation. “Violence” is opposed to “choice” (προαίρεσις*), 354

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS Γένη have two sorts of home in the Aristotelian corpus: one a logical home and one a natural or “physical” home. In Topics γένος is defined as “what is predicated in terms of what-it-is of many things differing in εἶδος” (Top. I.5). Thus γένος contributes to the determination of the essence, or what-it-is, of something, but anticipates, minimally, a more specific εἶδος* for the completion of this determination. In the natural or more specifically biological context γένη do not seem to have fixed objective significance; the term γένος, it is only a slight exaggeration to say, is nearly always used ad hoc, that is, in terms of categorical boundaries suited to the inquiry at hand. Despite these transformations, the relationship between γένη and εἴδη, that is, between broader and more specific groups— where the more specific are distinguished in terms characteristic of their membership in the broader group—is a fairly fixed one. See διαφορά*, εἶδος*.

classification, land-dwellers, gregarious as well as solitary, and political (HA I.1). Moreover, Aristotle characterizes humans and distinctively human capacities as “having λόγος*.” NE X describes the best human life as a βίος θεωρετικός or a βίος κατὰ τὸν νοῦν (see θεωρία* and νοῦς*). (On this, see also Pol. VII.) See ζωή*, ψυχή*. γένεσις, γένεσθαι (genesis, genesthai) n. genesis, coming-to-be, becoming, generation; eq. L n. generatio “Becoming” is a general term descriptive of a process whereby something achieves a different state or attribute. There are five ways in which something coming to be changes, namely in terms of their shape, by addition, by subtraction, by combination, or by alteration. “Becoming” for Aristotle requires three terms: a subject (ὑποκείμενον) and two contraries (ἐναντία). According to the account in Phys. I.7, in the case of qualified becoming (where something that is in some respect unchanged undergoes some change in some other respect) the subject is the matter. Moreover, although only οὐσίαι, “substances,” come to be “without qualification” (ἁπλῶς*), yet they too come to be from some subject. See μεταβολή* on why γένεσις is not a movement (κίνησις*).

διαίρεσις (diairesis) n. division

γένος (genos) n. genus, kind; orig. clan, kin, stock, tribe, family; eq. L n. genus The expression γένος is a general term meaning “group” or “class.” Aristotle distinguishes four senses of γένος in Met. V.28, which differ as to how membership is determined, and how membership reflects the identity of members.

Division in Aristotle is a procedure, inherited from Plato, by means of which essences (τί ἦν εἶναι*) or forms (εἴδη*) are discerned. It consists in drawing distinctions between members of the same class (i.e. γένος*) in order to make out what is distinctive essentially of one of the members. That feature distinctive essentially of one of the members is a “difference” (διαφορά*). The formula rendered then by the application of the difference to the broader class or genus is a “definition” (ὁρισμός*). Distinctive of Aristotle’s use of this tool is his twofold critique of Platonic division. Platonic divisions fall short of their theoretical mark,

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS critical” whereas philosophy is a form of understanding.

according to Aristotle, because they tend to yield only definitions by negation, and because the various divisions are made arbitrarily, that is, without relation to the nature of the broader class. One of the more conspicuous instances in the Aristotelian corpus is the division articulated in DA II.1. For Aristotle’s own remarks on division, see APr I.31; APo II.5 and II.13; and PA I.23.

διαφορά (diaphora) n. difference; eq. L n. differentia A difference for Aristotle in the technical sense is not merely a way in which something differs from something else but a way in which it differs from something else such that this difference is constitutive of its essence, or what it is to be it. “Differences” in logic for Aristotle are what, when added to a γένος*, yield an εἶδος*; a διαφορά is thus εἰδοποιός, “εἶδος-making” (Top. VI.6). In Met. X.1 Aristotle illustratively distinguishes between difference and otherness (ἑτερότης), claiming that to be different entails being “different from [a definite] something in some [definite] way (τινὸς τινὶ διάφορον), so that there must be some same respect in which they differ (ταὐτό τι ᾧ διαφέρουσιν).” On the role of διαφοραί in definition and division, see Met. VII.12. See γένος* and εἶδος*.

διαλεκτικός, ἡ διαλεκτική (dialektikos, hedialektike-) adj. dialectical; n. dialectic “Dialectic” is defined by Aristotle in Topics as a “method by which it is possible to argue (συλλογίσθαι) about every problem presented from commonly accepted opinions” (Top. I.1). On this last point, as a species of deduction (συλλογισμός*), dialectic differs first of all from demonstration (see ἀπόδειξις*); for the principles (ἀρχαί*) of the latter are “true and primary” and self-evident, whereas those of dialectic are “what appear” to be the case “to everyone, or to most, or to the wisest, and of the wisest to all or to most or to the most knowledgeable.” On the other hand, dialectic differs also from “eristic” (reasoning from apparently accepted opinions) and from reasoning inappropriately on the basis of principles taken from another science. Aristotle contrasts διαλεκτική and sophistry in Met. IV.2 by claiming that, while both are, like philosophy, ways of being skilled in reasoning about everything, the sophist, who differs from the dialectician by their “choice of life form” (προαίρεσις τοῦ βίου), is merely a semblance of the philosopher. He moreover contrasts διαλεκτική and philosophy by claiming that the former is “merely

δύναμις (dunamis) n. potential, potentiality, power, capacity, faculty; eq. L n. potentia, facultas In his description of the various meanings of δύναμις in Met. V.12, Aristotle distinguishes five senses. Its chief meaning is as a principle (ἀρχή*) of movement “in something other or as other.” Principal to Aristotle’s understanding of potentiality is the notion that every potentiality is (or entails) at the same time an im-potentiality (see Met. IX.1). In the more elaborate discussion of Met. IX, Aristotle distinguishes between “rational” (μετὰ λόγου) and “arational” (ἄλογοι) potentialities, the difference being that what is potential in 356

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS it is. It is in this sense that “form” is one of the ways in which nature (φύσις*) is said, as outlined in Phys II.1. Indeed, it is a privileged way; for, although Aristotle most closely joins nature to the final cause and “that for the sake of which” (see especially Phys. II.8), form is more akin to nature than matter is, and it is in pursuit of form that efficient causes effect change. The εἶδος, on Aristotle’s analogy of nature and art, is so to speak the image had in view throughout the transformation of something into what it is (τί ἐστι). What Aristotle means when, most notably during the discussion of essence in Met. VII, he claims that εἴδη are “ungenerated” (see Met. VII.8; and further Bonitz 219a54f.) is a curiosity. He may be taken to mean at least either (1) that forms, in the biological sense of “species,” are eternal; or (2) that forms, as agents of change, do not themselves change over the course of processes for which they are responsible. Just as Aristotle analogizes matter to potentiality, so he analogizes form to actuality (see DA II.1; further, passages in Bonitz 219a24–9). See δύναμις*, ἐνέργεια*, οὐσία*, τέλος*, ὕλη*.

the second sense can only yield one sort of movement (e.g. heat is only capable of heating) whereas a “rational” capacity may yield a movement and its contrary (for example, knowledge how to heal is also knowledge how to harm) (Met. IX.2). The difference is made in the second case by desire (ὄρεξις*) or decision (προαίρεσις*) (see Met. IX.5). In every case, potentialities relate essentially to movements (κινήσεις*), that is, they are all potentialities for or of movements. Aristotle frequently (e.g. in DA II.1) treats potentiality and matter (ὕλη*) as equivalent, just as he treats form (εἶδος*) and actuality (ἐνέργεια*) as equivalent. See ἐνέργεια*, κίνησις*. εἶδος (eidos) n. form, shape, aspect, species; eq. L n. forma, species Aristotle has two basic, and fundamental, uses for the expression εἶδος—a logical and a natural use. In a logical context, an εἶδος is said to be composed “of a genus and differences” (Met. X.7) (on which see further γένος* and διαφορά*)—more or less of the “animal [genus] + risibility [difference] = human (εἶδος)” sort, where the εἶδος is rendered by the totality of differences characteristic of the species. “Essences” (τὰ τί ἦν εἶναι*) pertain only to “forms” (Met. VII.4), and the accounts that articulate essences (i.e. definitions; see ὁρισμός*) articulate the differences constitutive of forms (Met. VII.12). Aristotle will go so far as to say that form is the οὐσία* of something (Met. VII.10). The “formal” cause in Aristotle’s natural philosophy accounts largely for the role of εἶδος there. The definition of form operative here is similar to that operative in the logical context: A form is what something is when it has become what

ἐμπειρία (empeiria) n. experience Experience for Aristotle is acquaintance of knowledge of a proto-causal sort. That is, it is knowledge evidenced in the ability to reproduce a result; however, this knowledge does not necessarily (even if sometimes it does) include the ability to articulate what are the principles operative in that knowledge. Knowing that (ὅτι) a given cause reliably produces a given effect is a question of experience; knowing why (διότι) that cause 357

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS “specifically indivisible subject,” such as any homogeneous liquid, are another sort of essential unity, as well as (3) things sharing a γένος*. Of special import, finally, are (4) indivisible unities the definition or “thought” (νόησις, see νοῦς*) of which is one; for it is in virtue of their indivisibility, Aristotle argues, that other forms of unity are called unities. For that reason the things primarily called one are “substances” (see οὐσία*). Things may be one in four ways— numerically, specifically, generically, or by analogy (ἀριθμῷ, εἴδει, γένει, κατ᾽ ἀναλογίαν)—if they share, respectively, a matter, a definition, a sort of predicate, or a relationship structurally like another relationship; the first mode of unity entails the second, third, and fourth, the second entails the third and fourth, and so on. Detailed discussion of unity, as well as of its kinship with similarity and equality and of its opposition to “[the] many” and to “otherness,” may be found in Met. X. See ὄν*, οὐσία*, συνεχές*.

produces that effect is a question of art (τέχνη*) or understanding (ἐπιστήμη*). It is from experience that universals (τὰ καθόλου*) are grasped; and it is from the grasping and further investigation of universals that the intellectual virtues generally arise. See Aristotle’s discussions in APo II.19 and Met. I.1. ἕν/εἷς/μία, ἑνότης (hen/heis/mia, henote-s) n. one, unity; eq. L n. unum, unitas Being (τὸ ὄν*) and unity (τὸ ἕν) “are one and the same nature (φύσις*) because they mutually entail one another (ἀκολουθεῖν ἀλλήλοις) just as principle and cause (ἀρχὴ καὶ αἴτιον) do” (Met. IV.2). Comparison then of unity and being on the model of the similarities, differences, and relationship of principle and cause (see ἀρχή*, αἴτιον*) yields a certain clarity with regard to the Aristotelian usage. “One,” according to Met. V.6, is used in two ways: “accidentally” (see συμβεβηκός*) and “essentially” (see καθ᾽ αὑτό*). Accidental unities include unities of substances with accidents (“musical Coriscus”), unities of accidents with each other (“musical” and “just” in Coriscus), and in general any unities one of the terms of which belongs to the other accidentally. Essential unities by contrast to begin with include (1) any unities that are, with no further qualifications yet, “continuous” (συνεχής), that is, that move as one ([τὸ] οὗ κίνησις μία)—for example, a bundle of sticks, a line, or a body part. And there are degrees of such unity: “What is continuous by nature is more a unity than what is one by art” (Met. V.6; see also φύσις*, τέχνη*). (“Natural” unity here just means “unity not [merely] by contact.”) (2) Things sharing a

ἐνέργεια/ἐντελέχεια, ἐνεργοῦν (energeia/ entelecheia, energoun) n. activity, actuality, enactment; v. acting, enacting; eq. L n. actus, actualitas; v. esse in actu Although they are presented here in a single entry, since they are in many ways treated synonymously by Aristotle, ἐνέργεια and ἐντελέχεια are fairly different words. The former is formed by the prefixing of ἐν to ἔργον* (meaning something like “at-work-ness”). The latter, coined by Aristotle, is formed by the joining of ἐν to τέλος*, “end” or “purpose,” and ἔχειν, “to have” or (as in the present instance) simply “to be” (meaning something like “being in an ongoing state of completeness”). Actuality in Met. IX.6 is defined simply as the correlate to potentiality. Thus, 358

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS when what is potentially doing something is in fact doing it, it is said to be “in actuality” (ἐνεργείᾳ) or “acting” (ἐνεργοῦν). Aristotle distinguishes fairly consistently between actuality and κίνησις*. According to that distinction as outlined in Met. IX, actuality has not degrees of realization (thus one is, for example, “either seeing or not”), whereas movement does (thus, one crosses the room by degrees). In DA II Aristotle distinguishes between three tiers of actualization. At the first level, Alfie, being a human, is the sort of being capable of grammatical knowledge. This corresponds strictly speaking to having a δύναμις*; it is called by scholars a “first potentiality.” At a second level, Alfie, having learned grammar, is now capable of exercising it; this is called a “second potentiality” or “first actuality” (they are equivalent). Finally, whenever Alfie exercises his grammatical knowledge, he is “actualizing” it in the sense of a “second actuality.” See further all of Met. IX; and δύναμις* above.

rather than a capacity (δύναμις*) or an affection (πάθος*) (see NE II.5). The same qualification is essential for understanding intellectual virtues, which are described as “states” (e.g. NE VI.1; APo II.19); for they too imply not only ability but active pursuit and exercise. ἐπαγωγή (epago-ge-) n. induction Induction is “the leading (ἔφοδος) from particulars to universals” (Top. I.12). Aristotle interestingly describes induction as a sort of deduction in APr I.23—one in which an attribute is claimed to hold for a universal, given the consistent occurrence of the attribute in particulars. That is, to use Aristotle’s own example, supposing a group of animals that are all long-lived, if each of them is also bileless, then, on the evidence of the particulars, we might infer that long-lived animals are all bileless, or vice versa. The difference between induction and “deduction” (i.e. συλλογισμός*) on these terms is that in the former case the middle, that is, the explaining term is constituted by particulars, whereas in the latter it is a further universal (not particular long-lived animals but long-lived animals as such). In this sense induction is closely linked to Aristotle’s conceiving of the roles of similarity (ὁμοιότης) and exemplification (παραδεῖγμα) in understanding and meaning generally. It is by means of ἐπαγωγή that universals are grasped; see APo II.19. See ἀρχή*, ἐπιστήμη*.

ἕξις (hexis) n. state, habit; eq. L n. habitus A “state” may be, according to Aristotle’s disambiguation in Met. V.20, first of all the actuality (ἐνέργεια*) of a possessor and a possessed; secondly it may be a disposition (διάθεσις) good or bad relative to something or some act (she is ill, for example, means she is in a bad “state”); or it may be a combination of states in the previous sense (her head hurts, her mouth is dry, she can’t see well—she’s not in such a good “state”). “States,” particularly in reference to their role in the ethical treatises, entail activity, and are not just “dispositions.” This has particular import for grasping in what sense virtue (ἀρετή*) is a “state,”

ἐπὶ τὸ πόλυ (epi to polu) n. that which holds for the most part; adv. for the most part Aristotle generally holds that science (ἐπιστήμη*) is possible only for truths that 359

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS hold universally (see καθόλου*) and necessarily (see ἀναγκή*). The expression “for the most part” however indicates an imperfect form of regularity on the basis of which Aristotle thinks it is possible to have some more or less rigorous form of understanding. Most notably, it is in these—and yet more compromised— terms that Aristotle characterizes his methodology in ethical inquiry (see NE I.3). In the context of inquiry in physics, the matter is less clear; for Aristotle does seem to allow for the advent of spontaneity in change, and characterizes natural change as what occurs “always or for the most part.” On these latter points, see Phys. II.5 and II.8.

The Analytics, finally, articulate an ideal toward and for understanding that may generally be considered a theory of ἐπιστήμη. Distinctive of this sort of understanding is first of all that it is causal: “We suppose ourselves to understand something without qualification … when we know the reason (αἰτία*) why something is” (APo I.2). Distinctive also of understanding are the nature of its premises and in turn of its conclusions; for its premises must be—and this view has caused much debate among scholars—“true, primary, immediate, and better known than, prior to, and causes of the conclusion” (ibid.). In particular, it has been wondered whether any of what may be called Aristotelian ἐπιστῆμαι achieve these stringent demands, and to what extent Aristotle himself considered such premises necessary to projects of understanding. It may be helpful generally to contrast ἐπιστήμη in various contexts—especially in relation to first principles—to γνῶσις and γιγνώσκειν, which have a less technical use in Aristotle: The latter mean any form of “awareness” or “knowledge,” extending even to sensation and opinion, and most characteristically to νοῦς*, whereas ἐπιστήμη, in accord with the above characterizations, is bound more strictly. See ἀπόδειξις*, ἀρχή*, νοῦς*, συλλογισμός*.

ἐπιστήμη (episte-me-) n. understanding, science, knowledge; eq. L n. scientia Ἐπιστήμη may be viewed from a number of perspectives, and perhaps especially four. It is in the first place an intellectual virtue (ἀρετή*), and discussed among the other such virtues in NE VI. There (NE VI.2) Aristotle calls it a “demonstrative state” (ἕξις ἀποδεικτική), that is, the ability to carry out demonstrations (see ἀπόδειξις*). Understanding couples with νοῦς* in that, understanding being a form of “judgment” or “belief” (ὑπόληψις) premised on certain principles (see ἀρχή*), there is no understanding of the principles themselves but only νοῦς* (see NE VI.6; and APo II.19). Secondly, ἐπιστήμη constitutes a certain cognitive state achieved by progression through certain anterior or propaedeutic stages; it relies for the forging of its content on—and likely in some form of sequence—sensation (αἴσθησις*), memory (μνήμη), and experience (ἐμπειρία*) (see, generally, APo II.19 and Met. I.1).

ἔργον (ergon) n. function, task, act, work An ἔργον is the task performed by something when it is doing what it does characteristically, that is, as itself. The argument of NE I.6–7, that happiness consists in the performance of the human “function,” is characteristic of the Aristotelian use of ἔργα. “Functions” are teleological, that is, they have “ends” 360

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS or “purposes” (τέλη*); hence there is an ambiguity between an ἔργον in the sense of the production of an end and an ἔργον in the sense of the product thus generated. In addition, an ἔργον may be an act of production whose end is the act itself—that is, a πρᾶξις*. Another way of parsing distinctions between sorts of function is to describe their principle as “internal” or “external.” See the argument of NE I.6–7; and, further, ἀρετή* above; εὐδαιμονία*, ποίησις*, πρᾶξις*, and τέλος* below.

“ethical,” as they relate to the ability to act in accordance with one’s reason. Since for Aristotle “happiness” consists in no essential way in the gratification of pleasure (see NE X.1–5, and ἡδονή*), but rather in the realization of the highest human virtues, a more apt translation of εὐδαιμονία might be “fulfillment” in the sense of the fulfillment of these capacities. See ἀγαθόν*, ἔργον*, πρᾶξις*. ζωή, ζῆν (zo-e-, ze-n) n. life, vitality; v. to live

εὐδαιμονία (eudaimonia) n. happiness, fulfillment, flourishing

In Top. I.10, Aristotle discusses problems with defining life, holding that “life does not seem to be said according to one form, but rather to inhere in one way for animals and in another for plants.” From which, if true, it would follow that any definition of life “as such” would not define living things as having life, that is, as having the distinctive sort of life they have. “Life” as an attribute of animals, or even of specific animals, and “life” as an attribute of plants would then be mere homonyms. Connected with this may be the well-known opening lines of On Plants I.1: “Life is found in animals and in plants. Yet, whereas in animals it is evident and manifest, in plants it is hidden and not evident.” (On Plants is apocryphal; these first lines are, however, sometimes thought to be Aristotle’s own.) Also of related interest is the idea that the differences distinguishing one more complex form of life from a less complex form of life are in a way not differences in kind but of degree; see especially HA VIII.1. Aristotle nevertheless does define “life,” at least what he means by it, in DA: “By life we mean self-nourishment and growth and decay” (DA II.1). Life in this sense is closely associated with the “nutritive” (aspect of the) soul; it is that

“Happiness” for Aristotle is the end, articulated or implicit, wished for by all humans (NE I.4). Inasmuch then as all act in view of the attainment of happiness, and supposing actions are always undertaken with a view to some good or end, happiness itself must be self-sufficient, choice worthy in itself, complete, and the most complete end and good (NE I.6–7; see ἀγαθόν*). Since what counts as a good and end is specific to the sort of being at issue, happiness must in some way index particularly human capacities. Thus Aristotle wagers that happiness must consist in the performance of a particularly human ἔργον*, “function.” Distinctive of humans—because it belongs to no other animal (see διαίρεσις*)—is the having of λόγος*; happiness, on this wager, will consist then in the realization of virtues (see ἀρετή*) connected to this capacity. Now the full realization of the having of λόγος is simultaneously being able to reason and acting in accordance with one’s reason, and actions are performed through deliberation and desire (ὄρεξις*). The virtues requisite to the attainment of happiness then are both intellectual, as they relate to the ability to reason, as well as 361

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS is best inferred from examples. Likely the most important example is that relating to “being” in Met. There Aristotle claims that, whereas other sciences “cut off some portion of being” and study that, there is a science that studies “being qua being” (τὸ ὂν ᾗ ὂν) (Met. IV.1, 1003a21f.). The sense is that there are several ways in which something may be regarded, or may be, and that consequences for meaning follow from the way in which something is regarded.

potentiality in virtue of which organisms perform the nutritive functions: nourishment and reproduction (DA II.4). This attribute, or these attributes, Aristotle claims, is, or are, had “potentially” by all such bodies as have a soul; later he qualifies this to mean not that they do not have life but rather that they do in fact have it, just as sight exists in an eye even when out of use (DA II.1). See βίος*, δύναμις*, ψυχή*. ζῷον (zo-ion) n. animal An animal is a living thing (see ζωή* above) distinguished from other living things for the possession of at least two capacities: the sensitive (τὸ αἰσθητικόν) and the desiderative (τὸ ὀρεκτικόν) (see, for example, DA II.3; and see αἴσθησις* above, ὄρεξις* below). These capacities are mutually dependent: A thing that senses must experience sensations pleasurably or painfully, and a thing that experiences pleasure and pain must have desire. Additionally, animals have the ability, which plants do not, for locomotion (φορά or κίνησις κατὰ τόπον) (DA III.9). The ability to move thus is premised on desire or decision (προαίρεσις*). The role of φαντασία*—or in the case of humans νοῦς*—in movement is secondary to desire or decision. Whereas the role generally of perception in the practical register is to perceive means toward the achievement of some goal, it is up to desire or decision to resolve on a course of action. See αἴσθησις*, ζωή*, κίνησις*.

ἡδονή (he-done-) n. pleasure Aristotle treats pleasure chiefly in two places: NE VII.11–4 and X.1–5. In the latter he notes that pleasure, like happiness, is something “complete,” and not a movement (κίνησις*) but an activity (ἐνέργεια*) (NE X.4). But pleasure does not, like seeing, Aristotle argues, encompass an activity the product of which is the activity itself; rather, it is a product, or byproduct, of some other act. For that reason it is more appropriate to think of pleasure as a completing rather than complete activity; it accompanies some other activity and gives that activity fullness and vivacity. Therefore pleasure itself is properly speaking not an end desired in itself, although ends desired in themselves may be pleasurable. See NE VII.11–4, X.1–5; and EE VI; ἀγαθόν*, ἐνέργεια*, εὐδαιμονία* above; κίνησις* below. ἦθος (e-thos) n. character, comportment

ᾗ (hēi) conj. as, inasmuch as; eq. L conj. qua

Character for Aristotle is the individual or individual source to whom or which we attribute actions (πράξεις*). They have a dual import for Aristotle: in the first place for conceiving of human

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS different perspectives, namely those of movement (κίνησις*) and actuality (ἐνέργεια*) respectively. The argument in Phys. VIII is fairly straightforward: Since there is always movement (i.e. it is eternal), and movements must be caused by something unmoved, then there must be some unmoved mover responsible for the eternity of movement. This itself must be eternal, hence necessarily existent; otherwise it could not be the cause of that movement. It must exhibit a number of other attributes as well, such as being continuous, circular, and locomotive, for the arguments of which see Phys. VIII.6–10. The unmoved mover here seems to operate as an efficient cause of other movements. In Met. XII it is asked whether there is a substance (οὐσία*) that is unmoved that is responsible, again, for the eternity of other movements. The emphasis in Aristotle’s response however is on the actuality or activity (ἐνέργεια*) of this unmoved mover; and on its causality in terms of being a final cause (τέλος*) (see especially Met. XII.7). In expanding upon his conclusion, Aristotle seems to identify this god with “intellect” (see νοῦς*); in Met. XII.9, he argues that this unmoved-moving god’s activity consists in thinking its own thinking (νόησις νοήσεως νόησις). It may be seen to differ from the unmoved mover of Phys., however, in that, although suggestions abound as to its efficient causality of movement in the cosmos, it is said in Met. XII to move ὡς ἐρώμενον, “as a beloved.”

nature generally; and secondly for conceiving of the specifically practical aspect of human life. In his ethics, Aristotle stresses that in order to be happy, that is to say, fulfilled in the characteristically human (i.e. intellectual) way (see εὐδαιμονία*), one must not only cultivate capacities for thinking but for acting as well— these latter capacities relating to character. Characters in Aristotle are not fixed sets of beliefs or personalities, but dynamic: They are subject to incremental change in light of action. The connection between character and action is an essential one; thus the “virtues of character” or “ethical virtues” (ἀρεταὶ ἠθικαί) are all virtues relating to action (on which, see the specific discussions in NE III.6–V.11). Although actions then are attributable to characters, yet one may act in ways unanticipated by one’s character. Action is thus in a sense primary; for it is in light of actions that characters are formed. Character plays an important role in Aristotle’s conception of human representation and self-representation. Character in itself according to Rhet. I.2 is one of the modes of persuasion (πεῖσαι) (and see further Rhet. II.12–7). Moreover character—good character—is, second to plot, an essential element in the construction of tragedies (see especially Poet. 6). See ἀρετή*, πρᾶξις*. θεός, θεῖος (theos, theios) n. god; adj. divine Supposing Aristotle’s god and his “unmoved mover” (κινοῦν ἀκινητόν) are the same, Aristotle may be seen to develop his conception of divinity chiefly in two places: Phys. VIII and Met. XII. These two texts seem to approach a similar sort of conclusion, but they do so by asking a question from two fairly

θεωρία (theo-ria) n. study, contemplation; eq. L n. contemplatio “Study” is used frequently in complement to ἐπιστήμη*, “understanding” 363

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS or “science,” in order to elucidate a distinction between sorts of actuality (ἐνέργεια*) (e.g. in DA II.1). The contrast is like this. Understanding is the actual possession of a body of knowledge; θεωρεῖν, on the other hand, is the exercise of that knowledge. Aristotle will frequently use the adjectival θεωρετικός, “contemplative,” in opposition to πρακτικός, “practical,” or λογιστικός, “calculative,” as a way to distinguish the λόγος*-having part of the soul that perceives what is not otherwise (σοφία* and ἐπιστήμη*) from the part of the soul having λόγος* that perceives what may be otherwise (φρόνησις* and τέχνη*) (on which, see especially NE VI.1–2). Contemplation deals in none of the questions relating immediately to human practical affairs and happiness (see, for example, NE VI.12). However, inasmuch as θεωρία consists not just in the exercise of the highest forms of human intellectual virtue, then, since human happiness consists in the full exercise of characteristically human capacities, namely intellectual ones, and of these those concerning what is not otherwise are the highest, it is as θεωρητικός that a life attaining to the fullest form of human happiness is described (see especially NE X.7–8). See ἀρετή*, ἐπιστήμη*, εὐδαιμονία*, νοῦς*, σοφία*. κάθαρσις (katharsis) n. catharsis, purification

the meaning of this “catharsis” in Poet. 9 describes this alteration in terms of “wonder.” The sense seems generally to be one of “clarification”; tragedies make more clear to an audience the substance and content of these affections. See also πάθος*. καθ᾽ αὑτό (kath’ hauto) adj./adv. in itself, essential(ly); eq. L adj./adv. per se The expression καθ᾽ αὑτό describes the nature of a relationship between terms (ὅροι). A καθ᾽ αὑτό relationship is one where the belonging (see ὑπάρχειν*) of one term to another is necessary (see ἀναγκή*) and essential, that is, to put the matter grammatically, the predicate tells something about what it is to be the subject. The preposition κατά is used in the context of predication generally to describe the relation between terms: One term is said “of” (κατά) of another term. Thus a καθ᾽ αὑτό relation is one where B is said “of” (κατά) A inasmuch as B belongs to (ὑπάρχει) A “itself” (αὑτό). Καθ᾽ αὑτό relations serve as the basis for the espying of universals (τὰ καθόλου*). They serve moreover as the basis for the articulation of essences (τὰ τί ἦν εἶναι*), that is, in definitions (ὁρισμοί). On this last point, see especially Met. VII.4. (τὸ) καθ᾽ ἕκαστον ([to] kath' hekaston) n. particular; adj. particular What is καθ᾽ ἕκαστον is not, to use a traditional distinction, singular but particular. Thus it stands in definite relation with what is καθόλου*. An Aristotelian “particular” should not however be thought of as a thing but as a way in which predicates belong to a subject; thus one should speak most properly

The most notable appearance of catharsis is in the Poetics. Aristotle employs the expression only once, however, namely in the definition of tragedy of Poet. 6, where he describes tragedy as, among other things, “through pity and fear accomplishing a κάθαρσις of these affections.” The parallel discussion of 364

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS of “what is particular” rather than of “particulars.” Particulars are nevertheless opposed to universals psychologically in that evidence of them is revealed by sensation (αἴσθησις*) rather than the intellect (νοῦς*). It is through sensible evidence of particulars that universals are grasped, but they are grasped not by sensation but by the intellect. In this sense sensation is not only “of” particulars but also of universals (see APo II.19). Particulars for this reason are not “understandable” as such but objects only of sensation. See καθόλου*.

See καθ᾽ ἕκαστον*. κίνησις, κινεῖν (kine-sis, kinein) n. motion, movement; v. to move; eq. L n. motio; v. movere According to its Aristotelian definition, κίνησις is “the actuality of the potential as such [i.e. as potential]” (ἡ τοῦ δυνάμει ὄντος ἐντελέχεια ᾗ τοιοῦτον) (Phys. III.1). The definition is slightly misleading, as it seems to treat movement as a species of actuality. The difference between movement and actuality in the strict sense, as expounded in Met. IX, is twofold. On the one hand, movements as actualizations admit of degrees of actualization (getting closer to the door, for example), whereas actualities are either actualized or not (one, for example, sees or does not see). On the other hand, movements are “incomplete” in that they are actual only shy of the achievement of their ends (at which point they cease to exist as such), whereas actualities are complete at every moment of their actualization. On which, see also ἐνέργεια* above. Two notions may be seen to frame Aristotle’s general outlook on the phenomenon of movement: first, that movement is eternal (there is always movement, the world itself being eternal); and second, that every movement involves a finite number of terms. Thus, while there is always movement (and therefore no beginning or end proper to movement as such), and some individual movements (like that of the first heaven) are even eternal, yet in every case movement is an actualization relating to specific things. For movement is a phenomenon depending for its actuality on the existence of actual things, that is, on πράγματα or οὐσίαι (thus, for example, Phys. VIII.1; Met. XII.5).

(τὸ) καθόλου ([to] katholou) n. universal; adj. universal Two points about the meaning of this expression are in order. In the first place, what is universal is simply opposed to what is particular, as in De Int. 7’s distinction between “universal” and “particular” as forms of predicating something of many things and not of many things. As with particulars, secondly, it is more appropriate and illuminating in the Aristotelian context to speak of “what is universal” than of “universals.” In APo I.4, Aristotle describes as “universal” what belongs to everything (of a given class) “essentially and as such” (καθ᾽ αὑτό καὶ ᾗ αὐτό). Properly speaking, “universal” is a mode of predication. It is used frequently in conjunction with “essential” (καθ᾽ αὑτό*) attributes, that is, as a description of the fact that these attributes belong to every instance of the kind or species of which they are members. Again, when Aristotle treats a γένος* or εἶδος* as “universal,” the intention is to describe in what way the attributes bearing on the genus or species apply to the individuals ranging under them.

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS There are either three or four sorts of movement: (1) movement with respect to “place” (τόπος) or “where” (ποῦ), called “locomotion” (φορά); (2) movement with respect to “affection” (πάθος*) or “what sort” (ποιόν), called “alteration” (ἀλλοίωσις); (3) movement with respect to “magnitude” (μέγεθος) or “how much” (ποσόν), called “growth” or “decay” (αὔξησις, φθίσις); and (4) movement with respect to “being,” called “generation” or “destruction” (γένεσις*, φθορά) (see Phys. III.1, VIII.7; and Met. XII.2). Aristotle in Phys. V.1–2 however argues that generation and destruction are not in fact movements properly speaking, since they relate to substances, and of substances there are not contraries. Movements have the following five terms: something causing the movement (τὸ κινοῦν), something moved (τὸ κινούμενον), an “in which” (τὸ ἐν ᾧ), a “from which” (τὸ ἐξ οὗ, the terminus a quo), and an “into which” (εἰς ὅ, the terminus ad quem) (Phys. V.1, 224a34–b1). The terms “from which” and “into which” are “contraries.” Movement is either “essential” (καθ᾽ αὑτό*) or “accidental” (κατὰ συμβεβηκός), and all accidental movement results from essential movement. Now, all movements are either “natural” (see φύσις*) or “violent” (see βία*). A movement that is “natural” derives from the nature of the thing moved, and one that is “violent” from something contrary to or opposite that. Now something that is moved “naturally” is either moved by itself (like an animal) or not (like a stone). In the former case, however, the animal does not move itself qua one continuous whole, for movement requires that one part (the moved) be passive and another part (the mover) be active; and in short an animal only moves itself inasmuch as it is composed of parts moving as well as

moved. Therefore, since accidental, violent, and stone-like natural movements are all caused by something else, and the remaining case, animal-like natural movements, are caused, too, by the same thing inasmuch as it is other, then everything moved is moved by something else (see all of Phys. VIII.4). This argument, or something like it, is an essential piece of a larger Aristotelian puzzle concerning the causes of movement in the kosmos. On “the unmoved mover,” see θεός*. See δύναμις*, ἐνέργεια*, φύσις*. λόγος (logos) n. account, definition, reason, speech, proportion; eq. L n. ratio Aristotle uses λόγος to mean a number of things, among them (1) spoken language; (2) definitions and arguments generally; (3) the (human) rational faculty; and (4) proportion. The most explicit usage in the sense of “speech” is that proffered in De Int., that (a) λόγος is a “voiced sound, meaningful by convention, some part of which is separately meaningful” (De Int. 4). The “declarative λόγοι” that form the centerpiece of the De Int. discussion, it is worth noting, constitute by Aristotle’s own admission a partial account; for they include only λόγοι that are “either true or false,” and not, for example, statements of wish. (See ἀπόφανσις*.) The broadest usage of λόγος is that which includes definition and argument. A “definition” is a causal account of the essence of something; thus a definition of you will explain why it is you are who or what you are essentially (see ὁρισμος*). Aristotle will frequently contrast λόγος, as a form of evidence, to evidence of the senses. Implicit in this are two crucial ideas: first, that λόγοι for Aristotle are not simply abbreviations of sensible 366

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS experience; and second, which relates to questions concerning, for example, the meaning of ἔνδοξα relative to questions of “first principles,” that λόγοι themselves may be evidence, over and above sensation. On Aristotle’s characterization of the human being as an “animal having λόγος” (Pol. I.2), see ἄνθρωπος* above. It is vitally important, finally, to bear in mind the breadth of possible meaning of λόγος in cases like that in DA, where Aristotle describes sensation as affected by sensibles κατὰ τὸν λόγον, that is, “according to a proportion” (DA II.12). See ἄνθρωπος*, ὁρισμός*, τί ἦν εἶναι*, φωνή*.

V.1, however, Aristotle does distinguish between the two, claiming that there are three sorts of change (μεταβολή): from what is a subject (ὑποκείμενον) to what is a subject; from what is not a subject to what is a subject; and from what is a subject to what is not a subject. Of these the first is κίνησις; the second two are “changes” in some other respect, specifically, γένεσις* (coming-to-be) and φθίσις (passing-away). Thus μεταβολή is a more general term for change at all, and κίνησις a term specifically reserved for changes implying some persistent subject. μῦθος (muthos) n. plot, story, account

μεσότης (mesotēs) n. mean, intermediary

“Plot” is the central feature of Aristotle’s theory of tragedy. A dramatic plot consists generally in the imitation of action (πρᾶξις*), foremost in the presentation of which is the goal or purpose of that action. A “plot” is thus the “ordering” (τάξις) of events leading to the attaining or frustration of such a goal. In tragedy characteristic of such actions are περιπέτεια*, the “(tragic) reversal,” and ἀναγνώρισις*, or “(tragic) recognition.” (On the preceding, see Poet. 6.) In the specific discussion of μῦθος in Poet. 7–10, Aristotle emphasizes that a plot must constitute a “whole,” that is, have beginning, middle, and end, and be arranged as an animal is arranged (Poet. 7). However, what gives it its proper unity is not the unity of the agent represented but the unity of the action (Poet. 8). See ἀναγνώρισις* and περιπέτεια*.

A mean is a midway point determined to be midway depending on the nature of what is measured. A numerical or arithmetical mean is the most obvious sort; Aristotle will also use the expression μεσότης to mean a midway point spatially and temporally, as well as to mean the “middle” of an argument (i.e. the center point of a relationship between two terms that is explanatory of their relation). Aristotle’s understanding of “the mean” is especially central to his ethics; there what is “intermediary” or a “mean” is not at all an arithmetical mean, of course (because ethical are not mathematical phenomena), and what will count as a mean will differ in accordance with the predispositions of the individual (see NE I.6). μεταβολή (metabole-) n. change Change is frequently employed by Aristotle in ways entirely synonymous with κίνησις*, “movement.” In Phys.

νοῦς, νοεῖν (nous, noein) n. intellect, intelligence, mind, intuition; v. to think, to intellect; eq. L n. intellectus, intuitus, intelligentia; v. intelligere 367

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS Νοῦς is on the most general approximation “that [faculty] by which one thinks” (DA III.3), most frequently translated “intellect.” Having intellect is distinctive of human beings, and indeed it is a “life in accordance with the intellect” that is regarded in NE X as the highest and “most human” life (see ἄνθρωπος* and βίος*). Aristotle assigns to νοῦς the thinking of the most basic of epistemic entities— principles and essences (see, for example, DA III.6 and APo II.19). Commentators have wondered what it entails for Aristotle’s epistemology generally when in APo II.19 he attributes to ἐπαγωγή* the grasping of universals (τὰ καθόλου*) but goes on to say that principles are grasped by νοῦς. Of note in recent conversation concerning νοῦς is also the question whether for Aristotle it is embodied. Aristotle claims that it is impossible without φαντασία (for a description of which relation see De Mem. 1), and seems thereby to imply that it is impossible without the body (see DA III.7). However he does (as in DA III.5) seem to attribute to it “immortality.” Connected with these questions is a further question relating to a strange claim in GA II, that in the development of the human embryo, rather than being delivered by the male parent’s semen (along with αἴσθησις* and φαντασία*), the intellect “comes in from outside.” Like ἐπιστήμη*, νοῦς is frequently identified with its objects (νοητά) (see, for example, Met. XII.9). In Met. IX.10 Aristotle claims that intellect thinks “indivisibles,” and there and elsewhere (DA III.6) adds that it is incapable, like αἴσθησις*, of ever “erring” (ψεύδεσθαι*). It is thus essential to distinguish νοεῖν from an activity like διανοεῖσθαι, “thinking through something,” and the corresponding διάνοια, often rendered “discursive intellect.” By comparison

then it has become customary for some to think of νοεῖν as “non-propositional thinking,” but this view has been challenged. In Met. XII, Aristotle evidently identifies νοῦς with the unmoved mover; the arguments of Met. XII.9 have then been taken to bear strictly on the god’s intellect—on which, see θεός* above. See αἴσθησις*, ἐπιστήμη*, θεός*, φαντασία*. ὄν, εἶναι (on, einai) n. being, entity; v. to be, to exist; eq. L n. ens, esse; v. esse According to Met., “being” is said in “as many ways as” or “just as” “one,” and vice versa (see, for example, Met. VII.4; see ἕν*). Therefore the ways of saying ὄν and ἕν share a sort of basic structure. Accordingly, being (τὸ ὄν) on Aristotle’s account in Met. V.7 “is said in many ways,” and chiefly in two: “accidentally” (κατὰ συμβεβηκός*) and “essentially” (καθ᾽ αὑτό*). Accidental ways of saying being are those ways according to which P is an accident of S, either because (1) S is a substance having accident P, or because (2) S and P are both accidents of some unarticulated x, or because (3) S is an accident of x and P in turn an accident of S, or because (4) P is an accident of x and S in turn an accident of P. The “essential” ways in which being is said are “those indicated by the schemas of predication; for being is said in as many ways as these indicate.” By this Aristotle may be taken to mean any of the following: that the categories themselves are the essential ways in which being is said; that the things indicated in predicative assertions are essentially beings; or that, in every predicative assertion, whatever the composition of terms, either (1) S or P indicates a substance, or 368

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS (2) some unarticulated x is a substance indicated by S or P, or (3) S and P in some joint way indicate a substance. Being, thirdly, may be taken to mean the truth of a proposition, and non-being the falsity of a proposition (see ἀλήθεια*). Finally, being, that is, that in virtue of which we say something “is x,” may mean either what something is actually or what it is potentially (see δύναμις* and ἐνέργεια*). Aristotle seems to vacillate on the question whether there can be a science (ἐπιστήμη*) of being, an ambiguity of some importance for determining the meaning of his notion of being more generally. According to a claim in EE, there is no one science of being, just as there is no one science of the good (EE I.8; see also NE I.6), more or less on the reasoning that a science is one science inasmuch as it relates to one genus (see APo I.28), but being is not a genus (Met. III.3). In Met. however it is supposed throughout that there is indeed something like a “science of being [qua being].” The argument in Met. IV states first of all that the science of being differs from other sciences in that it does not “cleave off some part of being” and study that (i.e. being qua, for example, number or movement, as in mathematics and physics respectively) but rather studies “being qua being” (Met. IV.1). Aristotle then argues that the many ways in which being is said, while “manifold,” are “not equivocal” but rather tend πρὸς ἕν or πρὸς μίαν φύσιν, “toward one [meaning] [or ‘one nature’],” namely substance (Met. IV.2; see οὐσία*). This line of thinking has been said to claim that being is a “pros hen equivocal” or exhibits “focal meaning,” in contrast to the simple equivocity elsewhere espoused. The argument linking this claim to the problematic status of “the science of being” posits that, since being and unity

are to some extent semantically interchangeable (called the “convertibility thesis”), and unity is a genus, then being exhibits, through unity, sufficient epistemic integrity to be treated by a single science (see again Met. IV.2). See ἀλήθεια*, δύναμις*, ἕν*, ἐνέργεια*, οὐσία*. ὄρεξις (orexis) n. desire, appetite, longing Ὄρεξις is “desire,” and more literally any form of “longing.” Desire in Aristotle’s psychology is the principal factor in decision (προαίρεσις*) and action (πρᾶξις*) and generally the self-movement of animals—on which see DA III.9–13 and De Motu. It is, after Plato, distinguished by Aristotle from ἐπιθυμία, “irrational desire,” and frequently translators will render ὄρεξις “rational desire.” The reason for doing so is that for Aristotle ὄρεξις is subject to the influence of λόγος* as well as habituation through the cultivation of ethical and intellectual virtue (ἀρετή*). In discussion of the psychology of decision, Aristotle will frequently join to ὄρεξις a perceptual faculty, νοῦς* or φαντασία*. ὁρισμός (horismos) n. definition A ὁρισμός is a sort of λόγος*, and specifically a λόγος τῆς οὐσίας, that is, an account of “substance” (see οὐσία*). Especially in his Analytics, Aristotle seems to conceive of definitions as the ultimate objects of the pursuit of understanding or science (ἐπιστήμη*). Definitions—established, in APo, by division (διαίρεσις*)—are explanations why (see αἰτία*) individuals of a given form (εἶδος*) exhibit their characteristic 369

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS or “essential” (see καθ᾽ αὑτό*) attributes (see all of APr II). Definitions function as sorts of principles (see ἀρχή*), and the discovery of them will then connect in an essential way with the discovery of first principles generally. The expression ὁρισμός is sometimes treated synonymously with the expression ὅρος, that is, where the latter is intended to mean not only a single “term,” but a two-term “account.” As a rule, to be weighted against context, ὅρος should be conceived of as distinct from ὁρισμός, however, in the way just outlined. οὐσία (ousia) n. substance, being, essence; eq. L n. essentia, substantia Colloquially, οὐσία denotes “property.” The expression οὐσία is formed by the addition of an abstract suffix (“-ness”) to the feminine participle οὖσα (fr. ὄν*) (“being”); hence, most literally, it means “beingness.” In that way it is morphologically equivalent to the Latin essentia (essens + abstract suffix), which seems to have been the translation popular among Roman authors, such as Cicero. The translation of οὐσία as substantia, whence “substance,” is prima facie arbitrary: In order to grasp the transformations of meaning leading to this prima facie arbitrary connection, one should bear in mind three external influences: (1) the later Platonic approximation of οὐσία to ὑπόστασις (=substantia), as in Plotinus; (2) early Christian theological doctrine, as in Tertullian, which codified this approximation in terms of the translation of οὐσία as substantia; and, finally and most definitively, (3) Boethius’ translations of Aristotle where the identification is standardized. There is no obvious reason to try to see this translation as rooted in the

Aristotelian texts themselves: Aristotle never makes use of the appropriate expression, ὑπόστασις, in any way associated with οὐσία; and the mild association of οὐσία with grammatical subjecthood (see ὑποκείμενον=suppositum, “that which is posited”) in Cat. 5 does not justify the association with substantia (“that which stands underneath”) either. Nevertheless, “substance” is widely— and generally on the evidence of tradition and now convenience—the accepted translation of οὐσία. A more appropriate translation would be “being.” Οὐσία plays an immensely important role in Aristotelian philosophy. On it depend the metaphysical doctrines of the Categories and Metaphysics, most conspicuously—on which, see especially Cat. 5 and Met. VII. The account of substance as the fundament of all predication and of all change and accidents in Cat. 5 and Met. IV may more or less be taken as a mainstay of Aristotelian thinking. There are, however, some notorious ambiguities of this teaching. Categories seems to conceive of individual substances, or “thises” (τόδε τι), as the basic objects of meaning, even describing εἴδη* and γένη* as “secondary οὐσίαι” as compared to the “primary οὐσίαι” that populate the immediately evident sensible world. Metaphysics VII, however, beginning from the proposition that substance must be either a genus (γένος*), a subject (ὑποκείμενον), a universal (καθόλου*), or an essence (τί ἦν εἶναι*), goes on to argue that substances are essences, but essences hold of species (εἴδη*), not individuals. Whether then substances are for Aristotle the immediate, “separate” objects of sense perception or rather the forms of which these individuals are members, has stirred some fairly continuous debate among scholars. A substance is something the account (λόγος*) of which is a definition

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS (ὁρισμός*). Thus attributes of substances are all καθ᾽ αὑτό* or “essential” attributes; whether this individual human being has brown or red hair is not part of her substance but an “accident” (κατὰ συμβεβηκός*). All the affections (πάθη*) and other attributes of a substance have their existence and being “in reference to” (πρός) substance. Thus it is on substances that the existence of all else depends. Substances themselves are “separate.” In addition to Met. VII, Met. XII may be regarded as a meditation on substance. There Aristotle asks what sorts of οὐσίαι there are, and goes on to argue there are three sorts: sensible, changeable οὐσίαι; sensible, unchangeable οὐσίαι (like the planets); and (a) non-sensible, unchangeable οὐσία(ι), the unmoved mover or movers (on which see θεός*). The Aristotelian cosmic order rests on the balance and relations achieved between these several things.

describes them as causing differences in judgment, and it is toward them that the orator should direct her arguments. In a sense affects are thus for Aristotle the medium of human discourse. Aristotle has an extended discussion of particular affects in Rhet. II.2–11. περιπέτεια (peripeteia) n. reversal

πάθος, πάσχειν (pathos, paschein) n. affect, affection, occurrence; v. to be affected, to undergo, to suffer Affects play two roles in Aristotle’s thinking—a metaphysical and a psychological role. In the metaphysical context, an affect is the capacity to be altered, or the undergoing of that alteration itself (on which, see especially Met. V.21). In this regard, since affects are characteristics of things rather than things themselves, affects share many of the features of “accidents” (see συμβεβηκός*). Πάθη play, on the other hand, an essential role in Aristotle’s psychology, and in that role constitute an important centralizing node for Aristotelian inquiry into discourse, ethics, and rhetoric. Now affections are just, broadly speaking, movements or principles of movements in the soul (ψυχή*). In Rhet. II.1, Aristotle

Περιπέτεια is an essential ingredient of tragedy, as defined in Poetics 6; it bears on a transition of circumstances, relative to some action, to the contrary of what was intended by the action. Thus in Poetics 11 Aristotle defines περιπέτεια as a process by which an action is changed into its opposite; the process, he stresses, must however, if the tragedy is to be successful, be effected probably or necessarily. The best sort of tragedy, he claims, is one in which the reversal happens at the same time as the “recognition” (see ἀναγνώρισις*). ποίησις, ποιεῖν (poie-sis, poiein) n. production, making; v. to produce, to make, to act, to do In general use, ποεῖν may mean either “to produce” or “to act”—this lack of distinction persists generally in Greek. However, Aristotle himself distinguishes fairly starkly between production and action—on which, see πρᾶξις* below. According to that distinction, πρᾶξις and ποίησις are both sorts of movements effected for the sake of something, and differ as their “principle” (ἀρχή*) is either internal (in the case of “action”) or external (in the case of “production”). Ποίησις is action for the sake of producing some product. Aristotle uses ποίησις generally to mean “production” or “action.”

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS Aristotle in NE VI.5, in the context of describing φρόνησις, draws a distinction between action and production (see ποίησις*) in an immediately helpful, albeit perhaps eventually tenuous, way: the purpose or end (τέλος*) of production is something other than production itself; whereas actions’ ends are contained in the actions themselves. Thus, whereas while “producing” (ποιεῖν) something one is effecting a product external to oneself, and this product, or the further product to which the product is directed, is the intended goal, in the case of action the goal is the action itself; the good of the action is simply to do the action. Inquiring after what sort of knowledge expertise vis-à-vis either object entails, as well as where to draw the line between an external and an immanent good, this distinction may be seen to wobble somewhat. Πρακτικός is an adjective Aristotle uses to describe generally that part of the rational soul that reasons about what may be otherwise, that is, the contingent. Synonymously he will use the adjective λογιστικός. (See, for example, NE VI.1.) These he opposes to θεωρετικός (on which see θεωρία*). Whatever the psychological fixity of this opposition, and whatever broader fixity there is in the “practical-theoretical” distinction, in describing θεωρία as a kind of “life” (βίος*), Aristotle describes it as “practical” (see Pol. VII.3). See further θεωρία*, φρόνησις*.

However, internal to the rhetorical works—Poetics and Rhetoric—ποίησις will frequently take on the meaning particular to “poetry,” always referring to spoken poetry; for the same purpose he will use the adjective ποιητικός, although this again is not restricted to poetry. See πρᾶξις*. πόλις (polis) n. city, polis According to the first lines of Pol., a πόλις is a kind of community, and a community bound with a view to some good; inasmuch as the good pursued by a city comprehends the individual goods of each of its citizens, a πόλις would seem to be constituted with a view to the most comprehensive good of all. Though having its origin in the need humans have for one another, its goal is the realization, through some common “effort” (ἔργον*), of not a mere but a good life. Pol. III, the more specific discussion of what it is to be a city, thus takes as essentially related and co-determining the notions of city and of citizen (πολίτης). A citizen is someone who has a share in the deliberative practices of a city, and a city is a “multitude of such citizens sufficing for self-sufficiency of life” (Pol. III.1). Cities differ in kind as their πολιτεῖαι, “constitutions,” differ, and their πολιτεῖαι differ in accordance with the allotment of sovereign power (τὸ κύριον)—whether it is to one person or a few or many (Pol. III.6). Aristotle stresses that there is no meaningful distinction between the constitutions of a city and the acts committed by those to whom the constitutions allot power (Pol. III.7).

προαίρεσις (proairesis or prohairesis) n. choice, decision “Decision” is twofold. It may be concrete or universal. It is concretely that act by which one selects, from a previously deliberated-upon spectrum of possible means, some one determinate means in order to effect a goal previously wished

πρᾶξις, πράττειν (praxis, prattein) n. action, performance; v. to act, to do 372

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS or “thoughtful,” person is a sort of moral model in Aristotelian ethics. Thus Aristotle will frequently say things on the order that one should strive to care for those things for which the serious care; act in the way that the serious act; desire what the serious desire; find pleasure in what pleases the serious; and so on. That is, it is in light of this ideal representation of “thoughtfulness” that Aristotle constructs ethical imperatives. Comparable methodological claims like that, in order to understand φρόνησις*, we should look to φρόνιμοι (people exhibiting φρόνησις) (NE VI) evidence the nature of the connection. For a description of the σπουδαῖος (here as a model of friendship), see NE IX.4; on the link between seriousness and happiness, see NE X.6.

for. More broadly speaking, it is the selection of some way of life, that is, a universal presentation of one’s goals and commitments. (On the former, see especially NE III.2; but see III.3.) In NE VI.2, Aristotle defines decision as a confluence of desire (ὄρεξις*) and intellect (νοῦς*). It is that act in which one directs one’s actions under the influence simultaneously of clarity about the correct goals toward which to direct one’s actions; perspicuity in the perception of means to effect them; and a clear desire to effect this goal by these means. See further ὄρεξις* and νοῦς*. πρός τι (pros ti) n. relative, relation; adj. relative What is πρός τι—literally “toward something”—stands in some manner of relation to something else. For that reason it is fairly universally translated “relation,” “relative,” or similar. Now this second thing may contribute to the being of that thing; it may be entirely extraneous to that thing; or its account may depend on the account of that thing. In Met. V.15, Aristotle distinguishes then between things that relate to (or “are πρός”) another thing inasmuch as they are inflections of it (as 2 is an inflection of 1, or unity); or inasmuch as they have some past relation essential to their existence or meaning (as father relates to son); or because their meaning relates immediately to something else (as thinkable relates to thought or intellect).

σοφία (sophia) n. wisdom, expertise; eq. L n. sapientia “Wisdom” is an intellectual virtue in Aristotle that suffers from over-clarification. It is described in two places chiefly, Met. I and NE VI, and in both places under a heap of technical vocabulary. For example, in the latter, it is characterized simply as “understanding and intellect of what is naturally most honorable” (NE VI.7). Thus clarity about wisdom will turn on clariy about νοῦς* and ἐπιστήμη*. In Met. I it is called “knowledge of first principles and causes,” so that its sense will fluctuate depending on the epistemological and metaphysical meanings one attributes to ἀρχή* and αἰτία* here. Wisdom to be sure is one of the ways in which Aristotle characterizes the activities of happiness (NE X), and his question whether φρόνησις* or σοφία* is most typical of human excellence is answered in favor of the latter.

σπουδαῖος (spoudaios) n. a serious person; adj. serious Seriousness in Aristotle means deliberateness in purpose, and nuance in execution; and the σπουδαῖος, “serious” 373

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS Curious about Aristotle’s conception of σοφία is the way in which, although he fairly strictly assigns it to the part of the rational soul by which one thinks what cannot be otherwise (i.e. what is necessary), he describes it in ways suggestive of continuity with practical forms of intellectual virtue (but see also νοῦς*). The NE VI.7 discussion begins with a characterization of σοφία that sounds identical to τέχνη; and in Met. I.1–2 he characterizes σοφία as linked in important ways to the forms of knowledge attendant on manual labor and the history of the development of the sciences out of the progress of knowledge in technical and industrial enterprise. Σοφία as characterized in Met. I.1–2 is, it should be noted, likely Aristotle’s nearest characterization of the business of (πρώτη) φιλοσοφία, “(first) philosophy,” strictly speaking. See NE VI.7, X.6–7; and Met. I.1–2; and, further, ἐπιστήμη*, εὐδαιμονία*, νοῦς*, τέχνη*, φρόνησις*.

στοιχεῖον (stoicheion) n. element; eq. L n. elementum “Elements” are those things the composition of which constitutes some ordered or otherwise coherent whole. In Met. V.1 Aristotle defines a στοιχεῖον first as “that primary, immanent, specifically indivisible thing from which something is composed.” It is essential to being an “element” not only to be “basic” or “primary,” but also to be “immanent” (see ἀρχή*). In a “metaphorical” second sense, an element is sometimes called that which is contained in “all or most things” in the universe. In every case, in any event, an “element” is “the primary immanent thing” from which a whole is composed (see also DC III.3). In Aristotle’s theory of matter, an “element” is a simple, indivisible body into which a composite body may be divided but that cannot be divided into other bodies except of an identical sort; further, the elements possess natural dispositions for one of the simple movements—up, down, or in a circle—toward their “natural place.” Thus elements may exist either actually or potentially in composite bodies; they come about through mutual interaction. For the details of this theory, see GC II.1–8 and DC III. See αἰτία*, ἀρχή*.

στέρησις (stere-sis) n. privation A privation is generally a lack, and specifically of attributes relevant to the form or genus (εἶδος*, γένος*) of the thing to which the privation refers, and differing in sort according as the inherence of the attribute in members exhibiting the form or genus itself differs in kind. Thus Aristotle distinguishes four sorts of privation in Met. V.22, corresponding to four ways in which something might be said to belong to a member of a group as a member of the group. Humans are thus not “deprived” of the ability to fly properly speaking; but a blind adult human being is properly speaking “deprived” of sight. See also Met. X.4.

συλλογισμός (sullogismos) n. syllogism, deduction, inference, argument Aristotle’s use of συλλογισμός evidences a meaning wider than that of the transliteral “syllogism”; contemporary use of expressions such as “deduction,” “argument,” or “inference” grasps the broader sense. Συλλογισμοί have at least two terms and are propositional; characteristic of συλλογισμοί is the entailment relation 374

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS Aristotle it is thus inessential (οὐ καθ᾽ αὑτό) to (because not distinguishing of) being human.

exhibited between these terms. Thus Aristotle defines a συλλογισμός in Top. I.1 as “a λόγος in which, certain things being laid down, something follows from [or ‘is entailed by’] them necessarily.” “Demonstrations” (ἀποδείξεις*) are that species of inference in which the “things laid down” are first principles (see ἀρχή*; and further APo I.2). “Inference” is moreover opposed to ἐπαγωγή*, “induction” (Top. I.12), although the latter is sometimes treated as a species of inference. The difference in any event seems to have to do not with the nature of the relation of terms but with the modality of the inference; for inductions do not hold of necessity. Roughly speaking, APr is a theory of συλλογισμός; APo is a theory of ἀπόδειξις. See further ἀπόδειξις* and ἐπαγωγή* above.

τὸ συνεχές, συνεχής (to suneches, suneche-s) n. continuity, continuum; adj. continuous A number of Aristotle’s teachings touch on or allude to his conception of continuity—among them not only claims in the physical domain but in the grammatical and logical domains as well. Continuity is distinct from a number of seemingly related notions, and especially “simultaneity” (being in the same place or time); “separateness” (non-simultaneity); “succession” (coming one after another); and “consecutiveness” (contiguous succession). Continuity is like consecutiveness, the difference being that what is consecutive is divisible into constituting parts, whereas what is continuous is “indivisible.” On which, see, for example, Phys. V.3 and VII.1; and Met. X.12.

συμβεβηκός, κατὰ συμβεβηκός (sumbebe-kos, kata sumbebe-kos) n. accident; adj. incidental What is κατὰ συμβεβηκός is “incidental” to something; it does not belong among those attributes descriptive of what the thing is καθ᾽ αὑτό*. It is crucial to distinguish between what is “essential” in the latter sense from what is necessary. For example, the color of the flesh of a human being is for Aristotle an entirely “incidental” feature of a human being, but it is of course entirely necessary that humans have skin and that this skin have some color. And there are of course plenty of “incidental” characteristics that are necessarily characteristics of this or that sort of thing; they rank as “incidental” rather than “essential” owing chiefly to the fact that they are not distinctive. For example, having skin, and having skin color, is a feature not only of human beings, but also of much animal life; for

τέλος (telos) n. end, purpose; eq. L n. finis The notion of a τέλος, and in particular of an “end” of a movement, is a central notion in Aristotle; it has two main meanings. In the first place, it is used to mean the end, strictly, of a movement, that is, the point at which the movement arrives when the movement is completed. Another, wider usage is connected to the sense of “purpose”: A τέλος in this sense is “that for the sake of which” (τὸ οὗ ἕνεκα) the movement is undertaken. This may be understood either as (1) a projection on the part of a practical agent (in the sense in which σκόπος, “target,” is used in the opening of NE), where the τέλος of the action (πρᾶξις*) is simply the explicit 375

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS however, note, Aristotle also stresses, as again in NE VI.4, that the domain of τέχνη is coterminous with that of chance (see τύχη*), which he frequently opposes to nature and purpose. See further ἀρετή*, ποίησις*, φρόνησις*.

intended goal of the agent acting; or (2) as an end conduced to “by nature” (φύσει). Thus Aristotle argues in Phys. II that φύσις* is most closely associated with the final cause; for it is that under the influence of which natural movements are directed toward natural “ends.” τέχνη (techne-) n. art, craft, know-how

τί ἦν εἶναι (ti e-n einai) n. essence, what it was to be; eq. L n. essentia The unwieldy phrase, τὸ τί ἦν εἶναι— literally, “the what it was to be”—is an Aristotelian neologism and an obscure one. It is only a slight exaggeration to say that its translation into Latin as essentia—which is identical in sense to οὐσία—is the single most damning blunder of Latin translators of Aristotle. In Met. VII.4–6 Aristotle no doubt identifies οὐσία* and τί ἦν εἶναι. He there also restricts its scope, claiming that only a “species of a genus” will have an essence. This identification however does little to clarify the expression itself. Discussion of the meaning of the expression has centered on the imperfect ἦν, with three views generally offered: that ἦν indicates (1) the imperfect or ongoing aspect of the being of οὐσίαι; (2) the historical past of οὐσίαι as an essential feature of what it is to be them; and (3) what is logically or naturally prior about οὐσίαι as an essential determination of what it is to be them. Aristotle does not seem to distinguish between the expression τί ἦν εἶναι and the expression τί ἐστι (“what [it] is,” or “what is it?”); and translators frequently render both as “essence.” Aristotle’s own usage certainly suggests some proximity of meaning. Consensus suggests there is no distinction. See ὄν*, οὐσία*.

Τέχνη is one of the intellectual virtues; it is virtue, according to NE VI.4, in reasoning correctly about how to make something. Thus it belongs to the class of intellectual virtues dealing with things that may be otherwise, and more particularly with things that are “up to us,” that is, belonging to the domain of things subject to change through human effort. Just as production (ποίησις*) is opposite action (πρᾶξις*), τέχνη, which is intellectual virtue with respect to making, is opposite φρόνησις*, intellectual virtue with respect to acting. Aristotle frequently analogizes nature and art, and most evidently in Phys. II. His reasons generally are that both nature and art are purposive (i.e. act toward an end) and that both nature and art begin causal processes by the positing of a form (εἶδος*) and then proceed to assign to the realization of the form requisite material supports and configurations (see ὕλη*). The meaning of this analogy may be taken in a number of ways. It may mean, among other possibilities, that (1) Aristotle understands nature merely on the model of art (or “reduces” nature to art); (2) Aristotle understands art as a conspicuous example of natural processes; or (3) knowledge pertaining to art contains knowledge of nature put to work in the manipulation of nature. In contrast 376

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS τόδε τι (tode ti) n. this, this something, some this The expression τόδε τι means literally, “this something,” where “this” (τόδε) has indexical force. Supposing the Aristotelian treatises were originally intended as lecture notes, it has been conjectured that τόδε τι might have entailed something performative, that is, an actual act of pointing. The importance of the expression has to do with Aristotle’s use of it to characterize the features bearing on the “individuals” forming the basic primitives of the Aristotelian universe. Thus in Met. VII.3 Aristotle treats τόδε τι as a feature belonging characteristically to substances (οὐσίαι*); they are, as the phrase is usually translated, “individual.” In Cat. 5 Aristotle seems to suggest that substance and τόδε τι have the same “meaning” (σημαίνειν). See, further, οὐσία*.

chance relates only to what occurs as a result of “decision” (προαίρεσις*); for, absent decision, there is no contingency with regard to the means for the accomplishment of some goal. See τὸ οὗ ἕνεκα, φύσις*. ὕλη (hule-) n. matter; eq. L n. materia “Matter” for Aristotle is not a thing but an aspect of a thing; it is a principle explanatory of movement or change (κίνησις*, μεταβολή*). As such a cause or principle, matter, in one way of summarizing the matter, is explanatory of changes of two sorts: those incidental to substances (e.g. skin changing color) and those necessary to the fulfillment of some function (of a kind of substance) (e.g. the joints, ligaments, muscles, etc. necessary for standing upright). It is along these two lines that Aristotle extensively has recourse to the identification of matter with potentiality (see δύναμις* above). Matter constitutes one of the basic ways for the accounting of change relative to substances, then, along with form (see εἶδος*) (which provides a kind of blueprint) and privation (see στέρησις*) (which is that from which such changes proceed, but that is extinguished by them)—on all of which, see Met. XII.2–5. Thus Aristotle’s definitions of matter in Phys. and Met. (e.g. Phys. I.9; Met. VII.3) present matter generally as that “from which” (ἐξ οὗ) a change occurs, which “remains” or “is left over” after the change has occurred. Matter enjoys a strange relation with the notion in Aristotle of individualization. His frequent claim that matter is “not a this” (i.e. not τόδε τι*) (see, for example, Met. XII.3), given his claim that substances, that is, “thises,” are precisely those things from and to which

τύχη (tuche-) n. chance, fate, fortune Aristotle discusses chance and spontaneity (τὸ αὐτόματον) in Phys. I.4–6 as part of a larger attempt to outline exhaustively what are the kinds of causes of natural change (see φύσίς* and αἰτία*). The attempt in itself is provocative, as Aristotle frequently opposes chance to nature. Having in the preceding chapters outlined the four Aristotelian causes, Aristotle proceeds to explain that chance and spontaneity are not causes on a par with those four—they are not equivalently basic—but rather accidents of them. Thus Aristotle groups chance under the cause for-the-sake-of-which (τὸ οὗ ἕνεκα), claiming that for something to appear to be “by chance” is for it to conflict with some other projected outcome. Now for this reason, secondly, 377

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS all changes proceed (see, for example, Met. IV.2; and οὐσία* above), perhaps seems prima facie to pair oddly with this notion; for it would seem that matter is in some sense most basic to change at all. This is the difficulty articulated in Met. VII.3: that on the view that substance is what remains when all other determinations are stripped away, matter is substance. The response in brief is to claim that the “ultimate substrate,” that is, the “matter,” of a thing is not individuated, whereas substances must be. Some decades ago a somewhat rancorous debate emerged, or reemerged, concerning the question of so-called prime matter in Aristotle. Traditionally prime (πρώτη, “first”), as opposed to proximate (ἐσχάτη, “last”), matter has been taken as the antipode in the Aristotelian universe to the prime mover (see θεός* above); the latter being pure actuality, the former pure potentiality. One of the chief reasons for positing the existence of prime matter has to do with accounting for elemental change. For, since one of the conditions of change is that something persists, although the elements serve as that persisting subject in all other physical changes, the change from one to another element requires some yet-more basic subject—incipit prime matter, “stuff” completely free of all properties except that of openness to determination. The arguments surrounding this question concern GC I.4 and II.4 and Met. VII.3. Detractors note, however, that Aristotle nowhere uses an expression like “prime matter” in this sense (where he does use it is, with slightly different salience, in Met. IV.4 and IX.7), and that he explicitly rejects such a doctrine (see, for example, GC I.3). Moreover, it seems to contradict basic Aristotelian tenets about matter, such as one already mentioned, that matter, although not a “this,” is always particular.

While in the preponderance of Aristotelian usages matter is spoken of in reference to sensible substances, Aristotle in some places refers to “intelligible (νοητική) matter” or similar; see especially Met. VII.10. See δύναμις*, εἶδος*, ἐνέργεια*. ὑπάρχειν (huparchein) v. to inhere, to be an attribute of, to exist Aristotle has two main uses for the verb ὑπάρχειν. They are (1) to indicate the inherence of an attribute A in a subject B or (2) to indicate, simply, the existence of something. In general, τὰ ὑπάρχοντα in Aristotle mean “attributes.” An expression like τὸ Α ὑπάρχει τῷ Β, used extensively, for example, in APr and APo, means “A inheres in B,” “A belongs to B,” or “A is an attribute of B.” It is in the various modes of such inherence or belonging that a number of essential relations are described by Aristotle. For example, what is universal “belongs (ὑπάρχῃ) to every instance [of a kind of thing] essentially and as such” (APo I.4; see καθόλου*). φαντασία (phantasia) n. imagination, representation, presentation Along with αἴσθησις* and νοῦς*, φαντασία constitutes one of the modes of perception or “discerning” (κρινεῖν) discussed in DA II–III, and specifically in DA III.3. In the culmination of this discussion Aristotle defines imagination very broadly as “a movement resulting from an actual sensation.” The use Aristotle makes of φαντασία— and of the “images” (φαντάσματα) said to be imagination’s objects—is fairly wide-ranging and essential. In the first place thinking (νοεῖν*) and judgment 378

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS or belief (ὑπόληψις) generally are said to be impossible without images (DA III.7). The meaning of this connection may be taken in either of two ways, the first being that thinking itself consists in part in the generation of an image (see, for example, De Mem. 1). It may be taken also to indicate the means by which perceptible contents, later to be forged into universals, are “conveyed” from sensation via memory and experience, that is, as an “image” retained (see, for example, APo II.19; Met. I.1). Aristotle’s understanding of memory indeed relies heavily on his understanding of φαντασία. In other animals moreover imagination is a sort of surrogate for νοῦς, that is, as a proto-calculative means of planning (see DA III.10; De Motu 6). See αἴσθησις* and νοῦς*.

The role and standing of φρόνησις in NE has left many the scholar confused. Consider Aristotle’s claim that human happiness consists in the achievement of characteristically human virtues, and characteristically human virtues bear not only on the development of intellectual virtue but also on character (ἦθος*) of the sort to yield to the promptings of the intellect (see NE I.6–7). From this it follows that the achievement of happiness consists in the cultivation not only of intellectual virtues but also of virtues of character, for which action—indeed, right action—is necessary (see, for example, NE II.1). Inasmuch as φρόνησις demands intellectual acumen as well as good character (see NE VI.12), and moreover as the other intellectual virtues demand φρόνησις (NE VI.13), it might seem the “highest,” that is, fullest, intellectual virtue is precisely that of φρόνησις—but Aristotle in NE X argues that the achievement of “wisdom” (σοφια*) rather than φρόνησις constitutes happiness in the highest degree (see NE X.7). See ἀρετή*, ἐπιστήμη*, εὐδαιμονία*, νοῦς*, σοφία*, τέχνη*.

φρόνησις (phrone-sis) n. prudence, practical wisdom; eq. L n. prudentia Aristotle’s use of the term is somewhat idiosyncratic and technical. Φρόνησις, “prudence” or “practical wisdom,” is one of the intellectual virtues (see ἀρετή*)— and discussed in NE VI.5 most programmatically—specifically having to do with the “practical” (πρακτικός) as opposed to the “theoretical” part of the rational soul. Two distinctions relevant to the determination of φρόνησις may be noted here—that its domain consists in what is “up to us” rather than not (see ἐπιστήμη* and σοφία*) and that it is concerned with what can be accomplished by means of action (πρᾶξις*) rather than through production (ποίησις*) (see τέχνη*). Thus practical wisdom is an intellectual virtue “concerning human goods,” that is, in the achievement of human happiness through action (NE VI.5).

φύσις (phusis) n. nature, essence, origin, growth, appearance; eq. L n. natura In his discussion of φύσις in Met. V.4 Aristotle distinguishes six senses. Of these the fundamental sort is the fifth sort, “the οὐσία* of those things that have a principle of movement and rest in themselves as themselves.” For each of the other ways of speaking of nature refers in some way to this sort: matter because its features derive from such things; “generation” and “growth” because they are movements from or toward or otherwise relative to such things. 379

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS Of central significance in Aristotle’s notion of nature is its distinction from “chance” (τύχη*) and “art” (τέχνη*). What exists “by nature” (φύσει) “seems to have within itself a principle of movement and rest” (Phys. II.1). (See τύχη* and τέχνη* in this respect.) Thus non-natural things, qua non-natural, “have no innate impulse to change.” “Nature” is this “innate” impulse and principle; what “has a nature” has such an impulse and principle. It is essential further to distinguish between, again along the lines of the Phys. II.1 account, (1) “[what is] [a] nature” (φύσις) and “[what] has [a] nature” (ἔχει φύσιν), on the one hand, from (2) being “natural” (φύσει) or being “naturally” (κατὰ φύσιν) thus and so, on the other. Thus, although the material constituents of artifacts (e.g. since they are composed of certain “elements” [see στοιχεῖον*]) may exhibit something like the “innate impulse” of “what is [or ‘has’] a nature,” the artifacts themselves exhibit such features not qua themselves (καθ᾽ αὑτά*), only “incidentally” (κατὰ συμβεβηκός*) (see again Phys. II.1). For the artifacts only “happen” (τετύχηκε, συμβέβηκεν) to be composed of these materials. The term “nature” applies, finally, to the form (εἶδος*) rather, or more properly or strictly, than to the matter (ὕλη*) of a thing (see Phys. II.1). For matter exhibits features characteristic of “(a) nature” only to the extent that these characteristics derive from a form. Moreover, the various ways in which nature is spoken of refer in some way to this conception, that is, of nature as the form of a natural thing, or as the inherent principle of movement these natural things possess inasmuch as they are natural. Nature, either in this or in a broader sense, is for Aristotle a cause generally of order (τᾶξις).

See Phys. II.1 especially, and Met. V.4; moreover see εἶδος*, κίνησις*, ὕλη*, τέλος*. φωνή, φωνεῖν (pho-ne-, pho-nein) n. sound, voice; v. to make a sound According to the discussion of sound and hearing in DA II.8, φωνή is “a sort of sound of the living (ἔμψυκος).” Lifeless things do not emit “voices” or “vocalizations,” only “noise” (ψόφος*). Not all animals however have φωνή, “voice,” for not all of them have the physiological means, that is, a respiratory system (in DA II.8 the presence of blood is also mentioned; but fish have blood); and moreover some, like fish, do not live in air, the medium of sound. Voice is the soul’s taking “breath drawn from the air” and “striking” it against the trachea (DA II.8). Requisite therefore to the production of φωνή are a soul (and the capacity for imagination), a respiratory system, and a tongue. Voice thus exhibits the peculiarity that its physiology consists in the functioning of parts otherwise necessary to the life of the organism (lungs for breathing, tongue for tasting) in ways relevant rather to the “well-being” of the organism. As a form of σημαίνειν, or “meaning,” φωνή stands halfway between ψόφος, “noise” or “sound,” and λόγος*, “articulate speech.” Thus just as Aristotle in DA characterizes φωνή as σημαντικός τις ψόφος “a sort of meaningful noise” (DA II.8), elsewhere he characterizes λόγος as φωνὴ σημαντική, “meaningful vocalization” (De Int. 4). In each case the more intricately inflected sort of articulation consists in the discerning or assignment of meaning to phenomena already differently meaningful, that is, at a simpler level. On the differences between the voices—even “dialects” or “languages” 380

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS (διάλεκτοι)—of animals, see HA IV.9; and moreover ψόφος* below. See λόγος*, ψόφος*.

ψεῦδος, ψεύδεσθαι (pseudos, pseudesthai) n. lie, deception, falsehood; v. to lie, to deceive; eq. L n. falsum; v. falsum dicere, fallere

χρόνος n. time; eq. L n. tempus

The expressions ψεῦδος and ψεύδεσθαι are closer in meaning to “deception” or “cheating” and less like “falsity” in the sense of a failure to hit upon the truth. This difference may be illustrated by the fact that falsity in the latter sense is failure and unintentional; deception and cheating are intentional. Aristotle no doubt makes use of the expression in both senses. Thus τὸ ψεῦδος in the sense of “falsity” is merely a negative phenomenon of “truth.” Frequently then Aristotle will describe truth as “saying of what it is, that it is,” and posit falsity as “opposite” or “contrary” to this (see, for example, Met. IX.10), supplying for falsity the twofold formula “saying of what is, that it is not, or of what is not, that it is” (Met. IV.7). In this sense, ψεύδεσθαι seems just one of the forms a λόγος might take, that is, inasmuch as an “account” must be “either true or false” (see λόγος*). In his exploration of the meanings of ψεῦδος in Met. V.29, Aristotle begins with its meaning—foreign to the notion of “falsity” to be sure—as “deceptive thing” (πρᾶγμα ψεῦδος). A “deceptive thing” is something that deceives either because it seems to be so and so, but is not (e.g. the diagonal seeming commensurate or you seeming to be sitting when you are not), or because it seems to be otherwise than it is or not to be at all (e.g. a drawing or a dream). “Deception” therefore is a feature of these very things; “they are in a way, but not in the way one’s imagination construes them to be.” It is in its evocation or creation of such “things,” secondly, that a λόγος is then said to be “deceptive”; for they, on a tandem with the previous distinction,

Aristotle’s discussion of time is to be found in Phys. IV.10–4. According to a precept of Phys. III.1, “nature” (φύσις*) is a principle of movement (κίνησις*), and movement is thought to be impossible without, among other attributes, time. The investigation of time in Phys. therefore connects essentially with the investigation of nature and more specifically of movement. Time according to Aristotle is “number of movement with respect to the before and after” (ἀριθμὸς κινήσεως κατὰ τὸ πρότερον καὶ ὕστερον) or, as he glosses this definition, “movement inasmuch as it admits of number” (ᾗ ἀριθμὸν ἔχει ἡ κίνησις) (Phys. IV.11). The operative notion of “number” here deserves two sorts of specification. First, it is not the intellectual operation of counting or the ideal instruments of counting (i.e. what we in English might call “numbers”: 1, 2, 3, etc.) that are meant by “number”; rather, “number” here means “what is counted,” as in quartet, which is counted by the number four; “quartet” being like “number” in the definition. Secondly, counting as it relates to Aristotle’s conception of time is not “tracking,” in the sense of saying, “one, two, three, etc.” For time consists in a form of judgment about a change, specifically with regard to the extremities of change, which relies on an anterior summary judgment about the change as one change, that is, as exhibiting at least two terms internal to which the change occurs. See ἀριθμός*, κίνησις*. 381

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS attempt to show something to be other than it is, or to exist if it does not, or not to exist if it does. By a further degree removed a “deceptive person” is someone given to such arguments. In sum, what is ψεῦδος is therefore either itself a thing that deceives or so called given its relation to such things. Imaginations (see φαντασία*) are said for the most part to be “false” and animals other than humans are said to act for the most part on the basis of imaginations (DA III.3)—this in contrast with the idea that sensations, from which imaginations are constructed, are “always true” (on which, see αἴσθησις*). Deception, or, better, the representation of a percept “before one’s eyes,” as if the thing perceived were there, where the perceiver however is not confused by this paradoxical intention, thus plays some fundamental role in animal perception. On falsity in deductions (συλλογισμοί), see APr II.2–4. Further, see ἀλήθεια*, λόγος*, φαντασία*.

may make; (2) φωνή*, which is sound emitted through the pharynx, requiring therefore a respiratory system; and (3) διάλεκτος, “the articulation (διάρθρωσις) of φωνή by the tongue,” that is, the juxtaposition of “voiced” and “unvoiced” (consonantal) sounds. Thus ψόφοι do not even constitute “names” (ὀνόματα) (De int. 2). See λόγος*, φωνή*. ψυχή (psuchē) n. soul, life; orig. breath of life; eq. L n. anima; syn. ζωή (life) Aristotle in DA I provides a historical overview of conceptions from Homer to Plato of the soul. Chief among his questions as they arise from that discussion are whether the soul has parts (about which he is ultimately skeptical: see DA III.9); whether the soul is separate from the body (he thinks it is not: see DA II.1; but see νοῦς* above); and what the functions of the soul are, with special emphasis on the soul’s role in movement (DA III.9–11) and perception (DA II.5–III.2, on αἴσθησις*; DA III.3, on φαντασία*; DA III.4–7, on νοῦς*). Characteristic of Aristotle’s own view is that, while the soul is not at all separate from the body, it is not itself a body, nor does it function as a body, in the sense championed by certain of his materialist predecessors. Aristotle’s description and definition of soul is to be found in DA II.1–2. The soul he defines as the “first actuality” of “a body potentially having life” (see ἐνέργεια*). Elsewhere he employs a number of surrogate expressions that tell the range of this idea. Two complementary expressions especially are worthy of mention: that the soul is a (or the) principle of a living being; and that the soul is a form or λόγος. By the former he means that it is “with,” “by means of,” “in,” or

ψόφος (psophos) n. sound, noise Aristotle discusses ψόφος, in the broad sense of “sound,” in DA II.8 and there defines it as “a movement of what can be moved in such a way as to rebound off smooth surfaces when it strikes them.” Sound occurs through the impact on one such body of another, and in an appropriate medium. In this psychological context, ψόφος is just the objective correlate to the perceptual capacity “hearing” (ἀκοή). In another sense ψόφος constitutes the most basic level of sound and its production. Accordingly HA IV.9 distinguishes between (1) ψόφος, which constitutes any sort of sound an animal 382

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GLOSSARY OF ARISTOTELIAN TERMS “through” (ᾧ) soul that the living being executes its characteristic functions: metabolizing, sensing, thinking, moving (for this expression, see DA II.2; but also DA I.4: “Perhaps it is better not to say that the soul pities or learns or thinks, but that the human being [pities, etc.] with the soul (τῇ ψυχῇ)”). Now it is in two senses that λόγος seems for Aristotle to relate to soul: as

relates to proportionality in the context of perception (on which, see αἴσθησις*) and as relates to account-giving of living beings or their vital functions. In this second sense the soul-as-λόγος is the equivalent of the “form” (εἶδος*) or “essence” (τί ἦν εἶναι*) of a living body. See αἴσθησις*, ἐνέργεια*, κίνησις*, νοῦς*, φαντασία*. Erick Raphael Jiménez

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CHRONOLOGY OF RECENT RESEARCH

I do not pretend that what follows is exhaustive—or, for that matter, anything but a reflection of a dominant mainstream—nor that it identifies The Most Important Works of Aristotle Scholarship in the twentieth century. The former is not possible, and the latter would be a more substantive piece of research than is appropriate here. Thinking about the temporal movement of Aristotle scholarship is of value insofar as it highlights something that might otherwise go unnoticed. That is my aim. In addition to the essays in this volume, readers interested in pursuing the themes identified here should consult Jiménez’s “Bibliography” below, which presents a greater variety of complete references. Modern and contemporary Aristotle scholarship is the result of the confluence of three factors in the mid-nineteenth century, above all in Germany: (1) Philosophy was becoming the professional academic discipline that it is today. An increasing academic workforce led to a greater division of labor, which in turn led to increasing specialization of research. (2) There was a widespread interest in making classical antiquity available to and for modernity, rooted in German Classicism and Romanticism. (3) There was institutional support, both academic and state, for philosophical and philological scholarship.

Between 1831 and 1870, under the auspices of the Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences, Immanuel Bekker published the first authoritative modern critical edition of the extant Aristotelian texts.1 Volume 5 of Bekker’s edition, published in 1870, includes Hermann Bonitz’s Index Aristotelicus, a massive index of terms and concepts keyed to Bekker’s edition. Similarly monumental work was also done on texts surrounding the Aristotelian corpus. Between 1882 and 1909, under the editorship of Hermann Diels, critical editions of the extant late ancient commentaries on the Aristotelian texts were published in 23 volumes as the Commentaria in aristotelem graeca. And in 1903, Diels published the first edition of his Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, relying in large part on the recent editions of the Aristotelian texts and commentaries to assemble evidence of Presocratic philosophy. With that stage set, Aristotle research almost immediately proliferates across a wide range of philosophical and philological concerns. Research on Aristotelian philosophy has been a point of reference, if not inspiration, for major developments in philosophy more broadly, and Aristotle scholarship more narrowly construed has tended to mirror changes in the broader philosophical landscape. In what follows, I highlight some of the most significant developments in that relationship. Rather than trying to gather them in one continuous

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CHRONOLOGY OF RECENT RESEARCH chronology—which proves impossible—I briefly track the chronology of each.

TEXTUAL CRITICISM In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, renewed interest in textual criticism produced five major series of critical editions of the Aristotelian (and other classical) texts.

available to modernity, and thus with a prominent concern with historiography and method in Aristotle scholarship in the early and mid-twentieth century. Three distinct areas of concern stand out in this respect: the ancient doxographical and biographical traditions, Aristotle’s role or status as a historian of philosophy, and Aristotle’s philosophical development. Prominent works on the ancient doxographical and biographical traditions include: Düring, I., Aristotle in the Ancient Biographical Tradition, Göteborg: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1957. Moraux, P., Les listes anciennes des ouvrages d’Aristote, Louvain: Universitaires de Louvain, 1951. Zeller, E., Die Philosophie der Griechen, 3 vols, Leipzig: R. Reisland, 1844–52.

1850s–1930s: Bibliotheca Scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana (Teubner). 1920–1960s: Collection Budé (Budé). Includes facing-page French translations. 1920s–1960s: Critical editions with substantial introductions and notes published by Oxford University at the Clarendon Press. 1950s–1960s: Scriptorum Classicorum Bibliotheca Oxoniensis (Oxford Classical Texts). 1920s–1970s: Loeb Classical Library. Includes facing-page English translations, but does not include a critical apparatus.

See also Moraux’s study of Aristotelianism between the first century bce and the second century ce: Moraux, P., Der Aristotelismus bei den Griechen, 3 vols, Berlin: de Gruyter, 1973, 1984, and 2001.

That progression also tracks a more general shift in the relative prominence from German-language scholarship, to French, and then to English. And, for the most part, those are the texts we read today.2

HISTORY AND HISTORIOGRAPHY Interest in getting the Aristotelian texts right—or at least getting them in print in an authoritative version—overlapped with the broader interest in making classical antiquity

More recently, The Ancient Commentators Project (1987–present), led by Richard Sorabji, has been publishing English translations of the commentaries edited in Diels’ Commentaria in Aristotelem graeca, making the late ancient commentary traditions available to a wider audience.3 Given that the Aristotelian texts and commentaries on them are one of the primary sources for information about early Greek philosophy, Aristotle’s role or status as a historian of philosophy also became a crucial issue in this period. Perhaps most

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CHRONOLOGY OF RECENT RESEARCH notable here are Harold Cherniss’ criticisms of Aristotle in two works: Cherniss, H., Aristotle’s Criticism of Presocratic Philosophy, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University, 1935. —, Aristotle’s Criticism of Plato and the Academy, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1944. Prominent responses to the issues raised by Cherniss’ arguments include: Furley, D. and R. E. Allen (eds), Studies in Presocratic Philosophy, 2 vols, London: Routledge, 1970 and 1975. Guthrie, W. K. C., “Aristotle as a Historian of Philosophy: Some Preliminaries,” The Journal of Hellenic Studies, 77.1 (1957), 35–41. McDiarmid, J. B., “Theophrastus on the Presocratic Causes,” Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, 61 (1953), 35–41. Mansion, S. (ed.), Aristote et les problèmes de méthode, Louvain: Publications Universitaires de Louvain, 1961. The third major area of research driven by historical and historiographical concerns was Aristotle’s philosophical development— above all, his relationship to Plato and Platonic thought—and thus the relationship among various parts of the Aristotelian corpus. Two works by Werner Jaeger were decisive in establishing this as a, if not the, central issue: Jaeger, W., Studien zur Entstehungsgeschichte der Metaphysik der Aristoteles, Berlin: Weidmann, 1912.

—, Aristoteles, Grundlegung einer Geschichte seiner Entwicklung, Berlin: Weidmann, 1923. Of the mountain of research responding to Jaeger’s arguments, I note just the following:4 Arnim, H. von, Zur Entstehungsgeschichte der aristotelischen Politik. Die drei aristotelischen Ethiken. Arius Didymus’ Abriss der peripatetischen Ethik, Vienna and Leipzig: Hölder-Pichler-Tempsky, 1924–6. —, Eudemische Ethik und Metaphysik, Vienna and Leipzig: Hölder-Pichler-Tempsky, 1928. —, Die Entstehung der Gotteslehre der Aristoteles, Vienna: Wiener Akademie der Wissenschaft, 1931. Aubenque, P., Le problème de l’être chez Aristote, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1962. Guthrie, W. K. C., “The Development of Aristotle’s Theology,” Classical Quarterly, 27–8 (1933–4); 27: 162–71, 28: 90–8. Mansion, A., “La genèse de l’Oeuvre d’Aristote,” Revue Néoscolastique de Philosophie, 29 (1927), 307–41. Owens, J., The Doctrine of Being in the Aristotelian Metaphysics, Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 1951. Solmsen, F., Die Entwicklung der Aristotelischen Logik und Rhetorik, Berlin: Weidmann, 1929. More recently, see: Gerson, L., Aristotle and Other Platonists, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2005. Wians, W. (ed.), Aristotle’s Philosophical Development: Problems and Prospects, Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 1996.

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CHRONOLOGY OF RECENT RESEARCH TWENTIETH-CENTURY PHILOSOPHY (I) Of course, research into the origins and development of Aristotle’s thinking was not the only thing going on in the first half of the twentieth century. The broader philosophical landscape was changing dramatically, and changes in the focus of Aristotle scholarship tended to mirror those broader changes. PHENOMENOLOGY Growing dissatisfaction with traditional metaphysics led to two major developments in European philosophy at the beginning of the twentieth century: phenomenology and analytic philosophy. In the phenomenological tradition, two works by Franz Brentano played an early crucial role: Brentano, F., Die Psychologie des Aristoteles, insbesondere seine Lehre vom Nous Poietikos, Mainz: F. Kirchheim, 1867. —, Aristoteles und seine Weltanschauung, Leipzig: Quelle & Meyer, 1911. Brentano’s influence on Edmund Husserl, and on Martin Heidegger, is well documented. Heidegger’s readings of, and lectures on, Aristotle in the 1920s and 1930s had a dramatic impact on both Heidegger’s thinking, and on the trajectory of European philosophy. Their impact on Aristotle scholarship, though, was more mediated. In part, this is because many of those influenced by Heidegger’s work on Aristotle (e.g. Hannah Arendt, Hans Jonas, Jacob Klein, Leo Strauss, Hans-Georg Gadamer) did not go on to work primarily as Aristotle scholars. In part, as well, this is because most of Heidegger’s work on Aristotle took the form of lecture courses delivered at the Universities of Marburg and

Freiburg in the 1920s and 1930s, which were only edited and published a half-century later. Nevertheless, that tradition had a significant impact on Aristotle scholarship, particularly in France. See in particular: Aubenque, P., Le problème de l’être chez Aristote, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1962. —, La prudence chez Aristote, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1963. Brague, R., Du temps chez Platon et Aristote, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1982. —, Aristote et la question du monde, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1988. ANALYTIC PHILOSOPHY Under the imprecise heading of analytic philosophy, I here mean three more specific developments. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, philosophical and mathematical logic—often taken to have gone largely unchanged since Aristotle and then Kant—underwent radical and far-reaching transformations. Here, too, Aristotle was a point of reference for the broader changes, and Aristotle scholarship responded. See: Ackrill, J. L., Aristotle’s Categories and De Interpretatione, Oxford: Clarendon, 1961. Berti, E. (ed.), Aristotle on Science: The Posterior Analytics, Rome: Editrice Antenore, 1981. Hintikka, J., Time and Necessity, Oxford: Clarendon, 1973. LeBlond, J. M., Logique et méthode chez Aristote, Paris: Vrin, 1939. Łukasiewicz, J., O Zasadzie Sprzeczno´sci u Arystotelesa (On the Principle of

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CHRONOLOGY OF RECENT RESEARCH classical American pragmatism. See, for example:

Contradiction in Aristotle), Kraków: Akademia Umiejętności, 1910. —, Aristotle’s Syllogistic from the Standpoint of Modern Formal Logic, Oxford: Clarendon, 1951. Solmsen, F., Die Entwicklung der Aristotelischen Logik und Rhetorik, Berlin: Weidmann, 1929. What came to be known as ordinary language philosophy had a similar, if briefer, impact. On which see: Austin, J. L., “A Plea for Excuses,” in Philosophical Papers, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1961, 123–92. Nussbaum, M., “Saving Aristotle’s Appearances,” in Language and Logos: Studies in Ancient Greek Philosophy, ed. M. Schofield and M. Nussbaum, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982, 240–63. Owen, G. E. L., “Tithenai ta phainomena,” in Aristote et les problèmes de méthode, ed. S. Mansion, Louvain: Publications Universitaires de Louvain, 1961, 83–103.

Anton, J. (ed.), Naturalism and Historical Understanding: Essays on the Philosophy of John Herman Randall, Jr., Albany, NY: SUNY, 1967. Dewey, J., Experience and Nature, Chicago: Open Court, 1925. Long, C. P., Aristotle on the Nature of Truth, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Randall, Jr., J. H., Nature and Historical Experience, New York: Columbia University, 1958. —, Aristotle, New York: Columbia University, 1960. Woodbridge, F. J. E., Aristotle’s Vision of Nature, New York: Columbia University, 1965. —, An Essay on Nature, New York: Columbia University, 1940.

TWENTIETH-CENTURY PHILOSOPHY (II)

And, more generally, as emphasis on the (formal) logical analysis of arguments came to dominate philosophical method, especially in England, that method, perhaps more than any specific thematic concern, gained a similar prominence in Aristotle scholarship. Examples are too numerous to list. PRAGMATISM Although American pragmatism and naturalism have not been as prominent as other Anglo and European traditions in the twentieth century, nor had the same impact on Aristotle scholarship, Aristotle played an analogous role as a point of reference in

The past half-century of research in and around the Aristotelian texts has, in one way, continued the pattern of the first half of the twentieth century. There has been an even greater division of academic labor, and thus even greater specialization of research. Aristotle continues to be a prominent point of reference for philosophy more broadly, and Aristotle scholarship more narrowly continues to largely mirror changes in that broader landscape. In another way, though, increasing specialization and differentiation have led to a nonlinear proliferation of research that may mark a qualitative change. For further references to work of the last half-century, see Jiménez’s “Bibliography” below. I here limit myself to three prominent

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CHRONOLOGY OF RECENT RESEARCH trajectories, namely, those in ethics, philosophy of mind, and philosophy of biology. ETHICS Interest in Aristotelian ethics never fully disappeared. But as far as a broader philosophical interest in Aristotle’s ethics is concerned, a major shift is marked by the emergence in the mid-twentieth century of what became known as virtue ethics as an alternative to broadly Kantian and utilitarian ethical theories. See:

from philosophy of language and epistemology to philosophy of mind.6 As debates consolidated around various types of physicalism and functionalism, Aristotle’s potential contributions to the conversation came to the fore, most notably in works such as:

Anscombe, G. E. M., “Modern Moral Philosophy,” Philosophy, 33.124 (1958), 1–19. Foot, P., Natural Goodness, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001. Hursthouse, R., On Virtue Ethics, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999. McIntyre, A., After Virtue, Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame, 1981. Murdoch, I., The Sovereignty of Good, London: Ark, 1970. Nussbaum, M., The Fragility of Goodness, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986. Smart, J. J. C. and B. Williams, Utilitarianism: For and Against, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973. Thompson, M., Life and Action, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, 2008.5 Williams, B., Morality: An Introduction to Ethics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972. —, Moral Luck, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981. —, Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, 1985.

Ackrill, J. L., “Aristotle’s Definitions of psuche-,” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 73 (1972/3), 119–33. Caston, V., “The Spirit and the Letter: Aristotle on Perception,” in Metaphysics, Soul, and Ethics, ed. R. Salles, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005, 245–320. Everson, S., Aristotle on Perception, Oxford: Clarendon, 1997. Johansen, T., Aristotle on the Sense Organs, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997. Lloyd, G. E. R. and G. E. L. Owen (eds), Aristotle on Mind and the Senses, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978. Nussbaum, M., Aristotle’s De Motu Animalium, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978. Nussbaum, M. and A. Rorty (eds), Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. Putnam, H., “Philosophy and Our Mental Life,” in Mind, Language and Reality, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975, 291–303. Sorabji, R., “Body and Soul in Aristotle,” Philosophy, 49 (1974), 63–89. —, “From Aristotle to Brentano,” in Aristotle and the Later Tradition, ed. H. Blumenthal and H. Robinson, Oxford: Clarendon, 1991, 227–60.

PHILOSOPHY OF MIND

BIOLOGY

Beginning (roughly) in the 1970s, the center of gravity of Anglophone philosophy shifted

One of the most striking results of the past half-century of Aristotle research is an

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CHRONOLOGY OF RECENT RESEARCH unprecedented understanding and appreciation of Aristotle’s biological works.7 David Balme’s work was pioneering in this respect; see: Balme, D. (trans. and ed.), Aristotle’s De Partibus Animalium I and De Generatione Animalium I, Oxford: Clarendon, 1972. Several of Balme’s papers—along with many other notable contributions—are collected in Gotthelf, A. (ed.), Aristotle on Nature and Living Things, Pittsburg and Bristol: Mathesis, 1985. Gotthelf, A. and J. Lennox, (eds), Philosophical Issues in Aristotle’s Biology, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987. See also:

Pellegrin, P. and D. Devereux (eds), Biologie, logique et métaphysique chez Aristote, Paris: Éditions du CNRS, 1990. Preus, A., Science and Philosophy in Aristotle’s Biological Works, Hildesheim/ New York: Olms, 1972. As the other chapters in this volume make clear, this is but a small fraction and a pale reflection of the rich variety of recent research surrounding the Aristotelian texts. The Western tradition of philosophy, in all its variety, is virtually coextensive with the Aristotelian tradition, in all its variety. There is no area of the broader philosophical landscape in the twentieth century that does not bear its mark, and that appears to be continuing into the twenty-first century. Benjamin J. Grazzini

NOTES

Lennox, J., Aristotle’s Philosophy of Biology, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. Leunissen, M., Explanation and Teleology in Aristotle’s Science of Nature, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010. Lloyd, G. E. R., Method and Problems in Greek Science, Oxford: Clarendon, 1991. Kullmann, W., Wissenschaft und Methode, Berlin: de Gruyter, 1974. —, Die Teleologie in der aristotelischen Biologie, Heidelberg: Winter, 1979. Kullman, W. and S. Föllinger, (eds), Aristotelische Biologie, Stuttgart: Steiner, 1997. Pellegrin, P., La classification des animaux chez Aristote, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1982.

1

2

3 4

There had been others—at least Aldus Manutius’ fifteenth-century edition, and J. G. Buhle’s edition published in 1791–3. But nothing appears to have had the impact of Bekker’s Aristotelis opera omnia. See Jiménez, “Bibliography,” §1.1. Notable exceptions include Rudolfus Kassel’s 1976 edition of the Rhetoric, Martha Nussbaum’s 1978 edition of the De Motu Animalium, and David Balme’s edition of the History of Animals (published posthumously in 2002). More recently, Marwan Rashed has prepared a new Budé text of De Generatione et Corruptione (2005), and David Bloch a new text of De memoria et Reminiscentia (2007). As more and more medieval manuscripts become available online, this may change. See Jiménez, “Bibliography,” §2. For a much more detailed and well-documented survey, see A. H. Chroust, “The First Thirty

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CHRONOLOGY OF RECENT RESEARCH

5

Years of Modern Aristotle Scholarship (1912– 1942),” Classica et Mediaevalia, 24 (1963), 27–57. More recently, see the renewed interest in Aristotelian discussions of akrasia, leading to the seventeenth Symposium Aristotelicum

6 7

(2005) focusing on Nicomachean Ethics VII. (The proceedings of the 2005 Symposium were published in 2009, edited by Carlo Natali.) See further Jiménez, “Bibliography,” §2.3. See also Jiménez, “Bibliography,” §2.4.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

Research in Aristotle today entails acquaintance with a number of resources, some of them general with regard to ancient philosophy (on which see my and Ben Grazzini’s “Resources” below) and others particular to the Aristotelian. The present essay, which speaks to the latter regard, has two parts. The first presents editions of works by Aristotle taken to be standard or important, in Greek (§1.1) and in English translation (§1.2). The list is not exhaustive of the corpus; it focuses on those works of more acute interest to philosophers. Standard fare for scholarship of Aristotle is presented, arranged topically, in §2. I have restricted my focus in the main to works of the last half-century. For a broader narrative account of the life of Aristotelian studies in the last century and a half, see Grazzini’s “Chronology” above.

of Aristotelian works; volume 4 (ed. C. A. Brandis) contains ancient scholia; volume 5 contains fragments (ed. V. Rose), supplements to scholia (ed. H. Usenet), and the Index Aristotelicus (Bonitz). Aristotelis Opera was re-edited by O. Gigon (De Gruyter, 1960–87). This edition is (with the exception of vol. 3) a photomechanical copy of the 1831–70 edition: Volumes 1 and 2 contain Aristotle’s works; volume 3 Gigon’s revision and supplementation of Aristotle’s fragments; volume 4 a selection of classical commentaries on Aristotle, together with a concordance with the Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca; volume 5 contains the Index. Two notable predecessors to the Akademie edition may be mentioned:

1. WORKS BY ARISTOTLE

Also of interest, in many cases decisive interest, are the Latin translations of the Aristotelian corpus, on which see the translation project at

1.1 GREEK EDITIONS

Opera, ed. A. Manutius, 5 vols, Venice, 1495–8. Opera, ed. Erasmus and S. Grynaeus, 2 vols, Basel, 1531.

The now-classic edition of the Aristotelian corpus1 is: Aristotle, Opera, ed. I. Bekker, 5 vols, Akademie, 1831–70. Volumes 1 and 2 contain Aristotle’s works; volume 3 contains Renaissance Latin translations

A. Latinus

Aristoteles Latinus Project, http://hiw.kuleuven.be/ dwmc/al/

All scholars when citing Aristotle cite Bekker’s edition, and do so by “Bekker number.” Given along with the name of the

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BIBLIOGRAPHY work, a Bekker number consists in three or four pieces of information: (1) the book number, where relevant (usually in Roman numeral); (2) the chapter number (usually in Arabic numeral); (3) the page number; (4) the column (“a” for left column; “b” for right column); and (5) the line number(s). The first line of Physics would thus be cited: “Phys. I.1, 184a10.” The Bekker edition is no longer the definitive edition, and no definitive edition of the corpus as a whole exists; scholars rely on individual texts. Of those—listed below in the order of Bekker’s edition—particularly useful to philosophers, and also still widely available, are these: 1.1.1 Logic and Science Cat./De int. Categoriae et Liber De Interpretatione, ed. L. Minio-Paluello, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1936. APr/APo

Prior and Posterior Analytics, ed. W. D. Ross, repr. Oxford: Clarendon, 2000.

Top./SE

Topica et Sophistici Elenchi, ed. W. D. Ross, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1958.

Du ciel, ed. P. Moraux, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1965. GC

On Coming-to-Be and Passing-Away, ed. H. H. Joachim, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1922. De la génération et la corruption, ed. M. Rashed, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2005.

1.1.3 Psychology Of all of Aristotle’s “philosophical” works, De Anima is most widely acknowledged as a textual mess; it is thus essential to compare texts. In addition to Ross’, which is only the easiest to find, one might, minimally, consult two further editions: DA

On the Soul, ed. R. D. Hicks, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1907. De Anima, ed. W. D. Ross, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1956. De l’âme, ed. A. Jannone, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2002.

Topiques, ed. J. Brunschwig, 2 vols., 3rd edn, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 2009 (vol. 1) and 2007 (vol. 2).

The Parva Naturalia—De Sensu, De Mem., De Somn., De Insomn., De Div., De Long., De Iuv.—may all be found in: Parva Naturalia, ed. W.D. Ross, Oxford: Clarendon, 1955.

1.1.2 Natural Science Phys. Physics, ed. W. D. Ross, revd. edn, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1936.

1.1.4 Biology HA Historia Animalium, ed. D. M. Balme, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002.

DC

PA

De Caelo, ed. D. J. Allan, 3rd edn, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1961.

Les parties des animaux, ed. P. Louis, Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1956.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY MA

GA

1.1.8 Fragments Frag. Fragmenta selecta, ed. W. D. Ross, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1955.

De Motu Animalium, ed. M. Nussbaum, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978. De Generatione Animalium, ed. H. J. Drossart Lulofs, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1965.

Fragmenta, ed. O. Gigon, Berlin: De Gruyter, 1987.

1.1.5 Metaphysics Met. Metaphysics, ed. W. D. Ross, 2 vols., revd. edn, Oxford: Clarendon, 1953.

1.2 English Translations All of Aristotle’s known works were translated into English in: The Collected Works, ed. W. D. Ross and J. A. Smith, 12 vols., Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1908–54.

Metaphysica, ed. W. Jaeger, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1957. 1.1.6 Moral and Political Philosophy NE Ethica Nicomachea, ed. I. Bywater, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1894. L’Éthique à Nicomaque, ed. R. A. Gauthier and J. Y. Jolif, 2nd edn, 2 vols, Louvain: Publications Universitaires, 1958. EE

Ethica Eudemia, ed. R. R. Walzer and J. M. Mingay, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991.

Pol.

Politica, ed. W. D. Ross, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1957. Politik, ed. A. Dreizehnter, Munich: Wilhelm Fink, 1970.

1.1.7 Rhetoric and Poetics Rhet. Ars rhetorica, ed. W. D. Ross, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1959. Ars rhetorica, ed. R. Kassel, Berlin: De Gruyter, 1976. Poet.

De arte poetica, ed. R. Kassel, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1966.

This edition is known as “The Oxford Translation.” A widely available edition, which is based on the former, is called “The Revised Oxford Translation,” and it is presently treated more or less as a standard. The Collected Works, ed. J. Barnes, 2 vols, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984. A number of shorter edited collections exist, most notably: A New Aristotle Reader, ed. J. L. Ackrill, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988. Selections, ed. T. Irwin and G. Fine, Indianapolis: Hackett, 1995. In addition to the translations available in these collections (which include, for example, the Ackrill translation of Cat. and De Int. and the Barnes translation of APo; see §2.1 below), the following may also be fruitfully consulted:

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BIBLIOGRAPHY On the Soul, trans. H. G. Apostle, Grinnell, IA: Peripatetic Press, 2001.

1.2.1 Logic and Science Cat./De Int. Categories and Propositions, trans. H. G. Apostle, Grinnell, IA: Peripatetic Press, 1980. APr

APo

Top.

De Anima, trans. M. Shiffman, Newburyport: Focus, 2010.

Prior Analytics, trans. and ed. R. Smith, Indianapolis: Hackett, 1989.

DA/De Mem. On the Soul and On Memory and Recollection, trans. J. Sachs, Santa Fe: Green Lion, 2001.

Posterior Analytics, trans. H. G. Apostle, Grinnell, IA: Peripatetic Press, 1981.

1.2.4 Biology HA History of Animals, trans. and ed. A. L. Peck, 3 vols., Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, 1965.

Topics: Books I and VIII, trans. and ed. R. Smith, Oxford: Clarendon, 1997.

1.2.2 Natural Science Phys. Physics, trans. R. Hope, Lincoln: University of Nebraska, 1961.

PA/MA

Parts of Animals, Movement of Animals, Progression of Animals, trans. and ed. A. L. Peck and E. M. Forster, revd. edn, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, 1937.

GA

Generation of Animals, trans. and ed. A. L. Peck, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, 1942.

Physics, trans. H. G. Apostle, Peripatetic Press, 1969. Physics: A Guided Study, trans. J. Sachs, Newark: Rutgers University, 1995. Physics, trans. R. Waterfield, ed. D. Bostock, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. DC

On the Heavens, trans. and ed. W. K. C. Guthrie, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, 1939.

GC

De Generatione et Corruptione, trans. and ed. C. J. F. Williams, Oxford: Clarendon, 1982.

1.2.5 Metaphysics Met. Metaphysics, trans. R. Hope, St. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 1952. Metaphysics, trans. H. G. Apostle, Grinnell, IA: Peripatetic Press, 1979. Metaphysics: Books VII–X, trans. M. Furth, Indianapolis: Hackett, 1985.

1.2.3 Psychology DA De Anima II and III, trans. D.W. Hamlyn, Oxford: Clarendon, 1993.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY Metaphysics, trans. J. Sachs, 2nd edn, Santa Fe: Green Lion, 2002.

perhaps the most diverse and divisive. I have trimmed my focus to mostly English-language studies, and mostly from the latter half of the twentieth century to the present. Ancient and medieval commentaries remain however mainstays of theAristotelian conversation. The former were collated and collected in:

1.2.6 Moral and Political Philosophy NE Nicomachean Ethics, trans. M. Ostwald, Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall, 1962. Nicomachean Ethics, trans. H. G. Apostle, Grinnell, IA: Peripatetic Press, 1984.

Diels, H. (ed.), Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca, 23 vols, Berlin: Reimer, 1882–1909.

Nicomachean Ethics, trans. T. H. Irwin, Indianapolis: Hackett, 1999.

These works are presently being translated into English in the following series:

Nicomachean Ethics, trans. S. Broadie and C. Rowe, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002. Pol.

The Politics, trans. C. Lord, Chicago: University of Chicago, 1984.

A further 20 volumes are projected. For a selection of works, see:

The Politics of Aristotle, trans. P. Simpson, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 1997.

Sorabji, R., The Philosophy of the Commentators 200–600 AD: A Sourcebook, 3 vols, London: Duckworth, 2005.

1.2.7 Rhetoric and Poetics Rhet. On Rhetoric, trans. G. A. Kennedy, 2nd edn, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006. Plato’s Gorgias and Aristotle’s Rhetoric, trans. J. Sachs, Newburyport: Focus, 2008. Poet.

Sorabji, R. (ed.), Ancient Commentaries on Aristotle, 80 vols, London: Duckworth, 1987–.

On Poetics, trans. S. Benardete and M. Davis, South Bend: St. Augustine, 2002. Poetics, trans. J. Sachs, Newburyport: Focus, 2005.

The publication and translation of later medieval commentary on the other hand is a phenomenon far more diffuse. Here I shall mention just some places to begin in research on Aquinas’ and Averroes’ works. The works of Averroes, first of all, are presently being compiled online at: DARE

Digital Averroes Research Environment, http://dare.uni-koeln.de/

The entirety of Aquinas’ works are also available (albeit in non-critical, html editions) online at:

2. WORKS ON ARISTOTLE Aristotelian scholarship ranks among the vastest of fields of commentary in the history of philosophy, for it is not only one of the oldest continuous fields of interpretation but also

Opera

Thomas Aquinas, Opera Omnia, http://www.corpusthomisticum. org/iopera.html

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BIBLIOGRAPHY Editions of Averroes’ commentaries in English translation are available, notably by St. Augustine Press and by Brigham Young University Press. Aquinas’ commentaries are also widely available and translated into English, most notably by Dumb Ox Books, an imprint of St. Augustine Press. For contemporary commentary work on the Aristotelian texts, mention-worthy especially is the Clarendon Aristotle Series. Each volume includes translation and very good philosophical and philological commentary, as well as, customarily, an extensive bibliography. Relevant volumes are mentioned below. For further bibliographical information, as well as helpful general commentary on the Aristotelian corpus, see: Barnes, J. (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Aristotle, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995. Anagnostopolous, G. (ed.), A Companion to Aristotle, Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009.

LeBlond, J. M., Logique et méthode chez Aristote, Paris: Vrin, 1939. Łukasiewicz, J., Aristotle’s Syllogistic from the Standpoint of Modern Formal Logic, 2nd edn, Oxford: Clarendon, 1957. Dancy, R., Sense and Contradiction, Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1975. Lear, J., Aristotle and Logical Theory, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980. Aristotle’s theory of modality has been the subject of a number of works, among them notably: Hintikka, J., Time and Necessity; Studies in Aristotle’s Theory of Modality, Oxford: Clarendon, 1973. Waterlow (=Broadie), S. Passage and Possibility: A Study of Aristotle’s Modal Concepts, Oxford: Clarendon, 1982. Patterson, R., Aristotle’s Modal Logic: Essence and Entailment in the Organon, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995.

2.1 LOGIC AND SCIENCE For commentary on the texts of the Organon, see Ross’ commentaries on APr and APo in his texts, cited in §1.1.1; and all of the translations cited in §1.2.1. Additionally see: Ackrill, J. L. (trans. and ed.), Categories and De Interpretatione, Oxford: Clarendon, 1961. Striker, G. (trans. and ed.), Prior Analytics I, Oxford: Clarendon, 2009. Barnes, J. (trans. and ed.), Posterior Analytics, 2nd edn, Oxford: Clarendon, 1996. For more general commentary see these works:

From an excellent collection of articles on APo, see esp.: Barnes, J., “Proof and the Syllogism,” in Aristotle on Science: The Posterior Analytics, ed. E. Berti, Padua: Editrice Antenore, 1981, 17–59. Burnyeat, M., “Aristotle on Understanding Knowledge,” in Aristotle on Science: The Posterior Analytics, ed. Berti., Padua: Editrice Antenore, 1981, 97–139. See also, on Top. and SE, the essays in: Owen, G. E. L. (ed.), Aristotle on Dialectic: The Topics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY On the question of the nature of first principles, and the relation between them and dialectic, see, to begin, Owen, G. E. L., “ΤΙΘΕΝΑΙ ΤΑ ΦΑΙΝΟΜΕΝΑ,” in Aristote et les problèmes de méthode, ed. S. Mansion, Leuven: Peeters, 1961. Bolton, R., “The Epistemological Basis of Aristotelian Dialectic,” in Biologie, logique, et metaphysique chez Aristote, ed. D. Devereux and P. Pellegrin, Paris: Éditions du CNRS, 1990, 186–236. See also, on APo II.19, Lesher, J. H., “The Meaning of ΝΟΥΣ in the Posterior Analytics,” Phronesis, 18 (1973), 44–68. Kosman, A., “Understanding, Explanation, and Insight,” in Exegesis and Argument, ed. E. N. Lee, A. D. Mourelatos, and R. M. Rorty, Assen: Van Gorcum, 1973, 374–92.

Heidegger, M., “On the Essence and Concept of ΦΥΣΙΣ in Aristotle’s Physics B 1,” trans. W. McNeil, in Pathmarks, ed. W. McNeill, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. Kosman, L., “Aristotle’s Definition of Motion,” Phronesis, 14 (1969), 40–62. Lang, H. S., The Order of Nature in Aristotle’s Physics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. Solmsen, F., Aristotle’s System of the Physical World, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1960. Waterlow (=Broadie), S., Nature, Change, and Agency in Aristotle’s Physics, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982. Wieland, W., Die aristotelische Physik, 3rd edn, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 1997. For further essays on Phys., see: Judson, L., ed., Aristotle’s Physics: A Collection of Essays, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995.

2.2 NATURAL SCIENCE 2.3 PSYCHOLOGY For commentary on the relevant texts, see those in §§1.1.2 and 1.2.2. Additionally, on Physics, see: Charlton, W. (trans. and ed.), Physics I–II, Oxford: Clarendon, 2nd edn, 1970. Hussey, E. (trans. and ed.), Physics III–IV, Oxford: Clarendon, 1983. Graham, D. W. (trans. and ed.), Physics VIII, Oxford: Clarendon, 1999. Works of a sort introductory to Aristotle’s notion of nature and to his project for natural science include:

For commentary on DA and the Parva Naturalia, see the texts in §§1.1.3 and 1.2.3. A number of very good essays on DA may be found in: Nussbaum, M. and A. Rorty (eds.), Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. Barnes, J., M. Schofield, and R. Sorabji (eds.), Articles on Aristotle, vol. 4, Psychology and Aesthetics, London: Duckworth, 1979. For introductory accounts of soul in Aristotle, see:

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BIBLIOGRAPHY Bolton, R., “Aristotle’s Definition of the Soul: De Anima II.1–3,” Phronesis, 23 (1978), 258–78. Frede, M., “On Aristotle’s Conception of Soul,” in Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, ed. M. Nussbaum and A. Rorty, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. Matthews, G., “De Anima II.2–4 and the Meaning of Life,” in Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, ed. M. Nussbaum and A. Rorty, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. A particularly lively argument between “spiritualism” and “literalism” emerged surrounding the following few, among other, accounts:2 Burnyeat, M., “Is an Aristotelian Philosophy of Mind Still Credible?” in Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, ed. M. Nussbaum and A. Rorty, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. Sorabji, R., “Intentionality and Physiological Processes,” in Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, ed. M. Nussbaum and A. Rorty, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. On the varieties of perception—sensation, imagination, and intellect—see generally: Brentano, F., The Psychology of Aristotle, trans. R. George, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1977. Modrak, D., Aristotle: The Power of Perception, Chicago: University of Chicago, 1987. Lloyd, G. E. R. and G. E. L. Owen (eds.), Aristotle on Mind and the Senses, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1978. On sensation, in addition to Burnyeat’s and Sorabji’s essays, see, respectively, on ques-

tions of physiology and on the self-reflexivity of sensation, Johansen, T., Aristotle on the Sense Organs, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997. Kosman, L., “Perceiving that We Perceive,” Philosophical Review, 84 (1975), 499–519. On imagination, see: Frede, D., “The Cognitive Role of ΦΑΝΤΑΣΙΑ in Aristotle,” in Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, ed. M. Nussbaum and A. Rorty, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992, 279–96. Schofield, M., “Aristotle on the Imagination,” in Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, ed. M. Nussbaum and A. Rorty, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992, 249–77. On the intellect, see: Barnes, J., “Aristotle’s Concept of Mind,” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 72 (1971–2), 101–14. Kahn, C., “Aristotle on Thinking,” in Essays on Aristotle’s De Anima, ed. M. Nussbaum and A. Rorty, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. Wedin M., Mind and Imagination in Aristotle, New Haven: Yale University, 1988. 2.4 BIOLOGY3 For commentary on relevant texts, see those in §§1.1.4 and 1.2.4. See also: Balme, D. M. (trans. and ed.), De Partibus Animalium I and De Generatione Animalium I (with Passages from II.1–3),

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BIBLIOGRAPHY revd. edn, Oxford: Clarendon, 1992. Düring, I., Aristotle’s De Partibus Animalium: Critical and Literary Commentaries, 1943; repr. New York: Garland Publishing, 1980. Lennox, J. (trans. and ed.), On the Parts of Animals I–IV, Oxford: Clarendon, 2002.

Kirwan, C. (trans. and ed.), Metaphysics Gamma, Delta, and Epsilon, Oxford: Clarendon, 1993. Madigan, A. (trans. and ed.), Metaphysics Beta and Kappa 1–2, Oxford: Clarendon, 1999. Makin, S. (trans. and ed.), Metaphysics Theta, Oxford: Clarendon, 2006.

Philosophers interested in biological issues will profitably make use, above all, of:

Some helpful general Metaphysics include:

Gotthelf, A. and J. Lennox (eds.), Philosophical Issues in Aristotle’s Biology, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987.

Aubenque, P., Le problème de l’être chez Aristote, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1962. Owens, J., The Doctrine of Being in the Aristotelian Metaphysics, Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 1978. Reale, G., The Concept of First Philosophy and the Unity of the Metaphysics of Aristotle, New York: SUNY, 1980.

See also: Lennox, J., Aristotle’s Philosophy of Biology, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. Lennox, J. and R. Bolton (eds.), Being, Nature, and Life in Aristotle, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Pellegrin, P., Aristotle’s Classification of Animals: Biology and the Conceptual Unity of the Aristotelian Corpus, trans. A. Preus, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986. Thompson W., On Aristotle as a Biologist, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1912. 2.5 METAPHYSICS Again, for commentary, see the texts in §§1.1.5 and 1.2.5. See further the Clarendon Aristotle volumes: Annas, J. (trans. and ed.), Metaphysics Mu and Nu, Oxford: Clarendon, 1988. Bostock, D. (trans. and ed.), Metaphysics Zeta and Eta, Oxford: Clarendon, 1994.

studies

of

the

On substance (οὐσία), the central theme of Metaphysics generally and specifically most of all of book VII, see: Burnyeat, M., A Map of Metaphysics Zeta, Pittsburgh: Mathesis, 2001. Charles, D., Aristotle on Meaning and Essence, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002. Frede and Patzig, Aristoteles Metaphysik Z, Munich: C. H. Beck, 1988. Gill, M. L., Aristotle on Substance: The Paradox of Unity, Princeton: Princeton University, 1989. Kosman, L., “Animals and Other Beings in Aristotle,” in Philosophical Issues in Aristotle’s Biology, ed. A. Gotthelf and J. G. Lennox, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY Loux, M., Primary ΟΥΣΙΑ: An Essay on Aristotle’s Metaphysics Zeta and Theta, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1991. Wedin, M., Aristotle’s Theory of Substance, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.

Rorty, A. (ed.), Essays on Aristotle’s Ethics, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980.

On potentiality and actuality, see: Heidegger, M., The Essence and Actuality of Force, trans. W. Brogan and P. Warnek, Bloomington, IN: Indiana University, 1995. Kosman, L., “Substance, Being, and ΕΝΕΡΓΕΙΑ,” Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 2 (1984), 121–49. Witt, C., Ways of Being: Potentiality and Actuality in Aristotle’s Metaphysics, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2003.

Cooper, J., Reason and Human Good in Aristotle, Indianapolis: Hackett, 1986. Gadamer, H. G., The Idea of the Good in Platonic-Aristotelian Philosophy, trans. P. Christopher Smith, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986. Kraut, R., Aristotle on the Human Good, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989. Sherman, N., The Fabric of Character, Oxford: Clarendon, 1989.

On book XII generally, and on the unmoved mover, see:

Additionally, on the constitution and psychology of ethical action, see:

Frede, M. and D. Charles (eds.), Aristotle’s Metaphysics Lambda, Oxford: Clarendon, 2000. Lang, H. L., “The Structure and Subject of Metaphysics Lambda,” Phronesis, 38.3 (1993), 257–80.

Charles, D., Aristotle’s Philosophy of Action, London: Duckworth, 1984. Dahl, N., Practical Reason, Aristotle, and Weakness of Will, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1984. Meyer, S. S., Aristotle on Moral Responsibility: Character and Cause, revd. edn, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012.

2.6 MORAL AND POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY4 For commentary on Nicomachean Ethics, see the Gauthier-Jolif volumes in §1.1.6 and the translations, especially Irwin’s, of §1.2.6 above. For further commentary on Aristotelian ethics, see: Broadie, S., Ethics with Aristotle, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993. Sparshott, F., Taking Life Seriously, Toronto: University of Toronto, 1994. For an introductory collection of scholarly articles, see:

On Aristotle’s vision of the good, in a specifically human context, see generally:

With special emphasis on the ethical and political dimensions of Aristotelian thought, three volumes of essays charting paths for feminist commentary should also be mentioned: Bar On, B. (ed.), Engendering Origins: Critical Feminist Readings in Plato and Aristotle, New York: SUNY, 1994. Freeland, C. (ed.), Feminist Interpretations of Aristotle, State College: Pennsylvania State University, 1998. Ward, J. (ed.), Feminism and Ancient Philosophy, London: Routledge, 1996.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY Of intense interest in the last decades has been the question of the status of women in Aristotle’s Politics, on which one might consult: Fortenbaugh, W. W., “Aristotle on Slaves and Women,” in Articles on Aristotle, vol. 2, ed. J. Barnes, M. Schofield, and R. Sorabji, St. Martin’s, 1977, 135–9. Modrak, D., “Aristotle: Women, Deliberation, and Nature,” in Engendering Origins: Critical Feminist Readings in Plato and Aristotle, ed. B. Bar On, New York: SUNY, 1994. On the Politics, useful general commentary, in addition to that found in the texts of §§1.1.6 and 1.2.6, is to be found in: Newman, W. L., The Politics of Aristotle, 4 vols., Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1888–1902. Simpson, P., Aristotle’s Politics: A Philosophical Commentary, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 1998.

Rorty, A. (ed.), Essays on Aristotle’s Poetics, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992. —, Essays on Aristotle’s Rhetoric, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996. On Rhetoric, see also: Furley, D. J. and A. Nehamas (eds), Aristotle’s Rhetoric: Philosophical Essays, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994. Gross, A. G. and A. E. Walzer, Rereading Aristotle’s Rhetoric, Carbondale: Southern Illinois University, 2000. For detailed textual commentary on Rhetoric, see the commentary in the volumes of §§1.1.7 and 1.2.7, but especially: Grimaldi, W., Rhetoric I: A Commentary, New York: Fordham University, 1980. —, Rhetoric II: A Commentary, New York: Fordham University, 1988.

Politics is also covered by the following Clarendon volumes: Keyt, D., Politics V–VI, Oxford: Clarendon, 1999. Kraut, R., Politics VII–VIII, Oxford: Clarendon, 1997. Robinson, R., Politics III–IV, Oxford: Clarendon, 1995. Saunders, T. J., Politics I–II, Oxford: Clarendon, 1995.

The “affects” or “emotions” forming the center of Aristotle’s Rhetoric are the topic of: Fortenbaugh, W. W., Aristotle on Emotion, 2nd edn, Bristol: Bristol Classical Press 2002. The “affects” also play a central role in the argument of: Heidegger, M., Basic Concepts of Aristotelian Philosophy, trans. R. D. Metcalf and M. B. Tanzer, Bloomington, IN: Indiana University, 2009.

2.7 RHETORIC AND POETICS For an introduction to scholarship on the Rhetoric and the Poetics, one can count on the Rorty readers:

Of particular interest with respect to Rhetoric are the notions of enthymeme and example, discussed in:

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BIBLIOGRAPHY Benoit, W. L. “The Most Significant Passage in Aristotle’s Rhetoric,” Rhetoric Society Quarterly, 12 (1982), 2–9. —, “On Aristotle’s Example,” Philosophy and Rhetoric, 20 (1987), 261–7. Burnyeat, M. “Enthymeme: Aristotle on the Rationality of Rhetoric,” in Essays on Aristotle’s Rhetoric, ed. A. Rorty, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996. —, “Enthymeme: Aristotle on the Logic of Persuasion,” in Aristotle’s Rhetoric: Philosophical Essays, ed. D. J. Furley and A. Nehamas, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994. Hauser, G. A. “Aristotle’s Example Revisited,” Philosophy and Rhetoric, 18.3 (1985), 171–80. Lanigan, R. “Enthymeme: The Rhetorical Species of Aristotle’s Syllogism,” Southern Speech Communication Journal, 39 (1974), 207–22. Two commentaries on Poetics will prove helpful: Else, G. F., Aristotle’s Poetics: The Argument, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, 1963. Halliwell, S., Aristotle’s Poetics, Chicago: University of Chicago, 1998. Some attempts have been made in recent years to reconstruct Aristotle’s lost account of comedy, most notably:

The question of “tragic error” has been the topic of a number of works, and especially of: Bremer, J. L., Hamartia: Tragic Error in the “Poetic” of Aristotle and in Greek Tragedy, Amsterdam: Adolf A. Hakkert, 1969. Dawe, R. D., “Some Reflections on Ate and Hamartia,” Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 72 (1967), 89–123. Stinton, T. C. W., “Hamartia in Aristotle and Greek Tragedy,” Classical Quarterly, 25 (1975), 221–54. “Catharsis,” the most vexing of notions in Poetics, has naturally generated a mountain of scholarship. To begin with one might consult: Bernays, J. “Aristotle on the Effects of Tragedy,” trans. J. Barnes, in Articles on Aristotle, vol. 4, ed. J. Barnes, M. Schofield, and R. Sorabji, London: Duckworth, 1969, 164–5. Golden, L., “The Clarification Theory of Catharsis,” Hermes, 104 (1976), 437–52. Keesey, D., “On Some Recent Interpretations of Catharsis,” Classical World, 72 (1979), 193–205. Nicev, A., L’énigme de la catharsis tragique dans Aristote, Sofia: Académie Bulgare des Sciences, 1970. Erick Raphael Jiménez NOTES 1

2

Jenko, R., Aristotle on Comedy: Towards a Reconstruction of Poetics II, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984.

3 4

See, further, the introductory discussion in Grazzini’s “Chronology” above. A fuller listing of works is to be found in Grazzini’s “Chronology,” Twentieth-Century Philosophy (II). See ibid. On the rise of interest in Aristotelian ethics, see ibid.

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RESOURCES

Research in Aristotle entails acquaintance with the Aristotelian texts, in Greek and in translation, as outlined in §1 of the “Bibliography,” as well as knowledge of Aristotelian interpretation, as outlined in the “Bibliography,” §2; and it entails in addition the ability to make use of a number of other Ancient Greek-specific and Aristotle-specific resources, as outlined here. The channels of contemporary Aristotelian scholarship are becoming electronic ones. Many of the best and most frequently used resources are relatively antique as well and, because therefore out of print, they are widely and freely available online. So we have focused in particular here on collecting some of the essential materials for study in the Aristotelian tradition now thus available. Below we have clumped together five groups of such resources: (1) resources generally for work with Ancient Greek texts; some sites at which to find Aristotle’s texts (2) in Greek and (3) in translation; (4) some academic journals with which the Aristotelian ought be conversant; and (5) some professional organizations centered around the study of Aristotle or of ancient philosophy more broadly.

GENERAL ANCIENT GREEK RESOURCES The Thesaurus Linguae Graecae is an immense, digitally searchable compilation of Ancient Greek texts, including Aristotle’s own, and it is housed online at: TLG Thesaurus Linguae Graecae, www. tlg.uci.edu. The Perseus Project is a similar venture; it may be found at: Perseus Perseus Digital Library, www. perseus.tufts.edu. In addition to the texts available at these sites, they maintain a number of incredible resources—to begin with, the best existing Ancient Greek lexicon: LSJ Greek-English Lexicon, ed. H. G. Liddell, A. Scott, and H. S. Jones, 9th edn, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1925. (n.b. A new Greek lexicon is presently being compiled by a team at Cambridge University.)

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RESOURCES The LSJ is available both at the TLG (www.tlg.uci.edu/lsj) and at Perseus (www. perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseu s:text:1999.04.0057); in both places it is searchable.

ARISTOTLE’S TEXTS IN GREEK The five volumes of Bekker’s Opera (see §1.1 of the “Bibliography”) are available entirely for free online as well. At this writing, one may find it at a number of sites. An especially easy-to-use copy is available at:

Opera, Volume 1,” is in fact Langkavel’s 1868 edition of PA.) Excepting the copies of the Aristotelian texts available at the TLG (some of which are taken from OCT editions), no copies of the Bekker edition are searchable. Other editions of Aristotelian texts are available at Perseus and the TLG (see §1 above); many of these are based on the OCT editions. The majority of “standard” critical editions listed in the “Bibliography,” §1.1 are not available online, except where copyrights have lapsed. For other, mostly older editions, see, to begin with, the links at: UPenn

archive.org Volume 1: archive.org/stream/ aristotelisopera01arisrich Volume 2: archive.org/stream/ aristotelisopera02arisrich

Online Books by Aristotle, http://onlinebooks.library. upenn.edu/webbin/book/ lookupname?key=Aristotle

See also the vast manuscript collection at France’s Bibliothèque Nationale:

Etc. Gallica In addition to making a still-valuable and complete Greek text of Aristotle’s works available, the Opera also includes the still-unrivaled: Index Index Aristotelicus, ed. H. Bonitz, vol. 5 of Opera, ed. I. Bekker, archive. org/stream/aristotelisopera05arisrich Copies of the Bekker edition are also available on:

Bibliothèque Nationale de France, http://gallica.bnf.fr

Digitized versions of much of the BNF collection, including their medieval manuscripts, can be found there, and image files of manuscripts can be viewed online or downloaded.

ARISTOTLE’S TEXTS IN ENGLISH TRANSLATION

Google Google Books, books.google.com Readers should note, however, that at present the labeling and naming of volumes suffers from some confusion there, owing to an influx into the e-book marketplace of print-on-demand volumes frequently misunderstood by their publishers. (E.g. a volume labeled “Aristotelis

Most of the translations of Aristotle from Ross’s and Smith’s Collected Works (see §1.2 of the “Bibliography”) are available for free online. In particular, see: ICA The Internet Classics Archive, classics.mit.edu

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RESOURCES Phronesis: A Journal for Ancient Philosophy Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society Proceedings of the Boston Area Colloquium in Ancient Philosophy Review of Metaphysics Rhizai: A Journal for Ancient Philosophy and Science

Adelaide

eBooks@Adelaide, ebooks. adelaide.edu.au Gutenberg Project Gutenberg, www. gutenberg.org Text from all three sites may be downloaded in html format, and is searchable thus. n.b. The valuable commentary of The Oxford Translation volumes is not available in the ICA, Adelaide, or Gutenberg texts. However, some of these editions may be found by searching Google Books; but see the relevant cautionary note in §2 above.

JOURNALS

PROFESSIONAL ORGANIZATIONS Another way to keep in the loop of Aristotelian commentary is to keep track of the activities, such as conferences and colloquia, of professional organizations devoted to the study of ancient philosophy or of Aristotle in particular. The following are a few such organizations presently active:

The best way to keep abreast of contemporary research in Aristotle is to read actively journals specializing in Aristotelian or more broadly ancient studies. Some of the more well-known ones include the following: Ancient Philosophy Apeiron: A Journal for Ancient Philosophy and Science Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie British Journal for the History of Philosophy The Classical Quarterly Elenchos: rivista di studi sul pensiero antico Epoché: A Journal for the History of Philosophy Les Études Philosophiques Journal of Ancient Philosophy (online: www.revistas.usp.br/filosofiaantiga/ index) Journal of the History of Philosophy Methexis: Rivista internazionale di filosofia antica Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy Philosophie Antique

Ancient Philosophy Society (www. ancientphilosophysociety.org) The Aristotelian Society (www.aristoteliansociety.org.uk/) La Asociación Latinoamericana de Filosofía Antigua (http://inif.ucr.ac.cr/ component/content/article/1/26-alfa-asoc iacion-latinoamericana-filosofia-antigua) The Australasian Society for Ancient Philosophy Centre d’études sur la pensée antique (Kairos kai Logos) (www.kairoskailogos. com/) European Society for Ancient Philosophy HOPOS: The International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science (www.hopos.org) International Association for Greek Philosophy (www.hri.org/iagp) Midwest Seminar in Ancient and Medieval Philosophy (academic.mu.edu/ taylorr/Midwest-Seminar/Welcome.html) The Northern Association of Ancient Philosophy (www.ncl.ac.uk/historical/ research/groups/naap.htm)

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RESOURCES up.ac.za/default.asp?ipkCategoryID=18 434&subid=18434&ipklookid=9) The Southern Association of Ancient Philosophy (www.uea.ac.uk/phi/ eventsnews/SAAP) Benjamin J. Grazzini Erick Raphael Jiménez

Sociedad Ibérica de Filosofía Griega (www.sifg.org) Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy ( www.societyforancientgreekphilosophy.com/) South African Society for Greek Philosophy and Humanities (http://web.

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SOURCES OF TRANSLATED/ REPRINTED ESSAYS

Aubenque, P., “Aristote était-il communitariste?” in En torno a Aristóteles. Homenaje al profesor Pierre Aubenque, ed. A. Álvarez Gómez and R. Martínez Castro, Santiago de Compostela: Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, 1998, 31–43. Berti, E., “Que reste-t-il aujourd’hui de la Métaphysique d’Aristote?” in La Métaphysique d’Aristote. Perspectives contemporaines. Première rencontre aristotélicienne (Aix-en-Provence, 21–24 octobre 1999), ed. M. Narcy and A. Tordesillas, Paris/Bruxelles: Vrin/Ousia, 2005, 227–38. Brague, R., “Sur la formule aristotélicienne Ὅ ΠΟΤΕ ὌΝ (Physique, IV, 11 et 14),” Du temps chez Platon et Aristote, Paris: PUF, 2003, 97–144.

Cassin, B., “Dire ce qu’on voit, faire voir ce qu’on dit,” Cahiers de l’Ecole des sciences philosophiques et religieuses 5 (1989), 7–37. Nussbaum, M. C., “Aristotle on Human Nature and the Foundations of Ethics,” in World, Mind, and Ethics: Essays on the Ethical Philosophy of Bernard Williams, ed. J. E. J. Altham and R. Harrison, Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1995, 86–131. *** Note: Regarding the utilization of Greek font and/or transliteration, the essays reprinted/ translated here rigorously follow the decisions in the original publication, however disparate. In the essays published here for the first time, in general the passages from ancient texts appear in Greek font, while isolated Greek terms are transliterated.

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INDEX

abstraction 4, 9, 12–13, 41, 45, 49, 106, 115, 133, 178, 192, 214, 265, 286, 290, 299–301, 303, 342, 345 accident (sumbebēkos) 26–8, 69, 79, 108, 117–18, 151–5, 157–63, 173, 231–3, 243, 250, 282, 286, 352, 358, 366, 368, 377 see also essence account see logos act (ergon, energeia) 35, 38, 75–6, 95–9, 108–11, 119, 153, 159, 165–6, 184–5, 227–31, 246–50, 264, 273, 289–90, 298–9, 328–30, 333–5, 372–3 see also activity; actuality action (praxis) 12, 64, 99–101, 109, 112, 115–16, 158, 166, 176, 179, 197–9, 217, 227–38, 242–50, 265–6, 282, 287, 305–7, 339, 362–3, 369–72 see also practical (praktikon); work (ergon) activity (energeia) 35, 43–5, 47–8, 108, 130–4, 166, 179–81, 184–6, 202, 209–14, 230, 264–7, 271, 298, 305–7, 318–19, 335, 358 actuality (energeia, entelecheia) 99–100, 106–11, 116, 132–3, 175–7, 184, 228–30, 264–5, 270, 287, 299–305, 331–6, 358 affect (pathos) 95, 98–100, 132–3, 136–8, 184, 307, 371 affection (paschein) see affect aisthēsis 24, 44, 48, 109–11, 130–2, 349 see also sense alloiōsis 132, 264 see also other

altruism 219 see also other anachronism 2, 6, 12, 101, 283, 309n. 32, 338 see also historicity analogy (analogia) 34–5, 49, 85, 140, 158, 165, 317, 343, 350 see also logos; proportion analysis (analutikē) 4, 9, 30, 48, 66–7, 75–7, 106–8, 267, 332, 388 analytic philosophy 327–32, 387–8 Andronicus 2–6, 173 Anglo-American philosophy 6–7, 13, 389–90 see also analytic philosophy animal (zōion) 4, 7, 9, 12, 24–6, 41, 62, 65, 68, 95, 106, 110–19, 130–1, 148–50, 160–3, 181, 201–11, 215, 219–21, 251, 263–5, 268, 285–6, 303–7, 339–40, 352, 362 see also life; soul anthropology 62, 247 see also human Anzahl see arithmos aporia 10, 29, 331 appearance (phainomenon) 25–8, 59, 66, 98, 111, 203, 313–14, 318–20, 379 see also phenomenology appetite (epithumia) 119, 191, 215, 280, 369 see also desire archē 4, 41–50, 147–9, 152, 229, 298, 304, 307, 332 see also principle; source Aristotelianism 91, 338, 385 see also Peripatetic school arithmos 78–85 see also number; time art (techn ē) 12, 29, 35, 67, 148, 167, 280, 283–5, 290, 302, 308, 376 aspect 78, 85, 184, 235, 302–3, 357

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INDEX assertion (apophansis) 353, 368 see also logos; statement atomism 6, 60–2, 67–8 see also matter Ausgleichung 282 Averroes 298, 304, 396 Avicenna 6, 330 bad see evil becoming (genesis) 4, 45, 75, 132, 139, 194, 265–6, 299, 303, 320, 332, 355 being (to on, einai) 5–6, 9, 11–15, 27–9, 35–6, 43–5, 47–51, 76–9, 83–4, 101, 119, 133, 150–5, 157–9, 162–4, 174–86, 283, 318–20, 327–36, 349, 368, 370 see also essence; substance belief (pistis) 30–1, 47, 117, 175, 180, 184, 192–200, 204–8, 250, 306–8 biology 4, 11, 47, 59, 130–1, 150, 194, 202, 219–20, 327, 389–90 see also life; nature blindness 11 see also sight body 10, 13, 21, 32, 59–69, 91–101, 106–15, 119, 132–4, 137, 152–3, 194, 205, 247, 264, 268–70, 272, 301, 306–8 see also life; nature calculation 200–1, 284, 364 see arithmos; number canon (kanōn) 27, 34, 298, 300–1, 305 see also rule capability 135, 217, 284 see also capacity capacity 32, 41, 45, 112, 118, 131–4, 137–40, 159, 233, 244, 259, 269, 273, 285, 313, 339, 356 see also power catharsis (katharsis) 279, 282–4, 364 cause (aitia, aition) 62, 65, 68, 114, 134, 148–9, 152, 163–7, 180–6, 229–33, 243–4, 248–9, 300–2, 307, 320, 331–5, 339, 350 chance (tuchē) 219, 230–3, 237–8, 339, 377 change (metabolē) 59, 78, 80, 82, 136, 151, 165–6, 177, 198, 205, 213, 245–7, 263, 265, 268, 302, 305, 320, 333, 367, 383–6 see also alloiōsis; becoming; motion

character (ēthos) 30, 98, 118, 198, 203, 281, 289, 340–6, 350, 362 virtues of 227–38, 264, 268–73, 305–7, 353 see also choice cheating see deception choice (prohairesis, proairesis) 193, 203–5, 208, 213–14, 227–33, 244–8, 250, 268–73, 307, 342, 345, 372 see also deliberation; practical wisdom Christian philosophy 13, 297–8, 330, 370 Cicero 1–2, 219, 343, 370 citizen (politēs) 42, 191, 199, 214, 264, 269–73, 288, 305–6, 340–5 see also constitution; polis city (polis) 31–3, 131, 199, 214, 269–71, 288, 320, 372 see also polis common sense 35, 94, 109, 133–5, 284, 289 see also aisthēsis; works by Aristotle, De Anima community 7, 11, 191, 199, 205, 207, 216– 17, 236–7, 268–9, 315, 319, 338–43 communitarianism 13, 338–46 see also MacIntyre, Alasdair comportment (hexis) 45, 47, 50–1, 114, 237, 285, 362 see also hexis consciousness 4, 10, 28, 128–30, 133, 137–40, 288 see also aisthēsis; intellect constitution 75, 140, 148, 159, 163, 341–6 contemplation (theōria) 6–7, 98, 179–80, 306, 363 see also study continuity (to suneches, sunecheia) 45–7, 65–9, 82, 100, 131–3, 149, 164–6, 194–7, 199–202, 216, 298, 304, 341, 358, 375 cosmos (kosmos) 4, 7, 65–7, 69, 166, 219, 268, 349, 363 see also nature craft (technē) 177, 209–11, 229–33, 289, 376 see also art; making Cratylus 27–9 deception 381 see also falsehood decision (prohairesis, proairesis) 118, 199, 202, 213, 227, 297, 343, 356, 369, 372 see also choice deconstruction 327

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INDEX deduction (sullogismos) 3, 30, 332–3, 352, 356, 374 deed see act; work definition (horismos) 3, 8, 26, 30, 33–4, 41–51, 61–9, 80–4, 154, 162–4, 183, 266, 331–5, 355, 366, 369 deliberation (bouleusis) 42, 51, 107, 118–20, 232, 268, 304, 307, 343–4 see also choice demonstration (apodeixis) 3–4, 27–30, 33, 43, 45–9, 80, 333–4, 352 see also knowledge; science Descartes, René 6, 26, 60, 91, 330 desire 11, 13, 31, 34, 64, 92, 95, 99–100, 115–18, 138, 166, 176–9, 208–9, 215, 227–9, 233, 236, 246–51, 270, 287, 298–9, 303–7, 357, 361, 369 see also appetite dialectic (dialektikē) 3–8, 29–30, 42–5, 48, 50–1, 82–4, 92, 178, 185, 196, 204, 208, 298, 314, 334, 346, 356 see also demonstration difference (diaphora) 7, 41, 50, 63–5, 94, 109–11, 128–9, 135–9, 158, 163, 272, 301–2, 304–6, 316, 328–30, 332–6, 345, 356 division (diairesis) 30, 78, 82, 84, 95, 106–7, 117–18, 355 see also dialectic echo/Echo 21–3, 26, 29, 35, 270, 272 education 4, 7, 12, 198, 214, 219, 262–73, 307, 345 see also hexis; virtue ekphrasis 29, 33, 36–8 see also rhetoric Eleatics 44, 60, 62, 182, 185 element (stoicheion) 49–50, 60–9, 76, 82–4, 96, 111, 118, 147, 160, 163–4, 178, 195–7, 207, 279, 282–3, 328, 333, 343, 374 see also archē empirical 9, 42, 45, 47–8, 59, 68–9, 176, 181, 228, 284, 314 enactment see act end (telos) 31, 38, 92, 99–100, 165, 167, 175–6, 182, 229–36, 246, 249–51, 269–73, 303, 306–7, 342–3, 351, 358, 375–6 ens commune 157

enthymeme 29, 402–3 see also demonstration; performance; rhetoric entity 42, 196, 298–9, 306, 368; see being; essence; substance environment (periechon) 9, 95, 106, 108–11, 118–19, 313 epistēmē see science epistemology 151, 368, 389 error (hamartia) 26, 116–18, 183, 229, 236, 246, 248–50, 283, 287, 290, 350 see also evil essence (ti esti, ti ēn einai) 9, 44, 68–9, 92, 94, 101, 151, 159–63, 166, 177, 184–5, 329–31, 333, 335, 355, 370, 376, 379 see also being; substance ethical virtues see character (ēthos), virtues of ethics 5–6, 11–13, 32, 191–4, 199–207, 216–20, 228, 235, 238, 241–2, 263, 268, 270, 273, 363, 367, 389 see also virtue Euclid 44, 48–50, 102n. 5, 279 eudaimonia see happiness; well-being evil (kakon) 11, 131, 176, 241–52 excellence 7, 11, 33, 195, 215, 224, 343, 346, 353 see also virtue experience (empeiria) 6, 8–9, 11, 27, 42–5, 48–50, 59–61, 67–9, 98, 109, 112, 119, 134–40, 148, 177, 184, 192, 202, 215– 16, 227, 231, 250, 272, 281, 290, 317, 321, 330, 354, 357 see also empirical explanation (aition) see cause faculty 30, 64, 91, 94, 99, 130–3, 183, 213, 356 falsehood (pseudos) 25–6, 116–19, 381 “fatal flaw” see error fate (tuchē) 191, 219, 281–7, 377 see also chance Fink, Eugen 135–6, 140 first philosophy (philosophia prōtē) 4–6, 10–12, 147–59, 164–7, 173–4, 181–2, 184–5, 328 see also metaphysics flourishing 204, 213, 234, 303–4, 361 see also happiness; well-being force see violence

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INDEX form (eidos, morphē) 9, 22, 25–6, 31, 42–50, 62–9, 75–6, 79, 83, 91–3, 96–8, 107–8, 111–12, 116, 135–8, 147–8, 151, 153–4, 160–5, 174, 195, 199–200, 214, 251, 301, 304–7, 316–20, 327–34, 357 see also matter; soul fortune 237, 243–4, 269, 287–7, 377 friendship 2, 11, 198, 203–4, 228, 234–5, 331, 342 fulfillment 6, 92–3, 101, 147, 195, 268, 279, 361 function (ergon) 12, 21, 41, 43, 47, 76–9, 84–5, 97, 100, 130, 134, 164, 198, 204, 208–16, 220, 236, 242, 264, 339, 353, 360 see also act; work generation 9, 60, 182, 185, 302, 305, 333, 355 genus 34–5, 41–2, 150–63, 211, 302, 328–30, 335, 355 god (theos) 35–6, 62–3, 67, 159, 166–7, 179–81, 194–5, 198, 244, 303, 306, 318, 330, 339–40, 363 see also being; substance good (agathon) 12, 23, 38, 91, 99, 112–15, 119, 131, 133, 166–7, 176, 191, 194, 200–14, 217–20, 227–39, 241–52, 264, 269–73, 280–1, 286–8, 304–6, 319, 338–45, 349 see also virtue government 167, 214, 305, 343–6 see also constitution gnōsis 42–5, 48–50 see also knowledge ground see archē growth 176–7, 210–11, 269, 361, 366, 379 see also life; nature habit (ethos) 29, 42, 95, 246–7, 250, 268– 70, 299, 303–8, 359 see also education; virtue happiness 176, 245, 269, 286, 342–3, 361 see also well-being health 132, 152–3, 231, 233, 247, 306, 345 see also body Hegel, G. W. F. 3, 21, 30, 85, 149, 312, 342–3 Heidegger, Martin 22–9, 38, 79, 85, 135, 327–8, 330, 387

Hellenistic philosophy 2, 6 Heraclitus 27, 128–9, 132, 135–6, 139–40, 217–18 Hesiod 36, 182, 321n. 3 hexis 42, 45, 50, 250, 264, 266–7, 273, 299, 315, 335, 359 see also character (ēthos); choice historicity see history history 5, 10, 14, 22, 36, 68, 94–5, 131, 149, 159, 173–86, 216–18, 279, 290, 318, 342–4 homonyms 33–4, 150–2, 157, 232, 251, 327, 331–2, 335 horismos 46, 83, 162, 369 see also definition human being 7, 11, 41–3, 117, 128–9, 132, 135–6, 140, 147, 150–1, 166, 185, 191–201, 241–2, 244, 251, 263–73, 285, 298, 304, 314, 321, 339–46, 352 see also human nature human nature 42, 191–2, 202–15, 268–9, 339 human rights 219, 338, 345 huparchein see archē Husserl, Edmund 10, 26, 69, 133, 140, 327, 387 hylomorphism 108, 192, 213–14, 216 see also body; soul idealism 6, 281, 312, 317, 328 see also Descartes; Hegel; Kant identity 11, 33, 42, 148, 151, 154, 159, 161–3, 194–202, 205–6, 218, 234, 338, 340, 342, 355 see also self illusion (apatē) 38, 137–9 see also deception imagination (phantasia) 9–10, 96–9, 106–7, 112, 114–19, 137, 197, 202, 217–18, 299, 301–4, 307, 318–21, 378 see also intellect; knowledge imitation 36, 238, 281, 284–7, 334, 367 impasse see aporia in itself (kath’ hauto) 8, 38, 62, 128, 130, 133, 148, 159, 166, 189, 235, 265–6, 329–31, 335 see also essence incontinence (akrasia) 12, 242, 246–8, 250–1

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INDEX Index Aristotelicus (Bonitz) 87, 348, 384, 392 individuality 3, 6–7, 11, 42, 45, 48, 61–9, 106–7, 114, 148, 151, 160–1, 163–4, 176, 179, 195, 198, 201–2, 212–15, 220, 244, 268, 297–300, 313, 327–9, 333–5, 339–42, 345–6 see also particular indivisibility 60–1, 66–7, 78, 109, 178, 358 induction (epagōgē) 30, 43, 353, 354, 359 see also knowledge inference 175, 374 see also deduction; syllogism infinite (apeiron) 46, 60–1, 65–9, 139, 166, 175, 299, 315, 318, 341 intellect (nous) 9–10, 12–13, 26–7, 41–2, 45, 50, 95, 98, 100, 115–16, 119, 186, 191, 196–7, 200, 335, 367 divine intellect 166, 181, 185 as natural phenomenon 107–8, 205, 297–308 passive and intelligible object (noētikon) 233, 303, 316–19 virtue of (aretē noētikē) 98, 100, 227–8, 265–70, 272–3 see also mind intellectual virtues see intellect, virtue of intermediary 176, 327, 367 see also mean intuition see intellect

138, 147–9, 162–6, 175–80, 183, 229–36, 265–8, 271–3, 299, 302–7, 360, 376 see also intellect; science; understanding language see logos Laws (Plato) 223, 269, 336 lie see falsehood life (zōē, bios) 4, 7, 11, 35–6, 47, 106–8, 112, 115–19, 128–34, 138–41, 166–7, 174–6, 193–219, 233–5, 241–4, 269–72, 284–5, 299–301, 306, 312–14, 317–19, 339–40, 342–3, 345–6, 354, 361, 382 see also animal; motion; soul literature 36, 182, 279, 286 logic 3–4, 8–9, 41, 45, 60, 66, 154, 174, 236, 285 see also demonstration; knowledge; logos logos 3, 8, 22–4, 26–7, 32–3, 43–6, 48, 50, 76–7, 83–5, 131, 182, 185, 211, 218, 265, 271, 280, 313–15, 319–20, 331, 339–40, 343–6, 374 see also assertion; demonstration; reason longing 37, 369 see also appetite; desire

Jaeger, Werner 13, 156–7, 164, 167, 311–13, 386 judgment 24, 26–7, 36, 95, 98, 101, 116–18, 164, 192–3, 195, 201–2, 204–6, 213, 217–19, 230, 280, 288, 304, 344 see also practical wisdom justice 29, 38, 48, 77, 157–8, 198, 219, 229–34, 248–9, 287, 315, 338–40, 342–5 Kant, Immanuel 6, 27, 48, 68–9, 230, 312, 387–9 kind (genos) 4, 27, 62–3, 66–7, 69, 111, 158, 185, 194–5, 204–6, 232–4, 248–50, 266–8, 270–3, 286, 290, 328, 340, 355 knowledge (epistēmē, technē) 6–7, 9, 11, 33–6, 41–51, 62–6, 118, 128–9,

McDowell, John 218, 220 MacIntyre, Alasdair 220, 274, 338, 344 magnanimity 228, 234–7 magnitude (megethos) 62, 66–9, 77–8, 108, 133, 179, 366 Maimonides 298, 304 making (poiēsis) 12, 29, 35, 177, 198, 211, 218, 371 see also act; production Marx, Karl 214–15, 225 material see matter mathematics 7, 45, 49, 150–1, 156, 167, 174, 177–8, 181, 185, 265, 282, 300–1, 343–5 see also science, as demonstrative matter (hulē) 4, 9, 14, 31, 59, 62–9, 91–4, 100–1, 107, 110–12, 118–19, 160–5, 181, 185, 192, 301–3, 331–2, 377 see also body; hylomorphism; nature mean (mesotēs) 109, 111, 114–15, 242, 245, 251, 306, 367 meaning (sēmainein) 25, 28, 33, 43–4, 46, 50, 83, 151–2, 157, 331–4, 349,

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INDEX 380 see also works by Aristotle, De Interpretatione measure (metron) 12, 68, 111, 117, 241, 243, 250, 280, 284–5, 289, 307 memory 44, 64–5, 95, 115, 130, 138, 148, 200–1, 237, 265, 299, 302, 341 Meno (Plato) 42, 44–5, 266 metaphor 29, 33–7, 130, 282, 318–19 metaphysics 4–5, 7, 22, 29, 149, 157, 159, 169, 202, 206, 280, 327–31, 334–6, 349 see also archē; first philosophy; works by Aristotle, Metaphysics method 1–8, 23, 30, 41–2, 48–9, 59–60, 79, 174, 202–3, 264, 328, 333 mimesis see imitation mind 91–101, 119, 179–84, 312–19, 367, 389 see also intellect mistake 236, 247–9, 305–6, 350 see also error mode 33, 42–6, 48, 50–1, 77–8, 129, 133–4, 140, 151, 185, 297, 301–3, 307 moment see now see also time motion (kinēsis) 4, 9, 47, 60–7, 107–8, 111–16, 184, 198, 229, 233, 263, 266–8, 299, 303–5, 365 self-motion 112, 299, 301, 307 “unmoved mover” 10, 344–5, 363, 366, 371 see also soul; substance; time myth 14, 21–2, 38, 133, 197–8, 367 naturalism 8, 13, 284, 314, 321, 346, 388 nature (phusis) 4–5, 8–9, 12–13, 33, 36–8, 41–3, 45–50, 91, 117–19, 138, 152, 156–8, 164–7, 173–4, 181–5, 197–209, 231–3, 245–7, 263–5, 267, 284–6, 298–301, 318–21, 343, 346 by nature (phusei) 47, 59–60, 62–9, 133, 147, 178–80, 231, 244, 250–2, 265, 272–3, 302–7, 314, 339–40 see also human nature necessity (anankē) 30, 44, 79, 92–5, 99, 118, 176, 181, 284, 286, 288, 297, 333–4, 351 see also demonstration neo-Platonism 1, 328–30, 334 Nietzsche, Friedrich 31, 280, 283

noise (psophos) 27, 112, 380 see also sound now (nun) 9, 76–80, 83–5, 114–16, 117, 137, 194–6, 266–7 see also time objectivity 8, 14, 24, 30, 116, 149, 184–5, 229–30, 282, 340, 344 occurrence 27, 177, 244, 272, 285, 371 oneness (hen/heis/mia, henotēs) 1–3, 9, 12, 45, 47, 82–4, 106–9, 147, 150–2, 162–3, 167, 176, 184, 263, 270, 307, 328–32, 340–2, 358 see also being ontology 8, 29, 150, 155–9, 251, 328 see also first philosophy; metaphysics order 2, 5, 7, 9, 30, 65, 107, 167, 173–4, 180, 183–4, 196, 218, 282–3, 339–40, 343 Oresteia (Aeschylus) 199 organism 9, 12, 48, 99–100, 106–8, 111, 380 see also body; life; soul origin 8, 11, 43, 59, 136, 141, 183, 233, 264, 299, 304, 320, 354 see also archē; becoming other 11, 41–3, 45–7, 63–4, 109–11, 113–15, 119, 132–6, 139–40, 161–4, 194–7, 199, 203, 205, 207, 216, 248, 266, 313, 320, 332 ousia 10, 45–6, 49, 62, 94, 152, 155, 330–5 see also being; substance Ovid 21 Parmenides 27, 29, 44, 59–60, 151, 177, 184, 329, 335 particular (kath’ hekaston) 82, 98, 148, 150, 154–6, 158–9, 163–4, 175–8, 182–3, 219, 234, 237, 263–7, 272–3, 331–2, 364 performance 29–32, 141, 231, 272–3, 353, 360 see also definition (horismos); demonstration Peripatetic school 2–3, 13, 173, 311–21 Phaedo (Plato) 1, 196, 205 phenomenology 22–30, 33, 35, 37, 59–62, 67–9, 139–40, 147, 387 phenomenon 3–4, 8–9, 11–12, 22–33, 36–8, 49, 68, 76–8, 81, 128–30, 139, 268, 315 see also appearance; phenomenology Philebus (Plato) 200–2, 205, 208, 212–13

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INDEX philia 194, 203–4, 213, 228, 234 see also friendship Plato 1, 6–7, 11, 22, 31–3, 37, 44, 60, 75, 82–3, 128–9, 133, 138, 149, 157, 163, 166, 174–5, 182–3, 185, 191, 196–8, 202–3, 214, 269, 280, 287–8, 297–8, 300, 304, 306, 329–30, 332, 344–5 Platonism 13, 45, 157, 300, 302–3, 331, 333 pleasure (hēdon ē) 34, 37–8, 112, 114, 133, 200–1, 208, 211–12, 215, 232, 235, 265–6, 272–3, 281–2, 285, 303, 306, 339, 343, 361, 362 plot (muthos) 279–90, 367 Plotinus 60, 329, 370 polis 7, 12, 176, 203, 269–73, 304–6, 339–43, 372 see also city; politics; politikon politics 5–6, 11–12, 31–2, 216, 263, 304, 306, 341, 346, 399 politikon 204, 206, 345 see also human; politics polity see constitution; government posterior 9, 68, 75, 78–80, 83–5, 341 see also being; time potential (dunamis) 62–8, 85, 91, 101, 108–11, 113–19, 132–3, 166, 175–7, 183–5, 266, 283–4, 287, 301–4, 327, 331, 333, 335, 339, 354, 356 see also capability; capacity; power power (dunamis) 32, 38, 106–19, 135–6, 180–4, 198, 264, 272, 301, 303–7, 317–20 see also capability; potential practical (praktikos) 49, 82, 99–100, 108, 112, 115–19, 156, 177–8, 181, 192, 198, 200–2, 208–9, 212–19, 227–33, 306–8, 338, 343–4 practical wisdom (phron ē sis) 212, 227–8, 233, 264, 267–8, 272–3, 379 practice (praxis) 3, 78, 80, 100, 209–11, 244, 264, 280, 338, 372 Pragmatism 388 predication (katēgorein) 3, 9–10, 26, 38, 66–8, 75–7, 79–80, 84–5, 150–5, 159– 64, 184–5, 328, 331 see also assertion; demonstration; logos

presentation 14, 96, 98, 164, 378 see also representation principle 4–5, 10, 27, 31, 43–5, 47–50, 59–61, 64–9, 77, 79, 99–100, 107–8, 110–11, 118–19, 152–5, 162, 165–6, 174, 212, 246–8, 250–1, 273, 298, 300, 304–7, 320, 331–5, 340–2, 344–5 see also archē prior 4, 8–9, 28, 78–80, 83–4, 109–11, 114–19, 156, 164, 173, 208, 266, 302 see also being; time privation (sterēsis) 131, 141, 152, 165, 250, 374 production (poiēsis) 12–14, 33–8, 60–9, 100, 112, 115, 118, 136–8, 156, 229–33, 263, 269, 271, 284–8, 302, 306, 314, 320, 343, 371–2 proportion (analogon, analogia) 280–1, 284, 287–9, 344, 351, 366, 398 see also analogy Protagoras 27–8 prudence see practical wisdom psychology 64, 92–3, 114–15, 238, 279, 282, 288, 297, 315 purification see catharsis (katharsis) purpose see end puzzle see aporia Quintilian 2 rationalism 6, 13, 101, 175, 185, 344, 354 see also reason reason 6, 13, 33, 77, 98, 109, 131–2, 165, 175, 198–202, 208, 210–20, 231–3, 246–50, 270, 273, 280, 285–6, 289, 298, 306–7, 317, 343, 345–6, 366 see also logos recognition (anagnōrisis) 203, 207, 215, 234, 236, 279, 281–3, 313, 315, 321, 351 see also knowledge recollection (anamnēsis) 115, 138, 265–6, 352 see also knowledge; Meno regime see constitution; government relation (pros ti) 41, 48, 63–4, 67–9, 78–81, 84, 91–3, 95–6, 100–1, 109–13, 118–19, 151–3, 156–9, 162–3, 166–7,

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INDEX 234, 264–8, 302–5, 314–16, 331–6, 341, 345–6, 373 representation 25–6, 37, 50, 94–8, 138, 141, 268, 285, 287, 363, 378 see also imitation reproduction 112, 211 see also life Republic (Plato) 7, 129, 138, 198, 269 reversal (peripeteia) 279, 288, 371 rhetoric 5, 8, 14, 29–35, 43, 48, 175, 206–7, 210, 283, 289, 351, 371–2 rule 44–5, 47–8, 50, 176, 203, 205–6, 251, 270, 285, 306, 342, 345, 354 see also archē; canon (kanōn) science (epistēmē) 6, 9, 27–9, 62–9, 167, 191–2, 202–3, 206, 208, 300, 306–7, 329–31, 360–1 of causes 106, 119, 147–52, 164, 334 as demonstrative 29–31, 41, 47, 50 and desire 175, 178–9, 181–2 as empirical 9, 47–8, 59, 68–9, 176, 314 of first principles 10, 155–9, 176–82 see also intellect; knowledge self 207, 216 self-governance 140, 242–3, 250, 273 self-knowledge 5, 11–12, 108, 110–12, 116, 197–8, 236, 249 self-motion see motion self-sufficient (autarkēs) 176, 191, 198, 201, 203, 207, 215–19, 306–7, 330 see also identity sense 8–10, 24–30, 34–6, 38, 42, 47–9, 51, 59–69, 81–4, 94–101, 106–15, 118–19, 129–40, 150, 152–3, 156–9, 161–7, 178–84, 203, 214–15, 265, 267, 299–304, 307, 316–20, 328, 335–6, 349–50 see also aisthēsis separate (chōristos) 5, 10, 82, 91–4, 97, 107–10, 118, 129, 156, 161–3, 167, 184, 207–8, 251, 298–304, 317, 332–3, 370–1, 375 serious (spoudaios) 212, 249, 269, 286–7, 373 shape see form sight 22, 28–9, 32, 34, 37, 64, 94, 134–5, 140, 285, 362 see also sense; vision

simply (haplōs) 5, 11, 44–5, 50, 112, 116–17, 136, 139–40, 269, 282, 333–5, 352 sleep 10, 128–41 Socrates 21, 30, 32, 69, 128, 151, 196, 200–1, 205, 266, 330 Sophist (Plato) 22, 122 sophistry 6, 32, 35–8, 342, 356 sōphrosunē 211, 212 soul (psuchē) 9–10, 13, 23–4, 26, 29, 32, 76, 85, 93–5, 99, 106–19, 130–1, 150, 174, 180, 191, 196, 210–11, 217–18, 241, 247, 251, 263–8, 270–3, 283, 287, 297, 303, 305, 308, 382 see also desire; reason; sense sound (phōn ē, psophos) 21–6, 28–9, 33, 36, 38, 112, 115, 129, 174, 231, 289, 319, 380, 382 see also logos source see archē species 30, 33–4, 41–2, 48, 91, 112, 119, 150–1, 155, 163–4, 195–7, 199, 201, 206–7, 211, 213, 219, 329, 344, 357 spectacle 38, 289 speech 21–2, 24, 28, 30, 32–3, 35, 44, 46, 48–9, 175, 184, 198–201, 213, 300, 312, 314, 319, 366 see also logos state (hexis) 42, 45, 50, 99, 106, 112, 116–18, 128–30, 136–40, 213, 229–30, 232, 238, 245, 249–50, 265, 279, 359 see also comportment; hexis state (polis) 131, 214, 342, 344–5; see city; government; polis statement (apophansis) 26, 30, 50, 68, 131, 151, 153–4, 163, 181, 185 see also assertion Stevens, Wallace 191, 312, 315, 318, 321 study (theōria) 14, 96, 106–8, 119, 129, 136, 155–9, 173–4, 181, 271, 299, 363 see also spectacle substance (ousia) 10, 28, 46, 60–2, 66, 106, 152–67, 173–4, 184, 196, 251, 299, 301, 327, 349, 370 see also being; first philosophy substrate (hupokeimenon) 76–7, 79, 132, 154, 159–63, 165, 333, 378 syllogism (sullogismos) 29, 33, 43, 45–8, 50, 99, 374 see also demonstration; knowledge 416

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INDEX system 1–3, 5–6, 10, 29–30, 60, 81, 129, 147, 150, 167, 183, 200, 208, 215, 219, 251, 270, 282, 287, 313, 341, 343 territory 340–1 textual 2, 14, 192, 264, 385 thinking 3, 5–6, 10, 13, 48, 62, 75, 91–101, 107–8, 116, 118–19, 139–40, 166, 174, 177, 179, 184, 193, 199–200, 206–7, 212–13, 219, 263, 266–7, 284, 298, 301–7, 311–21, 335 see also intellect thisness (tode ti) 308, 377 see also separate ti ēn einai see being; essence Timaeus (Plato) 82, 166 time (chronos) 4, 9, 28, 65, 67, 75–85, 95–7, 109, 129, 162, 165, 176, 180, 183, 185, 217–18, 266, 272, 329, 343, 381 tragedy 176–7, 280, 282–9 triangle 44, 49–50, 82 truth (alētheia) 8, 10–11, 12, 23–30, 48, 98, 116–19, 153–4, 173–7, 179–85, 205, 218, 228, 248, 251, 272, 285, 307, 312, 316, 350 understanding (epistēmē) see knowledge unity see oneness universal (katholou) 2, 30–1, 33, 41–5, 62, 65, 67–8, 92–3, 140, 148, 150, 154–6, 158–9, 163, 173–4, 176, 178–9, 181–2, 218–19, 263–7, 272–3, 284, 289, 305, 331–4, 338, 340, 342, 344–6, 365 unjust 32, 131, 220, 232–3, 248–9, 286–7, 339 see also vice vice 152, 218, 242–8, 250–1, 305 see also evil violence (bia) 82, 134–6, 180, 183–5, 217, 267, 279, 305, 320, 351, 354, 366 see also motion; nature virtue (aretē) 2, 33, 62, 133, 211, 214, 227–8, 248, 263–7, 305, 353 ethical virtue (aretē ēthikē) see character (ēthos) intellectual virtue (aretē noētikē) see intellect see also good

vision 43, 45, 50, 166, 185, 287, 290, 311, 317 see also aisthēsis vitality see life voice see sound wakefulness 128, 131, 133–4, 136–8 weakness of will (akrasia) see incontinence well-being (eudaimonia) 174, 304, 306–7, 380 see also happiness wholeness 3–4, 6–7, 37, 68, 79, 82, 111, 113–15, 119, 165, 167, 174, 179, 181–4, 197, 217, 227, 230, 263, 269–71, 288, 301, 321, 366, 367, 374 Williams, Bernard 23, 192–4 wisdom (sophia) 7, 31–2, 38, 114, 128, 147–50, 164, 173, 175–8, 182, 212, 244, 271, 373 see also intellect, virtue of Woodbridge, Frederick 13, 311–21 work (ergon) 33, 42–3, 113, 115–18, 130, 175, 185, 209–13, 267–9, 271–2, 315–16, 318, 358, 360–1 see also act works by (attributed to) Aristotle, Alexander or On Colonies 2 De Anima 4, 9, 13, 24, 26, 81–2, 92–4, 96–8, 100, 106–9, 111–12, 115, 116, 119, 132, 136, 264, 297–304, 307, 314–16 De Caelo 4, 9, 60, 66–7 De Insomniis 129, 134, 136–7 De Interpretatione 3, 23, 25–6, 32 De Motu Animalium 113, 218, 320 De Philosophia 4 Eudemian Ethics 213, 231, 233, 235–6, 244, 331, 362, 369 Magna Moralia 241, 244 Metaphysics 4–6, 10, 13, 24, 27–8, 31, 34–5, 45, 47, 64, 95, 147–55, 159–66, 173–5, 177, 179, 180–6, 231, 250, 265–7, 297–8, 314, 317, 327–8, 331–3, 336, 370 Nicomachean Ethics 4, 5, 7, 31, 48, 50, 147–8, 166, 174, 191, 194–8, 200, 202–4, 208, 211–12, 227, 230–3, 241–2, 245, 248–50, 265, 267, 269–70, 272, 297–9, 301, 304–7, 340, 343–5

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INDEX On the Cosmos 2 On Divination in Sleep (De divinatione per somnum) 10, 129, 136 On Kingship 2 On Memory and Recollection 115, 138, 274 On Sleep and Wakefulness (De Somno et Vigilia) 10, 129, 131, 134, 136, 137 Organon 3, 8, 264 Physics 3, 4, 6, 9, 30, 35, 42–9, 60, 64–8, 75, 78, 106, 151, 157, 173, 182, 230–1, 263–7, 272–3, 299–300, 314 Poetics 5, 8, 12, 33–5, 176, 238, 279, 282, 289, 319 Politics 11, 31, 131, 176, 195, 205, 264, 268–73, 306, 339–44

Posterior Analytics 3, 4, 30, 33–4, 42–3, 45–6, 50, 81, 95, 150–2, 154, 299 Prior Analytics 3, 4, 29, 72, 351, 356, 359, 370, 375, 382 Rhetoric 5, 8, 29–36, 230, 243, 351, 363, 371–2 Sophistical Refutations 3, 175 Topics 3, 33, 54, 72, 154, 257, 308, 356 world 4–5, 8, 33, 34, 36, 41–2, 44–5, 47, 49–50, 59–60, 69, 81, 98, 111–12, 114–19, 128–9, 139–40, 156, 166, 175, 183, 199, 202, 204, 210, 215, 217–20, 227, 232–3, 247, 251, 267, 271, 283, 285–6, 288–9, 311, 313–14, 317, 320, 328, 330, 336, 338, 365, 370 see also cosmos; nature

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