Abstract
Abstract In 1965, having been newly appointed a philosophy tutor at Balliol, I was assigned to teach the Nicomachean Ethics to Jonathan Barnes, then in his final year of Literae Humaniores. One week I assigned as a topic ‘Practical Truth ‘, with special reference to chapter 6. 2 of the Ethics. The essay he handed in was one of the best I ever encountered in a dozen years of Greats tutoring: I was so impressed that I asked him if I could keep it. Its theme was that Aristotle had no concept of practical truth: that was a fiction foisted on him by commentators. Sadly, I can no longer find the essay among my papers, so I cannot refresh my memory of the arguments it contained. However, in Barnes ‘s recently published Locke lectures On Truth etc the index contains no entry for practical truth, and there is no reference in the Index Locorum to NE 6. 2. So I conclude that the John Locke lecturer is in agreement with the fourth-year undergraduate: there is no such thing as practical truth.
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