Theory and Akrasia in Aristotle's Ethics

Abstract

In book 7 of the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle argues that vice, lack of self-restraint (akrasia), and brutishness are to be avoided. While the opposite of vice is virtue, the opposite of akrasia is self-restraint, and of brutishness a form of divinity. This article explores Aristotle's analysis of self-restraint and its lack, akrasia, focusing on the phenomenon of akrasia and its causes. Self-restraint is the experience of excessive and idiosyncratic desires that are nevertheless resisted. Like self-restraint, akrasia, or lack of self-restraint, involves the experience of excessive and idiosyncratic desires. However, those lacking in self-restraint give in to these desires; the unrestrained person knows the good but does the opposite nonetheless. Possible causes of akrasia are the overpowering of reason by desire among the young and the effeminacy of some women and womanly men. This article argues, however, that the most interesting cause of akrasia in Aristotle's account is theoretical thinking.