This article aims to offer an alternative reading of the opening passage of Metaphysics Λ10. The passage in question, corresponding to 1075a11-25, is often interpreted as an Aristotelian attempt to present the Prime Mover as a unifying cause of the universe, while also paving the way for a cosmic teleology in Aristotle’s philosophy. The reading proposed here suggests that, in this passage, Aristotle is not necessarily arguing for the relation of all things with the Prime Mover, so that the imitative aspect would not play a fundamental role in the argument as well. The article also examines the role of Λ10 within the context of Aristotelian teleology, offering brief considerations on how this teleology tends to be interpreted, and discusses the relationship between teleology and the imitation of the Prime Mover.

This paper offers a new interpretation of Thrasymachus’ thesis in Republic I (338c–341a). Against readings that reduce his position either to sophistic cynicism or to a purely technical account of rule, I argue that Thrasymachus advances an implicit theory of legitimacy. Through a close reading of Socrates’ Polydamas parody (339a) and the technē exchange (340d–341a), I develop what I call the Principle of Appearances (PA): political power survives only when coercion presents itself as truth. This performative dimension clarifies why Thrasymachus demands the ruler’s infallibility and why law (nomos) appears as the advantage of the stronger. The paper situates this paradox of legitimation within the genealogy of political realism, from Plato’s dramatic text through Machiavelli’s verità effettuale della cosa to Bernard Williams’s Basic Legitimation Demand. The conclusion is that justice, for Thrasymachus, is not simply kratos or technē, but the linguistic and symbolic form by which domination sustains itself as acceptable order.

Dem Stoizismus zufolge hat uns die Natur mit Vernunft ausgestattet, die es uns durch kataleptische Eindrücke ermöglicht, die Welt wahrhaftig wahrzunehmen. Dennoch weichen die meisten Menschen von diesem Ideal ab. Um dies zu erklären, identifizieren die Stoiker zwei Ursachen: (a) die Überzeugungskraft der Eindrücke und (b) die Lehren unserer Mitmenschen. Während sowohl Galen als auch Poseidonios die Gültigkeit dieser Ursachen in Frage stellen und viele Gelehrte ihre Komplexität hervorheben, zielt dieser Beitrag darauf ab, ihnen eine tiefere stoische Grundlage zu geben. Wie ich vorschlagen werde, erfordert die Behandlung dieser beiden Ursachen eine umfassende Analyse verschiedener Aspekte der stoischen Ontologie, Epistemologie und Kausalität. Dieser Beitrag argumentiert, dass die Überzeugungskraft von Eindrücken einerseits in der komplexen Kausalstruktur der stoischen Welt und den Ähnlichkeiten zwischen den kausalen Interaktionen unserer Seele mit Tugend und wünschenswerten Äußerlichkeiten begründet liegt, andererseits in der Ähnlichkeit zwischen den in Leidenschaften und tugendhaften Emotionen erfahrenen Zuneigungen – insbesondere der Erfahrung von Ausdehnung und Kontraktion der Seele, wenn uns etwas zuteilwird oder entzogen wird. Darüber hinaus werde ich argumentieren, dass der Einfluss von Mitmenschen unsere Werturteile aufgrund der kausalen Kraft von Überzeugungen beeinflusst, die durch die Überzeugungskraft relevanter Eindrücke kontinuierlich verstärkt wird. Um diese Schlussfolgerungen zu untermauern, ist eine detaillierte Untersuchung sowohl der stoischen Kausalitätstheorie als auch des Status von Sagbaren in der stoischen Ontologie unerlässlich.

Tras una reconstrucción historiográfica del Argumento del Tercer Hombre (ATM), interpretado antiguamente en contra de la doctrina platónica de las ideas, se analizan la tercera y la quinta aporía de Parménides, así como las aporías de la República y la de Timeo, interpretadas en la era moderna como otras cuatro formas del ATM. Mi intención es demostrar, por el contrario, que Platón nunca ha considerado realmente el ATM debido a su inconsistencia dialéctica y construye sus aporías para aclarar principalmente, y a diferentes niveles, por qué la idea/forma es una y solo puede ser una, a diferencia de la multiplicidad no eidética.

El libro de Laura Liliana Gómez Espíndola sobre los conceptos de “necesidad” y de “responsabilidad moral” en Aristóteles constituye el resultado coherente de un recorrido de investigación que tiene como antecedente notable la publicación en el año 2016 de un libro sobre los mismos ejes problemáticos, pero en el pensamiento del estoicismo.[1] La vuelta a Aristóteles, según dice la autora en la Introducción del libro, obedece a la voluntad de establecer hasta qué punto la filosofía práctica del estagirita permite superar los riesgos del determinismo extremo; esto es, los riesgos de que, en un mundo en el que los fenómenos naturales parecen estar gobernados por una causalidad necesaria, se desdibujen los márgenes de la voluntad humana con relación a la posibilidad de tener el control de sus propias acciones.

The History of Hylomorphism is a most welcome book. 1 Aristotelian hylomorphism has recently been vindicated as a viable option for interpreting the nature of objects and natural beings, especially when seen in contrast with Cartesian dualism.This book offers a series of papers in which hylomorphism is studied as a philosophical notion from Aristotle to Descartes and investigates how this doctrine was born and subsequently reworked in the history of philosophy.Hylomorphism, in a nutshell, is seen as offering an alternative to dualisms in general and to Cartesian dualism in particular by notably arguing that human beings are not composed of two distinct substances, matter and soul (or mind), but are such that in them psychological and physiological aspects are so intrinsically connected as never to occur separately.If dualism is still in the area, hylomorphism may well function as a useful vaccine while also acting as a check against excessive materialism.All papers display outstanding and impressive scholarly analyses, and the reader who goes through the whole book gets an enlightening view of this metaphysical doctrine and how different thinkers reclaimed it at different times.It should be said from the outset, though, that, despite their highly scholarly quality, some of the papers included in this book do not belong to the history of hylomorphism properly speaking.This can be clearly seen in relation to Plotinus's philosophy, and Neoplatonism: these doctrines absorb hylomorphism only to regurgitate it as having no philosophical relevance.As Riccardo Chiaradonna shows in his paper Plotinus on Hylomorphic Forms, the main reason for this is that, while hylomorphism concerns sensible substances, according to Plotinus, "the so-called sensible substance is actually no substance at all: it is a mere image of substance (for substance as such is intelligible substance)" (216).Thus, this rival theory purports to show that hylomorphism is a dead end ontologically speaking and is eager not to establish compromises but to get rid of it instead.The same is true for Neoplatonism in general.In her very interesting paper, Paulina Remes shows that "Neoplatonists' relation to the hylomorphic tradition is one of offering a 1 Charles, David (editor).

In this paper I offer a new reading of the final arguments of Metaphysics Γ4, from a cognitive approach. Against a number of different positions, I argue that the passage 1008b2-1009a5 provides arguments that are not contained in the preceding proofs of the chapter. Furthermore, I try to show that these arguments are not dislocated but that, under this approach, they are revealed to be articulated under the same subject relative to mental states and contents, and also by the same objective: to preserve the cognitive thesis with which Aristotle characterizes the principle of non-contradiction in Γ3 1005b11-14. Given the discrepancies between the editors of the text and the difficulties arising from textual paradosis, I have once again revised manuscripts J, E and Ab. The results of that examination include lectiones never before noted, one of which (from ms. J) improves, in my judgment, the difficult argument presented between lines 1008b3-10. The final part of this study offers the results of my examination in the form of a new text of the entire passage, with translation and commentary

Buchrezension Rossella Saetta Cottone, Soleil et Connaissance: Empédocle avant Platon. Paris, Les Belles Lettres, 2023 [Collection encre marine]

Le terme εὐβίοτος, « bien vivre », et ses équivalents apparaissent dans les observations d'Aristote sur les oiseaux, dans l'Historia Animalium IX. Cette note de recherche compare la façon dont le terme aristotélicien a été traduit dans les manuscrits grecs, latins et arabes, ainsi que dans les traductions modernes et contemporaines en anglais, français et allemand, et démontre qu'il a été mal traduit, à commencer par les traducteurs humanistes du XVe siècle, Georges de Trébizonde et Théodore Gaza. Les libertés prises dans la surinterprétation du terme aristotélicien ont peut-être obscurci ce qu'il cherchait à communiquer sur les capacités des oiseaux.

The concept of essence plays a crucial role in the research on substance that takes place in Book VII of Aristotle’s Metaphysics. Chapter VII 4 contains the first approach to it in Book VII. In this difficult text, essence is examined from an abstract point of view that sets the basis for the remaining discussions of the subject throughout Book VII. My purpose here is to place Metaphysics VII 4 under a new light by means of a new Portuguese translation with explanatory notes. The translation avoids such interventions in the transmitted text as have been frequently made by contemporary editors. It also aims at keeping as much as possible the reading of manuscripts E and J. The comments are intended to justify the choices made as to the edition and the translation of the text and also to clarify the content of the chapter.