Aristotle's Treatment Research Articles

Aristotle on Red Mirrors (On Dreams II 459b24 - 460a23)

This passage in Aristotle's treatise On Dreams was for a considerable time regarded as too indelicate for the English reader, and thus languished in the decent obscurity of a dead language: both Beare in the Oxford translation and Hett in the original Loeb edition preferred a Latin version. It may be for this reason that somewhat scant attention has been paid to Aristotle's disquisition on menstruating women and their effect upon mirrors. I In offering some comments on the passage, I bypass the question of Aristotle's credulity and focus on a different question: what interested Aristotle in the supposed fact that the gaze of a menstruating woman has the power to redden the mirror into which she looks? The passage occurs in the context of Aristotle's explanation of the phenomenon of dreams, an explanation that relies chiefly on the notion of residual sense impressions. Although sense perception as normally understood is not operative in dreams 458b8, it is not true that the sense organ is unaffected 459a6, 10. Dreams belong, he says, to the sensitive faculty, but qua imaginative 459a21. The images involved in the sense organs not only while the sensations are active but also after they have gone 459a27-28.2 After enunciating this general principle, Aristotle proceeds to illustration. He begins with the case of projectiles: they continue to move even after they have broken contact with the moving agent 459a28-30. This illustration from the category of place is by way of introduction to illustrations from the category of quality, qualitative change or change of state being the type of change most relevant to sensation. Again he emphasizes the factor of persistence, adding that change of state may persist deep down (bathu 459b7) as well as on the surface. Examples are drawn from smell and hearing 459b21, but mainly from vision. The act of looking at a green object for a considerable time may, for instance, produce such a strong effect upon the eye that any object to which we shift our gaze appears to be that colour 459b12-14.3

Aristotle's Semantics and a Puzzle Concerning Change

In this paper I shall examine Aristotle's treatment of a certain puzzle concerning change. In section I, I shall show that within a certain standard framework for the semantics of subject-predicate sentences a number of things that Aristotle wants to maintain do not make sense. Then, I shall outline a somewhat non-standard account of the semantics for such sentences — arguably Aristotle's — and show how the proposals concerning change fit quite naturally into this framework. The results of this exercise will enable us to say something quite precise about applications of some obscure but characteristically Aristotelian doctrines: that ‘is’ is ‘said in many ways,’ that his predecessors got the Law of Opposites wrong. They also shed some light upon Aristotle's ontology of predicables.

Averroes' Middle Commentaries on Aristotle's 'Categories' and 'De Interpretatione'

Ibn Rushd (1126-1198), better known as Averroes, is said to be the greatest among the Muslim commentators on Aristotle and is especially known for his influence on medieval Christendom and on medieval and Renaissance science and philosophy. This volume presents a readable translation of his middle commentaries on Aristotle's Categories and De Interpretation--the first of his middle commentaries on Aristotle's logical treatises.

Al-Farabi's Commentary and Short Treatise on Aristotle's De Interpretatione

Al-Farabi of Baghdad (c. 870-950) is the first major representative of the medieval Arabic Aristotelianism which came to influence the Christian West so profoundly. In the Islamic world his writings on logic set the pattern for the future and virtually created Islamic philosophy. He is also important as a witness to the study of Aristotle in late antiquity, demonstrating a knowledge of Galen and the exegetical tradition of Porphyry. Aristotle's treatise was famous in antiquity for its study of the simple, unconditional proposition, for its examination of modal sentences containing `necessary' and `possible', and above all for the notorious chapter on future contingents - a problem fully alive in twentieth-century debate. This translation is based on a fresh study of the Arabic manuscripts. An introduction and notes make this intriguing document accessible to all for whom it contains important matter. Classicists, historians of philosophy and logic, medievalists, Arabists, students of Islamic thought.

Not Available

AbstractNature and significance of the ‚final cause’︁ in Aristotle. − 1. In Aristotle's treatment of the tissues and the organs of animal body the search for their final cause is nothing but the search for their function. There are no speculations about the origin of the purposive organisation of biological species, because species are eternal for him. − 2. When Aristotle is describing the production and propagation of an animal as goal‐directed, he does not exclude a causal explanation. He gives causal explanations at great length in De generatione animalium: Against widespread views it is not the future goal that controls the development as a retroactive cause. In animal blood a sort of genetic code is included, which is represented by impulses (which you can imagine as undulatory motions). By these genetic impulses the form of the parent will be transported to the semen (or the menstrual blood in the case of woman) and from the semen to the germ of the offspring. − 3. The biological use of the concept of purpose or goal is quite different from the use in physics and cosmology. In ignorance of the law of inertia Aristotle tries to explain the continuous movement in the world metaphysically, by assuming a tendency of the stars towards the immaterial god. Terminologically he strictly distinguishes this tendency from the ‚final cause’︁ in biology. − 4. In policy man aims at welfare and ‚good life’︁. In history Aristotle denies a goal‐directed progress.

A "Descriptivist" Reading of Aristotle's Treatment of Virtue — Terms

A "Descriptivist" Reading of Aristotle's Treatment of Virtue — Terms

Aristotle and Theories of Justice

Today it is all the rage for political theorists and even philosophers to have theories of justice. Looking back on the history of political thought, we cannot help but notice that not all previous philosophers have taken justice and theories of justice so seriously. Among those who did not was Aristotle. To be sure, he had a theory of justice, and from this fact we might infer that he thought it necessary to have one. But I shall presently argue, primarily from Aristotle's treatment of the problem in the Nicomachean Ethics, that Aristotle thought all theories of justice, including his own, to be unsatisfactory. In his opinion, a politics that understands its highest purpose as justice and a political science that attempts to comprehend all political phenomena within a theory of justice are practically and theoretically unsound.

Libri Ad Mnemosynen Missi

G.B. Kerferd, Aristotle's Treatment of the Doctrine of Parmenides.?M. Mignucci, Expository Proofs in Aristotle's Syllogistic. ? M. Schofield, Explanatory Projects in Physics 2, 3 and 7.?M. Woods, Universale and Particular Forms in Aristotle's Metaphysics.?J. Ackrill, Change and Aristotle's Theological Argument.?A. Kenny, The Nicomachean Conception of Happiness.?J. Brunschwig, On a Booktitle by Chrysippus: 'On the Fact that the Ancients Admitted Dialectic along with Demonstrations'.?A.A. Long, The Harmonics of Stoic Virtue.?H. Armstrong, Aristotle in Plotinus: The Continuity and Discontinuity of Psyche and Nous.?Pamela Huby, Stages in the Development of Language about Aristotle's Nous.?J. Barnes, Ammonius and Adverbs.?Anne Sheppard, Phantasia and Mental Images: Neoplatonist Interpretations of De anima 3,3.?Ilsetraut Hadot, The Role of the Commentaries on Aristotle in the Teaching of Philosophy according to the Prefaces of the Neoplatonic Commentaries on the Categories.??. Blumenthal, Nous pathetikos in Later Greek Philosophy.?H. Robinson, Form and the Immateriality of the Intellect from Aristotle to Aquinas.?R. Sorabji, From Aristotle to Brentano: The Development of the Concept of Intentionality.?Publications on Ancient Philosophy by A.C. Lloyd.?Indexes.

Plato: Laches & Charmides (review)

Book Reviews Plato: Laches & Charmides. Translated, with an Introduction and Notes, by Rosamond Kent Sprague. (Indianapolis and New York: The Bobbs-Merrill Co., 1973, pp. ix+ 102. $2.50) This volume is a useful addition to the Library of Liberal Arts series of texts in Classical Philosophy. The volume consists of new translations of, introductions to, and notes on two of Plato's early dialogues, the Laches and the Charmides. These two dialogues are of value for several reasons. They are the earliest philosophical discussions of two virtues: courage and temperance. These discussions are of importance since Plato raises some central questions concerning virtues and human conduct in general; because they throw light on Plato's later discussion of the same virtues--in particular the discussions in the Republic--as well as on Aristotle's treatment of these virtues; and lastly, because they give us some of the liveliest portraits of Socrates engaged in his favorite activity: searching for and examining proposed definitions of moral concepts. Sprague has translated the texts of the Laches and the Charmides as given by John Burnet in the Oxford Editions of Plato's dialogues (Platonis Opera, vol. 3, Oxford Classical Texts). The translations seem to be on the whole more readable than those of the Loeb Classical Library, and more accurate than those by Jowett. The introductions, although by no means detailed analyses of the arguments of the two dialogues, nonetheless contain useful remarks about the dates and persons, as well as brief accounts of the general structure of the argument of each of the dialogues. In the introduction to Laches, the author raises an interesting question about the title of the dialogue: Why is it named after Laches and not after the other major character of the dialogue, Nicias--especially since the latter seems to be the more philosophically astute? The author claims that "the dialogue is called Laches because Laches shows a more promising reaction to the Socratic elenchus than does Nicias" (p. 6). Nicias, Sprague notes, never felt the full force of the elenchus: "he seems no less satisfied with his own intellectual state than he was in the beginning" (p. 8). Laches, on the other hand, as a result of the elenchus, realizes his ignorance and is angry with himself for it. Sprague concludes, "I think Plato means us to feel that whereas Nicias may be the more gifted, his philosophical progress will be less than that of Laches since it is unlikely that he will ever be made to feel angry with himself. Hence I believe that Laches is the right title for the dialogue. The reader will, however, want to form his own opinion on this point" (p. 8). Regarding the Charmides (as well as the Laches and other early dialogues), the author points out that by associating temperance (and virtue in general) with knowledge Plato "has involved himself in the mechanics of the term 'knowledge' as well as in the question of defining the various virtues" (p. 53). Now "knowledge" is a "tinosword : (literally, an 'o/-what'-word) a word that appears to be complete but is not, since it demands another word or words to explain it" (pp. viii-ix). So to use the term "knowledge" ("science," "art") is to raise the question "knowledge of what?" There are however two types of art (knowledge, science): (1) First-order art--an art that possesses a recognizable scope or product, such as carpentry, medicine, etc.; (2) second-order art--an art the scope of which comprises arts of the first order, such as rhetoric, sophistry or statesmanship. The last, and very difficult, account of temperance in the Charmides is that it is a science of sciences--a second-order art. A great deal of [102] BOOK REVIEWS 103 what Plato says about temperance (and the virtues in general) can be better understood by seeing that what he is often doing is examining the similarities and differences between the two types of art. The above distinctions and comments alone by no means solve the problems surrounding the definition of temperance in the Charmides as a science of sciences, but they perhaps point in a fruitful direction. Of particular value...

Prime Matter in Aristotle

A ristotle argues that every change has something which underlies it (eg 190 a 31b 9). What underlies a change is the matter of that change (eg 1042 b 9-11). This has traditionally been taken to mean that, in every change, there is something which is first a part of the whole which precedes the change, and then a part of the whole which succeeds it; thus what underlies a change persists through it. When a substance alters in an accidental fashion the matter of the change is the substance itself, for that persists through the change. When the change involves the forming of a new substance from an old one, then the matter of the change is that which constitutes first the one substance then the other: thus if I turn an iron statue into cannonballs the iron is what underlies this change. Aristotle believes that the elements (air, fire, earth and water) can change into each other (eg 305 a 14-35). As there is no identifiable matter more primitive than the elements (305 a 14-35) there is a problem about what underlies such change. The traditional interpretation of Aristotle's treatment of this problem is that he posits a prime matter, a bare 'stuff', lacking all positive determinations, which is the matter of the elements and which makes elemental change possible. This prime matter is nothing but a potentiality which can exist only as actualized in some determinate matter i.e. in one of the elements and which is what persists when one contrariety is replaced by another and the identity of an element changes. I intend to defend the view that Aristotle believed in a prime matter of this sort. This venerable theory has twice been attacked in recent years. First it was attacked by H. R. King (Journal for the History of Ideas, Vol. 17, 1956), and then by W. Charlton in his edition of books one and two of the Physics (Clarendon Aristotle Series, Clarendon Press, Oxfoid, 1970) where it merits a special appendix. King has been

Logic and Metaphysics in Aristotle. Aristotle's Treatment of Types of Equivocity and its Relevance to His Metaphysical Theories (review)

Logic and Metaphysics in Aristotle. Aristotle's Treatment of Types of Equivocity and its Relevance to His Metaphysical Theories (review)

Aristotle's Metaphysical Argument - Walter Leszl: Logic and Metaphysics in Aristotle. Aristotle's treatment of types of equivocity and its relevance to his metaphysical theories. Pp. xiii+60i. Padua: Antenore, 1970. Paper, L. 9,000.

Aristotle's Metaphysical Argument - Walter Leszl: Logic and Metaphysics in Aristotle. Aristotle's treatment of types of equivocity and its relevance to his metaphysical theories. Pp. xiii+60i. Padua: Antenore, 1970. Paper, L. 9,000. - Volume 23 Issue 2

Logic and Metaphysics in Aristotle: Aristotle's Treatment of Types of Equivocity and its Relevance to his Metaphysical Theories. By Walter Leszl. Padova: Editrice Antenore. 1970. Pp. xiii, 601. L.9000.

Logic and Metaphysics in Aristotle: Aristotle's Treatment of Types of Equivocity and its Relevance to his Metaphysical Theories. By Walter Leszl. Padova: Editrice Antenore. 1970. Pp. xiii, 601. L.9000. - Volume 11 Issue 1

Aristotle on Scientific Explanation

The problem. The purpose of this paper is to provide a general discussion of Aristotle's views on scientific explanation, by which I mean a discussion of Aristotle's treatment of scientific explanation, its structure and its principles, as distinct from Aristotle's own principles of explanation. By means of this distinction I hope to be excused from a discussion of Aristotle on form and matter, potentiality and actuality, and the four causes, and to avoid so far as possible the controversy among commentators concerning the respective merits of Aristotlequanaturalist and Aristotlequapre-Thomist Thomist. I wish to be excused from treating these problems in order to approach directly Aristotle's formal treatment of scientific explanation as given in thePosterior Analytics, but if I were to be accused of introducing a distinction between parts of the Aristotelian corpus for which there is insufficient warrant, if I were told that I am making an illegitimate abstraction from the whole of which thePosterior Analyticsis but a part, I should plead not guilty.

ΔΙΠΛΟΥΣ ΜΥΘΟΣ

Aristotle'sPoeticsis a treatise notoriously difficult to understand, largely because of Aristotle's treatment of his theme, with its elliptical thought and loose terminology, but also because Aristotle's influence on subsequent drama and criticism makes it difficult to isolate the original thought from subsequent attempts at implementation or interpretation. However, as Aristotle devotes most of his treatise to tragedy—despite the wider subject he professes—and in discussing tragedy deals most extensively with plot, his views on the tragic plot should be reasonably clear. The passages cited have some importance for the understanding of his views.

De tragische dood van Pentheus

An analysis of the Bacchae on the basis of Aristotle's Poelies revealsthat Euripides' treatment of Pentheus' fate has all it takes to arouse pityand fear. The king's μεταβασιζ εξ ευτυχιαζ ειζ δυστυχιαν begins witha peripety (v. 810) and ends upon a pathos-scene (vv. 1114-36). Theemotional effect of the latter is enhanced by the surrounding songs (vv.977-90; 1153-59) and the εναργεια of the messenger's description.Ultimately, however, the impact of Pentheus' downfall will depend onour evaluation of his ηθοζ and διανοια. Whoever is blind to the circumstancesof the young man's αμαρτια as well as to the negative evolutionin Dionysus' behaviour, will not be moved. But even (s)he will fee] pityand fear in the exode, as we witness through a brilliant αναγνωρισιζ(vv . 1264-96) how Pentheus' death brings undeserved misfortune onAgave.

The discipline of speech

In spite of the diversity of subjects subsumed under the generic term speech, all areas of this discipline are based on oral communication with its essential elements--voice, action, thought, and language. Speech may be viewed as a community of persons with a common tradition participating in a common dialog, described in part by the memberships and activities of its learned societies. Speech as a separate discipline evolves from (1) the informal rhetorical theories of the Egyptians (2900 B.C.), (2) the systematic treatises of Aristotle, Cicero, Quintilian, and Augustine, (3) the 18th century concern for communication in a parliamentary society, (4) the 19th century interest in language and style, and (5) the 20th century need for a clear, precise system of communication based upon research using such modes of inquiry as description, experimentation, and historical or rhetorical analysis and synthesis. Since the act or process of communication (an essential function of mankind) is the domain of the discipline of speech, and is a necessary element in most intellectual and scientific disciplines, the practitioners of speech must construct relevant programs which provide links between theoretical principles and effective practices. (JM)

Aesthetic Theories: Studies in the Philosophy of Art (review)

Book Reviews Aesthetic Theories: Studies in the Philosophy o] Art. Ed. by Karl AsChenbrenner and Arnold Isenberg. (Englewood Cliffs, N. J.: Prentice-Hall, 1965. Pp. xi + 491. $7.95.) Given the large number of good anthologies and paperbound books now available in aesthetics, one is naturally inclined to question the values of still another collection of readings . Such was my inclination as I approached this book of selections. However, I was pleased to find that---in addition to the usual selections from Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus, Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche, and so on--the editors have included several important but neglected works in traditional aesthetic theory. Among these are essays by Hutcheson, Diderot, Reid, Adam Smith, Francis Jeffrey, and Theodor Lipps. Professor Aschenbrenner translated Diderot's Encyclopedia article on beauty and Lipps' essay on empathy so that they could be included in this volume. The editors' governing aim has been to present the main tradition of aesthetic theory from Plato to Sartre. At the same time they have restricted their selections to philosophical works, as distinguished from the writings of artists, critics, historians, psychologists, and others who have contributed to aesthetics. The resulting collection of over twenty-five substantial readings amply testifies to the richness and continuity of traditional philosophical aesthetics. Through brief introductions, the editors relate each selection to this tradition and to the issues which are still alive in aesthetic theory. The one shortcoming in an otherwise very useful book is the paucity of bibliographical suggestions. JAMES F. DOYLE Claremont Men's College The Development o] Arabic Logic. By Nicholas Rescher. (Pittsburgh : University of Pittsburgh Press, 1964. Pp. 262. $6.50.) In the first part of this book Rescher offers a survey of Arabic logic, tracing its beginnings to around A.D.800. The discussion opens with a brief exposition of the Syriac Christian translation of late Alexandrian Aristotelianism into an Arabic setting. According to Professor Rescher, "The Arabic Aristotelians are thus the continuators of the work of the Hellenistic Greeks, and such Arabic-language scholars as al-F~r~bi, Avicenna, and Averroes are later links in a chain whose earlier members include such Greek-language scholars as Alexander of Aphrodisias, Porphyry, Themistius, and Ammonius" (p. 22). Rescher devotes a chapter to each of the following: (i) The "First Century" of Arabic logic, from 800 to 900, which is understood to have been a period mainly of transmission, translation, and assimilation. (ii) The flowering of Arabic logic which takes place between 900 and 1000, a period dominated by the School of Baghdad, and during which we witness the pursuit of logic for its own sake. It is generally acknowledged that the leading thinker here is al-Fg~r~bi. "By the end of the 10th century," Rescher writes, "Greek logic was not only Arabicized, but also on the way to being Islamized--both in the origin of its personnel and the geographical distribution of the foci of its pursuit" (p. 47). (iii) Next we come to the century of Avicenna (1000-1100). We are told that this period as a whole was one of stagnation, with the notable exception of the logical contributions of Avicenna. During this period the School of Baghdad was steadily approaching the point of exhaustion and death: "Avicenna dominated his century (otherwise barren) in influence and skill" (p. 50). Throughout this century, logic "is no longer studied via Aristotle's treatises, and logic books were no longer commentaries on Aristotle, but handbooks, more or less independent treatises covering the ground after their own fashion" (p. 52). (iv) We turn to the century of Averroes. Now the center of logical studies and philosophic initiative belongs to Muslim Spain. As Rescher says, and as is generally conceded, "Averroes was beyond question the towering figure of Arabic [338] ...

The Practical Syllogism and Incontinence 1

Philosophers do not agree whether a man can voluntarily do what he believes to be wrong. This disagreement has coloured their opinions of Aristotle's treatment of incontinence the seventh book of the Nicomachean Ethics. Some, believing that one cannot unless prevented fail to do what one believes to be the best thing to do at the moment of action, have praised for sharing the same belief. Others, holding a different opinion, have regretted that this passage misrepresents the moral struggle. They have consoled themselves by alleging other texts a contrary sense. Thus, Sir David Ross: Aristotle elsewhere shows himself alive to the existence of a moral struggle, a conflict between rational wish and appetite, which the agent has actual knowledge of the wrongness of the particular act that he We must suppose that interest his favourite distinctions of potential and actual, of major and minor premise, has betrayed him into a formal theory which is inadequate to his own real view of the problem. What is missing his formal theory is the recognition that incontinence is due not to failure of knowledge, but to weakness of will. (Aristotle, 224). I wish to argue that both the praise and the blame thus accorded to are unwarranted. I shall try to show that the central passage of Chapter Three (1147a24ff.), expressly provides for the case in which the agent has actual knowledge of the wrongness of the particular act that he does. Failure to recognise this, I shall contend, is due to misunderstanding of the structure of the practical syllogism. Aristotle's starting-point is the popular notion of incontinence set out the first two chapters. The incontinent man (x yet he acts, it seems, willingly: for it is argued that a man cannot be

La filosofia medievale: Antologia di testi (review)

258 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY To make this theme conspicuous to the reader, the author deals with three topics in Aristotle's first philosophy: the path from beings to the primary instance of being, the study of sensible substance, and the distinction between the potential and the actual. Grene's essay on the most perplexing of Aristotle's works is the least satisfactory in her study. Though she acknowledges that the path of thg Aristotelian first philosopher is not easy, her analysis of the school X67oLmakes the road more facile than it, in fact, is. For example, what is the relation between Wisdom (the science of principles and causes), the science of being-qua-being, and the science of immovable substance? How can the latter be universal and, at the same time, have as its object one kind of being? Why does Aristotle dismiss substrate in the sense of compound of form and matter as a candidate for substance? It would seem to satisfy his criteria of thisness and separability better (or at least in more instances) than substrate in the sense of form. Finally, it is hard to avoid Ross's conclusion (Aristotle's Metaphysics, Vol. 1, pp. ci) that Aristotle in Book Z moves away from the view that the primary ontological units are sensible individuals toward the view that they are pure forms. The real is either the object of definition (and this appears to be Aristotle's view for the most part in Book Z) or it is the individual (the doctrine of the Categories); it cannot, on Aristotelian grounds, be both. Grene's resolution of the difficulty will not bear scrutiny. She says (p. 205): "Definition is of the universal. But the object of definition is the real substance, the being-what-it-is of the thing. This is substance and not universal." The incompatibility of the first and third sentences in this passage constitutes what Grene refers to (p. 205) as "a very perplexing situation indeed;" and they also reflect the "double meaning" which "pervades Aristotle's whole treatment of substance" (Ross, Aristotle, p. 166). It is the doctrine of the first sentence which comes to the fore in Book Z, for there Aristotle concludes (i) that ot~r is r6 I"L~Tv e~tL and maintains (ii) that rb rl ~v rival 'will belong to nothing which is not a species of a genus' (1030"12-13). And we hardly need be reminded that an Aristotelian species is not an individual. Grene, it seems to me, relieves our perplexity somewhat, but only by blurring the oscillation in Aristotle's mind on this point, e.g., when she implies that the unambiguous doctrine of Book Z is that "as far as the perceived world goes, the naturalist's specimen, the individual of a type, the member of a class, is the prototype of the real" (p. 205). In very readable prose Grene has given us a picture of Aristotle that is at once engaging and in most respects faithful to the interests and outlook of her model. She says in a bibliographical note that her book is "meant more for the undergraduate reader or the general public than for scholars already conversant both with the text and the tradition" (p. 257). I suggest that the account Grene has given us is stimulating and refreshing also for the scholar. JosxAtt B. GOULD,JR. Glaremont Graduate School La filosofia medievale: Antologia di testi. Edited by Nicola Abbagnan0. (Bari: Editori Laterza, 1963. Pp. 440. -----Coll. del Candelaio. L. 2700.) it is the purpose of this, the second volume in the Antologia di testi filosofici to appear under the general editorship of the fine Italian scholar, Nicola Abbagnano, to provide an introduction to the history of mediaeval philosophy through the presentation of selected primary source materials in Italian translation. The book could have been a significant addition to the sparse philosophical literature of the period that is now available BOOK REVIEWS 259 to the non-Latin reader; instead, it turns out to be a sort of catalogue of opinions on a wide variety of philosophical topics held by many of the thinkers active in the period: between St...