Fates no more! Reflections on Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics

Polis: The Journal for Ancient Greek and Roman Political Thought, 2024

Nicomachean Ethics 6.8 has been interpreted in a variety of ways. One dispute involves Aristotle’s remarks about the relationship of phronēsis to politics: does Aristotle claim that phronēsis is foremost applicable to an individual’s private life, to the political realm, or to some combination of the two? Two features of this dispute make it worthy of closer attention. First, the conflict of interpretations has not been documented as such. Second, I argue this contemporary conflict is a repetition of an ancient conflict about phronēsis that was being waged in 5th/4th century Athens. Phronēsis was a contested term alongside two related terms, apragmosynē (quietism) and polypragmosynē (meddlesomeness), and the construction of lines 1141b23–1142a12 enters into this historical debate to create a productive tension between two rival views. Aristotle heightens the tension between views represented by quietists and busybodies for his own purposes. In section 1, I surface the neglected historical frame of Nicomachean Ethics 6.8. In section 2, I turn to the contemporary conflict of interpretations, showing how it repeats the historical frame in many ways, and I provide a basic taxonomy of the views typically offered. In section 3, I bring the two debates – historical and contemporary – together and offer my own view of what Aristotle is up to in the passage. I argue that centering the historical frame in this passage highlights Aristotle’s use of Isocratean-style phronēsis, while also transforming the concept by connecting it to a series of questions that go beyond Isocrates’ view, thus preparing for a later exploration of the best forms of human living.

Review of the contents of the Proceedings of the Symposium Aristotelicum on Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics VII in Venice 2007. Published in Rhizai VIII, 1, pp. 99-109. (2011)

Polis: A Journal of Ancient Greek Political Thought, 2013

In the present text, I compare Aristotle's proto-phenomenology of life in Nicomachean Ethics 1170a-b with Michel Henry's account of life. Both authors touch several interconnected themes, the most important being the feeling of living as pleasurable in itself. The most interesting point in this regard is that Aristotle offers his account as part of a discussion of friendship, while for Henry it clarifies the structures of subjectivity.

Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 45.2, 103-148, 2013

ABSTRACT: This paper is distinctly odd. It demonstrates what happens when an analytical philosopher and historian of philosophy tries their hand at the topic of reception. For a novice to this genre, it seemed advisable to start small. Rather than researching the reception of an author, book, chapter, section or paragraph, the focus of the paper is on one sentence: Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics 3.5, 1113b7-8. This sentence has markedly shaped scholarly and general opinion alike with regard to Aristotle’s theory of free will. In addition, it has taken on a curious life of its own. Part one of the paper examines the text itself. Part two explores its reception from antiquity to the present day, including present-day popular culture, later ancient, Byzantine, Arabic, Latin Medieval, Renaissance, Victorian and contemporary scholarship. There are some surprises on the way. (The paper also serves as an introduction to the reception of the Nicomachean Ethics from its beginnings to the present.)

Many commentators have noted how the conflict in Aristotle's account of human nature in the Nicomachean Ethics is passed on, via the function argument of I 7, to his view(s) of happiness (eudaimonia). But the general consensus has been that Aristotle must have a single, unified view of eudaimonia, which in turn presupposes a single, unified account of human nature. Accordingly a great deal of exegetical energy has been spent resolving the apparent conflict in the Nicomachean Ethics. Although others have maintained that there is a real and irresolvable conflict here, I believe a stronger case can be made. In addition to making this case, I argue that given Aristotle's view of rationality, he was right to be so conflicted: our capacity for theoretical reasoning is not easily accommodated in a life governed by practical reasoning and viceversa.

2022

This essay was originally designed for a Nicomachean Ethics reading subgroup of the Goodreads.com online discussion group “Political Philosophy and Ethics” (https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/137714-political-philosophy-and-ethics), of which I am the founder and moderator. I revised the essay on July 16, 2018, in order to make it suitable for any reader interested in the Nicomachean Ethics. The present edit makes several changes to the format and style of the paper as well as some substantive revisions. — Alan E. Johnson, February 16, 2022

2022

By presenting happiness [εὐδαιμονία] within the framework of a properly human philosophy [ἀνθρωπίνη φιλοσοφία]2, Aristotle also clarifies the extent to which any attempt to access a finalistic understanding of acting well [εὖ πράττειν] in view of a well-living [εὖ ζῆν] will have to make its way through a compact tangle of fluid opinions and divergent perceptions as to its nature and extent. On the other hand, given the contingent cut-off of the action-not only because the possible course of its outcome is indeterminate [ἀδιόριστος] but also obscure [ἄδηλος] the possible outcome of its course -one can hardly conceal the praxeological impact of the glossed expression "we deliberate not about the ends, but about the means" [βουλευόμεθα δ'οὐ περὶ τῶν τελῶν ἀλλὰ περὶ τὸς τὰ τέλη: EN III, 3, 1112b 11-12] On the assumption that Aristotelian practical philosophy compagines a double teleological routing -one more tied to the practice of virtue [ἀρετή], the other more rooted in the exercise of deliberation [βούλευσις] -, the notion of end [τέλλος] acquires thickened ethical coloration in the multiple throws that bring into play the fundamental question that makes us wonder about the properly human good [τἀνθρώπινον ἀγαθόν]. Now, if in Plato the practice of virtue founded on a Good is what, at the end of the dialectical ascent, should finally make us happy [Res pub, 508 e], in Aristotle, on the other hand, it is important that happiness arises from the completion of a practical good [πρακτὸν ἀγαθόν] called supreme [μέγιστος] not because it is "above" or "beyond" all other goods, but because, in being "chosen-in-reason-of-itself" [αἰρετός καθ'αὑτό] needs mediation [μεσότης] either of "goodsperceived-as-total" [φαινόμενα ἀγαθά] according to which the elective appropriation of different modes of human life [ἀνθρώπινος βίος] takes place, or of prudential conditions by which a deliberate choice [προαίρεσις] is exercised on the basis of the judicious adjustment of a formal universalization of the norm to the contingent particularity of a limit situation.

IAFOR Journal of Ethics, Religion & Philosophy

This paper will discuss and analyze specific arguments concerning moral virtue and action that are found within the ten books of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. Eudaimonia, i.e. well-being, or happiness, is the highest good for people, and in order to achieve this, a virtuous character is necessary. A virtuous character is cultivated, and the life of a virtuous human is a life that is lived well, and is lived according to moral virtues which are developed through proper habits. It is through this development and practice of moral virtues by which one achieves eudaimonia, for this well-being is achieved by partaking in actions that are virtuous. The study of ethics for Aristotle is a practical science. Although through the study of ethics one may acquire theoretical knowledge, it is practical knowledge, or practical wisdom, that is most important for Aristotle when engaged in a search to define and cultivate a life that is well-lived. The topics and arguments contained within this paper will be of interest and relevance to both those who are interested in ancient Greek philosophy and to those that are concerned with ethics in the modern world. For this paper will also present situations from the modern world that are either examples of virtuous activity or its opposite. Such a study into Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics will offer insightful perspectives on proper action and virtue that is rooted in ancient Greek philosophy and remains relevant in our modern world.

ΠΗΓΗ / FONS, 2016

The paper analyses the dual form of striving for a good life underlying Aristotle’s distinction between “human” and “divine” lives. The paper explores this theme with regard to the close connection between ethics and politics inherent in Aristotle’s analyses, focusing primarily on the specific relationship between politics and philosophy outlined in this connection in Book X of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics. The distinction between political and philosophical life is interpreted not as a definition of two different life contents we are to choose from, but as a definition of two attitudes or perspectives our lives can be approached from – either from the perspective of a variety of different types of actions performed in the social space, or with regard to the unifying element binding our life together reflexively in a coherent whole. Taking into account the relevant principles of Aristotelian anthropology, the paper demonstrates that philosophical contemplation thus conceived is already grounded in political life and it does not stand against it as an option of some “other” life released from socio-political ties. The proposed interpretation makes it possible to alleviate the tension in Aristotle’s concept of political and philosophical life and thereby support a more coherent reading of the conclusion of the Nicomachean Ethics.