PH354 Aristotle

Week 7. Puzzles about the Good

Plan

• We will start with Book I, where Aristotle offers a famous characterization of the notion of the chief good, and eudaimonia.

• We will then look at Book X, in which Aristotle offers what seems to be a different account

• We will raise some questions about the relation between the Book I and Book X accounts, and the adequacy of the latter.

• We will then look briefly at Aristotle’s discussion of akrasia (‘incontinence’ or ‘action contrary to reason’)

• In the light of that discussion, we will return to the issue about the nature of the chief good with some suggestions about how this issue might be approached.

The Good

• The good for an action or activity is ‘what it is aimed at’.

• At its most general the notion of the aim of an action or an activity is ‘what the action is to bring about’ or ‘what the success of the action or activity consists in’.

• It is not to be assumed right away that the aim of an action is always the intention.

• (Aristotle offers the examples; the aim of the medical art is health, the aim of shipbuilding is a vessel, economics is wealth.)

The Chief Good

• If, then, there is some end of the things we do, which we desire for its own sake (everything else being desired for the sake of this), and if we do not choose everything for the sake of something else (for at that rate the process would go on to infinity, so that our desire would be empty and vain), clearly this must be the good and the chief good.’ (1094a18-22)

Eudaimonia

• The chief good, Aristotle says, is clearly eudaimonia. • Ross translates this as ‘happiness’ which I will follow

(with the appropriate warnings understood).• He seems to think that this is relatively

uncontroversial (because so far relatively formal)• But if what it is that we should ultimately aim at is to

live well, what is involved in living well?

The Function Argument

• Aristotle thinks that the state of happiness or what we should aim at is fixed by our nature and the kinds of things we are.

• The chief good or the final good for man is just our form, in its active or fully actual state.

• So we can understand what happiness is by understanding what our form is.

The Function Argument

• 1. The final good for things of a kind is determined by the function of things of that kind (by what they are for, or what they are supposed to do)

• 2. An assumption [The function of something must be the function of it qua ‘what is peculiar to that thing’]

The Function Argument

• 3. The function of human beings is living a life that involves rational activity (activity of the rational part of the soul)

• (‘There remains, then, an active life of the element that has a rational principle (of this, one part has such a principle in the sense of being obedient to one, the other in the sense of possessing one and exercising thought)’

• 4. The function of a thing of a certain kind is the same as the function of a good thing of that kind.

• (What we mean when we ask what the function of a thing of a kind is is what its function is insofar as it is a good thing of that kind; i.e. a thing that does the things that it is supposed to do.)

The Function Argument

• 5. So ‘the function of man (is) the good and noble performance of actions of the soul implying a rational principle; where such actions are well performed when ‘they are performed in accordance with the appropriate excellence’.

• 6. Therefore, ‘human good turns out to be activity of soul in conformity with excellence, and if there are more than one excellence, in conformity with the best and most complete.’

Excellence

• ‘Excellence’ (Ross) translates arete (cf ‘virtue’). • ‘Excellence’ (adj.) is success. ‘Excellences’ are

capacities• Human excellence concerns the soul not body• There are distinctions in the soul. Though

appetite and desire is not a matter of thinking, the passions ‘listen to’ and ‘obey’ reason.

Excellence

• There are both moral and intellectual excellences• Moral: courage, temperance, prudence• Intellectual: Philosophical wisdom, understanding• If happiness is rational activity in accordance with

excellence, then the Book I account suggests that a good life is one that consists in the active exercise of both moral and an intellectual capacities.

EN Book X

• In Book X, chapter 7, Aristotle appears to offer a radically different conception of eudaimonia.

• He argues that the highest good for man is an activity he calls theoria.

• Theoria is standardly translated (as in Ross) as ‘contemplation’.

•

EN Book X

• If happiness is activity in accordance with excellence, it is reasonable that it should be in accordance with the highest excellence; and this will be that of the best thing in us. Whether it be intellect or something else that is this element which is thought to be our natural ruler and guide and to take thought of things noble and divine, whether it be itself also divine or only the most divine element in us, the activity of this in accordance with its proper excellence will be complete happiness. That this activity is contemplative we have already said. (1177a11-18)

EN Book X: Contemplation

• (i) It is an activity of intellect (nous). • (ii) The objects of contemplation are truths.

(1177a23)• (iii) It involves pleasure (“the activity of

wisdom is admittedly the pleasantest of all excellent activities.” (1177a25-27)

EN Book X: Contemplation

• (iv) Contemplation is an activity that is its own end, and does not involve an external aim. It is self-sufficient. (“And this activity alone would seem to be loved for its own sake; for nothing arises from it apart from the contemplating, while from practical activities we gain more or less apart from the action.” 1177b1-4)

• (v) It is leisurely. In this it is contrasted with the messy and painful business of politics and generalship (1077b10-25)

• (vi) It is divine.

EN Book X: Contemplation as Philosophy

• “And we think happiness has pleasure mingled with it, but the activity of wisdom is admittedly the pleasantest of all excellent activities; at all events philosophy is thought to offer pleasures marvelous for their purity and their enduringness, and it is to be expected that those who know will pass their time more pleasantly than those who inquire.” (1177a25-27)

Problems from Book X: Dominance

• Activity in accordance with the excellences (moral and intellectual) is very different from the contemplative activity of doing philosophy

• Dominant: There is just one type of activity that is the chief good. (See Kraut (1979)(1989))

• Inclusive: There are many different types of activity that are ‘chief goods’ (i.e. not good in virtue of their relation to anything else), or: the chief good is a ‘complete package’ of activities, rather than just one activity. (See Ackrill (1974), Bostock (2000), and Hardie (1965))

The Inclusiveness of Book I (?)

• ‘(H)uman good turns out to be activity of soul in conformity with excellence, and if there are more than one excellence, in conformity with the best and most complete.’ (1098a15-18)

• (See Ackrill (1974), Bostock (2000) for inclusivist response and Kraut (1989) for ‘dominant’ reading)

Problems from Book X: Adequacy

1. The implausibility of an ascetic ideal as the function of human beings in general

2. The implausibility of the idea that the goodness of the moral virtues (the conditions for their successful functioning) are determined by their contribution to philosophical activity.

Akrasia

• Akrasia is loss of self-control, in the sense of action contrary to reason

• In akrasia, there is an ingrained habit, in an individual, of the non-rational elements of the soul subverting the rational capacities

• Action is usually guided in a range of ways by reason. So akrasia is interesting because it involves a departure from a norm.

Socrates on Akrasia

• Socrates (in Protagoras) says that it not possible to act against reason; to act badly or wrongly while knowing one does so.

• The only way to act badly is to act ignorantly; to act without knowing that what one is doing is bad or wrong.

• (Socrates thought that to do what is bad is to do harm to oneself. He thought that doing wrong is to knowingly harm oneself. And no-one in their right mind could do that.)

• In EN, Book VII, Aristotle describes this view as ‘contrary to the appearances’. It does seem like actions of this kind are perfectly possible.

Aristotle on Akrasia: Elements of an Orthodox Interpretation

1. ‘Possessing but not using knowledge’2. The presence of competing reasons3. Rational incapacity

‘Having’ and ‘Using’ Knowledge

• ‘But since we use the word ‘know’ in two senses (for both the man who has knowledge but is not using it and he who is using it are said to know), it will make a difference whether, when a man does what he should not, he has the knowledge but is not exercising it, or is exercising it; for the latter seems strange, but not the former.’ (1146b32-36)

‘Having’ and ‘Using’ Knowledge

• ‘And further the possession of knowledge in another sense than those just named is something that happens to men; for within the case of having knowledge but not using it we see a difference of state, admitting of the possibility of having knowledge in a sense and yet not having it, as in the instance of a man asleep, mad, or drunk.

‘Having’ and ‘Using’ Knowledge

• But now this is just the condition of men under the influence of passions; for outbursts of anger and sexual appetites and some other such passions, it is evident, actually alter our bodily condition, and in some men even produce fits of madness. It is plain, then, that incontinent people must be said to be in a similar condition to these.’ (1147a10-18)

The Practical Syllogism

• Everything sweet should be tasted (Universal)• This is sweet (Particular)• This should be tasted (Conclusion)

Competing Syllogisms

• Aristotle suggests that in cases of akrasia, two practical syllogisms compete with one another.

• (A) One should not taste anything that is such and such• This is such and such• So you do not taste it• (B) Everything sweet is pleasant• This is sweet• So you eat it• Aristotle suggests that in a case of akrasia, the syllogism in (B)

is ‘active’, which presumably contrasts with the idea that (A) is inactive. (A) is inactive because it is inaccessible.

Thought and Choice in Akrasia

• When (B) wins out, the akrates does not choose to eat the sweet thing.

• Aristotle thinks that there is a difference between akrasia, or loss of self-control, and what he calls ‘self-indulgence’.

• ‘(T)he one (the self-indulgent) is led on in accordance with his own choice, thinking that he ought always to pursue the present pleasure; while the other (the akratic) does not think so, yet pursues it.’ (1146b22-23)

• The akratic does not make judgements about what to do, nor make choices about what to do. He does not think.

• The best explanation is that he cannot think. His power of thinking is inactive.

Exercising Knowledge as Theorein

• At 1146b33-35, Aristotle says: ‘Since we use the word ‘know’ in two senses (for both the man who has knowledge but is not using it and he who is using it are said to know), it will make a difference whether, when a man does what he should not, he has the knowledge but is not exercising it, or is exercising it; for the latter seems strange, but not the former.’

• Exercising here translates “theorein” which (following Bostock (2000)) ought really to be translated ‘contemplating’). (cf ‘theoria’ is contemplation)

Eudaimonia as Accessibility of Truth

• Suppose then that for knowledge to be available or accessible to one is for one to be ‘contemplating it’.

• Then perhaps if eudaimonia and the best life for man consists in contemplation of the truth, the best life is not philosophy, at least as we would conceive of it.

• A life that involves the contemplation of the truth would then be a life that involves the truth about things being available to one, or accessible to one. Contemplating the truth is being ‘in touch with’ the truth.

• One is ‘in touch with’ the truth if one is in that state in which one’s states, events, and activities can be explained in terms of a grasp of the truth (or in terms of knowledge of the truth).

Eudaimonia as Contemplating Truth

• Our assessments of eudaimonia are sensitive to the possession of knowledge in interesting ways

• The Ignorant Philanthropist• Zombie Doctors