In this authoritative discussion of the philosophy of Plato and Aristotle, A. W. Price considers four related areas: eudaimonia, or living and acting well, as the ultimate end of action; virtues of character in relation to the emotions, and to one another; practical reasoning, especially from an end to ways or means; and acrasia, or action that is contrary to the agent's own judgement of what is best. The focal concept is that of eudaimonia, which both Plato and Aristotle view (...) as an abstract goal that is valuable enough to motivate action. Virtue has a double role to play in making its achievement possible, both in proposing subordinate ends apt to the context, and in protecting the agent against temptations to discard them too easily. For both purposes, Price suggests that virtues need to form a unity--but one that can be conceived in various ways. Among the tasks of deliberation is to work out how, and whether, to pursue some putative end in context. Aristotle returns to early Plato in finding it problematic that one should consciously sacrifice acting well to some incidental attraction; Plato later finds this possible by postulating schism within the soul. Price maintains that it is their emphasis upon the centrality of action within human life that makes the reflections of these ancient philosophers perennially relevant. (shrink)
Are inferences, theoretical and practical, subject to requirements of rationality? If so, are these of the form 'if … ought …' or 'ought … if …'? If the latter, how are we to understand the 'if'? It seems that, in all cases, we get unintuitive implications (often involving bootstrapping) if 'ought' connotes having reason. It is difficult to formulate such requirements, and obscure what they explain. There might also be a requirement forbidding self-contradiction (not that one's current beliefs can be (...) consciously contradictory). It is a good question whether self-contradiction constitutes, or evidences, irrationality; but talk of a rational requirement causes trouble. (shrink)
This book presents the first detailed analysis of the way Greek philosophers treated mental conflict. The ancient Greeks considered mental conflict as the condition of a divided mind consciously torn between contrary desires or beliefs. Greek philosophers offered a variety of formulations for mental conflict, either as a reason that fails to be resolute or as a split soul that houses a play of forces. Studying the treatment of mental conflict by Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and the Stoics, A. W. Price (...) demonstrates how the arguments of the Greeks are still relevant to current philosophical discussion. Reflecting upon their accounts can alert us to the elusiveness at once of mental reality and of the understanding by which we hope to capture and transform it. (shrink)
A. W. Price (1990). Plato and Freud. In Christopher Gill (ed.), The Person and the Human Mind: Issues in Ancient and Modern Philosophy. Oxford University Press.
This book explores for the first time an idea common to both Plato and Aristotle: although people are separate, their lives need not be; one person's life may overflow into another's, so that helping someone else is a way of serving oneself. Price considers how this idea unites the philosophers' treatments of love and friendship (which are otherwise very different), and demonstrates that this view of love and friendship, applied not only to personal relationships, but also to the household and (...) even the city-state, promises to resolve the old dichotomy between egoism and altruism. (shrink)
