The paper deals with he tension between morality and efficacy both from the point of view of economics (and politics) on the one hand and ethics (and politics) on the other.

The paper focuses on the contrast between the ontologies of the subject, such as the Aristotelian one, with the ontologies of the process, such as that of Quine. It attempts to justify the Aristotelian approach paying special attention to Quine's criticism.

Practical truth is not so much the truth of propositions as that inherent in getting things rightly done. The purpose of the contribution ist threefold: firstly, to trace back practical truth to its Platonic origins; secondly, to show how Aristotle -refering, unlike to Plato, expressis verbis to the concept of practical truth- was faithfiil to those Platonic origins while at the same time departing from Plato on account of his less intellectualist approach of right amd wrong doing; and thirtly to (...) show how Johannes Duns Scotus', in developing his conception of human theology as a practical science, explicitly drew on Aristotle's concept of practical truth but departed from him in those respects in which he rather sided with Plato. (shrink)