This work examines Aristotle's discussions of definition in his logical works and the Metaphysics, and argues for the importance of definitions of simple ...

ABSTRACTIn the debate about the worth of women in sixteenth and seventeenth century Italy three pro-woman authors of the period, Moderata Fonte, Lucrezia Marinella, and Arcangela Tarabotti, develop...

Marie de Gournay, in a central argument in the pamphlet Égalité des hommes et des femmes [The Equality of Women and Men], offers an interpretation of an argument for equality that she attributes to ‘the School.’ I argue that Gournay is drawing on Aristotle’s Metaphysics to formulate an argument for the equality of women; that she does not temper that argument with claims for the superiority of women, which makes her unique for some time; and that her alleged misrepresentation of (...) her authorities – Aristotle in particular – is itself an interesting and suggestive phenomenon. Moreover, while some of her contemporaries would have agreed that the soul of a person has no sex, Gournay was unusual in arguing that the social implication of this was intellectual equality for women and men, just so long as education should be provided to women as well as men. (shrink)

In the treatise called La nobiltà et l’eccellenza delle donne co’ diffetti et mancamenti de gli uomini Lucrezia Marinella claims that women are superior to men. She argues that men are excessively hot, and that heat in a high degree is detrimental to the intellectual and moral capacities of a person. The aim of this paper is to set out Marinella’s views on temperature differences in the bodies of men and women and the effects of bodily constitution on the capacities (...) necessary for political deliberation and rule. I situate Marinella’s argument in the context of an ongoing debate about physiological differences between the sexes, begun in antiquity and extending into the Renaissance. That debate is important for several reasons: as part of a broader discussion of the nature and worth of women, as determining influential interpretations of ancient authorities on matters of physiology, and as anticipating later discussions of the relation between the sexed body and political roles. This paper considers Marinella in dialogue with a number of interlocutors, elements of whose work can be found in her own: Aristotle, Mario Equicola, Galeazzo Flavio Capra, Ludovico Domenichi and Torquato Tasso. (shrink)

Aristotle is presented, in this introduction to his work, as a scientist and a philosopher of science. This view is developed through the structure of the book, which emphasizes Aristotle's methodological concerns as a scientist, and through the no-nonsense interpretation of Aristotle's thought that it offers. Barnes particularly wants to impress on the reader the range of Aristotle's interests. He stresses that it is the empirical foundation of almost all the treatises that gives unity to their diversity.

This paper considers the distinctions Aristotle draws (1) between the intellectual virtue of "phronêsis" and the moral virtues and (2) among the moral virtues, in light of his commitment to the reciprocity of the virtues. I argue that Aristotle takes the intellectual virtues to be numerically distinct hexeis from the moral virtues. By contrast, I argue, he treats the moral virtues as numerically one hexis, although he allows that they are many hexeis 'in being'. The paper has three parts. In (...) the first, I set out Aristotle's account of the structure of the faculties of the soul, and determine that desire is a distinct faculty. The rationality of a desire is not then a question of whether or not the faculty that produces that desire is rational, but rather a question of whether or not the object of the desire is good. In the second section I show that the reciprocity of "phronêsis" and the moral virtues requires this structure of the faculties. In the third section I show that the way in which Aristotle distinguishes the faculties requires that we individuate moral virtues according to the objects of the desires that enter into a given virtue, and with reference to the circumstances in which these desires are generated. I then explore what it might mean for the moral virtues to be different in being but not in number, given the way in which the moral virtues are individuated. I argue that Aristotle takes "phronêsis" and the political art to be a numerical unity in a particular way, and that he suggests that the moral virtues are, by analogy, the same kind of unity. (shrink)

Early feminist or pro-woman works often combine the claim that the rational souls of men and women are the same with an argument for the superiority of women. This article considers two such works, Lucrezia Marinella's The Nobility and Excellence of Women and the Defects and Vices of Men and Marguerite Buffet's In Praise of Illustrious Learned Women, both Ancient and Modern, in order to show the continuities and distinctive features of feminist arguments for superiority, to emphasize the differences in (...) the conceptions of reason and physiology that distinguish them, and to demonstrate that claims of superiority persisted even as those defending women's worth began to adopt egalitarian positions. (shrink)

Charlotte Sabourin,Marguerite Deslauriers.

Aristotle begins the discussion of pleasure in Book X of the Nicomachean Ethics with the claim that pleasure “is thought to be most properly connected with our kind,”. In his positive account of pleasure in X 4, he suggests that we can somehow experience pleasure otherwise than “in time”. The aim of this article is to show how the claim that pleasure does not occur ‘in time’ might illuminate the claim that pleasure is most properly connected to our kind. The (...) point, I will argue, is not only that pleasure is complete at every moment – that will be true of many activities – but also that pleasure has the same structure as the best activity available to us, and a structure different from the best activity available to other kinds. Several passages indicate that Aristotle believes that all living things act for the sake of immortality, understood as divine and eternal life, and connect the pursuit of eternal life with the activities that are natural to a species. These offer us a way to understand why the pleasure of contemplation is the best pleasure, and why pleasure is most intimately connected with our kind. I begin in section with an exploration of the pleasures proper to different activities which are in turn proper to different kinds. In subsequent sections I take a closer look at contemplation, particularly insofar as it is an activity that does not take place ‘in time’ but rather ‘in a moment’, and consider Aristotle’s reasons for describing such activities as wholes, or indivisible, or without parts ; and I turn to the relation between the activities and pleasures proper to different kinds and the possibilities available to those different kinds for approximating divine life. In the final section I return to question of pleasure and its intimate connection with our kind. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to show that for Aristotle god is, and is not, virtuous. I consider first the arguments of the EN to show that the gods do not have virtue---beginning with an account of the divisions of the faculties of soul, and of the virtues that belong to those divisions. These arguments suggest that nous is a divine virtue, and so in the second section I consider nous, as a faculty of soul and as a virtue, (...) and examine the differences between nous as a human virtue, and nous as a virtue which is also a substance, and with which the first divine principle is identified. In the third and final section I ask what kind of difference Aristotle takes the difference between human and divine nous to be---and in particular whether this is a difference in kind or in degree. (shrink)

Aristotle claims that the citizens of the best city should be both intelligent and spirited at Politics VII.7 1327b19-38. While he treats intelligence as an unqualified good, thumos is valuable but problematic. This paper has two aims: to consider the political value of spirit in Aristotle’s Politics and in particular to identify the ways in which it is both essential to political excellence and yet insufficient for securing it, and to use this analysis of the role of spirit in the (...) political realm to explain Aristotle’s exclusion of women from political authority, even in the context of the household. I analyze spirit as a physical phenomenon and as a type of desire, before considering its moral and affective aspects. I then return to the role of spirit in political life and examine its importance for the activity of ruling. In the last section I consider the implications of this analysis of spirit for the social and political roles Aristotle assigns to men and women. (shrink)

Aristotle's remarks about the differences between the sexes have become infamous for their implications for the social status of women. In his observations on female biology, Aristotle claims that "the female nature is, as it were, a deformity." In describing women's role in the public sphere, he claims that women are naturally subordinate because, while they possess a deliberative faculty, that capacity is "without authority." While both claims express the "inferiority" of female bodies/women relative to male bodies/men, it is not (...) self-evident that the defects Aristotle identifies in female biology have cognitive or moral manifestations that would justify the rule of men over women in political life. Marguerite Deslauriers here aims to construct a coherent picture of Aristotle's views on sexual and gender-based difference from these remarks and to show the extent to which his views on female biology and women's role in politics are causally connected. Without exculpating Aristotle from charges of misogyny, Deslauriers contextualizes his explanations of the role and origin of female animals in his biology and the role of women in his political philosophy; she shows how Aristotle developed these views and the importance they hold for his wider philosophical commitments. She then explores how Aristotle might have seen the link between the physiology of sex and the bearing it has on political life. She ultimately argues that in Aristotle's conception of sexual difference in biology and politics, there is a tension between his view of the inferiority of female bodies and women and his commitment to the idea that females and women are valuable both for generation and for the political life characteristic of human beings. In this tension she finds a difference between Aristotle and his predecessors: while previous accounts associate sexual difference with affliction, Aristotle sees sexual difference as a benefit, both to a species and a political community. This volume will be of interest to philosophers and students interested in ancient philosophy, feminist philosophy, as well as those studying moral and political philosophy. (shrink)

One of the most influential works in the history of political theory, Aristotle's Politics is a treatise in practical philosophy, intended to inform legislators and to create the conditions for virtuous and self-sufficient lives for the citizens of a state. In this Companion, distinguished scholars offer new perspectives on the work and its themes. After an opening exploration of the relation between Aristotle's ethics and his politics, the central chapters follow the sequence of the eight books of the Politics, taking (...) up questions such as the role of reason in legitimizing rule, the common good, justice, slavery, private property, citizenship, democracy and deliberation, unity, conflict, law and authority, and education. The closing chapters discuss the interaction between Aristotle's political thought and contemporary democratic theory. The volume will provide a valuable resource for those studying ancient philosophy, classics, and the history of political thought. (shrink)

Aristotle discusses character in four contexts: ethics, poetic theory, the study of rhetoric and zoology. What he means by character is different in each of these cases, but not radically different. He always uses it as a device to explain actions or behavioural patterns: in animals, in people, and in fictional people. The similarities between the character exhibited by different species, moral character, and tragic character have gone unexamined. As a result, the notion of character as explanatory, and the possibilities (...) and limitations of explanation by means of character are still undetermined. (shrink)

In recent years, Aristotle's treatment of the imagination has become the subject of renewed interest. A pioneering paper by Malcolm Schofield argued that, far from being the rag-bag of widely separate and more or less unrelated concerns that it had previously been generally taken to be, phantasia was, for Aristotle, a ‘loose-knit family concept’ covering all aspects of what Schofield labelled ‘non-paradigmatic sensory experience’. With that conclusion I am more or less in agreement, although only on the condition that ‘sensory’ (...) be given a suitably broad interpretation. My purpose in this paper is to tease out, in a necessarily limited and circumscribed manner, the implications of a proper understanding of Aristotle's developed concept of deliberative imagination, phantasia bouleutikê, for his moral theory and his account of rational action, and to indicate ways in which this is related to his accounts of mental imaging in the rest of the Parva Naturalia. (shrink)