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Rachel Barney

University of Toronto, St. George Campus
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Princeton University
Department of Philosophy
PhD, 1995
Homepage
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Areas of Specialization
Ancient Greek and Roman Philosophy
Areas of Interest
Meta-Ethics
Normative Ethics
  •  849
    The Sophistic Movement
    In Sean D. Kirkland & Eric Sanday (eds.), A Companion to Ancient Philosophy, Northwestern University Press. 2018.
    This discussion emphasises the diversity, philosophical seriousness and methodological distinctiveness of sophistic thought. Particular attention is given to their views on language, ethics, and the social construction of various norms, as well as to their varied, often undogmatic dialectical methods. The assumption that the sophists must have shared common doctrines (not merely overlapping interests and professional practices) is called into question.
    Sophists
  •  964
    Plato on the Desire for the Good
    In Sergio Tenenbaum (ed.), Desire, Practical Reason, and the Good, Oxford University Press. pp. 34--64. 2010.
    Plato's WorksPlato: The Good
  •  384
    History and Dialectic (Metaphysics A 3, 983a24-4b8)
    In Carlos Steel (ed.), Aristotle's Metaphysics Alpha: Symposium Aristotelicum, Oxford University Press Uk. pp. 66-104. 2012.
    Aristotle, MiscAristotle: Metaphysics A
  •  878
    A Puzzle in Stoic Ethics
    Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 24 303-40. 2003.
    It is very difficult to get a clear picture of how the Stoic is supposed to deliberate. This paper considers a number of possible pictures, which cover such a wide range of options that some look Kantian and others utilitarian. Each has some textual support but is also unworkable in certain ways: there seem to be genuine and unresolved conflicts at the heart of Stoic ethics. And these are apparently due not to developmental changes within the school, but to the Stoics’ having adopted implicitly …Read more
    Stoics: Ethics
  •  1705
    Socrates' refutation of thrasymachus
    In Gerasimos Xenophon Santas (ed.), The Blackwell Guide to Plato's Republic, Blackwell. 2006.
    Socrates’ refutations of Thrasymachus in Republic I are unsatisfactory on a number of levels which need to be carefully distinguished. At the same time several of his arguments are more powerful than they initially appear. Of particular interest are those which turn on the idea of a craft, which represents a shared norm of practical rationality here contested by Socrates and Thrasymachus.
    SocratesAncient Greek Political Philosophy