Peter Simpson

This article is an attempt to break down Aristotle's arguments in favour of slavery into what I take to be their constituent premises and conclusions, to set these out schematically in syllogistic form, and to display both how each of the arguments works on its own and how all of them fit together to form one overarching argument. The purpose of this exercise is to make as evident as possible the structure, coherence, and validity of Aristotle's reasoning. This is something that is lacking in scholarly treatments of Aristotle on slavery, few of which make a serious attempt to engage with the details of Aristotle's text. My conclusion is that Aristotle's argument is not only valid but, on the assumption of his virtue theory, sound as well

This book consists of an introduction by Carnes Lord and nine essays: Stephen Salkever on Aristotle's social science; Cames Lord on Aristotle's anthropology; Abram Shulsky on Aristotle's economics; Josiah Ober on Aristotle's sociology of class, status, and Order; David O'Connor on Aristotle's conception of justice; Stephen Salkever on Plato and Aristotle on women, soldiers, and citizens; Waller Newell on Aristotle on monarchy; Barry Strauss on Aristotle on Athenian democracy; and Richard Bodéus on Aristotle on law and regime.

The text of Aristotle'sEthica Eudemia is often in need of emendation, especially because of the particular fault in the manuscripts of misreading one letter for another or misdividing letters to form words. Scholars have already done fine work in correcting many of these errors, but more needs to be done. A second problem with the text does not have to do with matters of spelling or grammar, but rather with those of philosophical sense. For, as scholars have noted, theEEis marked by considerable compression of thought, and this compression leads scholars to propose changes where, on further consideration, it can be shown that not change of words but change of comprehension is needed.

In this follow up to The Eudemian Ethics of Aristotle, Peter L. P. Simpson centers his attention on the basics of Aristotelian moral doctrine as found in the Great Ethics: the definition of happiness, the nature and kind of the virtues, pleasure, and friendship. This work's authenticity is disputed, but Simpson argues that all the evidence favors it. Unlike the Nicomachean and Eudemian Ethics, Aristotle wrote the Great Ethics for a popular audience. It gives us insight less into Aristotle the theoretician than into Aristotle the pedagogue. For this reason, the Great Ethics has distinct advantages as an introduction to Aristotelian ethical thinking: it is simpler and clearer in its argumentation, matters such as the intellectual virtues are made suitably secondary to the practical focus, the moral virtues come through with a pleasing directness, and the work's syllogistic formalism gives it a transparency and accessibility that the other Ethics typically lack. Arius' Epitome, which relies heavily on this work, helps confirm its value and authenticity. Because the Great Ethics is generally neglected by scholars, less has been done to clear up its obscurities or to expose its structure. But to ignore it is to lose another and more instructive way of approaching and appreciating Aristotle's teaching. The translation is prefaced by an analytic outline of the whole, and the several sections of it are prefaced by brief summaries. The commentary supplies fuller descriptions and analyses, sorting out puzzles, removing misunderstandings, and resolving doubts of meaning and intention. This book is a fresh rendition of the work of the preeminent philosopher of all time.

This brief text assists students in understanding Karol Wojtyla's philosophy and thinking so they can more fully engage in useful, intelligent class dialogue and improve their understanding of course content. Part of the Wadsworth Notes Series, (which will eventually consist of approximately 100 titles, each focusing on a single "thinker" from ancient times to the present), ON KAROL WOJTYLA is written by a philosopher deeply versed in the philosophy of this key thinker. Like other books in the series, this concise book offers sufficient insight into the thinking of a notable philosopher, better enabling students to engage in reading and to discuss the material in class and on paper.

Aristotle's Ethica Eudemia and Ethica Nicomachea, as is well known and much discussed, contain three books in common. Less well known, at least until Dieter Harlfinger alerted scholars to the fact in 1971, is that some of the manuscripts of Eth. Eud. do, contrary to the then prevailing consensus, contain the text of these common books. Even less well known is that Harlfinger's discovery was anticipated some 50 years before by Walter Ashburner, who had uncovered this fact about Eth. Eud. MSS in the Laurentian library of Florence. Ashburner's anticipation of Harlfinger, however, is not the real value of his article. Its value rather is that it contains collations of readings for the common books, and thereby gives us an excellent resource for examining the text of the common books as this text is contained in exclusively Eth. Eud. MSS. The Eth. Eud. tradition of the common books has hitherto received little attention. Modern editions of Eth. Eud. do not include these books, and editions of Eth. Nic. have other MSS for the purpose. Ashburner's collations are the more valuable because they are taken from the one MS that, in Harlfinger's learned stemma, appears as the archetype for all the rest.

As its title implies, this book is meant to give a new foundation to moral philosophy. In the sense meant, a foundation is a cognitive grounding. Lee is opposing the various non-naturalist 'volitionalisms' that have proved so influential in recent moral philosophy. The burden of her book is to show that the non-naturalist claim that there is no grounding for values in facts is unwarranted. This claim is due, she says, to positivism and empiricism and the associated contention that knowledge is only possible on the basis of strict deductions or strict implications from evidence. If evidence E does not strictly imply assertion A, then A is irrational and unjustified. But to maintain this, says Lee, is to condemn oneself to absurdity. Strict implication does not in fact obtain in any sphere of cognitive discourse, so if moral claims are irrational because they lack strict implication from evidence, then claims in many other spheres are irrational, and this consequence is absurd. Therefore, she says, people should cease finding fault with moral claims as if they were somehow uniquely deficient in this respect.

Among the works on ethics in the Aristotelian corpus, there is no serious dispute among scholars that the "Eudemian Ethics "is authentic. The "Eudemian Ethics "is" "increasingly read and used by scholars as a useful support and confirmation and sometimes contrast to the "Nicomachean Ethics." Yet, it remains a largely neglected work in the study of Aristotle's ethics, both among scholars and moral philosophers. Peter L. P. Simpson provides an analytical outline of the entire work together with summaries of each individual section, making the overall structure and detailed argument clear. His translation and explanatory notes include the common books that the "Eudemian" "Ethics" shares with the "Nicomachean." This translation contains renderings of words and phrases, and proposals for emending the text that differ from what other translators and scholars have adopted. This translation is literal, without expansion or paraphrase, and yet also readable. A readable but literal translation is necessary because in the "Eudemian Ethics," more than usual in Aristotle's writings, the logic of the argumentation can turn on the peculiar wording or order. Simpson explains the argumentation where necessary in notes and separate explanatory comments. This book is a fresh, twenty-first-century rendition of the work of one of the most eminent philosophers of all time.

Veatch's theme in this book is natural law as a basis for rights. He wishes to defend the classical notion that the good and the right, in ethics, politics and the law, can be found by some appeal to nature. In the first chapter of the book he directs arguments against the standard anti-natural law positions in philosophy, and against particular philosophers, like Hobbes and Kant. This is the least effective chapter in the book. The criticisms are not so much wrong as a bit weak and lacking in penetration. Some of the characterizations of philosophical positions are also in parts too simple.

Ernest Barker wrote two books on the political thought of Plato, both of which were also directly related to his study of the political thought of Aristotle. This essay examines the way Barker's readings of Plato changed, first from the earlier to the later of his two books, and then from the later of these books, written during WWI, to his translation of Aristotle's Politics, written during WWII. The contention is that, as Barker himself partly confessed, WWI led him to read hopes into Plato's works that he not had before and that he abandoned in WWII. This shift in reading Plato was essentially a shift in Barker's allegiance to political Hegelianism , which, while it intensified during WWI, had given way entirely to a thoroughly English Whig Constitutionalism by the end of WWII. The abandonment of Hegel enabled Barker to reach not only a better understanding of Plato in his Aristotle book but also a better and more wry understanding of German philosophy