Stephen R. L. Clark

This chapter aims to suggest the sort of ontological model which best makes sense of the views that have been imputed to Aristotle. The key to it is the realization that what is believed about the world is part of what humans are: cosmological models are expressions of personal concerns. It makes no apology for the ‘unreasonableness’ of what follows from the point of view commonly called realistic, for it is the latter that seems to be more truly absurd. The body–soul unity posited by Aristotle is not an uneasy yoking of material and mental, but an acceptance of the lived world, from which the object body of science is also an abstraction. Aristotle's account of sexual difference, though partly deformed by a Platonizing view of women as inferior men, draws attention to intersexual love and the making of loving couples as the groundwork for a decent society in which virtues are accorded their proper status. The comparison of Aristotle and certain Chinese thinkers is addressed.

This chapter makes use of Buddhist and Neo-Confucian parallels: ‘there is a universal mind in which all sages participate, be they from east, south, west or north, past or future’. It hopes that it makes this view seem plausible, in both its literal and metaphorical sense. The chapter then follows Alexander of Aphrodisias in identifying poetic _nous_ with the Prime Mover. The intuition of the world as a unitary whole reveals the nature of things and gives only deathlessness. In this, Aristotle is at one with the doctrines of Ch'an Buddhism. _Theoria_, _theo-ria_, is the practice of enlightenment.

This chapter considers self-creation and organic wholeness. It does not wish to deny that other senses could be provided, particularly ones that involve Aristotle in contradiction: it specifically prefers to outline a sense which seems reasonable, and of some use. The good life is one of properly ordered activities, culminating in the absolute value of _theoria_. The logic of wholeness explicates the nature of the structure involved. The _daimon_ of _eudaimonia_, for Aristotle as explicitly for Plato, is _nous_, but a complete realization of this paramount good (which heals the specious breach between inclusive and dominant _eudaimonia_) is only momentary. Civil and theoretic good meet in this, that both are a service of the divine in man.

This chapter attempts to show how Aristotle resolves the tension between the two major views of death: as an intrusion and as a completion. It also hopes to counter the difficulty inherent in any ethical theory that bases itself on the desire for survival, namely that ethical values may sometimes require the demise. Plato's arguments for immortality lead to Aristotle's belief only in the immortality of _nous_. One can endure death because one turns to the world and seeks its perfection by living according to the unaging best in them, energetically rather than kinetically. The argument from self-movement, that the soul keeps itself going, and is therefore _causa sui_ and immortal, collapsed when Aristotle decided that literal self-movement was impossible, in that it implied the simultaneous actuality and potentiality of the same entity in the same respect.

This chapter discusses Aristotle's views on history. The study of history can never be fully scientific, for it can never be rid of the accidental. The course of history runs in cycles, but not exactly repeating ones, nor can it be fully predicted. Political history involves the development and decay of organic wholes, in which economic relationships are to be understood as properly embedded in the life of the community. Historical study is important, but there are better things to contemplate than man. It is hoped to emphasize the importance of the judgement of the experienced man in descrying what is happening or has happened, to hint at a certain emotional detachment from the course of events as a consequence of Aristotle's historical model, and to add somewhat to earlier defence of his organic view of the state. Aristotle's view of history reveals on the one hand his practical concerns, enshrined in the concept of the reasonable man of experience, and on the other a slight detachment from the course of history – where there is no end of time one's expectations are inevitably slightly detached from the millennial future, for that too will pass.

This chapter evaluates Aristotle's approach to time. It then reviews his account of temporal change and provides at least some prima facie reasons for thinking this reasonable. Aristotle gives an operationalist account of time, such that change is an unanalysable datum. The world cannot be reduced to the static form common in dimensionalist theories of time. The temporal metric is no more than an abstraction from the experience of changefulness. This view is related to various other cosmological doctrines, particularly the indeterminacy of the future. Only such a theory can accommodate organic entities that can fail of their completion.

This chapter outlines an Aristotelian approach of reconciliation. It also suggests that it can be solved, or dissolved, with the help of a ‘moral’ concept of personal identity, the theory that society has a life of its own, and the fact and nature of love. The reconciliation of individuality and gregariousness, in particular, is to be found in the discovery that one has created his identities, so that ‘self-interest’ is wholly ambiguous. The best is to make one that can love and be loved. Master–slave relationships are to be abandoned in favour of equal friendship, so that one act in accord with the principles of the best society and therefore of the divine in each and all human being. On Aristotle's terms a truly self-reflexive activity is impossible, so that any claim to self-reflexivity must unpack in terms of a separate subject and object. It is concluded that the reconciliation of man's capacities for solitude and togetherness, for self-service and altruism, lies in realizing that the self which is served is one that is created, and that the only reasonable self to create is a loving one.

This chapter explores certain details of the existence and of the theories that have been expounding. It also confirms Aristotle's biological works that must be taken seriously as considered expressions of his philosophical attitude. It is convenient to study his account of sensory perception first through the eyes of Irving Block. In doing so, the chapter particularly describes the relation between the ‘primary’ and the ‘special’ senses, and the concept of the senses as self-aware, which is used in the earlier biological works. It then addresses the concepts of corrigibility and accuracy, and finally the doctrine of sense or the senses as means. The last point leads on to the ethical mean; self-awareness and accuracy to the discussion of _nous_. It is concluded that Aristotle's psychological and biological works may legitimately be placed towards the later part of his life – his philosophy turns toward the world; that the relation of primary and special senses, of the critical faculty to the various types of phenomena presented in different sensory dimensions, is an instance of that relation of whole to parts that pervades his work; human senses are variously accurate, detached from immediate pleasure and pain, and grasping of wholes – sight is the paradigm; and the senses are means partly because sense is a mean.

This chapter suggests that the analogy between moral sense and the primary sense is of considerable value. Moral awareness involves the concept of a mean: the form of virtue is elicited from a discussion of the virtues, commonly so called, in the light of biological and metaphysical theses about wholes. Virtue is revealed as a form of balance: the most reliable judge in moral as in other matters is he who is least one-sided, who sums up the various human potentials and so sees straight. The three means of social life, _aletheia_, _eutrapelia_, and _philia_, are described. The judge must balance the contestants' claims against each other, giving each their proper weight, and any deviation is equally injustice.

Man's _ergon_, his defining character, lies in his capacity for choice and action, so that his nature is not wholly determinate. To live well, being human, one must do their own living. The subject of ethical discourse is the free man. In finding the way through the labyrinth of the Aristotelian texts, focus is placed on the questions, speculations, and, occasionally, the answers related to the nature of man, or, less abstractly, of men. It is suggested that the _ergon_ argument is a way of defining the subject matter: what are these ‘men’ we are talking about? The Sartrean's problem is that in thus describing human identity, he has himself defined it.

Man is the most natural of living things. This claim, and certain other oddities in the biological works can be explained on the assumption that Aristotle was a believer in devolutionary transformism, either in the full sense – that Man is the First Ancestor of all life – or in the modified sense, that the universe is itself, in a way, human. In either case, man, particularly the perfect man, is the _telos_ of the world. Man is the most characteristic, most polar, and most living form of life. The theory of evolutionary transformism, in particular unifocal evolutionary transformism, is frequently presented in this age as a fact quite as certain as that the world is round. This chapter points out that the view attributed to Aristotle is no more mythical in purpose nor much more lacking in unequivocal, concrete evidence than modern theory. Both evolutionary and devolutionary transformism are in large part myths, and the Aristotelian story is almost as likely, even on modern terms, as the other.

Understanding of another's philosophy is an aspect of the interpreter's own philosophical growth, and the result should not be, because it cannot be, assessed as matching or missing an unknowable and possibly non-existent ‘original version’, but as an intelligible and (hopefully) plausible way of seeing the world that is developed by meditation on the chosen traditum. The ability to follow an argument depends upon an ability to catch hold of those reasonable generalizations, common definitions, and the like that can be made totally explicit only at the price of unbearable tedium – if then. The attempt to check the results is made more difficult precisely by the too-ready acceptance of certain doctrines as reasonable. Interpretation is always re-creation, whether good or bad, and this need not surprise a person. A good interpretation of Bach is accounted good for aesthetic reasons, not historical. An interpretation of Aristotle must be assessed upon other grounds.

The world is best understood in terms of a complex of wholes that are more than the aggregates of their parts and are to be picked out in terms of their ends. Aristotle's talk of Nature, of Being, and of Prime Matter can be explained by reference to the universal Whole, which men can mirror. Teleological analysis is a condition of our seeing the world of common sense at all, and the Whole makes sense in terms of the Aristotelian saint's awareness of it. This chapter argues that certain of Aristotle's remarks about _ousia_, being, can be explicated with the help of the concept of a teleologically identified whole. Locke's claim that ‘the boundaries of species are as men, and not as nature, makes them’ is in fact true only on a prescientific level. The paradeigmatic _ousiai_ are wholes; the paradeigmatic wholes are living entities; living entities exist dynamically in such a way that they are wholes at any point in their existence but that their growth and nature is completed over a period of time.

Twenty years ago, people thought only cranks or sentimentalists could be seriously concerned about the treatment of non-human animals. However, since then philosophers, scientists and welfarists have raised public awareness of the issue; and they have begun to lay the foundations for an enormous change in human practice. This book is a record of the development of 'animal rights' through the eyes of one highly-respected and well-known thinker. This book brings together for the first time Stephen R.L. Clark's major essays in one volume. Written with characteristic clarity and persuasion, _Animals and Their Moral Standing_ will be essential reading for both philosophers and scientists, as well as the general reader concerned by the debates over animal rights and treatment.

Immortality is a subject which has long been explored and imagined by science fiction writers. In his intriguing new study, Stephen R.L.Clark argues that the genre of science fiction writing allows investigation of philosophical questions about immortality without the constraints of academic philosophy. He reveals how fantasy accounts of issues such as resurrection, disembodied survival, reincarnation and devices or drugs for preserving life can be used as an important resource for philosophical inquiry and examines how a society of immortals might function through a reading of the vampire myth. _How to Live Forever_ is a compelling study which introduces students and professional philosophers to the possibilities of using science fiction in their work. It includes extensive suggestions for further reading, both fictional and philosophical, and examines the work of such major science fiction authors as _Arthur C. Clarke, Frank Herbert, Larry Niven, William Gibson_, and _Colin Wilson_.

Whether churches should be demolished, rebuilt, restored or preserved is a contentious issue. Some hold that the needs of a present worshipping community should take precedence over antiquarian or aesthetic interest, others that we owe a debt to the ages. Arguments mirror those between developers and environmentalists. It is argued here that it is not abstract rights that matter, but a sense of history, and of the sacred. Church buildings and landscapes are to be maintained not as museum pieces but as living elements of a humane piety.

"Plotinus, the Roman philosopher (c. 204-270 CE) who is widely regarded as the founder of Neoplatonism, was also the creator of numerous myths, images, and metaphors, which have frequently been dismissed by modern scholars as merely ornamental. In this book, distinguished philosopher Stephen R. L. Clark shows that they form a vital set of spiritual exercises by which individuals can achieve one of Plotinus's most important goals: self-transformation through contemplation. Clark examines a variety of Plotinus's myths and metaphors within the cultural and philosophical context of his time, asking probing questions about their contemplative effects. Through rich images and structures, Clark casts Plotinus as a philosopher deeply concerned with philosophy as a way of life." -- Résumé de l'éditeur.

Immortality is a subject which has long been explored and imagined by science fiction writers. In his intriguing new study, Stephen R.L.Clark argues that the genre of science fiction writing allows investigation of philosophical questions about immortality without the constraints of academic philosophy. He reveals how fantasy accounts of issues such as resurrection, disembodied survival, reincarnation and devices or drugs for preserving life can be used as an important resource for philosophical inquiry and examines how a society of immortals might function through a reading of the vampire myth. _How to Live Forever_ is a compelling study which introduces students and professional philosophers to the possibilities of using science fiction in their work. It includes extensive suggestions for further reading, both fictional and philosophical, and examines the work of such major science fiction authors as _Arthur C. Clarke, Frank Herbert, Larry Niven, William Gibson_, and _Colin Wilson_.

Immortality is a subject which has long been explored and imagined by science fiction writers. In his intriguing new study, Stephen R.L.Clark argues that the genre of science fiction writing allows investigation of philosophical questions about immortality without the constraints of academic philosophy. He reveals how fantasy accounts of issues such as resurrection, disembodied survival, reincarnation and devices or drugs for preserving life can be used as an important resource for philosophical inquiry and examines how a society of immortals might function through a reading of the vampire myth. _How to Live Forever_ is a compelling study which introduces students and professional philosophers to the possibilities of using science fiction in their work. It includes extensive suggestions for further reading, both fictional and philosophical, and examines the work of such major science fiction authors as _Arthur C. Clarke, Frank Herbert, Larry Niven, William Gibson_, and _Colin Wilson_.

People, as Aristotle said, are political animals. Mainstream political philosophy, however, has largely neglected humankind's animal nature as beings who are naturally equipped, and inclined, to reason and work together, create social bonds and care for their young. Stephen Clark, grounded in biological analysis and traditional ethics, probes into areas ignored in mainstream political theory and argues for the significance of social bonds which bypass or transcend state authority. Understanding the ties that bind us reveals how enormously capable we are in achieving civil order as a species. Stephen Clark advocates that a properly informed political philosophy must take into account the role of women, children, animals, minorities and the domestic virtues at large. Living and comnducting our political lives like the animals we are is a more congenial prospect than is usually supposed.