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123Between Saying and Doing: Aristotle, Speusippus, and the Struggle against PleasureApeiron. forthcoming.This study aims to provide a coherent new interpretation of the notorious anti-hedonism of Speusippus, Plato’s nephew and the second scholarch of the Academy, by reconsidering all the relevant sources concerning his attitude toward pleasure—sources that seem to be in tension or even incompatible with each other. By reassessing Speusippus’ anti-hedonism and Aristotle’s response, it also sheds new light on the Academic debate over pleasure in which he and Aristotle participated: This debate is not…Read more
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65"Every Perception Is Accompanied by Pain!": Theophrastus's Criticism of AnaxagorasJournal of the History of Philosophy 61 (4): 559-583. 2023.abstract: Anaxagoras is notorious for his view that every perception is accompanied by pain but that not all concurrent pains are distinctly felt by the perceiving subject. This thesis is reported and criticized by Aristotle's heir Theophrastus in his De Sensibus. Traditionally, scholars believe that Theophrastus rejects Anaxagoras's thesis of the ubiquity of pain as counterintuitive, with the appeal to unfelt pain looking like a desperate category mistake given that pain is nothing but a feelin…Read more
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18Between Aristotle and Stoicism: Alexander of Aphrodisias on the Varieties of PainIn Jacqueline Clarke, Daniel King & Han Baltussen (eds.), Pain Narratives in Greco-Roman Writings, Brill. pp. 176-204. 2023.
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43Aristotle and the pain of animals: Nicomachean Ethics 1154b7–9Classical Quarterly (1): 1-8. 2023.This paper explains the motivation behind Aristotle’s appeal in Nicomachean Ethics 1154b7–9 to the physiologoi, who notoriously declare that animals are constantly in pain. It argues that the physiologoi are neither the critical target of this chapter nor invoked to verify Aristotle’s commitment to the imperfection of the human condition. Rather, despite doctrinal disagreement, they help Aristotle develop a naturalistic story about how ordinary people easily indulge in sensory pleasures.
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539Aristotle and Eudoxus on the Argument from ContrariesArchiv für Geschichte der Philosophie 102 (4): 588-618. 2020.The debate over the value of pleasure among Eudoxus, Speusippus, and Aristotle is dramatically documented by the Nicomachean Ethics, particularly in the dialectical pros-and-cons concerning the so-called argument from contraries. Two similar versions of this argument are preserved at EN VII. 13, 1153b1–4, and X. 2, 1172b18–20. Many scholars believe that the argument at EN VII is either a report or an appropriation of the Eudoxean argument in EN X. This essay aims to revise this received view. It…Read more
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712Speusippus, teleology and the metaphysics of value: Theophrastus’ Metaphysics 11a18–26Journal of Hellenic Studies 140 143-175. 2020.This paper reexamines Theophrastus’ Metaphysics 11a18–26, an obscure testimony about Speusippus, the second head of the Platonic Academy. As opposed to the traditional interpretation, which takes this passage as Theophrastus’ polemic against Speusippus’ doctrine of value, I argue that he here dialectically takes advantage of, rather than launches an attack on, the Platonist. Based on this new reading, I further propose a revision and a reassessment of the ‘gloomy metaphysics’ of Speusippus which…Read more
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443Neutral, Natural and Hedonic State in PlatoMnemosyne 4 (72): 525-549. 2019.This paper aims to clarify Plato’s notions of the natural and the neutral state in relation to hedonic properties. Contra two extreme trends among scholars—people either conflate one state with the other, or keep them apart as to establish an unsurmount- able gap between both states, I argue that neither view accurately reflects Plato’s position because the natural state is real and can coincide with the neutral state in part, whereas the latter, as an umbrella term, can also be realized in a no…Read more
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1041Aristotle’s Vocabulary of PainPhilologus: Zeitschrift für Antike Literatur Und Ihre Rezeption 163 (1): 47-71. 2019.This paper examines Aristotle’s vocabulary of pain, that is the differences and relations of the concepts of pain expressed by synonyms in the same semantic field. It investigates what is particularly Aristotelian in the selection of the pain-words in comparison with earlier authors and specifies the special semantic scope of each word-cluster. The result not only aims to pin down the exact way these terms converge with and diverge from each other, but also serves as a basis for further understa…Read more
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165Aristotelian emotions. M. krewet die theorie der gefühle bei aristoteles. Pp. 648. Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag winter, 2011. Paper, €64. Isbn: 978-3-8253-5825-9 (review)The Classical Review 66 (1): 62-64. 2016.
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154Orality and literacy 10. R. Scodel between orality and literacy: Communication and adaptation in antiquity. Orality and literacy in the ancient world, vol. 10. pp. X + 387, ills. Leiden and boston: Brill, 2014. Cased, €134, us$174. Isbn: 978-90-04-26912-5 (review)The Classical Review 66 (1): 5-7. 2016.
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Peking UniversityDepartment of Philosophy and Religious Studies
Centre for Classical StudiesAssociate Professor
Beijing, China
Areas of Specialization
Ancient Greek and Roman Philosophy |
Aristotle |
Plato |