Ethics

by Aristotle

Overview

According to Wikipedia: "Aristotle (384 BC – 322 BC)[1] was a Greek philosopher, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology. Together with Plato and Socrates (Plato's teacher), Aristotle is one of the most important founding figures in Western philosophy. Aristotle's writings were the first to create a comprehensive system of Western philosophy, encompassing morality and aesthetics, logic and science, politics and metaphysics."

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781455408023
Publisher:	B&R Samizdat Express
Publication date:	04/01/2014
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	232 KB

About the Author

Aristotle (Greek: Ἀριστοτέλης Aristotélēs, pronounced [aristotélɛːs]; 384-322 BC)[A] was a Greek philosopher and polymath during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. Taught by Plato, he was the founder of the Lyceum, the Peripatetic school of philosophy, and the Aristotelian tradition. His writings cover many subjects. including physics, biology, zoology, metaphysics, logic, ethics, estheticspoetry, theatre, music, rhetoric, psychology, linguistics, economics, politics, and government. Aristotle provided a complex synthesis of the various philosophies existing prior to him. It was above all from his teachings that the West inherited its intellectual lexicon, as well as problems and methods of inquiry. As a result, his philosophy has exerted a unique influence on almost every form of knowledge in the West and it continues to be a subject of contemporary philosophical discussion.
Little is known about his life. Aristotle was born in the city of Stagira in Northern Greece. His father, Nicomachus, died when Aristotle was a child, and he was brought up by a guardian. At seventeen or eighteen years of age he joined Plato's Academy in Athens and remained there until the age of thirty-seven (c. 347 BC).[4] Shortly after Plato died, Aristotle left Athens and, at the request of Philip II of Macedon, tutored Alexander the Great beginning in 343 BC.[5] He established a library in the Lyceum which helped him to produce many of his hundreds of books on papyrus scrolls. Though Aristotle wrote many elegant treatises and dialogues for publication, only around a third of his original output has survived, none of it intended for publication.[6]
Aristotle's views on physical science profoundly shaped medieval scholarship. Their influence extended from Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages into the Renaissance, and were not replaced systematically until the Enlightenment and theories such as classical mechanics. Some of Aristotle's zoological observations found in his biology, such as on the hectocotyl (reproductive) arm of the octopus, were disbelieved until the 19th century. His works contain the earliest known formal study of logic, studied by medieval scholars such as Peter Abelard and John Buridan. Aristotle's influence on logic also continued well into the 19th century.
He influenced Islamic thought during the Middle Ages, as well as Christian theology, especially the Neoplatonism of the Early Church and the scholastic tradition of the Catholic Church. Aristotle was revered among medieval Muslim scholars as "The First Teacher" and among medieval Christians like Thomas Aquinas as simply "The Philosopher". His ethics, though always influential, gained renewed interest with the modern advent of virtue ethics, such as in the thinking of Alasdair MacIntyre and Philippa Foot.

Table of Contents

	Preface	ix
	Abbreviations and Conventions	xi
	Introduction	xiii
	Nicomachean Ethics	1
Book I	[Happiness]	1
1.	[Ends and Goods]	1
2.	[The Highest Good and Political Science]	1
3.	[The Method of Political Science]	2
4.	[Common Beliefs]	3
5.	[The Three Lives]	4
6.	[The Platonic Form of the Good]	5
7.	[An Account of the Human Good]	7
8.	[Defense of the Account of the Good]	10
9.	[How Is Happiness Achieved?]	12
10.	[Can We Be Happy during Our Lifetime?]	13
11.	[How Happiness Can Be Affected after One's Death]	15
12.	[Praise and Honor]	15
13.	[Introduction to the Virtues]	16
Book II	[Virtue of Character]	18
1.	[How a Virtue of Character Is Acquired]	18
2.	[Habituation]	19
3.	[The Importance of Pleasure and Pain]	20
4.	[Virtuous Actions versus Virtuous Character]	22
5.	[Virtue of Character: Its Genus]	23
6.	[Virtue of Character: Its Differentia]	23
7.	[The Particular Virtues of Character]	25
8.	[Relations between Mean and Extreme States]	27
9.	[How Can We Reach the Mean?]	29
Book III	[Preconditions of Virtue]	30
1.	[Voluntary Action]	30
2.	[Decision]	33
3.	[Deliberation]	34
4.	[Wish]	36
5.	[Virtue and Vice Are in Our Power]	37
	[The Individual Virtues of Character]	40
6.	[Bravery; Its Scope]	40
7.	[Bravery; Its Characteristic Outlook]	41
8.	[Conditions That Resemble Bravery]	42
9.	[Feelings Proper to Bravery]	44
10.	[Temperance; Its Scope]	45
11.	[Temperance; Its Outlook]	47
12.	[Intemperance]	48
Book IV49
1.	[Generosity]	49
2.	[Magnificence]	53
3.	[Magnanimity]	56
4.	[The Virtue Concerned with Small Honors]	60
5.	[Mildness]	61
6.	[Friendliness]	62
7.	[Truthfulness]	63
8.	[Wit]	65
9.	[Shame]	66
Book V	[Justice]	67
1.	[Varieties of Justice]	67
2.	[Special Justice Contrasted with General]	69
3.	[Justice in Distribution]	71
4.	[Justice in Rectification]	72
5.	[Justice in Exchange]	74
6.	[Political Justice]	77
7.	[Justice by Nature and by Law]	78
8.	[Justice, Injustice, and the Voluntary]	79
9.	[Puzzles about Justice and Injustice]	80
10.	[Decency]	83
11.	[Injustice to Oneself]	84
Book VI	[Virtues of Thought]	86
1.	[The Mean and the Virtues of Thought]	86
2.	[Thought, Desire, and Decision]	87
3.	[Scientific Knowledge]	87
4.	[Craft Knowledge]	88
5.	[Prudence]	89
6.	[Understanding]	90
7.	[Wisdom versus Prudence]	90
8.	[Types of Prudence]	92
9.	[Good Deliberation]	93
10.	[Comprehension]	95
11.	[Practical Thought and Particulars]	95
12.	[Puzzles about Prudence and Wisdom]	96
13.	[Prudence and Virtue of Character]	98
Book VII	[Incontinence]	99
1.	[Virtue, Vice, and Incontinence]	99
2.	[Puzzles about Incontinence]	100
3.	[Incontinence and Ignorance]	102
4.	[Simple Incontinence]	104
5.	[Bestiality and Disease]	106
6.	[Incontinence and Related Conditions]	107
7.	[Incontinence, Intemperance, and Softness]	109
8.	[Why Intemperance Is Worse than Incontinence]	110
9.	[Continence]	111
10.	[Answers to Further Questions about Incontinence]	113
	[Pleasure]	114
11.	[Questions about Pleasure]	114
12.	[Pleasure and Good]	115
13.	[Pleasure and Happiness]	116
14.	[Bodily Pleasures]	117
Book VIII	[Friendship]	119
1.	[Common Beliefs and Questions]	119
2.	[The Object of Friendship]	120
3.	[The Three Types of Friendship]	121
4.	[Comparison between the Types of Friendship]	123
5.	[State and Activity in Friendship]	124
6.	[Activities Characteristic of the Different Types of Friendship]	125
7.	[Friendship between Unequals]	127
8.	[Giving and Receiving in Friendship]	128
9.	[Friendship in Communities]	129
10.	[Political Systems]	130
11.	[Friendships in Political Systems]	131
12.	[Friendships in Families]	132
13.	[Disputes in Friendships between Equals]	134
14.	[Disputes in Friendships between Unequals]	136
Book IX137
1.	[Friends with Dissimilar Aims]	137
2.	[Conflicts between Different Types of Friendships]	139
3.	[Dissolution of Friendships]	140
4.	[Self-love and Friendship]	141
5.	[Goodwill and Friendship]	143
6.	[Friendship and Concord]	144
7.	[Active Benevolence and Friendship]	145
8.	[Self-love and Selfishness]	146
9.	[Why Are Friends Needed?]	148
10.	[How Many Friends Are Needed?]	150
11.	[Friends in Good and Ill Fortune]	151
12.	[Shared Activity in Friendship]	152
Book X	[Pleasure]	153
1.	[The Right Approach to Pleasure]	153
2.	[Arguments about Pleasure]	154
3.	[Pleasure Is a Good, but Not the Good]	155
4.	[Pleasure Is an Activity]	157
5.	[Pleasures Differ in Kind]	159
	[Happiness: Further Discussion]	162
6.	[Conditions for Happiness]	162
7.	[Happiness and Theoretical Study]	163
8.	[Theoretical Study and the Other Virtues]	165
	[From Ethics to Politics]	167
9.	[Moral Education]	167
	Notes	172
	Glossary	315
	Further Reading	355