The Weakness of the Will

First Published in 2004. Since before Plato, philosophers have puzzled over why it is that people will sometimes deliberately take the worst course of action. The book begins by examining the various theories put forward by Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics and a selection of medieval philosophers and discusses how and why later philosophers avoid the problem. In the second section, Justin Gosling argues that familiar ways of viewing the problem mislocate the apparent irrationality of weakness. ...