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Books > Philosophy > Western philosophy > Ancient Western philosophy to c 500 > General
Since Friedrich Schleiermacher s work in the 1800s, scholars interested in the literary dimension of Plato s writings have sought to reconcile the dialogue form with the expository imperative of philosophical argument. It is now common for mainstream classicists and philosophers to attribute vital importance to literary form in Plato, which they often explain in terms of rhetorical devices serving didactic goals. This study brings the disciplines of literary and classical studies into methodological debate, questioning modern views of Plato s dialogue form. In the first part of this book, David Schur argues that the literary features of Plato s dialogues when treated as "literary cannot be limited to a single argumentative agenda. In the second part, he demonstrates the validity of this point by considering a rhetorical pattern of self-reflection that is prominent in the Republic." He emphasizes that Plato s book consistently undermines the goal-driven conversation that it portrays. Offering a thought-provoking blend of methodological investigation and methodical close reading, Schur suggests that the Republic" qualifies the authority of its conclusions by displaying a strong countercurrent of ongoing movement."
In the 20th century theorists of mind were almost exclusively concerned with various versions of the materialist thesis, but prior to current debates accounts of soul and mind reveal an extraordinary richness and complexity which bear careful and impartial investigation. This book is the first single-authored, comprehensive work to examine the historical, linguistic and conceptual issues involved in exploring the basic features of the human mind - from its most remote origins to the beginning of the modern period. MacDonald traces the development of an armature of psychical concepts from the Old Testament and Homer's works to the 18th century advocacy of an empirical science of the mind. Along the way, detailed attention is paid to the Presocratics, Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics and Epicurus, before turning to look at the New Testament, Neoplatonism, Augustine, Medieval Islam, Aquinas and Dante. Treatment of Renaissance theories is followed by an unusual (perhaps unique) chapter on the words "soul" and "mind" in English literature from Chaucer to Shakespeare; the story then rejoins the mainstream with analyses of Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Hobbes, Locke, Berkeley, and Hume. Chapter-focused bibliographies.
This volume explores Plato's and Aristotle's theories about good
things, goodness, and the best life for human beings, and draws
comparisons between ancient and modern theories of good and
justice." Goodness and Justice" argues that goodness was the most
fundamental normative concept in the ethics of Plato and Aristotle,
and illustrates how they used their functional and formal theories
of good to build their theories of virtue, justice, and happiness.
It also shows that they fought subjective theories of good as
desire satisfaction and good as pleasure, in favor of what they
thought was a more objective concept of good found in form and
function. The comparisons with the moderns illuminate the merits and limits of ancient and modern ethical theories and place them within a broad philosophical and historical context.
This collection of essays focuses on the reception of Plato and Greek political thought in the work of some major (pre)Victorian classical scholars and expands on a remarkable range of hotly debated issues on the interpretation of Greek antiquity. The central figure in this volume is the radical philosopher, utilitarian, and Platonist George Grote, whose works on the history of Greece and Plato moved away from traditional models of classical interpretation. His works and their background are critically explored in light of his philosophical commitment and political radicalism. Article IV brings to light a forgotten manuscript by Grote, "On the Character of Socrates," produced in the 1820s. Grote sought to counter the current literature on ancient Greece and its predominant motifs, which is here examined in its own right along with an independent study on Bishop Connop Thirlwall's influential History of Greece. The second half of this volume is devoted to analyzing important aspects of the revival of Platonic studies in the ideological and discursive context of early and middle Victorian times. This collection of essays presents comprehensive and illuminating contextual analyses of nineteenth-century works on classical reception, providing simultaneously a rich bibliographic guide to further research.
Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy is a volume of original articles on all aspects of ancient philosophy. The articles may be of substantial length, and include critical notices of major books. OSAP is now published twice yearly, in both hardback and paperback. "'Have you seen the latest OSAP?' is what scholars of ancient philosophy say to each other when they meet in corridors or on coffee breaks. Whether you work on Plato or Aristotle, on Presocratics or sophists, on Stoics, Epicureans, or Sceptics, on Roman philosophers or Greek Neoplatonists, you are liable to find OSAP articles now dominant in the bibliography of much serious published work in your particular subject: not safe to miss." - Malcolm Schofield, Cambridge University "OSAP was founded to provide a place for long pieces on major issues in ancient philosophy. In the years since, it has fulfilled this role with great success, over and over again publishing groundbreaking papers on what seemed to be familiar topics and others surveying new ground to break. It represents brilliantly the vigour-and the increasingly broad scope-of scholarship in ancient philosophy, and shows us all how the subject should flourish." - M.M. McCabe, King's College London
Published in 1987: The following essays form, as their title-page shows, only the first half of a collection which the writer hopes to complete in the course of a few months. Even when completed the whole work is designed to be merely preparatory to another on the interpretation of the Platonic Philosophy, and the materials brought together in the following pages, as well as those which, it is trusted, will form their continuation, were originally intended to appear in the Introduction to that projected work.
Can the intellect or the intellectual faculty be its own object of thought, or can it not think or apprehend itself? This book explores the ancient treatments of the question of self-intellection - an important theme in ancient epistemology and of considerable interest to later philosophical thought. The manner in which the ancients dealt with the intellect apprehending itself, took them into both the metaphysical and epistemological domains with reflections on questions of thinking, identity and causality. Ian Crystal traces the origins from which the concept of self-intellection springs, by examining Plato's account of the epistemic subject and the emergence of self-intellection through the Aristotelian account, before the final part of the book explores the problem of how the intellect apprehends itself, and its resolution including Plotinus' reformulation and the dilemma raised by Sextus Empiricus. Crystal concludes that Plotinus recasts the metaphysical structures of Plato and Aristotle in such a way that he casts the concept of self-intellection in an entirely new light and offers a solution to the problem.
The 15,000 pages of the ancient Greek commentators on Aristotle, written mainly between 200 and 600 AD, constitute the largest corpus of extant Greek philosophical writings not translated into English or other European languages. This series of translations with introductions, copious notes and indexes fills an important gap in the history of European thought.
Recovering the Ancient View of Founding questions the consensus view of contemporary scholars who view Cicero as an eclectic and unoriginal political thinker. For them, De Legibus is perhaps the most striking example of this eclecticism. They say that Cicero claims a universal ground for laws that would restore the political privileges of his own aristocratic class. Yet Timothy Caspar shows that Cicero offers a unified, coherent, and original teaching about politics whose aim is justice for the entire republic, not just a part of it. Contrary to the prevailing view, Cicero does not embrace but rejects Stoicism and any philosophy that culminates in a community of the wise as a standard for politics. Instead, nature serves as the foundation of Cicero's laws, and he elucidates a political standard grounded in nature and applicable to all citizens. Thus, the law codes of De Legibus are not only in harmony with but required by Cicero's natural law principles. Caspar's Recovering the Ancient View of Founding is a reinterpretation of a key work of ancient Roman political philosophy and belongs on the bookshelf of anyone interested in philosophy, politics, or ancient Rome.
This edition of volume 1 in the series Rutgers University Studies in Classical Humanities concerns Hellenistic ethics. Its particular focus is the compendium of Stoic and Peripatetic ethics attributed to Arius Didymus, court philosopher to the Roman emperor Caesar Augustus. Arius was admired in antiquity for his Consolatio addressed to Livia, Augustus' wife, on the death of her son Drusus. He was also known for having advised Augustus to spare the inhabitants of Alexandria when that city fell to the army of Augustus. Arius was, then, an important advisor to a powerful emperor; he held the position that Plato dreamed of and Kant recommended. He advised the ruler of the Mediterranean world and practiced an ethics based on his knowledge of Hellenistic philosophy. That knowledge is discussed in On Stoic and Peripatetic Ethics. Prior to the publication of On Stoic and Peripatetic Ethics, Arius was best known in the English-speaking world for fragments concerning physical philosophy. There were some works in German and Italian but discussion in English was meager and largely inconsequential. Within the English-speaking world, there is now a significant and growing body of scholarly literature on Arius' compendium. Far from supplanting the present volume, this body of literature underlines the importance of the volume and builds on issues raised in it.
Plotinus, the most profound philosopher of the third century C.E.,
has been influential on Byzantine and Western Christianity, and
Islam. In the West, Augustine brought Plotinian philosophy into
Christianity, ensuring the interest of a long line of Christian
thinkers. As Margaret Miles shows, Plotinus's philosophy holds both
perennial attraction and offers specific contributions to
particular issues at the beginning of the twenty first century.
Miles offers a fresh interpretation which situates Plotinus's philosophical ideas in the context of society and culture in which those ideas developed. Using extant evidence (the "Enneads," Porphyry's "Life"), she reconstructs an intense third-century conversation, n namely the relationship of body and soul. Mile's portrayal of Plotinus will encourage readers from a range of disciplines to question their construction of body, "self," and identity.
Throughout history, some books have changed the world. They have transformed the way we see ourselves and each other. They have inspired debate, dissent, war and revolution. They have enlightened, outraged, provoked and comforted. They have enriched lives and destroyed them. Now Penguin brings you the works of the great thinkers, pioneers, radicals and visionaries whose ideas shook civilization, and helped make us who we are. The Stoic writings of the philosopher Seneca offer powerful insights into the art of living, the importance of reason and morality, and continue to provide profound guidance to many through their eloquence, lucidity and timeless wisdom.
Theophrastus was Aristotle's pupil and second head of the Peripatetic School. Apart from two botanical works, a collection of character sketches, and several scientific opuscula, his works survive only through quotations and reports in secondary sources. Recently these quotations and reports have been collected and published, thereby making the thought of Theophrastus accessible to a wide audience. The present volume contains seventeen responses to this material. There are chapters dealing with Theophrastus' views on logic, physics, biology, ethics, politics, rhetoric, and music, as well as the life of Theophrastus. Together these writings throw considerable light on fundamental questions concerning the development and importance of the Peripatos in the early Hellenistic period. The authors consider whether Theophrastus was a systematic thinker who imposed coherence and consistency on a growing body of knowledge, or a problem-oriented thinker who foreshadowed the dissolution of Peripatetic thought into various loosely connected disciplines. Of special interest are those essays which deal with Theophrastus' intellectual position in relation to the lively philosophic scene occupied by such contemporaries as Zeno, the founder of the Stoa, and Epicurus, the founder of the Garden, as well as Xenocrates and Polemon hi the Academy, and Theophrastus' fellow Peripatetics, Eudemus and Strato. The contributors to the volume are Suzanne Amigues, Antonio Battegazzore, Tiziano Dorandi, Woldemar Gorier, John Glucker, Hans Gottschalk, Frans de Haas, Andre Laks, Anthony Long, Jorgen Mejer, Mario Mignucci, Trevor Saunders, Dirk Schenkeveld, David Sedley, Robert Sharpies, C. M. J. Sicking and Richard Sorabji. The Rutgers University Studies in Classical Humanities series is a forum for seminal thinking in the field of philosophy, and this volume is no exception. Theophrastus is a landmark achievement in intellectual thought. Philosophers, historians, and classicists will all find this work to be enlightening.
This book explores Socrates' role as narrator of the Lysis, Charmides, Protagoras, Euthydemus, and Republic. New insights about each dialogue emerge through careful attention to Socrates' narrative commentary. These insights include a re-reading of the aporetic ending of the Lysis, a view of philosophy as a means of overcoming tyranny in the Charmides, a reconsideration of virtue in the Protagoras, an enhanced understanding of Crito in the Euthydemus, and an uncovering of two models of virtue cultivation (self-mastery and harmony) in the Republic. This book presents Socrates' narrative commentary as a mechanism that illustrates how the emotions shape Socrates' self-understanding, his philosophical exchanges with others, and his view of the Good. As a result, this book challenges the dominant interpretation of Socrates as an intellectualist. It offers a holistic vision of the practice of philosophy that we would do well to embrace in our contemporary world.
Aristotle was the first philosopher in the Western tradition to address politics systematically and empirically, and he remains a central figure in political theory. This essential volume presents Aristotle's complete political writings--including his Politics, Economics, and Constitution of Athens--in their most authoritative translations, taken from the complete works that is universally recognized as the standard English edition. Edited by Jonathan Barnes, one of the world's leading scholars of ancient philosophy, and with an illuminating introduction by Melissa Lane, an authority on ancient political philosophy, this compact but comprehensive volume will be invaluable for all students of politics, philosophy, classics, or Western thought.
Dicaearchus of Messana (fl. c. 320 b.c.) was a peripatetic philosopher. Like Theophrastus of Eresus, he was a pupil of Aristotle. Dicaearchus's life is not well documented. There is no biography by Diogenes Laertius, and what the Suda offers is meager. However, it can be ascertained that a close friendship existed between Aristoxenus and Dicaearchus as both are mentioned as personal students of Aristotle. Dicaearchus lived for a time in the Peleponnesus, and in his pursuit of geographical studies and measuring mountains, he is said to have enjoyed the patronage of kings. Dicaearchus's interests were in certain respects narrower than Aristotle's. There is no evidence that Dicaearchus worked in logic, physics, or metaphysics. To the contrary, his work "On the Soul" recalls the Aristotelian treatise of the same title, but Dicaearchus's work was not an esoteric treatise. Instead, it was a dialogue in two parts. His interest in good and bad lifestyles also found expression in works such as "On the Sacrifice at Ilium," and "On the Destruction of Human Beings," in which he presented man himself as the greatest threat to mankind. In "On Lives," a work of at least two books, he considered philosophers and others noted for their wisdom, with his main thesis being the superiority of the active life over that of quiet contemplation. Cicero speaks of controversy between Dicaearchus and Theophrastus the former championing the active life and the latter that of contemplation. "Circuit of the Earth" was a work of descriptive geography in which Dicaearchus said that the earth has the shape of a globe. This interest in earth's sphericity led him to make maps and discuss other phenomena like the cause of ebb- and flood-tides and the source of the Nile River. The largest number of texts in the collection deal with cultural history, most of which stem or appear to stem from his "Life of Greece," while the smallest section deals with politics. This tenth volume in the series Rutgers Studies in Classical Humanities includes a facing translation of the Greek and Latin texts, making the material accessible to readers who lack the ancient languages, and the accompanying essays introduce important issues beyond the scope of the text. " "Dicaerchus of Messana"] is a beautifully produced book...highly recommended, not only as a very full and useful treatment, meeting the highest standards, of one of Aristotle's more important pupils, but also as a model of methodology in the attempt to reconstruct from few remains something of an achievement which has been largely lost." -Dominic O'Meara, "The Classical Bulletin" William W. Fortenbaugh is professor of classics at Rutgers University. In addition to the other books in this series and his many articles, he has written "Aristotle on Emotion" and "Quellen zur Ethik Theophrasts." Eckart Sch3trumpf is professor of classics at the University of Colorado at Boulder. His interests include ancient literary criticism, rhetoric and political theory. His extensive commentary on Aristotle's "Politics" now extends to three volumes. A fourth and final volume is forthcoming.
Plato's Utopia Recast is an illuminating reappraisal of Plato's later works, which reveals radical changes in his ethical and political theory. Christopher Bobonich examines later dialogues, with a special emphasis upon the Laws, and argues that in these late works Plato both rethinks and revises the basic ethical and political positions that he held in his better known earlier works, such as the Republic. This book will change our understanding of Plato. His controversial moral and political theory, so influential in Western thought, will henceforth be seen in a new light. |
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