In the Nicomachean Ethics Aristotle introduces his Doctrine of the Mean, where he argues that virtue is the mean between two extremes, the mean between excess and deficiency. However, Aristotle mentions actions whose wrongness does not seem to be explained in terms of excess and deficiency; rather, it seems that these actions are always wrong, regardless of whether they are excessive, deficient, or neither. Among such actions Aristotle mentions moicheia, androphonia, and klopê (usually translated "adultery," "theft," and "murder"). Thus, with such actions the main questions become, first, what, according to Aristotle, explains the wrongness of these actions, and second, what makes it the case that they are always wrong. With these questions in mind, I will take moicheia as a test case to come up with an account that can answer these questions. In order to build this account, I make use of an objection leveled by Rosalind Hursthouse against the Doctrine of the Mean and of Howard Curzer's response to this objection. Though I claim Curzer's account fails, I make use of Curzer's work in another context in order to respond to Hursthouse's objection. Ultimately, I will claim that the wrongness of actions like moicheia can be satisfactorily explained as failures of the virtue of justice in which the agent goes beyond what properly belongs to her, beyond her proper share. However, in order for this account to succeed, I must get clearer about what resources Aristotle might have to specify what properly belongs to an agent, or what makes for one's "proper share." This can be done by looking deeper at Aristotle's theory of justice. Making use of the work of Richard Kraut, I claim that the concept of proper share involves Aristotle's ideas of nomoi (laws), and the common good. Ultimately though, what will allow us to make sense of prohibitions against acts like moicheia being absolute will be Aristotle's claim that certain laws are based on phusis ("nature"). In the last analysis, it is Aristotle's concept of phusis as it relates to human beings that will be central to his account of absolute moral prohibitions.

This dissertation looks at Aristotelian political thinkers of the later Middle Ages and argues that they meet all of the criteria of a mature Kuhnian science. Scholars of medieval Europe have spent decades arguing over exactly how one should define medieval Aristotelianism and which thinkers qualify as Aristotelian. I answer this question by turning to the philosophy of science literature. By using the criteria laid out by Thomas Kuhn- a common education, a shared technical language and general agreement on problem choice- I am able to parse out a group of political thinkers who qualify as a scientific community. My dissertation then goes on to illustrate how several different medieval thinkers were able to operate within this Aristotelian paradigm. This project gives scholars of the Middle Ages a more useful lens through which to view the phenomenon of medieval Aristotelianism. For those interested in political science more broadly, I demonstrate that our field has, in fact, experienced a period of maturity, in which scholars shared a unified paradigm and proceeded with their research in concert. I also show some of the benefits and limitations of a common research agenda in the study of politics.

Thèse : Lettres : Paris : 1865. / Notes bibliogr.

Thesis (M.A.)--Kent State University, 2009. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed Jan. 12, 2010). Advisor: Gina Zavota. Keywords: Aristotle, ancient physics, place, unity, Benjamin Morison. Includes bibliographical references (p. 129-132).

In this paper, I examine the treatments of law contained within Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics and Plato’s Minos. I find that both offer powerful and complementary critiques of law, while recognizing law’s power and promise in shaping the character and opinions of each citizen. The Minos, though, goes further than the Ethics in describing and examining the possibility of divine law that transcends the limitations of merely human laws. / text

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This thesis investigates whether Aristotle is actually presenting substance as the subject of a single science in Metaphysics ?. It proposes that he is, and that the common principles of all substances, which are required for there to be a single science of substance, are those found in ?.2-5. Although these causes and principles describe change, the analogy of the general and the army, which describes the relationship between God and the cosmos, also describes the relationship between causing and caused sensible substances. The analogy of the general and the army is used to the show that the principles that describe the actuality and effects of separate substance are analogically similar, and that the cause of this similarity is God’s ordering of the cosmos to be like his own eternal actuality as far as possible.

In contrast with the procedural orientation of Athenian law in his day, Aristotle thinks that the lawcode should include principles which explain the rules of the lawcode and guide the interpretation of these rules in difficult cases. It should be determined by majority vote whether the decisions and proposals of political experts are consistent with the principles of the lawcode. Aristotle's views on practical explanation support his views on political deliberation. Someone has a techne rather than mere empeiria if he can give an account of the principles of an art and is able to explain the results of his deliberations in the art in terms of the principles. Such explanation does not have the same status as apodeixis in the epistemai, in that such an explanation cannot demonstrate that a conclusion follows necessarily from the principles of the art. However, a person who has experience in the art is able to evaluate deliberative options based on such arguments. / Aristotle has an account of practical intellection which, like Plato's, is theory-based. Aristotle's account is an adjustment of Plato's account in the light of Isocrates' criticisms of Plato. Aristotle combines the accounts of Plato and Isocrates---the emphasis of the one on explanation and the emphasis of the other on practical principles. Aristotle's views on practical intellection allow him to solve a problem associated with Plato's proposals in the Laws, which resemble in important respects Aristotle's own proposals. Plato intends in the Laws to introduce an arrangement on which the polis is governed by non-philosopher citizens educated by the lawcode. However, because of his views on practical intellection, Plato is forced to put the 'Nocturnal Council' in charge of 'preserving the laws'. Because of his views on practical intellection, Aristotle can accept that the majority can be in charge of preserving the law. Aristotle's views on practical intellection also allow him to say that one ought to spell out the principles of the lawcode and privilege them in the interpretation of the law---which is different from the Athenian, procedural approach to the law---even though no universally true claims are possible on practical issues.

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