Esta tese investiga, em sua primeira parte, a invenção retórica apresentada no Do orador, de Marco Túlio Cícero, tendo como ponto de partida comentário do próprio autor, em Ad Familiares I, 9, 23, de que os libri De oratore afastam-se dos preceitos comuns e contemplam toda a doutrina oratória dos antigos, tanto a de Aristóteles como a de Isócrates. Para tal, compara-se a exposição de Antônio, protagonista do diálogo, em II, 99-216 aos tratamentos dados nas artes anteriores ao diálogo e na Retórica de Aristóteles. A segunda parte consiste na primeira tradução completa do Do orador em língua portuguesa. / The present thesis investigates, in its first part, rhetorical inventio as presented in Marcus Tullius Ciceros On the orator. Its starting point is Ciceros own comments in Ad Familiares I, 9, 23 that the libri De oratore shun the regular precepts and comprise the whole oratorical doctrine of the ancients, both the Aristotelian and the Isocratic ones. In order to achieve such goal, Antoniuss presentation (2.99-216) is compared to both the treatment given to the same issue in the artes, which predate the dialogue, and that of Aristotles Rhetoric. The second part presents De oratores first complete translation into Portuguese.

This thesis is concerned with the idea of the rise of the moral political economy. Whilst Aristotle did not invent the word 'economics' he came closer than many think. This thesis is an exploration in the field of the history of ideas. It views the origins of distant economic-like thinking as having a moral and political bases of existence. / PhD Doctorate

Studies in acoustics, in so far as sound and hearing are concerned, are evident from the middle of the 5th century B.C. in ancient Greece. The earliest extant works originated in Tarentum with Archytas, after which the fundamentals were developed in Athens, particularly by Aristotle. Aristotle�s writings represent the transition from rudimentary hypothesising to true philosophical argument, and display accuracies missing from earlier studies. This study examines incipient acoustic theories from classical Greece, diachronically, presenting original translations of all relevant passages, to illustrate the development of fundamental consideration and the origins of acoustic science. 5th and 4th century texts are examined in detail, with questions of authenticity being answered where necessary, to decipher the true level and depth of knowledge on the subjects of sound and hearing. Extant Archytean material is paradigmatic, containing the nucleus of sound production underlying most models to follow, whilst relevant Platonic material embraces more difficult sound qualities, raising important questions for successors. The larger portion of this work centres upon the writings of Aristotle, whilst illustrating the debt he owes to his predecessors. Each aspect of sound and hearing is discussed in turn, based predominantly, though not exclusively, upon information sourced from Aristotle�s De Sensu and De Anima. Where pertinent, attention is given to his discussions of the full range of senses and sense organs. The result is a self-contained work tracing the origins and development of acoustic study from its fundamental beginnings to the critical point when the essential elements of a nascent science were in place and the door was opened for future enhancement and scientific verification.

<p>This is an investigatory work on the Aristotelian foundations of Martha Nussbaum's capabilities approach and the disability issue. After an initial exposition of the capabilities approach and the application of the approach on the disability issue, the author makes a survey of the previous works of Nussbaum on Aristotle. That survey of the works of Nussbaum on Aristotle was utilized to evaluate the Aristotelian foundations of the capabilities approach (which Nussbaum claims is an Aristotelian approach). The conclusion was that Aristotle, as developed by Nussbaum, does not provide a sufficient foundation for the approach nor for the issue on disability.</p>

Wayne Booth and other rhetorical critics have developed methods for examining the rhetorical aspects of fiction. In this dissertation, I examine, specifically, the use of rhetorical violence in American fiction. It is my premise that authors use rhetorical violence and the irrationality of violence created mimetically to construct ironic metaphors that comment on the irrationality of the ideology behind the violence, pushing that ideology's maxims to its logical ends. The goal of rhetorical violence, therefore, is to create the conditions for a transfer of culpability so that the act becomes transitive-transferable-loosed from its moorings. Culpability, if indeed it reflects something intrinsically awry with an ideology, becomes the fault of the ideology-€”it becomes the perpetrator of illogic and the condemnatory force associated with the act of violence gets transferred to it. Hence, if the author has created an effective metaphor, when he or she flips the violent scene'€™s "€œvalue," the audience is willing to follow along. The violence remains a great evil, but the culpability for the act is shifted to a representative of the ideology in question-as-victimizer; nonetheless, that transfer can only occur inasmuch as the audience is willing to force-fit the incongruities of the metaphor.I examine this rhetorical phenomenon in the works of three modern American writers: Flannery O'Connor, Toni Morrison, and Chuck Palahniuk. I seek to examine the ideologies questioned in these works, the contradictory beliefs expressed by the authors, and to explicate primary episodes in the works of fiction wherein rhetorical violence functions in a rhetorical fashion to promulgate the author's ideology by emotionally jarring the reader loose from commonly-held ideological assumptions in three specific appeals: first, to negate one socially-held ideology in order to promote a conflicting one (Wise Blood); second, to elicit compassion for victimized characters representing social ills (Beloved); third, to call into question the validity of social institutions and practices (Fight Club).

This is an investigatory work on the Aristotelian foundations of Martha Nussbaum's capabilities approach and the disability issue. After an initial exposition of the capabilities approach and the application of the approach on the disability issue, the author makes a survey of the previous works of Nussbaum on Aristotle. That survey of the works of Nussbaum on Aristotle was utilized to evaluate the Aristotelian foundations of the capabilities approach (which Nussbaum claims is an Aristotelian approach). The conclusion was that Aristotle, as developed by Nussbaum, does not provide a sufficient foundation for the approach nor for the issue on disability.

I analyze the potentially self-destructive tension inherent in liberalism between conceptions of negative liberty and positive liberty. In doing so, I utilize Aristotle’s theory of virtue to show that virtue is the best method of resolving this tension. In addition, I demonstrate that liberal virtues are best construed as virtues of intellect to be exercised in the public sphere. In particular, I show the importance of not construing liberal virtues as virtues of character (often referred to as moral virtues), because advocating such virtues is, in fact, contrary to the central tenets of liberalism. That is, I argue that it is illiberal to ask liberal citizens to develop a certain moral character, and that it is, instead, essential for said citizens to develop intellectual virtues as a method of resolving this tension within liberalism between the virtues needed to sustain liberalism and liberalism’s resistance towards promoting those virtues.

This thesis investigates Aristotle's criticism and consequent reformulation of the Platonic method for formulating definitions called the Method of Division. For both Plato and Aristotle, the object of division is a natural kind, which consists in a class whose members stand in a homologous relationship to a single form. I argue that Aristotle's criticisms of the Method of Division fall under two categories: logical objections and ontological objections. The logical objections focus on division as a method for demonstrating definitions, a method that Aristotle wants to distinguish from his syllogistic logic, the centerpiece of his theory of scientific demonstration. The ontological objections focus on the question of whether the sort of account generated by division is sufficient to constitute a definition of its object. Aristotle's revised Method of Division is supposed to avoid the problems he raises by constructing definitions that satisfy the principles motivating his ontological objections through a logical process devised to make the resulting account a "necessary" consequence of the initial assumptions of the division. I argue that Aristotle?s ontological objections to the Method of Division reflect a deeper disparity between the Platonic and the Aristotelian notion of a form and natural kind. Underpinning Aristotle's notion of a natural kind is an ontology of discrete substances. Because the unity of substance is paramount in this ontology, Aristotle argues that a definition, which is supposed to give an account of the essence of a substance, must account for the unity of its object by itself possessing a non-accidental unity. Yet, on a Platonic ontology, a definition by division invokes a plurality of independent Forms whose conjunction does not constitute a unity. On the basis of this consideration, Aristotle argues that an ontology of abstract Forms cannot account for the unity of an individual substance. To this extent, I conclude, Aristotle's methodological objections to the Platonic Method of Division are a component of his broader criticisms of Platonic metaphysics.

Wayne Booth and other rhetorical critics have developed methods for examining the rhetorical aspects of fiction. In this dissertation, I examine, specifically, the use of rhetorical violence in American fiction. It is my premise that authors use rhetorical violence and the irrationality of violence created mimetically to construct ironic metaphors that comment on the irrationality of the ideology behind the violence, pushing that ideology's maxims to its logical ends. The goal of rhetorical violence, therefore, is to create the conditions for a transfer of culpability so that the act becomes transitive-transferable-loosed from its moorings. Culpability, if indeed it reflects something intrinsically awry with an ideology, becomes the fault of the ideology-€”it becomes the perpetrator of illogic and the condemnatory force associated with the act of violence gets transferred to it. Hence, if the author has created an effective metaphor, when he or she flips the violent scene'€™s "€œvalue," the audience is willing to follow along. The violence remains a great evil, but the culpability for the act is shifted to a representative of the ideology in question-as-victimizer; nonetheless, that transfer can only occur inasmuch as the audience is willing to force-fit the incongruities of the metaphor.I examine this rhetorical phenomenon in the works of three modern American writers: Flannery O'Connor, Toni Morrison, and Chuck Palahniuk. I seek to examine the ideologies questioned in these works, the contradictory beliefs expressed by the authors, and to explicate primary episodes in the works of fiction wherein rhetorical violence functions in a rhetorical fashion to promulgate the author's ideology by emotionally jarring the reader loose from commonly-held ideological assumptions in three specific appeals: first, to negate one socially-held ideology in order to promote a conflicting one (Wise Blood); second, to elicit compassion for victimized characters representing social ills (Beloved); third, to call into question the validity of social institutions and practices (Fight Club).

Thesis (Ph. L.)--Catholic University of America, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 73-75).