Aristotle’s statement that — in terms of philosophy — poetry is superior to history can be understood better, when analysed in the context of the Stagirite’s epistemology, ontology, and eudaimonic ethics. Both poetry and history deal with numerous contingent and chaotic events, but while history is only reconstructive, poetry reworks its matter more thoroughly. History attempts to recount all events and does it in accord with their contingent and chaotic nature, whereas poetry implies certain choices. By doing so, it introduces (...) uniformity and coherence thus providing a different ontic status than the one that reigned originally. Consequently, the cognitive result of poetry can be compared to the beatific value of conceptual knowledge in philosophy. (shrink)

This article offers a Polish translation of Aristotle’s treatise, On Philosophy, of which only certain fragments and testimonies have been preserved. The translation is supplied with an introduction presenting the history of various interpretations and reconstructions of Aristotle’s work.

It is sometimes claimed that Aristotle’s doctrine of the Mean is false or unhelpful: moral virtues are not typically flanked by two opposing vices as he claimed. However, an explicit restatement of Aristotle’s view in terms of sufficiency for an objective reveals that the Mean is more widely applicable than has sometimes been alleged. Understood as a special case of sufficiency, it is essential to many judgments of right and wrong. I consider some objections by Rosalind Hursthouse to Aristotle’s theory (...) and argue that they are based on a misunderstanding. However, there is indeed a tension in Aristotle’s view of goodness, hinted at in his claim that the good is "said in many ways". (shrink)

A topic common to both Plato’s and Aristotle’s discussions of theories of the soul is the doctrine of the soul as a harmony of the parts of the body. Plato’s Phaedo as well as Aristotle’s De anima and Eudemus present this theory and argue against the identification of the soul as a harmony. This paper has two focuses, one philosophical and one historical. First, I will focus on the argumentation used by Aristotle in his dialogue Eudemus, which is often associated (...) with Aristotle’s early attachment to Plato. On the basis of the argumentation against the harmonia theory, I will try to show that the Eudemus is not a dialogue that depicts Aristotle’s Platonic phase. Instead, by comparing the arguments of the Eudemus with both Plato and Aristotle’s mature thought, I will argue that the argumentation of the Eudemus seems to be an indirect attack on Plato’s view on the Forms and on the nature of the soul, and that it seems to be consistent with Aristotle’s mature work On the Soul. Second, given that Aristotle discusses this topic twice, I will try, also on the basis of conclusions about the Eudemus and on later reception of Aristotle’s arguments, to show why this is the case. (shrink)

What is meant under the genuine title of Aristotle’s ta Analytika is rarely properly understood. Presumably, his analytics was inspired by the method of geometric analysis. For Aristotle, this was a regressive or heuristic procedure, departing from a proposed conclusion and asking which premises could be found in order to syllogize, demonstrate or explain it. The terms that form categorical and modal propositions play a fundamental role in analytics. Aristotle introduces letters in lieu of the triples of terms constitut­ing the (...) propositions and the three syllogistic figures that schematize them. His formulation of the three syllogistic figures refers to a syntacti­cal and predicative order and position of the triples of terms, arranged in some diagrammed schemata, which, regrettably, are missing from the extant text of the Prior Analytics. Considering planar and graphic arrangements, both vertical and horizontal orders as well as the posi­tion of the three terms involved, we propose a reconstruction, at least to some extent, of these probable lettered diagrams. In such reconstructed diagrams, we can appropriately capture the definition of syllogism as a predicative connexion of terms, and easier survey a synoptic account of all valid predicative relations and transpositions, and also reduce the imperfect syllogisms into the moods of the first figure. Aristotle’s syllogistic is an analytical calculation of terms, understood as predicates and subjects within the categorical propositions, and more precisely of three terms schematized in three figures in predicative links such that, by means of a middle, follows from necessity a conclusion of the extreme terms. The necessity of the consequence is not based on the implication or inference of the propositions, but on a predictive transi­tivity through the middle term within the syllogistic figures. Syllogism must draw its conclusion through the way its terms are predicated of one another. Aristotle in his Prior Analytics developed also a complex account of modal syllogisms within necessity and possibility of belonging. This account involves also such an analyti­cal reduction to the syllogistic figures. In this analytical perspective, we try to throw some light on his modal syllogisms, although this difficult and nowadays thoroughly discussed topic would require a much wider treatment. (shrink)

Just as Aristotelian dialectic sharply distinguishes between real and fallacious arguments, Aristotelian rhetoric distinguishes between real and fallacious enthymemes. For this reason Aristotle’s Rhetoric includes a chapter – chapter II.24 – that is exclusively devoted to what Aristotle calls “topoi” of fallacious enthymemes. Thus, the purpose of this chapter seems to be equivalent to the purpose of the treatise Sophistici Elenchi, which attempts to give a complete list of all possible types of fallacious arguments. It turns out that, although the (...) Rhetoric’s list of fallacious types of rhetorical arguments basically resembles the list from the Sophistici Elenchi, there also are some striking differences. The paper tries to account for the relation between these two, more or less independent, Aristotelian approaches to the phenomenon of fallacious arguments. Can one of these two lists be seen as the basic or original one? And what is the point in deviating from this basic list? Are all deviations occasioned by the specific contexts of the rhetorical use on the one hand, and the dialectical on the other? Or do the two lists display different logical assumptions? Even an only tentative answer to this set of questions will help to clarify another but closely related scholarly problem, namely the relation between the Rhetoric’s list of topoi for real enthymemes and the Topics’ list of topoi for real dialectical arguments. It will also help to account for the general place of fallacious arguments within Aristotle’s dialectic-based approach the rhetoric. (shrink)

La biografía griega puede asociarse a dos polos principales: en uno predomina el eje sintagmático, con sucesión, y en el otro el paradigmático, sin sucesión. El primero se relaciona con la historiografía, tiene un método cercano a la investigación o ἱστορία y tiene su tipo ideal más difundido en la biografía energética o peripatética ; el segundo se liga a la retórica demostrativa, su método es próximo al del anticuarianismo y aparece en la biografía alejandrina. Esta contribución sugiere que en (...) la hagiografía típica esta oposición se verifica en un tratamiento relativamente separado de “vida” y “conducta” –sintetizada habitualmente en los títulos como Βίος καὶ πολιτεíα–: la sucesión de hechos situados en el tiempo en los que se manifiesta un carácter más o menos intemporal. Para ello, discute las características principales de la biografía; expone el sistema de F. Leo sobre la biografía clásica; se detiene en el cronotopo de M. Bajtín sobre biografía y autobiografía antigua, y en su deuda con autores como Leo o G. Misch; expone ciertas características del discurso hagiográfico y de su particular cronotopo; ofrece una breve conclusión. (shrink)