Abstract

Walter Burley’s Commentary to the Nicomachean Ethics is commonly considered little more than an expositio littere. Nevertheless, in some notanda he raises open questions about the crucial gap between the conclusion of the practical syllogism and action. Within the interpretative framework of Saarinen’s and Wood’s works, I will focus on Burley’s analysis of akrasia in book VII. The first point will be some questions related to a notandum, concerning the gap between intellect and will as typical of akrasia. Secondly, I will analyze it in the light of Burley’s semantics, where conceptual tools developed in one science prove useful in solving problems of another discipline, in this case ethics. Finally, I’ll address the Commentary’s brief gloss about heroic virtue, as example of Burley’s first steps in the use of measure languages in ethics, by analogy with the Oxford Calculators’ techniques.