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  1. Between Saying and Doing: Aristotle and Speusippus on the Evaluation of Pleasure.Wei Cheng - 2024 - Apeiron (3):391-426.
    This study aims to provide a coherent new interpretation of the notorious anti-hedonism of Speusippus, Plato’s nephew and the second scholarch of the Academy, by reconsidering all the relevant sources concerning his attitude toward pleasure—sources that seem to be in tension or even incompatible with each other. By reassessing Speusippus’ anti-hedonism and Aristotle’s response, it also sheds new light on the Academic debate over pleasure in which he and Aristotle participated: This debate is not merely concerned with the truth and (...)
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  2. Aristotle’s Vocabulary of Pain.Wei Cheng - 2019 - Philologus: Zeitschrift für Antike Literatur Und Ihre Rezeption 163 (1):47-71.
    This paper examines Aristotle’s vocabulary of pain, that is the differences and relations of the concepts of pain expressed by synonyms in the same semantic field. It investigates what is particularly Aristotelian in the selection of the pain-words in comparison with earlier authors and specifies the special semantic scope of each word-cluster. The result not only aims to pin down the exact way these terms converge with and diverge from each other, but also serves as a basis for further understanding (...)
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  3. Aristotle and Eudoxus on the Argument from Contraries.Wei Cheng - 2020 - Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie 102 (4):588-618.
    The debate over the value of pleasure among Eudoxus, Speusippus, and Aristotle is dramatically documented by the Nicomachean Ethics, particularly in the dialectical pros-and-cons concerning the so-called argument from contraries. Two similar versions of this argument are preserved at EN VII. 13, 1153b1–4, and X. 2, 1172b18–20. Many scholars believe that the argument at EN VII is either a report or an appropriation of the Eudoxean argument in EN X. This essay aims to revise this received view. It will explain (...)
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  4. Speusippus, teleology and the metaphysics of value: Theophrastus’ Metaphysics 11a18–26.Wei Cheng - 2020 - Journal of Hellenic Studies 140:143-175.
    This paper reexamines Theophrastus’ Metaphysics 11a18–26, an obscure testimony about Speusippus, the second head of the Platonic Academy. As opposed to the traditional interpretation, which takes this passage as Theophrastus’ polemic against Speusippus’ doctrine of value, I argue that he here dialectically takes advantage of, rather than launches an attack on, the Platonist. Based on this new reading, I further propose a revision and a reassessment of the ‘gloomy metaphysics’ of Speusippus which will shed new light on his ethics.
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  5. Dyschereia and Aporia: The Formation of a Philosophical Term.Wei Cheng - 2018 - TAPA 148 (1):75-110.
    Plato’s nephew Speusippus has been widely accepted as the historical person behind the mask of the anti-hedonists in Phlb. 42b–44c. This hypothesis is supported by, inter alia, the link between Socrates’ char- acterization of them as δυσχερεῖς and the frequent references of δυσχέρεια as ἀπορία to Speusippus in Aristotle’s Metaphysics MN. This study argues against assigning any privileged status to Speusippus in the assimilation of δυσχέρεια with ἀπορία. Instead, based on a comprehensive survey of how δυσχερ- words were used in (...)
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  6. A Battle Against Pain? Aristotle, Theophrastus and the Physiologoi in Aspasius, On Nicomachean Ethics 156.14-20.Wei Cheng - 2017 - Phronesis 62 (4):392-416.
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  7. Neutral, Natural and Hedonic State in Plato.Wei Cheng - 2019 - Mnemosyne 4 (72):525-549.
    This paper aims to clarify Plato’s notions of the natural and the neutral state in relation to hedonic properties. Contra two extreme trends among scholars—people either conflate one state with the other, or keep them apart as to establish an unsurmount- able gap between both states, I argue that neither view accurately reflects Plato’s position because the natural state is real and can coincide with the neutral state in part, whereas the latter, as an umbrella term, can also be realized (...)
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  8. Orality and literacy 10. R. Scodel between orality and literacy: Communication and adaptation in antiquity. Orality and literacy in the ancient world, vol. 10. pp. X + 387, ills. Leiden and boston: Brill, 2014. Cased, €134, us$174. Isbn: 978-90-04-26912-5. [REVIEW]Wei Cheng - 2016 - The Classical Review 66 (1):5-7.
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  9. Aristotelian emotions. M. krewet die theorie der gefühle bei aristoteles. Pp. 648. Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag winter, 2011. Paper, €64. Isbn: 978-3-8253-5825-9. [REVIEW]Wei Cheng - 2016 - The Classical Review 66 (1):62-64.
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