Workshop in Ancient Philosophy (Thursday - Week 5, TT26)

Abstract: This paper assesses partiality, self-interest, and their relationship in Aristotle’s Politics. Focusing on Book II, I argue that Aristotle endorses partiality and grounds it on self-love. This indicates that concern for others somehow derives from concern for oneself. However, concern for oneself is not dominant; Aristotle here rejects maximal self-love. Moreover, as I argue on the basis of Book III and other texts, Aristotle claims that we should prioritize the interests of others over our own interests. Yet self-love qualifies this prioritization of others, in that we only prioritize others who are specially related to ourselves in the first place. I close by highlighting a problem for the Politics’ proposal that we should prioritize others over ourselves. I argue that this effacement of one’s own interest falls prey to a complaint that Aristotle levels against Plato, of compromising individual happiness, and also gets uncomfortably close to the situation of Aristotle’s ‘natural slaves’, who exist not for their own sake but only for the sake of the other (i.e., the master). Comparisons are made throughout to the Eudemian Ethics and Nicomachean Ethics.

Registration: If you do not hold a university card, please contact the seminar convenor or admin@philosophy.ox.ac.uk at least two working days before a seminar to register your attendance.