tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11017234.post6956330428804862907..comments2023-11-16T07:12:40.867-05:00Comments on Dissoi Blogoi: Haven't a ClueUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11017234.post-66347489261518438522007-02-12T10:08:00.000-05:002007-02-12T10:08:00.000-05:00Dear Eric,I suppose Burnet would say that the text...Dear Eric,<BR/><BR/>I suppose Burnet would say that the text up until <I>dokei</I> should be moved. Then <I>peri toutwn</I> at 1096b7-8 changes its reference and points back to 1096b5 and what comes before. But that's okay (he could say) because the plural shows that a wider range of problems is being put aside than whatever was raised in the comment about the Pythagoreans and Speusippus.<BR/><BR/>Suppose we ask what the argumentative role of that obscure passage should be. Aristotle is arguing against the view that good is uniform. He has just given a very nice argument that, on the assumption that it is, then one cannot explain why The Good Itself is better than any particular good (as it must be, if that is the ultimate good, as he is taking the Platonists to be holding). Why? Because since good is uniform, The Good Itself has to be good in just the same way as any particular good. And its simply lasting longer won't itself make it better.<BR/><BR/>A possible reply would be: "But the unity of The Good Itself makes it better. The Good Itself contains in a single Form the goodness that is scattered and not united in particular things."<BR/><BR/>Could <I>that</I> be the view that Aristotle thinks is in the spirit of the Pythagoreans? <BR/><BR/>In any case, it leads directly to a retort, which presumably would be implicit: "But to say that is to hold that unity is a good-making characteristic. But unity is <I>obviously</I> not uniform. It's clear that there are many senses of the word 'one'. And thus, as a consequence, there would be many senses of the word 'good'."<BR/><BR/>A possible trouble with this interpretation is that it does not seem to comport with what else is thought about Speusippus. Wouldn't he want to say that The Good Itself, as a principle, isn't good at all?Michael Pakalukhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00233648836210188722noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-11017234.post-43491857144073022002007-02-10T14:45:00.000-05:002007-02-10T14:45:00.000-05:00I agree that the passage is puzzling. How does th...I agree that the passage is puzzling. How does the Pythagorean belief that the One is a good provides a more plausible account of the puzzle assayed at 1096a34-1096b5, concerning what difference 'itself' makes when the Platonist refers to the F itself as opposed to Fs?<BR/><BR/>You do not mention Susemihl's solution. According to Burnet's note that you cite (CR 3 [1889]: 198), Susemihl would simply bracket 1096a34-1096b5 as a marginal insertion. This makes the point clear, since the Pythagorean belief that the One is a good can more plausibly accommodate Aristotle's preceding claim (at 1096a29-34) that there seem to be multiple sciences of goods than the Platonic belief that the Good is the One can. (Since the Pythagorean does not say that the Good is uniform, his belief does not entail that there must be one science of all goods, as the Platonic belief does.) <BR/><BR/>Burnet appears to reject Susemihl's solution, presumably because it involves radical textual surgery. <BR/><BR/>I don't get Burnet's alternative. He asks if it would not be easier to move "1096b, 5 sqq" so that it follows gumnastike in 1096a34. But how much text is he proposing to move? Aristotle ends his reference to the Pythagoreans by setting them aside in a men clause that is immediately picked up by the de clause of the next point, which is quite distinct and which takes Aristotle many lines to discuss (1096b8-31, on my reckoning). Surely this is radical textual surgery, as well, no?<BR/><BR/>Perhaps, then, we should take the introduction of Aristotle's point about the Pythagoreans a little more loosely. He says that they say something more plausible "about this," and it is natural to take 'this' to refer to the immediately preceding puzzle about what 'itself' adds. But perhaps Aristotle's reference is not so tidy as that. Perhaps he just means that the Pythagoreans say something more plausible about this whole subject that is under discussion, namely, the Platonic claim about the Good itself. If we allow him the looser relevance, then he can be saying just what Burnet and Susemihl take him to say, that the Pythagorean claim that the One is a good is more plausible than the Platonic claim that the Good is the One because the Pythagorean claim does not insist that there is only one kind of goodness and one science of goodness and so on, to be explained in terms of isolating the Good <I>itself</I>.<BR/><BR/>So understood, Aristotle's parenthetical remark about the Pythagoreans is not ideally introduced or ideally placed, but it is not deeply problematic, either.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com