The Function Argument of the Eudemian Ethics Colloquium version: 3032 words (3645 minus 613 from the handout) Unlike the well-studied function (ergon) argument in Aristotle s Nicomachean Ethics (EN) 1.7, the argument in Eudemian Ethics (EE) 2.1 has received relatively little attention. 1 We can split up the Eudemian function argument into two parts: the first (1218b32 19a28) moves slowly and takes care to defend various premisses, while the second (1219a29 39) briefly summarizes the key steps of the first argument and extends its results. Reconstructions of the Eudemian function argument are few; 2 I begin by identifying a key problem they all face. I assume without much argument for the purposes of this talk that the method Aristotle uses in the Eudemian function argument is the method of division, which seeks to define a thing by placing it within its genus and identifying differentiae which characterize the definiendum. 3 In summary, 1 By my count, there are only three explicit, step-by-step reconstructions of the full EE function argument: (Woods 1992, 85 90; Hutchinson 1986, 39 45; Simpson 2013, 233 238). There is discussion of the argument in (Karbowski 2015, 198 207), including an explicit reconstruction of the summary version of the argument from 1219a29 39. (Dirlmeier 1962, 219 227; von Fragstein 1974, 53 59) also discuss the passage. (Barney 2008, 293n1) and (Baker 2015, 260n66) are helpful guides to the enormous literature on the EN function argument. 2 Unfortunately, Hutchinson s reconstruction is invalid. Hutchinson s step 17 infers that a good life is the perfect good from supporting premisses 1, 2, 3, 5, and 16. But step 16 only shows that a good life (an activity) is better than the virtue of the soul. None of the other cited supporting premisses shows that a good life is better than the other activities of the soul. Without that he cannot infer that the good life is the best thing. Woods s reconstruction, too, makes invalid inferences. His step 18 does not follow from 15 and 17. From 23 to 24, he moves from the activity of the soul s excellence to the activity of a good soul (I argue below these are distinct). And he is missing key intermediate steps between 24, 25, and 26. 3 Key texts where Aristotle discusses the method of division include APr 1.31, APo 2.5, 2.13, and Met. Ζ.12. See (Falcoln 1997) for a discussion of Aristotle s method of division. (Natali 2010) argues that the Nicomachean function argument seems to follow Aristotle s scientific method. (Karbowski 2015) argues that the Eudemian counterpart follows what he calls the Eudemian method, which seems to share similarities with the scientific method of the Posterior Analytics. Since Aristotle seems to think even in the APo 2.13 that the method of division can help hunt out definitions, I take this assumption to be compatible with Karbowski s view.
2 the argument begins by dividing up the genus of humanly achievable goods 4 exhaustively into two groups: those external to the soul and those internal to it. After arguing that the goods internal to the soul are more choiceworthy, Aristotle proceeds to divide the goods internal to the soul into four classes, arranged in two groups: Of the goods in the soul, some are states or capacities, and others are activities and processes. 5 The key step, then, is to show that the activity of the virtue of the soul is better than all the other things in the soul, namely everything else in these four classes. This establishes that the activity of the virtue of the soul is the single best humanly achievable good, since, being the best thing internal to the soul, it is better than anything else external to it, too, and this division is exhaustive. Thus, happiness, which Aristotle takes to be the highest or best good, is the activity of the virtue of the soul. One problem with previous philosophical reconstructions of the EE function argument has been that they take the fourfold division of goods in the soul at 1218b36 37 as a twofold division. This reduces the burden of the argument: instead of having to show that the activity of the virtue of the soul is better than every other state, capacity, activity, and process of the soul, the argument would only need to show that the activity of the virtue of the soul is better than every other state and activity of the soul. While Hutchinson initially presents all four items of the soul, he adds that in what follows it becomes clear that this is meant to be a two-way contrast, not a four-way contrast (Hutchinson 1986, 40). Simpson, similarly favoring a twofold division between powers and acts, notes that Aristotle is peculiarly flexible in the words he uses for the 4 The restriction of happiness to the highest good which is achievable in action for a human [τῶν ἀνθρώπῳ πρακτῶν ἄριστον] is introduced at EE 1.7 1217a40. I follow the OCT edition for Aristotle s Greek text, except for the De Motu Animalium, for which I use W. Jaeger s Teubner edition. Translations are modified from (Inwood and Woolf 2013) for the EE, (Broadie and Rowe 2002) for the EN, and (Barnes 1984) for other works. 5 EE 1218b36 37: τῶν δὲ ἐν ψυχῇ τὰ µὲν ἕξεις ἢ δυνάµεις εἰσί, τὰ δ ἐνέργειαι καὶ κινήσεις.
3 goods of the soul in the function argument, perhaps because his argument does not yet need the distinctions, though it does need some differentiation between powers and acts, and such differentiation cannot be made without employing one or more of the terms (Simpson 2013, 234). Woods is more explicit in saying why he favors the twofold division: he thinks that the key inference of the function argument is invalid with the fourfold division. Aristotle, he thinks, only argues that the activity of the virtue of the soul is the best activity, better than other states or capacities; he does not show it is better than all processes, the fourth good of the soul (Woods 1992, 87). Without this, the argument is invalid. The main attraction of collapsing the fourfold division into two lies in the ability to avoid this outcome. 6 One might also be tempted to think that Aristotle had only the twofold division in mind by considering Aristotle s restatement of the premiss at 1219a30 31, where he says that the goods of the soul are just states and activities (1219a30 31). But given that the argument there is a summary of the longer argument that preceded, 7 it seems more likely that the full argument contains the correct psychic ontology, and the summary omits any discussion of capacities and processes in distilling the argument s key moves. There is a further difficulty with supposing that Aristotle uses the twofold division. At 1219a11 18, 8 Aristotle distinguishes two kinds of functions (erga) a thing s use, or something beyond the thing s use. 9 There, Aristotle is explicit that the function that is a thing s use is an activity, while a function that is something beyond its use is a process. In other words, the distinction Aristotle presents here in at EE 1219a13 18 is 6 (Karbowski 2015, 198) also seems to read EE 1218b36 37 as presenting a distinction between two, not four items. 7 I follow (Simpson 2013, 236; Karbowski 2015, 199 200) in judging the second function argument to be a summary of the first. 8 See also Met. Θ.6, 1048b28, EN 1.1, 1094a3 6 and EN 10.4. I discuss Met. Θ.6 below. 9 I follow (Baker 2015) in taking Aristotle s notion of function to mean something like achievement rather than essence. Baker s evidence includes the EE passage under discussion.
4 exactly the distinction between an activity and a process. He uses this distinction to show that the function of the soul, since it is a using, is an activity. That this distinction appears later on in the argument makes it difficult to maintain, as Woods, Hutchinson, and Simpson do, that Aristotle intends to suppress the distinction between an activity and a process. 10 In their reconstructions, this distinction, which makes up a significant chunk of the text of the argument, does virtually no work. My aim in presenting my own reconstruction of the function argument will be to reintegrate the distinction into the argument. [Note to reviewer: the following stepwise reconstruction will be provided in a handout but not read aloud in the presentation; I also exclude it from the word count. 1. All [human] goods are either within the soul or external to it [1218b32, premiss]. 2. The goods within the soul are more choiceworthy (better) than those external to it [1218b32 35, premiss]. 3. The goods in the soul are states, capacities, activities, or processes [1218b35 36, premiss]. 4. If something X has a function, then the virtue of X =is 11 the best disposition or state or capacity of X [1218b37 1219a5, premiss]. 5. If state S 1 is better than state S 2, then the function F 1 of S 1 is better than the function F 2 of S 2 [1219a6 8, premiss]. 6. The function of a thing X =is X s end [1219a8, premiss]. 7. The end E of a thing X is better than the other things in X, which are for the sake of E [1219a10 11, premiss]. 10 The fact that the distinction between activities and processes appears later in the argument also casts doubt on Woods s suggestion that Aristotle uses kinêseis to mean affections (e.g. at 1220a30), rather than processes, to be contrasted with activities (Woods 1992, 90). 11 The is of identity.
5 8. The function F of a thing X is better than states in X [1219a9, a11 13, from 6, 7]. 9. If F is the function of a thing X, then either F is an activity and hence the use of X, or F is a process and hence something other than its use, but not both [1219a13 18, premiss]. 10. If something has a function which is a using (i.e. an activity), then that activity is better than the state of which it is a use [1219a17 18, from 8, 9]. 11. If something has a function F 1, then its virtue also has a function F 2, which is the same as F 1, but done excellently [1219a19 23, premiss]. 12. The soul has a function, which =is the life of the ensouled being [1219a23 24, premiss]. 13. The function of the soul is a using and a being awake [1219a24 25, premiss]. 14. The function of the soul is an activity, i.e. a using, not a process [from 9, 13]. 15. The function of the virtue of the soul is also an activity [from 11, 14]. 16. The function of the virtue of the soul =is the excellent life of the ensouled being [1219a25 27, from 11, 12]. 17. The function of the virtue of the soul is better than the virtue of the soul [from 10, 15]. 18. The function of the virtue of the soul is better than all of the states or capacities of the soul [from 4, 17; the better than relation is transitive]. 19. The function of the virtue of the soul is better than the function of any other state or capacity in the soul [from 4, 5]. 20. The function of the virtue of the soul is better than any other activity or process in the soul [from 9, 19; non-function activities or processes are ruled out by 6, 7]. 21. The function of the virtue of the soul is better than any other state, capacity, activity, or process in the soul [from 18, 20]. 22. The function of the virtue of the soul =is the best thing in the soul [from 3, 21].
6 23. The function of the virtue of the soul =is the best thing [from 1, 2, 22]. 24. The function of the virtue of the soul =is an excellent life and =is the perfect good [1219a27 28, from 16, 23, taking best thing and perfect good to be synonymous]. 25. Happiness =is the best thing and perfect good [suppressed premiss, see 1219a29]. 26. The function of the virtue of the soul =is an excellent life =is the perfect good and =is happiness [1219a28, from 24 and 25].] Figure 1: Divisions of the First Function Argument all good things are either (step 1) external to the soul are better than (step 2) internal to the soul are either (step 3) capacities or states are better than (step 10) any other state of the soul functions of either (step 4) is better than (step 5) the best state (virtue) of the soul is either a (step 9) process (ruled out at step 15) activity Consider the argument on the handout. Steps 1 10 lay out axiological principles that describe value relationships between various classes of goods. Steps 11 16 bring in
7 psychological premisses in order to identify the function of the virtue of the soul with an excellent life, showing also that it is an activity. Steps 17 24 make the inferences from the previous steps required to identify the function of the virtue of the soul with happiness. Figure 1 provides a graphic representation of the method of division. In my reconstruction, Aristotle divides the starting genus of all humanly practicable good things with a series of four exhaustive and progressively more specific divisions. The highest good is either internal to the soul or external to the soul (a tautology, step 1). At step 2, Aristotle shows that goods internal to the soul are more choiceworthy, or better, than goods external to the soul. Aristotle defends step 2 by pointing out that wisdom, virtue, and pleasure all three of the most eligible candidates suggested by philosophers are internal to the soul. 12 Step 3 makes the next division: goods internal to the soul are either capacities and states on the one hand or activities and processes on the other. 13 Activities and processes, it will turn out, are the actualities of capacities and states, and the best or natural actuality of a state or capacity is its function. At step 10, Aristotle addresses the second division, between states or capacities and their functions: the functions of capacities and states are better than the capacities and states themselves. Step 10 follows from steps 6 9. Step 6 is the premiss that the function of a thing is the thing s end. This is a distinctly Aristotelian claim, arising from his doctrine of final causation, prominently defended in the Physics. In Phys. 2.7, Aristotle holds that the essence and 12 Aristotle first notes at EE 1.1, 1214a32 33 that wisdom, virtue, and pleasure are said by others to be the greatest goods, and considers the lives corresponding to each of the goods in EE 1. At Politics 7.1, 1323a38 b11, Aristotle defends a version of step 2 with another argument, that the goods in the soul are more final than the external goods because the latter face a limit (πέρας, 1323b7) on their usefulness at high levels of accumulation, while the former do not. Since external goods face diminishing marginal returns at higher quantities, while internal goods do not, the latter and not the former are apt for unqualified pursuit. 13 A defense of the exhaustiveness of this division will require a detour through Aristotle s account of motion that I cannot discuss here.
8 form of a thing are ends for the sake of which natural beings are moved, 14 that a thing s essence is its end, and this is what is best for it (198b8 9). Step 7 adds that a thing s end is better than everything else of the thing, and in particular, the states and dispositions of the thing. The point here is that for something to be the end implies that it is more valuable than those things which are there for its sake. 15 If something other than the end were more valuable than it (within a given domain), the pursuit of the original end might well lose its appeal when a more valuable thing is reached along the way. From 6 and 7, 8 infers that a given thing s function is better than everything else in it. Step 10 is a conditional whose consequent is step 8 and whose antecedent includes information from step 9 (below). Step 10 says that if a thing s function is a using, hence an activity, then it is better than everything else in it, in particular its states and capacities. Marking the third division, step 4 claims that virtue is the best disposition or state or capacity of each of the things that has some use or function (1218b37 1219a1). 16 So, at least some states or capacities have an associated use or function, and of these states and capacities, one is the best. The division here is between the virtue and any other states or capacities. Step 5, which is the claim that the function of the virtue of the soul is better than the function of any other state. To determine whether the function of a state is better than another, we need only 14 Phys. 198b3 4: καὶ τὸ τί ἐστιν καὶ ἡ µορφή τέλος γὰρ καὶ οὗ ἕνεκα. See also Met. Θ.8 (Dirlmeier 1962, 223). There, in arguing for the priority of activity to capacity, Aristotle says: For the function is the end, and the activity is the function (1050a21 22). 15 See also Phys. 2.7, 198b8 9 and Top. 3.1, 116b23 26 for corroborating text. 16 EE 1218b37 1219a1: ταῦτα δὴ οὕτως ὑποκείσθω καὶ περὶ ἀρετῆς, ὅτι ἐστὶν ἡ βελτίστη διάθεσις ἢ ἕξις ἢ δύναµις ἑκάστων, ὅσων ἐστί τις χρῆσις ἢ ἔργον. At Cat. 8, Aristotle explicitly distinguishes dispositions, states, capacities, and affections but says that states and dispositions belong to the same kind (8b26 27). States are stable and long-lasting, while dispositions are more ephemeral, but the distinction is not systematically kept in EE 2.1. In my reading, state here occasionally refers metonymically to the kind of quality that includes dispositions and states. Ultimately, the distinction between states and dispositions is of little importance here.
9 decide which function arises from the better state. 17 The best function, then, will be that of the best state. The fourth and final division comes at step 9: the functions of the soul are divided exclusively into either processes or activities. The distinction developed from 1219a13 20 is between a function which is the use of a potentiality, an activity, or a function which is something other than its use, a process. The function of the art of housebuilding is a house, which is something other than the use of the art, so this is a process; on the other hand, the function of sight is seeing, which just is the use of the capacity, and this is an activity. Here in 1219a13 20, he does not use the words process and activity. Nevertheless, it is clear this is what he has in mind: otherwise, it should be totally mysterious why he mentions processes and activities in the division of the soul. 18 The passage in Met. Θ.6, that distinguishes between activities and processes, explicitly uses the words kinêseis and energeiai (1048b28); this maps onto a distinction he introduces there between complete and incomplete actualities. 19 The EE 2.1 and Met Θ.6 passages have some shared examples. Housebuilding and healing are examples of processes, or incomplete actualities, while seeing and thinking (theorein in EE and noein in Met. Θ.6) are complete, so they are activities. Since actions are either complete or incomplete 17 Having set this premiss down, Aristotle does not defend it, but perhaps the argument at Met. Θ.9 that the activity is also better and more estimable than the excellent capacity (1051a4 5) can give us a clue. The activity of a rational capacity is more valuable than the capacity because rational capacities are capacities for contraries, i.e. for the activity and its privation. But since contraries can only be compresent in potentiality and not in actuality, when the capacity is activated, the good of the capacity exists without the bad of its privation. If the goodness of a capacity transfers to its activity in this way, then the better the capacity, the better its activity. See (Makin 2006, 221 231). 18 This is not a controversial assumption. Woods, Hutchinson, and Simpson all agree that when Aristotle discusses functions of states in, e.g., step 5, he is talking about activities as actualities of states. 19 See (Baker 2015, 247) for a brief recent discussion as it relates to the concept of function and references to the secondary literature.
10 actualities, the distinction between processes and activities is exhaustive. It will help here to stop and summarize the first part of the argument, which I have just discussed. Aristotle has laid down four successive divisions of the genus of all humanly practicable goods, and he has said at each step which class is better. All goods are either in the soul or external to it, and those in the soul are better. Internal goods are states and capacities or their functions, and their functions are better. These functions are either of the virtue of the soul, or any other state; the function of the virtue of the soul is better. And that is either a process or an activity. Steps 11 16 will show that it is an activity. This section introduces three additional premisses. Step 11 is the claim that if something has a function F 1, then its virtue also a function F 2, which is the same as F 1, but done excellently (1219a18 23). To take Aristotle s example, the function of the art of shoemaking is a process, because it has a natural ending point, i.e. the completed shoe. Assuming that the shoemaker s art has a virtue, the function of that virtue is also going to be a shoe but not just any shoe: an excellent one. We can decompose step 11 into two parts: there is a similarity claim (F 1 and F 2 are the same) and a dissimilarity claim (except F 2 is done excellently). The similarity claim licenses the inference at step 15, and the difference claim is at work at step 16. Steps 12 and 13 are further premisses about the soul: Further, let the function of the soul be to effect life, and that is its use and a waking state, for sleep is idleness and rest (1219a23 25). 20 Step 12 is the premiss that the soul has a function, and the function is to zên poiein, an awkward phrase which I have translated to effect life. 21 At a general level, all of the capacities 20 EE 1219a23 25: ἔτι ἔστω ψυχῆς ἔργον τὸ ζῆν ποιεῖν, τοῦ δὲ χρῆσις καὶ ἐγρήγορσις ὁ γὰρ ὕπνος ἀργία τις καὶ ἡσυχία. 21 The identification of the function of the soul with life appears also in the function argument of the Republic, where Socrates proposes to zêin alongside management, rule, and deliberation as examples of the function peculiar to the soul (353d7 8).
11 of the soul are, in the first place, capacities for living the kind of life appropriate to the ensouled creature; for some higher creatures, the soul s capacities are not only for living, but for living well. 22 For instance, the explanation at DA 3.12 for why animals have perceptive capacities is that any body capable of going anywhere and yet lacking perception would perish and not reach its end, which is the natural function, 23 because it will fail to nourish itself. In other words, the perceptive capacity of mobile animals is explained by perception s contribution to the animal s continued life. Aristotle s characterization of the function of the soul here in the EE is consistent with his treatment of the soul s function in his psychological works. In step 13, Aristotle confirms that the function of the soul is a use and a condition of waking. This is consistent also with Aristotle s identification of waking with the exercise of sense-perception in De Somno 454a4 5, where he specifies that this is an energeia. Since the function of the soul is a use, it is not something other than a use; Aristotle means for this to map onto the distinction between activity and process. Thus, (step 14) the function of the soul is an activity and not a process. In step 11, it was established that the function of something and the function of its virtue are the same; it follows, then (step 15) that the function of the virtue of the soul is also an activity. There is another intermediate conclusion that follows from these psychological premisses: since the function of the virtue of the soul is the same as the function of the soul, but done excellently, if the function of the soul is to effect life, then (step 16) the function of the virtue of the soul is to effect life excellently, i.e. to live an excellent life. 22 This claim is defended extensively in (Leunissen 2010) with examples taken from the DA as well as other biological works. 23 DA 434a32 434b1: εἰ οὖν πᾶν σῶµα πορευτικόν, µἠ ἔχον αἴσθησιν, φθείροιτο ἂν καὶ εἰς τέλος οὐκ ἂν ἔλθοι, ὅ ἐστι φύσεως ἔργον.
12 The remaining steps of the argument take the result of step 15 and trace it through the axiological tree that steps 1 10 outlined. Since (from 10), activities are better than the states of which they are the use, we get step 17: the function of the virtue of the soul is better than the virtue of the soul. 24 Since, from step 4, the virtue of the soul is better than any other state or capacity of the soul, we get step 18: the function of the virtue of the soul is better than every state or capacity of the soul, both the virtue of the soul and the other states and capacities. Since (from 5) the better state has the better function, (step 19) the function of the virtue of the soul, being the function of the best state, is better than every other function of the soul. Since (from 9), a function is either a process or an activity, it follows that (step 20) the function of the virtue of the soul is better than every other process or activity of the soul. Step 21 combines the results of steps 18 and 20: the function of the virtue of the soul is better than every capacity, state, process, or activity of the soul. But these exhaust the goods of the soul. Thus, (step 22), the function of the virtue of the soul is better than all of the goods of the soul. Since the goods of the soul are better than external goods, and these are all the goods there are, we get step 23: the function of the virtue of the soul is the single best humanly practicable thing, the perfect good. Now combine step 16 with step 23 to infer (step 24) that the function of the virtue of the soul, the excellent life, and the perfect good are all the same. This requires taking perfect good and best thing to be synonymous. The equivalence between the best thing and happiness, which is step 25, does not appear in the text here but was established prior to the function argument at EE 1.7, 1219a18 22 and is the first step of the second part the EE argument, at 1219a29. 25 Thus, 24 Here we have to assume that the better than relation is transitive. 25 In identifying happiness with the single best thing, Aristotle does seem to rule out from the start an inclusivist view according to which external goods are a part of one s happiness. This is consistent with his comment at EE 1.2 distinguishing happiness from the necessary conditions for happiness; see especially 1214b16 17. Given that steps 2 and 3 rule happiness out of the
13 Aristotle concludes that, step 26, This, then, is the perfect good, the very thing which is happiness. Aristotle is then able to tie together the various identity claims he has established throughout the course of the argument neatly into one. Recall the problem for other reconstructions that I raised earlier: the collapse of the distinctions between state and capacity, and process and activity. Interpreters who think that Aristotle introduces these distinctions toward the beginning of the argument at step 3 only to ignore them later on have trouble making sense of why he goes on to illustrate the distinction with examples at 1219a13 18. A result of collapsing these distinctions is that Aristotle s argument proves less than is intended. In my reconstruction Aristotle s argument is able to explain why the function of the virtue of the soul is better than every other capacity, state, activity, or process of the soul not just states and activities. According to my reconstruction, one of the tasks of the psychological section (steps 11 16, in particular, 15) is to rule out that the best thing is a process rather than an activity. 26 Commentators also do not get step 15 because they do not see that step 11 comprises the similarity claim in addition to the difference claim. Not only are commentators forced to ignore 1219a13 18, but they also have a hard time seeing what work the section of the argument I have labeled steps 11 16 are doing. For instance, since Woods collapses the distinction, he has a hard time seeing why Aristotle brings in the psychological premisses at all. He calls the psychological premisses the Subsidiary Argument and cannot see Aristotle s reason for including it (Woods 1992, 87). But by seeing his distinction as one between four goods of the soul, not two, we can fully make use of the full argument. class of external goods, an interpretation of happiness that takes certain external goods to be its constituents is not consistent with the EE. 26 Recall this is the task at least Woods worried was impossible and which motivated him to collapse processes into activities.
14 Works Cited: Baker, Samuel. 2015. The Concept of Ergon: Towards an Achievement Interpretation of Aristotle s Function Argument. Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 48: 227 266. Barnes, Jonathan, ed. 1984. The Complete Works of Aristotle: The Revised Oxford Translation. In. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Barney, Rachel. 2008. Aristotle s Argument for a Human Function. Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 34: 293 322. Broadie, Sarah, and Christopher Rowe. 2002. Nicomachean Ethics: Translation, Introduction, and Commentary. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Dirlmeier, Franz. 1962. Aristoteles: Eudemische Ethik. Berlin: Akademie-Verlag. Falcoln, Andrea. 1997. Aristotle s Theory of Division. In Aristotle and After, edited by Richard Sorabji, 127 146. London: Institute of Classical Studies. Fragstein, Artur von. 1974. Studien Zur Ethik Des Aristoteles. Amsterdam: Grüner. Hutchinson, D. S. 1986. The Virtues of Aristotle. New York: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Inwood, Brad, and Raphael Woolf, trans. 2013. Eudemian Ethics. Cambridge Texts in the History of Philosophy. New York: Cambridge University Press. Karbowski, Joseph. 2015. Phainomena as Witnesses and Examples: The Methodology of Eudemian Ethics 1.6. Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy 49 (November): 193 225. Leunissen, Mariska. 2010. Explanation and Teleology in Aristotle s Science of Nature. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&scope=site&db=nlebk&db=nlabk&a N=331367. Makin, Stephen. 2006. Metaphysics: Book Θ. Clarendon Aristotle Series. Oxford : New York: Clarendon Press ; Oxford University Press. Natali, Carlo. 2010. Posterior Analytics and the Definition of Happiness in NE I. Phronesis 55 (4): 304 24. Simpson, Peter. 2013. The Eudemian Ethics of Aristotle. New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers. Woods, Michael. 1992. Eudemian Ethics: Books I, II, and VIII. 2nd ed. Clarendon Aristotle Series. New York: Oxford Clarendon Press.
15 The Function Argument of the Eudemian Ethics 4853 words (5466 minus 613 from the handout) Unlike the well-studied function (ergon) argument in Aristotle s Nicomachean Ethics (EN) 1.7, the argument in Eudemian Ethics (EE) 2.1 has received relatively little attention. 27 We can split up the Eudemian function argument into two parts: the first (1218b32 19a28) moves slowly and takes care to defend various premisses, while the second (1219a29 39) briefly summarizes the key steps of the first argument and extends its results. My aim here is to reconstruct the first part of the Eudemian function argument. The key strategy of the EE function argument is to divide the goods of the soul exhaustively into four classes: capacities, states, activities, and processes. The argument proceeds by showing that the activity of the best state, or virtue, of the soul is the best activity and is better than the other capacities, states, and processes of the soul. From this it follows that the activity of the virtue of the soul is the best thing achievable by humans, and this is happiness. Previous reconstructions of the EE function argument have taken Aristotle s argument to be more modest than it really is because they assume that there are really only two goods of the soul, even though he names four. I argue that this leads them to elide a crucial distinction Aristotle develops in the course of the argument, and I reconstruct the argument such that it does take this distinction into account. I end by comparing arguing that the Eudemian function argument avoids two common criticisms against the Nicomachean argument. I argue that the Eudemian argument makes no use of the notion of 27 By my count, there are only three explicit, step-by-step reconstructions of the full EE function argument: (Woods 1992, 85 90; Hutchinson 1986, 39 45; Simpson 2013, 233 238). There is discussion of the argument in (Karbowski 2015, 198 207), including an explicit reconstruction of the summary version of the argument from 1219a29 39. (Dirlmeier 1962, 219 227; von Fragstein 1974, 53 59) also discuss the passage. (Barney 2008, 293n1) and (Baker 2015, 260n66) are helpful guides to the enormous literature on the EN function argument.
16 peculiarity, and that it does not seek to ground normativity on being a good instance of the species of human being. Reconstructions of the Eudemian function argument are few; 28 I begin by identifying a key problem they all face. It will help first to outline the strategy of the Eudemian function argument. I assume without much argument for the purposes of this talk that the method Aristotle uses in the Eudemian function argument is the method of division, which seeks to define a thing by placing it within its genus and identifying differentiae which characterize the definiendum. 29 The argument begins by dividing up the genus of humanly achievable goods 30 exhaustively into two groups: those external to the soul and those internal to it. After arguing that the goods internal to the soul are more choiceworthy, Aristotle proceeds to divide the goods internal to the soul into four classes, arranged in two groups: Of the goods in the soul, some are states or capacities, and others are activities and processes. 31 The key step, then, is to show that 28 Unfortunately, Hutchinson s reconstruction is invalid. Hutchinson s step 17 infers that a good life is the perfect good from supporting premisses 1, 2, 3, 5, and 16. But step 16 only shows that a good life (an activity) is better than the virtue of the soul. None of the other cited supporting premisses shows that a good life is better than the other activities of the soul. Without that he cannot infer that the good life is the best thing. Woods s reconstruction, too, makes invalid inferences. His step 18 does not follow from 15 and 17. From 23 to 24, he moves from the activity of the soul s excellence to the activity of a good soul (I argue below these are distinct). And he is missing key intermediate steps between 24, 25, and 26. 29 Key texts where Aristotle discusses the method of division include APr 1.31, APo 2.5, 2.13, and Met. Ζ.12. See (Falcoln 1997) for a discussion of Aristotle s method of division. (Natali 2010) argues that the Nicomachean function argument seems to follow Aristotle s scientific method. (Karbowski 2015) argues that the Eudemian counterpart follows what he calls the Eudemian method, which seems to share similarities with the scientific method of the Posterior Analytics. Since Aristotle seems to think even in the APo 2.13 that the method of division can help hunt out definitions, I take this assumption to be compatible with Karbowski s view. 30 The restriction of happiness to the highest good which is achievable in action for a human [τῶν ἀνθρώπῳ πρακτῶν ἄριστον] is introduced at EE 1.7 1217a40. I follow the OCT edition for Aristotle s Greek text, except for the De Motu Animalium, for which I use W. Jaeger s Teubner edition. Translations are modified from (Inwood and Woolf 2013) for the EE, (Broadie and Rowe 2002) for the EN, and (Barnes 1984) for other works. 31 EE 1218b36 37: τῶν δὲ ἐν ψυχῇ τὰ µὲν ἕξεις ἢ δυνάµεις εἰσί, τὰ δ ἐνέργειαι καὶ κινήσεις.
17 the activity of the virtue of the soul is better than all the other things in the soul, namely everything else in these four classes. This establishes that the activity of the virtue of the soul is then the single best humanly achievable good, since, being the best thing internal to the soul, it is better than anything else external to it, too, and this division is exhaustive. Thus, happiness, which Aristotle takes to be the highest or best good, is identical with the activity of the virtue of the soul. One problem with previous philosophical reconstructions of the EE function argument has been that they take the fourfold division of goods in the soul at 1218b36 37 as a twofold division. This reduces the burden of the argument: instead of having to show that the activity of the virtue of the soul is better than every other state, capacity, activity, and process of the soul, the argument would only need to show that the activity of the virtue of the soul is better than every other state and activity of the soul. Kenny observes that the things in the soul fall into two classes: some are states (or powers), others are activities (or processes). So the best thing in the soul will be either the best state or the best activity (Kenny 2016, 198). While Hutchinson initially presents all four items of the soul, he adds that in what follows it becomes clear that this is meant to be a two-way contrast, not a four-way contrast (Hutchinson 1986, 40). Simpson, similarly favoring a twofold division between powers and acts, notes that Aristotle is peculiarly flexible in the words he uses for the goods of the soul in the function argument, perhaps because his argument does not yet need the distinctions, though it does need some differentiation between powers and acts, and such differentiation cannot be made without employing one or more of the terms (Simpson 2013, 234). Woods is more explicit in saying why he favors the twofold division: he thinks that the key inference of the function argument is invalid with the fourfold division. Aristotle, he thinks, only argues that the activity of the virtue of the soul is the
18 best activity, better than other states or capacities; he does not show it is better than all processes, the fourth good of the soul (Woods 1992, 87). Without this, the argument is invalid. The main attraction of collapsing the fourfold division into two lies in the ability to avoid this outcome. 32 One might also be tempted to think that Aristotle had only the twofold division in mind by considering Aristotle s restatement of the premiss at 1219a30 31, where he says that the goods of the soul are just states and activities (1219a30 31). But given that the argument there is a summary of the longer argument that preceded, 33 it should surprise us that Aristotle is more precise in the summary version of his argument than in the full version of the argument. It seems more likely that the full argument contains the correct psychic ontology, and the summary omits any discussion of capacities and processes in order to distill the argument s key moves. There is a further difficulty with supposing that Aristotle only has a twofold division in mind. At 1219a11 18, Aristotle distinguishes two kinds of functions (erga) a thing s use, or something beyond the thing s use. 34 The division, however, between a thing s use and something beyond its use appears also at Met. Θ.6, 1048b28. 35 There, Aristotle is explicit that the function that is a thing s use is an activity, while a function that is something beyond its use is a process. In other words, the distinction Aristotle presents here in at EE 1219a13 18 is exactly the distinction between an activity and a process. He uses this distinction to show that the function of the soul, since it is a using, is an activity. That this distinction appears later on in the argument makes it difficult to maintain, as Woods, Hutchinson, and Simpson do, that Aristotle intends to suppress 32 (Karbowski 2015, 198) also seems to read EE 1218b36 37 as presenting a distinction between two, not four items. 33 I follow (Simpson 2013, 236; Karbowski 2015, 199 200) in judging the second function argument to be a summary of the first. 34 I follow (Baker 2015) in taking Aristotle s notion of function to mean something like achievement rather than essence. Baker s evidence includes the EE passage under discussion. 35 See also EN 1.1, 1094a3 6 and EN 10.4.
19 the distinction between an activity and a process. 36 In their reconstructions, this distinction, which makes up a significant chunk of the text of the argument, does virtually no work. My aim in presenting my own reconstruction of the function argument will be to reintegrate the distinction into the argument. The function argument begins in EE 2.1, and it is recapitulated and briefly repeated after it is first presented. [Note to reviewer: the following stepwise reconstruction will be provided in a handout but not read aloud in the presentation; I also exclude it from the word count. 27. All [human] goods are either within the soul or external to it [1218b32, premiss]. 28. The goods within the soul are more choiceworthy (better) than those external to it [1218b32 35, premiss]. 29. The goods in the soul are states, capacities, activities, or processes [1218b35 36, premiss]. 30. If something X has a function, then the virtue of X =is 37 the best disposition or state or capacity of X [1218b37 1219a5, premiss]. 31. If state S 1 is better than state S 2, then the function F 1 of S 1 is better than the function F 2 of S 2 [1219a6 8, premiss]. 32. The function of a thing X =is X s end [1219a8, premiss]. 33. The end E of a thing X is better than the other things in X, which are for the sake of E [1219a10 11, premiss]. 34. The function F of a thing X is better than states in X [1219a9, a11 13, from 6, 7]. 36 The fact that the distinction between activities and processes appears later in the argument also casts doubt on Woods s suggestion that Aristotle uses kinêseis to mean affections (e.g. at 1220a30), rather than processes, to be contrasted with activities (Woods 1992, 90). 37 The is of identity.
20 35. If F is the function of a thing X, then either F is an activity and hence the use of X, or F is a process and hence something other than its use, but not both [1219a13 18, premiss]. 36. If something has a function which is a using (i.e. an activity), then that activity is better than the state of which it is a use [1219a17 18, from 8, 9]. 37. If something has a function F 1, then its virtue also has a function F 2, which is the same as F 1, but done excellently [1219a19 23, premiss]. 38. The soul has a function, which =is the life of the ensouled being [1219a23 24, premiss]. 39. The function of the soul is a using and a being awake [1219a24 25, premiss]. 40. The function of the soul is an activity, i.e. a using, not a process [from 9, 13]. 41. The function of the virtue of the soul is also an activity [from 11, 14]. 42. The function of the virtue of the soul =is the excellent life of the ensouled being [1219a25 27, from 11, 12]. 43. The function of the virtue of the soul is better than the virtue of the soul [from 10, 15]. 44. The function of the virtue of the soul is better than all of the states or capacities of the soul [from 4, 17; the better than relation is transitive]. 45. The function of the virtue of the soul is better than the function of any other state or capacity in the soul [from 4, 5]. 46. The function of the virtue of the soul is better than any other activity or process in the soul [from 9, 19; non-function activities or processes are ruled out by 6, 7]. 47. The function of the virtue of the soul is better than any other state, capacity, activity, or process in the soul [from 18, 20]. 48. The function of the virtue of the soul =is the best thing in the soul [from 3, 21]. 49. The function of the virtue of the soul =is the best thing [from 1, 2, 22].
21 50. The function of the virtue of the soul =is an excellent life and =is the perfect good [1219a27 28, from 16, 23, taking best thing and perfect good to be synonymous]. 38 51. Happiness =is the best thing and perfect good [suppressed premiss, see 1219a29]. 52. The function of the virtue of the soul =is an excellent life =is the perfect good and =is happiness [1219a28, from 24 and 25].] Consider the argument on the handout. Steps 1 10 lay out axiological principles that describe value relationships between various classes of goods. Steps 11 16 bring in psychological premisses in order to identify the function of the virtue of the soul with an excellent life, showing also that it is an activity. Steps 17 24 make the inferences from the axiological principles of 1 10 and the description of the function of the virtue of the soul from 11 16 to show that the function of the virtue of the soul is the perfect good. The argument ends by identifying this with happiness. Figure 1 [on the handout] provides a graphic representation of the method of division. In my reconstruction, Aristotle divides the starting genus of all humanly practicable good things with a series of four exhaustive and progressively more specific divisions. Steps 1, 3, 4, and 9 introduce the divisions, while steps 2, 10, and 5 assert that one of the freshly divided classes is better than the other (the remaining division, introduced at step 9, is addressed in a different way at step 15). In the reconstruction above, I have ordered the numbered premisses above to reflect the ordering in the text. I concede that the order of the four divisions is not obvious from Aristotle s presentation, but in the graphic representation and my discussion of the steps below I 38 Here I am taking teleon as perfect ; for the premiss to be true, it will have to be synonymous in some sense with the best of things humanly practicable (τῶν ἀνθρώπῳ πρακτῶν ἄριστον) of EE 1.7, 1217a40.
22 have ordered the divisions in accordance with the order in which the division-introducing steps appear in the text. Figure 1: Divisions of the First Function Argument all good things are either (step 1) external to the soul are better than (step 2) internal to the soul are either (step 3) capacities or states are better than (step 10) any other state of the soul functions of either (step 4) is better than (step 5) the best state (virtue) of the soul is either a (step 9) process (ruled out at step 15) activity The highest good is either internal to the soul or external to the soul (a tautology, step 1). At step 2, Aristotle shows that goods internal to the soul are more choiceworthy, or better, than goods external to the soul. Aristotle defends step 2 by pointing out that wisdom, virtue, and pleasure all three of the most eligible candidates suggested by those (the wise) who propose a
23 final end for ethics are internal to the soul. 39 Step 3 makes the next division: goods internal to the soul are either capacities and states on the one hand or activities and processes on the other. 40 Activities and processes, it will turn out, are the actualities of capacities and states. In Figure 1, I represented these instead as functions of states and capacities, since processes and activities are distinguished more sharply at step 9, and processes and activities are two kinds of functions (1219a13). At step 10, Aristotle addresses the second division, between states or capacities and their functions: the functions of capacities and states are better than the capacities and states themselves. Step 10 follows from steps 6 9. Step 6 is the premiss that the function of a thing is the thing s end. This is a distinctly Aristotelian claim, arising from his doctrine of final causation, prominently defended in the Physics. In Phys. 2.7, Aristotle holds that the essence and form of a thing are ends for the sake of which natural beings are moved, 41 that a thing s essence is its end, and this is what is best for it (198b8 9). The claim is also repeated at Met. Θ.8 1050a21. Step 7 adds that a thing s end is better than everything else of the thing, and in particular, the states and dispositions of the thing. The point here is that for something to be the end implies that it is more valuable than those things which are there for its sake. 42 If something other than the end were more valuable than it (within a given domain), that would give us reason 39 Aristotle first notes at EE 1.1, 1214a32 33 that wisdom, virtue, and pleasure are said by others to be the greatest goods, and considers the lives corresponding to each of the goods in EE 1. At Politics 7.1, 1323a38 b11, Aristotle defends a version of step 2 with another argument, that the goods in the soul are more final than the external goods because the latter face a limit (πέρας, 1323b7) on their usefulness at high levels of accumulation, while the former do not. Since external goods face diminishing marginal returns at higher quantities, while internal goods do not, the latter and not the former are apt for unqualified pursuit. 40 A defense of the exhaustiveness of this division will require a detour through Aristotle s account of motion that I cannot discuss here. 41 Phys. 198b3 4: καὶ τὸ τί ἐστιν καὶ ἡ µορφή τέλος γὰρ καὶ οὗ ἕνεκα. See also Met. Θ.8 (Dirlmeier 1962, 223). There, in arguing for the priority of activity to capacity, Aristotle says: For the function is the end, and the activity is the function (1050a21 22). 42 See also Phys. 2.7, 198b8 9 and Top. 3.1, 116b23 26 for corroborating text.
24 to arrange our resources to attain the more valuable thing instead. The pursuit of the original end might well lose its appeal when a more valuable thing is reached along the way. From 6 and 7, step 8 infers that a given thing s function is better than everything else in it. Step 9 distinguishes functions into processes and activities, which makes up the fourth division. Step 10 is a more specific instantiation of 8 that includes information from step 9. Step 10 says that if a thing s function is a using, hence an activity, then it is better than everything else in it, in particular its states and capacities. That concludes the second division. Marking the third division, step 4 claims that virtue is the best disposition or state or capacity of each of the things that has some use or function (1218b37 1219a1). 43 So, at least some states or capacities have an associated use or function, and of these states and capacities, one is the best. The division here is between the virtue and any other states or capacities. So, given something that has a function, like a ship, a cloak, or a house, among the states and capacities of each such item, one state or capacity is the best one. The purpose of distinguishing the best state 44 from the others is to compare the value of the different functions which arise from those states in step 5, which is the claim that the function of the virtue of the soul is better than the function of any other state. Aristotle says at 1219a6 8: And let it be established that the 43 EE 1218b37 1219a1: ταῦτα δὴ οὕτως ὑποκείσθω καὶ περὶ ἀρετῆς, ὅτι ἐστὶν ἡ βελτίστη διάθεσις ἢ ἕξις ἢ δύναµις ἑκάστων, ὅσων ἐστί τις χρῆσις ἢ ἔργον. At Cat. 8, Aristotle explicitly distinguishes dispositions, states, capacities, and affections but says that states and dispositions belong to the same kind (8b26 27). States are stable and long-lasting, while dispositions are more ephemeral, but the distinction is not systematically kept in EE 2.1. In my reading, state here occasionally refers metonymically to the kind of quality that includes dispositions and states. Ultimately, the distinction between states and dispositions is of little importance here. 44 By best state it is not necessary to take Aristotle as referring to sophia (which he argues at EE 5.7 is better than phronêsis). Since he goes on to divide the soul into the rational part and the part receptive to reason, and the rational part of the soul into the scientific and deliberative parts (EE 2.1, 5.1), the best state of the soul could well be referring to the composite of the best state of each part. This is supported by the gloss of perfect virtue as virtue whole, at 1219a36 37.