Aristotle's Philosophy of Action

Dr Charles examines some main themes in Aristotle's philosophy of action. He is interested both in the exegesis of Aristotle and in the relation between his views and those of certain fashionable present-day philosophers. He argues that the set of positions which he attributes to Aristotle constitutes an alternative which deserves serious consideration. First he discusses Aristotle's views on the identity conditions for processes, and then his account of the explanation of processes, and in particular of actions; here the explanatory roles of desire, belief and reasoning become important. Discussion of this drives one' to examine Aristotle's treatment of akrasia. Here C. argues that he allows for an akrates who, with clear-eyed, but off-beat knowledge of the right conclusion, acts against it. He rejects the view that Aristotle effectively capitulates to Socrates: the akrates' knowledge need only be off-colour in the sense that it is not fully integrated into his life. This allows him to fit the treatment of akrasia into an account of education and the development of practical reason. The account, however, seems to produce a tension between explaining action teleologically and explaining it causally by reference to beliefs and desires. The argument that on Aristotle's view these styles of explanation are compatible enables C. to develop what he considers to be the peculiarly Aristotelian form of materialism, avoiding any version of identity thesis regarding mental and physical processes. This makes him interestingly different from most modern materialists. C. is not just interested in using Aristotle as a counter in modern disputes; he also enters the scholarly lists and one has, to one's profit, to work through Aristotle to disagree. The book contains a good deal of interesting scholarly argument. It is, however, very densely written, usually at a highly abstract level. Charles is very parsimonious with examples which might help one see how to cash the views he considers. Worse, he is given to a love of convolution and semi-formalisation which leads to obscurity. Some examples: (i) On p. 34 we get the following semi-formalisation: (3X7) (7r is an event & (3 !t) ((t is in 400 B.C.) & (0 is and successfully (7j)))). No interpretation of INT is given. Angled brackets usually indicate ordered n-tuples, but then there should be commas between the items: the only commas come within rounded brackets. What is the significance of brackets round the final 77? (ii) p. 113 'The sufficiency thesis If the conclusion of practical reasoning is the agent's best judgment, and that conclusion is always sufficient for action, if the agent acts intentionally, a man who reaches his best judgment must act on it, if he acts intentionally.' To save this from unintended tautology we need to excise 'and that... agent acts intentionally'. After that a little tidying could produce a clear, crisp and correct sentence. The semi-formalisation that follows should not be an existentially quantified formula. The semi-formalisation on the next page also deserves attention. (iii) On pp. 199-200 the confusion deepens. One is left uncertain whether the subject of 'necessitates' is a proposition, or an event or state of affairs asserted in some proposition to obtain. If the former, necessitates' presumably means 'entails'. In that case the gloss in footnote 4 ('P necessitates Q' ('P is necessary for Q')) should have 'sufficient' for 'necessary'. The use of 'explanation' in the main text suggests that C. 69