Combining Texts

Ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'The Art of Rhetoric' and 'Epistemology: contemporary introduction'

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2 ideas

22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / e. Human nature
Men are physically prime at thirty-five, and mentally prime at forty-nine [Aristotle]
     Full Idea: The body is in its prime from the ages of thirty to thirty-five, and the soul around the age of forty-nine.
     From: Aristotle (The Art of Rhetoric [c.350 BCE], 1390b09)
     A reaction: Wonderfully specific! It is important that Aristotle is interested in these questions. The good for man follows the path laid out by nature, in which a man rises to his highest good in maturity, and then declines from it into old age.
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / j. Ethics by convention
We all feel universal right and wrong, independent of any community or contracts [Aristotle]
     Full Idea: There is something of which we all have an inkling, being a naturally universal right and wrong, even if there should be no community between the parties or contract.
     From: Aristotle (The Art of Rhetoric [c.350 BCE], 1373b07)
     A reaction: This is the strongest assertion I know of in Aristotle of an absolute moral standard, independent of natural function. It makes Aristotle an intuitionist, and is strikingly opposed to contracts as the most basic aspect of morality.