 |
| C. Gill |
Christopher
Gill is Professor of Ancient Thought at the University of Exeter, following
earlier posts at Yale, Bristol, and Aberystwyth. His work is centred on
psychology and ethics in Greek and Roman thought, especially ideas about
personality and self.
Encyclopedia of Applied Ethics (Second Edition) 2012, Pages 529–537
Abstract
This
article offers an overview of ancient Greek ethics. The chronological scope is
broad (from early Greek thought to late antiquity); but the main thinkers or
theories discussed are Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, and Epicureans.
As well as outlining the main ethical themes in these ancient approaches, the
article also considers how far each theory gave scope for applied ethics. The
article thus shows that Greek philosophy is important not just as a forerunner
of modern versions of virtue ethics but also because of its pioneering work on
applied or practical ethics.
Keywords
Character;
Community; Dialectic; Friendship; Happiness; Nature; Pleasure; Psyche; Therapy;
Virtue; Wisdom
Introduction
Greek
ethics is taken here to mean the ethical thought of ancient Greece, in the
period from the eighth century BC to the end of antiquity (ca. fifth century
AD). Greek thought, together with Christianity, has been a key influence on the
development of Western ethical thought and is still regarded as being of the
highest philosophical importance. This article outlines the main features of
Greek ethical thought, focusing on the question of how far this contained what
we might call ‘applied ethics.’ For this purpose, we can demarcate four broad
phases of Greek thought, in each of which the question of ‘applied ethics’
takes a rather different form: (1) Greek thought prior to the demarcation of
ethics as a distinct area of philosophy, including Presocratic thought and the
sophistic movement down to the late fifth century BC; (2) the emergence of
ethics as a distinct area of thought in the work of Socrates, Plato, and
Aristotle (fifth to fourth century BC); (3) the systematization of branches of
philosophy in later Greek (Hellenistic) philosophy, especially Stoicism, and
the associated demarcation of ‘practical ethics’ (the closest ancient analogue
to modern applied ethics); and (4) ethical philosophy in late antiquity,
including Neoplatonism, and the interplay between Classical thought and
Christianity.
In
modern Western thought, applied ethics is typically understood as an organized
communal response to perceived personal and social problems, especially those
brought to light in certain professional areas, such as medicine or law.
Although we do not find in ancient Greece an exact equivalent for this
conception, or for its cultural context, there are two recurrent features of
Greek thought that are especially relevant. One is the tendency for social
problems to give rise to (more or less public) argument and debate, including
debate about fundamental ethical questions and principles. Another is the
belief that properly conducted debate, issuing in well-reasoned conclusions,
provides an authoritative basis for resolving practical problems and shaping
people’s lives. The practical outcome of ethical reflection is conceived either
as (sometimes utopian) programs for large-scale social change or as advice to
individuals on how to direct their lives.
Early Greek Thought
Traditional Thought: Homer
The
first surviving Greek text, Homer’s Iliad (ca. eighth century BC),
exemplifies certain general characteristics of Greek thought that also figure
in subsequent ethical theory. The wrath of Achilles, caused by the breakdown in
cooperation between Achilles and his fellow chieftains, stimulates, especially
in Book 9, reflective debate about ethical questions. These include that of the
basis of cooperative relationships, the justification for breaking social bonds,
the best form of a human life, and the grounds for dying for others. Also
characteristic of later Greek thought is that these questions are not taken to
be settled by an appeal to authority, whether human or divine. Rather, the
ethical status of human (political) and divine authority is one of the
questions raised through the medium of this epic poem. There is an obvious
contrast on this point with the Judeo-Christian tradition, especially as
expressed in the Old Testament, in which the idea of God as an ultimate moral
authority, and as the source of determinate moral rules (e.g., the Ten
Commandments), is fundamental.
The Iliad
also gives rise to an issue much discussed by scholars in recent years, that of
the nature and development of Greek ethical attitudes as expressed in literary
forms and social practices. Earlier scholars tended to characterize early Greek
ethics as based on a socially derived sense of shame and honor, and as
developing only later, if at all, a more inner sense of guilt and moral responsibility.
Some recent work (notably by Bernard Williams) has argued, by contrast, that,
from the Iliad onward, Greek ethics places value on the internalization
of social principles (on making shame and honor integral to one’s character);
value is also placed on reflective debate about what these social principles
should be. A related idea, also expressed in the Iliad, is that emotions
and motives are properly modified by such debate, and that they should not,
therefore, be rigidly subject to conventional social rules. These poetic ideas
prefigure the themes of much later Greek philosophy: that virtue centers on
character shaped by one’s ethical community, and that dialectical debate
properly determines norms for character as well as action.
Presocratic Philosophers
Characteristic
of the earliest Greek philosophers (whose work survives only in fragments) is
that they discuss ethics only as part of their highly speculative accounts of
nature and reality as a whole. For instance, Anaximander (ca. 610–540 BC) analyzes
the natural world in terms of retribution and injustice, and Empedocles (ca.
493–433 BC) does so in terms of alternating patterns of love and strife. For
Heraclitus (late sixth to early fifth century BC), the logos (‘reason’)
is at once the basic principle of nature, ideal law, and rationality. Sometimes
explicit in their thought (e.g., that of Xenophanes, sixth century BC, or
Anaxagoras, ca. 550–428 BC), and sometimes implied, is a critique, or
rethinking, of the traditional, anthropomorphic Greek religion to match their
rethinking of nature. The application of the principles emerging from their
work takes two main forms. The thinkers sometimes advocate (at least by
implication) the adoption of the state of mind and character that corresponds
to the underlying pattern discerned in nature. This advice is mostly given to
individuals (e.g., the named addressees of the thinkers’ works), who are urged
to adopt this pattern for themselves. However, Pythagoras (sixth century BC)
apparently saw his theory as providing the basis for a political and ethical
community (in Croton, South Italy). ‘Harmony’ was conceived both as a cosmic
principle (analyzable by number theory) and as an ethical norm for diet, daily
life, and social relationships.
The Sophists
A
feature of the second half of the fifth century BC, especially in the
economically flourishing democracy of Athens, was the growing
professionalization of branches of knowledge and education, including the
skills of rhetoric (public persuasion) and medicine. Key figures in this
process were itinerant teachers of rhetoric and other skills (‘sophists’) who
received fees for their teaching. The conflict and debate associated with this
process are presented vividly (though from strongly partisan standpoints) in, for
example, Aristophanes’ comic play Clouds (423 BC) and Plato’s Gorgias
and Protagoras (early fourth century BC). A central issue was whether
authority in transmitting ethical beliefs belonged to the family and the
community of the city-state as a whole or to experts in, for instance,
rhetoric, argument, or natural science. There was also competition between
different forms of expertise about which one played the most important role in
this process. This debate is analogous with one of those associated in modern
times with ‘applied ethics,’ namely, that of the relationship between
professional expertise and the ethical standards of the community. In Protagoras,
Plato ascribes to Protagoras (ca. 485–415 BC), a leading teacher of rhetoric,
what might be called a ‘communitarian’ position on ethics, according to which
justice and the other virtues are developed, in any given community, by public
and private discourse; the expert’s role is limited to facilitating this
process. (For the contrasting status given by Plato’s Socrates to dialectical
expertise, see the section titled ‘ Socrates.’) Plato’s Gorgias centers
on the related question of whether techniques of discourse, such as rhetoric
and dialectic, are value-neutral instruments or whether the techniques in
themselves necessarily carry implications about the ends to which they should
be used.
The
fifth and fourth centuries BC also saw the emergence of the Hippocratic and
other schools of medicine, and, in the Hippocratic Oath, one of the first
surviving Western formulations of ‘professional ethics.’ Doctors, like other
claimants to wisdom, took part in public debates about nature (including human
nature), environmental influences on social character (e.g., Airs, Waters,
Places), and the status of their expertise. However, the professional
status and techniques of medicine in antiquity were too insecure and disputed
to generate analogues for the issues about ethics and medical science (e.g.,
about artificial insemination or genetic engineering) that are central to
modern debate. An issue that recurs in different contexts throughout this
period (and that also takes up questions raised by the Presocratics) is that of
the relationship between nature (phusis) and law or ethical conventions
(nomos). Among the positions advanced are (1) that human nature and
desires are inherently in conflict with ethical principles and laws; (2) that
morality is the product of an implied ‘social contract,’ adopted as a
second-best to the pursuit of self-interest; and (3) that human nature, if
properly understood, is functionally adapted to develop toward virtue. This
debate persists in subsequent Greek ethical theory, in which Plato, Aristotle,
and the Stoics adopt versions of the third position.
Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle
Socrates
Socrates
(469–399 BC) had a crucial role in the history of Greek ethics in that the
scope of his interests defined, in effect, what ‘ethics’ meant in Greek
philosophy. His basic question is ‘How should one live?’ More specifically, he
is presented as asking what virtue (or a given virtue) is, how it is acquired,
how it affects action and feeling, and whether it constitutes happiness.
Socrates is presented, especially in Plato’s early dialogues, in Aristotle, and
to a lesser extent in Xenophon, as practicing a distinctive method of
systematic questioning (dialectic) conducted with one person at a time and
designed to produce a logically consistent set of beliefs. By implication,
Socrates claimed that ethical virtue depends on expertise in this form of
dialectic. The so-called ‘Socratic paradoxes’ that recur in his arguments
(virtue is knowledge, virtue is one, and no one does wrong willingly) can be
understood as meaning that there is a direct correlation between (this type of)
dialectical expertise and ethical virtue.
This
approach to ethics (which can be contrasted with the more ‘communitarian’ position
associated with Protagoras; see the preceding section titled ‘The Sophists’)
was highly controversial, and may have contributed to Socrates’ trial and
execution by the Athenian state in 399 BC (on the charges of ‘corrupting the
young and not worshipping the gods the city worships’). On the other hand,
Socrates seems also to have assumed that such dialectical expertise is, in
principle, open to everyone, and that his method consisted simply in
articulating ethical assumptions implicitly held by all human beings. Indeed,
he claimed that he ‘knew nothing,’ and that his dialectic served simply as the
vehicle for this articulation of shared (consistent) human beliefs. Unlike the
sophists, he charged no fees and did not undertake to teach a technique. The
question of whether Socrates’ dialectic does or does not imply a determinate
set of doctrines, and does or does not claim to achieve knowledge, has been a
matter of dispute since antiquity. What is undisputed is that his approach
represents in an extreme form a position sometimes found elsewhere in Greek
thought – that the ‘application’ of ethics is inseparable from reflective ethical
enquiry, or in Socratic terms, “the unexamined life is not worth living”
(Plato, Apology 38a).
Plato
Although
Socrates wrote nothing, Plato (ca. 429–347 BC) conducted philosophy (in part)
through writing dialogues, combined in later life with dialectical teaching in
the philosophical ‘school’ (study or research center) that he founded, the
Academy. Plato’s early dialogues represent Socrates’ distinctive method of
dialectic. Since all the dialogues are more or less fully fictionalized, and
Plato was a highly creative philosopher, we cannot draw a sharp distinction
between Socratic and early Platonic thought. In the middle-period dialogues
(e.g., Phaedo, Symposium, Republic), Plato is generally supposed to have
pursued the implications of Socrates’ arguments and methods further than
Socrates himself did. In the late dialogues, Plato seems to have reexamined the
theories of the middle period and either extended or modified these, partly as
a result of expanding the scope of his philosophy beyond the ethical concerns
that are dominant in the early and middle dialogues. Although the middle and
late dialogues contain more constructive argumentation than the early ones,
Plato’s continued use of the form of the Socratic dialogue raises the question
(as in the case of Socrates) of whether his philosophical activity is conceived
by him as a continuing search or as achieved understanding.
Central
to the middle-period dialogues is the exploration of Socrates’ claim that
virtue depends on dialectical expertise. A key idea in this exploration is the
contrast between belief/opinion (based on social communication) and knowledge
(based on philosophical argument). A related contrast is that between
particulars (individual objects and qualities) and Forms (ideal or objective
realities). A recurrent theme is that dialectically based understanding
provides objective knowledge of what is really or essentially just or good (the
Forms), whereas social communication merely provides subjective, localized
opinions (that this or that act is just or good). This way of analyzing
Socrates’ claim is coupled in Plato’s middle period with exploration of the
psychological implications of the claim. The Socratic idea that knowledge
carries with it correlated actions and feelings (that no one does wrong
willingly) is developed into more complex ideas about the relationship between
body and psyche, and between the parts of the psyche. One such idea is that the
achievement of postdialectical knowledge depends on (but also enhances) a
cohesive, ‘harmonized’ relationship between the parts of the psyche, in which
the other parts are persuaded to accept the rule of reason.
The Republic
contains the fullest discussion of these ideas; it also outlines the political
preconditions for the achievement of these ideal types of knowledge and
character. These preconditions center on a two-stage educational program (for
the guardians of the ideal state) that combines the Socratic ethical approach
with a version of the communitarian one. The guardians’ attainment of
postdialectical knowledge and the corresponding psychic state depend on the
previous (childhood) shaping of their beliefs and emotions by their community.
The second stage of their education converts these prereflective beliefs into
objective knowledge, culminating in knowledge of the Form of the Good. The
knowledge thus achieved provides the basis for the prereflective
belief-structure of the community. Plato’s last work, the Laws, takes
this version of a communitarian approach to ethics still further. It pursues
the idea that a good community is one in which the beliefs and desires of the
whole citizen body are correctly shaped by public persuasion and social
institutions, though it retains the idea that a minority of the citizens must
also be able to understand through dialectic the truth of the community’s
informing beliefs.
Plato’s
dialogues offer differing indications about the way in which these ethical and
political ideals could be realized. The Phaedo and Symposium, for
instance, suggest that it is only by adopting the philosopher’s pursuit of
objective truth (the Forms) as one’s overriding goal that one can make progress
toward achieving real virtue in character, action, and relationships. The
question of how one should try to put into practice the ideas of the Republic
or Laws is more open to debate. For one type of interpretation, these
dialogues present constitutional blueprints that Plato would have liked to put
into political practice (as Protagoras, apparently, drew up a law code in 444
BC for Thurii, a newly founded city-state). Some support for this idea comes
from two of the letters ascribed to Plato in antiquity, the Second and the
Seventh. For another type of interpretation, these dialogues present normative
ideals, which are designed to shape ethical and political debate and life
conducted in very different circumstances from those described in the
dialogues. At least one passage in the Republic strongly supports the
latter view that the ideal state provides an ethical pattern ‘in heaven’ for
each of us to establish within ourselves (592b). Broadly similar issues are
raised by other ideal constitutions in Greek philosophy, including Aristotle’s Politics
7-8, and two works called Republic by the Stoics Zeno and Chrysippus.
Aristotle
Aristotle
(384–322 BC) was Plato’s pupil for 20 years and later set up his own school,
the Lyceum or Peripatos; the surviving works, including the Eudemian
(EE) and Nicomachean Ethics (NE), are based on his lectures in the
school. Although those works seem not to have been available in the early
Hellenistic period, his ethical approach was maintained through his school and
was influential in determining the general form of subsequent Greek ethical
theory. The fundamental issue (derived from Socrates’ characteristic questions)
was this: How should we shape our life as a whole; that is, what should we take
as our overall goal (telos)? The goal was generally assumed to be
happiness (eudaimonia) or (regarded as the same thing) the good (agathon);
debate focused on what ‘happiness’ was. For Aristotle, as for Plato in the Republic,
the answer was that it was virtue (aretē), or more precisely, “activity
according to virtue,” and, more precisely again, “activity according to the
best and most perfect [or complete] virtue” (NE 1.7). However, for Aristotle
(by contrast with the Stoics) this does not mean that “external” goods such as
health, wealth, and social position are without any importance in determining
one’s happiness (NE 1.8–11).
Virtue
is defined partly in terms of psychological capacities and functions, and
partly in terms of modes of action and social behavior. Aristotle distinguishes
between virtue of character (ēthos) and that of intellect (dianoia),
though seeing these as partly interdependent. Ethical or character virtue (from
whose name, ēthikē aretē, the category of ‘ethics’ was derived) is
defined by the fact that the virtuous person does virtuous acts because of a
combination of correct (and stable) motivation (‘character’) and correct
practical reasoning. The virtuous person is motivated to act virtuously ‘for
the sake of the fine’ (to kalon) or ‘for its own sake’ (taken to be the
same). His or her motivation and action hits the ‘mean’ between defective
extremes. The failure to develop ethical virtue results in a character and life
that display either defectiveness/vice (kakia) or the ‘weakness of will’
of those for whom virtuous patterns of desire and emotion have not become
integral to their character.
Although
Aristotle demarcates ethics as a separate area of theory, he also stresses that
its ultimate aim is practical: “we enquire not to know what virtue is but to
become good people” (NE 2.1). This view is characteristic of Greek ethical
philosophy; hence, the modern distinction between ethics and meta-ethics (or
between theoretical and applied ethics) goes against the grain of much Greek
thinking. The interplay between practical and theoretical aspects of virtue for
Aristotle can be defined, in part, by the way in which, like Plato in the Republic
and Laws, he combines communitarian and dialectical approaches to
ethics. Aristotle stresses that effective ethical reflection needs to be based
on the prereflective shaping of dispositions through the beliefs and practices
of one’s family and community. (By contrast with Plato in the Republic,
Aristotle seems to think that this process can occur in conventional societies,
and not just in a community based on ideal knowledge.) Many of the virtues
discussed by Aristotle, including tact, generosity, and magnanimity, are those
recognized in conventional Greek ethics. This feature of Aristotle’s thought is
contrasted favorably by some modern thinkers (including Alasdair MacIntyre and
Bernard Williams) with the grounding of ethics on abstract norms such as
rationality and benevolence in much modern theory. Part of the practical
outcome of ethical enquiry, for Aristotle, lies in enabling an engaged member
of his or her community to gain a better understanding of the conception of
‘virtue’ implied in its belief structure.
On
the other hand, Aristotle also sees ethical reflection as revising, rather than
simply codifying, conventional attitudes. For instance, his account of
friendship does not simply offer a new analysis (in terms of virtue, as
distinct from utility) of the conventional ideal (which is that of loving the
friend “for the other person’s sake”) (NE 8.3–8.5). He also presents this
ideal, controversially, as a means of virtuous self-love and of extending one’s
own (virtuous) existence, and thus of contributing to one’s happiness. His most
controversial move, in NE 10.7–10.8 (though not in EE), is that of presenting
contemplative, rather than practical and ethical, virtue as the highest
realization of human (or ‘divine’) happiness. Some modern scholars claim that this
move is inconsistent with the presentation of ethical virtue as the chief
element in human happiness elsewhere in the ethical treatises. Others, however,
argue that it is consistent with the ranking of contemplative wisdom above
practical wisdom in NE 6.7 and 6.13, as well as with Aristotle’s metaphysical
conception of god. Another area of current controversy is whether the appeal to
the notion of ‘human’ or ‘divine’ nature constitutes a move within ethical
theory or an attempt to ground ethics on a metaphysical account of reality. On
either view, however, Aristotle’s move in NE 10.7–10.8 illustrates both his
dialectical revision of conventional thought and the practical outcome of
reflection (in that he commends a specific conception of the overall goal by
which to shape one’s life).
Hellenistic Philosophy
General
In
the Hellenistic Age (323–31 BC), and under the Roman Empire (31 BC onward),
there are two important developments in Greek ethical thought. One is that
philosophical debate becomes centered on the positions of the various schools
(the Academy, Lyceum, Epicurean, or Stoic) and that ethics is treated as part
of the integrated system adopted by each school. The other recurrent idea is
that adopting any one of these systems carries with it a distinctive way of
life and pattern of character. We can describe as ‘practical’ or ‘applied’
ethics the task of spelling out the form of life implied by each system; this
work is also characterized (by the thinkers themselves) as providing ‘therapy’
for the sicknesses which are the outcome of living by purely conventional
beliefs. The main ethical positions of the Hellenistic schools are presented in
the next three sections; the practical implications of these positions are
examined in the two sections following those. Whereas Plato’s dialogues and
Aristotle’s school texts have survived in considerable quantity, the works of
the most important and innovative Hellenistic philosophers survive only in
fragments and quotations. However, later Greek and Roman writings (especially
from the first centuries BC and AD) enable us to reconstruct the main features
of Hellenistic ethical theory and their thinking about the application of these
theories.
Stoicism
Stoicism
evolved as a system under successive heads of the school, especially Zeno
(334–262 BC) and Chrysippus (ca. 280–206 BC), though retaining a set of core
positions. In ethics, Stoics maintain in a strong form the thesis also adopted
by Plato and Aristotle that virtue constitutes happiness. The Stoic claim is
that virtue is not just the chief goal of a life, but the only good; by
contrast with Aristotle, who allowed that, for instance, health and property
count as ‘external goods’ (NE 1.8–11), the Stoics describe these as ‘matters of
indifference’ in comparison with virtue. However, most Stoics allow that such
things are, at least, ‘preferable,’ and that selection between indifferents
(though not the pursuit of them for their own sake) is the only way to make
progress toward complete virtue (or ‘wisdom’). The latter is a state of
character and way of life grounded on full understanding of what ‘virtue’ is
and of the fact that it is the only good.
The
Stoics see ethics as closely integrated with logic and physics (study of
nature) in a three-part philosophical system. Like Aristotle, the Stoics claim
that the life according to virtue is natural for human beings, and that the
progressive recognition of the naturalness of the virtuous life is a crucial
element in making ethical progress. There is currently dispute among scholars
as to how far the recognition of the ethical significance of nature belongs to
the sphere of ethical philosophy, and how far it belongs to the integrated
understanding of ethics and physics (and logic). The doctrine of oikeiōsis
(‘appropriation’ or ‘familiarization’), the idea that humans naturally develop
toward the recognition that virtue is the only good, seems to fall centrally
within the sphere of ethics. Also part of this doctrine is that human beings
develop naturally from wanting to benefit only those close to them (family and
friends) to wanting to benefit other human beings as such (as fellow rational
animals). However, the understanding of the way in which the universe
constitutes a rational, providentially ordered whole seems to require an
integrated grasp of physics and ethics. The ideal normative figure in Stoicism,
the ‘wise person’ or ‘sage,’ combines this understanding with a recognition of
the providential character of all events (including apparent misfortunes), and
a correspondingly dispassionate attitude toward such events (see the section
titled ‘ Practical ethics and therapy’).
Epicurus
Epicurus
(341–271 BC) stands apart from Plato, Aristotle, and the Stoics in seeing the
goal of life as pleasure rather than virtue. (In this respect, he developed the
theory of Democritus, born mid-fifth century, that ‘feeling good’ was the goal,
just as he also developed Democritus’ atomic theory of matter.) However,
Epicurus’ aim, like that of most other Greek thinkers, was to identify as the goal
a certain character and mode of life; the Cyrenaics, by contrast, saw the goal
as simply maximizing episodes of pleasure. For Epicurus, pleasure is defined
negatively, as the absence of physical pain and emotional disturbance. He also
distinguishes between types of desire (natural, necessary, nonnecessary) and
types of pleasure (kinetic and static) in order to characterize those desires
and pleasures (natural and necessary, static) which are characteristic of the
truly pleasurable life. Like the Stoics, Epicurus supposes that an
understanding of human nature and the nature of the universe plays a crucial
role in producing happiness. Such an understanding can free people from false
or empty desires (such as for wealth or political power) as well as from misguided
fears (above all, fear of death). The recognition that the universe functions
by purely natural causes, without divine intervention (even of a providential
kind), and that death is simply the decomposition of a certain set of atoms
should free people from fear of divine interference in life or after death.
Epicurus’
positions on virtue, friendship, and justice (central topics in Greek ethics)
are more complex, and closer to other schools, than they seem at first.
Although virtue is seen as purely instrumental to the overall goal of pleasure,
it is also described as ‘inseparable’ from the pleasant life. Although
friendship is valued as a way of providing mutual assistance and pleasure, the
friendship so valued is that in which we love our friends as ourselves. For
Epicurus (by contrast with the Stoics), justice is taken not to be an objective
ethical norm, but only “a guarantee of utility with a view to not harming
another and not being harmed.” However, the ideal Epicurean community will be
one in which “everything will be full of justice and mutual friendship” because
a correct grasp of the goal of life makes unjust action unnecessary. Implied in
all these points is that a proper understanding of Epicurean philosophy carries
with it a revised conception of what virtue, friendship, and justice mean, and
of how they contribute to happiness.
Skepticism
This
position, attributed to Pyrrho (ca. 360–270 BC), was adopted by leading figures
in Plato’s Academy from the mid-third to the first centuries BC, who saw it as
an extension of the Socratic conception of philosophy as an unending search for
truth (see the section titled ‘Socrates’). Sextus Empiricus (second century AD)
provides the fullest surviving statement of the position. Ancient skeptics deny
the possibility of gaining knowledge, as distinct from receiving ‘appearances’
about how the world looks or forming beliefs that do not constitute knowledge.
The recognition that knowledge is unavailable is thought to lead to ‘suspension
of judgment’ and so to provide freedom from emotional disturbance. This is
because one escapes from the distress of trying to reconcile the (dogmatic)
claim to knowledge with the contradictions that inevitably arise on any topic.
Also, one achieves ‘moderate feeling’ through not claiming to have knowledge
about what is good or bad and therefore not having the intense emotional
reactions that result from this supposed knowledge. Unlike modern skepticism,
which is often seen as a purely theoretical position, not affecting practical
life, the ancient skeptic maintained that this position (like those of the
other schools) changed one’s entire character and way of life.
Practical Ethics and Therapy
A
prominent idea in Hellenistic thought is that philosophy should spell out the
practical implications of its ethical theories and the kind of ‘therapy’ it can
offer both to adherents of the systems and to those not (or not yet) committed
to any one system. Much Roman ethical philosophy, which is based largely on
Hellenistic theory, centers on this idea. This is true, for instance, of
Cicero’s (106–43 BC) On Duties, Tusculan Disputations 3–4 and Seneca’s
(ca. 4 BC–65 AD) Moral Epistles, On Benefits, and On Anger.
Seneca writes as a committed Stoic, Cicero as an Academic skeptic (or at least
an independent-minded thinker), not committed to any one position but strongly
attracted to Stoic ethics. It is also true of much Greek work from this period,
including the Discourses of the Stoic Epictetus (ca. 55–135 AD) and the
moral essays (Moralia) of the (broadly) Platonic thinker Plutarch (ca.
50–120 AD). The analogy between philosophy (for the mind or character) and
medicine (for the body) is developed extensively in this connection. For
instance, Philo of Larisa (ca. 110–79 BC), a skeptic, subdivides practical
ethics into ‘protreptic’ (persuading someone to engage in philosophy),
‘therapy’ (removing the false beliefs which cause distress), and ‘advice’
(giving instructions about how to live), and compares each of these functions
to aspects of the work of the doctor. Eudorus (first century BC) and Seneca
present comparable typologies of philosophical discourse, based on the idea
that there is a close link between the key principles of a given ethical theory
and the associated implications for character and action. Epictetus (Discourses
3.2.1–3.2.5) defines a three-stage curriculum of practical ethics by which one
can systematically examine one’s desires, feelings, and social actions, and the
logical relationship between one’s beliefs, to make sure these are in line with
the fundamental principles of Stoic ethics.
There
are certain general reasons for the stress on philosophy as therapy and a
source of practical advice in this period. By contrast with the communitarian
ethical approach noted above, in different versions, in some earlier Greek
thought (e.g., Protagoras in the section ‘The Sophists’ and Aristotle in the
section titled ‘Aristotle’), Hellenistic philosophy regards conventional
ethical discourse as promoting misguided norms for shaping character and
action. Stoics stress that the conventional valuation of ethical ‘indifferents’
(e.g., health and wealth) produces ‘passions,’ intense emotions expressing
incorrect judgments about what is really valuable. Epicureans, similarly, see
conventional thought as promoting misguided valuations (e.g., of wealth and
power) and fears (e.g., of divine intervention and death) which cause emotional
disturbance and so prevent peace of mind. (See the sections titled ‘Stoicism’
and ‘Epicurus’ above.) The ‘therapy’ offered by these philosophical systems is,
primarily, the removal of the false beliefs developed by conventional societies
and of the ‘sicknesses’ of intense or painful emotions and desires produced by
these beliefs. Like modern ‘cognitive therapy,’ these ancient theories
presupposed a belief-based model of human psychology (a connection explored in
recent work by Martha Nussbaum). However, the ancient theories laid much
greater stress than modern cognitive therapy on the idea that one’s overall
conception of the good informs one’s whole pattern of motivation and action.
They also stressed that the only complete therapy lies in achieving the
understanding of the truth of this conception of the good which (together with
the corresponding character and way of life) constitutes complete ‘wisdom,’ as
envisaged by each school.
Political Theory
A
further question about the application of ethical ideas arises in Hellenistic
political theory, especially that of the Stoics. In Stoic thought, emphasis is
placed on certain general ideals that go beyond conventional political norms,
for example, the brotherhood of humankind, rational or ‘natural’ law, the city
of gods and humans, and cosmopolitanism (citizenship of the universe). On the
other hand, some Stoics, including Chrysippus, the main theorist of the school,
saw ethical development as normally occurring within conventional societies,
and apparently offered a theoretical justification for conventional
institutions such as private property. Some scholars think there was a shift
from an earlier, more radical phase of Stoicism (strongly influenced by
Cynicism), expressed especially in Zeno’s Republic, to a later phase in
which Stoic ideals were seen as guiding principles for application within
conventional societies. Others think that these ideals were always seen as
having the latter function. Some later Stoics, such as Musonius Rufus (ca.
30–101 AD), use Stoic principles to argue, against ancient conventions, that
men and women are equally capable of developing virtue and of doing philosophy,
or to emphasize the conventional basis of the institution of slavery (without
arguing for its abolition). However, a more prevalent tendency is to use Stoic
ideals, including those already mentioned, as regulative norms to help people
to live virtuous lives in any social and political context. The Meditations
of Marcus Aurelius (121–180 AD), for instance, shows a Roman emperor using
ideals such as the brotherhood of humankind and cosmopolitanism to reinforce
his dutiful (and largely conventional) practice of his role as emperor.
Epicureanism is more consistently opposed to any form of conventional political
system, as being necessarily based on false conceptions of what is truly
desirable. The community of friends sharing their lives in Epicurus’ own Garden
served as an ideal model of society, though there is little evidence to suggest
that Epicureans succeeded in developing other such communities in antiquity.
A
subject of recent debate has been whether the Stoic ideal of rational or
‘natural’ law exercised any significant influence in Roman legal thinking.
Cicero, in his Republic and Laws, sometimes uses this ideal to
signify a core of universally valid rules (though he fails to specify their
content). This is, broadly, the way that the idea of ‘natural law,’ and,
subsequently, ‘human rights,’ has been used in modern Western thought. Also,
the term ‘natural law’ sometimes appears in the writings of Roman jurists from
the second to third centuries AD. Gaius (mid-second century) uses it as a
synonym for the ‘law of nations,’ that is, roughly, international law, by
contrast with the ‘civil law’ applying only to Roman citizens. At the start of
Justinian’s Digest (sixth century AD, but based on earlier material),
natural law is conceived as a universal norm going beyond both the other
categories of law. However, some scholars have pointed out that, in the moral
thinking that is embodied in Roman legal writing as a whole, natural law
figures much less as a normative idea than, for instance, ‘fairness’ or ‘good
faith.’ Also, within Stoic thought, natural law signifies an objective norm
(whose content is only fully understood by the wise person) and not a
determinate body of rules that could guide legal decision making.
Later Antiquity
In
later antiquity, we find a tendency to collect, codify, and comment on previous
Greek thought (which was already seen as having reached an exceptional,
‘classical’ status). For instance, two important sources for Stoic ethics are
Diogenes Laertius’ (ca. third century AD) life of Zeno (in Lives of the
Philosophers) and Arius Didymus’ (first century BC) summary preserved in
Stobaeus’ anthology (fifth century AD). A related tendency was renewed interest
in Plato and Aristotle, and the use of commentaries on their works as a mode of
continuing philosophical reflection (by, e.g., Alexander of Aphrodisias, third
century AD, and Proclus, fifth century AD). Neoplatonism, one of the more
creative philosophical movements in this period is, in effect, a synthesis of
Platonic and Aristotelian thought, which especially develops the idealism of
Plato’s middle period. In the Enneads, Plotinus (205–270 AD) defines
three fundamental levels of reality that are (in ascending order of being and
value): (1) the psyche (conceived as non-material), (2) the intellect, and (3)
the One (or Good). Plotinus’ view is that human beings are naturally disposed
to aspire toward the highest possible level of reality, that is, toward psychic
rather than material being, intellectual rather than sensual or emotional
being, and, finally, a state of union with the One or Good.
Another
tendency is the interplay between Greek philosophical ideas, especially
Platonic, Aristotelian, or Stoic ideas, and Christian thought. This can already
be seen in the New Testament (written in colloquial or koinē Greek),
especially in John and Paul, and continues in a more fully articulated form
through the early Church Fathers to Thomas Aquinas and beyond. The Confessions
of Augustine (354–430 AD), an intellectual and spiritual biography, exemplifies
this interplay. Augustine was attracted first by Manicheanism, whose worldview
centered on a stark contrast between good and evil (seen as cosmic principles
locked in permanent struggle). He then turned to Neoplatonism, for which the
universe was a combination of (nonmaterial) being and matter, in which matter
was at a lower level than being but was not bad in itself. Finally, he returned
to a more theorized version of the Christianity in which he was brought up. In
Christian thought (as Augustine understands this) evil is explained by the fact
that, although God created the universe, human beings are free to reject God’s
love, and human sin is redeemed by God’s grace, as expressed in the
Incarnation. Augustine used Greek thought as part of the means of achieving and
defining this worldview (for instance, Neoplatonic thinking about the three
forms of reality helped Augustine to analyze the three Persons of the Trinity).
But his final account of the ethical relationship between the human and the
divine is significantly different from anything in Greek thought.
Conclusions
As
well as playing a crucial role in shaping Western ethical ideas, Greek
thinkers, especially Plato and Aristotle, are still regarded as philosophers
whose work is of substantive importance to modern thought. Some current
thinkers, notably Alasdair MacIntyre and Bernard Williams, have emphasized the
value of Greek, especially Aristotelian, theory as an example of ‘virtue
ethics’ (centered on virtue and happiness, not rule following). As noted in the
section titled ‘Aristotle,’ they commend the Aristotelian idea that general
moral ideas (e.g., ‘human nature’) need to be grounded in dispositions and
beliefs developed in ethical communities, rather than treated as foundational
without such support, as they are in some modern theories (e.g., Kantian or
utilitarian). Recent scholarly work in ancient philosophy has given special
attention to Hellenistic ethics and its practical implications. As indicated in
the sections titled ‘Practical ethics and therapy’ and ‘Political theory,’ the
Hellenistic conceptions of practical ethics and of philosophy as therapy, and
the philosophers’ thinking about the role of general norms in shaping social
and political life, are complex and sophisticated and are of continuing
interest for modern thinking about the application of ethical ideas. Martha
Nussbaum, for instance, sees in the Stoic combination of a belief-based
psychology and an appeal to universal norms (e.g., natural law) a powerful
statement of the idea that philosophy can change attitudes and emotions by
revising ideals.
