TRANSLATIONS
Necip Fikri Alican
Istanbul, necipalican@gmail.com
Language: English
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 7–60
Keywords: Pyrrhonism, skepticism, truth, assent, belief, equipollence, suspension of judgment.
Abstract. This is a defense of Pyrrhonian skepticism against the charge that the suspension of judgment based on equipollence is vitiated by the assent given to the equipollence in question. The apparent conflict has a conceptual side as well as a practical side, examined here as separate challenges with a section devoted to each. The conceptual challenge is that the skeptical transition from an equipollence of arguments to a suspension of judgment is undermined either by a logical contradiction or by an epistemic inconsistency, perhaps by both, because the determination and affirmation of equipollence is itself a judgment of sorts, one that is not suspended. The practical challenge is that, independently of any conceptual confusion or contradiction, suspending judgment in reaction to equipollence evinces doxastic commitment to equipollence, if only because human beings are not capable of making assessments requiring rational determination without believing the corresponding premises and conclusions to be true. The two analytic sections addressing these challenges are preceded by two prefatory sections, one laying out the epistemic process, the other reviewing the evidentiary context. The response from the conceptual perspective is that the suspension of judgment based on equipollence is not a reasoned conclusion adopted as the truth of the matter but a natural reaction to an impression left by the apparently equal weight of opposing arguments. The response from the practical perspective is that the acknowledgment of equipollence is not just an affirmation of the equal weight of arguments but also an admission of inability to decide, suggesting that any assent, express or implied, is thrust upon the Pyrrhonist in a state of epistemic paralysis affecting the will and the intellect on the matter being investigated. This just leaves a deep disagreement, if any, regarding whether equipollence is an inference based on discursive activity or an impression coming from passive receptivity. But this, even if resolved in favor of the critic (which it need not and ought not be), is not the same as confusion or inconsistency on the part of the Pyrrhonist, the demonstration of which is the primary aim of this paper.
Elena Lisanyuk
St-Petersburg State University, e.lisanuk@spbu.ru
Language: English
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 61–77
Keywords: Protagoras, logical paradox, argumentation, agency, action, sophism, consistency.
Abstract. The famous dispute between Protagoras and Euathlus concerning Protagoras’s tuition fee reportedly owed to him by Euathlus is solved on the basis of practical argumentation concerning actions. The dispute is widely viewed as a kind of a logical paradox, and I show that such treating arises due to the double confusion in the dispute narrative. The linguistic expressions used to refer to Protagoras’s, Euathlus’s and the jurors’ actions are confused with these actions themselves. The other confusion is the collision between the pairs of incompatible actions ambiguously expressed by two different pairs of sentences, one of which is a propositionally consistent pair whereas the other is an inconsistent one. The actional (practical) paradox solution aims to clear up these confusions by means of two core borderlines, propositional and expressive, drawn between the actions and the propositions. The propositional distinction says that actions are empirical facts and they lack truth values unlike propositions, which are mental entities and are often employed for referring to the actions. This distinction helps to avoid the confusion between the empirical incompatibility of actions and the truth-functional inconsistency of propositions. The expressive distinction claims that although the same linguistic sentences can be used to refer both to actions and propositions, two empirically incompatible actions can be expressed both by a pair of inconsistent propositions as well as by a pair of consistent ones. Therefore, the action of Protagoras’s being paid may be linguistically symbolized in four different ways: Protagoras gets paid due to the verdict, Protagoras gets paid due to the contract that amount to Protagoras does not get paid by the contract and Protagoras does not get paid by the verdict respectively, and likewise for Euathlus’s actions. The two distinctions are used for classifying the two groups of paradox solutions, legal and logical, proposed so far depending on which of the two confusions they purport to escape from. The actional reconstruction of the paradox suggests that there is only one single agent in the dispute, Protagoras, while the other named Euathlus is a ‘phantom,’ which most probably was invented by Protagoras himself for the sake of creating this challenging sophism.
Alexey Chernyak
Peoples' Friendship University, Moscow, abishot2100@yandex.ru
Language: English
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 78–94
Keywords: Name, meaning, convention, coordination, agreement, impression.
Abstract. According to Aristotle spoken words are signs of impressions, and those words which are used as names have conventional meanings. This theory of meaning poses a problem because it is unclear how exactly impressions which are essentially subjective may be assigned to names conventionally, i.e. due to certain interactions between different persons. In the following article the nature of the problem as well as the most prominent notions of conventions are analyzed: it is shown that considering the ways by which conventions about meanings should be established according to them the problem cannot be eliminated. It is also claimed that this is the problem not only for the particular Aristotle's theory of names, but also a problem for a much wider set of theories of meaning and interpretation.
Andrey Darovskikh
State University of New York at Binghamton, adarovs1@binghamton.edu
Language: English
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 95–116
Keywords: Aristotle, Galen, semen, cause, teleology, biology, medicine, foetus.
Abstract. In this paper, I try to demonstrate how critical empiricism and philosophical reasoning intertwine with each other and affected the development of medicine. It is a case study considering the problems of generation and semen in the writings of Aristotle and Galen via relationship between such concepts as matter, form, movement, change, causes and some others. The main question addressed in the paper is the reason of Galen’s return to Hippocratic paradigm of two-semina (male and female). I argue that the reason is two-fold: 1) Different philosophical reasoning and erroneous understanding of some aspects of Aristotle’s embryological model by Galen. 2) Empirical discoveries, which proved to be wrong. I demonstrate that Galen’s understanding of form/matter relationship, and his view on matter as an underling principle conditioned his understanding of the notion of physical change, that allowed him to speak about conception only as quantitative mixture between equal substrata. Finally, I show that Galen’s view on teleology and his limited understanding of formal/final vs efficient causes and their relationship forced him to claim the inadequacy of Aristotle’s biology and necessitated Galen to introduce emendations in definitions of seminal faculties of genders and reproductive fluids.
Christos Terezis and Lydia Petridou
University of Patras, Greece, terezis@upatras.gr
Language: English
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 117–132
Keywords: Gregorius Palamas, union, distinction, pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite.
Abstract. The issue concerning the real existence of the divine energies and consequently their relation to the divine essence is remarkably important for Christian Metaphysics. This study deals with the way in which Gr. Palamas included in this perspective the theory on unions and distinctions, which derives from Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite’s works, who is considered to be one of the main founders of Christian theology. It is also important to mention that the study deals with matters that, on the one side, have formed a tradition in the history of Christianity and, on the other, are subsumed in the context of the hesychastic controversy of the fourteenth-century, during which the specification of both the similarities and the differences between philosophy and theology was decisively raised.
Igor Tantlevskij
St. Petersburg State University, Russia, tantigor@mail.wplus.net
Language: English
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 133–142
Keywords: Ecclesiastes, Aristotle, eternity and immortality of the spirit/soul, “parts” of the soul, “actual mind”, afterlife requital.
Abstract. Comparing Ecclesiastes’ thoughts attested in Eccl. 3:10–11, 21; 7:29, 8:5–7, 11–14, 11:5, 9, 12:3–7, 14 with Aristotle’s ideas recorded in his treatises On the Soul (II, 2, 413a3–10, 413b24–25; III, 5, 430а22–25; V, 4, 430а1–4), Metaphysics (XII, 1070а26, 1074b1–14), and Nicomachean Ethics (I, 11, 1100a29–30, 1101a35–1101b9; X, 7, 1177a11–1178a8, cf. also Protrepticus, fr. 10c), the author tries to reveal possible parallels in these thinkers’ views on the eternity and immortality of the spirit/soul and posthumous requital in correlation with its rational and moral merits.
Igor Gasparov
Voronezh State Medical University (Russia), gasparov@mail.ru
Language: Russian
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 144–165
Keywords: Aristotle, metaphysics of material constitution, hylomorphism, mereology.
Abstract. In the article I consider various “Aristotelian” solutions to the problem of “material constitution.” First I provide a critical analysis of two solutions recently offered by Michael Rea and Kathrine Koslicki from a broadly Aristotelian perspective by arguing that both accounts of how a material whole could be constituted by its parts fall short from being satisfactory. Then I sketch how the problem in question could be solved in a more adequate way if based on Aristotelian metaphysics.
Valery V. Petroff
Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow)
campas.iph@gmail.com
Language: Russian
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 166–176
Keywords: representations of embodiment, soul, body, metempsychosis, leather garments, weaving the body.
Abstract. The article discusses two traditions of representation of embodiment in anti¬quity and the Middle Ages: the soul’s putting on the body as a vestment and the soul’s weaving its body. With regard to the first tradition the texts of Seneca, Plutarch, Plotinus, Macrobius, Aristides Quintilianus are considered. It is shown that the topic of changing the bodies like garments had been discussed along with the theories of metempsychosis and (among the middle Platonists) the teaching on the soul’s descent from heaven to earth through the planetary spheres. It is pointed out that after Philo had liked the idea of the body as the soul’s robe with the biblical narrative of “leather garments” (Gen 3:21), this theory became widespread and can be found in Irenaeus, Clement, Tertullian, Origen and his followers, including John Scottus Eriugena. With regard to the problems of embodiment, we examine less common views according to which the soul itself makes its own body, weaving it like a tunic. The corresponding arguments by Plato, Porphyry, Origen, Macarius of Egypt / Symeon of Mesopotamia, Proclus of Constantinople are considered. As additional evidence, we discuss the relevant theories of Plotinus, Iamblichus, and John Scott.
Yaroslav Slinin
St Petersburg State University, Russia, slinin@mail.ru
Language: Russian
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 177–184
Key words: logic and semantic conceptions, empty terms, Parmenides, Aristotle, Leibniz.
Abstract. In the paper, we compare Aristotle’s and Parmenides’s views regarding the semantic aspects of logic. In Chapter 10 of Categories Aristotle outlines his logical and semantic conception according to which all affirmative propositions with empty subject terms are false whereas all such negatives are true. The laws of non-contradiction and of identity do not apply to them by virtue of this. Contrary to Aristotle’s conception, Parmenides in his poem On nature insists that since there are no empty terms no complication concerning the laws of logic arises in his approach.
Igor Dmitriev
St. Petersburg State University, Russia, isdmitriev@gmail.com
Language: Russian
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 185–193
Abstract. The historians of science and philosophers widely believe that Galileo refuted the theory of free fall, as set out by Aristotle in his treatises “On the Heavens” and “Physics”. However, a comparative study of the texts of Galileo and Aristotle shows that they a) considered different physical situations and b) differently understood the term “heaviness”. Besides, one can argue that Galileo actually challenged not the real views and statements of Aristotle and his followers, but a simplistic interpretation of them, common from the Middle Ages to the 16th – the beginning of the 17th centuries.
Keywords: classical mechanics, a free fall, experiment, scientific argumentation.
Kirill Rodin
Siberian State University of Telecommunications and Information Sciences
rodin.kir@gmail.com
Language: Russian
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 194–202
Keywords: Wittgenstein, Plato, language-game, dialogical form.
Abstract. Wittgenstein’s Anti-Platonism in a field of ethics, philosophy of religion and philosophy of mathematics is a common place in Wittgenstein studies. But Wittgenstein’s approach to Plato and especially the way Wittgenstein reads Plato’s dialogues are usually dismissed. In the article, I recollect nearly all passages in Wittgenstein’s texts where Wittgenstein gives any quotations from Plato or any comments on Plato and Socrates. I analyze contexts in which these quotations and comments emerge. Then I argue that the only theme Wittgenstein was interested in Plato’s dialogues was the dialogical form itself and that the nature of language or the nature of knowledge (as a part of Platonistic discourse) appears to be of no interest for Wittgenstein.
Irina Protopopova
Russian State University for the Humanities, Moscow, plotinus70@gmail.com
Language: Russian
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 203–207
Keywords: Aristotle, Plato, On the Soul, Metaphysics, soul, movement, noesis.
Abstract. The author attempts to show the way how Aristotle “misunderstands” Plato, taking as an example a fragment from the his treatise “On the Soul” (Arist. De an. 406b-407b). First, Aristotle ascribes to Plato the notions of the soul and mind (νοῦς) as spatial magnitudes, and then demonstrates that the nous may not be a circular spatial movement, since our thinking is actually a sequential logical reasoning. Thus, Aristotle imputes to Plato the judgment, which the latter never formulated, and proceeds to criticize this judgment from his own presumptions about noesis as logical reasoning. However, in Plato, noesis relates to the sphere of nous, being a movement directed to the first principle, while reasoning with its inference belongs to the sphere of dianoia. In assuming here a mere “misunderstanding” between Aristotle and Plato we are nonetheless hampered by the existence of Book 12 of “Metaphysics”, especially its 7th Chapter, where we are told about the Supreme mind and the unmoving Prime mover: this concept, according to the commentators of Aristotle, goes back to Plato's views about nous. Therefore, the mysterious “misunderstanding” requires a separate detailed research, based primarily on the further study of the Lambda.
Roman Svetlov & Valery Savchuk
St. Petersburg State University, Russia, spatha@mail.ru, vvs1771@rambler.ru
Language: Russian
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 208–219
Keywords: Ancient Herms, Moral Philosophy, Iconography of Ancient philosophers.
Abstract. Already in archaic Athens herms can play not only a cult role, but also social and didactic. In Rome herms of philosophers, sages, politicians, demonstrated contradictory unity of wisdom and historical completeness of philosophical tradition - from Greece to Rome. They had not only aesthetic, but also ethical, behavioral and even «mnemonic» value. Double herm of Socrates and Seneca allows us to identify possible ways in which a «visual systematization» of moral philosophical heritage had place in the late Roman culture.
Eugeny A. Makovetsky & Alexander Drikker
St. Petersburg State University, evmak@yandex.ru, asdrikker@mail.ru
Language: Russian
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 220–235
Key words: Zeno of Elea, Zeno's paradoxes, Achilles and the Tortoise, Gothic manuscripts, Gothic drôleries, Knight and Snail, philosopher’s destiny.
Abstract. The well-known Zeno's paradox about Achilles and the Tortoise is considered in the article in comparison to the analysis of a complex of medieval miniatures on which battle of the Knight with a Snail is represented. These images executed in a genre of Gothic grotesque were widespread in the margins of the Western European manuscripts of various contents especially at the end of the 13th – the first quarter of the 14th centuries. In our opinion, hopelessness of both agons (the Knight and the Snail, Achilles and the Tortoise) is a good illustration of some strategies of the relation of the philosopher to the truth.
Alexander Sanzhenakov
Institute of Philosophy and Law, Novosibirsk, Russia, sanzhenakov@gmail.com
Language: Russian
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 236–244
Keywords: Art of living, care of the self, Stoics, M. Foucault, techniques of self.
Abstract. The article focuses on the Stoic notion of “art of living”. First of all, I discuss the Socratic phrase “art that one used for taking pains over oneself”, which is a prototype of the studied concept. Then I shows that Socratic normative requirement to take care of one’s own soul was taken up by the Stoics and equipped with a clear perception of the conditions of its practicability. These perceptions have appeared thanks to the Zeno’s definition of art as a ‘system of concepts’. However, the mechanism of its realization remained obscured due to the rigor of early Stoic doctrine. Only the Roman Stoicism, especially this of Seneca, was able to develop the “art of living” as a theoretical and practical concept.
Maya Petrova
Institute of World History RAS (Moscow), mayapetrova@yandex.ru
Language: Russian
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 245–259
Keywords: medieval manuscripts, Macrobius, interpretation, corrections.
Abstract. The paper treats the manuscript tradition of Macrobius’ Commentary on the ‘Dream of Scipio’; the characteristic features of MS Parisinus Latinus 6370, which have laid the basis for modern critical editions of the text, are under consideration.
Nikola D. Lečić
National Research University Higher School of Economics (Moscow, Russia), nlecic@hse.ru
Language: Russian
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 260–270
Keywords: Eurytus of Tarentum, Early Pythagoreans, limit, boundary, definition.
Abstract. This article attempts to reconsider the customary assessment of the performances attributed to one of the last Early Pythagoreans, Eurytus of Tarentum. His practice of «defining» a thing with the number of pebbles needed to draw its silhouette is usually regarded as a naïve or unworthy version of the number philosophy of his teacher, Philolaus of Croton. Our approach focuses on the concept of the limit, or the boundary (ὅρος), used by Aristotle to explain Eurytus' practice, which we analyse in the context of Aristotle's testimonies distinguishing Early Pythagoreanism from its interpretations in the Early Academy. We strive to show that the idea underlying Eurytus' performances deserves more appreciation in the context of Presocratic Philosophy, and to lay a basis for an alternative approach to the interpretation of this practice.
TRANSLATIONS
Eugene Afonasin, translation and comments
The Institute of World History (Moscow), Novosibirsk State University, Russia,
afonasin@post.nsu.ru
Language: Russian
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 10.1 (2016) 271–282
Keywords: the school of Aristotle, ancient biography, doxography, the seven sages, Socrates, Pythagoras, Plato, Academy.
Abstract. The Peripatetic Dicaearchus composed a series of works dedicated to the intellectual history of Greece. In a sense, he was the first ancient author to write a comprehensive history of philosophy, centered on such key figures, as the Seven Sages, Pythagoras, Socrates, and Plato. The sages are known for their highly practical maxims and general rules of right conduct; Pythagoras developed a new lifestyle and promulgated it in his public and private teaching; Socrates introduced a new form of intellectual and moral pursuit; while Plato founded an institutional framework for philosophical studies having thus paved the way to a systematic research, conducted by the Peripatetics. The evidences are translated on the basis of a new edition of Dicaearchus’ fragments, prepared by Mirhady (2001).
REVIEWS AND BIBLIOGRAPHY
Mikhail Egorochkin
RAS Institute of World History, Institute of Philosophy (Moscow)
egorochkin@torba.com
Language: Russian
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 283–291
Keywords: Aristotle, Constitution of Athens, classics in Russia.
Abstract. The discovery of Aristotle’s Constitution of Athens was one of the highlights of the late 19th century. Following the first London edition in 1891 there appeared numerous translations of the treatise, as well as a lot of scientific literature. History of the Constitution of Athens’s study in the late 19th – the first half of 20th century is of special interest, particularly in Russia, as far as the numerous publications on the treatise constitute the best chapter in the history of Russian Aristotelian studies. This paper intends to offer a comprehensive list of translations and studies of the Constitution of Athens, published in Russia from 1891 to 1937.
Svetlana Berdaus
Institute of philosophy and law, Novosibirsk, Russia, s.berdaus@yandex.ru
Language: Russian
Issue: ΣΧΟΛΗ 11.1 (2017) 292–294
Keywords: classics in Russia, scientific journals, the history of classical scholarship in Russia.
Abstract. A review on an annotated bibliography of the works dedicated to Antiquity, published in the Zhurnal ministerstva narodnogo prosveshcheniya from 1834 to 1917, prefaced, collected and annotated by A. I. Ruban and E. Yu. Basargina. St. Petersburg, 2015.
