Let us begin with community, in Greek, KOINONIA.

    Of course, there are different kinds of communities
                (and Aristotlke would, of course, be interested in the different kinds).

                                                                koinonia
                                                      the community aspect

                                dikaiosune                                             philia
                            aspect of justice                         aspect of "social sympathy"

Particular kinds of friendships correspond to particular kinds of associations.

"Without friends, no one would choose to live. . . . The truest form of justice has a friendly quality."
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Philia, in the widest sense, is well named "social sympathy" -- we find this among animals as
                                                                                                                well as humans.

                                                                                                                     equal philia
Philia, in the narrower sense, refers to human friendships. There can be
                                                                                                                     unequal philia

In friendships of equality, the same things is given and received.

What are these "same things"?

                                    the good (which includes the useful and pleasant)

                                    utility/ usefulness

                                    pleasure

The best friendship is based on the good, on virtue. Persons who are good and alike in virtue; each wish the other well for the other’s own sake. Such friendship is mutual (or reciprocal) and must be mutually recognized and it seems relatively permanent. Such friends desire to spend time together and share their life. Such friends are good-tempered and pleasant.

    Friendship is both necessary and noble.
                Necessary for rich and poor, young and old, parents and children, state and individual.
                Noble because we praise friendship and believe that good persons are also good friends.

Besides the state of friendship, there is also friendship as an activity. The activity of friendship involves choice, choice springing from a state of character [etc.]. There is also friendliness as a feeling.

Note:  Confucius (Master K'ung) lived in China in an earlier period,  600 - 500 BCE -- the time of the pre-socratics in Greece.  Aristotle d. 322 BCE.

    Confucius distinguishes five key relationships:

           in the world beyond the family ---leader-follower

(to which we could add all kinds of institutional relationships: employer-employee,  teacher-student, doctor-patient, lawyer-client, colleague-colleague, etc.)

  in the world of the family     --   mother/father -- son/daughter
                                                  spouse - spouse (husband-wife)
                                                  elder brother/sister - younger brother/sister

For Confucius, all are reciprocal but only in friendship is the same thing given and received.  Only friendship is outside the domains of duties.

    For each of the relationships, the Confucian tradition specifies a virtue:

        Thus,     for Leader-Follower (e.g. Ruler-Minister), the virtue is righteousness (yi).

                       for Parent - Child , the viture is affection  (ch'in).

                       for Husband-Wife, the virtue is separate function (pieh).

                      for Elder Sibling-Younger Sibling, the virtue is order (hsu -- with umlaut --
                                                                                                                        double dots --
                                                                                                                 over the letter "u").

                      for Friend-Friend, the virtue is faithfulness  (hsin).
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Back to Aristotle:

Special cases:

        1) When the motives (pleasure, utility, the good) are different.

        2) When there are conflicts

        3) Occasions for breaking off friendships: Suppose one becomes worse: if capable of reform, better to aid; still one does no wrong in breaking off the friendship. Suppose one becomes better?

A new notion enters -- equity ( epieikeia )

            We see so far Aristotle’s key notions: eudamonia, arete as a habit of character, the doctrine of appropriateness, justice, and friendship. Aristotle also writes about equity (epieikeia) which is not outside of the law in its best sense but is within the law (part of its "ideal element" as 20th century jurist Roscoe Pound might say). Equity for Aristotle is within the law and is a corrective of justice when to apply the rules of justice rigidly would not produce justice in its highest and best form.

In the Rhetoric, I, 13, 17-19, we read:

It is equitable to pardon human failings
and to look to the lawgiver and not to the law,
to the spirit and not to the letter,
to the intention and not to the action,
to the whole and not to the part,
to the character of the agent in the long run and not in the present moment,
to remember good rather than evil
and good that one has received rather than good that one has done,
to be patient under wrong,
to wish to settle the matter by words rather than by deeds;
lastly to prefer arbitration to judgment,
for the arbitrator sees what is equitable but the judge only the law,
and for this an arbitrator was first appointed that equity may flourish.

There is a perfect harmony between Aristotle’s ethical, legal and political theory --
the theory of the right mean is the basis; philia, social sympathy, is the life force;
equity, fairness, reasonableness and humaneness the leitmotiv; and
well-being [eudaimonia], i.e. human happiness and perfection, the supreme end." (p. 183)

                                                        Types of Constitutions

      Generic type             Best form                        Worst form                    Similar to

        one person                 Monarchy                       Tyranny                         father/son

        a few persons            Aristocracy                     Oligarchy                         man/wife
                                (based on worth, virtue)

       many people              Timocracy                        Democracy                    sibling/sibling
(here he means majority
of property holders)

Winston Churchill called democracy the worst form of government unless you consider all the other forms! [He is thinking of elected representative democracy] Aristotle was somewhat like him in that he thought democracy was the best of the worst forms of government. [He is thinking of a form where people "rule and are ruled in turn."]
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The Continuity of Ethics and Politics in the Ancient World:

        Aristotle’s ethics and politics are linked -- a kind of matched pair.  So it was for most of the ancients:  personal development was for the sake of human flourishing and human florishing was seen as possible only in a community, a political community, a POLIS.

        After all, Aristotle said each person is a “Zoon Politicon.”  This is often translated Political Animal.  I think it better to say humans are the kind of beings whose proper habitat is the polis.  ZOON POLITICON.

    In China, both Lao Tzu (the legendary founder of Taist thought) and Confucius (the founder of the Confucian tradition) also held that personal development flowered into leadership.

    Eastern wisdom traditions see two paths to greatness -- the Sage and the Ruler.  Yet in a balanced way, both aspects -- what I call stillness and service -- need to be present in a complete life.  This addition of a meditative component does not make its presence felt in Greek thought. Yet it occurs in Taoist thought and in Confucius thought and in the Eightfold Path of Buddhism.  Inward stillness and outward service.   An old Chinese adage: "Sheng, nei; wang wai" puts them together.  The phrase may be translated:

        The Sage, within; the King, without.  or

        Sageliness as the inward core and Kingliness as the outward expression. or yet again

        Sagely Stillness within; Sovereign Service without.   (JGS)
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                                                           SOCRATES
 

                                    PLATO                                     ARISTOTLE
 

1.  Both Plato and Aristotle advance a Philosophy of Aspiration --

                        Goal-directed thinking -- that is,

    Ends more important than starting points;
    Kinds and qualities more important than material stuff.

             For both, the object of true knowledge is

              Universal,

                       Necessary,

                                Certain,

                                         Eternal or Unchanging.

True enough, "where" they place the Forms or True Nature of Things will differ.

            Plato gives these archetypes a kind of independent existence. The Pattern of the True Nature of Things has a more permanent and fuller bodied reality than the sensibles that imperfectly gain the realityt they have from "participating" in the forms.

            Aristotle takes the concrete individual substance as primary.  The form -- or kind of being -- or nature of the individual substance is found "within it" somewhat as today we speak of the nature of humans as encoded in our DNA.  Aristotle speaks of the formal cause expressible as a true definition by genus and species.  Thus, for aristotle too, knowledge is not of the individual "specimen" but rather of what all such specimens have in common the nature of the species.  Thus, the biologist does not study "harry" -- this individual frog; the biologist studies "frogness" -- the kind of being frogs are. And the biologist studies the frog nature not only statically (as a classification) togeher with the material components -- formal and material causes.  the biologist also studies frogs in what we call today a developmental perspective -- how they grow from a seed (union of sperm and ovum) to their mature state.  Aristotle speaks of this more dynamic aspect of beings under the heading of the efficient cause (how they came to be) and the final cause (what their healthy mature state is).

            So no matter "where" they place natures, it is natures that both believe knowing is directed to.  And such natures are seen as universal (e.g. found in all frogs), necessary (e.g. the frog is what it is necessarily), certain and eternal.

            Neither Plato nor Aristotle have an evolutionary notion -- that forms -- the nature of beings -- can evolve.

            Philosopher / theologian Bernard Lonergan distinguishes between classical consciousness and historical consciousness.

            Classical consciousness sees what is most real as UNC-Eternalsville -- in my rendering of Lonergan!

            Historical consciousness --which comes to fruition in the 19th and 20th centuries -- sees "science" differently -- especially the study of human beings who embody meaning and value dimensions -- think of psychology, sociology, anthropology and modern history.

            Thus, for such disciplines, study looks not to what is universal but more often to what is distinctive of particular times and places and cultures.

            For such disciplines, study seeks not the necessary (as geometry does) but is content with  the contingent -- what as a matter of fact happens, not what necessarily has to happen.

             For such disciplines, study seeks not the certain, but is content with the highly probable.

             For such disciplines, study seeks not the eternal and unchanging, but what alters over time and changes.  It is content, we might say, with the temporal and with change.

            From this longer viewpoint, both Plato and Aristotle share a classical consciousness.

                                                                                                             John G. Sullivan

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