28017 - History of Ancient Philosophy (1) (LM)

Learning outcomes

Three main objectives: (1) philological: to provide the essential tools for the study of ancient Greek and Roman philosophy; (2) dialectical: train to the discussion of a philosophical problem by examining ancient solutions compared to other solutions, particularly in modern and contemporary philosophy; (3) rhetorical: to provide a philosophical writing method aimed at preparing a written exercise on ancient philosophy.

Course contents

The Ethics of Happiness: Aristotle's Contribution to the Contemporary Debate

First Semester, First Period: September 24-October 31, 2019.
Hours: Tuesday, 3-5pm, Classroom C (Via Zamboni, 34); Thursday, 11am-1pm, and Friday, 11am-1pm, Classroom C (Via Zamboni, 34).

Start: Tuesday, October 1, 2019, 3pm, Classroom C (via Zamboni, 34).

 

The moments of happiness – not the sense of well-being,

Fruition, fulfilment, security of affection,

Or even a very good dinner, but the sudden illumination –

We had the experience but missed the meaning.

T. S. Eliot, Four Quartets, III: The Dry Salvages

 

It has always been a shared opinion that happiness is something of the utmost importance, if not the most important thing of all: this is what Plato thought ("it’s the ownership of good things that makes happy people happy; and you don’t need to ask the further question, 'Why does someone want to be happy?’ This answer seems to mark the end of the enquiry", Smp. 204e-205a); and what Ludwig Wittgenstein also thought many centuries later ("And if I now ask myself: but why should I live happily, then this of itself seems to me to be a tautological question; the happy life seems to be justified of itself, it seems that it is the only right life" (Notebooks 1914-1916, 30.7.16). However, at least at first glance, Augustine’s remarks about time also seem to be true of happiness: ‘What, then, is time? If no one asks me, I know; if I want to explain it to someone who asks me, I do not know anymore’ (Conf. XI xiv 17). In the course of our lives, all of us have experienced something that, if asked, we would call happiness. For example we say that we have lived happy moments, periods or years, and so on, thus making very common use of the adjective ‘happy’. But if we were asked ‘What is happiness?’ perhaps we would not be so quick to respond, or, in attempting to do so, we would realise how difficult this question is to answer. Happiness is one of those things we think we know about until someone asks us what it is, and at that moment we realise that actually we are ignorant of it. This kind of question raises what Wittgenstein considered an eminently philosophical problem. But this philosophical problem seems to be both a practical problem: if I do not know what happiness is exactly, yet I consider it to be one of the most important – if not the most important – things, how do I pursue it? How do I direct my research without pursuing false goals that could irreparably compromise the quality of my life?

The ancient Greeks spoke not of happiness but of eudaimonia, something analogous to, but also profoundly different from our happiness. Aristotle founded the first whole ethics on this concept, giving it a definition that for our common sense is the most distant and paradoxical. Nevertheless, the Aristotelian arguments have been and still are at the center of the contemporary debate on the issue, influencing above all the orientation of the normative ethics known as Virtue Ethics, and in particular as Eudaimonistic Virtue Ethics, distinguishing itself from deontology and utilitarianism. The aim of these fifteen lessons is therefore to take up a double challenge: first, to show to what extent is the Aristotelian analysis of eudaimonia also a good analysis of the contemporary concept – or concepts – of happiness that could reveal to us a clearer path to follow in order to be happy; and, at the same time, giving back to the voice of Aristotle a role in the contemporary debate that is not only instrumental, through the slow reading of some significant passages of the Nicomachean Ethics.

Readings/Bibliography

• Aristotele, Etica Nicomachea, edited by Carlo Natali, Roma-Bari: Laterza, 1999.
• Capuccino, Carlotta, Aristotele e l’etica della felicità: Etica Nicomachea I, «Philosophia», XII-XIII (2015) 1-2, pp. 23-75.
• Sumner, L. Wayne, Happiness Now and Then, in L. J. Jost, R. A. Shiner (ed.), Eudaimonia and Well Being: Ancient and Modern Conceptions, Kelowna, BC: Academic Printing & Publishing, 2002, pp. 22-39.
• Tatarkiewicz, Wladyslaw, Analisi della felicità (1976), translated by S. Melani, Napoli: Guida, 1985.

* Further readings will be suggested in class.

Teaching methods

LECTURES COURSE (12 lectures)

Adopted methods:

• Slow reading of the sources in the original language and through a comparison of translations.
• Linguistic analysis and semantic fields.
• Argumentative analysis and short essays (pensum).

PHILOSOPHICAL WRITING SEMINAR (3 lectures)

• Editing guidelines.
• Reading essay of an ancient work: form and contents.

Assessment methods

The exam (6 credits) includes (1) a paper of 10/15 standard pages, to be drawn up according to the instructions of the writing seminar to be held during the last three lessons of the course, and (2) an oral interview. The paper will be delivered about one month before each exam call on the reported date; individual interviews will take place according to a calendar that will be published on the teacher's web page a week before the call and will provide a discussion of the paper and the study of the topics covered in class through a list of 10 questions distributed at the end of the lessons. Students who have never taken an exam in the History of Ancient Philosophy in their career will, in addition, establish with the teacher the study of an adequate historical-philosophical profile.

It is possible to take a 12 cfu exam by attending in addition to the course of lectures (SFA [1] LM) the 30 hours of the reading seminar of an ancient work held by Prof. Walter Cavini between April and June (SFA [2] LM). Seminar attendance, after an individual interview on a date to be defined, requires an active and constant participation, which includes the presentation of a single session of the seminar (with the distribution of a handout) and the contribution to the common discussion of each session. The oral exam is the same; the paper can be done on the topics of the course or of the seminar, as desired, and will be delivered on the scheduled date together with a revised and corrected copy of the handout.

PROGRAMME FOR NON-ATTENDING STUDENTS

Students who cannot attend for motivated reasons will have to establish an alternative programme with their teacher during office hours.

Teaching tools

• Handout with passages taken from the sources.
• Diagrams of partition and concept maps.
• Handbooks: (1) Editing guidelines for a short essay; (2) Philosophical writing seminar.

* All materials will be screened during lessons and made available to students in .pdf format.

• Web pages.
• Databases and bibliographical repertoires.

Office hours

See the website of Carlotta Capuccino