A DCAMP Symposium for the 2018 BSHP Conference in Durham

One of the chief topics of discussion n ancient moral philosophy is the degree to which ethical dispositions – habits of behaviour – are cognitively informed. At one extreme, Plato, an a common (although not uncontested) reading, distinguishes sharply between rational and non-rational parts of the soul, and in consequence between the nature and conditions for ethical and intellectual virtue. But if actions always involve the decision to act, then habits of action might depend on, or even boil down to, habits of thought. This panel explores this topic beginning from the provocative view of Diodorus Cronus (a rough contemporary of Aristotle’s), who seems committed to the position that a ‘habit’ can be no more than a generalisation over the choices one makes from time to time, eliminating the ‘reality’ of moral dispositions. Three papers explore responses to this thought in the reception-tradition of Aristotelian moral philosophy, first in the Platonism of later antiquity, and then in the writings of Robert Grosseteste. They variously explore how moral habit (a real disposition to act in a certain way) might be seen to depend on the prior acquisition of habits of thought, and how the analysis of moral and cognitive ‘habit’ might prove mutually illuminating.

This panel showcases the work of the Durham Centre for Ancient and Medieval Philosophy (dcamp.uk ), and the AHRC-funded Ordered Universe project (ordered-universe.com), which is partly based in Durham.

Paper 1: Epictetus’ use of Diodorus Cronus on habit

Dr Matthew Duncombe

Here is an intuitive account of habit: a habit is a disposition acquired by repeated action. Cycling to work is a habit, a disposition which one acquires by repeatedly cycling to work. That is, a habit is a modal property (a disposition to cycle to work) acquired by repeatedly instantiating a non-modal property (actually cycling to work). Epictetus discusses habits at Diss. 2.18, before recording Diodorus Cronus’ celebrated Master Argument. Diodorus was well known for his accounts of actuality and modality so it is likely that Epictetus intends some relation between these ideas. The question is: what?

There is something puzzling about Epictetus’ discussion of the acquisition and loss of habits. Epictetus repeatedly asserts that he can gain or lose a habit simply by acting in a certain way. Epictetus thinks he can lose the habit of anger simply by not becoming angry; or can lose the habit of libidinousness simply by refraining from lust (Diss. 2.18). But anyone who has quit smoking – or anger or lust, for that matter – will tell you it is not so easy to lose a habit! The appeal to Diodorus Cronus can explain Epictetus’ attitude. Diodorus Cronus, like Aristotle’s generic Megaric philosophers (Met. Theta), is an actualist. Actualism is the view that any modal feature just is a non-modal feature. Epictetus attributes to Diodorus a specific form of actualism namely, the thesis (D): nothing is possible (dunaton) which is neither true nor will be (Epic. Diss. 2.19.5 = Döring 131). Hence, what I am disposed to do, I either am doing or will be doing. If Epictetus has a Diodorean actualism in mind, his account of habit acquisition and loss makes sense. According to Diodorus’ account there are only non-modal properties. Hence, the fact that I am disposed to cycle to work just turns out to be the fact that I either do cycle to work or I will cycle to work. So there just is nothing more to the habit than the repeated action. Hence there is nothing more to gaining or losing a habit that acting in a certain way or not acting in that way. Which is precisely what Epictetus assumed. This move has costs. First, the intuitive definition – tat a habit is a disposition acquired by repeated action – must be modified. A habit turns out to simply be the repeated actions, as dispositions collapse into repeated actions. On the other hand, it implies an optimism about our autonomy over our habits – that I can change my habits just by acting differently.

 

Paper 2: Middle Platonists in the world: on why Plato teaches us how to behave

Dr Federico M. Petrucci

Post-Hellenistic Platonism is usually regarded as characterised by a strong interest in theological and cosmological matters; in consequence, practical and political aspects of Middle Platonist thought are often taken to be negligible, if not completely missing. Of course, this view has some good grounds, especially if one considers extant exegetical sources: apparently, even when Middle Platonists deal with ethics, they do by taking cosmological doctrines as its cornerstones. In this paper I want to claim that this view is somewhat misleading by highlighting intriguing cases of Middle Platonist arguments concerning practical habits and behaviours, and by showing why they are included in Platonist ethics. In order to do that, I shall focus on Plutarch and Taurus of Beirut. As to Plutarch, I shall analyse the strategy through which he spells out an ethically correct way to enjoy the experience of music: far from banning in general music from people’s practical life, Plutarch establishes criteria according to which one can enjoy music and indicates how this can lead people towards correct behaviour. Then, I shall focus on a neglected witness to the ethics of Taurus of Beirut, in which one can detect some clear indication about a correct way of drinking wine and the reasons why this is important for ethical education. It will emerge that both Platonists have exegetical grounds for their points, but also that these references are selected according to a precise philosophical commitment, namely providing people with directions to orient their habits. I shall finally emphasise why Platonists engage in such specific discussion of habit, namely, the need of providing Platonist ethics with a very practical side which allows it to compete with other schools, especially the Stoa, in the Imperial age.

 

Paper 3: Aristotle’s natural philosophy in the early works of Robert Grosseteste

Dr Sigbjorn Sonnesyn

It has long been known that Robert Grosseteste played an important part in the reception of the full corpus of Aristotelian texts. His commentary on the Physics is one of the earliest such commentaries in the Latin West; his commentary on the Posterior Analytics was recognised as a brilliant guide to the complexities of Aristotle’s dialectics; and his translation of the Nicomachean Ethics was recognised as a masterpiece. The influence of Aristotle’s natural philosophy can be seen in Grosseteste’s cosmology, and his accounts of natural causation within various spheres of the natural world. Crucially for the theme of the present conference, Grosseteste’s mature texts discussing the acquisition and organization of knowledge, such as the commentary on the Posterior Analytics, portray the acquisition of knowledge as the outcome of repeated and directed experiences. While these experiences have sometimes been interpreted as prototypes of modern scientific experiments, it may be argued that they may be more akin to habits in the Aristotelian sense – that is, that they constitute deliberate repetitions of actions that gradually change the soul in a pre-intended way. This interpretation might allow for a tighter integration of the scientific corpus to the rest of Grosseteste’s works, such as his pastoral and speculative theology and his later work on Aristotelian ethics.

Such a synthetic argument concerning Grosseteste’s oeuvre as a whole cannot be made without a new appraisal of Aristotle’s influence on Grosseteste’s thinking. This paper seeks to contribute to such a re-appraisal. The earliest texts attributed to Grosseteste have been regarded by scholarship as prior to Grosseteste’s direct study of Aristotle. This paper challenges this view. Some firm evidence can be found in Grosseteste’s earliest works of familiarities with the translations from the Greek of the Physics and On the Soul by James of Venice, and there are tantalizing hints of a more profound influence than mere verbal borrowings can demonstrate. This paper explores this evidence, in both verbal and conceptual terms, and provides an account of what can be demonstrated and what may be suggested in terms of Aristotle’s influence on the earliest texts by Grosseteste. These early texts arguably offer a unique glimpse of the earlies reception of direct influence from Aristotelian natural philosophy on intellectual life in England. Particular attention will be given to the extent to which the acquisition of knowledge as described or alluded to in Grosseteste’s earlier works can be seen to be influenced by Aristotle’s notion of habits of the soul as delineated in his On the Soul.

 

Paper 4: Robert Grosseteste and the Liberal Arts

Dr Giles Gasper

This paper presents the much under-discussed treatise by Robert Grosseteste On the Liberal Arts. Widely accounted as his first work, the treatise dates, probably, from the end of the twelfth and beginning of the thirteenth centuries. In it Grosseteste questions and re-thinks the traditional schema of the liberal arts, setting up many questions, especially of movement and perception (notably the combination of aspectus and affectus), that he explores in his later works. This includes especially those amongst the shorter scientific works, and his engagement with the newly translated corpus of Aristotelian and ancient Greek astronomical / astrological works in the first decades of the thirteenth century. The habits of mind that the treatise introduces can be traced throughout the rest of Grosseteste’s writing.

The historical context for the treatise is intriguing, not least for the opportunity it offers to reconstruct the development of mental habit. As is not uncommon with medieval thinkers little is known of Grosseteste’s early life. In the case of On the Liberal Arts a more than circumstantial case can be made for the Cathedral city of Hereford in the west of England as the location, if not for the composition of the treatise then certainly as inspiration for its contents. The scholarly institutions of the city, the interests of a number of scholars active in or associated with Hereford, with works in both Latin and Anglo-Norman all align with the themes of Grossetetse’s treatise. In presenting and analysing these connections, and the wider implications of this beguiling and under-studied treatise, its importance may be better appreciated. The work on which this paper is based represents a multi-disciplinary, international study of Grosseteste’s shorter scientific works, The Ordered Universe research project, based at the Universities of Durham, Oxford, York, Lincoln, Rome ‘Tor Vergata’, Montreal and Georgetown Universities and the American University of Beirut.