
Contents
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3.1. Introduction 3.1. Introduction
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3.2. Practical vs. Theoretical Knowledge 3.2. Practical vs. Theoretical Knowledge
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3.3. The Highest Good, Happiness, and Virtue 3.3. The Highest Good, Happiness, and Virtue
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3.4. Two Happy Lives, Two Happinesses: The Contemplative and the Practically Active Lives 3.4. Two Happy Lives, Two Happinesses: The Contemplative and the Practically Active Lives
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3.5. Theoretical vs. Practical Virtue as Highest Good 3.5. Theoretical vs. Practical Virtue as Highest Good
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3.6. The Practical Virtues: General Account 3.6. The Practical Virtues: General Account
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3.7. The Specific Practical Virtues 3.7. The Specific Practical Virtues
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3.8. Practical Knowledge and Ethical “Theory” 3.8. Practical Knowledge and Ethical “Theory”
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3.9. Political Community and the Highest Good 3.9. Political Community and the Highest Good
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3.10. Conclusion: Philosophy as Two Ways of Life 3.10. Conclusion: Philosophy as Two Ways of Life
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3 Aristotle: Philosophy as Two Ways of Life
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Published:May 2012
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Abstract
This chapter discusses the Aristotelian way of life. For Aristotle, philosophy is not a way of life, as it was for Socrates. It is two distinct ones. Aristotle's contemplatives are, of course, complete philosophers. They lead lives of practical virtue in just the way other private citizens who possess those virtues in full measure do. The contemplative is both a philosopher of human affairs and a theoretical philosopher. Contemplatives live their philosophy in a double way. Still, the life they lead is correctly called a contemplative one, not one of practical virtue. It is one of the two ways that for Aristotle philosophy is a way of life. But for those “philosophers of human affairs”—virtuous political leaders, fully virtuous ordinary citizens—who are not also accomplished theoretical philosophers, philosophy is nonetheless just as much their way of life. The thinking and analysis and systematic argument, and systematically organized understanding, that belong to philosophy as a whole, both practical and theoretical, as its defining and distinctive characteristic, are engaged and expressed in all the thoughts that give rise to and direct all the choices, actions, and activities constituting the whole of their lives.
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