emotions in ancient and medieval philosophy sep 2004

[...]... the emotions suggested in the Phaedrus was qualified by the Phileban conception of emotions, since as mixtures of pleasure and distress they were problematic and not very reliable sources of information Aristotle was not inclined to seek the meaning and end of life outside it, as Plato did, and correspondingly he did not think that detachment from appreciating contingent things and from associated emotions. .. (3) mistaking a neutral intermediate state for pleasure (42c– 44b), and (4) falsity arising from the mistaken understanding of a mixed condition (44c–50d) The discussion begins with some terminological remarks Plato first distinguishes the pleasures and pains attached to actual bodily events from the pleasures and pains which are felt in anticipating such pleasures and pains (31d–32d) Anticipating a pleasure... discussed in practical philosophy, and that it is worthwhile analysing the cognitive content and motivating functions of emotions (EN 2.6–8) Socially learned emotional paradigms played an important role in Aristotle’s theory of moral education: its main question was how to train and instruct young people to join in the emotional patterns of culture in such a way that the habits of feelings and emotions. .. emotions in ancient philosophy, since it was realized that many central questions had already been discussed in classical texts There has not been a similar boom in studies of emotions in medieval philosophy, though this is also a topic of considerable philosophical interest In Chapters 1 and 2 I shall discuss ancient philosophical theories of emotions, their impact on early Christian literature, and. .. as described in Book 2 of the Laws.26 In the Phaedrus, Plato paid attention to the subjective feeling of love, and even later considered the question of the nature of feeling in emotions to be a philosophically interesting subject Let us have a look at this part of Plato’s theory 1.3 Feeling and Emotion in the Philebus Plato begins his discussion of the bodily pleasures and pains by remarking that they... Christian doctrine of sin, it gave rise to minute investigations of the voluntariness and involuntariness of emotional reactions and to conceptual analyses of the concept of will Some of these were codified in twelfth-century discussions of the logic of will Another influential early medieval issue was a continuation of ancient theories of spiritual experiences The philosophically interesting aspect of... is capable of sharing in it, and since he always looks after the divine part in himself and respects his inner daimon, he will be happy (eudaimon) above all ¯ ¯ others (Timaeus 90b–d) In the Phaedrus Plato gave erotic love a special epistemic and edifying role, and it seems that this more clear-cut view of emotions as cognitive phenomena deepened his interest in the psychology of emotions even after... it involves a greater variety of desires People guided by their animal desires sway to and fro according to pushes and pulls initiated by changes in their bodies and in 2 See M C Nussbaum, The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 151–2; A W Price, Mental Conflict (London: Routledge, 1995), 36–40 8 Emotions in Ancient Philosophy. .. Emotions in Ancient Philosophy 9 Plato treated the three parts of the soul as if they were three separate agents, one striving for knowledge and understanding, one for immediate sensual satisfaction, and a third one which may become habituated to helping one or the other in their strivings Although Plato stressed the differences between the reasoning and the non-reasoning parts, he did not think that... Philebus (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1993), pp xlv–xlviii 33 Emotions in Ancient Philosophy 23 which are intensified by pain The discussion of emotions which are associated with poetry purports to exemplify the second group According to Plato, anger, fear, longing, lamentation, love, jealousy, and envy are emotions each of which is actual within the soul as a distress mingled with a pleasure (47d–50d) In this . y0 w0 h0" alt="" EMOTIONS IN ANCIENT AND MEDIEVAL PHILOSOPHY Emotions are the focus of intense debate both in contemporary philosophy and psychology and increasingly also in the history of ideas Ethics and the Philosophy of Religion at the University of Helsinki, and Research Professor at the Academy of Finland . This page intentionally left blank Emotions in Ancient and Medieval Philosophy SIMO. 205 3.4 Emotions in Medical Theories 212 3.5 Emotions in Avicenna’s Psychology 218 3.6 Emotions in Early Thirteenth-Century Philosophy 226 3.7 Emotions in Albert the Great 236 3.8 Aquinas on Emotions