Tagged: aristotle

Here Comes My Ride (It’s Aristotle)

If you have perused sculpture, paintings, and other forms of art from the Northern Renaissance, you may have stumbled upon imagery of a woman riding sidesaddle on the back of none other than the philosopher Aristotle. Bedecked in fine garments (most of the time, anyway), she is Phyllis, said to be the mistress or wife […]

Life Advice from Aristotle

In his first vlog on his Youtube channel The Classiest Beard (and yes, before you ask, it is indeed classy), Philosophy major and Core-ier Juan Andres Cabrera Saturno condenses Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics into eight pieces of advice on leading a great life. Needless to say, we had to share this on the Core Blog! CC102 […]

A Core joke for Thursday

Professor: “Have you finished reading the Nicomachean Ethics yet?” Student: “No, I’m waiting for them to turn it into a movie.” _ _ _ _ _ _ _ NB: When your humble blog author read this joke aloud in the Core office, the workstudy student on duty said: “That’s so typical.”

Picturing a Core discussion

In May 2011, a photographer visited Prof. Eckel’s CC102 seminar classroom. His pictures capture, vividly, the thrill and pleasure of deep, intellectual engagement that shows in the faces of Prof. Eckel and his students as they discuss Socrates. Photos by Kal Zabarsky (c) BU Photo Services. Click here to see the full set of photos […]

Should virtue be pleasurable?

In his lecture last week for CC102 on Aristotle’s concept of virtue, Prof. David Bronstein made a fascinating point about Aristotle’s understanding of the relationship between virtue and pleasure. Prof. Bronstein explains: Does it feel good to be virtuous? Hear what Aristotle has to say: We may even go so far as to state that […]

Analects of the Core: Aristotle on friendship and justice

Between friends there is no need for justice, but people who are just still need the quality of friendship; and indeed friendliness is considered to be justice in the fullest sense. It is not only a necessary thing but a splendid one. — Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics

Analects of the Core: Aristotle on happiness

Try not to fret in this frozen city, Aristotle can help you find happiness without (much) reference to the weather: For some people think that happiness is a virtue, others that it is practical wisdom, others that it is some kind of theoretical wisdom; others again believe it to be all or some of these […]

Analects of the Core: Aristotle on democracy

In anticipation of the debate on democracy being presented in CC101, consider this point made by Aristotle in Politics: In a democracy the poor will have more power than the rich, because there are more of them, and the will of the majority is supreme. Is there any way this can be critiqued?  Offer your […]

The value of happiness

Alumni of CC204 will take special interest in this piece at Huffington Post, where Leah Finnegan looks at a new study suggesting a measurable price on day-to-day happiness: Not having enough money causes emotional pain and unhappiness, the researchers found. But the happiness tipping point is about $75,000 – more money than that doesn’t make […]