ON ETHICS AS FIRST PHILOSOPHY

By reference to the ethical treatises and the Politics, but also to other texts of the Aristotelian corpus (most notably, the Metaphysics and the treatises of the Organon), the present study undertakes to demonstrate the indissoluble intertwinement of practical and theoretical wisdom (phronēsis and sophia as well as, concomitantly, praxis and theōria) in Aristotle's thinking. In this manner, I propose that sophia, theoretical wisdom, far from an autonomous and separate pursuit, should be acknowledged as integrally involved in becoming, sensibility, experience, and, hence, action. Of course, this line of inquiry cannot but address critically the established view of the separation, indeed the opposition of the two modes of reason. Such a dichotomous logic is retained even by those who, like Arendt and Gadamer, variously emphasize the practical over against the theoretical and do so by merely inverting the order of the hierarchy. However, the point is not to respond to the traditional privilege of theoretical wisdom by privileging practice or “rehabilitating” practical thinking instead. Rather, the aim here is to understand these modes of human endeavor in their irreducibility, to be sure, and yet, simultaneously, in their inseparability. More precisely, the investigation should cast light on the way in which practical considerations decisively mark the beginning or condition of all contemplation as well as discursive investigation.