#Artistotle

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Night at Sea - Daniel Ablitt , 2024 :: British , b. 1976 - :: [Oil on panel , 25 x 32 cm.]

* * * *

“The greatest thing by far is to be a master of metaphor. It is the one thing that cannot be learned from others; it is also a sign of genius, since a good metaphor implies an eye for resemblance.”

— Aristotle, De Poetica, 322 B.C. (via amiquote)

[alive on all channels]

[honeywithrose]

i wanna talk about like how the very nature of theatre is destructive and theatre of revolution and how some of the most important and influential periods in theatre history happened at times when people on the fringes of society were completely deconstructing and reconstructing the world and cultural canon and how it’s supposed to be uncomfortable and unfamiliar and how change is the entire point not just of the world but to change the audience

but i fear i don’t have the ability to put my thoughts into anything nearly comprehensible. so. support local theatre. support indigenous theatre. support radical fucking theatre.

[forsakenbythenarrative]

aristotle said 'rocks fall to the earth because they know to return to their natural place' YOU MEAN THEIR HOME??! YOU MEAN THEY KNOW TO RETURN HOME CAUSE THEY LOVE IT CAUSE THE ROCKS LOVE THE EARTH CAUSE IT'S HOME!!!

[diaryofaphilosopher]

Socrates pursues knowledge in order to live a philosophical life, while Aristotle lives a philosophical life in order to pursue knowledge.

— John Sellars, "Parrhesia."

Follow Diary of A Philosopher for more quotes!

[courtingwonder]

"Knowledge of the fact differs from knowledge of the reason for the fact."

—Aristotle (Greek philosopher and polymath, 384 BC - 322 BC)

[polyphanes]

Reading the Hermetica: AH 26—30 (NHC VI,8)

For this week’s Reading the Hermetica discussion, we’re continuing our reading and discussion of the Perfect Sermon or Asclepius (AH), proceeding to sections 26 through 30 (AH 26—30).  As ever, if you don’t have a copy of Copenhaver’s Hermetica, Salaman’s Asclepius, or Festugière/Nock’s Hermès Trismégiste (and I strongly urge you get at least one of those, as they’re the best versions of the AH…

[princetonuniversitypress]

Artistotle's advice for social media

There was no social media in Aristotle’s day. Social interactions were face to face, unmediated by technology. But a trio of virtues Aristotle invokes for social situations—and their corresponding vices—nicely capture the landscape of human (mis)behavior on the social media of today.

Do you tell the truth about yourself, or are you a braggart? In Aristotle’s example, you can be a braggart by wearing Spartan dress if you don’t also live a Spartan lifestyle. That’s a fourth-century CE version of virtue signaling. Does your Instagram feed give the impression that your life is more glamorous, your clothing more stylish, or your children more accomplished than they really are? That’s technologically mediated bragging, but bragging nonetheless.

While technology has increased the opportunities for engaging with other people, our incessant concern with how others perceive us has not changed. Even if we are not consciously jockeying for position, we are aware at some level of the level of esteem or regard others have for us. A braggart is someone who tries to garner more of this regard than is supported by the facts—a vice of excess in Aristotle’s terminology. But it isn’t good to sell yourself short either, by pretending to be less successful than you are. That would be the corresponding vice of deficiency.

Avoiding these two extremes is a delicate matter, requiring judgement and discernment. It is not simply a matter of not telling lies, since I’m assuming that everything in your Instagram feed is true. The problem is that it omits some less-flattering truths, if you are a braggart, or some flattering truths, if you have the opposing vice. Nor can you simply follow a policy of full disclosure: oversharing is another vice of excess. It is not easy to be good, and advances in technology are no help here.

The second social virtue in the trio is a good sense of humor. You don’t have to be adept at telling jokes in order to have this virtue. What you need are appropriate filters about what you will joke about or how you will respond when someone else has told a joke that is offensive or indecent. Joking of the sort Aristotle has in mind (skōptein) is transgressive, even at some level abusive: a joke at someone’s expense. Joking about someone is the opposite of taking them seriously or treating them with respect. So, when you laugh at a joke, you are in a sense taking pleasure in an attack on (or a put-down of) someone else.

Described in these terms, joking sounds like an anti-social activity, but Aristotle recognizes it as one of the pleasures we get from the company of others. Even if society is fundamentally a cooperative project that depends on a level of mutual respect, he recognizes that there is an adversarial element to the texture of even healthy social relations—a certain rough and tumble. Of course, this can be taken to extremes: there are jokes that are inappropriate in their content, their object, their occasion, and their audience. That is why Aristotle says there is a virtue in this domain, as well as all kinds of ways a person can go wrong. Social media only increases our exposure to this risk.

Social media also amplifies the stakes at issue in the final social virtue in Aristotle’s trio, sometimes called friendliness. Aristotle tells us that this virtue concerns how we engage (homilein) with other people in social contexts, using a verb that can also be used to describe engagement with an enemy in battle. Some shades of the latter meaning are operative even in its application to social contexts, evoking the give-and-take of conversation and other informal group activities. Sometimes what we say or do meets with support and approval (which we enjoy), but sometimes we get push back or opposition from others (which we find unpleasant). Delivering “likes” on social media or participating in a twitter pile-on are technologically amplified versions of these two responses, allowing us to deliver approval and disapproval remotely, often anonymously, and at scale. But the underlying human psychology that responds to this treatment remains the same: we enjoy being approved by others, and we find disapproval unpleasant.

According to Aristotle, we should care about being friendly and pleasant to others and about sparing them pain, but there can be both excess and deficiency in this endeavor. We are ingratiating if we go to excess in “praising everything [the other person says] … and objecting to nothing” and are disagreeable if we “oppose everything.” A virtuous person will strike the mean between these two extremes and will go along with, or oppose, the other person according to what is appropriate in the circumstances.

Now striking the right balance between being “too friendly” or not friendly enough is not always an easy matter, and the same goes for knowing how to respond to an offensive joke and how to avoid self-aggrandizing behavior. These concerns will also intersect with each other in complicated ways, since refusing to laugh at someone’s joke is bound to be unpleasant to the teller of the joke, and taking it upon oneself to call out an offense, or doing so in an inappropriately public manner, may itself be a form of self-aggrandizing behavior, and so constitute bragging (“virtue signaling”). Participating in mob justice, even if it takes place online, may itself be an act of injustice.

The Aristotelian moral here is that meting out approval and disapproval appropriately to fellow citizens requires more than a simple “moral compass.” You need a significant level of self-knowledge, discernment, and judgment. Aristotle’s name for this constellation of cognitive virtues is phronesis, which I translate as “good judgment.” It is a famous doctrine in Aristotle’s theory of virtue that you are not a good person unless you exercise good judgment.

Susan Sauvé Meyer is professor of philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania and a specialist in Greek and Roman philosophy. Her books include Ancient Ethics: An Introduction and Aristotle on Moral Responsibility. More than 100,000 people around the world have enrolled in her open-access online courses on ancient philosophy.

[happyallyscorner]

“In all things of nature, there is something of the marvelous.” - Aristotle

[vanillqvan]

ace attorney characters as memes & tumblr posts #10 📢

[warningsine]

[poseidons-getting-milk]

AND WAHT IF I SAID ARISTOTLE AND DANTE WERE A JEGULUS VARIANT???? WHAT THEN?!!!

[jackredfieldwasmyjacob]

i'm forced to read a 1920s book in french on ancient philosophy at 9 am because my seminary isn't long enough someone end with my missery

[aggelodelaluna]

i was having trouble parsing your username and kept reading it aristot-hole

LMFAOOOSKDJ you kno what… i’ll take it

[kirkwall-age]

there is a mural in Treviso that is probably not even Zevran and is more like in celebration of Crows

but all it looks like to me is Zev in his WoT armor killing Plato during his conversation with Artistotle

"YOUR Platonic Idea of the Republic is What Inspired THE QUN!" (STABS)

[improbabledreamgirl]

obsessed with all of the references to Greek mythology and history on TTPD !!

• thanK you aIMee — “i pushed each boulder up the hill” (edit: this is referencing Sisyphus, not Theseus, oops!)

• So Long, London “my spine split from carrying us up the hill” (this is also probably Sisyphus, not Theseus… i feel so dumb lmao)

• The Prophecy (prophecies were huge in Greece, launching most every hero’s quest)

• Cassandra (the Trojan War)

• So High School — “i know Artistotle” (Greek philosopher who wrote fables; “cards on the table, mine play out like fools in a fable” from The Prophecy) + “i’m hearing voices like a madman” (Cassandra could see visions, they called her mad??)

• Peter: “the goddess of timing” (the Horae, goddesses of the seasons)

• in The Bolter, she says “the chariot is waiting” (chariot races were popular in Ancient Greece)

OTHER:

- i feel like Down Bad could be related to how a lot of the gods’ human lovers felt after being abandoned

- the lines “you sacrificed us to the gods of your bluest days” from So Long, London and “i changed into goddesses, villains, and fools” from Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus (not intentional, just interesting to see mentions of gods and goddesses)

- the fraternity mention in The Black Dog gets a call-out, too; a reach, but fraternities are a Greek thing so why not include it?

[headingalaxys-spicy]

Ok, hear me out, but Denmark, America, or France having an s/o who’s very quiet around people and gets mistaken as shy; but they’re actually just distracted by seeing how much they can tease their partner without getting caught.

I think I understood the assignment. This is a slight spice post. So be warned.

America 

At a party, small gathering, to an absolute rager of a concert, you always manage to make his heart pump hard, especially to the other brain at times. 

-Artistotle or some shit 

This time, you were in a particularly crowded bar. Letting Alfred drabble on with other patrons about whatever it was. You weren’t contributing, just either flicking your eyes to one of the TVs closest to you, to your drink, listlessly checking your phone and….

Alfred’s eye twitches a little when he feels you pinch his ass. He was glad he wasn't mid-sentence. He reflexively reaches out his left arm to grab you by the waist. He was still fully invested in his conversation about comics with another nerd but was doing his best to try and keep you in check simultaneously. Alfred took another sip of his Jack and Coke. He’d need some lubricant not to be so riled up. He was determined to have some willpower this time. 

A Cheshire cat grin spreads across your face. It's time to up the ante just a little bit more. Your hand sneakily grabs his belt; you give it a slight tug once you do, you quickly divert your attention back to your phone. Alfred looks back at you briefly before he has to answer another question. 

That smile you wore didn’t fade. 

Your next attack, you walked your fingers up his bomber jacket. 

Alfred had to bite his lip mid-sentence this time. 

‘Damm it I can feel myself begin to rise.’ 

He continued on with the conversation anyway. 

You were trying hard to suppress a giggle. 

Alfred turned his head once more to quickly whisper in your ear. 

“I know what you’re doing Y/N….” 

“Don’t know what you’re talking about, babe.” You boop his nose. Alfred’s face gets lightly dusted with red. Due to the alcohol and coquettish moves, he could feel blood begin to drain from his upper brain to his lower one. 

‘Damn it. Couldn’t they wait at least until we got back to the apartment?’ 

The people he was conversing with finally noticed you and acknowledged you with a polite nod and lifted their drinks. They hesitated to do more than that since you hadn’t shown much interest in the conversation they were having. They didn’t want to make the evening awkward. 

Alfred’s leather-covered hand squeezed your side. A silent warning? Or was it a cute tit-for-tat tactic he was employing? You were going to test and find out. 

Swiftly, your hand gripped his swiney thigh. 30% fat, 70% muscle. You liked to feel his somewhat floppy fat. 

A little more blood flowed to his lower region, making his jeans tighter. Alfred nearly bit down on his tongue, suppressing a yelp. He shifted in his seat to try and shake off your hand. 

“Y/N what are you doing?” He said on the side of his mouth. 

“Nothing~” You swirled your drink around in an attempt to feign a level of innocence. “Just enjoying my drink.” You take a long sip of it while you make eye contact with his cerulean hues. 

Alfred raised an eyebrow. 

“What? I’m just being honest.” He brings you in closer with his still attached arm and messes up your hair somewhat before giving you a forehead kiss. 

“Sure you are.” Once more, Alfred was being drawn back into the conversation. He turned his head without disengaging you. He chugged the rest of his drink hopin g it could slow the flow to Florida. 

Your hand suddenly maneuvered to the growing ball in his pants. Alfred had the urge to gasp loudly in pleasure. Instead, he extended his voice to assist him with getting out of there. 

“Hey! Bartender! Dude! I need the bill when you have a quick second! Thanks!” He then snaps his head back to you. 

“Alright, Y/N that's it game on.” He tilted your head upwards to peck your lips and both of his hands squeezed your hips. 

Denmark

From the exhilaration of old daydreams & fairytales, it mixes in together with just a bit of chaos. 

  -Sebastian the Crab idk 

The two of you had been having a wonderful time wandering the streets of Nyhaven. From the bright blues to the bold reds situated between the light whites…it all felt as though you were in a modern fairytale book. The crisp air of Fall refreshed you some as the salt from the sea filled your nostrils. It ignited an impish smile upon your face. You were only a few paces behind Mathias. As you encroached upon him, you decided to tap his shoulder from the opposite side of where you were walking. No other cyclist from the club flanked him from that side. 

“What the-? Y/N are you teasing me?” Mathias continued to walk along the colorful cobblestone path. He knew he’d have to summon all of his energy to repel your flirtatious attacks. 

“Nooooooo” You smile & guide your hand to quickly slap his ass. 

Mathias yelps in surprise. 

“Y/N being a bit cheeky today?” In turn, he pinches your butt to retaliate. You jump and playfully smack his hand away. 

“Heh. Are you annoyed that you couldn’t keep up with me and the others earlier?” 

“Nooooooooo.” Too prideful to admit that you were. 

Mathias pinched your cheeks, which now had a rosy tint to them. 

“Sure, Y/N, I believe you.” 

“Hej! (Hey) Mathias, cool bike tricks earlier! I’m jealous; where did you learn them?” A fellow biker from the club commented. As he became more intertwined with the conversation mentally, you were preparing for your next attack, so much so that you neglected to converse with your fellow companions on the trip. They tried but were met with only the basic pleasantries. Your eyes roamed from scanning the ground to remembering where his other weak points were. 

You bumped your elbow into his then continued to speed past him. At that moment Mathias's sapphire hues met your tantalizing (eye color) shades when you looked back looking for his reaction. 

Mathias cracked a coy smile. You’d be paying for your sins later tonight. For now, he continued on with the conversation he was having with other members of the group. 

You were itching to land another attack on him. A light bulb went off in your head and you were ready to try again. You slowed your pace so you could be directly behind him again. 

You walked your hands playfully up his back making sure they made it up to his broad shoulders.  

Mathias quickly snapped his head around to see the wide goofy smile you always had when you were messing with him. He adored that about. He swiftly grabbed your meddling hand. 

“Trying to start something Y/N?” 

“Hahaha. Noooooooooo. Don’t know what you’re talking about.” You flutter your eyes at him. You then pause to stand on your tiptoes so you can rub your nose against his. Mathias took that as an invitation to capture your lips for a few moments. When he finally let go he maintained your full attention with his eyes. 

“You’re a bad liar Y/N.” 

“So, maybe I am.” You boop his nose and gently grip his chin. You allow your bike to be fully supported by your legs while both of your arms reach up to intertwine with his perfectly spiked hair, which had been flattened slightly by his helmet. You tousle it, giving it more of an unkempt quality. 

“Catch me if you can.” You hopped up on your bike & sped away, knowing your Danish lover wouldn’t be too far behind. You knew messing with his spiky hair was an invitation to a playful wrestle. 

France

Romance is the passionate language of France. Nothing can defeat the suave. Except for a heart that has fallen deeply in love. 

                          -Victor Hugo, I think

You were at another one of Francis's popular soirees that he was required to hold each month as per his government contract. Since he’d been away from you since the work he had lately was picking up. He’s been on longer UN missions trying to finish up essential deals and meet strict deadlines. So you were determined to steal all of his attention tonight. 

You wandered over to your Frenchman, who had perfectly coiffed hair. It had been freshly trimmed and conditioned, giving his blonde locks a shiny quality. You were eager to run your fingers through it. You fluttered over to him, not really paying attention to the waves and gestures that allowed you to interact with others. Those people were far away from your awareness. Only one man consumed your mind. 

“Good to see you again, my love?” 

You kissed him on both cheeks to greet him. You stole a quick glimpse from his ocean-tinged eyes; there was a sparkle you cherished. 

However, you did also see the heavy tiredness that surrounded his eyes. 

“Great to see you too, Y/N.” He quickly kissed you back and grabbed your free hand that wasn’t holding your champagne flute. 

“I’ll only be here for just a little while longer. I just have to finish talking to these diplomats.” Francis whispered in your ear. The tickle of his short beard felt like a siren song. How badly you missed playing with his schlong. The wait had been far too long. So you decided that you’d speed up the process. You tightly squeezed his hand and inched it closer to him, making sure your thigh could briefly rub against his. While Francis let one of the diplomats drone on about something economy blah, blah. 

“You sneaky minx. I know what you’re doing~” 

“De quoi parlez-vous?” (What are you talking about?)  You pout before a giggle breaks out from your lungs. 

Francis missed that so much. You really did know how to envelop his heart with a special type of magic.  It made him feel as if he could fly. 

“Francis! My good chap, what do you think?” 

Breaking up the special moment that was building between the two of you. Francis gives your hand a reassuring squeeze and parts his eyes away from yours with a smile. 

You decided that it was time to turn up the heat. Can’t conversate correctly when all horned up. You separated your hand from his and traced your pointer finger to spell out, ‘You should make love to me.’ You did it repeatedly to rile him up. 

Francis had to bite down on his lower lip. The excitement began to build in his freshly pressed white pants. Your proposal was better than hearing this British man prattle on about numbers. 

You raised your eyes to glance over at him. You could tell it wouldn’t be long before he could no longer hold his cock back. 

Francis could feel the coming of Spring rushing to his neither region, making them uncomfortable. He shifted from side to side to try and stifle the uprising to no avail. 

“Oui…but…” He turned his head back to you, and a bright glint flashed across his eyes. Francis knew right then that–

His hair perked up all over his body, and he jerked up with a lightning bolt of pleasure. 

Francis's face suddenly turned brilliant rose. 

You’d had a firm grip on his Eiffel tower. 

“Well, Francis and I have some other business to attend to. I’m sure whatever you’re dealing with can be managed by you diplomats on your own.” Not caring if you made them uncomfortable with your bold and intimate display. 

“Y/N…. you naughty-” 

“Shhhhhhh… just kiss me Francis. It’s been too long a wait.”