Robert W. Sharples – författare

Plato’s Meno is the dialogue which more than any other occupies a transitional position between the early Socratic dialogues and the developed middle period theory of the Phaedo, Symposium and Republic. It is thus of particular interest for the insights that it gives us into the process by which Plato arrived at that theory. The issues which it raises are philosophically interesting in themselves: how can we know that we have the right answer to a question, unless we knew what the answer was before we asked the question in the first place? Is excellence (aretē) something that we can acquire by being taught, or is it something that we are born with? And the dialogue is of historical interest for the evidence it provides, both for ancient Greek notions of what constitutes excellence, and for contemporary attitudes to the Sophists, who claimed to teach excellence and took larger fees for doing so. First published in 1985, this edition was revised in 1991, and the preface and bibliography updated in 2004. Greek text with facing-page English translation, introduction, notes and commentary.

This book comprises essays on the nature of Aspasius’ commentary, his interpretation of Aristotle, and his own place in the history of thought. The contributions are in English or Italian.Aspasius’ commentary on the Nicomachean Ethics is the earliest ancient commentary on Aristotle of which extensive parts survive in their original form. It is important both for the history of commentary as a genre and for the history of philosophical thought in the first two centuries A.D.; it is also still valuable as what its author intended it to be, an aid in interpreting the Ethics. All three aspects are explored by the essays.The book is not formally a commentary on Aspasius’ commentary; but between them the essays consider the interpretation of numerous problematic or significant passages. Full indices will enable readers quickly to locate discussion of particular parts of Aspasius’ work. This volume of essays will form a natural complement to the first ever translation of Aspasius’ commentary into any modern language, currently in preparation by Paul Mercken.

This is the first edition for nearly 150 years, taking into account a fuller range of manuscripts than either of the previous editions, of the collection of problems on natural science and medicine edited by Bussemaker in 1857 as pseudo-Aristotle, Problemata Inedita, and by Usener in 1859 as pseudo-Alexander of Aphrodisias, Problems books 3 and 4, the attribution differing in different manuscripts. The new critical text, based on collation of 31 Greek manuscripts, is accompanied by an annotated English translation. An extensive introduction reconstructs the complex manuscript tradition and examines the origin and nature of the collection, which is argued to be complex, including two distinct groups of problems from approximately the time of Alexander (the second to third centuries AD) together with other material which is similar in character and origin to the Problems included in standard editions of Aristotle, compiled in the third century BC and in some cases related to extant or lost works by Aristotle's colleague Theophrastus. Part of the collection is also related to the eighth-century Latin Problemata Bambergensia. The material in this book will be of interest to historians of ancient science, medicine and thought, and to students of the transmission of ancient texts.