Aristotelian Interpretations

Description

Aristotle’s phrase ‘Every realm of nature is marvellous’ serves as an underlying and unifying motif for this volume of original essays. Aristotelian Interpretations considers themes of perennial interest, offering new avenues of interpretation, illustrating how Aristotle’s thought may be creatively applied to a variety of timeless and contemporary questions. Apart from the final chapter – a comprehensive survey of the extensive and penetrating influence of Aristotle on James Joyce – they are concerned with central topics in metaphysics, aesthetics, political anthropology, ethics, and theory of knowledge.

The volume presents an integral survey of Aristotle’s philosophy emphasizing that, far from being just a figure of historical interest, his vision is still alive and relevant. While many of Aristotle’s empirical suppositions are archaic, his deeper intuitions have ageless validity. His philosophy is marked by a robust common sense, an optimistic trust in nature, confidence in the human mind’s capacity to discover truth and value, and an abiding sense of all-embracing beauty.

The author’s introduction describes early personal experiences that inspired his affection for a distinctively Aristotelian approach to the world.

Table of Contents

1. Wonder and Universality. Philosophy and Poetry in Aristotle
2. Philosophy and Poetry in Aristotle. Interpreting and Imitating Nature
3. Human Nature and Destiny in Aristotle
4. Knowledge and Necessity in Aristotle
5. Aristotle and the Metaphysics in Metaphor
6. Aristotle’s Political Anthology
7. Aristotle and the Metaphysics of Evolution
8. Evolutionary Ethics. A Metaphysical Evaluation
9. Aristotle and Evolutionary Altruism
10. James Joyce and Aristotle

About the Author

Fran O’Rourke retired in 2016 as professor of Philosophy from University College Dublin, where he taught for thirty six years. A graduate of University College Galway, he studied at the universities of Vienna, Köln, Louvain, and Leuven, where he received his PhD summa cum laude in 1986. He has held Fulbright and Onassis fellowships, and in 2003 was Visiting Research Professor at Marquette University.

His book Pseudo-Dionysius and the Metaphysics of Aquinas (2005) was described by Alasdair MacIntyre as ‘one of the two or three most important books on Aquinas published in the last fifty years’. His study of James Joyce and Aristotle, Allwisest Stagyrite: Joyce’s Quotations from Aristotle, was published by the National Library of Ireland in 2005.