Comments on Nicholas Gier’s “Aristotle, Confucius, and Practical Reason”

I know quite a bit about Aristotle’s ethics, but only a little about Confucianism; I have read and taught enough of the latter to be familiar with concepts like yi, li, and ren. Hence the bulk of my comments will pertain to Professor Gier’s interpretation of Aristotle. Given that discussion, I will then have some suggestions about the role of yi as I understand it. Professor Gier’s main claim is that “the Confucian concept of yi performs roughly the same function as phronesis in Aristotle” (1), and more specifically that “Confucian yi, just as does Aristotelian phronesis, allows us to adapt norms to context and to choose exceptions to rules” (5). I agree with this description of phronesis. However, Professor Gier makes other claims about the nature of phronesis that I believe are mistaken or at least misleading. Perhaps by clearing up some of these misconceptions, I can offer Professor Gier an account of phronesis with which he can strengthen his case for the parallel with the Confucian yi. On the other hand, he might think I am just wrong about Aristotle, in which case I am open to being corrected. Prof. Gier begins by suggesting that we translate sophia and phronesis as theoretical and practical reason respectively. He immediately adds: “The principal disadvantage with this choice is that it obscures the fact that Aristotle believes that both are virtues and not faculties, a concept alien to the Greek mind” (1). I would respond that whether we call them faculties or not, Aristotle clearly delineates parts or elements of the soul distinguishing them by their capacities or functions. He does distinguish the theoretical from the practical intellect assigning sophia and phronesis as the respective excellent states, or virtues, of these two parts. As a state of excellence, phronesis does not come in degrees, (which is why Aristotle says that “there is no such thing as excellence in practical wisdom [=phronesis]” [1140b22]). Increasing through experience and training one’s practical reasoning skills is a necessary condition for achieving phronesis, but phronesis itself is not something that matures over time, as Gier suggests (2); rather, we should say that mature practical reasoning skills are a sign of phronesis. That may seem a picky point, but I think one problem with Gier’s analysis of Aristotle is that it does not always clearly distinguish the parts of the soul from their respective excellences. An example of this problem is in the schematic chart of the Aristotelian soul and its excellences which Gier borrows from Damien Keown. This chart is a bit confusing because it does not clearly indicate which excellences correspond to which parts of the soul. In NE I.13 Aristotle is careful to name and describe the excellent state of each part of the soul relevant to his discussion. I would like to offer another chart based on NE I.13 and VI.1. A careful reading of these chapters yields the following in which CAPS indicate a part of the soul and underlining indicate an excellent state (that is, a virtue) of some part of the soul.

[see attached chart]

By way of contrast, first look at the Confucian schematic that appears in Gier’s essay. According to Gier, the “heart-mind” (called xin) at the core of this chart “represents a unified agent of the Confucian self” in which “[r]eason and passions are united” (12). Although Gier believes that in the end Aristotle inconsistently dichotomizes reason and passions (and I would I add here that I agree, but this is only a problem with Book X and its praise for the contemplative life), he also claims that the Confucians and Aristotle “share a functional holism in which the virtues must always work together in harmony with one another” (10). This Aristotelian holism appears in my chart in the quotations cited there. First, Aristotle says that the appetitive element can be called rational if it has been habituated such that it tends to obey the rational element (see 1103a3). Only a soul that has developed such a tendency could be said to have moral excellence. And this is why Aristotle insists that “it is not possible to be good in the strict sense without practical wisdom, nor practically wise without moral excellence” (1144b30-31). And, of course, that passage is of apiece with the one at the bottom of my chart (1144a6-8). This bit of text is crucial to an understanding of the relation between moral excellence and the intellectual excellence of phronesis. It says that phronesis guides us in choosing the proper means while moral excellence ensures that we are desiring the right ends. For this reason I believe that Gier’s page-four summary of how practical reason functions in the moral life is slightly inaccurate. I agree wholeheartedly when he says that “phronesis allows us to determine the proper means to the specific ends of our own lives,” but I believe it is misleading to say that “phronesis allows us to discover the reasons why we must be virtuous.” Aristotle is clear both that we do not deliberate about ends and that phronesis is the capacity to deliberate well regarding means to ends (see NE III.3 and VI.5). So it is not phronesis as such that enables one to grasp the why, the ends of virtuous action. However, nous, a kind of intuitive insight or perception of means-ends connections, does enable such a grasp of ends; a mature nous is a prerequisite for phronesis, and those who have the latter have “experience [that] has given such people an eye (nous) with which they can see correctly” (1143b13, Ostwald translation as quoted by Gier). To explain my account of Aristotelian nous, let me first agree with Gier that nous has both a theoretical and a practical function. Aristotle delineates these two functions in NE VI.11. The passages here are quite complex, and all I can do here is summarize my own findings. (I argue for these interpretations in my “Acquiring Ethical Ends,” Ancient Philosophy 10, 63-79.) In its theoretical function nous grasps first principles, the major premises of demonstrations. In its practical function, which is the only function relevant to the present discussion, nous grasps the minor premises of deliberations; that is it enables one to perceive what action to take as means to an end. For example, if I know that I should behave politely (major premise), and I perceive with nous that listening while others are speaking is a means to that end (minor premise), then I conclude that listening while others are speaking is what I should do. In addition to its role of locating the proper means in practical deliberation, nous also plays a role in the discovery of the proper ethical ends in a practical induction. For example, I know, as my parents have instilled this in me, that I should chew with my mouth closed, that I should listen while others are speaking without interrupting, that I should interact with older adults like my grandmother with an attitude of respect, that I should open a door for someone whose arms are full. Taken together these things-to-be-done form a pattern; they all have the same point, fall under a similar description, are means to a common end, namely, behaving politely. If I am perceptive with my nous, I will conclude that behaving politely is what I should do. Thus nous plays the same sort of perceptive role both in practical deliberations as one calculates the means to an end and in practical inductions as one generalizes ends; in both cases the role of nous is to perceive means-ends connections. When my parents insist that I chew with my mouth closed, etc., they are instilling good habits in me, training me to want to do the right thing. And when I generalize that behaving politely is an end worthy of pursuit, I am grasping a more unified description of what I already desire to do. I am on my way to becoming morally excellent, since I am developing a character that desires right ends. And I am on my way to becoming practically wise, since I am learning to perceive proper means-ends connections. This explains why Aristotle says that moral excellence and phronesis go hand in hand; “for the function of man is achieved only in accordance with practical wisdom (=phronesis) as well as with moral excellence; for excellence makes the aim right and practical wisdom (=phronesis) the things leading to it” (1144a8, quoted on my chart). Given this passage and my long-winded interpretation of it, I would recommend a change in Prof. Gier’s Aristotelian formula from page six of his essay. He suggests: “anthropos + phronesis + ethos = ethike arete.” I would suggest: anthropos + phronesis + ethike arete = anthrop? arete; or in English: being human + practical wisdom + moral excellence = human excellence. The term ethos (which Gier defines as “social custom”) appears in Gier’s formula, but not in my own. However, ethos is playing a role behind the scenes in my formula, and so is nous. We have already seen the crucial role nous plays in making one practically wise. One could also say that ethos, social custom, the habits instilled by proper parental guidance, plays a crucial role in making one morally excellent. (See NE II.1, 1103a16, where Aristotle says that “moral excellence comes about as a result of habit.”) With this background in Aristotle’s ethics, let me return to Prof. Gier’s claim that the Confucian concept yi performs roughly the same function as phronesis. Various descriptions of yi are offered in his essay. Some of these descriptions do sound parallel to phronesis. However, some of them are more akin to nous, and at least one seems like a description of moral excellence. When yi is described as a “basic disposition that allows us to put li into practice” (5) or as “the capacity to adapt to context” (7), it sounds very much like phronesis to me. However, thinking of yi as a “sense of what is appropriate to extend [his] way” (5) or as “a capacity for premoral discrimination” (9) likens it more to nous in my opinion. I think it really would be hairsplitting to insist that Prof. Gier find one-to-one correspondences for phronesis and nous in the Confucian schema. It would be enough if he were to provide evidence that “yi, like phronesis, allows us to apply the universal to the particular” (7). I think he has done this. I am however puzzled by the following passage from page ten: “One could say that yi provides the initial preference for action, while zhi would give us the skill necessary for carrying it out.” In this case, yi sounds like moral excellence and zhi like phronesis. David DeMoss Pacific University November 2000

Quotations from Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics are taken from the Ross/Urmson translation in The Complete Works of Aristotle:Volume Two, ed. Barnes (Princeton, 1984).