Wish, Motivation and the Human Good in Aristotle

Abstract

Aristotle's invokes a specifically human desire, namely wish (boulēsis), to provide a teleological explanation of the pursuit of the specifically human good in terms of virtuous activity. Wish is a basic, unreasoned desire which, independently of other desires, or evaluative attitudes, motivates the pursuit of the human good. Even a person, who pursues what she mistakenly believes to be good, is motivated by wish for what in fact is good, although she is oblivious of it. KeywordsAristotle; wish; motivation; teleology; human good; representation IntroductionA striking feature of Aristotle's psychology is the assumption of a specifically human desire, namely wish (βούλησις). But there is little agreement on the nature, and function, of wish, and even on its most basic characteristics. For instance, despite fairly straightforward evidence for the view that wish is located in the rational part of the soul (DA 3.9, 432b5-6; Top. 4.5, 126a13), there is significant dissent.1 Moreover, no one questions that wish is a desire for the good (τἀγαθόν), but what notion of the good Aristotle has in mind is contested. 2 These disagreements are no wonder, since Aristotle is not particularly explicit about wish, and the evidence is scattered in the corpus. Therefore, with some important exceptions, wish is treated on the sidelines of discussions of Aristotle's psychology, philosophy of action, and ethics. I shall argue that wish is invoked in order to provide a teleological explanation of the pursuit of the specifically human end, which fulfils human nature. 4 The idea is that wish is a basic desire which, independently of other desires, or evaluative attitudes, motivates pursuit of what is good for human beings specifically. Wish is, by nature (φύσει), for what is good for human beings (EE 2.10, 1227a28-9). The human good, again, is virtuous activity, which manifests human rational nature, and which is an independent value in the sense that it is not reducible to, or derivable from, objects of other kinds of desire.Although located in the rational part of the soul, wish motivates not only the exercises of the two intellectual virtues, namely theoretical understanding (σοφία) and practical wisdom shall argue, the ultimate motivation to pursue exercises of character virtue is the rational part's desire for the human good.

The role of reason in the establishment of practical goals. A dialogue with some interpretations of Aristotle

“…But thought (νοῦς) or reason (λόγος), thanks to the ability to foresee what is far away in time, can understand that to give in to this appetite is not the most convenient course of action. And for this reason, it orders (κελεύει) the agent to resist (ἀνθέλκειν) and to go in 8 Grönroos (2015) claims that in order to show that the intellect can produce wishes, "the intellectualist case requires that an agent can form a conception of goodness through reasoning without appeal to values already desired by the agent" (p. 66). I think intellectualists cannot do such a thing, and, besides, that Aristotle's strategy to rationally alter our conception of the end is based on the previous experiences of the agent (cf.…”

Aristotle on Prohairesis

“…Most scholars takes it to be the case that Aristotle's boulēsis[e] is located in reason, so Aristotle's view is similar to Plato's. 2006, 68.28, Mele 1984, Cooper 1988, Lorenz 2009, Grönroos 2015, and Müller 2016. For a few examples for the opposite view, see Price 1995, Moss 2011, 2014, and Pearson 2012 I tend to disagree with this general view about boulēsis [e], and even think that boulēsis [e] is not generated by the rational part of the soul is an important departure of Aristotle's moral psychology from Plato's, and related to his objection of Socratic or Platonic intellectualism.…”

“…According to this interpretation, boulēsis is not only a rational desire, but also a reasoned desire. Grönroos (2015), pp. 65-67 provides a good criticism of this view.…”

Colloquium 2 How to Argue about Aristotle about Practical Reason

“…(It has been argued that Aristotle's vicious agent must also have a desire for her normative good (e.g. for what is in fact good for her overall), seeGrönroos (2015aGrönroos ( , 2015b) but only by insisting that such an end is 'unarticulated' in her and insufficient to guide actions (2015a, 162). (For what it's worth, I would reject this conception of Aristotle's vicious agent, but I can't argue the point here.…”