Skill in Ancient Ethics

The Legacy of China, Greece and Rome

Tom Angier, Lisa Raphals, Tom Angier, Lisa Raphals

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN:
  9781350267411
• eBook ISBN:
  9781350104341
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Ancient & Classical Philosophy

Illustrating the centrality of skill within ancient ethics, including Socrates' search for expertise in virtue, the Republic's 'craft of justice', Aristotle's delineation of the politike techne, the Stoics' 'art of life' and ancient Chinese ethics, this collection shows how skill has been an ethical touchstone from the beginning of philosophical thought.

Divided into six sections – on Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, Mencius and Xunzi, the Mohists and Zhuangzi, and comparative perspectives – world-leading philosophers explore the significance of skill according to traditional figures, as well as lesser-known philosophers such as Carneades and Antipater, and texts such as the Zhuangzi. In doing so, the seventeen contributors illustrate how skill, expertise and 'know how' are essential to and foundational within ancient ethical thought.

As the first collection to foreground skill as central to ancient Greek, Roman and Chinese ethics, this is an essential resource for anyone interested in the value of cross-cultural philosophy today.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-Title Page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Contents
• List of Contributors
• Introduction
• Part 1 Skill in Plato’s Ethics
• 1 Socrates: Apprentice at Politics
• 2 The Question is not ‘Can Virtue be Taught?’ but ‘Can Virtue be Learned?’
• 3 The Contest Between Philosophy and Rhetoric in Plato’s Gorgias
• 4 A Dewian Conception of Skill as Clue to the Analogy Between Craft and Virtue in the Platonic Dialogues
• Part 2 Skill in Aristotle’s Ethics
• 5 Steering Against the Bad: An Aristotelian Account of Virtue as Two-way
• 6 Virtue Cultivation and the Skill of Emotion Regulation
• 7 Aristotle on Techne: Two Theses in Search of a Synthesis?
• Part 3 Skill in Stoic Ethics
• 8 The Craftsman of Impulse: Chrysippus on Expertise and Moral Development
• 9 Being and Becoming Good: Seneca’s Two Moral Conceptions of Ars
• Part 4 Skill in Confucian Ethics
• 10 Cultivating Goodness or Manifesting Goodness: Two Interpretations of the Mencius
• 11 Ritual as a Skill: Ethical Cultivation and the Skill Model in the Xunzi
• Part 5 Skill and Ethics in the Zhuangzi
• 12 A Path with No End: Skill and Dao in Mozi and Zhuangzi
• 13 Skilfulness and Uselessness in the Zhuangzi
• 14 Dao and Agency: What do the Zhuangzi’s Skill Stories Tell Us about Life?
• Part 6 Comparative Perspectives on Skill in Ethics
• 15 Can One Become Wise by Learning to Catch Cicadas? Analogies between Crafts and Wisdom in Daoism and Stoicism
• 16 Gendered Skill: Chinese and Greek Skill-Knowledge Analogies from Archery and Weaving
• 17 The Skilful Wanderer: On the Risks and Rewards of Travel in Plato and Zhuangzi
• Index
• Copyright