What makes the philosophical life the best kind of life according to Aristotle?

Question

What makes the philosophical life the best kind of life according to Aristotle?

A. Philosophy is best because it is good in itself and as a means to further goods (e.g. friendship, wealth, success in politics, etc)

B. Philosophy is best because we do all things for the sake of philosophy and contemplation, and would engage in it even if it produced no further goods

C. Philosophy is best because Aristotle likes it the best, and this is a philosophy course, so really you just have to say it's the best.

D. Philosophy is best only because it is useful for so many different things (e.g. writing just laws, talking with friends, understanding nature to build better things, etc.)

Explanation / Answer

Answer:

D. Philosophy is best only because it is useful for so many different things (e.g. writing just laws, talking with friends, understanding nature to build better things, etc.)

Description:

Aristotle investigates psychological phenomena primarily in De Anima and a loosely related collection of short works called theParva Naturalia, whose most noteworthy pieces are De Sensu and De Memoria.

The works of Aristotle in the Parva Naturalia are, in comparison with De Anima, empirically oriented, investigating, as Aristotle says, “the phenomena common to soul and body” (De Sensu 1, 436a6–8).

This contrasts with De Anima, which introduces as a question for consideration “whether all affections are common to what has the soul or whether there is some affection peculiar to the soul itself” (De Anima i 1, 402a3–5).

That is, in De Anima Aristotle wants to know whether all psychological states are also material states of the body. “This,” he remarks, “it is necessary to grasp, but not easy” (De Anima i 1, 402a5).

In this way, De Anima proceeds at a higher level of abstraction than the Parva Naturalia. It is generally more theoretical, more self-conscious about method, and more alert to general philosophical questions about perception, thinking, and soul-body relations.

In both De Anima and the Parva Naturalia, Aristotle takes psychology to be the branch of science which investigates the soul and its properties, but he thinks of the soul as a general principle of life, with the result that Aristotle’s psychology studies all living beings, and not merely those he regards as having minds, human beings.

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