Browsing by Subject "Plato"
Now showing 1 - 20 of 23
Results Per Page
Sort Options
Item A Pragmatic Standard of Legal Validity(2012-07-16) Tyler, JohnAmerican jurisprudence currently applies two incompatible validity standards to determine which laws are enforceable. The natural law tradition evaluates validity by an uncertain standard of divine law, and its methodology relies on contradictory views of human reason. Legal positivism, on the other hand, relies on a methodology that commits the analytic fallacy, separates law from its application, and produces an incomplete model of law. These incompatible standards have created a schism in American jurisprudence that impairs the delivery of justice. This dissertation therefore formulates a new standard for legal validity. This new standard rejects the uncertainties and inconsistencies inherent in natural law theory. It also rejects the narrow linguistic methodology of legal positivism. In their stead, this dissertation adopts a pragmatic methodology that develops a standard for legal validity based on actual legal experience. This approach focuses on the operations of law and its effects upon ongoing human activities, and it evaluates legal principles by applying the experimental method to the social consequences they produce. Because legal history provides a long record of past experimentation with legal principles, legal history is an essential feature of this method. This new validity standard contains three principles. The principle of reason requires legal systems to respect every subject as a rational creature with a free will. The principle of reason also requires procedural due process to protect against the punishment of the innocent and the tyranny of the majority. Legal systems that respect their subjects' status as rational creatures with free wills permit their subjects to orient their own behavior. The principle of reason therefore requires substantive due process to ensure that laws provide dependable guideposts to individuals in orienting their behavior. The principle of consent recognizes that the legitimacy of law derives from the consent of those subject to its power. Common law custom, the doctrine of stare decisis, and legislation sanctioned by the subjects' legitimate representatives all evidence consent. The principle of autonomy establishes the authority of law. Laws must wield supremacy over political rulers, and political rulers must be subject to the same laws as other citizens. Political rulers may not arbitrarily alter the law to accord to their will. Legal history demonstrates that, in the absence of a validity standard based on these principles, legal systems will not treat their subjects as ends in themselves. They will inevitably treat their subjects as mere means to other ends. Once laws do this, men have no rest from evil.Item The aim of dialectics In Plato's Euthyphro(2015-12) Fallis, Lewis Bartlett; Pangle, Thomas L.; Stauffer, Devin; Pangle, Lorraine; Tulis, Jeffrey; Muirhead, RussellThis dissertation presents an analysis of Plato’s dialogue on piety, the Euthyphro. The aim of the dissertation is to understand the nature of piety and its connection with morality. Chapter One introduces the topic of the dissertation, discusses two aspects of its political relevance, and justifies the decision to turn to Plato, and specifically Plato’s Euthyphro, for guidance on the question. Two weaknesses of contemporary approaches to the investigation of piety are discussed here, in order to highlight by contrast the strengths of Plato’s approach. Chapters Two and Three present an analysis of Plato’s Euthyphro, with special attention to what the dialogue can reveal about the connection between piety and morality. Chapter Four is a conclusion discussing the limitations of the study, the understanding of piety conveyed by Plato’s Euthyphro, and the aim of Socratic dialectics, understood as a means of testing whether moral opinions might be a condition of pious experiences.Item An analysis of Plato's Meno(2015-10-16) Duggan, Nicholas James; Stauffer, Devin, 1970-; Pangle, Thomas LThis thesis offers an analysis of Plato’s Meno, in which the Greek philosopher addresses more directly than in any other dialogue the character of human virtue. Believing that Plato has considerable guidance to offer us in respect to the question of what virtue is, I attempt to approach his writing with considerable care and attention to the details and the structure of the argument. I argue that the dialogue ultimately presents a complicated teaching about virtue’s character, and the way that virtue comes to be present, which ultimately culminates in the claim that virtue is knowledge – and in the thoughtful consideration of the alternatives to, and the nuances of, that claim.Item Ancient and modern approaches to the question of punishment : Hobbes, Kant and Plato(2010-08) Shuster, Arthur; Pangle, Thomas L.; Hankinson, Robert; Muirhead, Russell; Pangle, Lorraine; Stauffer, Devin; Tulis, JeffreyThe modern criminal justice system is experiencing what may be called a moral crisis brought about by a fundamental disagreement regarding the just and humane treatment of criminals and the purpose of punishment. This crisis has been addressed by contemporary scholarship without much success. The most serious defect of these scholarly attempts has been a failure to grasp how the apparently clashing aims of punishment—deterrence, retribution, and rehabilitation—relate to the fundamental principles of modern politics. Without this knowledge, it is impossible to begin to understand how these different penal aims may today be compatible and how incompatible, or even to appreciate what is at stake in each of them. In order to gain a firmer grip on the problem, this dissertation returns to the original arguments for modern punishment by examining crucial moments in its theoretical development. In Hobbes, modern punishment theory attains its first and most consistent articulation. Hobbes shows that the principles of modern politics limit the scope of justice to the protection of private freedom and property, and thus necessitate that deterrence should be the dominant aim of punishment. In his reaction against Hobbes, Kant affirms the importance of human dignity and argues that a penal system of pure deterrence would threaten the humanity of the criminal. Kant presents retribution as a more noble aim of punishment and tries to defend it on modern grounds, although he ultimately fails in this task. In light of the aporetic conclusion of the examination of modern punishment theory, this dissertation turns to investigate the classical approach to the question of punishment as it is expressed in the proposal for humane penal reform in Plato’s 'Laws.' In the 'Laws,' the highest aim of punishment, as the city understands it, is shown to be moral rehabilitation, although retribution and deterrence are also incorporated into the city’s actual penal code as a concession to necessity and to the limitations of the thumotic civic outlook. The most humanizing feature of the penal reform proposal in the 'Laws' is, however, its philosophical analysis of the nature of crime.Item Aristotle and Plato on Law : the Nicomachean Ethics and the Minos(2011-08) Kushner, Jeremy Christopher; Pangle, Lorraine Smith; Stauffer, DevinIn this paper, I examine the treatments of law contained within Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics and Plato’s Minos. I find that both offer powerful and complementary critiques of law, while recognizing law’s power and promise in shaping the character and opinions of each citizen. The Minos, though, goes further than the Ethics in describing and examining the possibility of divine law that transcends the limitations of merely human laws.Item The authority of pleasure and pain: moral psychology in Plato's Philebus(2004) Evans, Matthew Lyall; White, Stephen A.; Sosa, DavidI interpret, analyze, and defend Plato’s views about the nature and value of pleasure and pain, with special attention to the way he develops these views in the Philebus. The core of Plato’s position, I argue, is that pleasure as such is not a bearer of final value, but a fallible mode of perceiving final value. If Plato is right, then the claim that pleasure as such is the ethical goal is akin to the claim that belief as such is the epistemological goal. What makes this version of anti-hedonism exciting, to my mind, is that it can concede that pleasure has authority in itself—in that it always gives us a reason to act as it bids—without conceding that pleasure is good in itself. Moreover, an account of this sort is refreshingly free of the asceticism that pervades so much of both ancient and modern anti-hedonism, including some of Plato’s own earlier work. After establishing that Plato advances this view in the Philebus, I argue that the view itself yields genuine insight into the psychological role and ethical status of pleasure and pain.Item Enticing frames : the drama of authorial evasion in Plato's introductory scenes(2005-08) Pop, Constantin, M.A.; White, Stephen A. (Stephen Augustus)The introductory scenes of Phaedo, Symposium, Parmenides, and Theaetetus each present a story within a story narrative. The present paper explains Plato's choice for this complex design, which does not seem coordinated formally or semantically with the dialogue proper. This report argues that the missing link is based on the dramatic effects of the opening scene on Plato's contemporary audience. Starting from the fundamental assumption that Socrates was still a controversial public figure even after his death, I argue that Plato had to disguise his project of making the Socratic philosophy known, by making it obscure to his critics, but suggestive to his students. He achieves this by concealing his authorial presence in some of his most sensitive dialogues, and he selects his audience by ingeniously exploiting the ambiguities of language. The introductory scenes are the passages in the Platonic corpus where these narrative techniques can be best scrutinized. The leading thesis is that Plato used the introductory scene to manipulate his contemporary audience in order to select it and prepare it for Socratic philosophical inquiry.Item Examining ambition : an interpretation of Plato's Alcibiades(2013-12) Helfer, Ariel Oscar; Pangle, Thomas L.The relationship between Socrates and Alcibiades was infamous in antiquity. Alcibiades’ notorious betrayal of the Athenians during the Peloponnesian war helped to bring about Athens’ downfall, and the charges of corrupting the young and impiety for which Socrates was ultimately executed point unambiguously to the misdeeds of his most renowned and treasonous pupil. In Plato’s Alcibiades, Socrates approaches Alcibiades for the first time, claiming to have the power to bring the youth’s grandest and most tyrannical political hopes to a culmination. What does the ensuing conversation tell us about the nature of Alcibiades’ ambition and about Socrates’ intentions in associating with him? In this essay, careful attention is paid to the structure and unity of this underappreciated dialogue in order to uncover Plato’s teaching about the roots of political ambition and the approach of Socratic philosophy. The resulting analysis reveals that Socrates is interested in recruiting politically ambitious students because of how powerfully youthful political ambition seeks the good by means of just, noble, and honorable activity, and that Socrates’ hope is to awaken Alcibiades to the ambiguous and unquestioned character of his belief that the greatest human good can be obtained in the world of politics. Having recognized this as central to the Socratic project, we can consider how and to what extent political ambition relies on some misapprehension about the relationship of the good and the advantageous to the just and the noble.Item Harmony of city and soul : Plato and the classical virtue of moderation(2014-12) Rabinowitz, Laura; Pangle, Lorraine Smith; Stauffer, Devin, 1970-; Pangle, Thomas; Jacobsohn, Gary; Krause, SharonThis study examines and defends moderation as a moral, political, and philosophic virtue. I argue that modern political theory, despite its success in curbing certain excesses, is unable to account fully for our contemporary struggles with immoderation because it fails to treat moderation as a holistic virtue. To address this theoretical deficit, and to recover the unity of a virtue that has become fragmented and neglected in our age, I turn to the treatment of moderation found in Plato’s Charmides and Republic—the two dialogues in which Socrates asks and answers the question: what is moderation? I argue that Plato’s Charmides is not an early dialogue to be left behind as we move on to the Republic. Rather, it is through the interplay between the two dialogues that a full picture of moderation as a harmony of the city and soul emerges. Lessons learned from the Charmides must be remembered in order to temper the utopian ambitions inspired by Plato’s Republic. Moderating our own hopes for a world in which reason reigns, we see the need for cultivating both self and civic restraint in the absence of a perfectly harmonious whole. Nevertheless, moderation in the form of a genuine harmony orchestrated by reason remains a model of excellence, best embodied by Socrates himself. Understanding moderation in this light, we can see most clearly the sources in human nature of what Plato’s Socrates calls the “many limbs” of immoderation, from hedonism to tyranny. More important, in understanding Socratic moderation we recover a compelling vision of the virtue.Item Health and harmony : Eryximachus on the science of Eros(2014-08) Green, Jerry Dwayne; Dean-Jones, LesleyPlato’s Symposium masterfully depicts several different explanations of the phenomenon of Eros or love. The physician Eryximachus depicts Eros as a cosmic force that can bring harmony to a number of areas, from medicine and music to astronomy and divination. Most readers of the Symposium have read Eryximachus in an unflattering way, as a pompous know-it-all who fails to give a speech that meets either his high aspirations or his high opinion of himself. In this paper I argue that this reading of Eryximachus and his speech is unpersuasive. My defense of Eryximachus has three components: (1) Plato treats Eryximachus sympathetically in the Symposium and elsewhere, and has him deliver a modest and perfectly coherent speech about the science of Eros. (2) Eryximachus’s speech can only be properly understood if we read it in the context of Hippocratic medical theory, which infuses the speech throughout. (3) Outside the Symposium, Plato views medicine as a model technē, and health as a central philosophical concept; inside the Symposium, Plato has his mouthpiece Socrates give a speech on behalf of the priestess Diotima that agrees with Eryximachus on nearly every point of his speech. This indicates that Plato would have viewed Eryximachus’s speech quite favorably, and that modern readers should follow suit. I conclude by suggesting how this reading of Eryximachus should influence how we read the Symposium as a whole.Item Learned by heart : pederastic reading and writing practices in Plato's Phaedrus(2016-05) Emison, Emily Ruth; Walker, Jeffrey, 1949-; Boyle, CaseyRather than reiterating the ways in which Phaedrus may be seen as Plato's positive reformulation of rhetoric, this paper focuses on reading the pederastic dynamic between the dialogue's interlocutors (and, by extension, it argues, between Plato and his contemporary audience as well as the text and future readers). Viewed thus, Phaedrus may be less invested than is generally supposed in settling whether rhetoric belongs more properly to the realm of doxa versus episteme or whether there is a clear and steadfast division between a "philosophical method" and a "rhetorical method" of teaching. Closer attention to Plato's pederastic language not only reunites the Phaedrus with its originally stated subject (i.e., the prospective benefits and detriments of the lover versus the nonlover, of mania versus sophrosune), it also clarifies the ways in which Plato contributed to contemporary debates over the Athenian paideia and highlights the ideal relationship between author, written word, and reader that his dialogues sought to foster. The paper begins with a brief description of pederastic practices and pederasty as an aristocratic phenomenon in 5th and 4th-century Athens, drawing on the constructionist approaches of Kenneth Dover and Michel Foucault. It then turns to the Phaedrus itself, reading the dialogue's dramatic setting, the intensifying erotic and poetic force of its three speeches, and its denouement with the so-called Myth of Theuth. The matter at hand is twofold: Why pederasty and how pederasty? Why does the dialogue include various references to rape, trickery, or force and how does Plato advocate particular reading and writing practices via the extended pederastic play of Phaedrus? These questions lead to an abbreviated survey of sophistic approaches to rhetorical education in 4th-century Athens, touching on the expanded sense of paideia and the rivalry between Plato and Isocrates. The paper's conclusion carries Phaedrus into the 21st-century classroom, ultimately proposing that learning Plato's dialogue, in more ways than one, may serve as a propaedeutic to rhetorical studies in the digital humanities and adjacent fields.Item On Plato's Hipparchus(2015-09-23) Bellows, Samuel Palmer; Pangle, Lorraine Smith; Stauffer, DevinThe Hipparchus, Plato’s short dialogue on the love of gain, generally receives little attention from contemporary scholars. This essay, however, argues that Socrates’ brazenly amoral defense of seeking gain provides deep insights into some of the fundamental themes of Platonic political philosophy, helping to clarify the character of the human good, as well as its relation to philosophy and morality.Item Origen's doctrine of the soul: Platonist or Christian?(2008-05) Essary, Kirk A.; Christiansen, Peder; Lavigne, Donald E.; Webb, Mark O.This thesis attempts to exposit Origen’s doctrine of the soul as it appears in his De Principiis, a work that in our day is fraught with textual problems for a number of reasons. The first part of the thesis contains a reasonably coherent and responsible view of Origen’s psychological cosmology, and that this exposition contributes to modern understanding of Origen’s thought. More specifically, the paper attempts to illuminate, regarding each of the aspects of Origen’s doctrine of the soul, to what extent he is Platonizing and to what extent he is writing within the realm of Christian orthodoxy. Origen is certainly doing both to some extent, whether he is conscious of it or not. Themes of Platonism inherent in Origen’s De Principiis abound. However, many of the aspects of Origen’s doctrine of the soul to have a strong Christian basis. Whether from the abundant scriptural evidence that support epistemic salvation or that Origen’s maintenance of the preexistence of souls to stem primarily from his attempts to defend Christianity against Valentinus and Marcion, Origen has primarily Christian reasons for setting forth his doctrines. At almost every point that Origen’s enemies have charged him with heresy, Origen can respond with a poem from David, or a line from one of Paul’s epistles. It might have been inevitable that Origen escaped Alexandria with positive views of Aristotle’s ethics and Plato’s metaphysics. Rather than being accused of subverting Christian thought, Origen ought more often to be commended for trying to strengthen it by drawing on a peerless tradition of Greek philosophy. He has shown us that the writers of the New Testament are not themselves free from occasional Platonizing, and he always argued that rather than eschewing anything that smacks of Athens, Christianity ought to take from it what it can use for the improvement of its own doctrine, but to be careful of allowing it to supplant the major tenets of Christianity. Our goal is to show that this is, at worst, what Origen has done in presenting his doctrine of the soul in the De Principiis.Item Plato and Thucydides on Athenian imperialism(2012-05) Truelove, Scott Matthew; Seung, T. K., 1930-; Martinich, Aloysius; Perry, H. W.; Tulis, Jeffrey; Woodruff, PaulFor over two thousand years, Plato’s superiority to Thucydides was taken as an article of faith in Western philosophy. Nietzsche was the first to challenge this verdict by asserting his view—on philosophical grounds—that Thucydides was the more penetrating analyst of the human condition. Other than Nietzsche’s consideration of the two thinkers, surprisingly little has been done to investigate the connections between the two greatest Greek prose writers. My purpose in this dissertation is to rekindle this debate in light of new evidence to see what—if anything—can be gained by examining the relationship between how Plato and Thucydides treat the problem of Athenian imperialism. More specifically, I believe and attempt to show that: (1) Plato silently but explicitly directs his readers to different parts of the History through the use of textual references and thematic patterns; (2) Plato uses these textual allusions to highlight the common ground between the two thinkers, and that Plato understands Thucydides to be an ally to his philosophic aims; (3) Plato and Thucydides agree that the underlying cause of Athenian imperialism can be attributed to a combination of greed (pleonexia) and the internalization of specific sophistic teachings that, whether intended by the sophists or not, support unbridled appetitiveness as the best way of life; and (4) Plato and Thucydides largely agree on the solution to the problem—that pleonexia must be extirpated from the ruling order.Item Plato's Menexenus and Athenian ideology ca. 479-380 B.C.(2015-05) Cogbill, Aaron Parker; Hubbard, Thomas K.; Perlman, PaulaAthenian funeral oratory of the fourth century preserves what were in the fifth century competing oral traditions about the city's past that would have been promoted by different politicians, including Cimon and Pericles. Herodotus and Thucydides give evidence as to the content of the distinct traditions. Sometime between 430 and 392, all the claims were unified. In the Menexenus, Plato exhorts Athens' literate aristocracy to transform the unified tradition into a considered ideology.Item Plato's Theaetetus and the problem of knowledge(2010-12) Rabinowitz, Laura; Stauffer, Devin, 1970-; Pangle, Thomas L.In keeping with Socrates’ advice that it is “a better thing to accomplish a little well than a lot inadequately” (Theaetetus, 187d), this master’s report provides a detailed study of a few relatively short sections of Plato’s Theaetetus. After an analysis of the beginning of the work and its opening themes, I examine the Protagorean thesis as it is first revealed in Theaetetus’ second endeavor to say what knowledge is. Rather than follow the entire course of Socrates’ account of Protagoras’ position, I bring out a few of the essential features of this initial presentation and attempt to gain some clarity as to the possible meaning and purpose behind Protagoras’ enigmatic declaration that man is the measure of all things. The final section of my paper entails a close analysis of the dialogue’s last definition of knowledge: true opinion with speech. Although this account does not answer all of the questions posed by the Protagorean thesis, we find within it the most promising approach to answering the question of the dialogue: “What is knowledge?” While the Theaetetus comes to a close with this final attempt and ultimate failure to answer the question with which it began, I show that Socrates’ spurious arguments often serve more as pointers toward the truth than as refutations of the “truths” proposed.Item Platonic Cosmopolitanism(2011-10-21) Betti, Daniel VincentWhat is the content of a meaningful cosmopolitan theory? Contemporary cosmopolitanism offers numerous global theories of liberalism, democracy, republicanism, and postmodernism, but is there anything of the ?cosmos? or ?polis? within them? I argue these theories, though global, are not cosmopolitan. Ancient Greek philosophy holds a more meaningful, substantive conception of cosmopolitanism. From Homer to the Stoics and Cynics, ancient Greece was a hotbed for thinking beyond the confines of local tradition and convention. These schools of thought ventured to find universal understandings of humanity and political order. Conceiving of the world as a beautiful order, a cosmos, they sought a beautiful order for the association of human beings. Within that tradition is the unacknowledged legacy of Platonic cosmopolitanism. Rarely do political philosophers find cosmopolitan themes in the dialogues of Plato. Correcting this omission, I argue that Plato?s dialogues, from the early through the late, comprise a cosmopolitan journey: an attempt to construct a polis according to an understanding of the cosmos. The early dialogues address questions of piety, justice, and righteous obedience. More than that, they inquire into why a good man, Socrates, is persecuted in his city for nothing more than being a dutiful servant of the gods and his city. The middle dialogues construct a true cosmopolis, a political association in harmony with the natural laws of the world. Furthermore, they explain why those who know how to construct such a polis live best in such arrangements. In the late dialogues, Plato revises his political plans to accord with a more developed understanding of cosmic and human nature. Platonic cosmopolitanism constructs a true polis according to the beautiful order of the cosmos. Such a feat of philosophy is remarkable in the Greek tradition, and inspires contemporaries to rethink their own conception of what is truly cosmopolitan versus merely global.Item Plato’s Euthyphro : an examination of the Socratic method in the definitional dialogues(2011-05) Combs, Blinn Ellis; White, Stephen A. (Stephen Augustus); Mourelatos, Alexander P. D., 1936-; Woodruff, Paul B.; Hochberg, Herbert I.; Sosa, DavidThis dissertation examines Socrates' method of examining interlocutors, referred to as the elenchus, in Plato's definitional dialogues. It contains three parts. The first part lays out various theories of the elenchus. The first chapter examines the seminal view of Richard Robinson. The second sketches the development and aftermath of Vlastos' constructivist view. The third focuses on Socrates' own testimony about the elenchus in the Apology. These pictures of the elenchus form a selection of views against which various definitional dialogues may be compared. The second part, containing six chapters, provides a detailed commentary on the Euthyphro. Various features of that dialogue suggest that neither the prominent forms of constructivism, nor their non-constructivist alternatives presented in the first part adequately capture Socrates' procedure. The third part, consisting of one chapter, presents my view of the Socratic elenchus, which I term “technical destructivism.” I argue that this view provides a straight-forward solution to a number of problems which the alternative treatments leave unsolved. It also helps to explain some otherwise puzzling features of Socrates' procedure in the shorter definitional dialogues, including his use of the technē analogy, and his appeal to the priority of definitional knowledge.Item A prayer for me as well : friendship and philosophy in Plato's Phaedrus(2014-05) White, Glenavin Lindley; Woodruff, Paul, 1943-Although Plato's views on Friendship, or philia, are almost always found embedded in discussions of erotic love, I argue that these views nevertheless constitute a clear and compelling picture of the nature and value of the best kinds of friendship. Moreover, I suggest that these views on friendship present us with a surprising insight into Plato's overall conception of the practice of philosophy, as a personal process of striving for knowledge at the center of the best human life. To tease out these views on philia, I begin with a close reading of Plato's Phaedrus. As many have noted, this dialogue appears at first to be strangely disunified: its first half is concerned primarily with giving an account of erotic love, while its second half is devoted to a discussion of the nature and value of rhetoric. I begin by examining the theory of erotic love presented by Socrates in the 'palinode' at the center of the Phaedrus, and arguing that we can begin to see a theory of philia emerging from this account. I then argue that a central element of this theory of philia, as presented in the palinode to love, provides us with a link to the later discussion of rhetoric, and a unifying theme for the Phaedrus as a whole: the knowledge of souls. With this unifying theme in hand, I return to the account of philia, and eros, in the first half of the Phaedrus and, in light of this topic, draw further conclusions about Plato's views of the importance of philia, and eros, to philosophy.Item Shame and virtue in Plato and Aristotle(2013-05) Raymond, Christopher Cecil; Woodruff, Paul, 1943-In this dissertation, I examine Plato and Aristotle's reasons for denying that aidôs, or a sense of shame, is a virtue. The bulk of my study is devoted to the interpretation of two key texts: Plato's Charmides and Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. Although both philosophers see an important role for shame in moral education, they share the view that a fully virtuous person's actions are guided not by aidôs, but by practical wisdom. In the opening chapter, I provide an overview of their conception of shame as an essentially social emotion that expresses our concern for the opinions of others. I present and give a critique of a recent theory of shame that challenges this conception. The starting point of the second chapter is a brief passage in the Charmides where Socrates examines Charmides' claim that aidôs is the same as sôphrosunê ("temperance" or "moderation"). Socrates refutes the definition by citing a single verse from Homer's Odyssey: "aidôs is no good in a needy man." In order to make sense of his dubious appeal to poetic authority, I provide a close reading of Socrates' opening narration, in which he describes his initial encounter with the beautiful young Charmides. I show that the ambivalence about aidôs expressed in the quotation is justified through Socrates' portrait of Charmides. Though admirable at this early stage of his life, Charmides' aidôs is the very thing that prevents him from challenging Socrates' argument and gaining a deeper understanding of virtue. In the third chapter, I turn to the discussion of shame in Book 4 of the Nicomachean Ethics, where Aristotle explicitly argues that aidôs is not a virtue. The two arguments of NE 4.9 have puzzled commentators. My aim is to reconstruct Aristotle's view of aidôs and show that he does in fact have good grounds for excluding it from his list of virtues.