Rereading Ancient Philosophy Old Chestnuts and Sacred Cows

This book revisits, and sheds fresh light on, some key texts and debates in ancient philosophy. Its twin targets are 'Old Chestnuts' – well-known passages in the works of ancient philosophers about which one might have thought everything there is to say has already been said – and 'Sacred Cows' – views about what ancient philosophers thought, on issues of philosophical importance, that have attained the status of near-unquestioned orthodoxy. Thirteen leading scholars respond to these challenges by offering new perspectives on familiar material and challenging some prevailing orthodoxies. On authors ranging from the Presocratics to Plotinus, the book represents a snapshot of contemporary scholarship in ancient philosophy, and a vigorous and illuminating affirmation of its continuing interest and power. The volume is dedicated to Professor M. M. McCabe, an inspiring scholar and teacher, colleague and friend to both the editors and the contributors.

Introduction; 1. On Second Thoughts, Does Nature Like to Hide? Heraclitus B123 Reconsidered Shaul Tor; 2. Deinos (Wicked Good) at Interpretation (Protagoras 334-48) Charles Brittain; 3. The Unhappiness of the Great King (Gorgias 461-81) Amber Carpenter; 4. Love and Knowledge Raphael Woolf; 5. Socrates, Eros and Magic Angela Hobbs; 6. The Psychological Import of the First Wave in Republic 5 Tad Brennan; 7. Knowing and Believing in Republic 5 Verity Harte; 8. Knowledge, True Belief and Poetry in Republic 10 Dominic Scott; 9. Another Two Cratyluses Problem Malcolm Schofield; 10. Is Aristotle a Virtue Ethicist? Joachim Aufderheide; 11. Soul as Harmony in Phaedo 85E-86D and Stoic Pneumatic Theory Ricardo Salles; 12. A Neglected Strategy of the Aristotelian Alexander on Necessity and Responsibility Sir Richard Sorabji; 13. “Present without being Present”: Plotinus on Plato's Daimon Peter Adamson.

VERITY HARTE is George A. Saden Professor of Philosophy and Classics at Yale University. She is the author of Plato on Parts and Wholes: the Metaphysics of Structure (2002) and co-editor (with M. M. McCabe, R. W. Sharples, and Anne Sheppard) of Aristotle and the Stoics Reading Plato (2010) and (with Melissa Lane) of Politeia in Greek and Roman Philosophy (Cambridge, 2013).
RAPHAEL WOOLF is Professor of Philosophy at King's College London. He is author of Cicero: The Philosophy of a Roman Sceptic (2015), translator of Cicero's De Finibus (On Moral Ends, ed. Julia Annas, Cambridge, 2001) and (with Brad Inwood) translator and editor of Aristotle's Eudemian Ethics (Cambridge, 2012). He has published articles on Plato, Aristotle and Hellenistic philosophy.