Sobre o Significado da Doutrina da ‘Mediedade’ em Aristóteles

Abstract

In the Nicomachean ethics book II, Aristotle presents his well known doctrine of the mean (mesovth~). This doctrine has brought a certain perplexity due to a possible inconsistency because it would not present any practical or advisory force. One of the critics about it tries to demonstrate its inadequacy, since a more rigorous approach of certain moral virtues would show that it is not the case of a mean between two vices, one by excess and other by deficiency (mesovth~ de; duvo kakiw`n, th`n me;n kaq j uJperbolh;n th`~ de; kat j e[lleiyin), but of correct and incorrect objects. This paper will try to demonstrate that that interpretation does not find any textual evidence in the aristotelian ethics, since a reconstruction of such doctrine would sustain its consistency in qualitative terms, especially if we point out that the final purpose of the virtue is the noble (tou` kalou` e{neka), in conformity with the prescriptions of the right reason (ojrqo;~ lovgo~).