Is Aristotle's account of friendship too exclusive?

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Christopher Bell

For Harry Platanakis

28th February 4pm

Is Aristotle’s account of friendship too exclusive?

        This essay will consider Aristotle’s theory of friendship, as propounded in books 8 and 9 of the Nicomachaean Ethics.  First analysis of how Aristotle conceives friendship, divided into three species, needs to be performed to consider whether Aristotle is able to admit more than one species of friendship into his conception of friendship.  Then the implications of Aristotle’s “character-friendship” and its importance in his conception of the “good life” must be considered to determine whether Aristotle offers an account of friendship that needn’t be viewed as the exclusive preserve of the virtuous good.

        It must first be noted that the Greek word for friendship, philia, denotes a wider concept than in modern English.  The modern tendency only to consider close or social acquaintances as friends does not correspond to Greek philia, which encompassed just about any familiar acquaintance, including family and business associates.  Aristotle conceives of friendship as being (or at least involving) virtue:  “For no-one would choose to live without friends but possessing all other good things.” (1155a5).  However he observes difficulties in terms of defining friendship, both regarding whether both good and bad men are capable of friendship and whether there is only one type of friendship or several.  Aristotle remarks at NE 8.2 that not all types of liking correspond to friendship, for example one might like wine but this relationship is deficient compared to friendship in that the wine isn’t capable of reciprocating one’s liking nor does one wish well on the wine.  Friendship therefore exists only where one wishes someone well, for his own sake, and has his action reciprocated in the same vein.  At this point he appears to be endorsing his definition of friendship in the Rhetoric, in which friendship is characterised by a well-wishing for the friend’s sake.  However when Aristotle now introduces his presentation of the three species of friendship, it is unclear that he wants to uphold the definition of friendship from the Rhetoric.  

Aristotle divides friendship into three species: friendships of good people, friendships based on utility and friendships based on pleasure.  Aristotle conceives the latter two as imperfect, however his explanation of his view appears to preclude these two types of friendship from his previous definition.  “In a friendship based on utility or on pleasure men love their friend for their own good and their own pleasure.” (1156a16).  Friendships based on utility are imperfect, because they are motivated by short-term considerations and are contingent on changeable circumstances (1156a 20-30).  Similarly, friendships based on pleasure are contingent on feelings and accidental conditions (1156a 31 - 1156b 3).  However the friendship of good people is most enduring, and complete, because they "wish goods to each other for each other’s own sake" (1156b 9-10), in addition to being useful and pleasant to each other.

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        These three categories of friendship seem very problematic; the two imperfect categories do not appear to conform in any way to Aristotle’s previous definition of a friendship reliant on a reciprocal good will for another’s sake, while the friendship conceived as perfect between the good seems unattainable, due to inevitable flaws in human character.  The first problem requires my immediate consideration.    Aristotle says that utility and pleasure friendships only exist in that they resemble his central character friendship.  However while he seems to portray both as existent on an entirely selfish motive, there is clearly still space for ...

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