From: "Eric" <ericandmary-AT-earthlink.net>
Subject: RE: on the virtuality of human relationships
Date: Thu, 22 Jan 2004 21:20:26 -0600


Lydia/Steve/All;

The concept of friendship is also a very Greek notion, very integral to
the city-state. One of the things that makes Aristotle's ethics so
different from modern ethics is the space he gives to human flourishing
(eudaemania) in the context of friendship. He also agrees that
friendship can only take place among equals; the idea of friendship
between a slave and a free man seems impossible to him.  He
distinguishes three kinds of friendship;

Friendship based on mutual pleasure
Friendship based on mutual interest
Friendship based on shared virtue and character

While the first two are forms of friendship, they remain imperfect and
temporal. Only the last offers the possibility of a lifetime friendship
in which the human is allowed to be seen through the other.  It is this
mirroring of the soul that Aristotle sees as the true benefit on
Friendship.  

It is also interesting that a generation later when Epicurus taught his
negative hedonism, the Friend was the ideal of life found in the
community he called the garden and he moved to radicalize the notion of
equality in friendship.  

Part of the reason is seems today the friendship has become so fragile
is that we lack the leisure Aristotle saw as the basis of philosophy and
we lack the public life so typical of the city-state.  Under capitalism,
economics becomes sovereign. The question remains - is it possible to
establish the condition of leisure and public life in community without
returning to an earlier age? Why is it that with so much communication
technology, our social life seems to be diminished?

eric

 

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