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TELEOLOGY OF THE PRACTICAL IN ARISTOTLE: THE MEANING OF “ΠΡAΞΙΣ”* * An embryonic version of this paper was given in Campinas in 2008. I would like to thank Marco Zingano and in particular Lucas Angioni for their patience with an unfinished draft and their questions and comments. I would also like to thank the philosophy colloquium in Leipzig in November 2017, the 2018 St. Andrew’s graduate conference in ancient philosophy, the 2018 GanPh - Colloquium in Berlin, the Bochum ancient philosophy colloquium, and the philosophy colloquium at the Charles University in Prague in that same year. On all these occasion I was given opportunity to present more mature drafts of this paper. I thank all participants of the colloquia and workshops for their suggestions and comments, in particular Andrea Kern, Sebastian Rödl, James Conant, Wolfgang Sattler, Sarah Broadie, Friedemann Buddensiek, Ludger Jansen, Burkhard Reis, and Robert Roreitner. I owe special thanks to the editors, Lucas Angioni and Breno Zuppolini, for their insightful comments and suggestions.

Abstract

I show that in his De motu animalium Aristoteles proposes a teleology of the practical on the most general zoological level, i.e. on the level common to humans and self-moving animals. A teleology of the practical is a teleological account of the highest practical goals of animal and human self-motion. I argue that Aristotle conceives of such highest practical goals as goals that are contingently related to their realizations. Animal and human self-motion is the kind of action in which certain state of affairs that realize values are mechanized.

Keywords:
Aristotle; Action; Self-Motion; Zoology; Teleology

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