Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics is one of the most important ethical treatises ever written, and has had a profound influence on the subsequent development of ethics and moral psychology. This collection of essays, written by both senior and younger scholars in the field, presents a thorough and close examination of the work. The essays address a broad range of issues including the compositional integrity of the Ethics, the nature of desire, the value of emotions, happiness and the virtues. The result is a volume which will challenge and advance the scholarship on the Ethics, establishing new ways of viewing and appreciating the work for all scholars of Aristotle.

Aristotle's ethics, or study of character, is built around the premise that people should achieve an excellent character (a virtuous character, "ethikē aretē" in Greek) as a pre-condition for attaining happiness or well-being (eudaimonia).

One of the philosopher's most studied works, the Nicomachean Ethics, is here made available in the same translation in the World's Classics. Notes of primarily textual importance have been omitted, leaving only those of more general philosophical interest the index has been adapted for this edition and there is a new Introduction by the translator. Though Aristotle at hisdeath left other ethical works, and this book is therefore called after its first editor Nicomachus, it is this which is usually meant when Aristotle's Ethics is referred to. As such it is of fundamental importance in the development of philosophy.Keywords: Nicomachean Ethics Aristotle Philosophical Interest Philosophy Fundamental Importance Philosopher Translator Translation

The Nicomachean Ethics is one of Aristotle’s most widely read and influential works. Ideas central to ethics—that happiness is the end of human endeavor, that moral virtue is formed through action and habituation, and that good action requires prudence—found their most powerful proponent in the person medieval scholars simply called “the Philosopher.” Drawing on their intimate knowledge of Aristotle’s thought, Robert C. Bartlett and Susan D. Collins have produced here an English-language translation of the Ethics that is as remarkably faithful to the original as it is graceful in its rendering. Aristotle is well known for the precision with which he chooses his words, and in this elegant translation his work has found its ideal match. Bartlett and Collins provide copious notes and a glossary providing context and further explanation for students, as well as an introduction and a substantial interpretive essay that sketch central arguments of the work and the seminal place of Aristotle’s Ethics in his political philosophy as a whole. The Nicomachean Ethics has engaged the serious interest of readers across centuries and civilizations—of peoples ancient, medieval, and modern; pagan, Christian, Muslim, and Jewish—and this new edition will take its place as the standard English-language translation.

The Nicomachean Ethics is the Aristotle's best-known work on ethics. The work, which plays a pre-eminent role in defining Aristotelian ethics, consists of ten books, originally separate scrolls, and is understood to be based on notes from his lectures at the Lyceum. The theme of the work is a Socratic question previously explored in the works of Plato, Aristotle's friend and teacher, of how men should best live. In his Metaphysics, Aristotle described how Socrates, the friend and teacher of Plato, had turned philosophy to human questions, whereas pre-Socratic philosophy had only been theoretical. Ethics, as now separated out for discussion by Aristotle, is practical rather than theoretical, in the original Aristotelian senses of these terms. In other words, it is not only a contemplation about good living, because it also aims to create good living. It is therefore connected to Aristotle's other practical work, the Politics, which similarly aims at people becoming good. Ethics is about how individuals should best live, while the study of politics is from the perspective of a law-giver, looking at the good of a whole community.

"The Ethics" is Aristotle's most important study of personal morality. For many centuries, it has been a widely read and influential book. Though written more than 2,000 years ago, it offers the modern reader many valuable insights into human needs since people have not changed significantly in the many years since Aristotle first lectured on ethics at the Lyceum in Athens. In this book, Aristotle insists that no known absolute moral standards exist. Any ethical theory must be based partly on an understanding of psychology and firmly grounded in human nature and daily life realities.

Aristotle on the Sources of the Ethical Life challenges the common belief that Aristotle's ethics is founded on an appeal to human nature, an appeal that is thought to be intended to provide both substantive ethical advice and justification for the demands of ethics. Sylvia Berryman argues that this is not Aristotle's intent, while resisting the view that Aristotle was blind to questions of the source or justification of his ethical views. She interprets Aristotle's views as a 'middle way' between the metaphysical grounding offered by Platonists, and the scepticism or subjectivist alternatives articulated by others. The commitments implicit in the nature of action figure prominently in this account: Aristotle reinterprets Socrates' famous paradox that no-one does evil willingly, taking it to mean that a commitment to pursuing the good is implicit in the very nature of action.

A discussion of the intersections between Aristotle's works: Ethics and Metaphysics. It debates the ways in which - and even the extent to which - the two texts illuminate one another, examine Aristotle's methods and intellectualism and analyse issues of matter, form, potency and art.

What is the good life? Posing this question today would likely elicit very different answers. Some might say that the good life means doing good—improving one’s community and the lives of others. Others might respond that it means doing well—cultivating one’s own abilities in a meaningful way. But for Aristotle these two distinct ideas—doing good and doing well—were one and the same and could be realized in a single life. In Confronting Aristotle’s Ethics, Eugene Garver examines how we can draw this conclusion from Aristotle's works, while also studying how this conception of the good life relates to contemporary ideas of morality. The key to Aristotle’s views on ethics, argues Garver, lies in the Metaphysics or, more specifically, in his thoughts on activities, actions, and capacities. For Aristotle, Garver shows, it is only possible to be truly active when acting for the common good, and it is only possible to be truly happy when active to the extent of one’s own powers. But does this mean we should aspire to Aristotle’s impossibly demanding vision of the good life? In a word, no. Garver stresses the enormous gap between life in Aristotle’s time and ours. As a result, this bookwill be a welcome rumination on not only Aristotle, but the relationship between the individual and society in everyday life.