1. Was Socrates a ‘Weasel’? Socratic eironeia in Context

   Gabriel Danzig
   In contrast to irony, which is a mode of speech, eirōneia is a form of behavior, manifest in both speech and action, a form of self-presentation or prospoiēsis. It is not exactly deception, for which other words exist, but is more like being a ‘weasel’ in contemporary slang: prevaricating, temporizing, obfuscating, flattering, in a self-abasing manner in order to gain a dishonorable advantage. In Plato’s dialogues, the advantage being sought is internal to the dialogue and consists of humiliating someone or avoiding such humiliation. In this paper, I examine the evolution of eirōneia in ancient Greek and its application to Plato’s Socrates, arguing that Socrates was thought to have been an eirōn and that Plato seeks to refute the charge. I conclude by considering the innovations in Aristotle and the endurance of the traditional meaning in Theophrastus.
2. The Justice of the First Wave

   Cinzia Arruzza
   This article examines the argumentative coherence of the “first wave” in Plato’s Republic V, where Socrates advocates for the full inclusion of women in the guardian class. Contrary to interpretations that see this argument as dependent on the abolition of the private family (the “second wave”), I argue that Socrates presents a self-contained and logically consistent defense of women’s participation based on the principle of specialization. By distinguishing—with the help of Glaucon—between genos (kind) and individual, Socrates refutes the claim that sexual difference justifies exclusion from guardian roles. Additionally, I analyze the implications of Socrates’ remarks on women’s “weakness” in light of Hippocratic medical theories, arguing that female embodiment presents a comparative, but not categorical, disadvantage. Ultimately, Plato’s argument, while not feminist in a modern sense, is internally consistent and aligns with the Republic’s broader commitments to justice and the proper division of labor in Kallipolis.
3. The Powers of the Soul and the Pure Pleasures of Learning in Plato’s Philebus

   John Proios
   In Plato’s Philebus, Socrates argues that some pleasures depend for their pleasantness on a felt contrast with pain, whereas others do not. The former are “mixed”, and the latter are “pure”. He claims that there are pure pleasures associated with learning. But his account of these pleasures is puzzling: it appears to conflict with Plato’s other representations of learning as uncomfortable, it often relies on ambiguous, metaphorical language, and it claims, without explanation, that these pleasures are available only to “the few”. This paper resolves these puzzles by reconstructing the psychic basis of the pure pleasures of learning. It argues that Socrates understands learning as the act of putting in memory, which is enabled by the soul’s powers of memory and recollection. Memory and recollection enable the soul to have representational content present to mind and to enjoy having that content in mind without also being aware of pain. The painlessness of this psychic act has to do with Socrates’ conception of the structure of knowledge: only purely theoretical forms of expertise, which Socrates identifies as highly elite, allow for the representational contents of memory to be separate from the soul’s awareness of its or the body’s needs. The paper concludes with a discussion of the metaphysics of process in the dialogue and its significance for the paper’s interpretation for the pure pleasures of learning.
4. Aristotle’s Epistemology of Definitional Principles

   Christopher Hauser
   On Aristotle’s view, science is centrally concerned with two sorts of facts: indemonstrable principles and the facts demonstrable from them. Indemonstrable definitions (or accounts of the essences of things) have an important role to play in this explanatory project, as they are one of the three kinds of principles Aristotle discusses. This article examines Aristotle’s ideas about how we can best identify and come to know such definitions. Three prominent kinds of interpretations of Aristotle’s position are addressed: the Intuitionist (or Rationalist) interpretations favored by authors such as Ross, Irwin, and Frede, the Explanationist interpretations proposed by authors such as Bolton, Charles, and Lennox, and the Socratic interpretation recently articulated and defended by David Bronstein. This article argues for an Explanationist interpretation, showing why it is well-supported by key methodological passages and how it can be reconciled with the texts that have motivated the aforementioned rival accounts of Aristotle’s position.
5. ‘Being and Not-Being in the Strictest Sense’: A Reconstruction and Interpretation of the First Lines of Metaphysics Θ 10

   Jan Szaif
   Aristotle’s Metaphysics Θ 10 discusses ontological and epistemological implications of the true/false distinction. Right at the start of the chapter, at 1051b1, he uses the expression kyriôtata to assert the priority (ontological? semantic?) of either a certain sense of ‘to be’ and ‘not to be’ or a certain sense of the ‘true/false’ dichotomy. The textual tradition preserves at least five versions of this formulation, allowing for different interpretations. Based on a survey of the Greek text witnesses according to their stemmatic order and an analysis of the medieval Arabic and Latin translations, this essay offers a solution that best explains the derivation of the textual variants and also allows for a philosophically plausible interpretation within the framework of Aristotle’s logic and ontology: Aristotle asserts the priority of the veridical sense of the dichotomy of being and not-being on account of how he understands the logical function of negation.
6. Maternal Love and Tragic Tropes in Aristotle’s Ethics

   Mariska Leunissen
   This paper reconstructs Aristotle’s views of maternal love in two argument-pairs in his ethics. In both pairs, the evidence from maternal love reveals something important about virtue-friendship, however, this does not mean that Aristotle also values mothers and mothering as something virtuous. Instead, I argue that Aristotle consistently frames maternal love as being by nature rather than by choice and that for him mothers—perhaps especially ‘good’ ones who love their children intensely and unconditionally—are morally complex and even ambiguous figures, whose love is admirable but also potentially dangerous. This kind of ambivalence regarding maternal love is shared by Aristotle’s audience, and it is underscored by his own use of tragic tropes in these two argument-pairs. I first analyse maternal love in the context of Aristotle’s views about friendship, then suggest how the intertextualities with Greek tragedy should affect our reading of Aristotle’s appeals to maternal love.
7. The Ethics of the Stoic God

   Christopher Gill
   This article examines the relationship between Stoic ethics and theology (conceived as part of ‘physics’), focusing on the ethical status of god or divinity. It argues for a reciprocal relationship between ethics and theology, rather than one in which theology acts as the foundation for ethics. After outlining salient features of Stoic theology, especially the role of god in the natural world, it considers the characterization of god in ethical terms. This is followed by a more detailed discussion of certain well-known passages on god in Stoic ethics associated with the leading Stoic theorist Chrysippus. Although these passages are often taken to show that theology or physics is foundational for ethics, it is argued here that they express a reciprocal, mutually supporting, relationship between these two branches of knowledge.

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