This article falls into two parts: the first is an analysis, in the light of my earlier discussions of and of the Homeric usage of and the second, an attempt to show that, as in the case of the effects of Homeric usage persist to a considerable degree in the moral philosophy of Aristotle. In the earlier discussions I have argued that the higher value placed upon the competitive in Greek entails that co-operative relationships, even when valued and necessary, take (...) the form dictated by the more valued qualities, the The most general words to denote co-operative relationships in Greek are and its derivatives: my purpose here is to show how the Homeric usage of these words is related to the Homeric standard and to Homeric society, and to sketch in the outline of a wider discussion, which I hope to be able to fill in later. (shrink)

This paper will discuss the behaviour of and in the Homeric poems. These words are allotted a variety of different ‘meanings’ by the lexicographers. For example, LSJ s.v. I. pray, II. vow, III. profess loudly, boast, vaunt; s.v. I. prayer, II. boast, vaunt, or object of boasting, glory; s.v. I. thing prayed for, object of prayer, II. boast, vaunt. I shall, of course, discuss the whole range of these words; but I begin with some observations on ‘prayer’. It may appear (...) at first sight that ‘prayer’ is a simple word, with only one conceivable ‘meaning’, which must have that ‘meaning’ in any language. We might suggest that ‘request addressed to a god’ is an adequate representation of that ‘meaning’, and that when we have rendered by ‘pray’ in what appear to us to be appropriate contexts we have conveyed the full sense of the original. (shrink)

Since other readers of Mr. Creed's recent interesting article may find themselves in a similar puzzlement to my own over certain statements there made, I offer this reply in the hope of providing elucidation. It is clear that someone named Adkins has perpetrated something heinous; but that ‘someone’ manifestly holds views which differ in a number of important respects from my own. The most convenient method of demonstrating this fact would be to juxtapose passages of Creed with passages of my (...) Merit and Responsibility; but since space does not permit the juxtaposition of whole passages, I confine myself in the first part of this article to juxtaposing the references. (shrink)

This historical study of early 19th-century opposition to vivisection suggests that the moral persona of the vivisector was an important theme. Vivisectors claimed they deliberately suppressed their feelings to perform scientifically necessary experiments: Where there was reason, there could be no cruelty. Their critics argued they were callous and indifferent to suffering, which was problematic for medical practitioners, who were expected to be merciful and compassionate. This anthropocentric debate can be located within the virtue ethics tradition: Compassion for animals signified (...) a humane character. The 1876 Vivisection Act facilitated experimentation by separating the practice of vivisection from that of medicine. (shrink)

The National Anti-Vivisection Hospital opened to patients in 1903, the only district hospital in London not financed by state-controlled funds, which refused it support because of its principles. For three decades the hospital treated the local poor and conscientious objectors to vivisection, who were assured that staff pledged not to experiment on animals or patients. After an overambitious building program, the hospital ran into financial difficulties, and the King’s Fund refused to help unless all references to antivivisection were removed from (...) its statutes. Thus it reopened as Battersea General in 1935, continuing to serve the borough until 1972. (shrink)

A number of scholars have discussed the difficulty of preserving accurately—or at all—information about the past1 in the Greek Dark Ages when the literacy of Minoan/Mycenean Greece had been lost. Such preservation necessarily depended on the memories of the members of the society, especially those of the professional ‘rememberers’, the bards of the oral tradition: in such a society, if knowledge of an event is to be available to future generations, it must not be forgotten.