an anacluthon or not?--about 1113a29 Aristotle. N.E.

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medea
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an anacluthon or not?--about 1113a29 Aristotle. N.E.

Post by medea »

ἐν τοῖς πολλοῖς δὲ ἡ ἀπάτη διὰ τὴν ἡδονὴν ἔοικε γίνεσθαι: οὐ γὰρ οὖσα ἀγαθὸν φαίνεται.

The problem arrives when my friend and I analyse "οὐ γὰρ οὖσα ἀγαθὸν ". I make the same subject as the fomer, "ἡ ἀπάτη"and translate literally "the illusion seems to arise due to pleasure: in fact, (the illusion)it,not being good, appears to be so." But my friend argues that there's a semicolon entre the two parts, and it means there's an anacluthon. So the subject could be changed for the "οὐ γὰρ οὖσα ἀγαθὸν ". He translates : "the illusion seems to arise due to pleasure; in fact, the pleasure, not being good, appears to be so."
Till now, I have insisted that in greek, colon and semicolon are noted in same way. And I treat it as an explicit colon, but not an anacluthon semicolon.

Any advice about that?
Last edited by medea on Wed Nov 10, 2010 1:29 am, edited 1 time in total.

NateD26
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Re: an anacluthon or not?--about 1113a29 Aristotle. N.E.

Post by NateD26 »

What exactly is anacluthon semicolon?

I do not understand the way you and your friend have read the first part.
γίνεσθαι has passive meaning and it doesn't take the acc., which in here
is part of the prep. phrase διὰ τὴν ἡδονήν. Simply to become/arise/happen.

For the second part, φαίνεται + inf., to appear to be x; + part., to be manifestly/clearly x.

Perhaps something like this:
In many people, deceit/guile seems to arise due to pleasure [in it]; for it clearly isn't morally good.
Nate.

medea
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Re: an anacluthon or not?--about 1113a29 Aristotle. N.E.

Post by medea »

sorry for my english.
Let's reform my question by the help of ur translation:

which one "isn't morally good"? it refers Deceit or Pleasure? which is the subject of this negative affirmation? And is there an anacluthon or not?
Last edited by medea on Wed Nov 10, 2010 1:36 am, edited 1 time in total.

medea
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Re: an anacluthon or not?--about 1113a29 Aristotle. N.E.

Post by medea »

οὖσα : part.,f.,nominative, so it should accord to ἡ ἀπάτη,isnt it?

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Re: an anacluthon or not?--about 1113a29 Aristotle. N.E.

Post by NateD26 »

I think you're right about Anacoluthon here, and that it does refer to pleasure.
English translation by H. Rackham @Perseus has:
It appears to be pleasure that misleads the mass of mankind; for it seems to them to be a good, though it is not,
so they choose what is pleasant as good and shun pain as evil.
Nate.

medea
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Re: an anacluthon or not?--about 1113a29 Aristotle. N.E.

Post by medea »

so neither Deceit nor Pleasure is the subject ? It isnt possible to follow the analyse in last post? cauz in french version,we have "tout n'étant pas un bien, mais il l'est en apparence." The translator reform the phrase as“ouk ousa agathon (agathon) phainetai (einai)”. It's possible for u ?

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Re: an anacluthon or not?--about 1113a29 Aristotle. N.E.

Post by NateD26 »

Maybe instead of deceit we can call it trickery. That pleasure tricks people into thinking it, and anything associated
with it, is good. Therefore, being under the influence of that trickery, they choose anything that is pleasant as good,
and shun anything that is painful as bad.

I'll rewrite my initial attempt in light of this:
Trickery seems to arise because of pleasure; for pleasure is manifestly not good, therefore, [thinking it actually is,]
they choose what is pleasant as good, and flee pain as bad.

EDIT: I do not know French but using Google translator, it has pretty much the same as the English translation @Perseus:
while not good, but it is in appearance.
Pleasure is not good, but it seems to them to be good, therefore they are tricked
into choosing pleasant things as good, and shun painful ones as bad.
Nate.

medea
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Re: an anacluthon or not?--about 1113a29 Aristotle. N.E.

Post by medea »

I agree with your opinon that it’s better to treat it as Trickery.
But for me, that means—— trickery which cause by pleasure is not good; but not the pleasure. Actually, you've given two answers: the subject is "trickery" or "neither trickery nor pleasure"; then you consider the subject is "pleasure".

waiting for others to vote~~~~ :roll:

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Re: an anacluthon or not?--about 1113a29 Aristotle. N.E.

Post by modus.irrealis »

I can't find a direct reference right now but ἀπάτη can also mean "error" (the result of being deceived by your judgement or whatnot), and this seems to be how it's generally translated here. But the logic here is I think "this error seems to arise due to pleasure, because even though it [=pleasure] is not good, it seems [to be good], so people choose..." I can't see any grammatical reason against Nate's taking οὖσα with φαίνεται, but it makes better sense in my opinion to see the participle clause as separate and meaning "although". It's true that οὖσα is nominative, but γάρ is a conjunction so there's no reason to think that the subject can't change.

But the subject of φαίνεται is ἀπάτη -- at least I can't find any translation that doesn't read it that way -- the French one too - the full translation I found was "chez la plupart des hommes, au contraire, l'erreur semble bien avoir le plaisir pour cause, car, tout en n'étant pas un bien, il en a l'apparence" and "il" can only refer back to "plaisir".

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Re: an anacluthon or not?--about 1113a29 Aristotle. N.E.

Post by NateD26 »

Do you mean, modus, that when you translate "this error seems to arise due to pleasure, because even though it [=pleasure] is not good, it seems [to be good], so people choose...", you read the second it as referring to ἀπάτη? At least that's what you wrote in your second paragraph, which doesn't add up.

In this Translation by J.E. C. Welldon (1923),
He read 'appears to be...' as referring to pleasure, and the participle as still referring to it.
I don't understand how can the verb and the participle, of the same case, number and gender, refer to different subjects in a seemingly new clause.
medea wrote:Actually, you've given two answers: the subject is "trickery" or "neither trickery nor pleasure"; then you consider the subject is "pleasure".
I don't see where I've given any answer indicating that the subject is "neither trickery nor pleasure". That was your reply. I initially read
both the verb and the participle in the second clause as referring to ἀπάτη (not fully understanding the meaning of the sentence), but then
I read the entire sentence again, as well as checked myself with the English translation, and corrected my answer, that they're both referring to ἡδονή.
Nate.

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Re: an anacluthon or not?--about 1113a29 Aristotle. N.E.

Post by modus.irrealis »

Sorry, I wrote the wrong word. I meant to say ἡδονή is the subject of φαίνεται, and of course the participle and the main verb have to have the same subject here.

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Re: an anacluthon or not?--about 1113a29 Aristotle. N.E.

Post by IreneY »

Given that the next line is "αἱροῦνται οὖν τὸ ἡδὺ ὡς ἀγαθόν, τὴν δὲ λύπην ὡς κακὸν φεύγουσιν." I'd say that it's rather clear that "ηδονή" is the subject.

medea
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Re: an anacluthon or not?--about 1113a29 Aristotle. N.E.

Post by medea »

thanx a lot. It's clearly now.

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