The Ideas of the Mean before Aristotle

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초록

The doctrine of the mean is said to be Aristotle’s unique notion. Does it mean that we fail to find the notion of the mean in Pre-Socratic philosophers, Socrates, and Plato? The Greeks believed that mean was the key to becoming a better person; we can find in the works of Homer, Hesiod, Solon and the aphorisms of Seven Sages that the mean was praised as we were warned against excess and deficiency. In this manner, we can find the ideas of the mean in Pre-Socratic philosophers and Plato. Thus, my goal of this paper will catch tantalizing glimpses of such ideas before Aristotle, revealing the reason what are the goals the philosophers before Aristotle try to consider through the ideas of the mean. Furthermore, if Aristotle’s doctrine of the mean would lay down its basis for the ancient Greek’s tradition, then, what Aristotle’s new contribution is.
Pythagoras was the first philosopher who offered three types of mean in mathematics, in music, and in ethics to explain harmony in kosmos. Heraclitus emphasized the importance of measure (metron) in physical change with the cosmic fire (logos). Democritus offered us the moral ideal of moderation as the mean, praising happiness through moderation as the balanced life. For Hippocrates, health can occur when certain qualities or powers are blended (krasis) in proper proportion (metron) to constitute a bodily state without excess or deficiency. Plato also grapples with the same idea of the mean as his predecessors as middle or intermediate between two extremes or a proportion or a measurement to mix the two extreme elements in harmony.
The various ideas of the mean - measurement, mixture, middle, balance or harmony – are presented in the pre-Socratic and Plato and are taken up by Aristotle. These concepts are adapted for explaining what the best is both in human life and even in cosmology. Thus, we insist that Aristotle’s doctrine of the mean is a heritage of his predecessors, and Aristotle’s new approach consists in exploring the implications of the mean as ‘intermediate’ or ‘appropriate’ which is not exact middle, but close to one of two extremes for the best way in certain situation. Aristotle divides the mean into two types – the arithmetical mean and the ethical mean – and this distinction, brought forth on his own terms, distinguishes his doctrine of the mean from that of his predecessors.

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