Normative Considerations Reintroduced

Abstract

Abstract Until this point, all of Aristotle’s arguments have been axiological, which is to say that they have dealt with the metaphysics of goodness. Now he shifts, arguing that even if Plato’s axiology were correct, even if there were a Form of the Good, it would be otiose. No one would, or could, appeal to the Form of the Good in the conduct of life. So, talking about it is, in the end, a waste of time—wholly irrelevant to ethical theory, which deals precisely with the question of how we ought to conduct our lives.