May 2004 Archives

In 2004 my book, The Ethics of Ontology: Rethinking an Aristotelian Legacy, was published by the State University of New York Press.

A novel rereading of the relationship between ethics and ontology in Aristotle. Concerned with the meaning and function of principles in an era that appears to have given up on their possibility altogether, Christopher P. Long traces the paths of Aristotle's thinking concerning finite being from the Categories, through the Physics, to the Metaphysics, and ultimately into the Nicomachean Ethics. Long argues that a dynamic and open conception of principles emerges in these works that challenges the traditional tendency to seek security in permanent and eternal absolutes. He rethinks the meaning of Aristotle's notion of principle (archē) and spans the divide of analytic and continental methodological approaches to ancient Greek philosophy, while connecting Aristotle's thinking to that of Levinas, Gadamer, and Heidegger.

"This book is cogently presented, well written, and easy to follow. Long defends a controversial thesis and provides persuasive and extensive argumentation. The carefully constructed treatment of the relationship between Aristotle's theoretical and practical philosophy offers an integrated interpretation of Aristotle's philosophy as a whole." — Walter Brogan, coeditor of American Continental Philosophy: A Reader

I wrote a review of Does Socrates Have a Method? Rethinking the Elenchus in Plato’s Dialogues and Beyond, edited by Gary Alan Scott (University Park, PA: Penn State University Press) inn The Review of Metaphysics, 57 (2004): 650-2.

The Review of Metaphysics has generously allowed me to make the full text of this review available in .pdf format: Click this link to download the full text of the review.