Book 7 / Chapter 2
Paragraph 4 - The Sophistic Argument and Ethical Paradoxes
Explanation - Part By Part
"Further, the sophistic argument presents a difficulty; the syllogism arising from men's wish to expose paradoxical results arising from an opponent's view, in order that they may be admired when they succeed, is one that puts us in a difficulty"
Aristotle is pointing out a problem with certain kinds of arguments—specifically, those used by sophists, who often craft tricky, paradoxical reasoning just to challenge an opponent's viewpoint and show off their intellectual skill. These arguments are not necessarily aimed at uncovering truth or resolving an issue, but rather at creating confusion or winning admiration through cleverness. The "difficulty" here lies in the way these arguments can trap the mind: they lead to conclusions that feel unsatisfying or absurd, but at the same time, they seem logically airtight, making it hard to dismiss or refute them outright. This tactic disrupts productive thinking and creates intellectual tension without offering real progress.
"for thought is bound fast when it will not rest because the conclusion does not satisfy it, and cannot advance because it cannot refute the argument"
In this part, Aristotle is describing a mental state where our thinking gets "stuck." When we encounter an argument or a conclusion that doesn't feel right or satisfying, our minds naturally resist accepting it. However, if we can't logically disprove or challenge the argument, we find ourselves in a kind of intellectual paralysis—we're unable to move forward with clarity or resolution. It's that frustrating tension between knowing something feels off but not being able to pinpoint or dismantle the reasoning behind it.
"There is an argument from which it follows that folly coupled with incontinence is virtue; for a man does the opposite of what he judges, owing to incontinence, but judges what is good to be evil and something that he should not do, and consequence he will do what is good and not what is evil."
Aristotle is addressing a tricky philosophical argument that might seem absurd at first glance. The idea goes like this:
If someone is both foolish (holds incorrect beliefs) and incontinent (unable to act in line with their own judgments), this seems to lead to good actions in a paradoxical way. Why? Because the person judges good things to be bad (due to their folly), but since they are incontinent, they go against their own judgment. Therefore, instead of doing the bad thing they believe is good, they actually end up doing the good thing—because their inability to follow their own (incorrect) judgment accidentally leads them to act rightly.
Essentially, the argument suggests that being foolish and lacking self-control could, in a peculiar way, result in virtuous actions. Aristotle is pointing out how such reasoning creates mental difficulty because it challenges our usual associations—continence and virtue are typically linked, but here, lack of self-control paired with wrong thinking oddly seems to produce good outcomes, making the whole situation hard to reconcile.