ARISTOTLE AND THE PAIN OF ANIMALS: NICOMACHEAN ETHICS 1154B7–9

Abstract

This paper explains the motivation behind Aristotle's appeal in Nicomachean Ethics 1154b7–9 to the physiologoi who notoriously declare that animals are constantly in pain. It argues that the physiologoi are neither the critical target of this chapter nor invoked to verify Aristotle's commitment to the imperfection of the human condition. Rather, despite doctrinal disagreement, they help Aristotle develop a naturalistic story about how ordinary people easily indulge in sensory pleasures.

1

In Nicomachean Ethics 7,¹ after defending the value of pleasure by determining its genuine nature as an energeia, the unimpeded activity of the natural state (1153a12–15), Aristotle urges that in addition to the truth we should not ignore the cause of the error (1154a22–3). He is especially attracted to and puzzled by what is false appearing true and thus most attractive. This is a question concerning the seductive nature of bodily pleasures: why, in his view, they are enjoyable merely accidentally (κατὰ συμβεβηκός),² but in fact overpower many of us. While answering this question, Aristotle unexpectedly invokes a strange view held by some anonymous physiologoi, according to whom life is neither hedonically neutral nor purely pleasant for animals (including humans), since living always involves some kind of pain (1154b7–9), what I will call the ‘Ubiquity of Pain Thesis’ (UPT) (1154b2–15):

Bodily pleasures are pursued by people who are incapable of enjoying other pleasures because they are intense. Indeed, some people (τινές) induce thirsts in themselves.³ What they do is not a matter for reproach whenever [pleasures] are harmless, but it is base whenever they [these pleasures] are harmful. For they enjoy nothing else, and the neutral state is painful for many on account of nature. For the animal is always toiling, just as the physiologoi also testify, since they maintain that seeing and hearing are painful. But we are already accustomed to this, as they say (ἀεὶ γὰρ πονεῖ τὸ ζῷον, ὥσπερ καὶ οἱ φυσιολόγοι⁴ μαρτυροῦσι, τὸ ὁρᾶν, τὸ ἀκούειν φάσκοντες εἶναι λυπηρόν· ἀλλ᾽ ἤδη συνήθεις ἐσμέν, ὡς φασίν). The young, too, are in a condition similar to drunkenness because of their growth, for youth is pleasant (καὶ ἡδὺ ἡ νεότης).⁵ Naturally melancholic people, by contrast, are in constant need of a cure since their bodies are continually bitten because of their mixture, and they constantly have intense desires. A pain is driven out by its contrary pleasure, indeed by any pleasure at all that is strong enough; and this is why such people become indulgent and base.

It appears puzzling why, in this context, Aristotle feels the argumentative need to adduce the physiologoi and their UPT. If we believe, as some commentators did,⁶ that Aristotle actually endorses the doctrine of the physiologoi, then he turns out to be an eliminativist of the neutral state.⁷ As Keele summarizes, according to Aristotle, ‘for this [sc. sensation] to occur, pain or pleasure must intervene. These elements must accompany all forms of sensations.’⁸ This consequence, however, is in tension with Eth. Nic. 1154b6, the immediately antecedent text, where Aristotle criticizes those who cannot endure being in the neutral state (τὸ μηδέτερον).⁹ Even worse, the ascription precludes the possibility of mortal animals experiencing what Aristotle calls pleasure simpliciter, a kind of pleasure that involves no pain at all; yet as a central notion of Eth. Nic. 7.12–13, it also recurs in ch. 14 (1154b15–17). More generally, UPT defies Aristotle's in principle optimistic and friendly attitude to the normal operation of our natural or acquired faculties, according to which perceptual experiences are usually pleasant or at least not painful.¹⁰

Conversely, if we believe that Aristotle's appeal to the physiologoi does not imply any commitment to UPT, but that he is dedicated to examining or criticizing this radical view,¹¹ then we have to explain why Aristotle, in this context, opts for such a digression. Not only is no explicit criticism of the physiologoi attested in the following passage;¹² in addition, the conjunction γάρ at 1154b7 suggests that UPT must be used to further justify, or at least to clarify, what has been said above, namely the falsity of some bodily pleasure. It is, however, obscure how a criticism of UPT can serve this purpose.

In short, we are on the horns of a dilemma: either we cannot reconcile UPT with Aristotle's considered view on the hedonic profile of perceptual experiences, or we can hardly make sense of its argumentative relevance as far as the aim and the scope of Eth. Nic. 7.14 are concerned.

2

To overcome the dilemma, we should first ask what, exactly, Aristotle's motive is behind his appeal to the physiologoi. Read in context, Aristotle explains some people's (excessive) pursuit of bodily pleasures in terms of a set of causal mechanisms determined by the relevant objective and subjective conditions. According to this explanation, the corruption of people's psychophysical disposition renders them prone to being ‘in flux’, only responsive to intensive and excessive physical pleasure, so that the peaceful neutral state becomes unpleasant and even intolerable for them (1154a32–3, cf. Part. an. 648b15–17). Thus, like patients, such people, driven by the expansion of the pain, are inclined to pursue pleasure in order to compensate for the unpleasant experience they often or frequently endure. Sensory pleasures—immediate, short-lived, intense and prone to excess—seem especially suited to their needs and can help those ‘patients’ drive out pain promptly (1154a28–9). Yet pleasures of this kind, according to Aristotle, go hand in hand with pain as they originate from some defective bodily state and are accompanied by the corresponding appetite, which always involves pain.¹³ It is precisely because such pleasures involve such pain that those who indulge in them run the risk of replacing one pain with another, to be brought back to where they began on a ‘hedonic treadmill’. Consequently, this circle leaves little room for the realization of the hedonically neutral condition in one's life, not to mention room for enjoying any painless pleasure.

Aristotle's characterization of the misrepresentation of the neutral state as painful may remind one of what Plato says about hedonic illusion in Resp. IX 583c–586c. But, unlike Plato who seems inclined to take the mismatch primarily as an epistemic failure (Resp. 586a–c),¹⁴ Aristotle is more interested in the aetiology of behaviour disposition. According to his diagnosis, it is a flawed nature¹⁵ rather than intellectual incompetence that is chiefly responsible for the vicious circle of persistent oscillation between (bodily) pleasure and pain in those who are eager to enjoy pleasure. This mechanism is felicitously described by Aubry as ‘the quest for genesis for genesis’ sake, or intensity for intensity's sake, proceed[ing] from an inability to enjoy other pleasures’.¹⁶

In Aristotle's account, the neutral state—which, by definition, is deprived of any hedonic value—can be paradoxically regarded as painful by many people owing to their flawed constitution (διὰ τὴν φύσιν). Obviously, he is speaking of an abnormal situation, which is not the situation addressed by the physiologoi, the proponents of UPT. For they argue that animals feel pain even in their natural state—the ordinary disposition of a living being (or one of its organs) in which its proper function can be freely realized when required. Still, both Aristotle and the physiologoi seem to hold that being in a particular state for a long time can lead to an effect of habituation, which causes the experience of that state to be felt differently—in this case, with a decreased hedonic intensity. Just as the neutral state, according to Aristotle, can be experienced as painful by those who have become accustomed to sensual pleasures, people, for the physiologoi, are not always aware of being in pain because they have habituated themselves to its persistent presence. From this perspective, Aristotle needs their concept of ‘hedonic adaptation’ because both agree that habituation alters our subjective feeling of the pleasure/pain spectrum. Nevertheless, his ensuing discussion of the emergence of indulgent people shows that the same process can, or even more often does, lead to an oversensitive state rather than diminished sensitivity (1154b10–16).

As Aubry (n. 5), 247 points out, from the beginning of Eth. Nic. 7.14 and until the physiologoi testimony, the subjects in question change from ‘some people’ (τινές, 1154b4) via ‘many people’ (πολλοῖς, 1154b6) to ‘animals in general’ (τὸ ζῷον, 1154b7). In light of the reasoning of Eth. Nic. 7.14 as a whole, UPT must lend reinforcement to Aristotle's naturalistic story about hedonic error. For if all living states are invariably penetrated by pain (as the physiologoi hold, cf. ἀεὶ γὰρ πονεῖ τὸ ζῷον, 1154b7), then pain must be inevitably experienced by those who have been in the unnatural state, a pathological condition characterized by oversensitivity to internal or external stimuli.¹⁷ This is an argument a fortiori by which Aristotle strengthens his moderate thesis through a dialectical use of UPT, an extreme doctrine held by the physiologoi. According to this interpretation, Aristotle reminds his audience that the thesis—that an animal is constantly toiling—is also claimed by the physiologoi not because it is a slogan Aristotle himself endorses¹⁸ but because the thesis of the physiologoi bolsters the weaker thesis that pain can be involved in the experience of those who are actually in the neutral state.

3

If my interpretation is on the right track, one might ask whether Aristotle's argument is hazardous given that he seems to use a more controversial thesis to support a less controversial one. Formally considered, I concede that his reasoning is of this type, but I do not find its substance intolerable, especially if we pay attention to the very context in which this episode is embedded. For although Aristotle here wants to gain further support from the physiologoi, his explanation of the hedonic mistake is not built on their theory. Moreover, as mentioned, the central issue of Eth. Nic. 7.14 is the nature of bodily pleasures (1154a8). The doctor Eryximachus in Plato's Symposium already assigns a key function to the art of medicine: guiding humans to live a good life by controlling bodily pleasure and desire (Symp. 187e1–6). Since the physiologoi were traditionally believed to be experts on the body,¹⁹ and since Aristotle himself here tries to naturalize the way in which the hedonic mistakes take place, it is understandable for him to address the view of the physiologoi and even to adduce them as ‘assistants’ under this circumstance to his advantage. It thus cannot be coincidental that in Eth. Nic. 7.14 the physiologoi, the experts of physical constitutions and temperament, are invoked as witnesses (1154b7–9) immediately after Aristotle underlines the role of the flawed constitution (διὰ τὴν φύσιν) for the generation of hedonic error (1154b6).²⁰

This dialectical usage of the physiologoi is not exceptional in Aristotle. In discussing the akratic person—a type whose reason is temporarily driven out by the appetite for pleasure—he does not hesitate in declaring that we should consult the physiologoi for curing such a character flaw, just as we consult them when people are drunk or asleep (7.3, 1147b6–9).²¹ What we encounter in Eth. Nic. 7.14 is a similar scenario, though the subject matter shifts from the shaping of akrasia to the shaping of a more serious character flaw: indulgence (cf. ἀκόλαστοι, 1154b15). Aristotle points out that the young (ἐν μὲν τῇ νεότητι) and the melancholic (1154b11) are more disposed to pursue intense (physical) pleasure because their constitutions—either owing to their nature or owing to their pathological condition—are so sensitive to pain that they are naturally driven to seek to get rid of such disturbance (1154b9–15). Yet since pain must follow (or is necessarily blended with) pleasure of this kind, they would enter a vicious circle and eventually experience even more pain. As a well-established analogy in the Aristotelian tradition, being young is here compared to the state of being drunk. Both states experience excessive bodily heat, which leads people in either state to being easily subjected to intense desire.²² The melancholic face a similar problem.²³ Owing to the defective mixture (διὰ τὴν κρᾶσιν, 1154b12–13) in their bodies²⁴—specifically, an excess of black bile—their constitution is unstable (διὰ τὸ μεταβλητικόν, Div. somn. 464a33–b1), being imbued with violent and quick motions.²⁵ Their imperfect temperament makes them sensitive (or oversensitive) to the series of motions in their bodies so that their behaviour is easily often driven or—in Aristotle's term—‘bitten’ (δακνόμενον, 1154b12) by the stubborn desires stimulated by these motions.²⁶ From this perspective, they can be regarded as being in a state of constant suffering and pain, so that—as Aristotle claims—they constantly need medical treatment (ἰατρείας, 1154b12, cf. 1152a28). It is clear that by adducing these two medically coloured examples, Aristotle does not deviate from his initial concern with the puzzle of physical pleasures—the issue raised at the beginning of, and going through, Eth. Nic. 7.14. The ethical implication of his naturalistic analysis is made explicit at the end of this passage, where Aristotle establishes a causal connection between the indulgent on the one hand and the young and the melancholic on the other (also see 1148a20–2). This cannot lead to the conclusion that all indulgent people come to be indulgent in this way, but is sufficient to show that an ethical flaw can be generated from a physiological defect through a process of habituation by fixing and internalizing such a constitution.²⁷

The prevalence of medical elements in this account suggests that the whole passage (1154b9–20) is probably inspired by, and responding to, natural philosophers and medical writers who theorized on the nature of the body.²⁸ That likely includes the group he had just mentioned, namely the physiologoi, who espouse UPT. If so, Aristotle's appeal to them not only aims to explain many people's paradoxical experience of feeling pain in the neutral state but also helps develop his own naturalistic account for the formation of the indulgent type.²⁹ The distinction between the physiologoi and Aristotle lies in that the former would take pain-involvement as inevitable for experiencing pleasure, while for the latter this phenomenon merely touches upon pleasures of the accidental type.

4

According to the physiologoi, pain is always involved in animals’ lives, including the pleasure they enjoy. Despite a disturbing element, it seems well suited to help construct a unified account for two distinctive features of animal life: (a) Why do animals seem by nature always disposed to pursue bodily pleasure? (b) Why can animals not enjoy the activity they are enjoying forever? The reason, in accordance with their UPT, is that animals are always—whether they are aware of it or not—in pain, even in a potential or slight form, so that they are driven to seek a cure in counterbalancing the pain by means of pleasure (cf. Eth. Nic. 1154b9–30). But the co-occurring pain, whether it is distinct or in the background, is not just motivational but also destructive, so that the overall experience can easily exceed the limits, and thus urges for cessation or shift. Whether or not the physiologoi themselves develop their conviction in this direction, it easily fits into the main concern and the train of thought of Eth. Nic. 7.14. Although in Aristotle's eyes what the physiologoi say confuses the bad case with the normal case, their story helps explain the power of bodily pleasures, especially for those whose natural constitution or acquired disposition is defective. Their insight is thus adopted by Aristotle to account for how moral flaws can be generated from natural flaws if the latter fail to be rectified by good habituation.

For the reasons mentioned, contra Aspasius and his followers, the physiologoi cannot be invoked as Aristotle's target of criticism here. More importantly, it is also misguided to think that at Eth. Nic. 1154b5–15 ‘Aristotle directly acknowledges the evidence of the physiologoi’ (Francis [n. 6], 157) and ‘makes it clear that all living beings undergo internal movements, not just those who suffer by some extreme’ (162). Nor should the agenda of Eth. Nic. 7.14 be characterized as the ‘pain of the living’, proposed by the title of Aubry's excellent commentary on this chapter. Although she reasonably doubts whether Aristotle is wholeheartedly committed to the view of the physiologoi, she still attributes to Aristotle an overly pessimistic picture of human existence according to which ‘in man, the normal is pathological, and that human nature is constitutionally unbalanced’ (Aubry [n. 5], 238, emphasis mine).

But since UPT for Aristotle cannot be generalized but applies only to abnormal yet widely attested cases, Eth. Nic. 7.14 is mainly concerned neither with the Heraclitean-flux nature of the animal body (contra Francis [n. 6]) nor with a ‘tragic conception of sense’ (contra Romeyer-Dherbey)³⁰ or with the tragedy of mortal life (contra Aubry [n. 5]). To an extent, Aristotle would agree with the physiologoi that a living animal cannot always live its life spontaneously. Animals are self-movers only in a limited sense, susceptible to various external or material constraints (Ph. 253a7–21, 259b1–20). They must actively use their faculties, and, of course, these activities cannot go on ceaselessly.³¹ However, this is far from saying that suffering or pain is thus always latent in the normal activities of living animals. No matter whether the physiologoi actually draw any pessimistic conclusion on animal life, in Aristotle's eyes they confuse the limitation of the living with the misfortune of the living, thus threatening the hedonic value he integrates into good as well as ordinary life.

It is not unusual for Aristotle to utilize his theoretical opponents to his own advantage in his dialogues with his predecessors and contemporaries. Just as in Eth. Nic. 7.12–13, his energeia-based account takes in rather than replaces the traditional genesis-based accounts, which still preserve a certain explanatory power for what Aristotle calls pleasure per accidens. In Eth. Nic. 7.14, his approach indicates that, although the physiologoi succumb to the temptation of overgeneralizing their conviction, there are some elements of truth in it that are instructive for understanding the bad case—namely, why many people tend to indulge easily in bodily pleasures. A close parallel can also be attested in Theophrastus’ treatment of Anaxagoras, who holds a similar view to UPT, yet limits its scope to sense perception (DS 29 = 59A92 DK; Aët. 4.9.16).³² Despite substantial disagreement with this thesis, Theophrastus does not hesitate about invoking it in criticizing Empedocles’ failure to do justice to pain experiences that are possibly involved in sense perception:

[W]hen we are perceiving, we often (πολλάκις) suffer pain in the very act of perception—indeed, Anaxagoras declares, we always (ἀεί) do (DS 17.1–2).³³

Just as Aristotle tries to substantiate a moderate thesis (that is, those whose natures are corrupted take the neutral state as painful) via the radical UPT of the physiologoi, Theophrastus, in the same manner, finds fault with Empedocles by appealing to the frequent involvement of pain in perception in terms of Anaxagoras’ radical thesis that pain is constantly involved in perception. But, as in the case of Aristotle, a dialectical adoption should not be confused with a doctrinal commitment.