Congratulations to Daryl Li, who defended his doctoral dissertation on April 28th! His topic was "Heeding Nature's Order: Megalopsuchia as the Paradigm of Natural Justice in Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics" and his director was V. Bradley Lewis, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Philosophy and Dean of the School of Philosophy at the Catholic University of America.
Daryl Li graduated in 2008 from the National University of Singapore with a Bachelor of Social Sciences in Political Science (Hons.). He received his Master of Arts in Liberal Arts from St. John’s College (Annapolis) in 2010, and wrote a thesis on Friedrich Schiller’s On the Aesthetic Education of Man. He and his wife, Rosslyn, are looking forward to their next adventure, wherever Hermes desires to take them.
Dissertation Abstract:
In this study, I present an account of the relationship between megalopsuchia and natural justice in Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics. I argue that natural justice, as Aristotle understands it, is the exercise of our virtues for the sake of benefitting the common good. And since megalopsuchia is the prime virtue, the megalopsuchos is the paradigm of natural justice because he benefits the common good most expansively and enduringly through his virtues.
My treatment of the ethico-political character of megalopsuchia and natural justice relies heavily on Aristotle’s metaphysical principles such as final and formal causes, function, potential and actuality, and the hou heneka relation to uncover the natural foundations of man’s eudaimonia, thus allowing for an interpretation of the Nicomachean Ethics that stands at the intersection of Aristotle’s metaphysics, ethics, and politics.