Il dominio delle passioni. Sul versante psicologico dell’etica veteroaccademica

To explore the psychological side of luxuria and to deepen the philosophical aspect of this concept, it is important to carry out preliminary work on the pre-history of the ethical debate about the role of passions among some of Plato’s heirs in the Old Academy. Although there does not seem to be a specific reflection on luxuria in the Old Academy, it is important to show how the philosophical debate about pleasure, goods, passions, and virtues is indeed very articulated in the Old Academy and to what extent it could have influenced the Hellenistic and post-Hellenistic philosophical and literary debate. By reconsidering the ethics of Speusippus and Xenocrates in relation to their psychological conception, therefore, I intend to bring out the Old Academic ethical context, which appears to be less anti-hedonist than it is generally thought and more open to a wise control of passions and external goods, without this implying the eradication of the former or the rejection of the latter. This will show how the ethical doctrines of Speusippus and Xenocrates could be coherently inscribed in their philosophical system thanks to the anchoring of the psychological and ontological conceptions.