Christopher Isaac Noble

I am Associate Professor of Philosophy at Syracuse University. My work deals primarily with the development and transformation of Platonic and Aristotelian thought in Late Antiquity. I am particularly interested in the ways in which later authors can inform our understanding of problems in Plato and Aristotle, and in the distinctive contributions of Later Platonism to the ancient philosophical tradition.

Abstract: Following a tradition going back to Aristotle that Plato identifies the Good as the One, Neoplatonists identify the Good itself as the One itself, and hold that the goodness of other things is a function of their oneness. This project aims to improve our understanding of the fundamental place of unity in philosophical thought about value in Late Antiquity. In particular, it will seek to illuminate Neoplatonic views about: (1) the ways in which different forms of unity are good-making and various forms of goodness are explained in terms of unity, (2) how good pluralities and bad unities can be reconciled with a commitment to the sameness of oneness and goodness, and (3) the implications of these views for Neoplatonic conceptions of the human good in particular.