EleutherIA — Defined term

Akrasia (Weakness of Will)

ἀκρασία

Classical Greek

Akrasia is acting contrary to one's standing rational judgment or commitment under the influence of appetite or emotion. In Plato's Protagoras 352b–358d Socrates rejects the popular picture that knowledge is overpowered and explains the error through ignorance; this is not yet a theory of a faculty called the will. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics VII.1–10, analyzes akrasia and at VII.7 distinguishes weakness, in which agents deliberate but do not stand by the result, from impetuosity, in which they act without waiting for deliberation. Stoic sources use a different framework, treating passions as excessive irrational impulses and, in Chrysippus, as judgments.

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