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Aristotle was born
at Stagira, in
Macedonia, the son of a physician to the royal court. At the age of
17, he went to Athens to study at Plato's Academy. He remained there
for about 20 years, as a student and then as a teacher. When Plato
died in 347 BC, Aristotle moved to Assos, a city in Asia Minor,
where a friend of his, Hermias, was ruler. There he counseled
Hermias and married his niece and adopted daughter, Pythias. After
Hermias was captured and executed by the Persians in 345 BC,
Aristotle went to Pella, the Macedonian capital, where he became the
tutor of the king's young son Alexander, later known as Alexander
the Great. In 335, when Alexander became king, Aristotle returned to
Athens and established his own school, the Lyceum.
Works :
Aristotle made regular use of the dialogue in his earliest years at
the Academy, but lacking Plato's imaginative gifts, he probably
never found the form congenial. Apart from a few fragments in the
works of later writers, his dialogues have been wholly lost.
Aristotle also wrote some short technical notes, such as a
dictionary of philosophic terms and a summary of the doctrines of
Pythagoras. Of these, only a few brief excerpts have survived.
Methods :Perhaps
because of the influence of his father's medical profession,
Aristotle's philosophy laid its principal stress on biology, in
contrast to Plato's emphasis on mathematics. Aristotle regarded the
world as made up of individuals (substances) occurring in fixed
natural kinds species. Each individual has its built-in specific
pattern of development and grows toward proper self-realization as a
specimen of its type. Growth, purpose, and direction are thus built
into nature. Although science studies general kinds, according to
Aristotle, these kinds find their existence in particular
individuals. Science and philosophy must therefore balance, not
simply choose between, the claims of empiricism observation and
sense experience and formalism rational deduction.
These four causes
are the material cause, the matter out of which a thing is made; the
efficient cause, the source of motion, generation, or change; the
formal cause, which is the species, kind, or type; and the final
cause, the goal, or full development, of an individual, or the
intended function of a construction or invention. Thus, a young lion
is made up of tissues and organs, its material cause; the efficient
cause is its parents, who generated it; the formal cause is its
species, lion; and its final cause is its built-in drive toward
becoming a mature specimen. In different contexts, while the causes
are the same four, they apply analogically. Thus, the material cause
of a statue is the marble from which it was carved; the efficient
cause is the sculptor; the formal cause is the shape the sculptor
realized—Hermes, perhaps, or Aphrodite; and the final cause is its
function, to be a work of fine art. Aristotle thought his causal
pattern was the ideal key for organizing knowledge. His lecture
notes present impressive evidence of the power of this scheme. Some
of the principal aspects of Aristotle's thought can be seen in the
following summary of his doctrines, or theories.
Physics, or Natural Philosophy :In
astronomy, Aristotle proposed a finite, spherical universe, with the
earth at its center. The central region is made up of four elements:
earth, air, fire, and water. In Aristotle's physics, each of these
four elements has a proper place, determined by its relative
heaviness, its “specific gravity.” Each moves naturally in a
straight line—earth down, fire up—toward its proper place, where it
will be at rest. Thus, terrestrial motion is always linear and
always comes to a halt. The heavens, however, move naturally and
endlessly in a complex circular motion. The heavens, therefore, must
be made of a fifth, and different element, which he called aither.
Biology :
In zoology, Aristotle proposed a fixed set of natural kinds
(“species”), each reproducing true to type. An exception occurs,
Aristotle thought, when some “very low” worms and flies come from
rotting fruit or manure by “spontaneous generation.” The typical
life cycles are epicycles: The same pattern repeats, but through a
linear succession of individuals. These processes are therefore
intermediate between the changeless circles of the heavens and the
simple linear movements of the terrestrial elements. The species
form a scale from simple (worms and flies at the bottom) to complex
(human beings at the top), but evolution is not possible.
Aristotelian Psychology :
For Aristotle,
psychology was a study of the soul. Insisting that form (the
essence, or unchanging characteristic element in an object) and
matter (the common undifferentiated substratum of things) always
exist together, Aristotle defined a soul as a “kind of functioning
of a body organized so that it can support vital functions.” In
considering the soul as essentially associated with the body, he
challenged the Pythagorean doctrine that the soul is a spiritual
entity imprisoned in the body. Aristotle's doctrine is a synthesis
of the earlier notion that the soul does not exist apart from the
body and of the Platonic notion of a soul as a separate, nonphysical
entity. Whether any part of the human soul is immortal, and, if so,
whether its immortality is personal, are not entirely clear in his
treatise On the Soul.
Ethics :It
seemed to Aristotle that the individual's freedom of choice made an
absolutely accurate analysis of human affairs impossible. “Practical
science,” then, such as politics or ethics, was called science only
by courtesy and analogy. The inherent limitations on practical
science are made clear in Aristotle's concepts of human nature and
self-realization. Human nature certainly involves, for everyone, a
capacity for forming habits; but the habits that a particular
individual forms depend on that individual's culture and repeated
personal choices. All human beings want “happiness,” an active,
engaged realization of their innate capacities, but this goal can be
achieved in a multiplicity of ways.
Logic :
In logic, Aristotle developed rules for chains of reasoning that
would, if followed, never lead from true premises to false
conclusions (validity rules). In reasoning, the basic links are
syllogisms: pairs of propositions that, taken together, give a new
conclusion. For example, “All humans are mortal” and “All Greeks are
humans” yield the valid conclusion “All Greeks are mortal.” Science
results from constructing more complex systems of reasoning. In his
logic, Aristotle distinguished between dialectic and analytic.
Dialectic, he held, only tests opinions for their logical
consistency; analytic works deductively from principles resting on
experience and precise observation. This is clearly an intended
break with Plato's Academy, where dialectic was supposed to be the
only proper method for science and philosophy alike.
Metaphysics :In
his metaphysics, Aristotle argued for the existence of a divine
being, described as the Prime Mover, who is responsible for the
unity and purposefulness of nature. God is perfect and therefore the
aspiration of all things in the world, because all things desire to
share perfection. Other movers exist as well—the intelligent movers
of the planets and stars (Aristotle suggested that the number of
these is “either 55 or 47”). The Prime Mover, or God, described by
Aristotle is not very suitable for religious purposes, as many later
philosophers and theologians have observed. Aristotle limited his
“theology,” however, to what he believed science requires and can
establish.
Influence :
Aristotle's works were lost in the West after the decline of Rome.
During the 9th century AD, Arab scholars introduced Aristotle, in
Arabic translation, to the Islamic world (see ISLAM). The
12th-century Spanish-Arab philosopher Averroes is the best known of
the Arabic scholars who studied and commented on Aristotle. In the
13th century, the Latin West renewed its interest in Aristotle's
work, and Saint Thomas Aquinas found in it a philosophical
foundation for Christian thought. Church officials at first
questioned Aquinas's use of Aristotle; in the early stages of its
rediscovery, Aristotle's philosophy was regarded with some
suspicion, largely because his teachings were thought to lead to a
materialistic view of the world. Nevertheless, the work of Aquinas
was accepted, and the later philosophy of scholasticism continued
the philosophical tradition based on Aquinas's adaptation of
Aristotelian thought. |
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