Aristotle

Aristotle . Greek philosopher of encyclopedic knowledge, founder of logic as a science and of various specific branches of knowledge. ^{[1] He} wrote nearly 200 treatises on a huge variety of topics. He was the father of formal Logic , Economics , Astronomy , forerunner of Anatomy and Biology and a creator of Taxonomy (father of Zoology and Botany ). It is considered (together with Plato) as the determinant of much of the corpus of beliefs of Western Thought of the common man (what today we call “common sense” of Western man).

Table of Contents

Summary

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1 Biographical synthesis
- 1 Links with Alexander the Great
- 2 Return home
- 3 Death
2 Artwork
- 1 Chronological classification
3 Philosophy
- 1 Metaphysics
- 2 Soul and knowledge
- 3 Ethics
- 4 Policy
- 5 Influence
- 6 Apophansis
4 Phrases
5 References
6 Sources

Biographical synthesis

He was born in 384 BC in a small Macedonian town near Mount Athos called Estagira , from where his nickname, the Stagirite, comes from. His father, Nicómaco, was a court physician to Amyntas III , father of Philip and, therefore, grandfather of Alexander the Great . Nicomachus belonged to the family of the Asclepiades, who claimed to be a descendant of the founding god of medicine and whose knowledge was transmitted from generation to generation. This invites us to think that Aristotle was initiated as a child in the secrets of medicine and from there came his fondness for experimental research and positive science. Orphan of father and mother in the middle of adolescence, he was adopted by Proxeno, to whom he was able to show his gratitude years later by adopting his son named Nicanor.

In the year 367 BC , that is, when he was seventeen years old, he was sent to Athens to study at Plato’s Academy. It is not known what kind of personal relationship was established between the two philosophers, but, judging by the few references they make to each other in their writings, it is not possible to speak of a lasting friendship. Which, on the other hand, is logical if one takes into account that Aristotle was going to start his own philosophical system based on a deep criticism of Platonic. Both started from Socratesand his concept of eidos, but Plato’s difficulties in inserting his eidetic world, that of ideas, into the real world forced Aristotle to gradually outline terms such as “substance”, “essence” and “form” that would definitively distance him of the Academy. On the other hand, the legend according to which Aristotle left Athens is absolutely false because Plato, upon his death, appointed his nephew Speusippus to take charge of the Academy. As a Macedonian Aristotle he was not legally eligible for that position.

Links with Alexander the Great

At the death of Plato, which occurred in 348 BC , Aristotle was thirty-six years old, had spent twenty of them combining teaching with study, and was in Athens , as they say, without office or benefit. So he must not have thought much about it when he learned that Hermias of Atarneo, a Greek soldier of fortune (for more details, eunuch) who had taken over the northwestern sector of Asia Minor , was gathering in the city of Axos as many disciples of the Academy they would like to collaborate with him in the Hellenization of his dominions. Aristotle settled in Axos in the company of Xenocrates of Chalcedon , an academic colleague, and Theophrastus, disciple and future heir to the Aristotelian legacy.

The Stagirite would spend three peaceful and fruitful years there, dedicating himself to teaching, writing (much of his Politics was written there) and reproduction, since he first married a niece of Hermias called Pythias, with whom he had a daughter. Pythias must have died shortly after, and Aristotle joined another stagirite, named Erpilis, who gave him a son, Nicomacheus, to whom he would dedicate his Ethics . Given that Aristotle himself wrote that the man must marry at thirty-seven and the woman at eighteen, it is easy to deduce what ages one and the other must have been when they joined them.

After the murder of Hermias , in 345 BC , Aristotle settled in Mytilene ( Lesbos Island ), dedicating himself, in the company of Theophrastus, to the study of biology. Two years later, in 343 BC , he was hired by Philip of Macedonto take charge of the education of his son Alejandro, at the time of thirteen years of age. Nor is much known about the relationship between the two, since legends and forgeries have erased all traces of truth. But if the character attributed to Alexander by his contemporaries (whom they unanimously branded as arrogant, drinker, cruel, vindictive and ignorant) is true, there is no trace of the influence that Aristotle could have exerted on him. Nor is Alexander’s influence on his teacher in the political arena, since Aristotle continued to preach the superiority of city-states when his alleged disciple was already laying the foundations of a universal empire without which, according to historians, the Hellenic civilization would have succumbed much earlier.

Homecoming

Shortly after the death of Philip, Alexander had Aristotle’s nephew, Callisthenes of Olinto , executed , whom he accused of being a traitor. Knowing the vengeful character of his disciple, Aristotle took refuge for a year in his estates in Estagira , moving to Athens in 334 to found, always in the company of Teofrasto, the Lyceum, a pedagogical institution that for years would have to compete with the Platonic Academy , led at the time by his old comrade Xenocrates of Chalcedon.

The eleven years between his return to Athens and the death of Alexander, in 323, were used by Aristotle to carry out a profound review of a work that, according to Hegel, constitutes the foundation of all sciences. To put it in the most succinct way possible, Aristotle was a prodigious synthesizer of knowledge, as attentive to the generalizations that constitute science as to the differences that not only distinguish individuals from one another, but also prevent the reduction of the great genres of phenomena and the sciences that study them. As he himself says, beings can be mobile and immobile, and at the same time separated (from matter) or not separated. The science that studies mobile and non-separated beings is physics; that of immobile and not separated beings is mathematics,

The breadth and depth of his thought are such that it took two thousand years for someone of similar stature to emerge. And during that period his authority became as established and unquestioned as that exercised by the Church, and in both science and philosophy any attempt at intellectual advance has had to begin with an attack on any of the Aristotelian philosophical principles.

However, the path followed by Aristotle’s thought to reach its present preeminence is so amazing that, even discounting what the legend may have added, it seems like an adventure novel plot.

Death

In 322 BC, he died on the Island of Chalcis , the land of his mother, at the age of sixty-two.

Work

Unlike what happened with Plato , from whom we keep practically all his dialogues, that is, the works called exoteric because they are dedicated to the general public, and not the internal lessons of the Academy, from Aristotle we have received the works written for use internal of the Lyceum. In fact, we preserve many of his esoteric works, that is, what were probably the notes and notes of the lessons given at the Lyceum, intended for a reduced circle of students, practically all the works intended for the general public having been lost. , (or of which we only conserve some fragments), written, like those of Plato, in the form of dialogue.

In general, there is a tendency to oppose Plato and Aristotle in terms of the style used in their works: more fluid and literary in Plato, more crude and abstruse in Aristotle. We must bear in mind, however, that the works that we keep by Aristotle, being summaries of the lessons taught at the Lyceum, cannot present the characteristics of a work cared for and directed to the general public; but we do find that fluidity in his dialogues, works from his youth made in the shadow of his teacher Plato and which are not exempt from certain literary graces. The contrast of styles comes, then, from the comparison of works intended for different audiences and produced with pedagogical or literary criteria, also different.

In addition to this distinction between esoteric and exoteric works, Aristotle’s work is usually classified according to the periods in which it was made, thus following a chronological order. These works were known to the members of the Lyceum, but were not made known to the public until the first century BC by Andronicus of Rhodes, establishing a classification that was subsequently maintained for centuries. Studies carried out by specialists (W. Jaeger or P. Aubenque, among others) throughout the 19th and 20th centuries have clarified the evolution suffered by Aristotelian thought, as well as the correct dating of some books that were grouped by Andrónico de Rodas in the same work and belonging to different periods. In accordance, then, with this chronological dating,

Chronological classification

First period

(368-348): the time of the permanence in the Academy. It is characterized by the acceptance of Platonic philosophy and belong to it:
- – “Eudemo” or “On the soul” (a dialogue in which the theory of Ideas and the immortality of the soul is maintained)
- – “Protreptic” (letter in which the theory of Ideas is also maintained

Second period

(348-335): from the abandonment of the Academy until his return to Athens. In this period Aristotle begins to depart from that of the predominantly Platonic theses and begins to elaborate his own thought, still considering himself an “academic”, at least in its first phase.
- – “On philosophy” (criticism of the theory of Ideas, at least in its mathematical interpretation that identifies them with numbers)
- – “Ethics to Eudemo” (attributed to his years in Assos, still adhering to the Platonic conception of virtue)
- – “From heaven” (Cosmology)
- – “Of generation and corruption”
- – Some of the books of “Metaphysics” (W. Jaeger) and “Politics” are also attributed to this period.

Third period

(335-322): since his return to Athens, coinciding with his activity at the Lyceum. Most of the preserved works belong to this period, clearly highlighting the empiricist and scientific orientation of his thought as opposed to Plato’s philosophy. Despite the unity with which they have been presented to us by later compilers, Aristotle’s works from this period, as we know them, are the result of the lessons taught at the Lyceum, and were published in isolation as such; only later were they grouped into such works, in a composition work perhaps already begun by Aristotle but continued, surely, by his disciples at the Lyceum.

We can classify them into five groups, according to the most significant:

Logic
- – “Categories” (On the supreme genres of being and saying)
- – “On the interpretation” (On the statement and the proposition)
- – “First analytics” (The syllogisms)
- – “Later analytics” or “seconds” (The scientific proof)
- – “Topics” (Syllogistic resources to solve any difficulty)
Metaphysics
- – The “Metaphysical” books. They compose the treatise of being as being, that is, the Aristotelian ontology . You can access Aristotle’s Metaphysics, in translation by Patricio de Azcárate (1800-1886) from Gijón at the Miguel de Cervantes Virtual Library.
Scientific works
- – “Physics” (Treatise on nature. Analysis of change)
- – “Meteorological”
- – “Animal stories” (Zoology: a set of studies to which he devoted most of his activity and which for some is his masterpiece)
- – “On the movement of animals”
- – “From the generation of animals”
- – “On the soul” (Psychology)
- – “Parva naturalia” (set of small treatises on perception, memory, sleep …)
Ethics and politics
- – “Great morality” (According to some specialists, such as P. Aubenque, it would not be a work by Aristotle; others, such as J. Ll. Ackrill, consider it to be).
- – “Ethics to Nicómaco”. Work that contains the ethical doctrine of Aristotle.
- – “Politics”. Exhibition of Aristotelian thought on social and political organization.
- – “Constitutions”. Analysis of numerous constitutions of the polis of his time.
Esthetic
- – “Rhetoric” (The art of convincing)
- – “Poetics” (On artistic creation, lost work for the most part)

Philosophy

Aristotle has been considered one of the most important philosophers of all time and has been one of the pillars of Western thought. His works, written more than two thousand three hundred years ago, continue to exert a remarkable influence on countless contemporary thinkers and continue to be the object of study by multiple specialists. The philosophy of Aristotle constitutes, together with that of his teacher Plato, the most important legacy of the thought of ancient Greece.

Despite being a disciple of Plato, Aristotle distanced himself from idealistic positions, to develop a naturalistic and realistic thought. Faced with the radical separation between the sensible world and the intelligible world raised by Platonic doctrines, he defended the possibility of apprehending reality from experience.

Thus, contrary to the thesis of his teacher, he considered that universal ideas or concepts should not be separated from things, but rather that they were immersed, as a specific form of matter. For these reasons, he attached great importance to scientific studies and the observation of nature. However, Aristotle’s concerns were not directed solely at the speculative study of things and their causes, but also focused on questions of formal, moral, political, and aesthetic logic. According to ancient sources, the Greek philosopher wrote 170 works, although only 30 have been preserved to this day.

Aristotle distinguished:

a theoretical part, related to being, its elements, causes and principles,
a practical part: on the activity of man,
a poetic part: about creation.

The object of science is the general, which is reached by reason. But the general exists only in the singular, sensory perceptible, and can be known only through the singular: inductive generalization is a condition of all general knowledge, which cannot be realized without perception by the senses.

Aristotle admitted four causes:

the matter or passive possibility of a training process,
the form (essence, the being of the entity), the actualization of that which in matter is given only as a possibility,
the beginning of the movement and
4) the end.

Metaphysics

Aristotle’s metaphysical concern is both critical, with respect to that of his teacher Plato, and constructive, since a new systematization is proposed. What he wants with metaphysics is to get to know “the principles and the first causes.” He deals with the themes of metaphysics in what he calls “first philosophy”, a science that considers being as being. Because it deals with the first and true causes, it can also be considered a science of the divine, a theological science (Theoldgiké epistéme).

Aristotle rejects the Platonic theory of the separate Ideas of the entities of this world. What is truly existent are not the “reflections” of Ideas, but individual entities, captured by intelligence and in which the universal aspect resides. In every being there is substance (ousìa, essence of each individual entity subsisting in itself) and accident (quality that does not exist in itself but in substance). Sensitive substances are made up of two principles: matter, which tells what a thing is made of, and its shape, arrangement or structure.

To explain the change he uses the notions of act and power, the first determinations of being. Now, with these two notions, we know how changes or movements happen, but we don’t know why. We know this through the reasons or causes of change, which Aristotle concretizes in four: material cause, formal cause, efficient cause and final (or teleological) cause. The latter is of great importance for the Stagirite, since he is convinced that everything exists to fulfill an end, since everything, by its own immanence, seeks its intrinsic perfection.

Aristotle’s metaphysical science culminates in theology, which deals with being that exists per se, that is, being in its fullest sense, the pure form without matter. To prove the existence of that being, he appeals to several arguments: “Among the things that exist, one is better than the other; hence there is an optimal thing, which must be divine.”

His best known argument is the so-called cosmological predicament: the things of this world are perishable, and therefore undergo change; this change happens in time. Change and time are therefore imperishable; but for the eternal change or movement to occur, there must be an eternal substance capable of producing that movement. But we cannot go back to infinity to look for the causes of the causes, so we must arrive at an immobile Prime Mover. This motor is God, conceived by Aristotle as an unalterable immaterial force. That Being, however, does not appear in Aristotle as the creator of the world, because it is eternal.

Soul and knowledge

All living beings are presented to Aristotle as possessors of a soul (psyche), thus distinguishing themselves from inanimate or inorganic beings. It distinguishes three kinds of soul: vegetative (typical of plants, but also present in animals and man), sensitive (typical of animals and man), rational (exclusive of man). It has three characteristics: it is the cause of body movement, it knows, and it is incorporeal.

With regard to knowledge, Aristotle does not admit Plato’s doctrines, nor does innateness. The mind at birth is “tamquam tabula rasa”, on which there is nothing written. Knowledge begins in the senses, as experience shows us. The captures of the senses are apprehended by the intellect, thus generating the concept. In this way we arrive at supersensible knowledge.

Ethics

Aristotle’s ethics has an end that is summarized in the pursuit of happiness. For some, happiness consists of pleasures; for others, in riches; but the wise man seeks it in the exercise of the activity that is proper to man, that is, in the intellectual life. This does not exclude the moderate enjoyment of sensible pleasures and other goods, as long as it does not prevent the contemplation of the truth. On this basis Aristotle develops the concept of virtue.

Virtue consists of the right means. What he wants to imply is that man’s actions must be governed by prudence or upright rule. There are two modes of virtue: the dianoethics (which refer to the exercise of intelligence) and the ethical (which refer to sensitivity and affections). All virtues are habits that are acquired through repetition. The virtue par excellence is justice, which consists of obeying the laws and respecting other citizens.

Politics

For Aristotle, man is a “political animal” by nature. Only animals and gods can live isolated. The natural force towards reproduction and conservation inclines men to live together, first in the family, then in the village (union of several families) and finally in the city-state (not too few, not too many inhabitants). The proper functioning of a city-state is not only ensured by joining wills towards the same end; It also requires sensible and appropriate laws that respect differences and educate citizens for civil responsibility within freedom (Aristotle, in his Greek class mentality, does not conceive the right of citizenship for either women or slaves).

There are three forms of legitimate government: monarchy (government of one), aristocracy (government of the best) and republic (government of many). Tyranny, oligarchy and democracy are opposed to these straight forms of government (Aristotle understands by “democracy” the government of the poor). It cannot be said which of the three is better, since the concrete theory for a people must be deduced from an objective investigation of the various historical forms of government, and defined according to the circumstances which is more convenient for a given state (Aristotle collected and studied the constitutions of 158 states). In principle, every form of government is good if the ruler seeks the good of the governed.

Influence

For a long time Aristotelian thought was overshadowed by the prestige of Plato’s doctrines. In the time of Christianized Rome, Aristotle’s naturalism and realism were despised and the Neoplatonic readings of Plotinus and Boeotius were favored. Due to the spiritualism that characterized medieval thought, Plato’s doctrines enjoyed prominence until the twelfth century .

Arab philosophers and, particularly, Avicenna and Averroes – contributed to Aristotelian thought being once again the object of attention in the West. The growing interest in nature shown by Christian thought in the late Middle Ages made it possible for Aristotle’s work to be studied. Roger Bacon and Alberto Magno vindicated the thought of this philosopher, and Saint Thomas Aquinas transformed it into the basis of Christian theology.

The studies of the Florence school, Francis Bacon, and Galileo broke Aristotelian authority. However, the writings of the Greek philosopher continued to influence various currents of modern thought, such as idealism, neo-scholasticism, behaviorism and Bergson’s dynamism, among others.

Apophansis

(from the Greek apófansiç : statement, proposition; do not confuse it with the “apo-emphasis”, which means “negation”). Judgment of which Aristotle gives the following definition:

“Every proposition designates something, but not every proposition is a judgment, but only one that contains a true or false statement.”