Why is aristotle so famous

Aristotle was the first to write a book that dealt with the specifics of psychology: De Anima or On the Soul. In this book, he proposes the idea of abstraction that reigns over the body and mind of a human being.

The body and mind exist within the same being and are intertwined in such a way that the mind is one of the many basic functions of the body. In a more detailed psychological analysis, he divides the human intellect into two essential categories: the passive intellect and the active intellect. According to Aristotle, it is in human nature to imitate something that, even if on a mere superficial level, provides us with a sense of happiness and satisfaction.

Perhaps the highlight of his psychological observations has been the delicate connection that binds human psychology with human physiology. His contributions were a giant leap forward from the pre-scientific era psychology that went before him and led us into an age of far more precise qualitative and quantitative analysis. For his time and age, Aristotle was able to put forth a very detailed analysis of the world around him. But Aristotle had a far more generalized approach wherein he also covered the different aspects and phenomena of air, water, and earth within his treatise Meteorologica.

The highlights of his Meteorologica treatise are his accounts of water evaporation, earthquakes, and other common weather phenomena. Similarly, he categorized thunder, lightning, rainbows, meteors, and comets as different atmospheric phenomena.

An attempt to summarize the rich details of Aristotelian ethics within the bounds of a couple of paragraphs will not do it justice. It represents the best-known work on ethics by Aristotle: a collection of ten books based on notes taken from his various lectures at the Lyceum. Aristotelian ethics outline the different social and behavioral virtues of an ideal man.

Aristotelianism is the biggest example of the influence Aristotelian philosophy has had on the entire subsequent philosophical paradigm.

Aristotelianism represents the philosophical tradition that takes its roots from the various works of Aristotle in philosophy. The route of conventional philosophy is highly influenced by different aspects of Aristotelian ideologies including his view on philosophical methodology, epistemology, metaphysics, aesthetics, ethics, and many more.

His philosophical works were first rehearsed and defended by members of the Peripatetic school. The Neoplatonists followed suit soon after and made well-documented critical commentaries on his popular writings. Aristotle believed that the polis reflected the topmost strata of political association. Being a citizen of a polis was essential for a person to lead a good-quality life.

By turns charismatic and ruthless, brilliant and power hungry, diplomatic and In around B. Most of all, Pericles paid artisans to build temples Live TV. This Day In History. History Vault. Recommended for you. Julius Caesar. Mummy Mania. Hannibal's Bloody Tactics. The Death of Hannibal. Socrates Viewed by many as the founding figure of Western philosophy, Socrates B. Plato The Athenian philosopher Plato c. Pericles The so-called golden age of Athenian culture flourished under the leadership of Pericles B.

Thus, in understanding something, the productive intellect actuates the receptive intellect, which stimulates the imagination to produce a particular image corresponding to the universal content of the understanding. Hence, while Aristotle describes the active intellect as unaffected, separate, and immaterial, it serves to bring to completion the passive intellect, the latter of which is inseparable from imagination and hence from perception and nutrition.

Indeed, in Metaphysics b19—30 Aristotle argues that intellect actively understanding the intelligible is the everlasting God. For readers like the medieval Arabic commentator Ibn Rushd , passive intellect is spread like matter among thinking beings.

However, in other passages Aristotle says that when the body is destroyed, the soul is destroyed too Length and Shortness of Life , b23— Indeed, Aristotle argues that if thinking is either a kind of imaginative representation or impossible without imagination, then it will be impossible without body DA a8— But the psyche never thinks without imagination DA a16— It seems to follow that far from being a part of the everlasting thinking of God, human thinking is something that happens in a living body and ends when that body is no longer alive.

Thus, Jiminez , 95—99 argues that thinking is embodied in three ways: it is proceeded by bodily processes, simultaneous with embodied processes, and anticipates bodily processes, namely intentional actions.

For further discussion see Jiminez The whole psyche governs the characteristic functions and changes of a living thing. The nutritive psyche is the formal cause of growth and metabolism and is shared by plants, while the perceptual psyche gives rise to desire, which causes self-moving animals to act.

When one becomes aware of an apparent good by perception or imagination, one forms either an appetite, the desire for pleasure, or thumos, the spirited desire for revenge or honor. A third form of desire, wish, is the product of the rational psyche DA a20— By characterizing the psyche as he does, Aristotle can at once deny that the psyche is a body but also insist that it does not exist without a body.

But he also rejects nominalism, the view that mathematical things are not real. Against both positions, Aristotle argues that mathematical things are real but do not exist separately from sensible bodies Met. Mathematical objects thus depend on the things in which they inhere and have no separate or independent being Met.

Although mathematical beings are not separate from the material cosmos, when the mathematician defines what it is to be a sphere or circle, he does not include a material like gold or bronze in the definition, because it is not the gold ball or bronze ring that the mathematician wants to define.

The mathematician is justified in proceeding in this way, because although there are no separate entities beyond the concrete thing, it is just the mathematical aspects of real things that are relevant to mathematics DC a2—6.

One reason that Aristotle believes that mathematics must proceed by abstraction is that he wants to prevent a multiplication of entities. For example, he does not want to say that, in addition to there being a sphere of bronze, there is another separate, mathematical sphere, and that in addition to that sphere, there is a separate mathematical plane cutting it, and that in addition to that plane, there is an additional line limiting the plane see Katz It is enough for a mathematical ontology simply to acknowledge that natural objects have real mathematical properties not separate in being, which can nevertheless be studied independently from natural investigation.

Aristotle also favors this view due to his belief that mathematics is a demonstrative science. Aristotle was aware that geometry uses diagrammatic representations of abstracted properties, which allow one to grasp how a demonstration is true not just of a particular object but of any class of objects that share its quantitative features Humphreys Through the concept of abstraction, Aristotle could explain why a particular diagram may be used to prove a universal geometrical result.

Why study mathematics? Although Aristotle rejected the Platonic doctrine that mathematical beings are separate, intermediate entities between perceptible things and forms, he agreed with the Platonists that mathematics is about things that are beautiful and good, since it offers insight into the nature of arrangement, symmetry, and definiteness Met. Thus, the study of mathematics reveals that beauty is not so much in the eye of the beholder as it is in the nature of things Hoinski and Polansky , 51— Moreover, Aristotle holds that mathematical beings are all potential objects of the intellect, which exist only potentially when they are not understood.

The activity of understanding is the actuation of their being, but also actuates the intellect Met. In some instances, Aristotle seems to say that it concerns being insofar as it is Met. However, Menn , 10—11 shows that Aristotle is primarily concerned with describing first philosophy as a science that seeks the causes and sources of being qua being. Hence, when Aristotle holds that wisdom is a kind of rational knowledge concerning causes and principles Met.

First philosophy is consequently quite unlike natural philosophy and mathematics, since rather than proceeding from systematic observation or from hypotheses, it begins with an attitude of wonder towards ordinary things and aims to contemplate them not under a particular description but simply as beings Sachs The fundamental premise of this science is the law of noncontradiction, which states that something cannot both be and not be Met.

Aristotle holds that this law is indemonstrable and necessary to assume in any meaningful discussion about being. Consequently, a person who demands a demonstration of this principle is no better than a plant. While it is possible for a substance to take on contrary accidents, for example, coffee first being hot and later cold, substances have no contraries. The law requires that a substance either is or is not, independently of its further, accidental properties. This takes on metaphysical significance when one thinks of this distinction in terms of a dependence relation in which substances can exist independently of their accidents, but accidents are dependent in being on a substance.

For example, a shaggy dog is substantially a dog, but only accidentally shaggy. If it lost all its hair, it would cease to be shaggy but would be no less a dog: it would then be a non-shaggy dog. But if it ceased to be a dog—for example, if it were turned into fertilizer—then it would cease to be shaggy at the same moment. Given that substances can be characterized as forms, as matter, or as compounds of form and matter, it seems that Aristotle gives the cause and source of a being by listing its material and formal cause.

However, primary beings are not composed of other primary beings Met. Thus, despite some controversy on the question, there seems to be no form of an individual, form being what is shared by all the individuals of a kind. A substance is defined by a universal, and thus when one defines the form, one defines the substance Met.

However, when one grasps a substance directly in perception or thought, one grasps the compound of form and matter Met. But since form by itself does not make a primary substance, it must be immanent—that is, compounded with matter—in each individual, primary substance. Rather, in a form-matter compound, such as a living thing, the matter is both the prior stuff out of which the thing has become and the contemporaneous stuff of which it is composed. The form is what makes what a thing is made of, its matter, into that thing Anscombe , 49, Due to this hylomorphic account, one might worry that natural science seems to explain everything there is to explain about substances.

However, Aristotle insists that there is a kind of separable and immovable being that serves as the principle or source of all other beings, which is the special object of wisdom Met. This being might be called the good itself, which is implicitly pursued by substances when they come to be what they are. In any case, Aristotle insists that this source and first of beings sets in motion the primary motion.

But since whatever is in motion must be moved by something else, and the first thing is not moved by something else, it is itself motionless Met. Thus, we can conceive of the Aristotelian god as being like our own intellect but unclouded by what we undergo as mortal, changing, and fallible beings Marx , 7—8.

Practical philosophy is distinguished from theoretical philosophy both in its goals and in its methods. While the aim of theoretical philosophy is contemplation and the understanding of the highest things, the aim of practical philosophy is good action, that is, acting in a way that constitutes or contributes to the good life.

Thus, ethical inquiry is part of political inquiry into what makes the best life for a human being. Because of the intrinsic variability and complexity of human life, however, this inquiry does not possess the exactness of theoretical philosophy EN b10— Just as craftsmen like flautists and sculptors and bodily organs like eyes and ears have a peculiar work they do, so the human being must do something peculiarly human.

Such function is definitive, that is, distinguishes what it is to be the thing that carries it out. For example, a flautist is a flautist insofar as she plays the flute. But the function serves as an implicit success condition for being that thing. The human function cannot be nutrition or perception, since those activities are shared with other living things.

Since other animals lack reason, the human function must be an activity of the psyche not without reason.

A human being that performs this function well will be functioning well as a human being. In other words, by acting virtuously one will by that fact achieve the human good Angier , 60— Ethics and politics are, however, not oriented merely to giving descriptions of human behavior but on saying what ends human beings ought to pursue, that is, on what constitutes the good life for man.

While the many, who have no exposure to philosophy, should agree that the good life consists in eudaimonia —happiness or blessedness—there is disagreement as to what constitutes this state EN a18— The special task of practical philosophy is therefore to say what the good life consists in, that is, to give a more comprehensive account of eudaimonia than is available from the observation of the diverse ends pursued by human beings.

As Baracchi , 81—83 points out, eudaimonia indicates a life lived under the benevolent or beneficial sway of the daimonic, that is, of an order of existence beyond the human. Thus, the view that eudaimonia is a state of utmost perfection and completion for a human being Magna Moralia a14, b8 indicates that the full actualization of a human depends on seeking something beyond what is strictly speaking proper to the human.

Though the original meaning of ethics has been obscured due to modern confusion of pursuing proper ends with following moral rules, in the Aristotelian works, ethical inquiry is limited to the investigation of what it is for a human being to flourish according to her own nature.

For the purposes of this inquiry, Aristotle distinguishes three parts of the psyche: passions, powers, and habits EN b Passions include attitudes such as feeling fear, hatred, or pity for others, while powers are those parts of our form that allow us to have such passions and to gain knowledge of the world.

However, while all human beings share passions and powers, they differ with regard to how they are trained or habituated and thus with respect to their dispositions or states of character.

Those who are habituated correctly are said to be excellent and praiseworthy, while those whose characters are misshapen through bad habituation are blameworthy EN b28—a2.

How does a human being become good, cultivating excellence within herself? Aristotle holds that this happens by two related but distinct mechanisms.

Intellectual excellences arise by teaching, whereas ethical excellences by character, such as moderation and courage, arise by ethos, habituation, or training EN a14— Since pleasure or pain results from each of our activities EN b4 , training happens through activity; for example, one learns to be just by doing just things EN a35—b Legislators, who aim to make citizens good, therefore must ensure that citizens are trained from childhood to produce certain good habits—excellences of character—in them EN b23— Such training takes place via pleasure and pain.

If one is brought up to take pleasure or suffer pain in certain activities, one will develop the corresponding character EN b18— This is why no one becomes good unless one does good things EN b11— Hence the desires of children can be cultivated into virtuous dispositions by providing rewards and punishments that induce them to follow good reason EN b2—6. Excellence is not itself a pleasure but rather a deliberative disposition to take pleasure in certain activities, a mean between extreme states EN b36—a2.

Although he offers detailed descriptions of the virtues in his ethical works, Aristotle summarizes them in a table:.

This shows that each excellence is a mean between excessive and defective states of character EE b35—a Accordingly, good habituation is concerned with avoiding extreme or pathological states of character. Human action displays excellence only when it is undertaken voluntarily, that is, is chosen as the means to bring about a goal wished for by the agent. Deliberation is not about ends but about what contributes to an end already given by one of the three types of desire discussed above: appetite, thumos, or wish EN b11—12, 33— But if all excellent action must be chosen, how can actions undertaken in an instant, such as when one acts courageously, be excellent?

Since such actions can be undertaken without the agent having undergone a prior process of conscious deliberation, which takes time, it seems that one must say that quick actions were hypothetically deliberated, that is, that they count as what one would have chosen to do had one had time to deliberate Segvic , — Thus, neither are choice and action the same, nor are the processes or conditions from which they result identical. Hence an action based on those desires could still be described by a practical syllogism, though it would not be chosen through deliberation.

Deliberation does not describe a kind of deduction but a process of seeking things that contribute to an aim already presented under the guise of the good Segvic , — Geometrical analysis is the method by which a mathematician works backwards from a desired result to find the elements that constitute that result. Similarly, deliberation is a search for the elements that would allow the end one has in view to be realized EN b8— However, while geometrical reasoning is abstracted from material conditions, the prospective reasoning of deliberation is constrained both modally and temporally.

One cannot deliberate about necessities, since practical things must admit of being otherwise than they are DA a29— One can describe deliberation, then, as starting from premises in the future perfect tense, and as working backwards to discover what actions would make those statements true. In addition to these constraints, the deliberating agent must have a belief about herself, namely that she is able to either bring about or not bring about the future state in question EN a18— Since rational powers alone are productive of contrary effects, deliberation must be distinctively rational, since it produces a choice to undertake or not to undertake a certain course of action Met.

In distinction to technical deliberation, the goal of which is to produce something external to the activity that brings it about, in ethical deliberation there is no external end since good action is itself the end EN b7. Thus, deliberation ends when one has reached a decision, which may be immediately acted upon or put into practice later when the proper conditions arise.

Life will tend to go well for a person who has been habituated to the right kinds of pleasures and pains and who deliberates well about what to do. Unfortunately, this is not always sufficient for happiness. For although excellence might help one manage misfortunes well and avoid becoming miserable as their result, it is not reasonable to call someone struck with a major misfortune blessed or happy EN b33—a So there seems to be an element of luck in happiness: although bad luck cannot make one miserable, one must possess at least some external goods in order to be happy.

One could also ruin things by acting in ignorance. When one fails to recognize a particular as what it is, one might bring about an end one never intended.

Such actions are involuntary. But there is a more fundamental kind of moral ignorance for which one can be blamed, which is not the cause of involuntary actions but of badness EN b25—a In the first case, one does what one does not want to do because of ignorance, so is not worthy of blame.

In the second case, one does what one wants to do and is thus to be blamed for the action. Given that badness is a form of ignorance about what one should do, it is reasonable to ask whether acting acratically, that is, doing what one does not want to do, just comes down to being ignorant.

This is the teaching of Socrates, who, arguing against what appears to be the case, reduced acrasia to ignorance EN b25— Though Aristotle holds that acrasia is distinct from ignorance, he also thinks it is impossible for knowledge to be dragged around by the passions like a slave. In other words, he admits that the passions can overpower perceptual knowledge of particulars but denies that it can dominate intellectual knowledge of universals.

Acrasia consists, then, in being unruled with respect to thumos or with respect to sensory pleasures. In this sense, acrasia represents a conflict between the reasoning and unreasoning parts of the psyche for discussion see Weinman , 95— Thus, the good life may be accompanied not only by a pleasurable relation to oneself but also by relationships to others in which one takes a contemplative pleasure in their activities.

The value of friendship follows from the ideas that when a person is a friend to himself, he wishes the good for himself and thus to improve his own character. Only such a person who has a healthy love of self can form a friendship with another person EN b25— However, because people are by nature communal or political, in order to lead a complete life, one needs to form friendships with excellent people, and it is in living together with others that one comes to lead a happy life.

Friendship is a bridging concept between ethics concerning the relations of individuals and political science, which concerns the nature and function of the state. For Aristotle, friendship holds a state together, so the lawgiver must focus on promoting friendship above all else EN a22— Indeed, when people are friends, they treat one another with mutual respect so that justice is unnecessary or redundant EN a27— Such love of others and mutual pleasure are strictly speaking neither egoistic nor altruistic.

Instead, they rest on the establishment of a harmony of self and others in which the completion of the individual life and the life of the community amount to the same thing. This is shown by the fact that the individual human being is dependent on the political community for his formation and survival. One who lives outside the state is either a beast or a god, that is, does not participate in what is common to humanity Pol. The political community is natural and essentially human, then, because it is only within this community that the individual realizes his nature as a human being.

Thus, the state exists not only for the continuation of life but for the sake of the good life Pol. While other gregarious animals have voice, which nature has fashioned to indicate pleasure and pain, the power of speech enables human beings to indicate not only this but also what is expedient and inexpedient and what is just and unjust Pol. However, the formal cause, the distinctive way in which symbols are organized, is conventional.

The initial process involved describing objects based on their characteristics, states of being and actions. In his philosophical treatises, Aristotle also discussed how man might next obtain information about objects through deduction and inference.

Aristotle believed that knowledge could be obtained through interacting with physical objects. He also recognized that human interpretation and personal associations played a role in our understanding of those objects.

He attempted, with some error, to classify animals into genera based on their similar characteristics. He further classified animals into species based on those that had red blood and those that did not. Marine biology was also an area of fascination for Aristotle. Through dissection, he closely examined the anatomy of marine creatures. In contrast to his biological classifications, his observations of marine life, as expressed in his books, are considerably more accurate.

Aristotle in The School of Athens, a fresco by Raphael, Photo: Raphael [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons. Together, the couple had a daughter, Pythias, named after her mother.

In B. Soon after, Aristotle embarked on a romance with a woman named Herpyllis, who hailed from his hometown of Stagira. They presume that he eventually freed and married her. Phillip and Alexander both held Aristotle in high esteem and ensured that the Macedonia court generously compensated him for his work. On and off, Aristotle spent most of the remainder of his life working as a teacher, researcher and writer at the Lyceum in Athens until the death of his former student Alexander the Great.