ARISTOTLE: BIOGRAPHY, PHILOSOPHY, THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE, WORKS - ARTE - 2025

Aristotle (384 BC - 322 BC) was a Greek scholar of the classical era who dedicated himself to multiple areas of knowledge, especially philosophy, a field in which he stood out as one of the most prominent exponents of the entire West. His wisdom was very extensive, ranging from mathematics, physics and biology, to metaphysics, ethics and politics, although that was common among intellectuals contemporary with Aristotle.

His work is still visited by scholars and has remained one of the foundations of Western society. It is common for Aristotle to be called the father of logic, a subject to which he dedicated several works. Similarly, he was well versed in oratory, an art highly relevant to the Greeks of his time.

Bust of Aristotle, by HG Wells via Wikimedia Commons

He lived during the 3rd century BC. C., and belonged to the Academy of Athens for more than two decades. One of his mentors was Plato, the father of Western philosophy. In addition, Aristotle devoted himself to teaching and among his disciples was Alexander the Great.

But his work for education did not stop there, but towards the end of his life he created the Lyceum of Athens, named for the place where his philosophical school was located. This was known by the name of "peripatetic."

After the death of his teacher, Plato, Aristotle began to develop a vision about knowledge that was close to factual reality, so it was used as a basis for the study of natural sciences until the arrival of the Enlightenment.

He had a particular interest in biology and developed some theories that would later prove to be incorrect, such as that of spontaneous generation, but also others such as the one that explained the reproduction of octopuses through the hectocotyl were proven true.

The term "lyceum", used for the first time by the Aristotelians, came to designate secondary education institutions in some countries. Of the more than 200 treatises that the Greek philosopher is thought to have written, just over 30 have survived to our time.

Biography

-First years

Aristotle was born in 384 BC. C., in the city of Estagira, located northeast of Macedonia, kingdom to which the Calcídica peninsula belonged then.

The name of the man who became a landmark in Western culture, Aristotle, meant "the best purpose," or "end," in ancient Greek. He was one of the sons of Festis with Nicomachus, a physician who served Amyntas III of Macedon, grandfather of Alexander the Great.

Both parents of Aristotle held the title of "Asclepiadae", which meant "son of Asclepius", a legendary character in the Greek tradition related to medicine. Many doctors in Greece adopted the "Asclepiadae" in their names, so it is not clear whether it was a family or a professional group.

Aristotle had two brothers, one named Arimnesta and the other named Arimnesto. It is believed that for a time he lived with his father in Pella, the Macedonian capital, and that since then his connections with the kingdom's court emerged.

According to some sources, Nicómaco died when Aristotle was 13 years old, but others affirm that it was some time later and that the young man was 17. In both versions of the story, it is claimed that his guardian was Proxeno de Atarneo, husband of his older sister.

-Education

When Aristotle was about 17 years old, he was sent to study at the Academy of Athens, where Plato taught.

It is believed that at the time of Aristotle's entry, the leader of the school was in Sicily, so they were not found until 365 BC. C.

According to the most widespread version of Aristotle's life, he remained at the Academy for about twenty years, until Plato's death in 347 BC. C.

However, other accounts claim that Aristotle may have left earlier to study biology at Aso.

Departure

According to some, Plato's disciple was disgusted by the fact that the philosopher's nephew, Speusippus, was chosen as the successor at the head of the Academy, so he left Athens.

Plato and Aristotle, by Raphael, via Wikimedia Commons.

In addition, it was added that the anti-Macedonian sentiment that invaded the area, due to the increasing dominance of Greece by Philip II, could influence his decision.

In other versions it was commented that Aristotle, although intellectually separated from the current taught by Plato, always considered himself very close to his teacher and had a deep respect for him.

On the other hand, some have affirmed that, while remaining friendly towards the members of the Academy of Athens, he tried to show that some theories proposed within that group, such as that of the Forms, were incorrect.

In any case, some of his outstanding works were developed in this period of Aristotle's life.

-Travels

While he had been one of the students at the Academy, Aristotle met Hermias, who was the ruler of an area called Athenaeum and whose control spread throughout Asia Minor.

Aristotle traveled to meet his old companion at Aso. There he also met Pythias, Hermias' adoptive daughter, whom he married. Later, the couple had a daughter whom they named after her mother.

Thanks to the collaboration of Aristotle, an agreement was reached for Atarneo and Macedonia to become allies, which displeased the Persian shah, Artaxerxes III.

Memnon of Rhodes was the one designated to recover the area and captured Hermias to later assassinate him.

Lesbos and biology

After the death of his father-in-law, around the year 341 a. C., Aristotle went to the island of Lesbos where he stayed for two years and where he dedicated himself to research in zoology and marine biology.

He put together some of his research in The History of Animals. In this text some of the observations in greater detail in the field of zoology up to the 17th century are reflected.

Aristotle said that between theory and observation, the second must prevail, since it confirms the first.

-Macedonia

In 342 a. Aristotle went to Macedonia at the request of Philip II. There he served as a tutor for the most important young men in the kingdom, among whom was the heir to the throne, who after his conquests was known as Alexander the Great.

In the Temple of the Nymphs, in Mieza, the institution operated in which Alexander and other contemporary boys with the Macedonian prince, such as Ptolemy, Cassander or Hephaestion, were educated by Aristotle.

It is said that Philip II promised the philosopher that he would rebuild Estagira, which had been destroyed by the Macedonian king in 348 BC. After raising the city again, Filipo returned there to its inhabitants, who had become slaves after the occupation of Estagira.

At the time Aristotle began to instruct Alexander, the last one was about 13 years old. Although the records show that at the age of 15 the prince was already prominent in the military career, it is known that Aristotle stayed in Pella for about 5 years.

Among the areas in which he instructed the future conqueror, mathematics, physis (or natural sciences), logic and oratory stood out, aspects considered very important by Greek society.

-Return to Athens and the Lyceum

About 335 BC C., Aristotle returned to the city in which he was formed, Athens. At that time he decided to create his own teaching center, which he named the Lyceum, or Lyceum. In Greece these kinds of institutions were known as gymnasiums, and this one in particular was close to a temple dedicated to Apollo Lycian.

Many of his works were developed while he was in charge of the Lyceum. The intellectuals who followed this trend were known as "peripatetics" because Aristotle used to walk through the corridors while teaching.

Aristotle was not the first to use the Lyceum as an instructional site: other scholars before him had used it for the same purpose. Among those were Socrates and Plato himself.

However, as he did not hold Athenian citizenship, he could not own property, so he used that public space as a meeting place with his students. Therefore, the Lyceum, being a traveling school, had no official rank.

Because of the training that Aristotle gave his disciples, they focused, after the physical disappearance of their teacher, on natural questions rather than on metaphysics or philosophy.

Among the most prominent peripatetics was Theophrastus, who took the reins of the Lyceum when Aristotle left the city for good years later.

-Last years

Before Aristotle left Athens, his wife Pythias passed away and he began a relationship with Herpilis de Estagira, who was the mother of Nicomacheus, to whom the philosopher dedicated one of his best-known works.

The figure of Herpilis is dark, since not many details are had about its origin. Some have said that she was a slave to Pythias, the wife of Aristotle, while others consider that she was a free woman and that, in fact, she was also the wife of the philosopher.

In the year 323 a. C., Alexander the Great died and some city states, such as Athens, once again repudiated everything that had to do with Macedonia.

Chalcidia

It is believed that it was because of this rejection that Aristotle decided to move to Calcidia on the island of Euboea, separated from Boeotia by the Strait of Euripo.

The story has transcended that Eurimedón the hierophant and Demophilus presented charges against Aristotle for "impiety", as had been done in the past with Socrates, who was sentenced to death in 339 BC. C.

Some sources place the departure of Aristotle in 322 BC. In the words of the same scholar, his decision to leave the city was made to "avoid another sin against philosophy" on the part of the Athenians.

He spent his final days trying to find explanations for the phenomena of nature he observed at Chalcidia, such as the tide in the Strait of Eurippus.

-Death

Aristotle died at the end of 322 BC. C., on the island of Eubea, in Greece. The cause of his death has not been clarified, since there are no records that he suffered from any disease, but at the time he was approximately 62 years old.

Heritage

Aristotle's testament was preserved and valuable information about his life was extracted from it. To his successor as head of the Lyceum, Teofrasto, he left both his library and the texts of his authorship.

Nicanor, Aristotle's adopted son, was to receive the philosopher's assets when he reached the right age. Until then, the selected tutors were Aristómenes, Timarco, Hipparco, Dioteles and Teofrasto.

Aristotle, by Jusepe de Ribera, Indianapolis Museum of Art, via Wikimedia Commons.

He ordered that his daughter should marry Nicanor and he take care of the entire family as a father and brother at the same time. If something happened to the young heir, then the same arrangement was in place for Theophrastus.

Herpilis also included her requesting that, if she wished, a worthy husband be found for her, in addition to some slaves and money, and she was allowed to choose whether she would reside in the house of Estagira or in that of Calcidia.

Another of the wills that Aristotle established was the liberation of several slaves, whose ultimate destination was freedom, since he prohibited their sales. He also requested that the remains of Pythias be taken with his own.

Aristotle's Philosophy

Aristotle proposed an approach to philosophy that differed from the one he had received during his training at the Academy of Athens, directed by Plato.

The title of the new school was "Lyceum", and the followers of its postulates were given the name "peripatetics."

For Aristotle's students, the studies of physis, or nature, were more relevant than the other branches of knowledge.

-New approach

The Greek had divided the sciences, as they were understood then, into three categories which he called practical, theoretical and poetic.

He proposed that experience and the senses are the foundations of knowledge, which, in turn, is the ultimate end of man. Likewise, according to Aristotle, the soul and the body were inseparable, as was the form of matter.

In this way, knowledge had to be deduced from justifiable precepts, with what Aristotle and his followers have one of the world's first empiricists, since they used observation to show the veracity of their statements.

-Practical science

In this category were included the areas that were considered useful in the development of everyday life for Greek citizens contemporary with Aristotle, such as rhetoric, politics, ethics or economics.

Rhetoric

For Aristotle rhetoric was fundamental. Besides being considered the art of persuasion, it was one of the differences between men and animals. To achieve the objective of convincing the audience, one could resort to ethos, pathos or logos.

Politics

Aristotelian approaches ensured that politics was inherent in human nature, as men were social or "political" animals, that is, they lived in "polis".

Its essence is social, since they can communicate and in this way generate lasting rules and agreements that lead to justice.

Governments according to Aristotle

One of his most outstanding contributions was that of the six forms of government that he separated by the number of people at the head of the State and the purpose for which they assumed office, that is, if they were interested in obtaining their own benefit or in the welfare of the community.

The first three forms proposed by the Greek are those that try to achieve a good common development:

- Monarchy: the government of one.

- Aristocracy: the government of the few.

- Democracy: the government of many.

When these three forms are perverted and seek personal benefit they become:

- Tyranny: the government of one.

- Oligarchy: the government of the few.

- Demagogy: the government of many.

Economy

For Aristotle the word economy referred to the administration of the home. To refer to what we currently think of as economics, the term was "chrematistic", but according to Aristotelian ethics the accumulation of wealth was not something ethical.

Ethics

Among Aristotle's texts, Ética a Nicómaco stands out, a work dedicated to his son. Ethics was not considered a theoretical but a practical science, since man must try to become good and do good.

For something to be good, it must fulfill its function; in the case of man, his soul and mind must act in harmony, so that happiness is achieved through excellence. So the best action had to be made into a habit.

-Theoretical science

For Aristotle the theoretical sciences could be divided into three broad categories. On the one hand, physical philosophy - physis - (whose meaning corresponds to the term "natural"), then there are mathematics and, finally, metaphysics, which he considered the mother of the other sciences.

Metaphysics

Aristotle did not mention the word "metaphysics" in his texts, but in his treatises he alluded to "the first philosophy".

In this particular, Aristotle distanced himself from Plato's Theory of Forms, since he proposed that matter and form are inseparable, so that the world is not divided into two, but is one.

Metaphysics deals with being, so it cannot be identified as one of the specific sciences, but everything follows from it.

Physis

Here was a place for things related to nature. Biology, chemistry, physics and psychology, among other disciplines, according to Aristotle's classification were part of this branch of science that, in addition, was one of the favorites for peripatetics.

Bust of Aristotle, by Internet Archive, via Wikimedia Commons

Chemistry and physics

One of the main postulates of Aristotle in these fields was the theory of the elements. He reaffirmed the four basic elements proposed by Empedocles and added one more: the ether, which made up the sky.

Aristotle made a table in which he described the characteristics of these elements such as weight, movement or qualities.

He also raised theories that dealt with the various types of body movements that were proven wrong over time.

geology

Aristotle pointed out that the human life span is insufficient to record some changes in the world, such as the birth of islands, the disappearance of aquatic bodies such as lakes or the growth of the flow of rivers such as the Nile.

biology

Aristotle, in addition to sexual reproduction as a generator of life, which was the accepted theory until then, proposed spontaneous generation to explain the birth of some animals such as insects or members of the marine fauna.

According to the Greeks the universe was alive, and consequently, it could create life from the basic elements. This theory remained in force until, finally, Luis Pasteur, among other scientists, managed to verify that it was an error.

Despite his follies, Aristotle's true contribution to biology was the description and classification of more than 500 living beings. The biggest difference that the Greek highlighted was the one between animals that had blood and those that did not.

Likewise, he was the first to carry out embryology studies. Aristotle made observations of the development of bird eggs and extrapolated it to other animals.

Psychology

One of Aristotle's interests was the study of the human mind. He gave importance to dreams, which he did not consider to have a connection with the gods, but with the imagination of each individual.

As for the soul, Aristotle proposed that there were three types of soul, a vegetable, a sensitive and a third that was rational.

Plants possessed only the first, animals possessed the plant and the sensitive, while human beings were the only ones who possessed all three.

The possession of the soul was what, according to Aristotle, made something have life. Unlike Plato, he did not consider that they were two separable things, but a unit that was not divisible, although he affirmed that a part of the soul could transcend life.

-Poetic sciences

Aristotle grouped in his Poetics the study of aesthetics. He was one of the philosophers who began the formal study of artistic disciplines, which he classified as imitative and not imitative.

For this Greek, imitation was not a degrading activity, but a natural process that is inherent in human beings, since Aristotle proposed that imitating something requires memory and contributes to learning.

He thought that poetry was closer to philosophy than history, because it is responsible for posing tentative situations, in addition to generating a description of the natural consequences that they entail.

Aristotle's theory of knowledge

Aristotle moved away from what Plato suggested in the Theory of Forms, in which he asserts that what exists in the world is a representation of an idea that is found in the mind, the place where all knowledge is stored.

This Greek was considered the father of empiricism, since in his theory of knowledge, or epistemology, perception and human experience had a fundamental role for the development of knowledge.

Bust of Aristotle in the Museo Nazionale Romano, by Photo by Szilas, 2013-03-04, via Wikimedia Commons

-Types of knowledge

For Aristotle the cravings for wisdom are natural in men and represent one of the characteristics that place them on animals. He separated two types of knowledge, which he called "sensitive" and "intellectual."

Sensory knowledge is responsible for particular aspects, since Aristotle considered that the senses are the starting point of understanding.

However, the philosopher affirmed that, at the same time, there was an intellectual knowledge in which, thanks to abstraction, universal concepts and the basic essence of questions can be understood.

Likewise, Aristotle explained that the form and matter of things do not separate. Also, he asserted that abstraction was achieved thanks to experience and memory, which were the tools to create broader concepts.

-Logic and knowledge process

For Aristotle, understanding followed a logical order. First were the basic statements, which currently correspond to the term "axiom", but in Aristotelian logic that name was given to other types of principles, which were secondary.

The basic statements, according to Aristotle, had to be true, as well as justifiable. That was another of the points where he differed from his teacher, Plato. Furthermore, these statements cannot be deduced, since they are principles.

According to Aristotle's logic, a hypothesis cannot be considered as a principle, since everything that arises from such an approach would also, consequently, be hypothetical.

Father of logic

Aristotle is considered the father of Western logic, since his work was applied, almost without modifications, for more than a thousand years.

The first formal study of logic was carried out by this Greek philosopher and was reflected in the Organon, a collection of six books in which Aristotle addressed most of the concepts of logic and which was used as a principle in the study of matter until the XIX century.

Plays

Despite the fact that Aristotle wrote more than 200 treatises on various subjects, only about 30 of his texts survive to this day, since the rest were lost over the years.

The works of Greek that are preserved are compiled in the Corpus Aristotelicum.

Immanuel Bekker was the one who took on the task of organizing and classifying Aristotle's texts, between 1831 and 1836, in an edition of the Prussian Academy of Sciences.

In addition, there are other works that were not included in Bekker's original publication, such as the Fragments, which were lost works, inserted a posteriori in a reissue made by Valentin Rose in 1863 entitled Aristoteles Pseudepigraphus.

The Constitution of the Athenians was not part of the Corpus Aristotelicum either, since the papyri on which it was written were acquired by the British Museum and it was reissued in 1891.

It speaks of two types of works written by Aristotle, the exoteric ones, which were works made for those who were inside and outside the philosophical circle of the Peripatetics, and the esoteric ones, created for the philosophers close to the Greek.

-Corpus Aristotelicum

The works organized by Bekker are classified as follows:

Logic

- Categories (Categoriae), 1st.

- Of interpretation (De interpretatione), 16a.

- First analytics (Analytica priora), 24a.

- Analytical seconds (Analytica posterior), 71a.

- Topics (Topica), 100a.

- Sophistic refutations (De sophisticis elenchis), 164a.

Aristotle, by Visconti, via Wikimedia Commons.

Natural Philosophy

- Physics (Physica), 184a.

- On the sky (De caelo), 268a.

- On generation and corruption (De generatione et corruptione), 314a.

- Meteorology (Meteorologica), 338a.

- Of the universe (Of world), 391a.

- From the soul (De anima), 402a.

- Small treatises on nature (Parva naturalia).

The following texts are included there:

1) On the senses and the senses (De sensu et sensibilibus), 436a.

2) Of memory and reminiscence (De memoria et reminiscentia), 449b.

3) Of sleep and wakefulness (De somno et vigilia), 453b.

4) Of the dream (De insomniis), 458a.

5) From divination by sleep (De divinatione per somnum), 462b.

6) Of the length and brevity of life (De longitudinaline et brevitate vitae), 464b.

7) On youth and old age, On life and death, and On respiration (De juventute et senectute, De vita et morte, De respiratione), 467b.

- Of respiration (De spiritu), 481a.

- History of animals (Historia animalium), 486a.

- The parts of animals (De partibus animalium), 639a.

- The movement of animals (De motu animalium), 698a.

Aristotle by Seitz, Vatican Museums, via Wikimedia Commons.

- Progression of animals (De incessu animalium), 704a.

- Generation of animals (De generatione animalium), 715a.

- Of the colors (De coloribus), 791a.

- Of the things of the audition (De audibilibus), 800a.

- Physiognomonic (Physiognomonica), 805a.

- Of plants (De plantis), 815a.

- Of the wonders heard (De mirabilibus auscultationibus), 830a.

- Mechanics (Mechanica), 847a.

- Problems (Problemata), 859a.

- Of the imperceptible lines (De lineis insecabilibus), 968a.

- The places of the winds (Ventorum situs), 973a.

- Melisos, Xenophanes and Gorgias (abbreviated MXG), 974a.

Metaphysics

- Metaphysics (Metaphysica), 980a.

Ethics and politics

- Nicomachean Ethics or Nicomachean Ethics (Ethica Nicomachea), 1094a.

- Great morality (Magna moralia), 1181a.

- Ética eudemia or Ética a Eudemo (Ethica Eudemia), 1214a

- Booklet on the virtues and vices (De virtutibus et vitiis libellus), 1249a.

- Politics (Politics), 1252a.

- Económica (Oeconomica), 1343a.

Rhetoric and poetics

- Rhetorical art (Ars rhetorica), 1354a.

- Rhetoric to Alexander (Rhetorica ad Alexandrum), 1420a.

- Poetics (Ars poetica), 1447a.

References

1. En.wikipedia.org. (2019). Aristotle. Available at: en.wikipedia.org.
2. JP Kenny, A. and H. Amadio, A. (2019). Aristotle - Biography, Contributions, & Facts. Encyclopedia Britannica. Available at: britannica.com.
3. Salgado González, S. (2012). The philosophy of Aristotle, Duererías Notebooks, History of Philosophy Series (2). Duererías.
4. Shields, C. (2012). Aristotle's Philosophical Life and Writings. Oxford Handbooks Online.
5. Stoa.org. (2019). Legal Status in the Greek World, 79. Aristotle's will. Available at: stoa.org.