Philosophy of Aristotle

The Life of Aristotle

Aristotle was born at Stagira, a Greek colony of Thrace, in the year 384 B.C. His father, a Macedonian named Nicomachus, was a physician in the court of Amyntas II, King of Macedonia.

After the death of his parents, Aristotle's education was directed by Proxenus of Atarneus. In his eighteenth year, Aristotle went to Athens and entered the Academy of Plato, remaining there about twenty years, until the death of the master.

During Plato's last years, Aristotle collaborated with the master in the revision of his works. After Plato's death, Aristotle went to Assus, a city of the Troad, where he lived for three years. His friendship with Hermias, ruler of the city, led to his marriage to Pythias, the ruler's niece and adopted daughter.

About 343 B.C. Aristotle withdrew to Mitylene; during the same year he was summoned by King Philip to the court of Macedonia to educate Prince Alexander, then a youth of thirteen years. Aristotle remained there for three years, until the beginning of the famous Asiatic expedition.

Alexander was grateful for the education received, and supplied his master with the financial means to form a library and to assemble a museum of natural history with which Aristotle enriched his school. Aristotle had returned to Athens in the year 335. B.C., and there had opened a school in the gardens dedicated to Apollo Lyceios.

The school was hence called the Lyceum, and also the Peripatetic School, probably from Aristotle's custom of teacher, discussing and conversing with his pupils while walking along the shady lanes of the garden. He taught in the Lyceum for twelve or thirteen years, and composed the greater part of his books during that time.

In 323 B.C., upon the death of Alexander, there was reawakened in Athens conflict between the followers of the Macedonian party and the enemies of Alexander. The national reactionaries were led by the great Greek orator Demosthenes.

Aristotle, as a Macedonian sympathizer, was accused of impiety, which meant that he would be called to judgment to hear the sentence of death passed upon himself. He anticipated the condemnation and voluntarily retired to Chalcis, where he possessed a villa inherited from his mother.

It is said that while departing for exile he uttered these words, referring to the condemnation of Socrates: "I do not wish that Athens should sin twice against philosophy."

His school, including the library and the museum of natural history, went to his disciple Theophrastus. Aristotle died in 322. B.C., at Chalcis in Euboea.



The Works of Aristotle

Aristotle, whom Plato is said to have surnamed "The Intellect," certainly had the loftiest mind ever known in Greece, and perhaps in the entire human race. He is the type of true philosopher who, not allowing himself to be distracted by practical and political motives, lives entirely engrossed in his speculations.

The books edited by him and comprising all the knowledge of his day number about a thousand. Of these works, some were destined for the public, and some for Aristotle's school. The greater part of his works has been lost, but some important parts have been preserved, that is, those works destined for his school and representing the philosophic thought of this greatest of philosophers.

The complete edition was published for the first time by Andronicus of Rhodes about the middle of the last century before Christ. Following the classification of Andronicus of Rhodes and passing over the scientific books which have no direct connection with philosophy, the works of Aristotle comprise the following groups:

1. Logic

The works on logic were called the Organon, that is, an instrument of learning. The Organon includes the following:

• The Categories

• On Interpretation

• Prior Analytics (on the syllogism)

• Posterior Analytics (on Demonstration)

• Topics

• Sophistic Refutations

2. Physics

The works on physics comprise the body of doctrine which is today embraced by cosmology and anthropology:

• Physics (in eight books)

• Concerning the Heavens (in four books)

• Concerning Birth and Corruption (in two books)

• Meteorology (in four books)

• On the Soul (in three books)

3. Metaphysics

Aristotle's Metaphysics is usually divided into fourteen books. These are a compilation made after the death of Aristotle and are based on manuscript notes referring to general metaphysics and theology. The name "metaphysics" is due to the position of these works in the collection edited by Andronicus; they appeared "after the works on physics."

4. Ethics and Politics

• Nichomachean Ethics (in ten books, dedicated to Aristotle's con, Nicomachus, named after Aristotle's father)

• Eudemian Ethics

• The Great Ethics

• Politics (in eight books, unfinished)

5. Rhetoric and Poetry

• Rhetoric (in three books)

• Poetics (in two books)

These books, of course, are only a part of the works of Aristotle.



Introduction to Aristotle's Doctrine

Plato had split reality into two worlds:

• The World of Ideas (eternal, immutable, unchangeable, like the "being" of Parmenides, but fashioned according to the Socratic concept); and

• The World of Sensible Things (mutable, changeable, like the "being" of Heraclitus).

Plato had been induced to divide the world of reality because he believed that only by such a separation could he give metaphysical foundation to the concept of Socrates without denying Heraclitus' doctrine of "fluent reality" -- the object of immediate experience.
Aristotle found that the weakest point of his master's doctrine lies in this separation of the world of Ideas from the world of sensible things. "It would seem impossible for the substance and that which is the substance to exist in separation." (1)

How can Ideas be causes of the motion and change in the visible world if Ideas are separate from things? Plato had held that Ideas are patterns or models of things. Aristotle holds that to say this "is to use empty phrases and poetical metaphors; for what is it that fashions things on the model of Ideas?" (2) Since Ideas are separated from reality and are themselves immutable, unchangeable, they cannot be the cause of the motion and of change in sensible things.

Nor does the teaching of separate Ideas help toward the knowledge of other things, for Ideas are not the substance of particulars, but are separated from them. Hence, how would it be possible to have any knowledge of sensible substances if what constitutes these substances (Ideas) is really separated from them?

The cause of motion and change, according to Aristotle, must be sought in the thing itself as an immanent element of the reality. Only when an understanding of the factor or factors of motion is had can we have a true knowledge of things; for these factors of motion are the key to understanding the concept of Socrates.

Thus any investigation must start from things which begin to be, develop, and then pass away. Although sensible reality is in continuous "becoming," the "factors" of this becoming are unchangeable, immutable. Only when the causes of motion are grasped as intrinsic factors of motion itself will we have a true understanding of reality, i.e., knowledge by causes.

In other words, the intelligibility of sensible things must be sought in the things themselves, and not in a separate world of Ideas, as Plato believed.

References:

(1) Metaphysics, XIII, 1079b.
(2) loc.cit.

Theory of Knowledge (Epistemology)



Comprehension and Extension

Logic, of which Aristotle was the first systematizer, essays to state the relationships existing between one concept and another, with the purpose of forming an intrinsically organized entity which will enable the intellect to pass from one truth to another by showing the reasons for such passage.

To achieve this purpose, logic starts by analyzing each concept. Thus logic may determine:

• what are the logical elements of each concept -- in other words, its comprehension;

• what is the field of application of each concept -- in other words, its extension or the number of beings mentally represented by that concept.

(For example, the concept "animal" comprehends the following characteristics or logical elements: an animal has a body, it is organic, it requires nourishment, it is sensitive, etc.; the concept "animal extends to both non-human animals and man.)

It is easy to see that comprehension and extension are in inverse relation; the greater the comprehension, the less the extension of the concept, and vice versa. Thus if we increase the comprehension of the concept "animal" by adding another element, for instance "rationality," the extension of the concept will decrease, because it is now no longer applicable to non-human animals but only to men. With non-human animals excluded, the extension is proportionately decreased.

Again, concepts may be classified according to their extension and comprehension. If we were to arrange them on the rungs of a ladder, as it were, top place would be occupied by the concept with the greatest extension (but with the minimum of comprehension); inversely, the bottom would be taken by the concept with the least extension (but with the maximum of comprehension).

In such an arrangement, each intermediary concept is a species in relation to the concept above it, and a genus in relation to the concept below it. In this method of classification (by descending from genus to species), the last place will be taken by concepts having an individual extension ("this individual is John and no one else"); and the individual is neither species nor genus.

The Categories

By ascending the ladder (from species to genus), top place will be taken by a genus which is not a relative species, since there is no concept above it; hence it is called supreme genus. These supreme genera are also called categories (or predicaments), and according to Aristotle they are ten in number:

• substance (who or what is this thing?)

• quantity (how much or how big?)

• quality (what sort of thing is it?)

• relation (to what or whom does it refer?)

• activity (what does it do to another?)

• passivity (what is done to it?)

• when (at what point of time?)

• where (where is it?)

• site or posture (in what attitude?)

• habit (how surrounded, equipped; how conditioned?)

Such analysis and classification make it possible for us to know the general predicament or class under which a concept is located, and also the difference which distinguishes it from other species of the same genus.

Definition

Now, to know the genus and the specific (or specifying) difference of a concept is the same as knowing its definition or essence. For example, the definition (or essence) of man is rational animal: that is, proximate genus -- animal; and specific difference -- rational.

According to Aristotle, the differentia is not something diverse and distinct from the genus, but is rather the actuation (or form) of the same essence which existed virtually in the genus. Thus "animal" may be rational: that animal in which this potentiality to rationality is actuated is man.

Here we must observe that in giving the definition of a concept ("man is a rational animal") the intellect makes a judgment, which consists in affirming (or denying) that something (the predicate) belongs (or does not belong) to something else (the subject).

Characteristic of the judgment is truth or falsity. Such a possibility was not present in the simple concept, in which nothing was affirmed or denied. On the contrary, the presence of error is possible in a judgment, in which the logical affirmation of the relationship of the predicate to the subject may not correspond with reality.

The possibility of error forces the mind to demonstrate that a given judgment is true. This means that the intellect must find the reasons which ensure that the proposed judgment is in conformity with reality. Such reasons, giving the mind certainty that a judgment is true, are the foundation for perfect knowledge, since perfect knowledge is knowledge through causes.

The Syllogism

According to Aristotle, the best method of leading the mind to perfect knowledge is the syllogism. The syllogism is an argumentation formed from three judgments so connected with one another that from the truth of the first two (the premises) the mind draws out a third truth (the conclusion) necessarily connected with the premises.

The syllogism shows that the cause (or reason) for connecting the predicate (P) of the conclusion to the subject (S) of the same conclusion is that both predicate and subject are connected necessarily with a third concept (M), called the middle term, in the premises. According to the principle of identity, therefore, such a connection must be affirmed necessarily in the conclusion also.

Aristotle stated three figures of the syllogism; the first is the best and may be presented as follows:

• All men (M) are mortal (P);

• Socrates (S) is a man (M);

• Therefore, Socrates (S) is mortal (P).

This syllogism shows that the reason (or cause) which makes Socrates mortal is that mortality is an element necessarily connected with his being a man.

It is clear that the truth of the conclusion is conditioned on the truth of the premises. In other words, supposing that the premises express a necessary truth, the conclusion will also express a necessary truth. The truth of the premises, it is supposed, has been proved by another syllogism, and so on.

First Principles

But, according to Aristotle, this process cannot be extended ad infinitum; it is necessary that the mind reach some judgments which do not need any demonstration because they are evident from within. Such are the logical fundamental principles, the most important of which is the principle of contradiction, which was formulated by Aristotle in the following manner:

"A thing can not be and not-be at the same time in the same manner." (1)

The first principles of reason are universal, that is, valid for the whole of human knowledge, both philosophical and scientific. This means that philosophy and the sciences must start from these principles, and must deduce from them the particular principles which are the foundation of each kind of knowledge.

Aristotle spoke also of induction, which means the passage from particular to universal knowledge. According to Aristotle, concepts are the result of induction; the form, which is always particular in individuals, is a universal concept as soon as it is considered as abstracted from the individuating characteristics; this passing from the particular to the universal Aristotle calls induction. Since the concepts are the matter of the propositions and these latter the matter of the syllogism, we can say that induction prepares the material for perfect reasoning.

References:

(1) Metaphysics, IV, 3, 1005b.


General Metaphysics

A. Analysis of Being in Becoming: Matter and Form, Potency and Act.

Aristotle starts from the solid ground of experience.

Experience shows us that only individual substances exist, and all exist in the substance and are predicated of the substance. Moreover, experience shows us that individuals are not produced by some Idea or model, but are produced by other individuals of the same species.

The fact of generation tells us that first of all there must be an individual, who by the act of generation is able to produce a new reality as germ or seed. In virtue of this act of generation, the germ or seed receives the power of reproducing another individual specifically the same as the generator; for man generates man, and oak generates oak.

The power of reproducing a new individual is the very form of the seed; because, for Aristotle, every form is a force or a potency for developing what is virtually contained within the subject. Thus the immanent form of the seed or germ is a potency for developing a perfect being (it has the power of becoming man or oak). The development from the state of potency to the state of perfect being is called becoming.

To make this development possible, it is necessary to suppose some substratum or matter on which the successive forms of development can be realized until the last form is reached (the perfect or completed individual). This substratum is called matter, by which is meant all those conditions which make possible the passage of successive forms. To function thus, this substratum or matter must remain unchangeable.

Moreover, experience shows us that the forms in the development of a living being proceed from an inferior to a higher form, not by change but by a predetermined form, which specifically is the same as that of the individual that produced the germ or seed.

This predetermined form (entelechy) is always immanently present, coordinating and distributing the matter not arbitrarily but according to that specific from within -- in this instance, man or oak. The idea of the entire individual is present within the seed from the first moment as an immanent potency and does not cease its activity until the perfect (completed) individual is attained.

Now, as a first result of this analysis of becoming, we are able to determine and understand Aristotelian terminology.

Only individuals are beings in the full sense of the term. Every individual is a compound of matter and form. Matter is an indeterminate element: the form is the determining element; it is the force, power -- or better, the potency -- developing the whole which is virtually contained within the individual. Thus it is called active potency. Matter, considered as the complex of those conditions which make possible the activity of the form, is called passive potency.

Every form, since it designates some actual determination of matter, is also called act. Thus the analysis of the development of a living being has given us the concept of matter (substratum), form (determining element), potency (both active and passive), and act.

Aristotle extends the results of the analysis of the development of a living being to a work of art, that is, to artificial becoming. Let us take the classic example of the piece of marble which becomes a statue.

Here, too, first of all, there must be an artist who conceives the "idea" of the statue which he wants to bring forth in the marble.

Secondly, the marble, which already possesses its own shape -- for instance, that of a cube -- is supposed to be capable of losing this shape and assuming that conceived by the artist. In other words, the marble must be in passive potency in order to assume the form of a statue.

Thirdly, the marble, under the action of the tools used by the artist, loses its former shape and becomes a statue. The action of the artist ceases when the marble has passed into the new form, that of a statue.

This process is analogous to that of the development of the living organism. There are, however, some interesting differences.

In the development of a living organism, the seed is predetermined by nature to all the successive forms which are intermediary means of reaching that specific form which is the last.

The marble, on the contrary, is not determined by its form of marble to be this rather than that statue or something else. Here the determination comes extrinsically, from the idea of the artist -- as does also the origin of the active potency to produce such a statue; whereas in the living organism this active potency is immanent in the seed.

However -- the artificial becoming also consists in a union of matter and form.

B. The Four Causes of Becoming

The preceding analysis showed that four causes are acting upon the being in the process of becoming:

• There is an efficient cause, and it is that which gives the impulse to movement or development (the generator as becoming takes place in nature, and the artist as becoming takes place in art);

• There is a material cause, the permanent and indeterminate substratum of the successive transformations (organic matter in the case of the living organism, and the marble in the case of the statue);

• There is a formal cause, established by the forces within the idea (the form of species in the living organism, and the idea conceived by the artist in works of art);

• There is a final cause, that which directs the entire series of transformations on a pre-established plane, giving unity to the entire course of the development (which results in the complete organism in natural becoming, and the complete statue in artificial becoming). (1)

It is interesting to note that, according to Aristotle, three of the above-mentioned causes -- namely the efficient cause, the formal cause, and the final cause -- logically are reducible to the idea of "form." In the development of a natural organism -- for instance, that of man --

• The efficient cause or generative act is possible in so far as the acting individual (generator) possesses, already realized, the "form" of man;

• The formal cause, immanent in the germ, organizes the matter step by step and gives it exactly the "form" required by the species to which the germ belongs (thus the efficient cause is the same as the formal cause, if we consider the latter in its actual development);

• The final cause, considered as the model toward which the steps of development tend, is the same as the formal cause.

Thus the efficient cause, the formal cause, and the final cause coincide in the concept of "form." Hence form is the propelling, organizing and final principle of becoming.

C. Priority of Act

For Aristotle, only individuals exist as true realities, and individuals are in continuous development. Every development, however, is conditioned in the sense that it presupposes a reality already possessing the complete form, which is the origin of movement.
"The seed comes from other individuals who are prior and complete, and the first thing is not seed but the complete being; for example, we must say that before the seed there is a man; the man is not produced by the seed but by another from whom the seed comes." (2)

Likewise the statue presupposes the idea of the artist.

The priority of act over potency, the determinate over the indeterminate, the perfect over the imperfect, is one of the most outstanding principles of Aristotle's philosophy.

Every becoming is a movement, a passage from potency to act; and every movement depends upon the existence of a mover, which is in act; that is, which already possesses the form toward which the movement tends. The mover is in act what the moved is in potency; and because it is act, it can impart movement; that is, it can start the process of movement.

D. The Limits of Becoming: Prime Matter and Immovable Mover

From the above-mentioned principle Aristotle draws the most important conclusion of his speculative thought; development or movement, related not to this or that particular individual but to the whole universe, must have two limits, one deriving from matter and the other from form. In other words, becoming presupposes a lowest point (Prime Matter) and a highest point (the immovable Mover).

Prime Matter

The lowest point is Prime Matter, which must be conceived of as without any force of movement; it must be absolutely indeterminate, pure potency. But is a being without any form thinkable?

Let us try to explain this important point of Aristotelian philosophy.

Seed is matter in respect to a plant, as marble is matter in respect to a statue. Truly here by "matter" we mean the "indeterminate"; but evidently, in the aforementioned instances, such an indetermination is not absolute but relative.

Seed and marble are determined as such; at the same time they are determinable by the higher forms of plant and statue. In other words, seed and marble as such are compounds of matter and form, and, of course, are determinate beings.

However, they are called "matter" in relation to the higher form (plant or statue in our instance) which can be attained by the seed or the marble.

Thus our concept of "matter" is relative to the higher form, and seed and marble are called "matter" in so far as they are "in potency" as regards the completed plant or statue.

In other words, our concept of matter is obtained by a regressive process of mind from the higher to the inferior condition which was the substratum of the production of the new individual form. Going back along this regressive process, we must finally arrive at matter deprived of any form whatever.

For instance, we can deprive the marble not only of the form of the statue but also of the form of marble and reduce it to the elementary substances which concurred in the formation of marble; and these elementary substances can be deprived of their own forms, and so on, until we reach "matter" absolutely without form -- pure potency. This is what Aristotle called Prime Matter.

"For when everything else is removed, clearly nothing but matter remains...By matter I mean that which in itself is neither a particular thing nor quantity nor designated by any of the categories which define being." (3)

Prime Matter does not exist as such independently of any form. According to Aristotle, only individuals exist that are composed of matter and form.

However, Prime Matter is not a mental abstraction, but a metaphysical reality. How it would be possible to have a metaphysical entity, which on the one hand is pure potency, absolutely indeterminate, and, on the other hand, is naturally disposed to receive any form whatever, is not made clear by Aristotle; and, of course, it is one of the obscure points of his metaphysics.

God, the Immovable Mover

The highest point is the immovable Mover, God. Aristotle proves the existence of God by force of the above-mentioned principle: "priority of act over potency."

This proof may be summed up as follows: Becoming is the passage from potency to act. This transition cannot be effected without appealing to a mover which would activate the potency.

But again, this mover, if it be in the series of becoming, would derive its motion from a second, and so on. Such tracing of the object moved and the mover cannot go on into an infinite series, for, if so, the problem of becoming would remain unsolved.

It is necessary to stop at a prime mover which would be outside this series of becoming, and which moves but is itself unmoved, the immovable Mover, God.

The necessity of admitting the first and immovable Mover does not depend on the fact of whether becoming has a beginning. Even if the world is without a beginning (as Aristotle supposed it to be, because of his lack of a concept of creation), its becoming would remain ever inexplicable without a prime, immovable Mover, the absolute cause of all becoming.

Having thus formulated his proof for the existence of God, Aristotle gives himself to the task of determining God's nature. God is Pure Act, intermingled with no potency.

Since, according to the doctrine of Aristotle, knowledge of the world would imply duality between knower and known, he denies to God any knowledge of earthly becoming. Consequently, God is thought, which revolves upon itself, Thought of Thought, as Aristotle expresses it.

Cosmic reality has a pronounced aspiration toward God, and in this sense God moves the world. But He is not the Creator of this cosmic reality, and does not have any direct relationship to it. He is the exemplary (final) cause and the efficient cause of becoming, but He is ignorant of this reality and hence does not govern it.

If we compare the God of Plato (Highest Good) with that of Aristotle, we can say that in both there remains dualism: God is distinct from uncreated and co-eternal reality. Aristotle's proof for the existence of God through the notion of becoming is superior to that of Plato, whose proof consists in the intelligible substratum of all intelligible things (Ideas). Aristotle's explanation is frankly metaphysical, while Plato's is logical.

With reference to the nature of God, while Plato recognized in God the attribute of modeler or fashioner of the material universe (Demiurge), and hence also recognized the attribute of providence, these endowments are absent from the God of Aristotle.

Thus, though a development in metaphysics is achieved through Aristotle's proof for the existence of God, in matters of religion Aristotle's contribution involves a step in reverse.

References:

(1) Metaphysics, II, 994a and b; Physics, II, 3 and 7.
(2) Metaphysics, XII, vii, 1073a.
(3) Metaphysics, VII, iii, 1029a.

Cosmology

Cosmology as a science of nature (it was called physics by Aristotle) is connected with chemistry, physics and astronomy, sciences which were in a rudimentary state during the time of Aristotle. As a consequence Aristotle's cosmology is the weakest part of his philosophical system. We shall limit ourselves to giving a brief summary of this branch of his teaching.

Aristotelian cosmology is based on the principle of the mover and the thing moved. It is dualistic: God, Pure Act, immovable Mover, who transcends cosmic reality; and cosmic reality, consisting of the heavens which rotate around the earth.

Every sphere of the heavens is formed of incorruptible matter. God moves the highest sphere. The form of the sphere is round, and the spheres' movement is circular (the sphere is considered as the most perfect body).

The earth, which is at the center of the universe (geocentric system), receives its movement from the heavenly spheres, but it has characteristics opposed to them. It is formed of the four essences of Empedocles, and its motion is from higher to lower or vice versa. Movement, which comes from the heavenly bodies, is the proximate cause of all the becoming in the world.

In the cosmology of Aristotle there are some theoretical points that are worthy of consideration. Precisely because these points are theoretical they do not have essential dependence upon his physics.

Change is the passage from potency to act and is of four kinds:

• Substantial (change of the substantial form, birth and death);

• Qualitative (change of some quality);

• Quantitative (increase or diminution); and

• Spacial (change of place and of any of the other species of motion).

Space is defined as the immovable limit of the surrounding body with respect to the body surrounded.

Time is the measure of movement, the aspect of "before" and "after."

The so-called teleology (finality) of nature merits special consideration: nature does, as far as is possible, always that which is more beautiful. The end of nature is the realization of the form in matter, the development of potency into act; but this tendency will never be completely realized because, with the exception of Pure Act (God), the act must exist in potency.



Psychology

Life is called soul by Aristotle, and is the form of organized matter, and the principle of immanent action. Consequently, living beings are distinguished from minerals, whose form is the principle of transient action.

Corresponding to the three hierarchical grades of living beings there are three forms of psychic life:

• Vegetative life, proper to plants, whose operations are for the nourishment and growth of the plants themselves;

• Sensitive life, proper to animals, which, besides nutrition and growth, have also the faculty of locomotion and of sense; and

• Intellective life, proper to man, who, besides assuming the two inferior souls (vegetative and sensitive), has also the faculty of knowing through universal concepts.

Contrary to Plato, who affirmed that there are in man two distinct souls (one having two aspects) and that the union of the rational soul with the body is accidental, Aristotle vindicates the oneness of the soul, which is the form (entelechy) of the body and hence is immanent in it.

The various functions proper to the vegetative and sensitive life are performed by the one soul, which also has the capability of performing superior operations, of gaining knowledge through concepts (intellectual cognition).

Cognitive Activities

There are two cognitive activities of the soul, and these give origin to two distinct types of knowledge: sensible and intellective.

Sensible cognition, sensation, is objective and presupposes a physical fact, a contact of the object with an organ or sense of the subject, who then transforms the physical contact into a psychic act, or cognition of the object.

There are five senses, each of which perceives its proper sensible; the eye, for example, apprehends light; the taste, sapidity.

Aristotle calls common sensibles those qualities of the object that can be perceived by more than one sense organ -- size and shape, for instance, which can be perceived by the senses of sight and touch.

To the sensitive faculties belong also the memory (the faculty which preserves images already perceived) and the phantasy or imagination (the faculty which revives such images and represents them in the absence of the object itself).

The proper object of sensitive knowledge is the individual, the particular, the contingent and material thing.

The intellect, on the other hand, has as its object the universal, the necessary, the immutable, the essences, the forms of things abstracted from their individuation.

But for Aristotle the intellect does not possess innate ideas. Contrary to the innatism of Plato, Aristotle defends the theory of the tabula rasa (blank slate).

In its first awakening the intellect possesses no beautiful and formed ideas; it has only the capacity for receiving ideas, and acquires them by abstraction from the data of the senses. Sensation contains the universal concept "in potentia"; the intellect has the power of enucleating the universal.

We are now confronted with two potencies which of themselves cannot be the cause of the passage into act. Aristotle solves the difficulty by having recourse to an intellect which he calls poieticos, the agent intellect, in which the intelligible species is in act. This acts upon the so-called passive intellect (pateticos) and gives actuality to the concept contained in potency in the sensation.

Analogous to cognitive activity, there are also two practical activities of the soul: the appetite and the will. The appetite is a tendency toward a good presented by way of sensitive cognition and is proper to the animal soul. The will is the impulse toward a good guided by reason, and is proper to the rational soul.

The Immortality of the Soul

The question of the immortality of the human soul is one of the most obscure in the doctrine of Aristotle. It appears in fact that he affirms the immortality of the active intellect, which is one for all human beings; and denies it for the passive intellect, which is individual and the immanent form of the body.

On the other hand, Aristotle admits that the proper object of the soul is the knowledge of the universal, of the immaterial, of essences, and hence it is impossible to understand how the individual soul can perish with the body.

The steps in Aristotle's reasoning on this point are not clear, and thus his interpreters have divided them into opposing opinions.

Ethics

Ethics, for Aristotle, has the purpose of establishing what is the end that man, according to his nature, must attain, and also from what source his happiness comes.

The end of man, as for every being, according to the doctrine established in metaphysics, is the realization of the form, the attainment of the perfection due to his nature.

Now man is a rational animal, and hence his end will be the attainment of wisdom. The actions which bring one to the realization of this perfection of living according to reason are called virtues. Virtue, for Aristotle, is not the end, but the means to attain perfection, and consists in a conscious action fulfilled according to reason.

Aristotle distinguishes two types of virtue:

• Dianoetical, and

• Ethical.

Dianoetical (dia-noetics) concerns the perfection of reason in itself and therefore pertains to such virtues as prudence and wisdom, which give us the absolute, metaphysical knowledge of nature and of the universe in which we must act.

In the determination of ethical virtues, Aristotle is in conformity with the whole of Greek Socratic-Platonic thought in which science or knowledge is virtue.

But Aristotle recognizes the fact that man is not pure reason, that he also has passions; that he is a rational animal. In this, Aristotle goes far beyond the simple Greek intellectualism of other philosophers.

The passions imply a sentimental, affective element, an organic tendency of our body. At variance with Plato, Aristotle says that these tendencies should not be considered an evil, and hence should not be annulled. If they are regulated by reason they concur in the realization of the form and perfection which are due to man because of his nature.

The ethical virtues concern the activity of the passions controlled by reason.

The ethical virtues, according to Aristotle, consist in a just mean between two extremes.

This just mean is not a sole and abstract rule, but is relative to circumstances. Thus between prodigality and avarice there is the just mean of generosity; between abstinence from and abuse of pleasures there is the mean of temperance. The rule of virtue is relative in so far as what for a poor man is generosity may for a rich man be avarice.

The ethical virtues include another element, constancy. One swallow, says Aristotle, does not make spring. (One performance of an action does not make a habit.) Thus it is not enough to perform one act of generosity in order to be generous; it is necessary to act constantly according to the dictates of reason.

Constancy induces what Aristotle calls habit, a constant right moral disposition. Habit is acquired by the repetition of acts. The ethical virtues are based on natural dispositions, and with assiduous repetition they become mechanical, so to speak; they become second nature.

In this way a habit of virtue or vice may be contracted through repeated acts of virtue or vice. It is thus clear that Aristotelian morality is essentially rational, a system which tends to organize all human activity according to reason.

Happiness consists in this rational activity. It can be lacking, and this absence can make a man poor, but not miserable.


Politics

Aristotle's politics is the coronation of his moral teaching. If the end of man is his moral perfection, he needs the aid of his fellow creatures in order to attain conservation and perfection. Hence the definition of man as a political animal, who is ordained by nature to the polis, the state.

This natural tendency to live with his fellow men first brings about the organization of an imperfect society, the family, which chronologically and historically precedes the state as the parts precede the whole.

According to Aristotle, and contrary to Plato, the family is natural to man, and private property is necessary for the family. The family is composed of four elements:

• children

• wife

• goods

• slaves

The head of the family, naturally, takes care of the direction of all. He must guide the children and women by reason of their imperfection. He must bring forth profit from his goods, and in order to make his property productive he needs inanimate and animate instruments. The latter would be his slaves.

The low opinion in which Grecians held manual labor induced Aristotle to admit slavery. Thus Aristotle divides man into two classes: free and slave. The first are given to the liberal arts; and the second, to whom all liberal education is closed, take charge of manual labor.

Aristotle, as well as Plato, considers the state an ethico-spiritual institution.

The duty of the state is to provide citizens with such material goods as the individual and collective defense and security, the possibility of self-development, which would not be otherwise available. But above all it is to direct men to the attainment of happiness through virtue.

The state must above all educate; Aristotle criticizes the Spartan state and the "Republic" of Plato which, instead of being concerned with the bettering of citizens through their peaceful and scientific education, were preoccupied with wars of conquest.

Education, for Aristotle, is the harmonious development of all the activities of man -- first, his spiritual activities, and subordinately to them, the material and physical ones; first, knowledge, in which virtue consists, and then gymnastic exercises.

With a greater historical sense than Plato, Aristotle does not describe an ideal form of the state in his "Politics." He distinguishes three principal types of state:

• monarchical government, which is government by one person -- the character and power of monarchical government consist in its unity, and its degeneracy results in tyranny;

• aristocratic government, which is government by a few -- its character and power consist in the qualities of the persons who govern, and these should be the best, and their degeneracy results in oligarchy; and

• polyarchical government, which is government by many -- its character and power lie in liberty, and its degeneracy results in demagogy.

All these forms of government are good according to the ages, conditions, and needs of the people, provided the end of the state be attained, happiness through virtue.

Aristotle's preference seems to be for a form of intellectual democratic government, which would be what in his moral teaching he calls the just mean.


Religion and Art

Aristotle presents us with the religious cult of Pure Act and astral intelligences, which animate the celestial bodies. Pure Act, which is not a creator and which ignores terrestrial becoming and hence is not divine providence, can be the object only of a rational cult.

Astral intelligences, which have a true influence upon cosmic becoming, would give place to a physical religion. Religious teaching in Aristotle is inferior to Plato.

Popular religion is not justified by Aristotle's metaphysics and, with Plato, Aristotle opposes mythical polytheism. He is nevertheless induced to admit the traditional Grecian religion which, even though not justified metaphysically, is a means of educating the people.

Art for Aristotle is imitation. But he proposes a different basis for this imitation than does Plato. Art does not tend to imitate the contingent element of nature, but the intelligible, that which in nature is rational and universal.

The artist must look not at nature as it is presented, because this model is always imperfect, but he must look at what it ought to be. He must imitate this ideal type of reality. This concept established, art, for the Stagirite, contrary to Plato, has a high educative value.

Even when the clash of violent contrast is presented in tragedy, art awakens in the soul the ideal type of reality, and hence, rather than stir up the passions, frees the soul from disturbances (catharsis) which have their origin in the passions.

Deficiencies of the System of Aristotle

The metaphysics of Aristotle has as its historical and logical precedent the system of Plato, whom Aristotle tries to surpass. The problem which troubled Plato most was the reconciliation of the "being" of Parmenides with the "becoming" of Heraclitus, and that Plato solved this problem with a metaphysical dualism (Ideas -- non-being) and interposed between these two points the work of Demiurge, which effect the becoming.

For the world of Ideas Aristotle substitutes the concept of Pure Act; he replaces Platonic non-being, an irrational reality, with the concept of potentiality, or tendency toward new perfection (act). The great merit of Aristotle consists in this surpassing of Plato's system; this is his finest contribution to metaphysics.

But metaphysical dualism is present in Aristotle no less than in Plato. Aristotle's Pure Act is completely separate from potency; Pure Act is not the creator of potency; it ignores the existence of potency and the tendency of potency toward act or perfection. This tendency of potency is directed toward Pure Act, since the latter is the efficient and final cause of the former.

Yet Pure Act knows nothing of its own causality. What is the origin of this potency, which is no mere nothing, from the moment it possesses the potency to be something?

This is the great question which remains unanswered in Aristotle because he did not have a concept of creation in which potency and act arise from nothingness through the volitional act of Pure Act.

It is useful to point out another deficiency in Aristotle regarding the concept of form, or entelechy, as he calls it. For Aristotle entelechy is the form immanent in matter, in which it develops itself according to its own nature. There is no doubt that the concept of entelechy -- as a principle which limits and determines the possibilities of matter -- is the most outstanding and original contribution which Aristotle gave to philosophy.

However, the historian of philosophy has to note that it is exactly this fundamental Aristotelian concept that has caused one of the most profound crises of thought in regard to the human soul.

According to Aristotle's famous definition the human soul is "the entelechy of a natural body having life potentially within it." (1) Now Aristotle himself acknowledges that the nature of the human soul is not such that the soul is limited to the organic operations of the vegetative and sensitive life; the soul also possesses understanding, which is an operation "unmixed" with matter and is "divine."

Thus it would be expected that Aristotle, who gave the concept of a form acting in dependence on matter, would expound also the nature of a form independent of matter; in other words, Aristotle should have made clear what is the nature of the intellective soul in itself and in its relations with the human body.

Unfortunately this was not done, and such a lack was to give origin to the question of the separated intellect.

References:

(1) On the Soul, II, i, 412a, 20.



Aristotelianism

The literary activity of Aristotle was a complexus of philosophy and of the sciences. The ages immediately following him placed greater stress on scientific development by given an empirical bent to the Peripatetic School. This was in keeping with the times. The first to direct the Lyceum after Aristotle was Theophrastus, who wrote a book on plants.

Philosophically, Theophrastus' system did not have developments of significance. The Peripatetics can be considered as commentators on Aristotle, with the intent of giving development to this or that part of his system, but without departing from the ensemble of his metaphysics.

Thus we record as commentators on Aristotle Alexander of Aphrodisias (second century A.D.), who interpreted the doctrine of the Stagirite in a naturalistic manner, denying the immortality of the soul and the finality of the world. This is an interpretation which was to pass into Arabian philosophy and beyond Greek thought.

Aristotelianism was to have its greatest success and its ultimate development outside Greek thought, in Christian thinking. Thomistic Scholasticism drew from the depths of the Peripatetic system its logical theistic conclusions, which are the rational basis of Christianity.