The year 2016 marked the 2,400th anniversary of the birth of Aristotle, arguably the greatest philosopher who ever lived. His intellectual achievements are remarkable for their astonishing breadth and, in philosophy, for their profound and abiding influence, which continues to the present day. Aristotle was, among his many other achievements, the first natural scientist in history (he pioneered the study of botany and zoology), the first political theorist in history, the first person to systematize the study of logic (he invented the field of deductive logic), the first person to classify human knowledge into distinct disciplines, and the first person to establish a research institute (the Lyceum) and a research library for collaborative inquiry by scholars. Aristotle made revolutionary and foundational contributions to all the major fields of philosophy, including (in addition to logic) metaphysics, ethics, aesthetics, philosophy of mind and philosophical psychology, political philosophy, philosophy of science, and history of philosophy. He was the author of more than 200 treatises, none of which has survived in its original form; the approximately 30 extant works consist mainly of notes and preliminary drafts that Aristotle never intended to publish. Partly because of their unpolished state, most modern readers, including many philosophers, find these texts difficult.
Aristotle was born in the village of Stagira, on the Macedonian peninsula of northern Greece, in 384 BCE. His father, Nicomachus, was court physician to Amyntas III, king of Macedonia and grandfather of the future Alexander the Great, whom Aristotle famously tutored (for two or three years), beginning when Alexander was about 13 years old. After his father died, Aristotle, still a boy, was sent by his guardian to Athens, where he entered Plato’s Academy and remained a student and colleague of Plato there until the latter’s death 20 years later. Aristotle thereafter lived in Assus, on the northwestern coast of Anatolia; in Mytilene, on the island of Lesbos; and in the Macedonian capital of Pella (where he tutored Alexander). About 335, while Alexander was conquering the world, Aristotle returned to Athens and established the Lyceum. After Alexander’s death in 323, anti-Macedonian sentiment in Athens increased, and Aristotle reasonably feared for his life. Saying that he did not wish Athens to “sin twice against philosophy” (a reference to the city’s notorious execution of Socrates in 399), he fled to Chalcis, on the island of Euboea, where he died of natural causes about a year later.
Aristotle’s philosophical thought is conventionally contrasted with that of his teacher, Plato, the only other philosopher who bears comparison to him. Aristotle notably rejected Plato’s metaphysical theory of Forms, according to which the perceptible world consists of imperfect copies of ideal and unchanging archetypes, which alone are truly real. Plato is accordingly regarded as idealistic, utopian, and otherworldly; Aristotle, as realistic, utilitarian, and commonsensical. This view is reflected in the famous depiction of Plato and Aristotle in Raphael’s Vatican fresco School of Athens: Plato points to the heavens and the realm of Forms, Aristotle to the earth and the realm of things.
It is difficult to overstate the influence of Aristotle’s philosophy. It was the foundation of medieval Islamic philosophy from the 6th century; it decisively shaped the development of medieval European philosophy from the 12th century, when Aristotle’s writings were rediscovered in the West, partly through the commentaries of Islamic scholars; and it was a main current of philosophical and scientific thinking during the Renaissance. So dominant was Aristotle’s philosophy during the late Middle Ages that he was referred to simply as The Philosopher; Dante called him “the master of those who know.” Even after the scientific revolution and the Enlightenment of the 17th and 18th centuries, much of Western science and philosophy remained grounded in Aristotelian concepts. Today Aristotle’s ethics and philosophy of mind are a major source of fruitful philosophical theorizing, notably in the late 20th-century development of virtue ethics, a thoroughly Aristotelian alternative to utilitarianism and rule-based (deontological) ethical theories.
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