was one of the greatest thinkers of the ancient world. Aristotle was deeply interested in the philosophy of nature, devoting much thought the relation ship between form and matter and the nature of change. Another important area for thought about Aristotle was the nature of knowledge itself. Aristotle ideas strongly influenced the development of thought in western civilization, especially through the middle ages in the Christian nations of Europe and the Islamic world.
In addition to his philosophic contemplations, Aristotle collected a large number of observations about the physical world, particularly of living things. In fact, Aristotle may be considered the first great biologist He examined the structure of plants and animals and observed the behavior of animals. He also classified living things in groups according to their common traits rather than their usefulness to humans.
One measure of Aristotle's influence on the modern world is the large number of words in modern languages that can be traced back to his teaching and writings. For example, the terms of grammar, subject and predicate, come from Aristotle. Also, many words used to describe basic scientific principles are Aristotle's. These include matter, energy, potential, cause, genus, species, and many others. Mathematics relies on such vocabulary as quantity, relation-also words of Aristotle. Many of these words have come into modern languages through Latin, rather than directly from Greek. Aristotle was born the son of a physician who attended the king of Macedonia. At the age of about 18, he entered the great philosopher Plato's school in Athens, the Academy. Aristotle remained at the Academy for about 20 years, then joined a group of Plato's disciples for some 3 years afterward. In about 343 B.C., Aristotle went to the court of King Philip II of Macedonia to supervise the education of Alexander, the king's son. Aristotle thus had the opportunity to influence the future world conqueror, Alexander the Great. After Alexander reached maturity, Aristotle returned to Athens and founded the Lyceum, his own school. The method and philosophy associated with the Lyceum came to be known as peripatetic-a Greek word for walking about-because Aristotle taught while walking with his students. In 323 Aristotle fled the Athenians, who had trumped up a charge against him, and settled in the city of Chalcis, where he spent his final year. Relatively few of Aristotle's written works survive. We know of the existence of many more because of references in the works of other writers of ancient times.
No comments:
Post a Comment