Aristotle英文简介

1、Aristotle 彭秀芬n 384 - 322 BCn Born in Stagira, in Thrace, near Macedonia.n Son of Nicomachus, prominent physician of the king of Macedonn Aristotle was educated as a member of the aristocracy Platos Studentn At age 17, Aristotle was sent to study with Plato at the Academy.n He became Platos most impo

2、rtant student, remaining at the Academy 20 years, until Platos death. In his former years, he devoted himself to Platonism. But after Platos death, Aristotle immersed himself in empirical studies and shifted to empiricism(经验论). “Plato is dear to me, but dearer still is truth.”(吾爱吾师,吾更爱真理) Aristotle

3、became a royal tutor. Aristotle tutored Phillips son, Alexander, for 5 years until Phillip died and Alexander assumed the throne. Alexander the Great went on to conquer much of the nearby world Aristotle encouraged Alexander toward eastern conquest and his attitude towards Persia was unabashedly eth

4、nocentric. E.g.: he counsels Alexander to be a leader to the Greeks and a despot(专制者) to the barbarians, to look after the former as after friends and relatives, and to deal with the latter as with beasts or plants. In 335 BC, Aristotle returned to Athens and established his own school, in competiti

5、on with the Academy.The LyceumAristotles works What we have as Aristotles works are about 30 closely written, terse, treatises on a full range of philosophical and scientific topics. These may have been his morning lectures, or even students notes on those lectures.An Encyclopedic Thinkern Physical

6、science: anatomy, astronomy, embryology, geography, meteorology, physics, zoology;n Philosophy: aesthetics, ethics, government, metaphysics, politics, economics, rhetoric and theology.n His works laid the groundwork for the systematic development of philosophy and the basic framework for the underst

7、anding of nature.Empiricism(经验论) Aristotle grounds all knowledge on experience. This is unlike Plato for whom knowledge came only when the philosopher escaped from the world of sense perception, which could mislead. Reality, for Aristotle, was the world around us, not the objects of the mind, which

8、could be just fantasy.Aristotle& Plato A basic division in how the world is understood: Plato (pointing up) true knowledge comes from contemplating the abstract ideas. Aristotle (pointing down) true knowledge comes from close examination of the world around.Plato and Aristotle from Raphaels School o

9、f Athens.Logic With the Prior Analytics, Aristotle is credited with the earliest study of formal logic, and his conception of it was the dominant form of Western logic until 19th century advances in mathematical logic. Syllogisms(三段论) The key component of Aristotelian logic is the syllogism. Typical

10、 format: Major premise a general truth, or observation Minor premise a particular fact, or specific observation Conclusion an inference implied by the two premises together The classic example of the syllogism: Major premise: All men are mortal. Minor premise: Socrates is a man. Conclusion: Socrates

11、 is mortal. In other words, what applies to all members of a group applies to each and every member.Aristotles Cosmos Classification: There are two different parts of the world. Sub-lunar World: there is the world all around, where things come and go; are born, live, and die; and motions start and s

12、top. There is the world up in the sky, where things happen over and over again: the sun rises and sets, the seasons reoccur, the planets repeat cycles.The Material of the World Aristotle accepted the popular four elements of Empedocles as the material of the sub-lunar world: Earth, Air, Fire, Water.

13、 He proposed a fifth elementaether(乙醚) the divine substance that makes the heavenly spheres heavenly bodies(stars and planets)Erroneous Ideas 1) In his History of Animals he claimed that human males have more teeth than females; 2) Galileo, showed by simple experiments that Aristotles theory that a heavier object falls faster than a lighter object is incorrect. 3）He is one of the major contributors to the geocentric theory(地心说).A Philosophy for 2000 Years Aristotles scheme provided a logi