SPRING QUARTER, 2006
Department of History
University of California, Irvine
Instructor: Dr. Barbara J. Becker
Lecture 2. Aristotle
|
Treatises Attributed to Aristotle (384-322 BCE)
|
|
Logic -- What, how and why of reason
|
|
Inanimate things -- What, how and why of the material world
|
|
| Animate things -- What, how and why of living things | |
Philosophy -- What, how and why of social interaction
|
|
|
|
| Aristotle's Critique of Plato |
|
Postulating the existence of two worlds (Real and Ideal) --
Mathematics --
Living things --
|
|
|
|
Aristotle's Argument for Biology as a Scientific Study |
|
| Of things constituted by nature some are ungenerated, imperishable, eternal; others subject to generation and decay.
The former are excellent beyond compare and divine, but less accessible to knowledge. The evidence that might throw light on them, and on the problems which we long to solve respecting them, is furnished but scantily by our senses.
On the other hand, we know much of the perishable plants and animals among which we dwell. We may collect information concerning all their various kinds, if we but take the pains. Yet each department has its own peculiar charm. The excellence of celestial things causes our scanty conceptions of them to yield more pleasure than all our knowledge of the world in which we live; just as a mere glimpse of those we love is more to us than the grandest vista. On the other side we may set the certitude and completeness of our knowledge of earthly things. Their nearness and their affinity to us may well balance the loftier interest of the things of heaven, that are the object of high philosophy. But of a truth every realm of nature is marvellous. It is told that strangers, visiting Heraclitus and finding him by the kitchen fire, hesitated to enter. "Come in, come in," he cried, "there are gods even here." So we should venture on the study of every kind of creature without horror, for each and all will reveal something that is natural and therefore beautiful. Absence of haphazard and conduciveness of all things to an end are ever to be found in nature's works. And her manner of generating and combining in ever changing variety is of the highest form of the Beautiful. If any person thinks the examination of the rest of the animal kingdom an unworthy task, he must hold in like disesteem the study of man. For no one can look at ... blood, flesh, bones, [and] vessels ... without much repugnance.... Moreover, when any one of the parts or structures ... is under discussion, it must not be supposed that it is its material composition to which attention is being directed ... but the relation of such part to the total form.... [T]he true object of architecture is not bricks, mortar, or timber, but the house; and so the principal object of natural philosophy is not the material elements, but their composition, and the totality of the form, independently of which they have no existence. |
 |
|||||||||||||
| All matter is made of two parts:
hyle (HOO-lee)--basic fundamental stuff
Tension and balance generated by opposing qualities (wet vs. dry; cold vs. warm) is behind all change observed in terrestrial world.
|
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
| Arché | motion (not a material substance)
• change of state (growth, decay, death, size, shape...) • change of position |
||||||||||||
| Physis | opposition • cold vs hot • wet vs dry |
||||||||||||
Physics of the Celestial realm The celestial element (quintessence) has no opposing qualities.
Physics of the Terrestrial realm Each terrestrial element (earth, water, air, fire) has a natural place or state.
|
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
To know a thing is to understand four basic things which cause it to be as it is:
|
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
Aristotle's Definition of Life excerpt from On the Soul (Book II, Chapter 2; compare this translation with J. A. Smith's) |
|||||||||||||
| The term life is used in various senses. If life be present in but a single one of these senses, we speak of a thing as alive. Thus, there is intellect, sensation, motion from place to place and rest, the activity concerned with nutrition, and the processes of decay and growth.
Plants have life, for they have within themselves a faculty whereby they grow and decay. They grow and live so long as they are capable of absorbing nutriment. In virtue of this principle [the vegetative soul] all living things live, whether animals or plants, but it is sensation which primarily constitutes the animal and justifies us in speaking of an animal soul. For, provided they have sensation, creatures, even if incapable of movement, are called animals.... |
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
Aristotle's Classification of Animals based on his History of Animals |
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
Theophrastus (c. 372 - 287 BCE) |
|||||||||||||
| On Aristotle's death in 322 BCE, his student, colleague and friend, Theophrastus took charge of the Lyceum, Aristotle's school in Athens. He wrote lengthy and detailed treatises on plants. His efforts at categorizing the plants he observed and recorded earned him the title of "father of taxonomy." His treatise, On Stones, influenced the thinking of natural historians, medical practitioners, and miners well into the Renaissance. | |||||||||||||
|
|
|
|
The Alexandrians
(Hellenistic Period--Greek influence) |
| Euclid | 330-260 BCE | Mathematics
·wrote The Elements |
| Aristarchos | 310-230 | Astronomy |
| Archimedes | 287-212 | Engineering |
| Eratosthenes | 276-194 | Math/Astronomy
·librarian at Alexandrian Museum ·measured size of earth |
| Hipparchus | 190-120 | Astronomy
·mapped the heavens ·studied Babylonian records ·discovered Earth's precession |
|
||
(Roman Empire--Greeks) |
||
| Hero | fl. 62 CE | Optics · studied reflection and refraction · constructed automated gadgets |
| Ptolemy | fl. 125 | Astronomy/Cartography · wrote Almagest; The Geography |
| Galen | 131-201 | Medicine · wrote On the Natural Faculties |
 |
