Aristotle—learning To Live A Life Governed By Reason
Aristotle—Learning to Live a Life Governed By Reason
One can say without exaggeration that today we live in an Aristotelean world, because
Aristotle, more than any other person, was responsible for defining the foundations of intellect in
all of Western civilization, and his concepts and ideas have remained embedded in Western
thinking for centuries. With all of history’s great thinkers, and their impact upon the
development of philosophy, how can one man be singled out as the most influential of them all?
Because as a result of two decades of research, he was able to expand upon all previous
philisophical notions, and to recognize a degree of rationality which he found could be applied
universally. According to Aristotle, all knowledge is empirical, and as a result of this belief, his
writings and theories covered a wide range of topics including, but not limited to rhetoric, ethics,
politics, physics, mathematics, anatomy, physiology, and logic.
Although he studied under Plato, Aristotle fundamentally disagreed with his teacher on just
about everything. Plato theorized that the ultimate reality is found in ideas or eternal forms, and
is knowable only through reflection and reason. But, Aristotle believed that the world could be
understood at a fundamental level through the detailed observation and cataloging of
phenomenon. As a direct result of his philosophy, science can today be described as;
“accumulated and established knowledge, which has been systematized and formulated with
reference to the discovery of general truths or the operation of general laws; knowledge
classified and made available in work, life, or the search for truth;...
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