Final Individual Creative Paper
Philosophy 1000-022
Zhenni Zhu
11/15/2013
The knowledgeable gifted youth---Aristotle
Aristotle was born in a small Greek city, Stagira, he lost his father who was a
court physician when he was a child; however, his father still somewhat motivated him in
science. He went to Plato's academy in Athens alone when he was only eighteen years
old with great concentration and stayed there until he was thirty-eight and Plato passed
away. Therefore, Plato was not merely an illuminative teacher on Aristotle's
philosophical study; he also took a significant role in Aristotle's life as a friend during the
twenty years that they spent together. In Plato's class, wisdom and selfdom could primly
stand for Aristotle, he was the most excellent and diligent student and even built a small
library by himself for owning an abundant range of references to learn and research.
Before leaving Athens, Philip of Macedonia invited him for training his son whose name
was Alexander due to Aristotle's talent and knowledge, Aristotle consented with pleasure.
Through those years, according to Alexander and Philip, he gained money and a lot of
supplies. In 334 B.C.E which was full with wars and fights, Aristotle returned to his
hometown---Stagira, where he built his own school with his recompenses which were
from Philip and Alexander. Whereas, substantially, he is such a popular social man and
not only males surrounded him; there are also two important ladies named Hermeias and
Herpyllis in his moral philosophy. Hermeias was crucified by the Persian King during
that time; and Aristotle and her father flew to the island of Lesbos; Herpyllis married
Aristotle and had a child, Nicomachus, with him. In 322 B.C.E, this fabulous philosopher,
an outstanding genius, left this world forever. Briefly, Aristotle was living for study, and
his studies covered philosophy, biology, linguistic, physics, music, logic, politics and
government.
Epistemology--- How did science affect his philosophy?
As we know, Aristotle gained great accomplishments in physics and biology
through his whole life; furthermore, these studies brought inspiration for his philosophy
and had close-knit relationship so that his philosophy was interdisciplinary as well.
Aristotle claimed three statements about epistemology based on science. Firstly, using
observation and experimentation; collect all relevant facts, because they are necessary
parts to support and begin a study. People always desire to know something when they
see or find that they don't understand. Secondly, using analysis, find out the laws of those
facts. If a study doesn't have a process and proof, it isn't a rigorous and legitimate study,
or it can't be counted as a study. Different attempts provide more chances for variable
understandings or discoveries to be gathered in order to be close to the theory or truth.
Moreover, almost everything could be proved by using analysis and facts. Thirdly, using
logic, combine those laws into a comprehensive theory. Summarizing and formalizing
statistical data and all conclusions for what you have found during the process to put
them into a theory with patience and many attempts. "As a linear theories of justification
Aristotle leaves us with a justified belief, with which we can have a great certainty in
relation to its validity." ( Nazarion, 2011). However, present fact testifies his statements
about how to make a study are decent. In spite of people having high technology and a
series of developed theories, his epistemology is so insightful that it is still used to seek
and make truth knowable without any doubt.
Morality and yourself
According to the paper about Aristotle's morality "Aristotle conceives of ethical
theory as a field distinct from the theoretical sciences. Its methodology must match its
subject matter—good action—and must respect the fact that in this field many
generalizations hold only for the most part." (Richard Kraut) In Aristotle's opinion, he
was object to morality theory, he encouraged morality should be practically strived and
achieved. His moral philosopher mainly consists of two words: eudaimonia (εὐδαιμονία)
and sophrosỹne (σωφροσύνη). Eudaimonia, people always understand it as happiness.
We are supposed to live with enjoyments and passions so that we know we are living
rather than only existing, which is already set up by the society or parents. Sophrosỹne,
this word is from legend. Sophrosỹne is actually a Greek god who stood for the spirit of
moderation, which means self-control, self-restraint and harmony. We should be aware of
what is enough for us, what is a limit for us, and never chase redundant happiness.
Therefore, everything is in moderation, being gentle men and women with moderation.
Because morality is able to affect people, people can also build morality (happiness) from
what they usually do. Aristotle paid attention to the obvious connection between us and
morality like he said:"Happiness depends on us", so he proposed to keep the mean, which
means get a balance to achieve happiness. Don't underestimate obstacles, but don't
overestimate them either. Trying to treat any obstacle properly and never being afraid in
front of them. Build your character, as his view, character is the overall property for
people; and it takes part in how people behave in normal life. Have good taste, because
good taste is a skill to help people choose. Fulfill your tἓlos, as a meaning of purpose or
goal in his moral philosophy, is also a vital key that connects Aristotle's political and
moral philosophy. In Aristotle's philosophy, everything ought to have its own tἓlos. For
example, light must be used for lighting dark up as its tἓlos. Hence, moral philosophy's
tἓlos refers to enlighten people to be moral. However, he also declared pleasure was not
only a goal, but also a by-product of our activity. True pleasure isn't supposed to be
treated just as a goal because people always achieve pleasure when they enjoy it in an
unwitting situation. It is supposed to be a process. For Aristotle, friendship is the most
moral and internal relationship. Friendship is the best way to make eudaimonia come true.
Healthy friendship is built upon a shared love for philosophy. Aristotle called it a
"complete sort of friendship between people who are good and alike in virtue” Because
every person is specific, people need to take time on finding or becoming the common
character between each other. When they demonstrate they are alike, their friendship will
become so stable that it lasts for a long time.
Rambling in his political theories' world
In Aristotle's political philosophy, he put forward a further political frame,
democracy. What is democracy for Aristotle? Aristotle conceived the democracy was a
rule that mainly serviced for middle class and it was a power of middle class(majority for
every type of society), not just the power of some leaders in a society, because he thought
the middle class was the foundation of the healthy society. Democracy was the sake of
providing the chance of happy and good life for most people like what he promoted in his
moral philosophy. It also avoided the poverty problem for the poor. He thought poverty
was always a major source of class conflicts. The government's stability was able to be
maintained if it had a method to deal with poverty problem, and democracy is the most
proper method. Therefore, it is the best political regime in his moral world, and the ideal
and best democracy is the democracy made for farmers. "The best people is the farming
sort, so that it is possible also to create [the best] democracy wherever the multitude lives
from farming or herding. For on account of not having much property it is lacking in
leisure, and so is unable to hold frequent assemblies." In addition, he mentioned
education, characteristics of the best city, the definition of citizen, and so on in his
Ontology---Naturalism
As we know, Aristotle focused on the study of nature. He appealed to the
kingdom of Edidoses doesn't exist; it is an illusion, and only nature does exist in practice.
His naturalism theory is different from Lao-tzu's, but they both contributed a lot for the
naturalism. His theory is scientific due to those scientific studies that Aristotle did made
him be precise about his philosophy. Nature is a sum of total physical things, and it is
made of every physical thing and is provided for every physical thing. Also every
physical thing consist of two parts: hỷle, which means body and flesh; tἓlos, which means
form and shape, which is not so much an outer(exterior) form, but it is not an inner form
either, but the program of the thing is genetic code. Aristotle liked tomorrow, so he
always used imagination. There is another outstanding theory that he gave us, the
philosophy of the organic growth: philosophy of the potential to be fulfilled. Everything
in nature will grow up from a tiny substance to a true life and has its own tἓlos by using
their potential materials or energies that are contained in their body at the end. For
instance, a small seed can grow up to become a huge tree.
Differences
Like what I mentioned before, Lao-tzu and Aristotle are both splendid
naturalism's philosopher and they both claimed everything was able to be transformed to
bigger thing. Yet, they belonged to different philosophical groups, their cognitive
attitudes and methods that they were used to explain and define theories are distinct
though some of their philosophies are somehow interlinked. Lao-tzu is an inchoate
Chinese philosopher who was born in sixth century BC. Lao-tzu's academic studies are
simplex and concentrated, Aristotle's academic studies are multiple and comprehensive.
In sum, the different forms of education that they gained, area differences, different
cultural backgrounds, different social environment, and society’s developmental level are
reasons, which made their philosophies distinct.
In Lao-tzu's philosophy, he thinks art is over science, intuition is over logic.
Instead, Aristotle somewhat crushed on science and was good at coping with and
analyzing problems with logics. Furthermore, Lao-tzu is more poetic because the
education that he gained was full of literatures in ancient China, he used Tao to express it
is the origin for every substance, which is abstract. Aristotle regarded nature as the origin
for every substance because his studies were aim for science, which is later-day and it has
been substantiated by human being.
In the meantime, they also have distinct thoughts in moral philosophy. In Laotzu's opinion, the love is macro love, the pleasure is the substance that gives love to
others and it contains goals. We should love the one who could support and encourage us.
According to Aristotle, the love mostly and commonly built for friendship and the
pleasure is to be earned. The pleasure is more than a goal; however, he emphasized it
should be worked as a process as well. Furthermore, Lao-tzu was a bureaucrat in ancient
China; however, Aristotle put forward democracy.
Reflection
To be honest, Aristotle was only an ordinary name in my knowledgeable world,
and sometimes I glimpsed his name on some western literature books or historical
commentaries before I took this class. Nonetheless, I pretty admire him because his
philosophy fulfills my curious requirement in my spiritual level after learning his
philosophy.
I am a sloppy person who is bad at scientific subjects and lack of logic in daily
life. However, his epistemology inspires me how important the logic it is due to
everything is based on logical thinking. Every step closes the other step up; anything that
you behave mistakenly would result in an opposite and serious aftermath. The more
careful we are, the more successes we can receive. Plus, discovery is a reasonable way to
stimulate interest; likewise, interest leads us to explore discovery. They are interacted
each other all the time.
Friend is the most important people for me except for my parents. The identical
taste and spiritual world is the fundamental key for everyone to start a friendship because
we need to be attracted first. After becoming friends, we spend masses of time together.
According to our relationship is built stably day by day, we inwardly changed and shared
habits under the unconscious situation; and this process need to take time.
Because of his moral philosophy, many thoughts about life came out in my mind.
Life is supposed to have its significance; we must catch this chance to take action to
instead of just existing in this world. Life only has one chance for us and it can’t be
repeated; it should be adventurous and colorful rather than impassive and boring. We
should try our best to overcome difficulties and face challenges to insist on our glowing
dreams. We should find any ability that we have to enrich ourselves to be a better person
and embrace our won pleasure.
Works Cited
Kraut, Richard. 1 May 2011. <http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/aristotle-ethics/>.
Nazarion, Jerrod. Knoji. 5 February 2011. <http://philosophy.knoji.com/untitled-article-471/>.