Aristotle (384-322 BC)

Aristotle was a Greek philosopher, he was born in Stagira. His father, Nicomachus, was the personal physician of Amyntas II of Macedonia. Aristotle lost his parents on early age.

When he was seventeen, he left to Athens, where he got entrance to the Akademia van Plato as a student. On the Akademia, philosophy, mathematics, rhetoric and biology were the main studies. Plato taught his students that observations by the sense organs are delusive and therefore the world that we see around us, shall easily trick us. According to Plato the reality is nor measurable nor visible. Mankind can see only a reflection of that world, but by reflecting upon these reflections, we can learn a lot about the reality. Results and experiences that do conflict with the notion are therefore wrong.

Twenty years later, when Plato had died (347 BC), Aristotle left the Akademia. He became head of a Platonical community in Assos, but left for Lesbos soon after, where he worked together with Theophrastus.

In 342 BC send to Macedonia on request of king Philippus, the king assigned him for the education of Alexander, the king’s son, who later would be known as Alexander the Great.

In 335 BC he returned to Athens, here he established the Lykaion (Lyceum). He gave his lessons usually walking with his pupils in a gallery.

Aristotle preferred observations above a settled point of view or theory, as Plato did. He wrote:

Observations need to be trusted more than the theoretical ideas and the latter are only valid when they lead to conclusions, which confine with that what can be learned from observations.

Aristotle and his pupil Theofrastos were the biggest biologists of the antiquity. Aristotle was a specialist in zoology, Theofrastos in botany and both in theoretical biology. Aristotle systematised the causes of the appearances of live. It ‘to be ’ of animals (the existence of animals) is the result of 4 causa’s (causes): 1 matter (causa materialis), 2 labour (the power or energy that shape the matter effectively; causa efficiens), 3 architect (designer of the effectively formed parts (organs) and the design of the aimed construction: causa formalis) and 4 programming (logistics to realise the organisms as part of the everlasting nature; causa finalis).

The causa finalis is the effective co-ordination of causa 2 en 3, from the start of the growth of the germ to full maturity of the individual animal. The sole that make living organism alive consists and controls the 4 causa’s.

The Aristotlical sole functioned: the re-growth of a living being that becomes equal to its parents. Living nature is everlasting, always a repeat of the history. As a result, the sole of every new starting living organism purposefully aims for the re-appearance of the parent, in body and spirit.

The reaction of Aristotle to the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC was explained as anti-Macedonically, after this reactions he was accused of collaboration and blasphemy. Aristotle left Athens and went to Chalcis on the island Euboea, here he passed away in 322 BC. After his death he still had big influences on the philosophy for many ages.