HOI ASSIGNMENT

Summary writing
Chapter 5
Book 4
Made by Anas Saleem (19609)
The chapter five of the book Routledge history of philosophy (from Aristotle to Augustine)
written by David Furley is “The peripatetic school”. This chapter written by Robert W.Sharples
discusses the history, rise and decline of peripatetic school and Aristotle’s writings. Aristotle’s and
other peripatetic philosophers views regarding the concept of Logic, Physics and Metaphysics, Soul,
Intellect, ethics, politics and rhetoric.

According to the author the history of Peripatetic philosophy can be divided into two parts one
after Aristotle work was being published by Andronicus in first century BC and one before that.
Aristotle himself remains head of the school and after he left Athens in 323BC Theophrastus was
made head of the school and after Theophrastus death Strato was made head of the school.
The initial activities of the school were collecting and interpreting information in every field and
two common themes were the theme of characters in which they collect information regarding
different personalities, mostly imperfect personalities and second theme is ethics according to
which they choose those characters. Moreover this school of thought was the first one to take
theoretical consideration while collecting data for example as in their botanical writing
(Research on plants and explanation of plants) they study the art in which nature help in
cultivation of plants and the purpose of trees. Their school and Alexandrian school Callimachus
have similar contribution in the following fields. History of mathematics, history of medicine,
natural world, music and political history etc. but on the other hand they work differently in
field like zoology, Human anatomy and physiology. After Aristotle Theophrastus and strato has
changed the emphasis of Peripatetic philosophy towards empiricism and materialism and
Sometimes Theophrastus and strato contradict or diverge from Aristotle’s work for example in
metaphysics where Theophrastus explained natural phenomena and unmoved mover he reject
Aristotle’s theory and it is irony that critics are also more interested in searching Aristotle’s
successors rejecting Aristotle’s work then in actual Aristotle work. For some critics Aristotle’s
position regarding issues is clear but the position of his successors is not clear as first
Theophrastus modifies Aristotle’s system of four sublunary elements but later raise questions
about his work and try to establish his own view. (After strato peripatetic school went into
decline and for some immediate successors questioning and rejecting Aristotle views was a
cause of decline while for others special sciences being studied in other schools than lyceum
was a cause of decline but this cannot tell why fields like zoology and botany which were not
getting studied elsewhere declined. The reason for decline of philosophy at lyceum was that for
people who were attracted to comprehensive philosophy lyceum has nothing to offer. One
reason for the decline of peripatetic school could be that some of Aristotle writings that we
have now were lost till 1st century BC so this also stops peripatetic scholars from carrying out
philosophy in a systematic way but according to writer this theory is confusing as many copies
of Aristotle work existed at that time and reason for decline could be that although these
copies existed at that time but they were not valued enough. Later Aristotelian school once
again revives through Andronicus collection and after this revival Aristotle’s writings were
translated into many languages such as Arabia, Greek and Latin but during this compilation it’s
found that most of Aristotle work was lost and most of the writing which survived were
collected by Alexander of Aphrodisiac. According to writer Although after Sulla’s sack of Athens
lyceum school was destroyed but city of Athens still remain the centre of all philosophical
activities and teacher were assigned for teaching Platonic, Aristotelian, Stoic and Epicurean
principal of philosophy. But still commentaries made on Alexander’s work do not show that
there was any formal teaching there as they still only contain open ended discussion or
alternative view point and this was what let to second disappearance of Aristotelian school of
thought. Due to this second decline we don’t get any significant amount of work from
Aristotle’s pupils except Alexander whose writings were Neoplatonistic. Later Aristotalienism
was absorb in NeoPlatonism and Platonist philosophers usually focus on Aristotle’s work in the field of
ethics and after Alexander the philosopher who dominated was Themistius but no significant work of his
successors survive. This is what we call the history of Aristotle’s work and peripatetic school of thought.

Peripatetic school had done prominent work in the study of logic and after Aristotle Theophrastus and
Eudemus carried the work of logic on their shoulders. Two areas where Aristotle have done most of his
work are area of modal logic which is also known logic of possibility and necessity in which according to
writer possible exclude not only what is impossible but also what is necessary and it also distinguish
between statement of possibility and statement of fact and in second area conclusion cannot be
stronger than the weakest of premises and it must always follow the weakest premises. But in these
areas work of Theophrastus and Eudemus is totally different from Aristotle. According to them there is
no necessary difference between statement of fact and statement of possibility and conclusion can be
determined by the simpler rule than Aristotle’s. Although Aristotelian logic was far ahead then stoic
logic but still even in Aristotelian logic there was no prominent work of any writer after the demise of
Theophrastus and Eudemus.

After logic the peripatetic school of thought had done prominent work in the field of Physics and
Metaphysics. In physics Aristotle defined time as numbered aspect of motion and states that Time
cannot be defined without soul as there cannot be any numbering without soul. Although Theophrastus
and Eudemus agree with Aristotle but Strato disagree and believe motion and time are continuous
where as numbers are discontinuous and he also believes that Time exists independent of motion. Later
on Alexander rejected this theory and states that time is the number of motions of outermost heavenly
bodies and he further argues that time can exist independent of numbering. Secondly Aristotle’s
definition of place was as innermost limit of something surrounding a thing later Theophrastus defined
place as position of a part in a complex whole and strato defined place as something which occupy
space. According to Aristotle all earthly things are composed of four objects earth, air, fire and water
and heavenly things composed of ether. Later Theophrastus rejected the presence of ether and do not
consider fire as an element. Strato and Xenarchus also rejected the presence of ether and strato further
believes that heavens are made of fire. Finally stoics also rejected presence of ether and give more
importance to fire. Most of the philosophers including Alexander of Aphrodisias, Aristotle, Theophrastus
and Herminus believed that heavens have souls. Most of Aristotle’s and Theophrastus physical theories
are similar including the passage of pores and only they have disagreement on whether pores contain
vacuum or matter. Strato believes matter contains micro voids where as Theophrastus believes that
matter contains vacuum but unfortunately none of these theories are consistent with later scientific
theory of particle where particle moves in empty space. Moreover Peripatetic material theory revolves
around odors and they even considered light as a material. Secondly on some issues of Natural world
later Peripatetic philosophers have views quite different from Aristotle for example stoics believe in
divine being and his philosophy revolve around divine beliefs where as Aristotle did not believe in any
divine being but still some treaties attributed to Aristotle contain evidence of divine involvement as in
his treaties he sees god as someone remote and like Persian king. According to some philosophers
Aristotle did not deny presence of divine being instead Aristotle believes in existence of some divine
being but he also believe that divine being cannot benefit people. On the other hand Alexander believes
in divine being but thinks that there is no involvement of divine being in any sort of evil. Secondly
According to Aristotle fate is natural but you cannot always blame it for any mishap. Alexander further
carries Aristotle’s work and said that Humans can control fate though their character and personality
where as Stoics has a totally different view on fate and he believes that fate and the movement of
heavenly bodies is really important in determining what happens in human life and in the world.
According to writer Theophrastus and Strato has little interest in general metaphysics field like Nature of
Universals just after the revival of Aristotelianism this field come into people’s attention.

Peripatetic school have also done immense amount of work in the study of soul and this was a field due
to which many scholars regard Alexander as un-Aristotelian. According to Aristotle soul is Un-separable
form of living creature. Aristotle explains body in terms of soul and sees spirit as a physical mean by
which soul operate. HE further states that Intellect one of the soul faculties is independent of any
particular organ later Aristotle immediate successor Dicaearchus views soul as composed of four
different elements. Moreover Strato sees soul as spirit present throughout the body especially in head.
In addition to this another philosopher Ariston distributed soul in two categories one he regarded as
rational soul and other as irrational soul. After it another successor of Critolaus described soul as made
of ether and he also claims that Aristotle also believes that soul is made of ether although his this view is
highly rejected by different philosophers. In addition to this Andronicus have a materialist approach
towards soul and he defines soul made up of different bodily elements. Finally it is obvious that different
peripatetic philosophers have different views regarding the theory of soul.
Aristotle’s peripatetic school also have contributions in the field of intellect and Theophrastus argues
that the reason that we always cannot think is the conflict between active, potential intellect and our
body Aristotle further added in his remarks in “on Soul 3.5” as active intellect “which makes all things”
and passive intellect “which become all things”. According to this book intellect let us think and make
intelligent decisions and while linking active intellect with our soul he says that active intellect is not
present in everyone’s soul instead it is needed to be developed by the individual himself. Later
Alexander argues that intellect is part of our body and could not come from something outside and we
need to develop it on our own. Another important book on this field is “On Intellect” where active
intellect acts upon our intellects and the first thing we think about is god. These were the believes of
prominent peripatetic scholars on the issue of intellect.

Peripatetic school of thought have also done huge amount of work in the fields of Ethics, Politics and
rhetoric. Theophrastus believes that external goods we obtain though our fortune are necessary to be
happy whereas Cicero believes that anything bad happen to us is due to our Misfortune not due to some
evil activity of our soul. Another philosopher Critolaus says that soul, body and external all could cause
happiness and according to him happiness of soul is more important than the happiness cause by body
or external goods. Later Areius rejected Critolaus views and put his own point on the table which is that
we cannot be happy if we don’t have virtue and external goods and he beliefs that virtue is more
important than external goods to be happy as lack of external goods could not be the cause of
unhappiness but lack of virtue would certainly cause unhappiness. In addition to this Aristotle believes
that concept of ethics is incomplete without the topic of emotional management. Aristotle and
Andronicus both regarded emotions as something irrational and something that should be controlled.
Later Stoics based his study of ethics on the concept of recognizing our own self he claims that we
recognize ourselves in two ways first automatically as we grew we recognize our self and secondly we
recognize our self by looking at other people. Many peripatetic scholars theory of politics revolve
around three systems monarchy, aristocracy and democracy and they regard democracy as better than
the other two systems. Aristotle’s views about rhetoric were that to persuade someone we should talk
or write with clarity, correctness, appropriateness and ornament.

In his concluding remarks author says that Aristotalian philosophy went into decline after the demise of
Alexander and Themistius and one reason for decline could be lack of interest of general public in formal
education in 3nd century but this reason alone could not be the cause of decline as Platonist philosophy
did not go through this kind of decline. While the other reason of decline could be that Platonist
philosopher have appealing message for the general public whereas peripatetic school theories were
only written for scholars. Later on he claims that the decline of Aristotelianism was only apparent and in
real Aristotle’s philosophy did not decline indeed it remain center of focus of Neoplatonist curriculum,
Greek philosophy and of many other scholars.

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