Aristotle, Greek 

Aristoteles, (born 384 BCE, Stagira, Chalcidice, Greece—died 322, Chalcis, Euboea), ancient Greek

philosopher and scientist, one of the greatest intellectual figures of Western history. He was the author of a philosophical
and scientific system that became the framework and vehicle for both Christian Scholasticism and medieval Islamic
philosophy. Even after the intellectual revolutions of the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the Enlightenment,
Aristotelian concepts remained embedded in Western thinking.
Aristotle’s intellectual range was vast, covering most of the sciences and many of the arts, including biology, botany,
chemistry, ethics, history, logic, metaphysics, rhetoric, philosophy of mind, philosophy of science, physics, poetics,
political theory, psychology, and zoology. He was the founder of formal logic, devising for it a finished system that for
centuries was regarded as the sum of the discipline; and he pioneered the study of zoology, both observational and
theoretical, in which some of his work remained unsurpassed until the 19th century. But he is, of course, most outstanding
as a philosopher. His writings in ethics and political theory as well as in metaphysics and the philosophy of science
continue to be studied, and his work remains a powerful current in contemporary philosophical debate.
This article deals with Aristotle’s life and thought. For the later development of Aristotelian philosophy, see
Aristotelianism. For treatment of Aristotelianism in the full context of Western philosophy, see philosophy, Western.
The Academy

Aristotle was born on the Chalcidic peninsula of Macedonia, in northern Greece. His father, Nicomachus, was the
physician of Amyntas III (reigned c. 393–c. 370 BCE), king of Macedonia and grandfather of Alexander the Great (reigned
336–323 BCE). After his father’s death in 367, Aristotle migrated to Athens, where he joined the Academy of Plato (c.
428–c. 348 BCE). He remained there for 20 years as Plato’s pupil and colleague.

What did Aristotle Do?

Aristotle was one of the greatest philosophers who ever lived and the first genuine scientist in history. He made pioneering
contributions to all fields of philosophy and science, he invented the field of formal logic, and he identified the various
scientific disciplines and explored their relationships to each other. Aristotle was also a teacher and founded his own
school in Athens, known as the Lyceum.
Where did Aristotle Live?
After his father died about 367 BCE, Aristotle journeyed to Athens, where he joined the Academy of Plato. He left the
Academy upon Plato’s death about 348, traveling to the northwestern coast of present-day Turkey. He lived there and on
the island of Lésbos until 343 or 342, when King Philip II of Macedonia summoned him to the Macedonian capital, Pella,
to act as tutor to Philip’s young teenage son, Alexander, which he did for two or three years. Aristotle presumably lived
somewhere in Macedonia until his (second) arrival in Athens in 335. In 323 hostility toward Macedonians in Athens
prompted Aristotle to flee to the island of Euboea, where he died the following year.
Who were Aristotle Teachers and students?
Aristotle’s most famous teacher was Plato (c. 428–c. 348 BCE), who himself had been a student of Socrates (c. 470–399
BCE). Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, whose lifetimes spanned a period of only about 150 years, remain among the most
important figures in the history of Western philosophy. Aristotle’s most famous student was Philip II’s son Alexander,
later to be known as Alexander the Great, a military genius who eventually conquered the entire Greek world as well as
North Africa and the Middle East. Aristotle’s most important philosophical student was probably Theophrastus, who
became head of the Lyceum about 323.
How many works did Aristotle write?
Aristotle wrote as many as 200 treatises and other works covering all areas of philosophy and science. Of those, none
survives in finished form. The approximately 30 works through which his thought was conveyed to later centuries consist
of lecture notes (by Aristotle or his students) and draft manuscripts edited by ancient scholars, notably Andronicus of
Rhodes, the last head of the Lyceum, who arranged, edited, and published Aristotle’s extant works in Rome about 60 BCE.
The naturally abbreviated style of these writings makes them difficult to read, even for philosophers.
How Did Aristotle influence subsequent philosophy and science?
Aristotle’s thought was original, profound, wide-ranging, and systematic. It eventually became the intellectual framework
of Western Scholasticism, the system of philosophical assumptions and problems characteristic of philosophy in western
Europe during the Middle Ages. In the 13th century St. Thomas Aquinas undertook to reconcile Aristotelian philosophy
and science with Christian dogma, and through him the theology and intellectual worldview of the Roman Catholic Church
became Aristotelian. Since the mid-20th century, Aristotle’s ethics has inspired the field of virtue theory, an approach to
ethics that emphasizes human well-being and the development of character. Aristotle’s thought also constitutes an
important current in other fields of contemporary philosophy, especially metaphysics, political philosophy, and the
philosophy of science.