Aristotle

Introduction
• Aristotle was perhaps the first and greatest of all polymaths. He
is known to have written from everything from the shape of
seashells to sterility, from speculations to the nature of the soul
to meteorology, poetry, art and even interpretation of dreams.
• Aristotle was born in a village of Stagira in northern Greece in
384 BC
• Aristotle’s father was a rich man and as many claim Aristotle
spent his youth in spending inherited cash on wine, women and
song. He also joined the army for a brief period of time.
• At the age of 17 Aristotle set for Athens to study at the Academy
under Plato
• Ancient Greece was not a unified nation-state
– Macedon was ruled by a monarch
– Athens had a form of democracy
 Foundational work in diverse
disciplines
• Biology, zoology (identified 500 species),
physics, medicine, psychology, logic,
metaphysics, rhetorics, aesthetics, ethics,
politics (all of these subjects were taught
in the Lyceeum)
• Politics
– Political theory
– Comparative government (Aristotle is the first
comparativist—study of 158 constitutions)
• So when he was about your age maybe slightly younger he was sent by his
father to go what you are doing to college to Athens to Study at the Academy
the first university,
• Unlike most of you Aristotle did not spend 4 years he remained attach to it for
the net 20 years until the death of Plato.
• Aristotle left for Asia minor where he was summoned by king Phillip to
establish the school for children of Macedonia's ruling class it was here
where Aristotle met his son which we know as
– Alexander

• Aristotle returned to Athens and later on established a school of his own a

rival to the platonic academy and he called it the Lyceum there is a story
about that. Aristotle like Socrates brought himself attention he left Athens and

• when important reason about Plato and Aristotle that they are different unlike
their intellectual god father Socrates who wrote nothing but conversed
endlessly and unlike his own brother aristae wrote disciplined and thematic
treaties on every topic from biology to ethics to metaphysics to litera0 -

• For Plato politics was about questions of metaphysics questions of the soul
what is the soul about?

• Aristotle appears to beginning to look more like what he scientist 158 of them
in all he was the first to give some kind of conceptual light to the vocabulary
of political life.
 Works:
• Compiled in 150 volumes
• Includes The Athenian Constitution, On
Dreams, Physics, Metaphysics, Poetics,
Politics, Nicomachean Ethics, Rhetorics…
• Politics (8 books)
 Aristotle
• Aristotle wrote 10 lac words out of which
we only received 2 lac words.
• Alexander the Great was a student of
Aristotle.
• Alexander’s enemies became Aristotle’s
enemies and he had to leave Athens and
he said I will not give Athens the chance to
commit a crime again as they already had
done with Socrates.
• Plato said everything is changing hence
there is no reality. Plato said that the things
are changing but behind them there is a
world of forms.
• Aristotle criticized Plato
• Plato and Aristotle look at the world
differently.
 Aristotle and Plato on
Metaphysics
• Essence VS existence
– For Plato the forms is real
– For Aristotle the essence is part of the existence.
Influenced:
• Ibn-Sina: Everything has an essence and a
existence, once these two combine we get to
see what we see.
• There is only ONE that has a combined
essence and existence.= GOD
 Aristotle, Ibn-Sina, Ibn Rushd,
Ibn Farabi
• The real cause the first cause is simple
– Everything emanates from the ONE

• The world is one of the example of the

emanation of the ONE
 Aristotle’s Class struggle
• One of the most important discovery by
Aristotle is ‘factions’
– Difference between Democracy and Aristocratic
(etc)
• Democracy is when the poor and not the
men of property are the rulers – Aristotle
definition of Democracy in Greek days.
• Today’s defintion of Democracy is different
then at the time of Aristotle
• Aristotle says wherever there is
Democracy – only the poor will rule
because they are greater in number.
– In a democracy the poor will have more
power than the rich, because there are more
o them.

• Aristotle believed that politics stems from

the natural struggle, actions between
societies.
• He also believed that Aristocratic faction should rule.
• He believed that the masses can be easily fooled
and can mislead.
• Aristocracy would be educated and would rule
diligently and the masses should not be able to
choose.
• He also talked about how to stop rebellion.
• Aristotle believed that there should be a mixed
system political system to prevent a democratic
revolution
• He believed that the masses should get some
power to comply with the aristocratic faction
and live in harmony.
• Man is a political animal
– He believed that it is natural for man to establish
relationships with others in society.
– Aristotle talks about the POLIS the city-state.
– He believes that when residents become united
and create a polis and this polis will in fact help
man reach their true potential
• City-state is a natural organic creation and
city-state is a product of human nature.
• Aristotle talks about the Natural Law:
certain laws that are present in Nature. He
emphasizes upon the need to understand
the Natural Law. He believes that
philosophy is part of the Natural Law.
• City-state: the Number of citizens must not
be more than 10,000 that is the population
(including slaves, families and so on)
• He believes that a larger society will break
apart the natural laws since people will not
connect with each other, and can lead to
anarchy.
• Greek city-states were rather small states.
• Aristotle challenges Plato’s Republic: he
says that Plato’s republic is problematic
– The majority class the producers hasn’t
mentioned enough and hasn’t analyzed
thoroughly.
• He says that the Guardian class will not be
happy since they don’t have family or
private property. Since, they will be
unhappy they wont be incentivized.
• Aristotle defends private property an the
family
– He believes they are tools for people to move
forward and serve as incentives.
• Aristotle’s approach to politics is opposite
of that of Plato
• Aristotle says that Plato spends so much
time on thinking about ideas of what an
city-state should look like.
• Aristotle took the way to discover more.
• Aristotle categorizes 6 constitutions
– These political terms are being used to this
day.
– Even 2500 years later we are using the same
terms to understand politics.
• Aristotle believed in Teleology
– He believed that the State is determined by its
character
– And you can observe the state and
understand.
• Good citizen vs Good person
• Bad citizen vs bad Person
 Aristotle’s Critique
• Aristotle states that man has no innate
ideas.
• He says that the world around shapes
those ideas.
Similarities/Differences
with Plato?
 Plato Aristotle

Best Ideal form of government Best ideal (kingship or

(kingship) aristocracy) and existent (polity)
forms of governments
Rationalism (deduction) Comparative method
Forms/Ideas Substance/categories
Nature (fixed) (realization of) nature
Comprehensive understanding Constitution: “arrangement of
of constitution magistracies in a state” (100)
Happiness as a quality of the Happiness: “realization and
whole perfect practice of virtue” (97)
Critique of property and the Property is good (and the familiy
family is necessary) -- equalization
Rule of the best Rule according to law
Other…?
 Nature
• Species (fixed #)

• Teleology: “…the nature of a thing is its end.”

• Potency Realization

• How and where is human nature fully

developed? Why?
 The State = Organic Whole
Man as a political animal Individual
Family
Village
State

What distinguishes the state from all other communities?

How is state rule different from master/slave domination?
 The Good Life = Happiness
• … Is the virtuous life.
• The practice of virtue requires being “furnished
with means.” (88)
• Practicing virtue allows human beings to become
what they are, to realize their essence.
• Speech and action (in the Polis)
• Good man ≠ good citizen
• Activities that allow men to realize their nature:
art, science, prudence, wisdom, and intuition.
– “The political sciences are species of prudence.”
 Functions of the State
(services the state must provide) (98)

• Food
• Arts
• Arms
• Revenue
• Religion
• Power of deciding
• Justice
“…a state exists for the sake of a good life, and not for the sake of life only…”
 Views of Aristotle’s Politics
• Ethics Aristotle identified politics as the
continuation and context of ethics.
• The communities, unlike his teacher Plato who
classified people of the state, Aristotle made the
term family, colony and the complete
community.
• The city as man’s Natural condition. City is a
creation of nature.
• The citizen, he defined the meaning of “citizen”
 Ethics influences Politics

• Politics has the most authoritative and

master art to attain and preserve ethics.
• To investigate politics, he made a plan first
– suggestion and second the influences
that favored or destroyed states and third
for an ideal continuation.
 The community.

• The family as “the association established

by nature for the supply of men’s everyday
wants,” like man and woman.
• Colony as basically familial, being
composed of children and relatives
• The complete community or city-state
unites several villages.
 City is a creation of nature.
• A social instinct is implanted in all men by
nature.
• The city is a creation of nature for
humankind.
• It is without a state who by nature and not
by mere accident so state includes bad
man and above all humanity.
 What is a citizen ?

He who has the power to take part

in the deliberative or judicial
administration of any state.
 What is a citizen ?

He who has the power to take part

in the deliberative or judicial
administration of any state.
Aristotle’s POLITICS: Book VIII
Basic Ideas & Analysis -- Chapter 1

• The legislator's primary concern should be

the education of the young.
• Education must be public and in common,
because there is a single end for the city
as a whole.
• Citizens do not belong to themselves, but
rather all belong to the city
Aristotle’s POLITICS: Book VIII – Ch 3

• The four customary areas of education are

letters, gymnastics, music and drawing.
• While music is not necessary, it is
important because it is with a view to
spending leisure time well.
Aristotle’s POLITICS: Book VIII – Ch 3

• Some of the useful areas of learning

should also be sought not only with a view
to utility, but with a view to enable the
student to reach higher levels of learning.
• Seeking utility above all is not fitting for
those who are magnanimous and free.
 Analysis: Aristotle’s POLITICS
Education is the best means of preserving a
regime and should be the legislator's greatest
concern.
• The value that Aristotle places on education is
rooted in his emphasis on the goal of the city as
living well.
• Since the raison d'être of the city is to help its citizens
live the good life, teaching citizens to be virtuous is of
primary importance.
• Furthermore, having well-educated and virtuous
citizens will also help the city as a whole to be better.
 Analysis: Aristotle’s POLITICS
A proper education in virtue requires
habituation and proper intellectual
formation.
• Education is not just an intellectual matter,
but is the education of the soul in virtue,
only part of which is intellectual.
 Analysis: Aristotle’s POLITICS
• Before children are ready for intellectual
training, however, they must learn virtues
of self-discipline through gymnastics,
• And must acquire a taste for harmony
in music so that they will be inclined to
seek the harmony of their souls through
a proper balance in which the appetites
are subordinated to the rule of reason.
 Aristotle
The Father of Political Thought

• All humanity was political by nature.

• A “constitution” was how humans were
organized politically
• That constitutions could be judged good or
bad by evaluating if politics took care of “part
s” or “wholes”

384– 322 bce

Aristotle’s view of wholeness
• If YOU’RE not whole then YOU’RE not fully
alive. You do not want to see the “members”
of the body separated.
• SOCIETY needs to be “whole” to be fully alive
as well.
• If you think you can stand alone outside of
society, then you are as ridiculous as a “huge
foot” all by itself.
 Aristotle’s view of wholeness
• Aristotle measured goodness with wholeness.
• Government is never perfect, but it can be good
if it concerned with the “whole” of society.
• If government doesn’t care about the “whole”
society, if it’s there only to benefit a “part” of
society, then that government is perverted.
 Making the “whole” through the “parts”
a.k.a. Citizens vs. Subjects

• If you are a citizen, you are engaged in the

political process.
• All citizens are equal, but they are not all
the same. They need to do their part to
contribute to the whole.
• If you’re not responsible enough to be a
citizen and do your part to contribute, than
you are a subject and will be lorded over.
 Aristotle on parts
• The parts (citizens), when are put together, will build
a life that maintains the spirit of the whole
community.
– How would you define the “American Spirit?”
– How about the “Spirit of the Chinese?”
– How about “Iraqi Spirit?”
• Could our Constitution work for the Chinese or the
Iraqi? Why or why not?
 The Spirit of the whole
is its Constitution
• It’s important to note that Aristotle’s definition of “constitutio
n” is different from ours today.
• To Aristotle, a constitution is how a community works . . .
NOT a document that is the rule of law.
• He wanted to study constitutions/communities . . . He
wanted to see the “whole” very badly but couldn't’t.
• So he studied the parts/citizens to define the the
spirit/constitution of the whole community.
Is a constitution good or bad?
• Is a government set up with the common
interests of the “whole”, or merely only the ruling
“part” that has the power?
• “Right” constitutions were directed to the
common interest of the whole.
• “Perverted” constitutions were directed at the
selfish interest of the ruling body.
• He said men is commanding and women is obeying
• Aristotle said that marriage should set maximum and minimum age of
marriage along with how many kids a couple can have.
• In the end he also says that no society can be happy till women are
happy.

• Slavery: he said slaves are ‘tools with voices.’

• He says men have a nature some are leaders and some are slaves.
• ‘men by nature are divided into two groups those rulers and those
who submitted by nature’

There is a contradiction: whenever Greeks would conquer and make

other people their slaves and there were people who were rulers and
when you captured them they became slaves so how is it that human
nature shows slave as a human nature

In Aristotle's framework of politics he did not give them any place he said
slavery should be there and slavery is important he said that
aristocracy can not stand if there is no slavery. He says if there are
no slaves how will the scholars learn
 Aristotle Constitutions
• To Aristotle, there were only three natural ways to
rule.
– Rule by the one
– Rule by the few
– Rule by the many
• But, if there were “right” and perverted”
constitutions then these three ways to rule are
doubled for the good and bad.
 Aristotle on constitutions
“Right” Constitutions
Considers the common interests of
the whole.
1. Kingship--the rule by one.
2. Aristocracy--the rule by a
few.
1. Constitutional Government--
the military ruling as the
mass (in Aristotle’s time).
“Perverted” Constitutions
Considers only selfish interests of
those ruling.
1. Tyrant--a perversion of
Kingship.
2. Oligarchy--a perversion of
Aristocracy
1. Democracy--a perversion of
Constitutional Government,
which is the rule. No one
ruling the poor, uneducated
masses . . . MOB RULE!
• Aristotle observed that in the answer to the first
question there types of ruler
• By a single person
• By a select few
• By many
• And in answer of the second question
• The rule could be either on behalf of the
population as a whole which he considered true
or good government or in the self interest of the
ruler or ruling class.
• In a defective form of government in all he
identified six species of rule which came in
pains Monarchy is rule by an individual on
behalf of all an tyranny
• The Greek city-state or polis is ‘should be’ an
ideal city-state where people form associations
such as,
– Families
– Trade organizations
– Social gatherings

• Aristotle said ‘man is a political animal’ and he

can only achieve the highest form of
happiness or live the good life by engaging in
the activities of the state.
 Class
• Politics involves factions caused by
– The desire of the lesser to be equal
– The desire of the equal to be greater

• Conflict arises because of

• Profit
• Honor
• Fear
• Arrogance
• Aristotle is the first philosopher who is keeping in mind
class struggle he keeps in mind that politics is a fight
between classes
– This is a time of Athens and Sparta – Peloponnesian war
this was a fight between two systems as well. The conflict
– Between Athens and Sparta was also shaped by class
contradictions.
– Aristotle says that democracy is a bad system he said
aristocracy is best system democracy says that false the
problem arises from the idea that those who are equal
under the law and we believe that they are also equal in all
other aspects.
– He says that people who have the highest intellect should
be rulers.
– He says that the masses can be easily fooled so
aristocracy would a democratic he says that the croon
masses
– He says he says that revolution can be stopped by
following a certain ways Aristotle says that if we create a
mixed political system in which aristocratic and democratic
constitution that way the revolution can be stopped.
• Aristotle challenged Plato's republic: he says
that the Plato's republic is based upon the
guardians, auxiliaries, and producing class.
– Aristotle said that Aristotle did not write enough on
the guardian class he says that the guardian class
will note happy why because they don’t have kids
or property so he said that the most important
class of people is unhappy than how will we live in
such a society.

– Aristotle says that family life is important and

private property they work harder it is an incentive
to work harder.
 Aristotle’s Class Analysis
• Aristotle most important discovery is he talked about society from a
class structure he does not use the word class but uses fraction as
a word

• Aristotle hated democracy similar to Plato-

– In that time democracy is when the poor are the rulers and not the rich
– Aristotle’s understanding of democracy there is a huge gap.

– Today’s democracy is election, parliament, and we don’t’ care which

class rules and in that time the class will be most important
– Aristocratic system.

– “in a democracy will have more power than the rich because there are
more of them and the will of the majority is supreme’ Aristotle.
 Rhetoric
• Rhetoric is a skill that must be learned by effective
leaders
• Rhetoric is a bridge between logic and politics
• The purpose of rhetoric is to persuade the citizens
• Rhetoric employs logic, ethics and emotions
• The good statesman ensures a large middle class
because the middle class will be more virtuous than the
wealthy or poor the middle class is free from arrogance
of wealthy the middle class is free of envy of poor
• Aristotle defends the institution of private
property but condemns excessive capitalism,
Aristotle also defends the institution of
slavery.

How does Aristotle identify citizenship?

Aristotle discusses 6 types of constitutions
Three are just and three are unjust
 Statesman
• Magnanimity- the great souled man. He does
great things because he should. The
Magnanimous man needs no one. But he does
help others.
• Justice-gives other their due
• Prudence-practical wisdom
• The constitutions
• Economics
• Rhetoric
• Aristotle frequently compares the politician to a craftsman.
The analogy is imprecise because politics, in the strict sense
of legislative science, is a form of practical knowledge, while a
craft like architecture or medicine is a form of productive
knowledge. However, the comparison is valid to the extent
that the politician produces, operates, maintains a legal
system according to universal principles (EN VI.8 and X.9). In
order to appreciate this analogy it is helpful to observe that
Aristotle explains the production of an artifact in terms of four
causes: the material, formal, efficient, and final causes (Phys.
II.3 and Met. A.2). For example, clay (material cause) is
molded into a vase shape (formal cause) by a potter (efficient
or moving cause) so that it can contain liquid (final cause).
(For discussion of the four causes see the entry on
Aristotle's physics.)
 Aristotle on Tyranny

• The concept of ”Tyranny” in ancient Greece

was understood as a ruler who acquired power
through extralegal means, means
• Often with support of rural poor. But it did not mean
the ruler was bad.
• Aristotle also offered suggestions for
reforming tyranny. According to Aristotle, the tyrant
“ought to show himself to his subjects in the light,
not of a tyrant, but of a steward and king.” Aristotle
contended that the best way for a tyrant to rule is
simply not to govern like a tyrant. If a tyrant were to
do so, Aristotle noted, “His power will be more last.”
Aristotle realized that moral arguments wouldn’t
influence a tyrannical personality, so he appealed to
the tyrant’s overwhelming desire to be esteemed.