Socrates Plato, and Aristotle have had a huge influence on Philosophy is still incomparable, up to this day. From what I have learned in this course, I will explain how they have inspired, invented and even have changed many people’s view on life.
One of Plato’s theories is his view on the universe, called Theory of Forms. According to Plato, we live in world that is constantly undertaking change. Plato says that nothing is ever permanent; people, animals and crops, and wildlife live and then die eventually. Buildings and infrastructures diminish as well. He believes that even the present is deceiving because our senses of touch, taste and sight are not always perfect and can be wrong sometimes. Plato had said that the world which we see,
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Also, the form is at its perfect. Plato believes that the Form has no matter while Aristotle believes that the Form has matter, making up the substance. As Aristotle was Plato’s inspiration, Aristotle combined his study of the world by his classifications with his work in logic and theology. In ancient times he became recognized as the leading authority on logic and was recognized in the Middle Ages as well. He began his study of logic as lessons, of how to succeed in the kind of debates found in Plato 's writings. Aristotle believed that people chased for happiness, and said that people should search for it in the divine and in the material world. Similar to the Hindus, Socrates and Plato, Aristotle believed that the pursuit of knowledge moved one closer to harmony with …show more content…
One was earthly matter that could be both seen and felt. Another consisted of the visible heavenly bodies, seen but not felt, the moon, planets, sun and stars. His third substance was the invisible world of spirit. Aristotle assumed that the moon, planets, sun and stars needed a force to move them because inertia was not understood yet. Everything must have a cause. Soul was what he assumed was the mover. In comparison to Plato, Aristotle saw soul as symbolizing reason. It was thought that the soul moved itself with a sense of purpose. In all, Aristotle believed that the cause of motion of all things is Divine Will. One major difference is that Aristotle did not accept Plato 's Theory of Forms. But he does not argue that what was platos the path to goodness is through knowledge of the universal
Aristotle believes that society should achieve eternal happiness and just acts. Plato was also an influential philosopher due to his study of the nature of truths and virtues. Thomas Aquinas believed in moral and virtuous acts from a Spiritual perspective. Knowledge and the governance of the law relies on the contribution of several different effective
Therefore, many of the philosophers disagreed with each other and came up with very different answers for the same concepts. Plato also did not know the answers to all of the questions that arose in the pre-Socratic era. Plato decided to look back on the pre-Socratics era in particular at the philosophers Heraclitus and Parmenides. He agreed with Heraclitus who believed our world is constantly changing and with Parmenides who believed that the real world is not the same as the world of our experience. Plato chose to look at materialism and also his theory of Forms in a two-world setting in order to attempt to answer the questions of the universe. The two worlds Plato is talking about are: a world that is in constant flux (the world we live in) and a world that is ever-changing (the real world, otherwise known as Forms). Plato’s Forms distinguishes things that are real from things in our mind that we perceive as real. Plato also made the argument that reality is different than our worldly experience. Plato believed that material objects can imitate the forms because they have order, however, Aristotle’s disagreed. However, Aristotle thought that Plato’s concept of “participation” didn’t make sense. Aristotle believed that the world we live in is our reality and he argued that Plato’s idea of forms
For Plato, Forms are eternal and changeless, but there is a relationship between these eternal and changeless Forms and particular things we perceive by means of our senses in the world. These particular things change in accordance to the perceiver and the perceiver’s environment and this is why Plato thought that such things do not possess real existence. For Plato, onl...
Thirdly, Plato and Aristotle hold contrasting views on the mechanism of finding the truth. Plato relied on the ability to reason in his attempt to explain the world. He produced his ideal world based on reason since such a world lies beyond the realm of the five senses. Plato ignored his senses because he believed his senses only revealed the imperfect forms of the ordinary world.
We have two great philosophers, Plato and Aristotle. These are great men, whose ideas have not been forgotten over years. Although their thoughts of politics were similar, we find some discrepancies in their teachings. The ideas stem from Socrates to Plato to Aristotle. Plato based moral knowledge on abstract reason, while Aristotle grounded it on experience and tried to apply it more to concrete living. Both ways of life are well respected by many people today.
Shields, Christopher. "Aristotle." Stanford University. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 25 Sept. 2008. Web. 3 May 2014. .
Plato's concept of what politics and government should be is a direct result of his belief in the theory of forms. The theory of forms basically states that there is a higher "form" for everything that exists in the world. Each material thing is simply a representation of the real thing which is the form. According to Plato, most people cannot see the forms, they only see their representation or their shadows, as in the simile of the cave.
In The Metaphysics, Aristotle states, “All men by nature desire to know.” Although, this is a generalization, of this insightful statement about the nature of humans and human understanding this statement truly captures what Aristotle was trying to figure out about humans and their thinking. Everyone has a desire to know or to understand. As rational beings we tend to contemplate very simple ideas to the most complicated, like our existence, or parts of the universe, or the universe as a whole. Aristotle is known as the father of modern day psychology and biology, even though many of his ideas of these two sciences was proven incorrect. The most important concepts of Aristotle’s theory of human understanding are the notion of cause, the infinite, and the soul.
Aristotle was the student under Plato. He came to Plato’s Academy at the age of 18 and stayed for 20 years until the death of Plato. He went to northern Greece and taught Alexander the Great. After educating Alexander, he returned to Athens and set up his own school, the Lyceum. Aristotle placed more emphasis on the physical world than did Plato. He wrote works on biology, physics, astronomy, just to name a few. But, he is also renowned for his ethical and political theories. He thought the highest good for people was a virtuous life. By thinking this, he promoted the doctrine of the Golden Mean.
According to Plato, his Theory of Forms states perfection only lives in the realm of thought. There only exists one of every ideal and the rest is just a copy. This one creation is called a form, the most flawless representation of an idea. In the physical world everything is a copy of these forms and all copies are imperfect. Plato believed in two worlds; the intelligible world and the illusionistic world. The intelligible world is where everything is unchanging and eternal. We can only grasp the intelligible world with our mind. It is the world of ideas and not senses. A place where there are perfect forms of the things we know on Earth. According to Plato everything in the world we live in is an illusion. All objects are only shadows of their true forms. His theory further states every group of objects that have the same defying properties must have an ideal form. For example, in the class of wine glasses there must be one in particular that is the ideal wine glass. All others would fall under this ideal form.
For both Plato and Aristotle, virtue was considered essential for happiness. For Plato, wisdom is the basic virtue and with it, one can unify all virtues into a whole. Aristotle, on the other hand, believed that wisdom was virtuous, but that achieving virtue was neither automatic nor did it grant any unification of other virtues. To Aristotle, wisdom was a goal achieved only after effort, and unless a person chose to think and act wisely, other virtues would remain out of reach
Philosophers are all known for questioning and exploring Ideals; taking a look at all options and what is most important. While Aristotle and Plato both take a plunge into the unknowns of a political state, Aristotle demonstrates a state for individuals, to rule as equals, contrary to Plato’s strict utopian structure and group over individual hierarchy view of the ideal state.
Plato’s whole idea of the forms are what would be considered substance. The form is the standard pattern or ideal model of the object or action that’s being named or mentioned. In order to understand the natural world and or the material world, we need to associate them with the substance we find in the intelligible world. Sensory perception attends merely to a thing's superficial appearance, and is therefore worthless for comprehending the world. These forms are required not only to comprehend the material world, but even to understand language itself. These forms of substance are a good way of explaining what we understand of the natural and material world.
Although Aristotle grew up under the ideas of Plato, through time he began to develop his own theories and views about philosophical thoughts (Aristotle Biography, 2015). Aristotle believed that in order to understand the natural world to the fullest, one must use each of the five senses, all of which we use to this day. Aristotle also had his own views of the world, especially the astronomy of it. He believed the earth was at the center of the universe and the remaining planets, only 5 known at the time, were circling around it (Worldview of Ancient Greece - Socrates, Plato & Aristotle, n.d.). We know now that his views on this matter are not taught and the planets revolve around the
In the Phaedo, Plato introduced the theory of Ideas which centered on the problem of immortality of the soul, which suggested that true cannot be finding in the sensible world, but in the world of ideas. He talked about the knowledge of equality in the sense world in which it is impossible to have things that are equal. Things in the sense world might seem to be equal, but in reality it is not. Equality can only come from the mind and this equality is Ideas, which has always been in the mind and is unchangeable, universal, and eternal. He lays down that ideas such as beauty itself, goodness itself, and justice itself are itself when they partake in themselves. For example, beautiful object is beautiful because they partake in itself or all beautiful things are beauty by itself. This makes beauty exist forever and not like objects in the sense world which is temporary. He used these Ideas to use as his proof for the immorality of the soul. The body is like objects in the sense world, which is temporary and insignificant. These objects can change from hour to hour and from day to day. They are unreliable and useless. The soul, on the other hand, is in the Ideas world which is unchangeable, perfect and is forever. Just like beautiful thing partake of beauty by itself, the soul partake in the ideas of life which means that the soul li...