Talk:Aristotelianism

Agree with many previous observations that article needs of definition of Aristotelianism
It is frustrating for readers who come to this article wanting to know what Aristotelianism is, to find no definition of it, no description of what the basic concepts of Aristotle's teachings were all about, and why it dominated scientific thought in the Islamic and European world for 2 millennia. This has been pointed out on this page since it seems 2006 - yet no attempt has been made by Wiki authors to provide such a definition. I don't feel qualified to write this myself, but surely someone out there in Wiki-land can do this honor.

Now I have to go to other sources to find out what this means.Tony (talk) 17:50, 27 August 2015 (UTC)
 * Agreeing with many editors on the need for a concise epitome describing the basic methods and conclusions, I added this:  A few more sentences wouldn't be too much.  If other editors are shy to change the lede (which shouldn't be done lightly), do it here first.  We could summarize the hylomorphism theory of form in matter, the Prime mover theory and the Celestial_spheres, politics, poetics, or some of his (later disproven) physical theories.Jaredscribe (talk) 15:04, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

Introduction needs work.
Much of the introduction is concerned with mentioning some of those influenced by Aristotle rather than giving any kind of Introduction. Since most subsequent thinkers are influenced this may not be a very useful exercise - it would be better moved into it's own section near the end of the article, and a replaced with an .. Introduction ! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 146.200.172.118 (talk) 18:52, 13 June 2015 (UTC)

The decline of Aristotelianism
There is a roaring gap in the text, namely the story of the decline and ultimate rejection of A. in post-mediaeval Europe. This is an important subject in itself, which needs to be covered in detail. The text jumps from Aquinas (A'ism as the dominant element in mediaeval philosophy) to Kant/Hegel as if not much happened in between. In fact what happened in between is hugely important: the story of how A's philosophy was contested and eventually came to be rejected almost in its entirety is the history of the rise of modern science: the one is the mirror image of the other. It was a tough fight, fought by the likes of Copernicus, Galileo, Gassendi, Bacon, Descartes and Boyle. For example, it took a major effort to disprove A's theory of the 4 elements, and to demonstrate the truth of atomism (which A. had "proved" to be false). Almost everything A. taught has now been demonstrated to be untrue, but it took a long time, bit by bit. A'ism lingered on into the first half of the 19th century, specifically in the field of medicine, as the doctrine of the 4 humours. Wish I could write the story myself, but this is clearly something for an expert, which I ain't. But I will gladly upload my notes on the subject (how do I do that?), as a starting point. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.207.137.140 (talk) 12:52, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

What is Aristotelianism?
Me again ("Decline of Aristotelianism" guy). Good question. Simple answer: "The totality of A's teachings, as passed on to posterity." However, that doesn't take us very far. But when A was rediscovered in the early mediaeval period, the result was like a bomb. Clearly, he was a towering intellectual figure, whose work moreover covered almost the entire spectrum of knowledge and speculative thought: religion, drama, politics, astronomy, biology, physics ... you name it. Too big to ignore. Only trouble, he wasn't Christian, he was pagan. So somehow his work had to be brought into line with Christian thought. Or rather A'ism (that word) and Christianity had to be reconciled. Tough job. The effort took a couple of hundred years, culminating in the work of Thomas Aquinas. It's called "Scholasticism." To quote the relevant Wikipedia article: "As a program, scholasticism began as an attempt at harmonization on the part of medieval Christian thinkers: to harmonize the various authorities of their own tradition, and to reconcile Christian theology with classical and late antiquity philosophy, especially that of Aristotle ..." That's when "A" became "ism." In the mediaeval period, A dominated the field of philosophy so completely that he was known simply as "The Philosopher." And remember, "philosophy" in these days covered all fields of knowledge, including what today is called "science." Then began the reverse procedure: the gradual tearing down of A'ism over the subsequent 4 centuries (see above: "Decline of A'ism). That's why "A'ism" is so important: it forms the background to the whole of the rise of modern Europe, from the early mediaeval period to the Enlightenment (and beyond). And by the way, give old A his due: almost every aspect of his work has now been discredited, but some of his biology fieldwork (observations on octopuses) wasn't improved upon until the 1940s. Now, would somebody please write all that up, in an authoritative way?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.207.137.140 (talk) 14:25, 18 February 2014 (UTC)

Aristotelian physics
The question "What is Aristotelianism?" is already answered pretty well in the Wikipedia article "Aristotelian physics". In fact the latter article could easily replace the present one: just rename it "Aristotelianism" and throw this one away as not fit for purpose. It only needs to be expanded somewhat as regards the mediaeval and early modern periods. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.207.137.7 (talk) 07:00, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Deverbositize and get to the point.
As said. This article really doesn't address the points of Aristotelianism as derived from... Aristotle. And can we make it less verbose? Lequis 06:29, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Yup, totally agree. As it currently stands this article is not fit for purpose. Shame, because it is a hugely important subject that needs to be covered. Needs to be re-written in its entirety, from scratch, by a fresh hand. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.207.137.131 (talk) 09:20, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

Criticism of Bertrand Russel
The section Criticism, which includes nothing but quotes from one book of Bertrand Russel contributes nothing to the understanding of Aristotelianism. The article makes it appear as a final judgement of Aristotelian logic, but Russel's criticism is flawed to begin with. The AAI-3 syllogism (Darapti) is no valid syllogism since it doesn't fulfill the validity rule that no syllogism with a particular conclusion (I or O) can have two universal premises (A or E). It is only a so called conditionally valid syllogism that requires that the middle term (golden mountains) exists. Therefore this example cannot be used to refute Aristotelian logic.

The entire section "Criticism" should be deleted. Its argumentation is flawed (existential fallacy) and it doesn't help in understanding Aristotelianism. 154.122.24.65 (talk) 20:09, 24 January 2015 (UTC) Mortran


 * I removed the "Criticism"-section as suggest by 154.122.24.65. It was directed mainly at Aristotle's logic but not at Aristotelianism at large. I'm not sure that a general "Criticism"-section is useful for this type of article given that the different forms of Aristotelianism often don't have that much in common with each other. The idea of a critical assessment is important, but it should be placed in the context of the specific theory that is being criticized. For example if someone feels like writing a section on Aristotelianism in logic then it would make sense to add a "Criticism"-subsection with Russel's remarks to it.Phlsph7 (talk) 14:48, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

Redundant Material
In the "Contemporary Aristotelianism" section, this entire section of text is simply a copy of what is found in the last para of the introduciton: "The most famous contemporary Aristotelian philosopher is Alasdair MacIntyre. Especially famous for helping to revive virtue ethics in his book After Virtue, MacIntyre revises Aristotelianism with the argument that the highest temporal goods, which are internal to human beings, are actualized through participation in social practices. He juxtaposes Aristotelianism with the managerial institutions of capitalism and its state, and with rival traditions — including the philosophies of Hume and Nietzsche — that reject Aristotle's idea of essentially human goods and virtues and instead legitimate capitalism. Therefore, on MacIntyre's account, Aristotelianism is not identical with Western philosophy as a whole; rather, it is "the best theory so far, [including] the best theory so far about what makes a particular theory the best one." Politically and socially, it has been characterized as a newly 'revolutionary Aristotelianism'. This may be contrasted with the more conventional, apolitical and effectively conservative uses of Aristotle by, for example, Gadamer and McDowell. Other important contemporary Aristotelian theorists include Fred D. Miller, Jr. in politics and Rosalind Hursthouse in ethics."

Isn't this a bit redundant? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Matthai0s (talk • contribs) 14:51, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

2020/21 Changes
I made some changes in response to the discussion here and I added some new content.

Several people have pointed out that after reading the article they were no wiser as to what Aristotelianism actually is. As others here have replied, the term "Aristotelian" in the wide sense can be applied to many theories that take one or another distinctive thesis of Aristotle as their origin. So anyone looking for one simple, clearcut and contentful answer will be disappointed by this article. But I think this is no different for Platonism, Kantianism, etc. I added a corresponding "disclaimer" to the lead section.
 * if we succeed in "summarizing" Aristotelianism in the lede, the disclaimer may no longer be needed since its somewhat obvious. Its not bad, just takes up space.  I'll let you remove if and when you feel its no longer necessary.  It looks like you and I are the only editors to give much attention to this article in quite a while.  While collaborating on the article, I hope we can learn some things together!Jaredscribe (talk) 16:01, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
 * I think your steps in "summarizing" Aristotelianism are a valuable contribution to this article. But Aristotelianism is just a very wide topic so I think we can hope at best to get down some general characteristics but not all of them. This is why I'm inclined to keep the "disclaimer" since that is the most general characteristic truly shared by all forms of Aristotelianism. In philosophy it often doesn't hurt to state the obvious. But I'm open to expressing it in a more concise fashion if there are suggestions. Phlsph7 (talk) 16:21, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

As Matthai0s mentioned, the paragraph on MacIntyre in the lead section is repeated word by word in the "Contemporary"-section. I truncated the version in the lead section and left the one in the "Contemporary"-section as it is.
 * thanks, I also removed the "most famous" qualifier given to MacIntyre: in general we should avoid evaluations like that.Jaredscribe (talk) 16:01, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Good that you caught that! "Most famous" is not very neutral. Phlsph7 (talk) 16:26, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

I moved the subsection "Contemporary Aristotelianism" to the new section "Contemporary" and divided it into subsections. The content of the "Ethics"-subsection remains unchanged but I added content to the "Ontology"-subsection & the "Problem of universals"-subsection. The content of the "Ontology"-subsection is a modified version of Meta-ontology.Phlsph7 (talk) 12:02, 20 October 2020 (UTC)
 * I concur with the sectioning. We can add more when more content is added. The "Problem of Universals" is topic of Ontology and should be a sub-sub-section under it, IMHO. Also, it should start with and emphasize the Aristotelian solution to the problem - the hylomorphic theory - rather than the problem itself which is covered elsewhere, or Plato's hypothesis. The relevant articles like the meta-ontology one you modified, should be linked as well as encapsulated in a summary.  In general, this article could be a type of sub-wiki linking to other articles' sections' that deal with Aristotelian thought on various subjects.  I would like to prioritize those particular wikilinks.Jaredscribe (talk) 16:01, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
 * I don't think that the hylomorphic theory is important to the problem of universals. For example, neither the article "The Medieval Problem of Universals" from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy nor the article "Universals" from the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy mention hylomorphism. Both the problem and Aristotle's solution are rather abstract/technical. The idea for comparing it with other positions was to make it a little more accessible to the reader.
 * It would be good for this article to cover hylomorphism. This could be in the history, for example, concerning Aquinas. But there are also some contemporary attempts at reviving hylomorphism, see . Phlsph7 (talk) 16:46, 22 March 2021 (UTC)
 * I think you have a point about the problem of universals belonging to ontology. Currently the ontology section only covers meta-ontology. I guess the most straight-forward solution would be to rename it to "Meta-ontology" and leave the universals-section as it is. Phlsph7 (talk) 16:48, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

Ethics
Aristotelianism starting point 158.62.41.141 (talk) 12:14, 19 February 2023 (UTC)