Aristotle’s Philosophy: Ethics, Politics, Metaphysics, and Physics

Posted on Dec 16, 2024 in Philosophy and ethics

Aristotle: Ethics and Politics

ETHICS. Aristotle stated that ethics is the human character, and the end toward which human action is directed is happiness. To achieve a happy life, it is necessary to be consistent with nature. The human faculty par excellence is the ability to reason, a human being cannot be happy without developing rational activity. Although the human being is not only his reason, the human soul also has a vegetative and a sensitive part. They contain the power of desire, which can obey or disobey reason. Aristotle argues that virtue ethics lies in the dominance and submission of desire to reason. For Aristotle, virtue is a habit, a permanent way of being reached after repeating the same behavior. The conduct that leads to virtue is always a balanced behavior that avoids excesses. Each individual human being should use their reason to discover their vicious behaviors and where the average, according to their individual abilities, leads to virtue. The human character is formed by many trends and impulses that reason should moderate. There may be a vicious default behavior or excess, or virtue, which lies between them. Aristotle believed that justice is the primary moral virtue. In contrast to Plato, justice is reached only at the end as a result of having other virtues. For Aristotle, in addition to ethical virtues, there are dianoetic virtues: prudence and wisdom.

POLICY.

Politics deals with the common good, which was considered by Aristotle as the most beautiful and priority. Human beings are not isolated individuals, since man is by nature a social animal and needs to be part of a human community. The existence of the state is not the result of an agreement that may not have been signed, as advocated by the Sophists; human nature requires its existence. Therefore, without a state that seeks the common good, no real human individuals can achieve their own individual good. To achieve the common good, the state may take different forms. Combining both criteria, Aristotle distinguished between just and unjust governments. He also said that considering in the abstract forms of government, monarchy and aristocracy would be preferable. However, considering that those who should govern are real people and knowing their natural tendency to guide action to personal benefit, the preferred form of government, being the one with the least risk involved, is a democracy that is not perverted.

ARISTOTLE: METAPHYSICS: BEING AND SUBSTANCE

The substance is what exists by itself, is the subject, the substrate that serves as a support for accidents which are predicated of it. For Aristotle, things can be predicated in different ways, and none of them change the essence of the subject. These are called categories, which are related to the substance, of which there are 2 classes:

  • The primary substances. They are concrete things, individual: this man, this stone…
  • The second substances. These are universal, genus and species: man, tree…

THE HILEMORFISMO:

All natural beings are composed of two elements:

  • Matter (hyle) is that of which something is made.
  • Form (eidos). This is what makes something what it is.

Matter and form cannot exist separately.

Aristotle distinguishes two levels of matter:

  • Raw material: the last material component of the cosmos.
  • Second matter: results from adding a formal component to raw material.

The form is ontologically superior to matter. The form gives being, and therein lies its importance.

THE ACT AND THE POWER:

  • Power is always power for a given event.
  • Being in power needs to exist, to have some actuality.

For Aristotle, as the form takes precedence over the matter, the act also takes precedence over power.

PHYSICS: THE DOCTRINE OF 4 CAUSES

A cause is something that must be taken into account to explain any process:

  • The material cause.
  • The formal cause. Essence and shape.
  • The efficient cause or agent. Produces the transformation.
  • The final cause.

EXPLANATION OF MOVEMENT:

Movement could be defined as the transition from potentiality to actuality, that which is in power. There are two types of acts:

  • The perfect act (entelecheia) is the final act, pure.
  • The imperfect act (kinesis) is about change to become the pure act.

Aristotelian cosmology.

According to Aristotle, the cosmos is closed, finite, eternal, and theologically ordained. Its guiding principle is that everything that moves is moved by something else. But as the chain moved by other engines cannot be infinite, there must be a first, unmoved mover. This unmoved mover is pure act; it sets in motion the entire universe without moving itself. It cannot get in touch with the world. Thus, the Aristotelian cosmos has a theological character. Below the unmoved mover is the first engine that sets in motion the world.

The celestial spheres are formed by the ether, which perfectly balances the material and shape; its movement is circular.