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Old 10-15-2012, 10:54 PM
 
3,493 posts, read 4,678,645 times
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Not only was he a terrible Scientist, his prestige ensured that the natural Sciences were stuck with Aristotelian physics for the next two thousand or so years.
It's funny, as far as I'm aware, Aristotle wasn't a scientist, at least not primarily. So of course he was a terrible one...

As for blaming him for the stagnation of physics...I'm thinking you should blame the physicists...

As for respect? He came up with a lot concepts that influenced the way humans exist today. In other words, rather than an end, he was a means, and I'm guessing he was ok with that...
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Old 10-16-2012, 03:24 PM
 
Location: Whittier
3,004 posts, read 6,283,975 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Sci Fi Fan View Post
No, really. Why the hell do modern philosophers place any value on his opinions?

His Scientific views were almost universally full of crap. Not only were they wrong, but they were so blatantly illogical and yet easily testable, yet Aristotle never bothered to try dropping a heavy and a light hammer at the same time to see which one fell faster. He never bothered to test whether or not spiders actually had six legs, even though it would take a matter of minutes to do so.

Not only was he a terrible Scientist, his prestige ensured that the natural Sciences were stuck with Aristotelian physics for the next two thousand or so years.

Additionally, the guy was a blatant misogynist who also supported slavery. How the hell is this guy a credible source of information?
You seem to be getting Philosophy and Science mixed up.

Discrediting all thoughts by someone because a few were bad doesn't make too much sense.

Heidegger was for all intents and purposes, a Nazi. And yet he had some brilliant things to say.

Aristotle's views on virtue; if you've read the Nicomachean Ethics, are still used today. Not because of anything other than the fact that they make sense.

Virtue, especially Aristotelian virtue is also being used in a wide range of Philosophy, namely in epistemology under (you guessed it) Virtue Epistemology. Virtue Epistemology (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
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Old 10-16-2012, 08:34 PM
 
10 posts, read 9,790 times
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I think Aristotle had some worthwhile things to say, although he is rather overrated. Apparently, the way we think of classification of things, of similarity and difference, of commonness and distinctness, of numbers, etc. were influenced by him.

I disagree with Kant being an idiot. His philosophy is essential in every field of science, of how we know anything at all.
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Old 11-05-2012, 08:34 AM
 
Location: Venice Italy
1,044 posts, read 1,402,879 times
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Reasoning potentially has no boundaries, but if I start to think, I realize that I am going to enter into a closed loop, anyway until no one can establish the perception of the surrounding reality in a different way, I'll get, as a good option, the old philosophical principles
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Old 11-05-2012, 02:19 PM
 
2,963 posts, read 5,459,557 times
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Originally Posted by harhar View Post
You seem to be getting Philosophy and Science mixed up.

Discrediting all thoughts by someone because a few were bad doesn't make too much sense.

Heidegger was for all intents and purposes, a Nazi. And yet he had some brilliant things to say.

Aristotle's views on virtue; if you've read the Nicomachean Ethics, are still used today. Not because of anything other than the fact that they make sense.

Virtue, especially Aristotelian virtue is also being used in a wide range of Philosophy, namely in epistemology under (you guessed it) Virtue Epistemology. Virtue Epistemology (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
Syllogisms are fun.
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Old 11-05-2012, 08:09 PM
 
Location: Freakville
511 posts, read 492,326 times
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I think it's just his b i t c h i n' name.
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Old 11-05-2012, 08:26 PM
 
560 posts, read 582,721 times
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Its so easy to call someone from so long ago an idiot, when they didnt have access to the internet, and centuries upon centuries of accumulated knowledge.
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Old 04-05-2024, 05:23 AM
 
2 posts, read 321 times
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He wasn't a genius, he was a politician and a businessman, obsessed with hierarchy and power. He had a high social position and access to lots of resources thanks to Alexander, and he capitalized. He would not be able to discuss so many topics without the help of Macedonian soldiers who brought him specimens and what not. So first of all, it is foolish to think he did it all on his own. He used many people to create himself as the ”genius” you discuss him as.

Everything he writes is only to prove that he's the best of them all. He presents other Greek philosophers in such a way, that their philosophy seems inferior to his, as if all the philosophy before was just a prelude to Aristotle's philosophy, which presents itself as the apogee of the human thought.

In actuality he's not so much different from the other Greek philosophers and he purposefully misrepresents them, so we don't see how much he owes and takes from his predecessors.

--->Remember, Aristotle and a few other Greek thinkers were among the first to not fall back on deities as an explanation of nature.

Actually most Greek philosophers, of whom Aristotle was one of the later ones. Not the one who led the movement


He's been so influential because other Greek philosophers were rejected by Christianity. Many Platonists were murdered by Christians because they were considered to wildly Pagan. There was book burning and people burning. Aristotle was the only one read - and not for his genius, but rather, his bigotry and rigidness which agreed with the Christian spirit back then.

It's ridiculous people think ”genius” is what gets you audience. No. It's your connections and PR. Alexander the Great created an empire bigger than anything before. For Aristotle, it meant access to unprecedented 1. money 2. material resources (any sources and specimens he wished, and many, many slaves to act as dictionaries, encyclopedia, and whatever he needed) 3. reach & popularity
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Old 04-05-2024, 05:30 AM
 
2 posts, read 321 times
Reputation: 25
Quote:
Originally Posted by RockyCity View Post
Its so easy to call someone from so long ago an idiot, when they didnt have access to the internet, and centuries upon centuries of accumulated knowledge.
It's not about that. There were many wise people in Greece before Aristotle. He is the most revered and the biggest idiot of them all.

Plato also has mistakes in his works, but you can clearly see that there is a vision behind it, how he could get there with the little information he had available to him, and how beautifully he writes about it.

While Aristotle just rumbles to have the most publications under his name
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Old 04-05-2024, 04:39 PM
 
Location: USA
9,209 posts, read 6,268,796 times
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What did he say about climate change?

Would that make him a real idiot?
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