what is the social philosophy of Aristotle?

Answer 1

read his books. you cant really sum it up in a sentance or 2.

if you want a very breif background on it, check wikipedia, but he has entire college classes based around his books. i dont think youre going to get it all in a few measly sentances on yahoo answers.

Answer 2

Aristotle's social philosophy is based upon his ethics of virtue. He says that in each and every situation there are two extreme reactions, but the virtuous action is the rational middle (e.g. faced with a dangerous situation the two extreme reactions are to be cowardly or to be fool-hardy, but the virtuous action is a middle-ground bravery). For Aristotle each and every situation is unique and should be approached with this in mind. Given this one is never considered a virtuous person, but one does virtuous acts. It is only at the completion of life that one can be judged as a whole.

Societies should operate in a similar manner, being ruled by those equipped with the rationality and the demeanour to make decisions that treat individuals as individuals, just as individuals treat each situation as unique. The most important concept in Aristotle's social philosophy is 'eudaimonia' - basically 'what it is to be human'. For Aristotle a human being is the zoon logon echon, or 'the animal that speaks with the logos'. This essentially means that we are the political, social and rational animal. A society should always accord with the individuals, hence it is by social and political dialogue that we should govern. Jurgen Habermas is your man if you want a bit of a contemporary Aristotlian. Although, Habermas is a bit lame for my liking. Martin Heidegger has the best contemporary understanding of Aristotle.

Answer 3

I don't think you can separate logic from psychology or ethics, so I'm including all three sections:

C. Aristotelian Psychology

For Aristotle, psychology was a study of the soul. Insisting that form (the essence, or unchanging characteristic element in an object) and matter (the common undifferentiated substratum of things) always exist together, Aristotle defined a soul as a “kind of functioning of a body organized so that it can support vital functions.” In considering the soul as essentially associated with the body, he challenged the Pythagorean doctrine that the soul is a spiritual entity imprisoned in the body. Aristotle's doctrine is a synthesis of the earlier notion that the soul does not exist apart from the body and of the Platonic notion of a soul as a separate, nonphysical entity. Whether any part of the human soul is immortal, and, if so, whether its immortality is personal, are not entirely clear in his treatise On the Soul.

Through the functioning of the soul, the moral and intellectual aspects of humanity are developed. Aristotle argued that human insight in its highest form (nous poetikos,”active mind”) is not reducible to a mechanical physical process. Such insight, however, presupposes an individual “passive mind” that does not appear to transcend physical nature. Aristotle clearly stated the relationship between human insight and the senses in what has become a slogan of empiricism—the view that knowledge is grounded in sense experience. “There is nothing in the intellect,” he wrote, “that was not first in the senses.”

D. Ethics

It seemed to Aristotle that the individual's freedom of choice made an absolutely accurate analysis of human affairs impossible. “Practical science,” then, such as politics or ethics, was called science only by courtesy and analogy. The inherent limitations on practical science are made clear in Aristotle's concepts of human nature and self-realization. Human nature certainly involves, for everyone, a capacity for forming habits; but the habits that a particular individual forms depend on that individual's culture and repeated personal choices. All human beings want “happiness,” an active, engaged realization of their innate capacities, but this goal can be achieved in a multiplicity of ways.

Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics is an analysis of character and intelligence as they relate to happiness. Aristotle distinguished two kinds of “virtue,” or human excellence: moral and intellectual. Moral virtue is an expression of character, formed by habits reflecting repeated choices. A moral virtue is always a mean between two less desirable extremes. Courage, for example, is a mean between cowardice and thoughtless rashness; generosity, between extravagance and parsimony. Intellectual virtues are not subject to this doctrine of the mean. Aristotle argued for an elitist ethics: Full excellence can be realized only by the mature male adult of the upper class, not by women, or children, or barbarians (non-Greeks), or salaried “mechanics” (manual workers) for whom, indeed, Aristotle did not want to allow voting rights.

In politics, many forms of human association can obviously be found; which one is suitable depends on circumstances, such as the natural resources, cultural traditions, industry, and literacy of each community. Aristotle did not regard politics as a study of ideal states in some abstract form, but rather as an examination of the way in which ideals, laws, customs, and property interrelate in actual cases. He thus approved the contemporary institution of slavery but tempered his acceptance by insisting that masters should not abuse their authority, since the interests of master and slave are the same. The Lyceum library contained a collection of 158 constitutions of the Greek and other states. Aristotle himself wrote the Constitution of Athens as part of the collection, and after being lost, this description was rediscovered in a papyrus copy in 1890. Historians have found the work of great value in reconstructing many phases of the history of Athens.


. Logic

In logic, Aristotle developed rules for chains of reasoning that would, if followed, never lead from true premises to false conclusions (validity rules). In reasoning, the basic links are syllogisms: pairs of propositions that, taken together, give a new conclusion. For example, “All humans are mortal” and “All Greeks are humans” yield the valid conclusion “All Greeks are mortal.” Science results from constructing more complex systems of reasoning. In his logic, Aristotle distinguished between dialectic and analytic. Dialectic, he held, only tests opinions for their logical consistency; analytic works deductively from principles resting on experience and precise observation. This is clearly an intended break with Plato's Academy, where dialectic was supposed to be the only proper method for science and philosophy alike.

Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2006. © 1993-2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2006. © 1993-2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.