"Plato is dear to me, but dearer still is the truth."

If we approach Aristotle's famous words objectively, they can provide a sufficient summary of his philosophy that rejects the Platonic view "that the moral evaluations of daily life presuppose a 'good' which is independent of experience, personality, and circumstances" (1). 

Aristotle (384-322 BC), one of the founding fathers of Western philosophical inquiry, was born to a physician named Nicomachus, who served as the royal physician in the court of Amnytas II, King of Macedonia. Raised in an academic atmosphere, Aristotle went on to study under Plato in Athens and remained there until Plato's death in 347 BC. He later became the tutor of Alexander, the thirteen-year-old son of King Philip. Although there is no historical evidence to suggest that his teachings influenced Alexander's conquests and idea of political unity, Alexander did subsidize many of Aristotle's research works in natural sciences. At the age of fifty-two, Aristotle founded the Lyceum, one of the four important schools of Western antiquity. The years that followed were of great significance in Aristotle's life as he is reputed to have written more than four hundred works during the period. He combined the roles of encyclopedist, scientist, and philosopher and also founded the largest libraries of the Greek era. After the death of Alexander and the subsequent anti-Macedonian uprising, Aristotle moved to Chalcis on the island of Euboea and died in exile. Aristotle's works mainly deal with a) theoretical sciences - Metaphysics, Physics, Astronomy, Biology, and Psychology; b) practical sciences - Nichomachean ethics, Eudemian ethics; c) political sciences - Rhetoric, Poetics; and d) Logic - Organon.

The social condition of Aristotle’s time

In Aristotle's time, the Cretan cities were settled by tribal invaders from the north who had sacked the city of Cnossus and conquered the Cretan empire around 1400 BC. These invaders established their own communities that were rigidly divided along class lines, with a polytheistic belief system and aristocratic monarchic governance. By the sixth and seventh centuries BC, as the population increased, the poverty of the lower classes, especially the farmers, created tremendous pressures for social reform and revolution. Cities like Athens found a solution by engaging in commerce and trade, which proved successful, and Athens subsequently became the centre of a new awakening in the Greek Peninsula. The aristocratic rule gave way to democratic experimentation with the emergence of wealthy trading people. Foreign trade interactions brought numerous new knowledge bases, and ordinary citizens began participating in political decision-making by the assembly, resulting in public courts. This gave rise to the Sophists, the predecessors of modern-day lawyers, who believed that "the purpose of an argument is victory, not truth." Later on, resentment towards this legacy became the root cause for the making of Socrates and his disciple Plato, who was Aristotle's teacher.

A bird’s view of Aristotle’s arguments

During his early days as a student of Plato, Aristotle supported and promoted Plato's ideas through arguments and writings. However, as he became more independent, he began to question and analyze Plato's ideas. According to Werner Jaeger, Aristotle lacked Plato's ability to synthesize his entire vision of the universe into a concise passage or paper, but he meticulously analyzed philosophy into its distinct streams and thoroughly examined each one.

Aristotle recognized the limitations of reason and understood that it could not function without the aid of the senses, unlike Socrates and Plato, who exaggerated the independence of the soul and the power of reason. Plato did not differentiate between logic and philosophy, but Aristotle sharply distinguished Logic from philosophy (Ontology) and the science of nature. Logic is dealt with in separate treaties, including the categories, of interpretation, and prior and posterior analytics. It is an instrument for gaining knowledge about being and not a theoretical or practical science.

Aristotle argued that every concept in the world corresponds to some form in nature, and that form is never abstract but remains an aspect of individual existence. Therefore, the universality of the form exists only in the mind as knowledge, and it is a logically related intelligence that does not necessarily correspond to any real relation in nature. The act of logical relation or universalization is always an act of selection and omission, indicating the incapacity of the intellect to understand the totality. Thus, while human minds cannot fully understand reality, they can still gain some understanding. The complexity of this partial understanding leads to a failure to distinguish between logic and Philosophy (ontology).

In contrast to Plato, who believed that individual things in the material world were copies of pure forms, Aristotle argued that physical entities do exert causal efficacy. He believed that when one form is replaced by another, the change is not simply reduced to succession, like a ripple in a pool, but rather physical entities pass on the motion (soul) that they receive.

Among this change of perspective between Aristotle and Plato, Aristotle’s critical and conscious attitude towards knowledge stands tall in Western thinking. He argued that the material world of nature is not the partial reflection of a pure of abstract universals. Even if they are partial reflections, the abstract universals in our minds are a partial reflection of the world of nature. “This world is not an array of copies, but they have an individual existence indeed. We do not come to know individual things by knowing other things first, they are the primary object of human knowledge”(5). These are firsthand knowledge derived through sense and these are real beings and are not individuated by something external including space and time. Although this argument is contestable, but he believed the change is not a mere succession. He argued a principle does not exist by itself, for its existence it has to have a union with a form. It is an enabling capacity for the form for other structures. So the form derives the ability for succession as well as discontinuity. “They not only suffer change; they also have active powers and exercise causal efficacy” (6).

Aristotle may have differed from Plato in many instances in their belief, but both of them believe in the concept of “all dependant on an ultimate first principle” For the universe remained an order of changing entities at different levels being organic and inorganic.

 For Aristotle, man is the outcome of a long process of evolution, where he holds a reasoning capacity which differentiates them from otherworldly beings. For him, a man was composed of matter & form and the soul is bound by it. If there is nobody with corporeal organs for sense even the power of reason will not have any existence. He believed it is only with difficulty and indirect that the soul can come to understand the nature of itself and its non-physical operations. But still, this reasoning is bound to the body, so Aristotle tread very cautiously regarding God’s position in the universe. Nevertheless, he man with all his limitations of reasoning, with the aid of sense our rational faculty can gain accurate insight concerning physical things, including the unmoved mover of nature, God, the non-physical existence.(7) 

3) Plato argued in Republic that there is no higher individual group substance and social unity depends upon common agreement with respect to the common good. But men are also bound together into smaller groups like family and other for other less conscious needs. So if one rationally transforms these needs then for society such small groups like family will become unnecessary. Aristotle differed from Plato and argued all children born at the same time will never become brothers and sisters because human reason is bound to the body. Hence Flesh of flesh and blood of blood will be closer than Plato’s common brotherhood. 

In practical reasoning, Aristotle believed that both a theoretical element and a practical reason drive an action. This judgment is not solely based on an individual's intelligence, but also on their long experience and discipline. Aristotle believed that the combined judgment of many ordinary individuals in matters of politics was often sounder than that of a few experts. He asserted that the ideal state consists of good men of reason and virtue, and this can be achieved through a highly disciplined and developed system of education.

Aristotle advocated for a mixed form of governance called "polity," which is a combination of oligarchy and democracy. He believed that man is a political animal and cannot exist as an individual by himself. A fully developed society consists of individuals and families cooperating together for the sake of living well. Aristotle argued that this would help in deriving customs and laws for the common good and would also eliminate extremes in society.

Aristotle acknowledged the existence of non-physical beings, which he called eternal substances, but he doubted the ability of the human mind to attain higher knowledge of them. He believed that God is a living being, eternal, and most good, and he did not sharply separate religion from philosophy.

For Aristotle, the human soul is the first animating form of a natural body and cannot exist as a whole without it, although the rational part is separable and immortal. The body is a physical thing located in space, and the animal part provides the faculties of sense and organs of locomotion. Aristotle detailed this further in De Anima, stating that the sense organ should receive actual stimulation from physical pressures, sounds, colours, etc. However, this is only the first condition of sensory feeling, and the feeling is already prepared beforehand. The colours are already embedded in the eye to differentiate and precipitate the sensory feeling, and simply having an eye drawn on the face would not be sufficient to perceive the feeling.

According to his argument, our senses allow us to perceive physical objects in our surroundings. However, since we have no control over these objects, such as the light that enables us to see, we only get a partial view of them due to the perspectival nature of vision. In response to this, he suggests that the imagination, which is under our control, helps us to create a near-complete picture of our sensory perceptions. Nevertheless, Aristotle notes that even with our imagination, we can never fully understand a situation, as seen in the example of a person who can only see the front of a house and can never fully explain it without visiting it.

 Aristotle also discusses the state of universality in human intellect, which involves separating everything irrelevant from the pure. He notes that if a concept relates to the matter that something is made of, it is specific. On the other hand, if it is acquired through a process of change, it is accidental. Therefore, all concepts are either generic, specific, or accidental.

 Like Socrates and Plato, Aristotle's moral theory is based on a refined ontology. He identifies two basic types of moral virtue: justice, which concerns the rational direction of social acts, and passional virtue, which deals with controlling our own subjective passions. Aristotle believes that these virtues cultivate a good life, which is the primary aim of sound statesmanship. He argues that through education, one can distinguish between practical and theoretical disciplines, such as moral virtue versus art. Art deals with the creation and use of tools for human life, while practical discipline is concerned with human actions. Aristotle notes that voluntary mistakes are preferable in art, but not in life.

 Aristotle believed that the cultivation of moral virtues is essential for attaining the good life, which is the ultimate goal of sound statesmanship. He also argued that through education, a clear distinction can be made between practical discipline, which pertains to human actions, and theoretical discipline, which is concerned with the manufacture and use of tools necessary for human life. In the context of art, he claimed that a voluntary mistake is preferable to an involuntary one, but this principle does not hold true for life (15).

 Aristotle's contributions to Greek thought extended beyond his exploration and expansion of the ideas of his predecessors. He conducted a critical investigation into the nature of human knowledge, laying a strong foundation for reason as the most important of all human faculties. However, he also recognized its limitations and weaknesses, demonstrating a deep and empirically accurate understanding of human cognition. In light of this, Aristotle remarked, "Plato is dear to me, but dearer still is the truth."

Ref:-
1-The concept of man in Greek thought –John Wild- P:48:5, George Allen & Unwin ltd, London
2)-W Jaeger, Aristotle (Tr. Robinson, Oxford, Clarendon Press)
3) De Anima 430 A 14-19
(4) Meta VI Ch 4
5) The ideas of men in Greek thought (p:56-98), Meta vii ch i
6) The concept of man in Greek thought –John Wild- P:79:2, George Allen & Unwin ltd, London
7) W Jaeger, Aristotle (Tr. Robinson, Oxford, Clarendon Press)
8) Pol. Ch. II
9) Pol. I 1253 A I
10) Pl. I ch. I and Ch .2 1252 B-27-ch 3
11) Book 12 Metaphysics.
12 De An 412 A 29
13) Categories ch.2
14)Nic. Eth. V,iii, cha 6-iv, ch 8
15) Nic Eth vi 1140 B 20-30