Civilization #13: Aristotle and the Greek Legacy

Aristotle is a paradox. He is one of the most mysterious figures in world history. He's one of the most famous, but he's one of the most mysterious. He's a paradox for three reasons.

• The First Paradox: He is considered to be one of the greatest philosophers in human history, next to Plato. He's certainly as influential as Plato, but what is unique about him is we do not have anything originally written by him. We have no text that we believe was personally written by him, and that's unique in human history. We say Shakespeare was a great writer, and we can prove it or show it by reading his text. We believe Aristotle is a great thinker and a great writer, but we have no evidence, no text, to show us this is the case.
• The Second Paradox: He was a very prolific writer and thinker. In fact, we believe there are about 200 works attributed to Aristotle. What is unique about his work is the range of his thinking and his research. He wrote a book on politics: what is the best political system? He wrote a book on poetics—basically theater—and what makes for a good tragedy. He wrote a book on ethics: what is a good life? What makes a good person? He wrote a book on rhetoric: how do you convince the audience that you are correct? He also wrote books on physics, metaphysics, and biology. The range is just incredible. We have no analog in human history like him. He's completely unique in the range of his curiosity.
• The Third Paradox: This is the most problematic. We know that Aristotle studied under Plato for 20 years, and so we also believe that Aristotle was Plato's most famous student. The paradox is Aristotle's understanding of the universe is radically opposed to Plato's understanding of the universe. And that, again, is unique in human history. You would think the best student would carry on the master's work or at least build on it. But Aristotle’s understanding of the universe is in conflict with Plato's work. In fact, you could also argue that Aristotle is negating Plato's worldview.

Plato vs. Aristotle: Two Conflicting Worldviews

To understand the conflict, we must first understand Plato. For Plato, there is a God, and it's called the form of the good. The form of the good is what is eternal, perfect, and immutable. Now, the form of the good emanates other perfections, what he calls the form of the ideal. These are concepts like justice, beauty, and reason. Then, these concepts manifest themselves in forms like a horse or a woman. And these are the ideal, perfect, immutable, eternal manifestations. So there's only one horse; it's up in heaven. Everything else is a copy of this horse or an imitation of this horse.

We live in the shadow realm, where everything is imitation. This is our reality—a shadow reality. And that's why art, poetry, and theater are so bad: because they are really an imitation of an imitation. This is Plato's hierarchy.

From this worldview, we can make certain extrapolations. The first is that for Plato, what is good is if you approach or return to the form of the good. What is evil or bad is if you move away from the form of the good. So poetry is evil; mathematics is good. Why is mathematics good? Because mathematics is what allows you to approach the form of the good.

Let me give you an example. Let's say there's a circle. What Plato argues is no matter how hard you try, you could never, ever draw a perfect circle in this world. Because a circle has an edge, it's literally impossible for you to create something without an edge. You might say, "Well, I can draw on the computer," but if you go to a microscopic level, you will always find an edge. So how do you create a circle? You create a circle by imagining it in your head. What you're really doing is imagining the circle because you're accessing the realm of the forms; you're approaching the form of the good. It is only through a process of pure thought, pure philosophy, pure mathematics that you can actually start to understand this world.

Aristotle has a completely different understanding. Aristotle starts with this: God is a prime mover. Just imagine a big bang—something explodes, boom, it moves and it forces other things to move as well. What Aristotle is saying is everything is really in motion. Everything is change because it was all caused by the prime mover.

In Aristotle's world, what is good is if the thing that changes moves towards its purpose, or the word he uses is telos. If you're moving towards your purpose, you are doing good in this world. If you're moving away from your purpose, you're doing bad in this world. The example is a soldier. The purpose of a soldier is to fight and win wars. So if you go fight and you do your best, you're doing good. But if you run away from a war, you're doing bad.

As you can see, these two worldviews cannot harmonize. They are in conflict with each other. You have either one or the other. Let me highlight the three major differences between these two worldviews. I need to emphasize this: I am not an expert on Aristotle or Plato, so I am committing oversimplifications. Scholars who are experts will hear this and be outraged. But for our purposes, I feel these oversimplifications provide clarity.

This conflict between Plato and Aristotle is what will inform the philosophical debate for all of Western civilization. There are two major camps in Western philosophy: the rationalist camp (people like Descartes) and the empiricist camp (people like David Hume). For most of Western history, philosophers will go back and forth between these two extremes: either the Platonic ideal or the Aristotelian reality.

The Argument: Aristotle as a Censor

So let's summarize where we are. Aristotle is a paradox: we have nothing that he wrote originally, the range of his work is incredible and unique, and his worldview is in direct conflict with Plato's, despite studying under him for 20 years.

How is this possible? How can we resolve these paradoxes? I'm going to make a controversial argument.

My argument is that Aristotle was not a philosopher, he was not a thinker, he was not a writer. What he was, ultimately, is what I refer to as a censor. You can also use words like systemizer, editor, or sympathizer.

Basically, nothing that he thought was original to him, but he decided what would be politically convenient for the moment. It's my argument that if we understand Aristotle as a censor, then these three paradoxes go away. We can explain them away.

The Evidence: Philip of Macedon and the Pan-Hellenic Project

My first piece of evidence is to compare and contrast the lives of Philip of Macedon and Aristotle. When you put their lives side-by-side, interesting parallels emerge.

• Aristotle was born in the year 384 BCE. Philip II was born in the year 383 BCE. That's about the same age.
• Philip II was a prince of Macedon; his father was the king. Aristotle's father was the court physician to the king—the king's personal doctor.

From these two pieces of information, we can guess that Philip and Aristotle grew up together. It would make sense they grew up together and would be educated together.

From 367 to 348 BCE, Aristotle went to Athens to study under Plato. Around the same time, from 369 to 365 BCE, Philip went to Thebes to study military innovation under the best generals in Greece. I would extrapolate and say that as teenagers, they were going to further their education and learn the best scientific and military innovations in order to bring them back to Macedon. We can also surmise that even while they were away, they were still in contact with each other.

In 359 BCE, Philip became regent, basically king, and from then on, he started a massive military campaign to conquer all of Greece. One thing that was interesting about Philip's conquest was that the Athenians didn't really oppose him. This is one of the great mysteries historians struggle with. One possible theory is that Philip II just bribed all these Athenian aristocrats. In fact, the man who most opposed Philip, an Athenian statesman named Demosthenes, actually said this in speeches. He said, "Listen, Philip tried to bribe me. And I know Philip is bribing all my opponents, but I'm telling you, Athenians, Philip is a menace to democracy, and that's why we must oppose him."

If Philip was bribing these Athenians, then who was the middleman? Who was the person in contact with these Athenian aristocrats? Aristotle. Why? Remember, Aristotle was at the Academy for 20 years. The Academy in Athens at that time was like Harvard or Oxford today; it's where all the rich and powerful go to study. For 20 years, Aristotle was in contact with and became friends with the most powerful individuals in Athens. That's why when Philip needed to negotiate with Athenians, it would make the most sense to send Aristotle.

We know that Philip united Greece in 338 BCE. Three years later, in 335 BCE, Aristotle started a new school in Athens in competition with the Academy, called the Lyceum. So what was the purpose of the Lyceum?

Philip had a vision for the world called the Pan-Hellenic project. At this time, Greece was divided into city-states all around the world. There were many who believed that this Greek world should unite because there's a common ancestry. It was the dream of many philosophers that a great man of history would arise and unite all of Greece by defeating Persia. Philip II said, "Hey, that's a great idea, and it should be me."

The problem is, the Pan-Hellenic project assumes a common Greek identity, and it didn't really exist at that time. Greeks probably had more in common with their local cultures than with each other. If you were a Greek living in Asia Minor, you were probably more Persian than you were Greek. In other words, Philip needed someone—a censor, basically—to create a Greek identity. The way you do that is by taking all this vast universe of knowledge that the Greeks created and creating an encyclopedia or a series of textbooks that define what it means to be Greek. You standardize and systemize Greek knowledge. That's probably what Aristotle was doing when he started the Lyceum.

Alexander's Conquest and the Pan-Hellenistic Project

The problem is that in 336 BCE, Philip was assassinated, and his son Alexander came to the throne. Alexander had a very different vision from his father. His father wanted to unite the Greek world; Alexander wanted to conquer the entire world to show he was superior to his father. Unbelievably, he was able to conquer most of the known world in about 10 years.

Suddenly, you have this sprawling empire all around the world.

This was not supposed to happen. Philip and the Pan-Hellenic project imagined their conquest would extend only to uniting the Greek world. Alexander went too far. Then Alexander died, and the empire was divided into three major fragments: the Antigonid dynasty in Greece and Macedon, the Ptolemaic Kingdom in Egypt, and the Seleucid Empire stretching from Anatolia to Pakistan.

Now that you've conquered these places, your problem is how to govern. You need a new culture. These different generals adopted different strategies. For example, in the Seleucid Empire, the Persian culture was extremely well-established, and the Seleucid king and his heirs decided on a process of localization, or what you can call synchronization—meaning two different cultures come together and coalesce.

At the same time, the Greeks were conquerors, so they still needed to maintain a coherent identity. It made sense for them to adopt a lot of Aristotle's work because he was creating a Pan-Hellenic identity. He basically created a lot of textbooks, an encyclopedia. It also made sense for them to import Aristotle's works because Aristotle was Macedonian, and for the longest time, Greeks did not consider Macedonians to be Greek. They saw Macedonians as barbarians. So it was in the best interest of these new Macedonian conquerors to exaggerate or highlight the intellectual contributions of Aristotle.

Ptolemy in Egypt was very different. Egyptian culture had been around for thousands of years, and Egyptians are very proud of their culture. This is a problem because if you're proud of your local culture, you don't like foreign rulers. The Persian Empire struggled with this for centuries. The Persians were famous for their tolerance, but because they were so supportive of local culture in Egypt, the Egyptians rebelled many times. Ptolemy and his heirs didn't want to make the same mistake. They wanted to impose a new culture on the Egyptians to show that they were superior and therefore more divine.

Ptolemy did many things to start this process. First, he stole Alexander's body from Babylon, where he died, and brought it back to Egypt. This started the Wars of the Diadochi, the successor wars. Second, he established a new capital in Alexandria, a new Greek city founded by Alexander. Third, he started to sponsor what we call today the Mouseion. The Mouseion is the root of the English word "museum," but it was really the world's first research university. Ptolemy and his heirs brought together the greatest Greek scholars in the world to basically continue the work of Aristotle: to standardize and systemize Greek culture so that they could impose it on the local Egyptian culture.

The most famous aspect of the Mouseion is the Library of Alexandria. The Ptolemies spent a lot of money on it, mainly by going around and collecting original manuscripts. A representative went to Athens and said, "We at the Library of Alexandria would like the original manuscripts for Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, the three great playwrights." The Athenians said they couldn't do that because they're like gods here. The Egyptians said, "What we're going to do is take these manuscripts back to the Library of Alexandria where our scribes will copy them out. That's all we're going to do, and then we'll give them back to you. As a guarantee, we're going to give you 15 talents of silver." That's like a billion dollars back then. The Athenians had never seen so much money, so they agreed. The Egyptians took the manuscripts, placed them in the Library of Alexandria, and told the Athenians to keep the money.

The Egyptians under Ptolemy were focused on turning Alexandria into the intellectual capital of the Greek world. After Alexander died and his generals took over, the Pan-Hellenic project really became what we call the Pan-Hellenistic project. It went from uniting the Greek world to spreading Greek culture all around the world.

Resolving the Paradoxes

Let's go back to the original paradoxes.

1. Why do we have nothing original from Aristotle? The answer is because Aristotle didn't write anything original. He stole everything from other thinkers, and students copied it out in manuscript form.
2. Why are his works so diverse? The answer is because he was trying to capture the essence of Greek knowledge. He was trying to unify Greek knowledge into an encyclopedia for dissemination around the world.
3. Why is Aristotle's philosophy so different from Plato's worldview? This is the most interesting question. Let's switch our perspective and ask ourselves: if you were a king of Macedon, if you were Philip or Alexander, what's your problem with Plato's philosophy?

The problem with Plato is if you, as Alexander, go to Plato and say, "I want to conquer the world," Plato would say, "What's the point? It's all not real. Alexander, you're just wasting your time. You can conquer the world, but all you're doing is conquering a shadow. What is real is the form of the good. Alexander, study mathematics, man. Do more math. Stop going around and killing people." Alexander would probably cut off Plato's head. Philip and Alexander would hate this philosophy. It's idiotic. "I want to conquer the world, but this philosophy is telling me it's pointless."

Now, compare this with Aristotle's prime mover theory. He is saying everything is in motion, and what is good is if you fulfill your purpose. If you're Alexander or Philip, this makes more sense. "I'm Philip. My purpose is to unite the Greek world, and the more I unite, the more good I'm doing for this world."

Also, if you're a king, you want your citizens, your soldiers, your workers to work hard. For Plato, working hard is useless; you're imitating an imitation. But for Aristotle, working hard is what gives you purpose; it's what gives you happiness. Aristotle also promoted two major concepts: arete and eudaimonia. Arete is just excellence. Alexander has arete; he is an excellent general. When you have arete and you are achieving your purpose, then you achieve eudaimonia, which is just flourishing or happiness. And that's the purpose of life: to have arete and to achieve eudaimonia. So work hard. Fight for Alexander. Support him as he conquers the world because he's making the world better.

But as a soldier, am I not approaching the form of the good?

That's a great question. For Plato, the answer is no. The reason why is that what you do in this material world is pointless because this material world is not real. So whatever you do is not real. What you need to do is return to the form of the good, but your body can't do that. Your soul can do that. Your use of the body is pointless; you have to use your soul, you have to use your mind. Therefore, you have to be a good person. You have to engage in philosophy and mathematics, and that's how you return to the form of the good. If you engage in art, then you are deluding others, and that's more evil. If you're Alexander, you're conquering others and forcing them to believe your fake philosophy, then you're committing the most evil in the world.

The Enduring Legacy of the Greeks

Even though we can argue back and forth about Aristotle and his provenance, what is not debatable is the profound influence that Aristotle had on the world. We can argue if Aristotle was the original writer or thinker, but what is not debatable is the tremendous influence he had on the entire world. There are three aspects of the Greek legacy I want to discuss.

1. The Greeks created a new way of being human. Look at the major thinkers: Homer, the playwrights Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, and the philosophers like Plato and Aristotle. Homer was an oral bard. He would get up in front of audiences and for hours recite beautiful poetry about the Trojan War. Listening to Homer created empathy and imagination. The playwrights, rather than singing directly at the audience, had characters face each other in a dialogue, a debate. By doing this, you create the capacity for perspective and inner debate. Then you have Plato and Aristotle, who took all the dialogue in the play and transported it onto the page. Now you're reading it by yourself with the benefit of time. This creates a capacity for reason and reflection. When you add these three things together, you now have a new human mind. When you study all of them, this is what we ultimately call a liberal arts education. Our greatest thinkers came to us through the liberal arts.
2. The Greeks established a cohesive cultural identity through education. One major function of the Library of Alexandria was to standardize and systemize Greek knowledge. They did this by standardizing texts. The text of Homer that we have today was developed by the people at the Library of Alexandria. They also created commentaries, which are basically like teacher handbooks. They created footnotes, chapters, page numbers, and indexes. The point was to make Greek education available and accessible to anyone. What this means is we can actually read Homer, Aeschylus, and Plato for ourselves, even though we are not culturally Greek. That's the benefit of the Pan-Hellenistic project.
3. Greek knowledge meant a global revolution in innovation. Greek knowledge was being spread all around the world and interacting with powerful local cultures. Through the process of synchronization, new forms of knowledge were being created. The Greeks spread their knowledge to India, where it interacted with local Indian philosophy and religion. The most famous synchronization was in the Levant, where Greek knowledge was being spread to the Jews. When you put the Greeks and the Jews together, you have a new idea that would forever revolutionize human history: Christianity. Christianity would not have been possible if it were not for the work of Aristotle.

It is perfectly fair to say the Greeks were the most influential and consequential civilization of all time. They're certainly the most creative. No other civilization even comes close to their creativity.