The year 2016 has been announced by UNESCO as "Aristotle Anniversary Year," celebrating 2400 years since the birth of the great philosopher and scientist who was a pupil of Plato and a tutor to Alexander the Great. While Alexander conquered physical empires, it is Aristotle who has the greater influence and relevance today, for his conquests were of the mind.

The breadth of Aristotle's work is staggering -- biology, zoology, astronomy, meteorology, ethics, logic, politics, art, philosophy, metaphysics, music, drama, rhetoric and poetics. Aristotle is celebrated as one of the first thinkers to systematize philosophy, science and math.

Mention should also be made of Aristotle's relationship to his teacher, Plato. Alfred North Whitehead observed that: "The history of Western philosophy is no more than a series of footnotes to Plato's philosophy." Samuel Taylor Coleridge noted with some truth that everyone by temperament is either a Platonist or an Aristotelian. By that he meant that people tend to be either idealists like Plato, who look inward to the creations of the mind, or Aristotelians, who look outward to observe the detail of the world, breaking it down into categories and trying to figure out how humankind fits in.

At a time when most countries, including China, are debating and working out the rule of law and the relationship between the individual and society, Aristotle's investigations remain relevant and timely. It was Aristotle, for example, who stressed the importance of equality, noting that: "The only stable state is one in which all men are equal before the law." In our increasingly narcissistic world where the focus tends to be more on fame than service leadership, Aristotle also provides an important caution that: "At his best, man is the noblest of all animals; separated from law and justice he is the worst."

In a world where global perspectives are increasingly important, it was Aristotle who did one of the first comparative works -- a study of the various Greek city state constitutions. His detailed observations and intense personal investigations laid the foundations for the development of a scientific approach to categorization and systematization that set the foundations for the Enlightenment and Age of Reason centuries later.

Aristotle also stressed the importance of education. He wrote that: "The educated differ from the uneducated as much as the living differ from the dead." He acknowledged that the act of becoming educated takes hard work: "The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet." As his own prodigious explorations demonstrated, his vision of education was comprehensive.

At a time when we tend to overly stress technical knowledge, Aristotle reminds us as well that it is vital to develop a person's character. He wrote: "I count him braver who overcomes his desires than him who overcomes his enemies." He noted, for example, that "Anybody can become angry -- that is easy, but to be angry with the right person and to the right degree and at the right time and for the right purpose, and in the right way -- that is not with everybody's power and is not easy."

At a time when politicians are struggling to convince their citizens of their views, many would do well to revisit Aristotle's Rhetoric. In that great work, Aristotle stressed that persuasion requires attention to ethos, logos and pathos. Ethos refers to a person's credibility -- all of the personal characteristics (character, intelligence, integrity, sincerity, experience, etc). Logos is the appeal to reason -- logic, argument, statistics and other evidence. Pathos is the appeal to the emotions. Aristotle knew that emotions drive decision making and people are not likely to be persuaded unless one also appeals to the underlying "why," or motivations.

In a 21st century that emphasizes innovation and entrepreneurship, Aristotle was an entrepreneur with his own school. He was also greatly aided by the fact that, as the tutor of Alexander the Great, he had access to resources that enabled him to follow his many educational pursuits. In today's world we are increasingly seeing the relationships between things and diverse fields. A significant percentage of innovations come from people outside the industry who are unencumbered by the blind spots of past solutions and who bring a new way of thinking and perspective. As we work through today's challenges, let us hope that among the billions people on our planet today, new Aristotles are emerging who will discover and invent new forms of knowledge to light the way for us just as Aristotle did many centuries before.

Eugene Clark is a columnist with China.org.cn. For more information please visit:

http://www.china.org.cn/opinion/eugeneclark.htm

Opinion articles reflect the views of their authors only, not necessarily those of China.org.cn.

Go to Forum >>0 Comment(s)