I've been reading about the newest Microsoft operating system, trade named Vista. It is scheduled to be introduced for commercial use late this year. If I want to use it now, I have to go to Baghdad.

Surprising, but true. This morning's New York Times tells the story of the growing Internet presence in Iraq. For people who endanger their lives by walking to the store, computers provide a safe outlet. Virtual community is the only community some can risk. And because anti-piracy laws don't exist, they often obtain software before we do.

We are truly in the Information Age. But we're not the first people to center our lives and culture around the accumulation and transmission of such. The second great thinker in Western history would have loved the Internet. Except that he already knew more than it does, or wanted to. As we continue our Friday series on the reasons we think as we do, let's meet Aristotle today.

The greatest of Plato's pupils was the most unlikely. Aristotle (384-322 B.C.) was the son of a doctor and the heir of a long family tradition in medicine. Not exactly the career pursuit a teacher would suggest who believed the physical is but a shadow. He grew up in Stagira, a city in Chalcidice on the north coast of the Aegean Sea. When he was eighteen he entered Plato's Academy, and stayed there for twenty years (until Plato's death in 348 B.C.).

Sometimes Aristotle maintained an excellent relationship with his teacher. On other days he would linger after lectures and challenge Plato's ideas and reasoning. Plato referred to him as the "mind" of the Academy. When Aristotle once conducted a sharp polemic against the master, Plato compared him to a filly that kicks the dam whose milk it drank. And when Plato's favorite pupils were absent one day, Aristotle argued so ruthlessly with the 80-year-old master that Plato was obliged to remain away from his own Academy for three months. Tough stuff, philosophy.

At Plato's death, Aristotle was incensed that he was not put in charge of the Academy (one wonders why he was surprised). Plato's nephew got the job instead, proving that academic politics haven't changed. And so Aristotle stormed off, moved to the principality of an old student of his named Hermias, married his niece, and wrote a noble poem when Hermias was later betrayed and crucified. From there he moved to the coast of Asia Minor to study marine biology. And by the way, for three years (from 343-340 B.C.) he tutored the heir to the throne of Macedonia, a young man named Alexander.

In 335 Aristotle returned to Athens to found his own philosophical school, the Lyceum. Here he built the first important library in Greece, with a large collection of maps and a natural history museum. Given his family background, it is no surprise that his curriculum was broader than Plato's Academy, including natural sciences, biology, literature, psychology, and the new science of logic.

Unlike Plato's artistic dialogues, Aristotle's works were composed of his straightforward, tightly reasoned lectures. He gave these lectures while walking about the spacious gardens of the Lyceum with his students while they discussed various subjects together. Hence the "peripatetic" method of teaching (from the Greek words for "to walk about"). Many preachers are peripatetics and don't even know it.

In 323 B.C., when Alexander the Great died and an anti-Macedonian sentiment swept the country, Aristotle was forced to abandon his Lyceum. He fled the country, and died the next year.