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.

Aristotle's major work was nothing much--just gathering all the learning of the past and present, in the fields of science, philosophy, rhetoric, law, and literature, and organizing this knowledge into meaningful patterns which would be available to posterity. And we thought Plato was broad.

The result was philosophy developed on the largest possible scale. Aristotle's career established the great divisions of philosophy which are still accepted today, and he made enduring contributions in each of them. Let's look at these contributions, each in turn.

If we are going to organize all learning into one system, we will need a strategy. And so Aristotle's first contribution to philosophy and Western thought was to state the laws of logic as we know them today. He studied the structure of rational thought, seeking to define those essential principles which sustain all reasoned inquiry. And he succeeded.

We all employ three basic axioms whenever we think in ordered ways. First, we use what Aristotle called the law of identity: A is A, and it must remain so. In other words, we begin by identifying the reality we are seeking to understand. We name it, quantify it, qualify it. We first want to know what it is, and how it relates to the rest of reality.

Then we move to the second axiom of reason: the law of contradiction: A is B, or it is not B, but it cannot be both. Whenever we identify something, we also identify what it is not. And it cannot be both, or reason breaks down. The page on which you are reading these words is either visible or it is not. If we think it is both, we cannot think about it at all.

Now we're ready for the last axiom of logic: the law of the excluded middle: A is B or it is not B, but it cannot be both at the same time. A statement must be either true or false within a given logical context. We must choose.

These laws of logic have sustained rational inquiry from Aristotle to today. This effect has been both very good and very bad, for reasons we'll soon investigate.

The logical approach Aristotle brought to the work of philosophy was a distinct departure from Plato's dialogues on scattered subjects. But his greatest break with his master came not in strategy but in substance, literally.

Remember that Plato was convinced by Pythagoras that there is a world of Forms or Ideas, distinct from this physical world, and that this world is but an imperfect shadow of that which is real. This ontology was the foundation for Plato's approach to the soul, the physical universe, aesthetics, and the future.

Aristotle rejects this essential premise. Completely. He is certain that the Form, such as it is, is to be found in the material world itself. Rather than being a shadow of the real, the physical universe is the real. Why did Aristotle come to this monumental shift of worldviews? And why does it matter?

Aristotle begins in his usual logical way. Rational beings must know objective truths, or they are not rational. However, the Forms cannot be known objectively--they are the product of a speculative philosophical system, not empirical experience. And so the primary realities of life must be the individual things we perceive. As a result, the Forms (such as they are) must be contained in the objects themselves.

In this view, individual concrete entities are real and scientifically knowable. Aristotle calls these entities the "substance," the thing which actually exists. He takes Plato's Forms to describe the unchanging essence which gives the thing its definition and purpose. As a result, things can change in quantity, quality, and position, but they cannot change in themselves because of their form.

And so Aristotle's ontology incorporates Plato's insistence on objective truth and values, as it was learned from Socrates. He explains how the world can change (cf. Heraclitus) while affirming unchanging values and timeless truths (cf. Parmenides). And he makes it possible for philosophy to be relevant to the observable world of real life experience.

One example of this relevance is Aristotle's fascination with biology. He was the first to construct a system for naming, categorizing, and relating all living forms. Another example is his view of the universe. He saw the observable universe as eternal and all-embracing, with nothing (such as a world of Forms) outside it, and theorized that it is hierarchically ordered and subject to causation in every respect. His understanding of physics was formative until well after the time of Copernicus--for centuries, the heavenly bodies revolved around the earth in perfectly elliptical, rational orbits. Or so the world thought. Such theories and many others were motivated by Aristotle's shift from the unseen Forms to the observable Substance of life.

How does this new perspective change things? In every way. If Aristotle is right, there is no "spiritual" realm to be separated from the "secular." God is not distant from this material universe. Spirituality is best developed by studying the empirical things which surround us. Ministry happens by reaching the world we can see, not by escaping to the world we cannot.

In coming Fridays we'll watch this philosophical shift as it works itself out in monumental ways across Western culture.

Some of the most intellectual facts have the most mundane explanations. For instance, most Christians do not know that the letters of Paul are arranged as they are for this deeply spiritual reason: they go from longest to shortest. Many people do not know that "Bible" comes from Byblos, the town where ancient paper was harvested and processed, so that the Holy Bible is simply the Holy Book. And many theologians and other Christians use the word "metaphysics" without ever knowing its deeply intellectual etymology--it is so named simply because Aristotle's writings on this subject were placed after ("meta") his writings on physics in his collected works. Philosophical trivia is such fun, isn't it?

When we reach Aristotelian metaphysics, we come to the most significant single subject in his thought relative to Christian faith. Remember that Aristotle believed the physical universe acts according to predictable laws of cause and effect. All substances are in constant motion. So, he asked himself, where did all this motion begin?

It seemed reasonable to Aristotle to suggest that motion requires a mover. All observable experience suggests that this is so. And so an Unmoved Mover must be the first cause of all other motion. This Mover would be purely immaterial in nature, on the order of Mind, since all material things require something else to begin their motion. Unlike Plato's Forms, it can cause physical reaction by direct involvement with the material universe, since the Form is in the Substance.

And so Aristotle believed that a Mind exists, self-sufficient and containing all knowledge and motion within itself. This Unmoved Mover would be impersonal, with no capacity for individual relationship with us. We can accept the existence of this God, but we cannot know him (or it).

When we apply Aristotle's laws of logic to his theology, we soon see how incompatible his metaphysics are with Christian faith. God cannot be three and one, for this is a contradiction; Jesus cannot be fully God and man, for the same reason. If laws of logic prevail, the Bible cannot be fully inspired and yet the product of human personality; God cannot be sovereign over the future while allowing us free will. But these denials of Christian belief are no problem for Aristotle, for he holds none of these beliefs.

When a theologian uses non-contradiction as the test for all truth, know that Aristotle is pleased. But God may not be.

From theology, Aristotle soon moved to ethics. His work comprised the first comprehensive study of morality in Western history. He was primarily concerned with finding the underlying purpose for human existence. And he (and millions after him) thought he succeeded admirably.

Aristotle observed that all people aim at eudaemonia--well-being or exalted happiness. (Note the influence of this idea on Thomas Jefferson and the Declaration of Independence.) Aristotle believed that the life of reason leads to this happiness, manifested as a holistic, complete life. For him, virtue is a settled disposition of character and right behavior. The life of reason flourishes when we follow a balanced course, the "golden mean."

And so Aristotle wanted us to feel anger, but not too much--righteous indignation, but not irrational action. He wanted us to feel sexual attraction, but not to the point of obsession. He wanted us to seek wealth, but not so much that we become overly materialistic. And so on.

Above all, he wanted us to contemplate life. Here we find perfection in the direct knowledge of the realities revealed to us by metaphysics, mathematics, and his philosophy of nature. The more we seek to understand perfection, as revealed in the imperfect world around us, the more our souls are elevated to eudaemonia. This idea would influence spirituality for more than a thousand years.

For Aristotle, the soul is the highest principle of life and being. It possessed no previous, disembodied immortality (vs. Orpheus and Plato). And the only part of you which lives beyond your death is the "separate reason," the highest part of your soul. Your soul operates in your body through the pneuma--a life-giving heat (literally "hot air"). By this active material principle, your soul influences your body.

And so with Aristotle we arrive at the "tripart" view of humanity which is still highly influential today--body, soul, and spirit. This is not at all the biblical view of mankind (which sees us as a whole being, variously described as body, soul, and spirit, but one creation). But it is the most popular today.

Like Plato, Aristotle thought art to be highly influential. Unlike Plato, he believed it to be valuable for our souls. Since the Form is in the Substance (the sensory world), artistic reflection on the world which surrounds us is good for our souls.

And so Aristotle wanted art to imitate life. He especially liked art which appeals to the emotions as well as the intellect. And he most especially liked art which helps to purge our spirits. This cathartic function of artistic expression is the highest purpose an artist can achieve, in Aristotle's view. Tragic drama is therefore the best art, for it operates psychologically to relieve us of the oppressive emotions of pity and fear.

This philosophy of art has become is one of the most influential aesthetic theories all time. It has been used to justify all sorts of artistic expression, and has itself been subject to significant critique. In short, it is by no means certain that an artistic cathartic experience relieves us of our emotions or the need to act them out. Much evidence indicates that such artistic experience actually creates in us an even greater desire to act out what we have seen the artist do.

Aristotle would say, "The drama kept me from doing it." Many psychologists today would say the opposite.

Aristotle wrote more than a thousand manuscripts. Unfortunately, only a few of his writings have survived, in the form of notes used in lectures. These were assembled by his pupil, Theophrastus, and sent to Asia Minor for safe keeping. Here they remained for 150 years, until they were translated into Latin, Syrian, and Arabic. They were lost again, and not rediscovered until the fifth century A.D., when they were translated from the Arabic versions.

From the fifth to the fifteenth centuries, Aristotle was regarded as the fountainhead of all knowledge. Thomas Aquinas called him "the Philosopher"; Dante called him "the Master of those who know." Education and culture were based on his thought, and his works were studied and memorized as dogma.

Reaction against Aristotle came with the Renaissance and Francis Bacon's critical philosophy. The flaws in his method, conclusions, and theories were pointed out. Some scientists believe that blind acceptance of the errors of Aristotle stunted the growth of science for hundreds of years.

The progress of Greek philosophy after Plato and Aristotle changed dramatically after their deaths. No great original systems would appear; thinkers for the most part were satisfied to repeat their opinions. From his time to ours, no other man has made such a serious addition to so many branches of knowledge as Aristotle. From theology to psychology, his philosophical construction shaped the Western world for more than a millennium. And its impact on our worldview continues today.

If a great man plants trees he'll never sit under, Aristotle was truly great. At least for philosophy. His impact on Christian faith is another matter, as we'll soon see.

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