Book contents
- Aristotle’s Anthropology
- Aristotle’s Anthropology
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Part I Human Beings as Rational Animals
- Part II Human Nature in the Light of Aristotle’s Biology
- Chapter 5 Is Reason Natural?
- Chapter 6 Spot the Differences!
- Chapter 7 Aristotle on the Anthropological Difference and Animal Minds
- Part III Aristotle’s Moral Anthropology
- Part IV Aristotle’s Political Anthropology
- Bibliography
- Index
Chapter 7 - Aristotle on the Anthropological Difference and Animal Minds
from Part II - Human Nature in the Light of Aristotle’s Biology
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 27 May 2019
- Aristotle’s Anthropology
- Aristotle’s Anthropology
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Part I Human Beings as Rational Animals
- Part II Human Nature in the Light of Aristotle’s Biology
- Chapter 5 Is Reason Natural?
- Chapter 6 Spot the Differences!
- Chapter 7 Aristotle on the Anthropological Difference and Animal Minds
- Part III Aristotle’s Moral Anthropology
- Part IV Aristotle’s Political Anthropology
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Aristotle did not deal with anthropological topics under that name. Small wonder, since that label was only coined in the sixteenth century. Nor did he devote a specific treatise to what we would nowadays call philosophical anthropology. But the impact of his writings on biology and the philosophy of mind have been second to none. At a methodological level, Aristotle’s essentialist metaphysics and the ensuing doctrines of definition and taxonomy (‘Porphyrian tree’) have provided the most important paradigm for anthropology’s endeavour to determine the nature of human beings. This quest immediately leads on to the two central problems of anthropology down the ages. On the one hand, there is the question of
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- Aristotle's Anthropology , pp. 140 - 160Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2019
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