Topics Books I and VIII by Aristotle

Topics Books I and VIII by Aristotle

The Topics is Aristotle's treatise on dialectical argument, a practice perhaps as old as human language, systemized for the first time by Aristotle. This seminal text offers many important insights into his conception of logic, his development of the notion of the predicables (the Five Terms), and his ideas on the method of philosophical inquiry itself.This volume contains a clear and accurate translation of Books I and VIII of Aristotle's Topics together with a philosophical commentary on these books and additional selections from Books II and III, and from the Sophistical Refutations. These books and selections best give a general view of the main ideas, arguments, and techniques expounded in the Topics. The volume is well suited to the requirements of students, including those who do not know Greek.

In this work (which is well up to the high standard of the rest of the series) Smith helps us through the debates while going some way to make good the lack of commentaries* Richard Wallace, Greece and Rome *

ARISTOTLE was born in the northern Greek town of Stagira in 384 B.C.E., where his father was the personal physician to the great-grandfather of Alexander the Great. At the age of eighteen Aristotle entered Plato's Academy and soon became recognized as its most important student. He remained under Plato's tutelage for nearly twenty years.

After his teacher's death in 347 B.C.E., Aristotle cultivated associations with other Academy students throughout Greece and Asia Minor. Then in 342 B.C.E., Aristotle was asked by King Philip II of Macedonia to become the tutor for his young son Alexander, who was later to become the conqueror of much of the known world at that time. The young prince remained under Aristotle's supervision until 336 B.C.E., when he acceded to the throne after his father's death. Two years later Aristotle returned to Athens and founded his own school, which he called the Lyceum. This intellectual center flourished during the years when Alexander the Great ruled Greece as part of his large empire. But upon Alexander's death in 323 B.C.E., Aristotle was charged with impiety by Athenians who resented his associations with the Macedonian conqueror. Rather than risk the same fate as Plato's mentor, Socrates, Aristotle fled to the city of Chalcis, where he died in 322 B.C.E.

Aristotle's interests, like those of Plato, were diverse and his writing cast its shadow on many fields, including logic, metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, politics, and the sciences. Among his most well-known works are: The Categories, The Prior and Posterior Analytics, The Physics, The Meta-physics, De Anima, The Nicomachean Ethics, and The Politics.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780198239420
ISBN 10	0198239424
Title	Topics Books I and VIII
Author	Aristotle
Series	Clarendon Aristotle Series
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	Oxford University Press
Year published	1997-01-16
Number of pages	242
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.