Influence on Modern Economics5 Aristotle was born in 384 BC, at Stagira, in Macedonia, the son of a physician to the royal court. At the age of 17, he went to Athens to study at Plato's Academy. He remained there for about 20 years, as a student and then as a teacher.When Plato died in 347BC, Aristotle moved to Assos, a city in Asia Minor, to counsel Hermias, the ruler. After Hermias was captured and executed by the Persians in 345BC, Aristotle went to Pella, the Macedonian capital, where he became the tutor of the king's young son Alexander, later known as Alexander the Great. In 335, when Alexander became king, Aristotle returned to Athens and established his own school, the Lyceum. Upon the death of Alexander in 323BC, strong anti-Macedonian feeling developed in Athens, and Aristotle retired to a family estate in Euboea . He died there the following year.WorksApart from a few fragments in the works of later writers, the transcripts of his lectures have been completely lost. Only a few brief excerpts of some of his technical notes have survived. However, the texts on which Aristotle's reputation rests are largely based on his lecture notes for carefully outlined courses, which were collected and arranged by later editors.Among the texts are dissertations on: logic, called Organon; natural sciences, called Physics; nature, scope and properties of being, called Metaphysics; and ethics, called Nicomachean Ethics (dedicated to his son Nicomachus). Some other works include his Rhetoric, his Poetics, his Politics, and his Economics.MethodsAristotle's philosophy laid its principal stress on biology. Aristotle regarded the world as made up of individuals (substances) occurring in fixed natural kinds (species). Each individual has its built-in specific pattern of development and grows toward proper self-realization as a specimen of its type. Growth, purpose, and direction are thus built into nature.The most distinguishing of Aristotle...
