Uncle Emanuel Watkins
03-13-2009, 12:47 PM
The effects of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle on the continents of Europe, Africa and Near East Asia
The works of Aristotle were introduced to Western Europe by the Arab Moors by way of its conquered territory of Southern Spain:
http://www.d.umn.edu/~nhassan/research/guidephilosophers.html
Study of Aristotle and the Averroists
To understand the crucial importance of this controversy for Western thought, it is necessary to consider the context in which it occurred. Before the time of Aquinas, Western thought had been dominated by the philosophy of St. Augustine, the Western church's great Father and Doctor of the 4th and 5th centuries, who taught that in the search for truth people must depend upon sense experience. Early in the 13th century the major works of Aristotle were made available in a Latin translation, accompanied by the commentaries of Averroës and other Islamic scholars. The vigor, clarity, and authority of Aristotle's teachings restored confidence in empirical knowledge and gave rise to a school of philosophers known as Averroists. Under the leadership of Siger de Brabant, the Averroists asserted that philosophy was independent of revelation. Averroism threatened the integrity and supremacy of Roman Catholic doctrine and filled orthodox thinkers with alarm. To ignore Aristotle, as interpreted by the Averroists, was impossible; to condemn his teachings was ineffectual. He had to be reckoned with. Albertus Magnus and other scholars had attempted to deal with Averroism, but with little success. Aquinas succeeded brilliantly.
Plato's influence in Europe is depicted in both the mathematicians Galileo and Descartes.
In order to challenge the great Aristotle, whose noteriety the Catholic Church had almost elevated to the heigths of Christ Himself, Galileo found it wise and tactful to use a method of Aristotle's teacher by writing a Platonic like dialogue:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialogue_Concerning_the_Two_Chief_World_Systems
In order to reesablish a semblance of rational thought after it had become a shambles following the persecution of Galileo, Descartes concluded not with a logical statement but with more of a platonic "best principled" or "first principled" statement -- "Cogito ergo sum" (I think, therefore I am).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cogito_ergo_sum
The Arabs influenced Timbuktu and the other civilizations of Western Africa. This is in and around the general ancient hearth of the Ivory Coast where African people under bondage to other Africans were later sold to the New and Old Worlds as slaves.
http://www.timbuktufoundation.org/history.htm
After the Greek philosophy transcended from the heighths of the Zenith to that of the Hellenistic age -- which included the skeptics, stoics and so on -- the Arabs became the modern civilization while Western Europe fell behind, comparitively. For example, the Islam religion had already divided themselves up into Platonic and Aristotilian Muslims long before the Christians would later do the same.
http://webs.csu.edu/~amakedon/articles/GreekCulture.html
The point in referencing here the true heritage of Western Civilization is to establish the differences between the FORMAL culture that we inherited from our Founding-Fathers, one that is self-evident and unalienably a natural right, and the minor cultures that we all brought with us from our prior foreign homelands.
The works of Aristotle were introduced to Western Europe by the Arab Moors by way of its conquered territory of Southern Spain:
http://www.d.umn.edu/~nhassan/research/guidephilosophers.html
Study of Aristotle and the Averroists
To understand the crucial importance of this controversy for Western thought, it is necessary to consider the context in which it occurred. Before the time of Aquinas, Western thought had been dominated by the philosophy of St. Augustine, the Western church's great Father and Doctor of the 4th and 5th centuries, who taught that in the search for truth people must depend upon sense experience. Early in the 13th century the major works of Aristotle were made available in a Latin translation, accompanied by the commentaries of Averroës and other Islamic scholars. The vigor, clarity, and authority of Aristotle's teachings restored confidence in empirical knowledge and gave rise to a school of philosophers known as Averroists. Under the leadership of Siger de Brabant, the Averroists asserted that philosophy was independent of revelation. Averroism threatened the integrity and supremacy of Roman Catholic doctrine and filled orthodox thinkers with alarm. To ignore Aristotle, as interpreted by the Averroists, was impossible; to condemn his teachings was ineffectual. He had to be reckoned with. Albertus Magnus and other scholars had attempted to deal with Averroism, but with little success. Aquinas succeeded brilliantly.
Plato's influence in Europe is depicted in both the mathematicians Galileo and Descartes.
In order to challenge the great Aristotle, whose noteriety the Catholic Church had almost elevated to the heigths of Christ Himself, Galileo found it wise and tactful to use a method of Aristotle's teacher by writing a Platonic like dialogue:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialogue_Concerning_the_Two_Chief_World_Systems
In order to reesablish a semblance of rational thought after it had become a shambles following the persecution of Galileo, Descartes concluded not with a logical statement but with more of a platonic "best principled" or "first principled" statement -- "Cogito ergo sum" (I think, therefore I am).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cogito_ergo_sum
The Arabs influenced Timbuktu and the other civilizations of Western Africa. This is in and around the general ancient hearth of the Ivory Coast where African people under bondage to other Africans were later sold to the New and Old Worlds as slaves.
http://www.timbuktufoundation.org/history.htm
After the Greek philosophy transcended from the heighths of the Zenith to that of the Hellenistic age -- which included the skeptics, stoics and so on -- the Arabs became the modern civilization while Western Europe fell behind, comparitively. For example, the Islam religion had already divided themselves up into Platonic and Aristotilian Muslims long before the Christians would later do the same.
http://webs.csu.edu/~amakedon/articles/GreekCulture.html
The point in referencing here the true heritage of Western Civilization is to establish the differences between the FORMAL culture that we inherited from our Founding-Fathers, one that is self-evident and unalienably a natural right, and the minor cultures that we all brought with us from our prior foreign homelands.