Philosophy Paper Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 1

Philosophy Paper - Essay Example An in-depth analysis of Aristotle’s criticism of Plato will necessarily reveal that, in some cases, Aristotle has failed to perceive the heart of Platonic concept of ‘form’. In other cases, it seems that Plato himself failed to predict oppositions such Aristotle’s criticisms and, therefore, to add some reasonable tenets to the concept of ‘form’. For example, he could say that Forms are the replications of the One and Oneness, and as the terms, ‘one’ and ‘many’, are meaningless without one another, ‘form’ and ‘particulars’ are meaningless without each other. For human cognitive process, both are simultaneously necessary, though ‘form’ precedes physical reality, as one precedes many. Indeed, these tenets are inherent to the idea of ‘form’ and they need not be invented; rather they need to be discovered. Aristotle’s criticisms themselves have limitations; therefor e, referring to those limitations and proving the effectiveness of the concept of ‘form’ to explain those limitations, Plato could make his theory of ‘form’ more self-sufficient. Plato claims that different ‘forms’ of different physical realities exist prior to the existence of physical realities. For him, the physical realities are the replicas or facsimiles of the ‘form’. He sees it as the ideal essence of the physical existence of things in this world. It is perfect, indivisible, transcendent and immutable. He believes that because of an innate idea of these forms, man can know things as they are. On the other hand, Aristotle complains that though ‘form’, as Plato assumes, exists prior to things’ physical existence, â€Å"Forms arises even of things of which we think there are no Forms† (Socrates 27). He further complains that Plato’s ‘form’ is applicable to static images of things (which he often names ‘substance’); therefore, it is not applicable to dynamic process of things such dissolution, decay, birth, etc. In Aristotle’s own words, â€Å"what on earth the Forms contribute to sensible things, either to those that are eternal or to those that come into being and cease to be. For they cause neither movement nor any changes in them† (Socrates 28). He makes his third criticism on the ground that the ‘substance’, which is concrete also, cannot evolve from the abstract, as he says, â€Å"All other things cannot come from the Forms in any of the usual senses of 'from'† (Socrates 34). Aristotle’s most severe criticism of Aristotle comes in a form of question: â€Å"why should '2' be one and the same in the perishable 2's or in those which are many but eternal, and not the same in the '2 itself' as in the particular 2?† (Socrates 39) Here, he asks that if two different particulars have something in comm on, will there be three forms (two for the two particulars and one for the common feature)? Plato could star his refutation of Aristotle’s criticisms by excavating the inherent limitations of Aristotle’s theory of ‘substance’. According to Plato, â€Å"‘Forms’ are as it were patterns fixed in the nature of things. The other things are copied from the Forms and are similarities.†