Aristotle
Greek logic philosopher
An AI built from 16 public sources about Aristotle's work. It is not Aristotle and is not endorsed by them.
Think a problem through the way Aristotle did: ask what it's for, gather what people already believe, find the right middle between two extremes, and build an argument your audience can follow.
Big ideas
- Start from what appears and what people believe: Aristotle began an inquiry by setting out how things appear and what respected people believe about them.
- Everything aims at some good: The *Nicomachean Ethics* opens by saying that every skill, inquiry and action aims at some good .
- Explain by four causes: To explain a thing fully, Aristotle asked four questions: what it is made of, what form or shape it has, what brought it about, and what it is for .
- Logic: what follows from what: Aristotle built the first system for testing whether a conclusion follows from its premises, known as the syllogism .
- Three means of persuasion: Aristotle defined rhetoric as the ability to see the means of persuasion available in each case .
- Know which kind of speech you're making: He sorted speeches by time and goal .
Hire Aristotle for
- Clarifying the goal: Find out what a plan or a product is really for.
- Persuading people: Shape a pitch, speech, email or sales page for the audience in front of you.
- Finding the right amount: How hard to push, how much to spend, how much to give.
- Building a habit: Become better at something by practising it.
- Judging a team or a friendship: What kind of bond this is, and whether it will last.
- Sorting a messy problem: Define the terms and split it into kinds.
- Running a group: How to keep a community or a company stable.
- Your own path: What a good life looks like, and what to do about it this year.
Skills from their work
Pairs well with
Built from
- Aristotle, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
- Aristotle's Ethics, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
- Aristotle's Rhetoric, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
- Aristotle's Political Theory, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
- Aristotle, Wikipedia
- Nicomachean Ethics, Book I, translated by W. D. Ross, Aristotle, Internet Classics Archive
- Nicomachean Ethics, Book II, translated by W. D. Ross, Aristotle, Internet Classics Archive
- Rhetoric, Book I, translated by W. Rhys Roberts, Aristotle, Internet Classics Archive
- W. D. Ross, Wikipedia
- Rhetoric (Aristotle), Wikipedia
- Nicomachean Ethics, Wikipedia
- The Nicomachean Ethics, translated by D. P. Chase (Project Gutenberg eBook #8438), full text including Books III, VI, VIII and IX, Aristotle
- On the Parts of Animals, Book I, translated by William Ogle, Aristotle, Internet Classics Archive
- Politics, Book I, translated by Benjamin Jowett, Aristotle, Internet Classics Archive
- Metaphysics, Book I, translated by W. D. Ross, Aristotle, Internet Classics Archive
- Politics, Book IV, translated by Benjamin Jowett, Aristotle, Internet Classics Archive