The word `` mimesis '' ( `` imitation '' ) is usually associated with Plato and Aristotle.

But Aristotle kept the principle of levels and even augmented it by describing in the Poetics what kinds of character and action must be imitated if the play is to be a vehicle of serious and important human truths.

For both Plato and Aristotle artistic mimesis, in contrast to the power of dialectic, is relatively incapable of expressing the character of fundamental reality.

The Chicago contingent of modern critics follow Aristotle so far in this direction that it is hard to see how they can compare one poem with another for the purpose of evaluation.

In his study Samuel Johnson, Joseph Wood Krutch takes this line when he says that what Aristotle really means by his theory of catharsis is that our evil passions may be so purged by the dramatic ritual that it is `` less likely that we shall indulge them through our own acts ''.

Together with Plato and Socrates ( Plato's teacher ), Aristotle is one of the most important founding figures in Western philosophy.

Though Aristotle wrote many elegant treatises and dialogues ( Cicero described his literary style as " a river of gold "), it is thought that the majority of his writings are now lost and only about one-third of the original works have survived.

It is during this period in Athens from 335 to 323 BC when Aristotle is believed to have composed many of his works.

A widespread tradition in antiquity suspected Aristotle of playing a role in Alexander's death, but there is little evidence for this.

With the Prior Analytics, Aristotle is credited with the earliest study of formal logic, and his conception of it was the dominant form of Western logic until 19th century advances in mathematical logic.

Aristotle is referred to as " The Philosopher " by Scholastic thinkers such as Thomas Aquinas.

It is Martin Heidegger, not Nietzsche, who elaborated a new interpretation of Aristotle, intended to warrant his deconstruction of scholastic and philosophical tradition.

The secondary literature on Aristotle is vast.

Aristotle ( 384-322 BC ) understood that sound consisted of contractions and expansions of the air " falling upon and striking the air which is next to it ...", a very good expression of the nature of wave motion.

On the Soul ( De anima ) is a treatise on the soul written along the lines suggested by Aristotle in his own De anima.

The work is a discussion of ethical issues based on Aristotle, and contains responses to questions and problems deriving from Alexander's school.

It is noteworthy that Socrates ( Plato, Phaedo, 98 B ) accuses Anaxagoras of failing to differentiate between nous and psyche, while Aristotle ( Metaphysics, Book I ) objects that his nous is merely a deus ex machina to which he refuses to attribute design and knowledge.

We know little more of the life of Andronicus, but he is of special interest in the history of philosophy, from the statement of Plutarch, that he published a new edition of the works of Aristotle and Theophrastus, which formerly belonged to the library of Apellicon, and were brought to Rome by Sulla with the rest of Apellicon's library in 84 BC.

Payment for jurors was introduced around 462 BC and is ascribed to Pericles, a feature described by Aristotle as fundamental to radical democracy ( Politics 1294a37 ).

In Aristotle this is categorized as the difference between ' arithmetic ' and ' geometric ' ( i. e. proportional ) equality.

The challenge to the assumption that beauty was central to art and aesthetics, thought to be original, is actually continuous with older aesthetic theory ; Aristotle was the first in the Western tradition to classify " beauty " into types as in his theory of drama, and Kant made a distinction between beauty and the sublime.

Aristotle is also quite frequently quoted in Alexander's works.

Alkindus considered Aristotle as the outstanding and unique representative of philosophy and Averroes spoke of Aristotle as the " exemplar " for all future philosophers.

In accordance with the Greek theorists, the Muslims considered Aristotle to be a dogmatic philosopher, the author of a closed system, and believed that Aristotle shared with Plato essential tenets of thought.

His commentaries on Aristotle were considered so useful that he was styled, by way of pre-eminence, " the commentator " ( ὁ ἐξηγητής ).

By the 6th century Alexander's commentaries on Aristotle were considered so useful that he was referred to as " the commentator " ().

They held that Aristotle considered the soul as a material and therefore a mortal entity which operates during life only under the authority of universal reason.

From Aristotle until Darwin, the natural world was predominantly considered static and unchanging.

Aristotle was considered to give a more important position to sense perception than Plato, and commentators in the middle ages summarized one of his positions as " nihil in intellectu nisi prius fuerit in sensu " ( Latin for " nothing in the intellect without first being in the senses ").

The context of this remark, however, suggests only that Aristotle advised that it could be rhetorically advantageous to appeal to such a law, especially when the " particular " law of ones ' own city was adverse to the case being made, not that there actually was such a law ; Aristotle, moreover, considered two of the three candidates for a universally valid, natural law suggested in this passage to be wrong.

Metaphysics as a discipline was a central part of academic inquiry and scholarly education even before the age of Aristotle, who considered it " the Queen of Sciences.

The context of this remark, however, suggests only that Aristotle advised that it could be rhetorically advantageous to appeal to such a law, especially when the " particular " law of one's own city was averse to the case being made, not that there actually was such a law ; Aristotle, moreover, considered two of the three candidates for a universally valid, natural law provided in this passage to be wrong.

Following Aristotle ’ s lead, Kant considered that knowledge can only be had through experience of particulars.

An entity that people commonly think of as a simple concrete object, or that Aristotle would think of as a substance, is, in this ontology, considered to be a comoposite of indefinitely many occasions of experience.

Plato and Aristotle both explored the relationship between signs and the world, and Augustine considered the nature of the sign within a conventional system.

The first known classical logician who didn't fully accept the law of excluded middle was Aristotle ( who, ironically, is also generally considered to be the first classical logician and the " father of logic ").

Aristotle considered the region around Dodona to have been part of Hellas and the region where the Hellenes originated.

Begging the question is related to the circular argument, circulus in probando ( Latin, " circle in proving ") or circular reasoning, though these are considered absolutely different by Aristotle.

When the fallacy of begging the question is committed in more than one step, it is sometimes referred to as circulus in probando or reasoning in a circle but incorrectly so, if this fallacy is considered under the definition Aristotle gave in Prior Analytics.

In his Poetics, Aristotle considered plot ( mythos ) the most important element of drama — more important than character, for example.

Aristotle considered the region around Dodona to have been part of Hellas and the region where the Hellenes originated.

However, Periander was later considered the typical evil tyrant ( for example, by Aristotle ).