Aristotle
Newton is known for his physics even more than his math.
Leibniz (sometimes considered with Da Vinci to be one of the “two greatest universal geniuses” and who was much more influential than several on Hart’s list) is often considered Newton’s rival. However he certainly knew who was the superior mathematician:
Another vote for futility: Gutenberg.
Johann Gutenberg
Aristotle
So I gather, but my knowledge of physics is weak. 
I figure though that if the proper institutions are set up then knowledge can advance. And Newton operated in an age of the Royal Academies of Science (right?).
But dropping the cost of transmitting knowledge by 1 or 3 orders of magnitude establishes an institution in and of itself. My only worry about Gutenberg is not whether he invented one technique in his print shop or another. My concern involves the counterfactual: absent Gutenberg, would the print shop been established anyway within 50 or 100 or 200 or 300 years?
(These sorts of discussions are part of the game, right?)
Of course they’re part of the game. So are cajoling, wheedling, and outright threats - I still owe some payback for how soon Johann Sebastian Bach was voted off! :mad:
Last day for this round, btw!
Yet even a five year delay in the Gutenberg printing press would have changed the face of the world. Pinpoints in history count. Getting to the patent office first matters. Location and timing is everything after all.
Gutenberg makes so many things happen because of when he did it. Other people, forgotten by history, might have had the same idea but didn’t make it successful.
And we’re still dealing with the Top Five here. (Flawed as that selection may be). No one on the list is walking away a loser, easily dismissed and ignored.
Hey! My contest is as rigorously subjective as any game here in the Game Room! I resemble that remark!
Been a fine time, JohnT.
But Shakespeare and Bach would have been around for awhile longer on * my *list…
Gutenberg
Aristotle was essentially synonymous with knowledge during the middle ages. That makes him influential, not necessarily to the good.
But strip away the adulation, and a lot of his work stands the test of time. And his work had little precedent: Plato’s work is suffused with idealism, while Aristotle’s is grounded in the sort of observation that would later evolve into empiricism. More generally, his even temperament remains an antidote to those espousing one final solution or another to the world’s troubles.
Take away Newton, and we would still have both physics and math. But take away Aristotle, and the history of western concepts would be very different. Nonetheless, I’m still putting Gutenberg in the #1 slot, based on the somewhat dubious hypothesis that the print shop wouldn’t have been invented for 50-300 years, absent his efforts as an unsuccessful businessman. I’m counting on the theory that the printing press permitted the transmission of science, news and technology, which in and of itself pushed technological advance.
Could you give some examples of specific concepts that Aristotle originated?
Well, I’m arguing for more than one concept for another: I’m saying Aristotle had something more important, an outlook. Pythagoras was a great mathematician, but his school was infused with mysticism. Plato was a great popularizer of Socrates, but his theory of essences and authoritarian streak was unhelpful. (See Popper (1945))
Aristotle was the first philosopher to write systematically and like a professor. He wrote something on basically every topic of philosophical significance. (Cite: Russell: A History of Western Philosophy, Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy).
Ok, I’ll skim my texts and try to answer Nimo’s question now. All quotes from secondary sources, cited above.
Metaphysics: “Plato diluted by common sense. He is difficult because Plato and common sense do not mix easily.”
Ethics: “The good, we are told, is happiness”, predating utilitarianism.
Golden mean: “Every virtue is a mean between two extremes, each of which is a vice.” Pushing moderation is a foundational concept: that it’s blindingly obvious and even trite today speaks of Aristotle’s influence. *
Politics: Apologetics, mostly. “The aim of the state is to produce a cultured gentleman.”
Logic: He invented syllogisms. He emphasized deduction, missed out on induction unfortunately.
Physics: “…incompatible with Newton’s First Law of Motion, originally enunciated by Galileo.” Distinguished between 4 types of causality.
Psychology: …
Biology: “…achieved an extraordinary syntheses of observation, theory and general scientific principle.” Described animals, wrote of their classification, anatomy, reproduction, inheritance, development of accidental characteristics. Studied mechanics of animal motion.
- Then again, the Buddha pushed moderation as well. I can’t really argue for originality on this one – but I can still argue for influence.
I’d argue that the Stoic school did a lot more for moderation than Aristotle did.
Aristotle’s term logic is inferior to prepositional logic, which is what most logicians actually use.
I’ll admit that Aristotle did a lot of observation and description of various natural phenomena. But millions of people do that. None of his observations were unique and he certainly did not form any valid general theories from his observations.
A lot of Aristotle’s work was just artificial categorization. But the categories only existed due to Aristotle creating them - there was no inherent order to his ideas. Compare Aristotle’s work to Newton’s (which is appropriate here). Since Newton (and Leibniz) invented calculus, people have been able to apply it to hundreds of situations which Newton never imagined. But Aristotle’s ideas are basically useful only for the study of Aristotlean philosophy. Whether something has a material cause, a formal cause, an efficient cause, or a final cause is not an issue anyone is going to worry about in the real world.
But we’re speaking of the history of thought. Aristotle was directly influential in medieval times, but only indirectly so today. Sure, lots of people in the 1500s - 1700s and beyond use observation, but there were rather fewer people doing so before the common era. He was in many ways operating outside of his time.
Now calculus is certainly foundational. Leibniz’s co-discovery complicates this problem though, just as distributing Christianity’s credit among Jesus and Paul does. According to the counterfactual approach to history, we can assess something’s historical significance by asking what would have happened in its absence. Can Newton truly be said to have advanced science by 100 years? I don’t doubt his genius, btw, nor do I question his status as the most influential scientist of all time, among scientists.
Perhaps the question turns on the speed at which empiricism would have developed absent the groundwork laid by Aristotle over a thousand years earlier.
Gutenberg, established shop ~1450: Might anyone argue that the print shop would have been established within 50 years anyway? Is the cheap dissemination of ideas as critical to scientific progress as I’ve implied and I believe?
Fifty year delay without Gutenberg might be a plausible guess, though it’s probably unknowable. But would a 50 year delay have delayed all science by 50 years? Columbus’ voyage was also important in changing European mindset; can you argue that Columbus wouldn’t have sailed without type-set books? (It’s a sincere question; perhaps Columbus’ voyage did depend on such book reading.)
One case where we do know exactly how long a discovery would have been delayed without the key scientist is Mendel’s laws: Delay of 35 years exactly. We know because Mendel was ignored! (Some on Hart’s list probably sped up science by only a few months.)
Aristotle was certainly influential, but was he essential? Without Aristotle surely someone else would have organized science. If this happened several centuries later than Aristotle, it might have been good for science, since it’s been argued that the authority of Aristotle’s misconceptions slowed down scientific progress.
All we need is 50 years or less to rank him above Gutenberg (see above). It’s Newton’s physics that make him #1, not his mathematics, and the fact that his Laws of Motion (published 1687) were generally accepted (rather than Descartes’ Laws) only after the Maupertuis expedition of 1736 may suggest that the statement “Newton advanced science by at least 50 years” is hardly far-fetched. In addition to gravitation, motion and optics, Newton was also first to enunciate the basic principles of thermodynamics.
As for mathematicians, that Newton, Gauss and Archimedes are the three greatest ever is so widely agreed as to be a cliche. There’s much disagreement over which of these three was the greatest but no doubt that Newton was the most influential of the three. However that does not mean Newton was most influential among all mathemticians. Euler and Euclid probably get the #1 and #2 spots for influence, with Newton possibly #3. As I’ve said, it is Newton’s physics that make his #1 standing clear.
Wonder where Newton got his work published? Gee, a printing press sure would have come in handy.
Handy, but not essential – after all Aristotle didn’t have one.
Not essential? Ooooooooooookay.
Aristotle did, however, gain the trust of the Catholic Church as his version of the universe was acceptable to them. No printing press, just thousands of monks over hundreds of years. It took the printing press to spread other ideas, contrary to Aristotle, and thus the Church, around Europe.