Aristotle's Philosophy of Histories

What is it about?

Aristotle is often called the "father of political science" for his rigorous and naturalistic study of ancient Greek city-states. However, most scholars have interpreted him as having a very low opinion about the value of history writing. They point to passages where he says history is "less serious" than poetry and philosophy. I push against this interpretation and show that in fact Aristotle provides a prominent place for historical investigations in his methodology. He thinks histories can do more than just rattle off a series of events over time; they can provide real causal pictures that are very useful for deriving more "scientific" conclusions about human political development.

Featured Image

Photo by Datingscout on Unsplash

Photo by Datingscout on Unsplash