Sam Hopkins Period 4 12/14/12 Aquinas-Aristotle Comparison Aristotle is undoubtedly one of the most recognizable philosophers in history.

His philosophy of pluralism in separating form from matter was a ground breaking idea that has inspired all philosophers after him Thomas Aquinas is credited with working out the best medieval solution both to the problems of faith versus reason and to the problem of the universals. Although these two philosophers lived and died in very different times they share many ideas in their philosophy because much of Thomas Aquinas philosophy is structured around Aristotles. For example, as Aquinas looked to distinguish reason from faith, he first needed to establish the form of natural theology, and to do this he developed a new metaphysical system based on Aristotelian philosophy. Aristotle stated that there is nothing in the human mind that does not begin with observation and experience and Thomas Aquinas agreed with this. Thomas also believed the human mind was capable of abstraction, or the ability to arrive at principles and causes that explain the natural world. To determine these principles Thomas employed Aristotles concept of pluraility. Where Aristotle divided things into form and matter, Aquinas placed more emphasis on the concept of actuality and the concept of being. Aquinass concept of acts of being is more Platonic than Aristotelian however. Aquinas determined that reality is a sytem of acts of being in a hierarchy with God at the top and the lowliest acts of being at the bottom. In the hierarchy God is seen as a pure act of being which is in accordance to Aristotles idea of the prime mover which states that God has no potential to be anything other than what he is. AS things move further down the hierarchy they have more potential to be other things than themselves. According to Thomas and Aquinas some things at the top of the hierarchy have no mater because matter is what is most susceptible to change. The lack of physical matter is true for God and humans according to Aquinas. The hierarchy marks the end of Aristotle and Aquinass agreement because Aristotle called the human soul the form of the body which implied that the soul and body are mortal, however Thomas said that the soul is the form of the subject and therefore possibly immortal.