ABSTRACT
No one in the history of civilization has shaped our understanding of science and natural philosophy more than the great Greek philosopher and scientist Aristotle (384-322 B.C.), who exerted a profound and pervasive influence for more than two thousand years, extending from the fourth century B.C. to the end of the seventeenth century A.D. During this long period, Aristotle’s numerous Greek treatises were translated into a variety of languages, most notably Arabic and Latin. He was, thus, a dominant intellectual force in at least three great civilizations that ranged over a vast geographical area, embracing sequentially the Byzantine Empire (which succeeded the Roman Empire in the east), the civilization of Islam, and the Latin Christian civilization of western Europe in the late Middle Ages.
