It's been 35 years but yes I read and studied Aristotle (& Plato, Epictetus, Sophocles, Euripides, Homer..) in school, in Greek. I still find Platonic constructions useful while I consider, for example Aristotle's moral models simplistic at best and much less insightful than those of his predecessors such as Epicetus). I'm well aware that the moral models of different societies rarely translate well into other societies (not just Bronze Age to present day, but also present day to present day) but I remain unimpressed by Aristotle.
I'm not saying I would particularly like Plato as a person, or that I even agree with him on many things, but I find him a wide ranging thinker with much to offer the present.
I think Aristotle got a lot of credibility by being seized upon by some early christian thinkers. The world would be in a much better shape had they leant on some of Sophocles' lost plays instead :-).
Well I described one in the message you replied to: the value of a person is derived solely from their value to the polity (I am glossing massively so no nitpicking on the wording: you can go read yourself as he is widely translated). And I think his approach to observation is lame even when compared to his contemporaries, thus I don't agree with Bluestrike2's defense.
And yes my view of him is formed in its context. Classical Greek society was profoundly weird by contemporary western standards, the closest analogy most people might understand might be 8th century islam. I always get a laugh when I see Greece portrayed in film, or cited by a politician: sure, I can and do draw a line philosophical from Athens to London, but but it is almost incomprehensible today without study. Then again I feel the same way when I see physics or computing in film.
There's another important piece of context Bluestrike2 mentions though you might have missed it: the modern view of science is very recent the result of several profound revolutions / dislocations / breakthroughs. Apart from the lovely lack of specialization, 2-3K years ago, philosophical (AKA scientific) theories were discussed more in essay form, like literary criticism rather than through reasoned debate, somewhat rigorous analysis and euclidean-style proof from postulate and theorem. I have read some Vedic era Sanskrit disputations on the nature of zero and they suffered from the same thing.
And yet, all that being said, I think Aristotle doesn't deserve the level of good press he gets. Though frankly my writing on this thread is more than I have really thought about him in 35 years. He simply doesn't have contemporary impact that many of this predecessors do on my daily life.
Just to mention one thing, Aristotle more or less invented formal logic. Without this we probably wouldnt have modern science or computers. If you want to argue he was an idiot and doesn't have any impact, you will have to make a better argument.
I'm not saying I would particularly like Plato as a person, or that I even agree with him on many things, but I find him a wide ranging thinker with much to offer the present.
I think Aristotle got a lot of credibility by being seized upon by some early christian thinkers. The world would be in a much better shape had they leant on some of Sophocles' lost plays instead :-).