• DOI:10.1007/BF00128136
• Corpus ID: 6090923

Was Aristotle's biology sexist?

@article{Morsink1979WasAB,
  title={Was Aristotle's biology sexist?},
  author={Johannes Morsink},
  journal={Journal of the History of Biology},
  year={1979},
  volume={12},
  pages={83-112}
}

• J. Morsink
• Published 1979
• Philosophy
• Journal of the History of Biology

Marianne Cline Horowitz, in her interesting paper "Aristotle and Woman,"1 has drawn attention to the connection between Aristotle's antifeminism2 and "the standard Western arguments for the inferiority of womankind and for the political subordination of women to men in home and in society."3 She points out that "Aristotle's definition of a female as a 'multilated male' was transmitted into biological, obstetrical, and theological tracts"4 with the ultimate result that "many of the socalled Old Wives' Tales on such subjects as the differences between male and female embryos have their origin not in women's self-deprecation but in the embryology of Aristotle and his followers."5 Horowitz defends the double claim that "Aristotle's biological sexism influenced many human beings' perceptions of themselves and their offspring [and that] his political sexism influenced their beliefs on the proper distribution of roles in society."6 In this paper I shall be primarily concerned with the charge of biological sexism. I shall explore the question of whether or not and in what sense Aristotle's biology was sexist. By way of preface I shall say something about the relationship between his biological sexism and his political sexism.