Do Aristotle and Darwin have the same thought about the issue that living beings came into beings from elements spontaneously?

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Aristotle is a great philosopher that lived between 384 BC and 322 BC and that influenced the ages after him with his views and thoughts. It is necessary to apply to our book called “İnsanlık Tarihi Boyunca Evrim” in order to be able to understand his idea and thought system. We will mention his thought briefly here.

One of the main views of Aristotle aims to know both the past of the existing forms of objects and to determine the future goals: For example, to explain how a seed is formed and what form it will assume in the future. This view is an important foundation on which Aristotle's scientific studies, primarily biology and cosmology, are based. According to him, every object in living and non-living nature has a goal that it is directed toward. It is possible to call it the ultimate goal, the final point, or the point of perfection that the being can reach.

According to him, Allah created the beings in the form we see by setting a target in matter. Form is not only a geometric feature. It is the form of the object that we perceive and that distinguishes it from others. Every object reaches its current form according to its goal it hides inside as a seed.

It can be said that, with the term form, Aristotle tried to indicate the genetic structure today. Today we know that it is the genetic structure of every living being that will reveal their ability and talent, and all the forms they will take in the future.
Aristotle connects every change to a cause outside the object because the cause of the change cannot be the change itself. According to him, Allah does not change, but He is the cause of change. Change in the world of objects is only possible through a factor other than change itself. Aristotle attributes realization of the potential goal every object contains to four causes. They are as follows:

1. Material cause
2. Formal cause
3. Efficient cause
4. Final cause

He gives a statue as an example of it. According to him, the materials such as bronze and marble used for making the statue are material causes. The human form, for example, that is desired to be given to the material, is the formal cause. It is the effective cause the sculptor who processes the marble wants to do. What the sculptor working on the statue wants to make is the final cause. Thus, the marble takes the shape of a statue and hence the question "Why did marble take the shape of a statue?" is also answered.
The biggest contribution of Aristotle to biology is the importance he gave to empiricism. He clearly states while evaluating his biological studies that observation has priority over theory and that theory can only be valid if it is compatible with observations. This essentialist approach of Aristotle also influenced Linné’s biological theory. Linné regards the duty of the biologist as to determine the essences created by Allah in the species and the species that depend on them.
Aristotle also has a special place in that he is the first to one understand the importance of comparison in scientific studies. The works of Aristotle called History of Animals, On the Generation of Animals and On the Life-Bearing Spirit are important in terms of biology. The accuracy of many observations he made on animals was understood only in the 19th century. In his studies related to birds, mammals and even fish living in deep seas, he made a detailed determination of the behaviors of these species including their mating.

It can be said that Aristotle is the most influential biologist in history with his works that affected a process of more than two thousand years. Nobody before him had made such a serious classification of animals. He classified animals based on the criteria like lifestyles, organs and behaviors. His work formed the basis of several fields of biology like morphology, physiology, embryology, systematic and animal behavior.
There is no room for leaps, unexpected destructions and reconstructions in Aristotle’s philosophy of biology. Living beings, carry their final form in the universe in their current forms. All kinds of evolutionary ideas including the idea that complex living beings emerged from simpler living things are contrary to his thinking.

According to him, it is necessary to for theology and physics to work together along with experience in order to understand how natural, that is, physical events take place. Physics opens the way for metaphysics to us. He points out that physics will be meaningless without metaphysics. Metaphysics provides the knowledge of knowledge. According to him, Allah creates His works purposefully; there is no randomness or coincidence. The purpose here is to create what is beautiful. There is no being that is not beautiful. In Aristotle's metaphysics, the prime mover, or the pure form, is the capable being. It is the highest and the best of all beings and essences. This pure form is Allah. Allah is completely immaterial and incorporeal.

What we have been tried to present so far is a summary of Aristotle's view on creation and biology. As it can be seen, Aristotle states clearly that all species were created in the most perfect way by Allah, and that coincidence and random change were not involved in the creation of living beings.

However, Darwinian thought rejects the existence of Allah, explains everything with coincidence and randomness, and claims that species emerged from one another through change and by chance. Therefore, Darwinian thought and philosophy, and the philosophy of Aristotle are completely opposite to each other.

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