1 the Aristotelian Method and Aristotelian
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Load more
Recommended publications
-
Aristotelian Metaphysics: Essence and Ground
View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Helsingin yliopiston digitaalinen arkisto Editorial Aristotelian Metaphysics: Essence and Ground Riin Sirkela, Tuomas Tahkob aDepartment of Philosophy, University of Vermont bDepartment of Philosophy, University of Helsinki is special issue of Studia Philosophica Estonica centers around Aristotelian metaphysics, construed broadly to cover both scholarly research on Aristo- tle’s metaphysics as well as work by contemporary metaphysicians on Aris- totelian themes. Aristotelian metaphysics is a growing tradition. ere are increasingly more metaphysicians identifying themselves as ‘Aristotelians’, and there are more scholars looking at work in contemporary metaphysics to advance scholarship. Indeed, there have already been a number of vol- umes showcasing this ‘Aristotelian turn’, including Daniel D. Novotný’s and Lukáš Novák’s Aristotelian Perspectives in Metaphysics (óþÕ¦), Edward Feser’s Aristotle on Method and Metaphysics (óþÕì), and Tuomas Tahko’s Contempo- rary Aristotelian Metaphysics (óþÕó). e contribution this special issue makes to the ongoing discussion is twofold. First, the special issue promotes a deeper interaction between schol- ars of Aristotle and contemporary metaphysicians. We hope that the pa- pers encourage people working in the history of philosophy to relate to con- temporary discussions and people working in contemporary metaphysics to engage with Aristotle and Ancient scholarship. Second, the special issue is unied in its focus on two themes in Aristotelian metaphysics, essence and grounding. e papers address questions concerning fundamentality and dependence, ontological independence or priority, the causal priority of forms, the unity of grounding, the reduction of grounding to essence, the unity of essence, the roles of essence, and explanation and denition. -
Hendrik Lorenz/Benjamin Morison Aristotle: Metaphysics Z PHI501, Fall/Spring 2018/2019
Hendrik Lorenz/Benjamin Morison Aristotle: Metaphysics Z PHI501, Fall/Spring 2018/2019 Aims of the course In this class, we aim to go through systematically the 17 chapters of Aristotle’s Metaphysics, book Z (sometimes called book VII), and chapter 1 of book H of the Metaphysics (the one immediately following Z), since we hold, as do many other scholars, that it is best read as a continuation of book Z. The goal is to understand Aristotle’s famous theory of ‘substance’ as presented in book Z. Substances are the central items in Aristotle’s ontology, and there are a cluster of other notions in the vicinity of ‘substance’ which we will also be trying to clarify: ‘being’, ‘account’, ‘form’, ‘this’, ‘subject’, ‘matter’, ‘essence’ or ‘being what it is’, etc. We also want to assess what kind of treatise Metaphysics Z is: its train of thought is notoriously hard to follow, with apparent digressions, or even insertions, so it might not even have been considered a unified treatise by Aristotle. There is also the question of its relation to the science of metaphysics: is it a preliminary contribution to it, or an actual exposition of (a fragment of) it? Is there even a science of metaphysics (in the sense of ‘science’ defined in the Posterior Analytics) to which it could be related? Brief list of some themes of Metaphysics Z Fall: Z1: Being is said in many ways; the central one is being as substance; so the question ‘what is being’ is the question ‘what is substance?’; Z2: Catalogue of some items which philosophers have thought count as substances; -
God As Both Ideal and Real Being in the Aristotelian Metaphysics
God As Both Ideal and Real Being In the Aristotelian Metaphysics Martin J. Henn St. Mary College Aristotle asserts in Metaphysics r, 1003a21ff. that "there exists a science which theorizes on Being insofar as Being, and on those attributes which belong to it in virtue of its own nature."' In order that we may discover the nature of Being Aristotle tells us that we must first recognize that the term "Being" is spoken in many ways, but always in relation to a certain unitary nature, and not homonymously (cf. Met. r, 1003a33-4). Beings share the same name "eovta," yet they are not homonyms, for their Being is one and the same, not manifold and diverse. Nor are beings synonyms, for synonymy is sameness of name among things belonging to the same genus (as, say, a man and an ox are both called "animal"), and Being is no genus. Furthermore, synonyms are things sharing a common intrinsic nature. But things are called "beings" precisely because they share a common relation to some one extrinsic nature. Thus, beings are neither homonyms nor synonyms, yet their core essence, i.e. their Being as such, is one and the same. Thus, the unitary Being of beings must rest in some unifying nature extrinsic to their respective specific essences. Aristotle's dialectical investigations into Being eventually lead us to this extrinsic nature in Book A, i.e. to God, the primary Essence beyond all specific essences. In the pre-lambda books of the Metaphysics, however, this extrinsic nature remains very much up for grabs. -
Advancing the Aristotelian Project in Contemporary Metaphysics a Review Essay
Philosophia Christi Vol. 21, No. 2 © 2019 Advancing the Aristotelian Project in Contemporary Metaphysics A Review Essay Robert C. Koons University of Texas at Austin Abstract: In a recent book, Substance and the Fundamentality of the Familiar, Ross Inman demonstrates the contemporary relevance of an Aristotelian approach to metaphysics and the philosophy of nature. Inman successfully applies the Aristotelian framework to a number of outstanding problems in metaphysics, philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of physics. Inman tackles some intriguing questions about the ontological status of proper parts, questions which constitute a central focus of ongoing debate and investigation. Ross D. Inman. Substance and the Fundamentality of the Familiar: A Neo- Aristotelian Mereology. New York: Routledge, 2018. 304 pages. $140.00. Ross Inman’s book is an excellent new installment in the ongoing renais- sance of Aristotelian metaphysics in analytic philosophy. Central Aristote- lian notions, such as substance, essence, causal powers, dependent parts, and matter/form combination, have reemerged in recent years, beginning with the work of Teodore Scaltsas, Peter van Inwagen, Kit Fine, David Oderberg, and Michal Rea in the 1990s.1 Te movement began to develop and fourish afer the turn of the millennium. Kit Fine, David Oderberg, Michael Loux, and E. J. Lowe built upon their own earlier work,2 while new collaborators 1. See Peter van Inwagen, “Material Beings,” Philosophy 67 (1990): 126–7; Teodore Scalt- sas, Substances and Universals in Aristotle’s Metaphysics (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1994); Kit Fine, “Tings and Teir Parts,” Midwest Studies in Philosophy 23 (1999): 61–74; David S. -
Metaphysics of Soul and Self in Plotinus Gwenaëlle Aubry
Metaphysics of soul and self in Plotinus Gwenaëlle Aubry To cite this version: Gwenaëlle Aubry. Metaphysics of soul and self in Plotinus. P. Remes; S. Slaveva-Griffin. The Routledge Handbook of Neoplatonism, pp.310-323, 2014. hal-02387195 HAL Id: hal-02387195 https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-02387195 Submitted on 29 Nov 2019 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. 20 Metaphysics of soul and self in Plotinus Gwenaëlle Aubry One of the great singularities of the philosophy of Plotinus consists in thinking of the self1 for its own sake and, in particular, in producing a concept of it diff erent from that of soul.2 Th is philosophical breakthrough is inseparable from the discovery of immedi- ate refl exivity, that is, the subject’s ability to apprehend itself independently of its rela- tion to an object or to another subject.3 In Plotinus, however, this refl exivity occurs only in an interrogative form, which can be read, in particular, in Enn. I.1[53] and Enn. VI.4[22]. In other words, it does not, as in Descartes, assume the form of an intuition by means of which the subject, grasping itself as consciousness, would, at the same time, have an evident revelation of its essence. -
19 Another Interpretation of Aristotle's De Interpretatione IX a Support for the So-Called Second Oldest Or 'Mediaeval' Interpre
Another Interpretation of Aristotle's De Interpretatione IX A support for the so-called second oldest or 'mediaeval' interpretation JOB VAN ECK Controversies regarding propositions about the future, occasioned by Aristotle's De Interpretatione IX have occurred throughout the history of logic from Antiquity to the 20th century, especially in the Middle Ages. The question under discussion is: must some such propositions be denied a truth value in order to escape determinism? Or does the law of bivalence also hold for future contingency propositions? And what is Aristotle's position in De Interpretatione IX? Does he say that bivalence implies determinism and thus abandons universal bivalence (this is called the oldest, or traditional, interpretation), or does he reconcile bivalence with indeterminism (the so-called second oldest in- terpretation). Boethius, in his two commentaries on De Interpretatione, shows himself a representantive of the second oldest interpretation. His main thesis is that according to Aristotle it is necessary for a future con- tingency proposition and its negation that one is true and the other false, but not definitely true, nor definitely false. In a recent article Pro- fessor Norman Kretzmann stressed the influence this point of view of Boethius has had on the subsequent discussion' . The second oldest interpretation became so prominent among mediaeval philosophers that some call it the mediaeval interpretation. In modern times most authors reject this interpretation, partly because the phrase "definitely true", which is at the heart of it, is rather obscure and its Greek analogue alêthes aphorismends does not oc- cur in De Interpretatione IX at all. -
Aristotle on Verbal Communication: the First Chapters of De Interpretatione
EJPC 7 (2) pp. 239–253 Intellect Limited 2016 Empedocles: European Journal for the Philosophy of Communication Volume 7 Number 2 © 2016 Intellect Ltd Critical Review. English language. doi: 10.1386/ejpc.7.2.239_3 CRITICAL REVIEW ANITA KASABOVA Sofia University VLADIMIR MARINOV New Bulgarian University Aristotle on verbal communication: The first chapters of De Interpretatione ABSTRACT KEYWORDS This article deals with the communicational aspects of Aristotle’s theory of significa- Aristotle tion as laid out in the initial chapters of the De Interpretatione (Int.).1 We begin De Interpretatione by outlining the reception and main interpretations of the chapters under discussion, verbal communication rather siding with the linguistic strand. We then argue that the first four chap- signification ters present an account of verbal communication, in which words signify things via linguistic expressions thoughts. We show how Aristotle determines voice as a conventional and hence acci- convention dental medium of signification: words as ‘spoken sounds’ are tokens of thoughts, language use which in turn are signs or natural likenesses of things. We argue that, in this way, 1. We follow the standard linguistic expressions may both signify thoughts and refer to things. This double edition of the Greek account of signification also explains the variety of ontological, logical and psycho- text of Int. by Minio- logical interpretations of the initial chapters of Int. Paluello (1949: 47–72), unless otherwise stated. All references to Aristotle’s works 239 11_EJPC 7.2_Critical review article_239-253.indd 239 11/22/16 1:55 PM Anita Kasabova and Vladimir Marinov follow the citation 1. -
From Aristotle to Contemporary Biological Classification: What Kind of Category Is “Sex”? Stella Sandford Kingston University London, UK [email protected]
REDESCRIPTIONS Sandford, Stella. 2019. “From Aristotle to Contemporary Biological Political Thought, Conceptual History and Feminist Theory Classification: What Kind of Category is “Sex”?” Redescriptions: Political Thought, Conceptual History and Feminist Theory 22(1): 4–17. DOI: https://doi.org/10.33134/rds.314 RESEARCH From Aristotle to Contemporary Biological Classification: What Kind of Category is “Sex”? Stella Sandford Kingston University London, UK [email protected] This paper examines the nature of the categories of ‘male’ and ‘female’ as classificatorygroupings,viaanexaminationofthisquestioninAristotle’szoology andmetaphysics.TracingtheuseofAristotle’slogicalcategoriesof‘genus’and ‘species’inhiszoologicalworksandcontrastingthiswiththeuseoftheterms incontemporarytaxonomy,thepaperdemonstratesthat‘male’and‘female’are, inasignificantsense,unclassifiable.AlthoughAristotlehasnogenericconceptof ‘sex’athisdisposal,thepapershowshowmanyEnglishtranslationsofhisworks introduce‘sex’asifinanswertothequestionofthenatureofthecategoriesof maleandfemale.Thepaperthenarguesthatthegenericconceptofsexcovers overtheproblemoftheclassificationofmaleandfemaleinbothAristotleand contemporarybiology(includingbotany,mycologyandbacteriology),byintroduc- ingaclassificatorygenus(‘sex’)thatdoesnotinfactexplainanythingbutrather (initstrans-speciesgenerality)needsexplaining. Keywords:Sex;male/female;Aristotle;biology;taxonomy;classification All living organisms that have been scientifically recorded or studied are named according to the relevant international code for nomenclature. Naming and denoting a taxonomical clas- sification are two sides of the same coin. -
Syllabus for B.H.M.S. (Degree) Course
SYLLABUS FOR B.H.M.S. (DEGREE) COURSE As per the Homoeopathy (DEGREE Course) BHMS regulation, 1983, (as amended up to 2019) ANATOMY Instructions: I. (a) Instructions in anatomy should be so planed as to present a general working knowledge of the structure of the human body; (b) The amount of detail which a student is required to memorise should be reduced to the minimum; (c) Major emphasis should be laid on functional anatomy of the living subject rather than on the static structures of the cadaver, and on general anatomical positions and broad relations of the viscera, muscles, blood-vessels, nerves and lymphatics and study of the cadaver is the only means to achieve this; (d) Students should not be burdened with minutes anatomical details which have no clinical significance. II. Though dissection of the entire body is essential for the preparation of the student of his clinical studies, the burden of dissection can be reduced and much saving of time can be effected, if considerable reduction of the amount of topographical details is made and the following points are kept in view:- (1) Only such details as have professional or general educational value for the medical students. (2) The purpose of dissection is to give the student an understanding of the body in relation to its function, and the dissection should be designed to achieve this goal. (3) Normal radiological anatomy may also form part of practical or clinical training and the structure of the body should be presented linking functional aspects. (4) Dissection should be preceded by a course of lectures on the general structure of the organ or the system under discussion and then its function. -
AUGUSTINE During the Ensuing Centuries, Aristotle's De Interpretatione Became the Subject of Frequent Commentary.1 Ammonius
CHAPTER TWO AUGUSTINE During the ensuing centuries, Aristotle's De interpretatione became the subject of frequent commentary.1 Ammonius and Boethius report that there had already been commentaries written by Aspasius (first century), Herminus and Alexander of Aphrodisias (second century), Porphyry (third century), Iamblichus (fourth century), and Syrianus of Athens (fifth century); Philoponus also commented on the work (sixth century), and Theophrastus, Aristotle's immediate successor at the Lyceum, may have also discussed it in one of his treatises. Around 363, early in the lifetime of Augustine, Marius Victorinus translated De interpretatione into Latin. There is, however, no indication that Augustine ever read the work. He never cites it and his own discussion of the problem of foreknowledge and future contingents reflects no contact with Aristotle's writing, but seems to have been stimulated principally by Cicero's De fato.2 This is not surprising, for in the time following Aristotle's death the purely logical issues of antecedent truth and semantic necessity tended to be eclipsed by questions concerning freedom of the will and causal determinacy.3 This concern manifests itself in Augustine's own discussions of the prob lem of fatalism. TURN TO THEOLOGICAL FATALISM What is of special interest to us, however, is that under the influence of Neo-platonism and Christianity, the problem of fatalism has taken on a new guise: the problem of theological fatalism. Well before the time of Ammonius (d. 241-42) the relation of God's foreknowledge to human freedom was an oft-discussed question.4 Celsus in the second century, for example, had objected to Christianity on the basis of the fatalistic conse quences of Christ's predictions of his betrayal.5 Origen defended the compatibility of foreknowledge and human freedom against Celsus's attack, charging that his opponent erred in thinking foreknowledge to be the cause of an event, rather than the reverse. -
Plato's (Metaphysics))
~o v . A. Vntcrnational Library of Philosophy Studies in and ScientificMethod)C (".1 FOUNDED BY: A. J. AYER PLATO'S EDITOR: BERNARD WILLIAMS ASSISTANT EDITOR: E. R. D. HONDERICK (METAPHYSICS) INDUCTIVE PROBABILITY by John Patrick Day. ) SENSATION AND PERCEPTION: A History of the Philosophy of Perception by D. W. Hamlyn. TRACTATUS LOGICO-PHILOSOPHICUS: Ludwig Wittenstein's Logiseh- philoJrJphiseheAbhandlung with a new Translation by D. F. Pears and B. F. McGuinness and with the Introduction by Bertrand Russell. PERCEPTION AND THE PHYSICAL WORLD by D. M. Armstrong. HUME'S PHILOSOPHY OF BELIEF: A Study of his First Inquiry by Antony Flew. KANT'S THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE: An Outline of One Central Argument in the Critiqueof Pure Reasonby Graham Bird. CONDITIONS FOR DESCRIPTION by Peter Zinkernagel, translated from the Danish by Olaf Lindum. AN EXAMINATION OF PLATO'S DOCTRINES by I. M. Crombie. Two volumes. I: Plato on Man and Society. II: Plato on Knowledge and Reality. PHENOMENOLOGY OF PERCEPTION by M. Merleau-Ponty, translated from the French by Colin Smith. THE IDEA OF JUSTICE AND THE PROBLEM OF ARGUMENT by Ch. Perelman, translated from the French by John Petrie. LECTURES ON PSYCHICAL RESEARCH by C. D. Broad. Incorporating the Perrott Lectures given in Cambridge University in 1959 and 1960. THE VARIETIES OF GOODNESS by George Henrik von Wright. METHOD IN THE PHYSICAL SOENCES by G. Schlesinger. METHOD IN ETHICAL THEORY by Abraham Edel. SOENCE, PERCEPTION AND REALITY by Wilfrid Sellars. NORM AND ACTION: A Logical Enquiry by Georg Henri, von Wright. PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENTIFIC REALISM by J. J. C.Smart. STUDIES IN METAPHILOSOPHY by Morris Lazerowitz. -
The Beginnings of Formal Logic: Deduction in Aristotle's Topics Vs
Phronesis 60 (�0�5) �67-309 brill.com/phro The Beginnings of Formal Logic: Deduction in Aristotle’s Topics vs. Prior Analytics Marko Malink Department of Philosophy, New York University, 5 Washington Place, New York, NY 10003. USA [email protected] Abstract It is widely agreed that Aristotle’s Prior Analytics, but not the Topics, marks the begin- ning of formal logic. There is less agreement as to why this is so. What are the distinctive features in virtue of which Aristotle’s discussion of deductions (syllogismoi) qualifies as formal logic in the one treatise but not in the other? To answer this question, I argue that in the Prior Analytics—unlike in the Topics—Aristotle is concerned to make fully explicit all the premisses that are necessary to derive the conclusion in a given deduction. Keywords formal logic – deduction – syllogismos – premiss – Prior Analytics – Topics 1 Introduction It is widely agreed that Aristotle’s Prior Analytics marks the beginning of formal logic.1 Aristotle’s main concern in this treatise is with deductions (syllogismoi). Deductions also play an important role in the Topics, which was written before the Prior Analytics.2 The two treatises start from the same definition of what 1 See e.g. Cornford 1935, 264; Russell 1946, 219; Ross 1949, 29; Bocheński 1956, 74; Allen 2001, 13; Ebert and Nortmann 2007, 106-7; Striker 2009, p. xi. 2 While the chronological order of Aristotle’s works cannot be determined with any certainty, scholars agree that the Topics was written before the Prior Analytics; see Brandis 1835, 252-9; Ross 1939, 251-2; Bocheński 1956, 49-51; Kneale and Kneale 1962, 23-4; Brunschwig 1967, © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ���5 | doi �0.��63/�5685�84-��34��86 268 Malink a deduction is (stated in the first chapter of each).