DOCSLIB.ORG

Aristotle Physics

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Aristotle Physics CLARENDON ARISTOTLE SERIES General Editors J . L. ACKRILL AND LINDSAY JUDSON Also published in this series Categories and De lnterpretatione J. L. ACKRILL De Anima Books II and Ill D. W . HAMLYN New impression with supplementary material by Christopher Shields De Generatione et Corruptione C. J. F. WILLIAMS De Partibus Animalium I and De Generatione Animalium I D. M. BALME New impression with supplementary material by Allan Gotthelf Eudemian Ethics Books I, Il, and VIII MICHAEL WOODS Second edition Metaphysics Books r , ~.and E CHRISTOPHE R KIRWAN Second edition Metaphysics Books M and N JULIA ANNAS Physics Books I and II WILLIAM CHARLTON New impression with supplementary material Posterior Analytics JONATHAN BARNES Second edition Other volumes are in preparation ARISTOTLE PHYSICS BOOKS Ill AND IV Translated with Introduction and Notes by EDWARD HUSSEY Fellow of All Souls College Oxford CLARENDON PRESS · OXFORD Oxford University Press, Walton Street, Oxford oxz 6oP Oxford New York Athens Auckland Bangkok Bombay Calcutta Cape Town Dares Salaam Delhi Florence Hong Kong Istanbul Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madras Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi Paris Singapore Taipei Tokyo Toronto and associated companies in Berlin Ibadan Oxford is a trade mark of Oxford University Press Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York ©Oxford University Press 1983 First published 1983 New impression with corrections and additions 1993 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press. Within the UK, exceptions are allowed in respect of any fair dealing for the purpose of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of the licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside these terms and in other countries should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Hussey, Edward Aristotle's Physics: books III and IV. -(Clarendon Aristotle Series) 1. Aristotle- Physics I. Title 110 Q151.A7 Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Aristotle. A1·istotle's Physics, books III and IV. (Clarendon Aristotle series) Translation of: Physics. Bibliography: p. - Includes index. 1. Science, Ancient. 2. Physics-Early works to 1800. I. Hussey, Edward. 11. Title. III. Series. Q151.A7913 1983 500.2 82- 18996 ISBN 0- 19-872069-6 (pbk.) 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 Printed in Great Brt'tain on acid-free paper by Biddies Ltd, Guildford and King's Lynn PREFACE AND DEDICATION This volume offers guidance to a reader who wishes to explore books III and IV of Aristotle's Physics. The translation and the notes follow the common pattern of the Clarendon Aristotle Series. The translation aims to be literal, in the sense that it tries to beg as few questions of interpretation as possible. The notes give a step-by-step discussion of the text. In the Introduction, I have tried to give a more connected account of what Aristotle is about in these books. Two fundamental, and controversial, topics that arise are (i) Aristotle's philosophy of mathematics; and (ii) Aristotle's mathematical or other 'laws' of motion and of change in general. On these, I have provided fairly systematic treatments, but ones which are in some degree unortho­ dox. These topics, therefore, I have relegated to Additional Notes at the end of the volume. It is a pleasure to acknowledge the various kinds of help I have received in preparing this book. I must record particularly my gratitude to the Editor of the Clarendon Aristotle Series, Professor John Ackrill, for his sympathetic patience and valuable comments and advice at all stages. To David Charles, David Fowler, Jennifer Hornsby, Gavin Lawrence, Christopher Peacocke, Malcolm Schofield, and David Wiggins I am variously indebted for conversation, guidance and encouragement. I thank Edna Laird and Diane Burden for their efficient typing, and Derek Parfit for the generosity with which he allowed me the use of his electronic word-processing equipment. To Gwil Owen, who died when the manuscript of this book was already in the hands of the publisher, I owe in common with many others a less easily defmed, but deeper debt for his teaching and example in the study of ancient philosophy. I dedicate this book to his memory, and to that of another friend early dead, R. C. ('Prof) Zaehner. All Souls College, Oxford E.L.H. July 1982 V CONTENTS INTRODUCTION ix TRANSLATION NOTES 55 ADDITIONAL NOTES 176 (A) Aristotle's Philosophy of Mathematics 176 (B) Aristotelian Dynamics 185 EXPLANATION OF REFERENCES 201 LIST OF DIVERGENCES FROM THE TEXT OF ROSS 208 GLOSSARY 210 INDEXES 215 vii INTRODUCTION !.PHYSICS Ill AND IV AND THEIR INTERPRETATION (a) Contents, aim, and method Books Ill and IV of Aristotle's Physics consist of five essays, on the subjects of change (111.1-3), the infinite (III.4-8), place (IV.l-4), void (IV.S-9), and time (IV.l0-14). It is clear that they were composed fairly early in Aristotle's career as an independent thinker. Probably they were originally written soon after the Topics was completed, and not (except for the essay on time) much reworked later. Some clues to the history of their composition are pointed out in the notes. For the understanding of the text, though, questions of relative and absolute chronology are not of importance.1 Aristotle's aim is to arrive at a correct general theory about each of the subjects under discussion. His method is the method of dialectic, by which (in theory at least) the philosophical inquirer started from the accumulated material of common-sense intuitions, previous opinions of philosophers, and observed facts relevant to the subject, and ascended by a process of rational criticism and generalization to the correct account of the subject, which would usually be enshrined in a definition of the central term. The practice of Aristotelian dialectic is codified in the Topics, and Physics Ill and IV provide one of the earliest surviving examples of its application.2 Dialectic is a formalization of the ordinary processes of rational reflection, and most of the time the modern reader will not be far out if he takes Aristotle to be doing in these essays much what a modern physicist or philosopher does when discussing certain very general topics, such as the nature of time or space, in general terms. The peculiarities of Aristotle's discussions derive not so much from a 1 On the date and composition of the Phyrfics see esp. Ross (1), 1-11. 2 On dialectic in general: Index of subjects (under 'Dialectical Method'); and Owen (3), Wieland (2). ix INTRODUCTION peculiar method of thought as from the fact that Aristotle starts out with a particular set of assumptions or philosophical commitments, of which the influence is often manifest and everywhere present. It would be impossible, and pointless, to state all these assumptions. In the later sections of this Introduction, and in the notes, some of them are identified and elucidated. Two in particular it may be useful to mention here, because they are so alien to our ways of thinking, and not only mistaken but disastrously so: the assumptions (a) that all the sciences are, not merely essentially finite and com­ pletable, but in principle deducible from principles which are in some sense self-evident; (b) that the essential truths about physics, at any rate the physics of inanimate matter, lie more or less 'on the surface' in the sense that there is no 'micro-structure' of matter, and no physical agent not directly observable, by the unaided senses, as such. Besides such assumptions there is Aristotle's general metaphysical position, and this is one that is fairly familiar, and even fashionable, at the present time: essentialist, realist,1 and anti-Platonist. As an exponent of this kind of position Aristotle has had (at least until recently) no serious rival. These essays are in the end important, if they are so at all, not only as almost the earliest but also as classic expressions of a durable philosophical treatment of the problems under discussion. (b) Obstacles to understanding For the innocent modern reader, the obstacles that lie in the way of understanding and appreciating these books, or any work of Aristotle, are many and serious. (I) The language barrier. Aristotle's Greek, even when perfectly clear in its own terms, is full of words and phrases for which there is no English equivalent. Even thp most faithful translation needs to be supplemented by a commentary. (2) The presentation is often repellent and difficult. It is obvious that these writings were never prepared for any 'publication' or 1 Aristotle's realism is severely qualified in certain directions; see below, secs 3(c) 3 and 6 (g). X INTRODUCTION literary presentation by Aristotle; they reek of the lecture-room, though the first editors of the Aristotelian corpus may have tidied them up a little. The language is sometimes sloppy and ambiguous, or clumsy and obscure. There is some confusing arrangement of materials, some repetition, and a few short passages which can hardly be authentic.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Avoiding the Void: Avicenna on the Impossibility of Circular Motion in a Void*
    Created on 24 December 2006 at 20.51 hours page 1 Avoiding the Void: Avicenna on the Impossibility of Circular Motion in a Void* Jon McGinnis The topic of the void was of significant philosophical and scientific importance in the ancient and medieval world. Some, such as the atomists, maintained that the void was essential if one were to explain motion. Others, such as Aristotle, argued that the exis- tence of the void would absolutely preclude the possibility of motion. Moreover, there were disputes concerning even how to characterize the void. Thus the atomists claimed that interstitial voids were dispersed throughout every body and existed alongside bo- dies in an infinite space. Others, such as the Stoics, held that all bodies were localized in a plenum that was itself situated in an extra-cosmic, infinite void. Still others, such as the Neoplatonist John Philoponus, thought that the void was finite, and although as a matter of fact it is never devoid of a body, it at least is capable of existing independent of any body. The above roughly provides the gamut of positions concerning the void as it reached the medieval Arabic philosopher Avicenna ( 370–428/ 980–1037). In one form or another, Avicenna was aware of the various moves and counter-moves associated with the notion of the void. Like Aristotle, he maintained that the existence of the void would absolutely preclude the possibility of motion. His arguments in some cases simply rehearse those of Aristotle; in other places they expand on the thought of Aristotle in order to respond to new threats that arose after Aristotle’s own time; and in certain situations Avicenna constructs new arguments against the void used neither by Aristotle nor, from what we can gather, Aristotle’s later Greek commentators.
    [Show full text]
  • Quantum Reversal of Soul Energy Fran De Aquino
    Quantum Reversal of Soul Energy Fran de Aquino To cite this version: Fran de Aquino. Quantum Reversal of Soul Energy. 2012. hal-01129313 HAL Id: hal-01129313 https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01129313 Preprint submitted on 10 Mar 2015 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. Quantum Reversal of Soul Energy Fran De Aquino Maranhao State University, Physics Department, S.Luis/MA, Brazil. Copyright © 2012 by Fran De Aquino. All Rights Reserved. In the last decades, the existence of the Soul has been seriously considered by Quantum Physics. It has been frequently described as a body of unknown energy coupled to human body by means of a mutual interaction. The Quantum Physics shows that energy is quantized, i.e., it has discrete values that are defined as energy levels. Thus, along the life of a person, the energy of its soul is characterized by several quantum levels of energy. Here, we show by means of application of specific electromagnetic radiations on the human body, that it is possible to revert the energy of the soul to previous energy levels. This process can have several therapeutic applications.
    [Show full text]
  • 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.
    [Show full text]
  • 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.
    [Show full text]
  • Aristotle's Physics
    PROPOSAL : Aristotle’s Physics , A Critical Guide EditedbyMariskaLeunissen,TheUniversityofNorthCarolinaatChapelHill A. Project description The importance of Aristotle’s Physics : Throughout his life, Aristotle was deeply committed to the study of natural phenomena: about one third of the surviving Corpus Aristotelicum investigatesandexplainsthemotionsandattributesofthingsthathaveanature, that is, of things that have an internal principle of change and rest. The Physics – an intellectual masterpiece in itself and one of the mostlywidely readAristotelian treatises – forms Aristotle’s most fundamental treatise in his studies of natural philosophy. In this treatise,Aristotleinvestigatestheprinciplesandcausesofallnaturalthingsingeneral,and,in thecourseofdoingso,definesalargenumberofkeyconceptsofhisnaturalphilosophy, suchasmotionandchange,spaceandtime,matterandform,causalexplanation,luckand spontaneity, teleology and necessity. In addition, Aristotle specifies in the Physics the methodologicalguidelinesforhowoneshouldstudynatureifonewantstogainscientific knowledgeofit,whichincludesthefamousbutstillill-understoodrecommendationtostart fromthingsthatare“moreknownandclearertous”and towork fromthere towhat is “moreknownandclearerbynature”.Inthisway,the Physics laysoutAristotle’sconceptual apparatus and methodological framework for all of his natural philosophy, including his psychology,biology,andotherinquiriesintothemorespecificandmorecomplexsegments ofthenaturalworldpreservedinAristotle’sremainingnaturaltreatises. The Physics isnotjustrelevantforAristotle’snaturalphilosophy,however;sincetheobjects
    [Show full text]
  • Separate Material Intellect in Averroes' Mature Philosophy Richard C
    View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by epublications@Marquette Marquette University e-Publications@Marquette Philosophy Faculty Research and Publications Philosophy, Department of 1-1-2004 Separate Material Intellect in Averroes' Mature Philosophy Richard C. Taylor Marquette University, [email protected] Published version. "Separate Material Intellect in Averroes' Mature Philosophy," in Words, Texts and Concepts Cruising the Mediterranean Sea. Eds. Gerhard Endress, Rud̈ iger Arnzen and J Thielmann. Leuven; Dudley, MA: Peeters, 2004: 289-309. Permalink. © 2004 Peeters Publishers. Used with permission. ORIENTALIA LOVANIENSIA ANALECTA ---139--- 'WORDS, TEXTS AND CONCEPTS CRUISING THE MEDITERRANEAN SEA Studies on the sources, contents and influences of Islamic civilization and Arabic philosophy and science Dedicated to Gerhard Endress on his sixty-fifth birthday edited by R. ARNZEN and J. THIELMANN UITGEVERIJ PEETERS en DEPARTEMENT OOSTERSE STUDIES LEUVEN - PARIS - DUDLEY, MA 2004 SEPARATE MATERIAL INTELLECT IN A VERROES' MATURE PHILOSOPHY Richard C. T AYLOR Marquette University, Milwaukee The doctrine of the material intellect promulgated by Averroes (i126- 1198) in his latest works is surely the teaching for which he has been most maligned both in the medieval era and in modern times. In medi­ eval times Duns Scotus spoke of "That accursed Averroes" whose "fan­ tastic conception, intelligible neither to himself nor to others, assumes the intellective part of man to be a sort
    [Show full text]
  • 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.
    [Show full text]
  • Luck and Good Fortune in the Eudemian Ethics
    Luck and Good Fortune in the EudemianEthics Kent Johnson Recentlythere has beensome discussion of Aristotle's treatmentof good for- tune(£\m>x;{a) in the penultimatechapter of the EudemianEthics. I Thereare two claims about this chapterI wish to challenge.One maintainsthat the use of the word tUXll (usuallytranslated as 'luck' or 'chance')in the EE is 'quite different' from Aristotle's theoretical discussion of luck, found in the Physics (Woods 1992,67). The other claim is that good fortune is a subspeciesof luck (Kenny 1992,ch. 5, esp.71 and 75). In challengingthese two views,I hopeto developan accountof Aristotle's true intent in this chapter.In the first part of this article I considerthe notion of luck asit is presentedin the Physicsand then argue that the discussionof luck in the EE accordswith this. In the secondpart I arguethat by the end of his discussionof good fortune in the EE, Aristotle doesnot consider good fortune to be any kind of luck at all. I. TuX1lin the Physicsand the EudemianEthics Woods 1992,166 denies that the useof 'luck' (tuX1l)in the EE agreeswith its usein the Physics,because in the PhysicstUX1l is usedin sucha way that 'to say that somethingoccurred by chancewill not be to give an explanation,but to deny that a general explanation is available'. Thus, there is 'no incompatibility betweensomething's occurring by chanceand its being caused',since chance is not a cause distinct from the four real causes(Woods 1992, 167). Instead, 'chanceoccurrences have the featurethat they fall underno law that holds uni- versallyor for the most part under the descriptionunder which theyare correctly said to occur by chance,though they will havesome explanation under another description'(166).
    [Show full text]
  • Averroes on Psychology and the Principles of Metaphysics Richard C
    Marquette University e-Publications@Marquette Philosophy Faculty Research and Publications Philosophy, Department of 10-1-1998 Averroes on Psychology and the Principles of Metaphysics Richard C. Taylor Marquette University, [email protected] Published version. Journal of the History of Philosophy, Vol. 36, No. 4 (October, 1998): 507-523. DOI. Copyright © 1998 Journal of the History of Philosophy, Inc. This article first appeared in Journal of the History of Philosophy 36:4 (1998), 507-523. Reprinted with permission by The oJ hns Hopkins University Press. Averroes on Psychology and the Principles of Metaphysics I RICHARD C. TAYLOR FIRST TRANSLATED FROM Arabic into Latin in the early thirteenth century, the philosophical works of Averroes were initially respected as valuable aids to understanding the true philosophy of Aristotle. William of Auvergne, Bishop of Paris and author of a philosophically astute theological synthesis of Greek and Arabic thought with Christian doctrine, openly expressed his appreciation with praise for Averroes. But by the mid-thirteenth century many of Averroes' teachings were under attack with his conceptions of human nature and separate immaterial intellect the subject of sharply focussed and heated argumentative assaults by Aquinas, Albert and others3 Their arguments were not primarily theological but rather philosophical criticisms which charged that Averroes, Drafts of this paper were presented at a conference sponsored by the International Society for the History of Arabic and Islamic Science and Philosophy at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC, March 28, 1996, and at the annual meeting of the Medieval Academy of America in Toronto, Canada, April 19, 1997. I benefited from discussions of this article with Alfred Ivry, my colleagues, David B.
    [Show full text]
  • 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.
    [Show full text]
  • A Lesson from the Arcane World of the Heavenly Spheres According to Maimonides
    A LESSON FROM THE ARCANE WORLD OF THE HEAVENLY SPHERES ACCORDING TO MAIMONIDES by DAVID R. BLUMENTHAL Emory Univeristy, Atlanta, GA 30322 The Teaching and the Text So that the ordinary Jew have an informed view of creation as a step toward true conviction about God, Maimonides devotes chapter three of "Hillscot yesode hattoriih" of the Mifoe Torah to an exposition of medieval astrophysics. The system he expounds has several traits that are strange to modern ears: first, it is geocentric; second, the heavenly bodies do not move by themselves in space but are embedded in transparent spheres which move; third, there is no empty space at all between these spheres; and fourth, Aristotelian physics demanded a system with circular uniform movement about a single fixed center. However, since the actually observed motions of the heavenly bodies do not fit this model, ancient and medieval astrophysicists invented a complicated series of spheres-within-spheres to account for the actual phenomena. This attempt to "save the phenomena," as Simplicius put it, seems very artificial to us, particularly since we now know it to have been a useless undertaking. We reject geocentrism, we accept the idea of space, and we are not bound by the idealist definitions of motion in Aristotelian physics. Maimonides, however, accepted all this and, as we shall see, took an important place in the extended fight over which of the explanations available to him was the correct one. 1 I. The best history of these matters remains the classic by Duhem ( 1913). Volumes I and II cover antiquity and the middle ages.
    [Show full text]
  • 1 the Aristotelian Method and Aristotelian
    1 The Aristotelian Method and Aristotelian Metaphysics TUOMAS E. TAHKO (www.ttahko.net) Published in Patricia Hanna (Ed.), An Anthology of Philosophical Studies (Athens: ATINER), pp. 53-63, 2008. ABSTRACT In this paper I examine what exactly is ‘Aristotelian metaphysics’. My inquiry into Aristotelian metaphysics should not be understood to be so much con- cerned with the details of Aristotle's metaphysics. I am are rather concerned with his methodology of metaphysics, although a lot of the details of his meta- physics survive in contemporary discussion as well. This warrants an investigation into the methodological aspects of Aristotle's metaphysics. The key works that we will be looking at are his Physics, Meta- physics, Categories and De Interpretatione. Perhaps the most crucial features of the Aristotelian method of philosophising are the relationship between sci- ence and metaphysics, and his defence of the principle of non-contradiction (PNC). For Aristotle, natural science is the second philosophy, but this is so only because there is something more fundamental in the world, something that natural science – a science of movement – cannot study. Furthermore, Aristotle demonstrates that metaphysics enters the picture at a fundamental level, as he argues that PNC is a metaphysical rather than a logical principle. The upshot of all this is that the Aristotelian method and his metaphysics are not threatened by modern science, quite the opposite. Moreover, we have in our hands a methodology which is very rigorous indeed and worthwhile for any metaphysician to have a closer look at. 2 My conception of metaphysics is what could be called ‘Aristotelian’, as op- posed to Kantian.
    [Show full text]