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The Aristotlian Concepts of Actuality and Potentiality and the Cartesian

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The Aristotlian Concepts of Actuality and Potentiality and the Cartesian Transformation in Knowledge: The Aristotelian Concepts ofActuality and Potentiality and the Cartesian Method by Andrew Piskun, BA (hons.) Submitted m fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of Tasmania, May 2009 1 ('l\o(I\ ~ ·•f\',~!;,I ':, ?1~lll~ ?hO DECLARATION OF ORIGINALITY ')..Oc/1\ This thesis contains no material which has been accepted for a degree or diploma by the University or any other institution, except by way of background information and duly acknowledged in the thesis, and to the best of my knowledge and belief no material previously published or written by another person except where due acknowledgement is made in the text of the thesis, nor does the thesis contain any material that infringes copyright. Andrew Piskun 29 th May 2009 2 bSl.~?_f>I 5 A 7002 19585648 STATEMENT FOR AUTHORITY TO ACCESS This thesis may be available for loan and limited copying in accordance with the Copyright Act 1968. Andrew Piskun 29th May 2009 3 ABSTRACT Transformation in Knowledge: The Aristotelian Concepts efActualiry and Potentialtry and the Cartesian Method In tlus thesis, I will discuss the Anstotelian concepts of actuality and potentiality in combination with the Cartesian method. On the one hand this will be done as an attempt to balance the traditional English language interpretation of the relationship between Anstotelian and Cartesian philosophy, which tends to characterise them as fundamentally opposed. On the other hand, it will be done in order to generate legitimate unexplored conceptual frameworks for viewing the work of both philosophers. There is an assumption central to the greater part of English language scholarship on Descartes, attaining almost the status of self­ evidence, that within the philosophical canon, the appearance of the Cartesian method marks a definitive break between the ancient and the modern. Descartes signal achievement, on this assumption, was that he found a way once and for all, to break philosophy free from the shackles of Aristotelian thought. Such an idea is based upon the notion that, after Aristotle and prior to Descartes, philosophy consisted of little more than the endless repetition, or subtle modification of a hybrid Christian/Anstotelian doctrine. The subsequent trajectory of English language philosophy appears to attest to the validity of such a Vlew, and its apparent self-evidence from the perspective of this tradition serves to cover over other legitimate approaches to interpretation and use of Aristotelian and Cartesian concepts. In this thesis, rather than performing a comparison of the philosophy of Aristotle and Descartes, the Aristotelian concepts of actuality and potentiality and the Cartesian method will be considered ID light of a smgle task, namely, an attempt to theorise transformations in fundamental structures of knowledge. This will be accomplished by identifying latent possibilities suitable for such a task within Aristotelian and Cartesian conceptual structures, and extending them accordingly. As such, this thesis must be understood as a speculative work rather than as a work in history of philosophy. Aristotle demonstrates the meaning and function of the concepts of actuality and potentiality by way of analogy. This form of demonstration leaves the meaning of actuality and potentiality open to further extension by analogy. As such, the concepts of actuality and potentiality can be extended to cases not originally brought under these concepts by Aristotle. In this thesis the concepts of actuality and potentiality will be extended, according to the structure of the analogy by which Aristotle originally defines them, to an explanation of transformation in structures of knowledge. At the same time, the Cartesian method will be interpreted as a detailed account of a particular transformation from one structure of knowledge to another. Whilst Descartes characterises his own project in terms of the attainment of certainty, I intend to show that Descartes' stated intention in the creation of his method is less significant in terms of his overall system that the transformation that this intent brings about. 4 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to acknowledge my supervisor Jeff Malpas, who somehow helped me to keep focus m spite of my natural tendency to wander off on endless tangents. I would also like to acknowledge Lenka Ucnik, without whose support, both intellectual and otherwise, I would not have been able to complete this thesis. 5 TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter 1 - Introduction ..................................................................................................... 7 Chapter 2-Actuality-Potentiality .................................................................................... 23 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................... 23 2. Actualiry and Energeia/Entelecheia ........................................................................... 25 3. From Being and Not-being to Actualiry and Potentzaliry ..................................................... .42 4. Analogy, the Categones, andActualiry-Potentialiry ............................................................. 72 5. Conclusion: From the Movement ef Beings to the Movement ef Structures ef Knowledge ............... 86 Chapter 3 - Pros Hen Structure and Non-generic Unity ................................................... 91 1. Introduction . .............................................................................................................. 91 2. Pros Hen Structure as an Alternate Form if Unity . ......................................................... 92 3. Equivocation, Paro1!Jmiry and Pros Hen Structure ......................................................... 109 4. 'Prioriry' as a Pros Hen Structure ............................................................................... 120 5. The Pre-apprehension ef S ul?Ject Matter and Its Integration into the Causal Milieu .................. 126 6. Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 135 Chapter 4-Thought and Phenomena in the Cartesian Method ...................................... 137 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................. 137 2. The Cartesian Theory ef]udgment and the Cartesian Method ............................................. 142 3. Method and Methodology ............................................................................................ 153 4. Method and Phenomena ............................................................................................. 158 5. Revelation and the Integration ef Phenomena .................................................................. 165 6. From Method as Effect to Method as Cause .................................................................... 170 7. Dzstinctness, &ductzon and the E:>q>ansion ifIdeas .......................................................... 172 8. The Prioriry ef 'Thought" within Methodological Doubt .................................................... 183 9. Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 197 Chapter 5 - The Actualisation of Cartesian Metaphysics ............................................... 202 1. Actualisation and the structure ef Cartesian metaphysics .................................................... 202 2. From Axioms or Common Notions .............................................................................. 211 3. A.xiomatzi:s and Structure ........................................................................................... 228 4. From God ............................................................................................................... 244 5. Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 250 Chapter 6 - Conclusion ................................................................................................... 254 Bibliography ................................................................................................................... 262 6 Chapter 1 INTRODUCTION In the study of history of philosophy two broad approaches are prevalent. One is represented by scholars who enter deeply into the work of a smgle phtlosopher or a small group of related philosophers, attemptmg to lay out in detail the minute internal characteristics of their works. The goal of such exegetical work is the ever more accurate rendition into modern philosophical language of archaic philosophical works, achieved through a combination of scrupulous philological work and empathy.1 The second approach is characterised by its focus on the development of individual concepts or sets of concepts. This 'developmental' approach can be divided into two further groups according to whether the development under consideration 1s that of philosophy as such 2 or of a given concept or set of concepts. 3 Regarding this latter approach, one rmght choose to follow the concept of 'knowledge' from Plato through to Descartes, noting continuities and differences of form and function along the way. In this case one would be required to trace this concept across several translations, using 1 Recent examples being Charlotte Witt, Ways of Being : Potentiality and Actualzty in Aristotle's Metaphysics (Ithaca,
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