Ancient Greece- Aristotle

Question 1

background

Answer 1

• he was the first empiricist, meaning that he didn’t look to another realm for understanding of our existence, instead based on sensory experience.
• his method of understanding was PER GENUS ET PER DIFFERENTIA, meaning by type and by difference, essentially greatening your knowledge of something.
• he disagrees with his teacher plato lots- he doesn’t believe that we ‘remember’ things, instead we’re taught them and learn them through practice (hence rejecting the theory of the forms). one of his discoveries was that the world was a sphere, which was made through observation- this knowledge couldn’t be acquired through platonic means.

Question 2

the four causes

Answer 2

he believed that everything is caused by something else- POTENTIALITY (possibility to become something), ACTUALITY (when potential is achieved). this links to cause and effect.
1) material cause: what is a thing made of, and what material makes it?
2) formal cause: idea or plan that led to the creation of something (the shaping and designing).
3) efficient cause: the maker of an object.
4) final cause: the purpose of an object. he believes that even non-human things have a purpose, hence nature as a whole has a purpose.
- teleology: any theory related to purpose.

Question 3

the prime mover

Answer 3

this is Aristotles god, which is completely different to the kind of god that abrahamic religions have given us, which were ‘perfect’ and ‘everlasting’. he believes that god and the universe are co-eternal, and that the universe had no beginning. it has no efficient cause, and is eternal with no start.
- his god isn’t interested with the world. it attracts through his nature and not through his interest, and has no conscience while doing so.
- the prime mover shouldn’t be known as ‘creator’, instead should be understood as something that creates change and movement by exercising and ‘pulling’. its responsible for all change and motion in the universe.
it is PURE ACTUALITY and has no potential to change, instead attracting things to itself.
- Aristotle believed in INFINITE REGRESS, which is the chain of cause and effect going back to eternity with no end.

Question 4

prime mover and the form of the good

Answer 4

• they’re similar in one way- neither is directly/ personally concerned with the world or created it.
• BUT, they’re also very different. plato doesn’t tell us if the form of the good has consciousness, while the prime mover is supremely conscious.
• both are just trying to explain why things occur in the world. the form of the good tries to explain what things like goodness ‘really’ is, and is a way of finding something permanent in the world of change, while the prime mover is made to explain change.

Question 5

strengths

Answer 5

• his understanding of the prime mover has influenced christian understanding of god (explaining the need for an entity outside of time and space + solution to infinite regress).
• four causes explain how things move from potentiality to actuality.

Question 6

scientific objections

Answer 6

as much as this is a valid argument, he didn’t actually have access to modern devices. this didn’t stop him from recognising the need to be careful in our observations, and finding appropriate ways of recording/ analysing/ sorting information.

Question 7

causes objections

Answer 7

its more of an assumption- just because its named, doesn’t mean its explained. for example, the efficient cause doesn’t tell us what happened, just that something happened. its too broad.

Question 8

purpose objections

Answer 8

• people question his notion for purpose- this is a mental intention, which humans DO, therefor how can inanimate things have purpose?
• its difficult to assume that the universe has a purpose- rocks and fragments whirl for no particular good. RUSSEL says ‘the universe is just there, and that’s all’ suggesting that that Aristotle is just finding purpose where it doesn’t belong. Dawkins says that the universe is simply the result of chance.
• modern anatomy suggests that not all parts of the body have purpose (e.g a mans nipple).

Question 9

prime mover objections

Answer 9

• just because theres final causes in the world doesn’t mean that the whole world is a final cause.
• the prime mover is used to explain motion/ change, but that assumes that theres one single cause for change. this makes it difficult to believe that the prime mover causes many reasons for change.
• the Big Bang theory argues that theres no need for god, especially one that brings the world into motion through attraction.
• religious people wouldn’t believe in the prime mover, since their god cares about the universe, and is therefore worthy of prayer.

Question 10

criticisms

Answer 10

• Aristotle was an empiricist, which contradicts basically all of his theories. he believed that you have to observe the natural world to make conclusions.
• his work is hard to evaluate. plato wrote elegantly with illustrations, however Aristotles work is hard to follow, leading some scholars to believe that his work wasn’t meant for publication.