Augros - Nature Acts for an End

Nature Acts for an End

Robert M. Augros

St. Anselm College,Manchester, New Hampshire.

2002

I

n this article

I shall explain and defend the principle that nature actsfor an end. When Aristotle and St. Thomas assert this principle they arespeaking of purposefulness apart from human intervention, since it is obviousthat man can employ just about any natural thing for his own purposes. AsAristotle puts it, “We use everything [in nature] as if it were there for oursake.”

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Thus, the question is whether natural things of themselves have pur-poses. Other ways of stating the thesis are: Nature does nothing in vain;nature acts for what is better; nature does not fail in necessary things; apartfrom human inﬂuence purpose is a real cause in natural things. Or as Aristotlesays in

On the Parts of Animals

, “Everything that nature makes is a meansto an end.”

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A sign of the great importance of the purposefulness of nature is that it hasapplications in several sciences. Whether nature acts for an end is importantfor natural science, since we know a thing most perfectly when we know itscauses. Now purpose is not only a cause. It commands and illuminates theother kinds of cause: matter, form, and mover. Therefore, if purpose is foundin natural things it will illuminate these things more than the other causeswill in themselves.It is also important for ethics. If nature acts for ends then man has anatural purpose. It belongs to ethics to deﬁne the purpose of human life butthe basis for this deﬁnition must be found in natural philosophy. Also, if therewere no wisdom in nature, it would be pointless to use nature as a measure of human acts, as in the natural moral law. If our ability to eat, or our sexualfaculty, or our power of speech do not have natural purposes, then it will beimpossible to abuse them, since abuse means using a thing in a way contraryto its natural purpose.

1

Aristotle,

Physics

2.2, in Richard McKeon, ed.,

The Basic Works of Aristotle

(NewYork: Random House, 1970), 240. All subsequent quotations of Aristotle are from thisedition.

2

Aristotle,

On the Parts of Animals

1.1 (McKeon, ed., 649).

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Nature Acts for an End

The consequences for political science are equally serious. If human natureis ordered to a common good, then in some sense the city will be “a creationof nature,” as Aristotle contends.

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But if nature does not aim at the commongood, then human beings will have no natural inclination to live together andany government will have to be imposed artiﬁcially on them, as Hobbes, Locke,and Rousseau maintain.It is important for the arts whether or not nature is wise and purposeful,especially those arts such as agriculture and medicine that build on natureand cooperate with it. Emphasizing the centrality of purpose, St. Thomasobserves, “In those cases in which something is done for an end, as occursin the realm of natural things, in moral matters and art, the most forcefuldemonstrations are derived from the ﬁnal cause.”

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There are consequences for metaphysics. Nature acting for an end can beused as a minor premise in a proof for God’s existence, as in St. Thomas’sﬁfth way. Further, if wisdom and goodness are found in nature, this can giveus insight into the wisdom and goodness of God.If natural things do not act for an end, then no action or product of natureis the object of an innate inclination or tendency. If that is true, then thereare no innate inclinations or tendencies. And if that is true, there is no nature.This is why Aristotle says that those who claim nature does not act for endentirely do away with nature and what exists by nature. For those thingsare natural which, by a continuous movement originated from an internalprinciple, arrive at some completion: the same completion is not reached fromevery principle; nor any chance completion, but always the tendency in eachis towards the same end, if there is no impediment.

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That nature acts for an end needs to be shown. In

Physics

2.3 Aristotledistinguishes four kinds of cause. The first three are obviously found in naturalthings. He devotes a whole chapter (2.8), however, to showing that purposeis also a cause in nature. The material cause is evident since all naturalsubstances are made from matter. The material cause explains why a tongueis flexible but bones are not. The formal cause is also obvious, since form andmatter always go together. Form is what makes an incisor different from amolar. The moving cause is also obvious in natural things: the sun warms theearth, a snake kills a rodent. Purpose, however, though obvious in our ownactions, is not as obvious as the other three causes are in natural things apartfrom man. It is easy to find examples of the good in nature, but it is not easyto see how the good is a cause in natural things. Proof and explanation arerequired.Whether nature acts for an end is a disputed question, as can be seen from

3

Aristotle,

Politics

1.2 (McKeon, ed., 1129).

4

Aquinas,

V Metaphys.

, lect. 3, in Thomas Aquinas,

Commentary on Aristotle’s Meta-physics

, trans. John P. Rowan (Chicago: Henry Regnery, 1961), 311 (no. 782).

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Aristotle,

Physics

2.8 (McKeon, ed., 251).

Nature Acts for an End

3the many arguments raised on both sides. Consequently, in the tradition of St. Thomas, I will follow in this article the format of an article in the

Ques-tiones Disputatae

. Such articles have four main parts: numerous objections,several probable arguments to the contrary, a corpus that oﬀers more coerciveevidence, and responses to the objections. Hence we proceed to the objections.

Videtur Quod Non

The scientiﬁc investigation of the truth begins with a careful consideration of the diﬃculties.

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There are many reasons that might lead someone to thinkthat purpose, apart from our own ends, is not found in natural things.

1) Nature Has No Mind

— Since nature does not have a mind of its own, it is anthropomorphic to say that nature acts for an end. Withouta mind, nature cannot know which means are required to achieve a givenend, and therefore cannot act for the sake of it. Embryologist and geneticistC. H. Waddington writes, “Natural philosophy nowadays rejects teleologicalideas because they appear to demand the existence of some self-aware beingwho can formulate purposes and ends.”

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2) The Posterior Cannot Cause the Prior

— What comes after cannotbe a cause of what comes before. Thus, the end result, which is the last thingin any sequence, cannot be the cause of anything prior to it. Therefore, thenotion of an end as a cause is illogical and unscientific. Hence, Spinoza saysthe doctrine of final causes overturns nature, “for that which is really a causeit considers an effect and vice versa.”

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3) Darwin Banished Purpose from Natural Science

— Darwiniansargue that nature does not act for an end, but produces things at random andonly those organisms with favorable characteristics survive. So what lookslike purpose in natural things is not intended at all but is the result of sur-vival of the ﬁttest. Nineteenth-century biologist Thomas Huxley declared that“teleology ...received its death blow at Mr. Darwin’s hands.”

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4) Simplicity Eliminates Purpose

— The principle of simplicity is oneof the most respected and most frequently used principles in all the sciences.It states that the simpler explanation is better (other things being equal).But everything in animals and plants can be explained by matter, structure,mover, and chance. Therefore, purpose is superﬂuous.

5) The Mover Explains the Entire Eﬀect

— If we can assign acause that accounts for all of an eﬀect, then any further cause is unneces-sary. Growth, for instance, produces the entire structure of an animal, not

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Aristotle,

Metaphysics

3.1 (McKeon, ed., 715).

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C. H. Waddington,

The Nature of Life

(New York: Harper & Row, 1961), 118–19.

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Benedict de Spinoza,

The Ethics

[appendix to Part 1], trans. R. H. M. Elwes, in