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Author(s): H. J. Easterling
Source: Phronesis , 1976, Vol. 21, No. 3 (1976), pp. 252-265
Published by: Brill
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H. J. EASTERLING
252
E'V 'CiXXWV eiU 8n,O'V 67r4 '/eL (gaTt yOp TL XLVOUV XOc OxLvoV).
201 a 25-27
After some preliminaries, r 1 begins by defining change as the
actualisation of the potential (a 11), giving examples (a 16). Aristotle
then makes the point that some things can be both actually and
potentially, and thus can stand both as agent and as patient. This
applies to To xLvo5v qpuaLXW, which is %Lv7qTov as well as xvv-rtsx6v (a 24),
because it produces change while being changed itself. A digression
(a 25-27) then remarks that there is another kind of mover (viz. un-
moved), though some thinkers fail to realise this.
2. xweVcoctL 8 xatL so xLvo5v 'Oaitsp XepraxL 7stWv, TO\ aUvo4ta OV XLVT6V,
XOct Oi n axwVatL' npqao ea-.Lv (V y&p I XVaCL u7rtpxel, OUTOou XxLvacta
202 a 3-5
This is merely the same point as that made at 201 a 25-27, appearing
again in the summary at the end of the chapter. Every mover, says
253
uro6 Xo6yoq &S7L XLVouvroq XaL xLvourvoou), t:5 E 7V no XtV0ov XLV CErcu,
I zZOV xLVYnaLv oU ztvyatroa. 202 a 21-31
F 3 deals with the relation between mover and moved. It motion is the
actualisation of the potential, where does this actualisation take place?
Is it in the agent or in the patient? Aristotle's answer is that it is in the
patient (a 13-14). But this raises a difficulty (a 21). There are really
two actualisations, that of the potential agent and that of the potential
patient. Do they both take place in the patient (alternative A) or is one
in the agent and the other in the patient (alternative B) (a 25-27)?
Aristotle examines these two possibilities in turn.
1. Take alternative B, that n teV noLLag eV 't) noto5vwn, -l 8? iaSCt,O
EVJ TC) wa7rocovwn.
This entails that there will be movement in the mover (a 29),
which in turn leads to one or the other of two alternatives,
either 1.1 every mover will be moved;
or 1.2 something that has movement in it will not be
moved.
These are both impossible consequences and so by this reductio
ad impossibile alternative B can be rejected.
2. Take alternative A, that both are in the patient (a 31). Various
difficulties result from this (a 33-b 5), but these can be resolved
(b 5-22).
In this argument, the section relevant to my present discussion is 1.1,
which shows that Aristotle implicitly rejects as impossible the sugges-
tion that every mover is in motion. I.e. he believes that there is such a
thing as an unmoved mover.
In these passages, then, Aristotle clearly mentions or presupposes the
existence of some kind of unmoved mover. And wh -lile passages 2 and 3
might be dismissed as referring merely to some unspecified kind of
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l Of course, as Ross remarks ad loc., Aristotle cannot mean to say this, because
it is obvious that the formal cause is relevant to natural objects; Aristotle must
be taken to mean that MxivrrTa provide a particularly clear illustration of formal
causation (because the other three causes do not, in the nature of the case,
operate 'v -oZq t'CxMLVoL, so that there is no danger of confusing the formal
cause with any of the others).
257
Of these three, (1) is clearly 7prIn (pL?oaocpqx and the other two are sub-
divisions of physics, (2) being astronomy and (3) the study of the
sublunary world.
(1) physics
(2) mathematics
(3) first philosophy.
(2) and (3) are here said to be sub-divisions of physics, but mathema-
tics does not appear as a third science; the only mention of hcjrex'nxa
here is as possible candidates for classification as MxLvThro4 ot6aUo. Thus
the presuppositions that lie behind the trichotomy of sciences in
Physics B 7.2 seem to be in sympathy with Met. A, and not with the
earlier part of Physics B. This again suggests that B 7.2 is not part
of the original version but is later in date than the rest of B"1.
10 For a fuller discussion of this subject see P. Merlan From Platonism to Neo-
platonism' (The Hague, 1960), pp. 59ff.
258
"1 I am assuming that Met. A is later in date than the Physics. Although many
scholars take Met. A to be an early work (so most recently I. During, Aristoteles,
pp. 189-190), I find it difficult to believe that it could have been written before
Physics 0. It must surely be later than the Physics, if only because its theory of
the Unmoved Mover represents a clear advance on that of Physics 0, and
because it presupposes and refers to a number of doctrines expounded in
Physics 0 (e.g. 1071 b 6-10, b 10-11, 1073 a 7, a 10; these passages are integral to
the argument and can hardly be explained away as later additions).
12 H. von Arnim, 'Zu W. Jaegers Grundlegung der Entwicklungsgeschichte des
Aristoteles' (Wiener Studien 46 (1928) lOff).
"I Of von Arnim's points, (1) and (2) are hardly conclusive, while (3) seems to be
an unreal difficulty. The statements about unmoved movers seem to be para-
doxical rather than contradictory. An unmoved mover is not a TUMxh &pyn (a
in the sense that it is not a natural object and does not have an &pyi xIac
murCo (a 37). The study of such a mover in itself is therefore not a department of
CpuaLxY (a 28, oux&rL 9uputx<), but comes under the heading of 7rpcu11 PL),OaOqta.
This, however, does not prevent it from having an effect on natural objects
which is 9uatx6v (i.e. it XLVeL 9ulamXi, a 36), in the sense that when it operates on
them its effect is to make them move in a natural way (i.e. it actualises their
&pX? xLV*aecoq &v cxa9). So although an unmoved mover as a subject of study is
itself outside the province of physics its effect on the world of natural objects is
a proper subject of study for the physicist. Simplicius recognises this paradox:
OG Y&p &a rL (puaLX' &XECVin PX, &X)Xo (puaixCv (367. 12-13). So too does Philopon
who explains the point at greater length (304. 11-24).
'1 F. Solmsen, Aristotle's System ol the Physical WVorld (Ithaca, 1963), p. 113
259
260
17 Cf. J. Bernays, Die Dialoge des Aristoteles (Berlin, 1863), pp. 108-110, followed
by H. F. Cherniss, Aristotle's Criticism of Plato and the A cademy (Baltimore, 1944),
pp. 594-595, E. Berti, op cit. pp. 355-356, and M. Untersteiner, op. cit. p. 285.
For the most recent discussions, see K. Gaiser and A. Graeser, op. cit. (above,
note 3).
18 Cf. Solmsen, op. cit. (above, note 14) p. 113, n. 83, and PNpin, op. cit. (above,
note 3), pp. 468-469.
'"1072 b 1-3-
20 Cf. de Anima 415 b 15-21, where the quXy is said to be the o6 gvexm for the bod
and its organs. There are three other passages where Aristotle makes the
distinction (de Anima 415 a 26-b7, Met. A 1072 b 1-3, and E.E. 1249 b 9-19).
In only one of these (Met. A 1072 b 1-3) is there an explicit reference to the
Unmoved Mover. The other cases show that the concepts of o5 bvexx and
&xivL*rov XLvoZv are not necessarily connected in Aristotle's mind. In both thes
passages he speaks of god or T-6 &lov as the oT bvexa of things without any mention
of his (or its) effect on the movement of the heavens, or indeed on x[V-aCl as such
at all. For a full discussion of these passages, see Gaiser and Graeser op. cit.,
(above, note 3).
'A In frs. 16 and 26 (Ross) the dialogue is cited by name.
261
ment. There are two distinct conceptions in Aristotle of the apyJ' of the
uriiverse: (1) there is god, the supreme being of the universe, whose
perfection makes him serve as a goal of aspiration, i.e. a final cause, for
all other beings in the universe, and (2) there is the Unmoved Mover
responsible for the movement of the heavenly bodies. These two concep-
tions are of course combined in one in Met. A, but this does not mean
that they must have been combined in Aristotle's mind at other stages
of his development, and in point of fact it hardly needs emphasising
that the account in Physics 0 is in terms of (2) only.
The doctrine of the Unmoved Mover as it is developed in Phlysics 0
is based on Aristotle's analysis of xtv-caL; beginning with the thesis
that the eternal movement of the universe must be explained by
reference to a prime mover, which must itself be either self-moving or
unmoved, he examines the nature of xLv-nat and concludes that a self-
moving prime mover is impossible; from this it follows that any prime
mover that we postulate must be unmoved. In this argument he is
thinking on a cosmic scale (although this is not stated explicitly at
the outset, and only becomes clear in the course of the argument), and
the unmoved mover that emerges in the course of E) is the Unmoved
Mover, i.e. the prime mover of the universe, conceived as the agency
responsible for the movement of the universe and in particular for the
movement of the heavens. The argument is worked out in mechanical
terms, and Aristotle's conception of the Unmoved Mover still seems
to be mechanical, since he assumes that a mover must be in contact
with the body moved by it, and he locates the Unmoved Mover at the
circumference of the universe. There is no idea of invoking final causa-
tion to explain the Unmoved Mover's mode of operation. Moreover
there is no attempt in this book to link mechanical and religious
ideas; there is no suggestion that the agency under discussion deserves
the title &e6;.
There is thus no necessary connexion between the two ideas of (1)
god as the supreme being of the universe, and (2) the celestial Un-
moved Mover. Physics 0 contains (2) but not (1), and it is quite
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