Aquinas's First Way

[balto]

I don’t even think that copper is a “pure substance”. If it can be broken down into distinct parts, it is not a substance. That is my position.

And what is it broken down into? Some fundamental particles I assume. And then to describe copper you have to add a laundry list of qualifications on these fundamental particles such that you’ve basically just given a fancy, long-drawn-out description of the substantial form of copper.

There is no distinct difference between the matter of dead things and the matter of living things. I can’t stress this enough.

Yeah, except for the fact that in one case the matter is supporting life and in the other it is supporting corpse-ness.

The carbon in your body has similar properties to the carbon in a rock.

Except that in the case of the bodily carbon it is there to support human life and in rocks it is there to support the rock. I’ve explicitly said many times already that carbon is indeed present in these different substances but it’s powers are harnessed to different ends. That is what it means to say that carbon is present virtually.

If an animal does not have any non-physical processes (perhaps thought or memory, but that is a different argument) then it does not need a soul to be alive.

Soul is defined as the form of a living thing. So what you are saying is that a thing need not be a living thing to be alive, which is nonsense. You are confusing “soul” with “rational soul.” Thomists have traditionally held that non-rational animals have purely material, mortal, and corruptible souls because they are all living yet lack immaterial processes such as intellection and free will. If you want to maintain that the Aristotelian notion of a soul is incoherent, you have to assume their definition of soul and show that it leads to a contradiction or logical absurdity, but as far as I can tell it doesn’t, at least not at face value.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Blue
I have a great deal of difficulty giving virtual substances any credence as well…
Linus2nd

Linus I am going to continue dialoguing with you, despite my better judgement wrt your poor manners below (in refusing to respond in good faith to my simple below questions below), …because I see a “new” and seemingly more open/tolerant Linus in your contribtion here .

I have a great deal of difficulty giving virtual substances any credence as well.

I believe Aristotle is trying to affirm the repeated observation that specific (more simple) elemental substances consistently and predictably arise from the substantial change of
particular substances under a variety of different types of substantial change. Its as if they have more “potential” than other substances to decompose into these simpler substances.

But, if he cannot admit plurality of forms, nor can he cannot find an answer in his assumption that all substances operate directly on prime matter (which admits of no potential differences between different substances) where can he go to explain this difference in “elemental potentialities” between different more complex substances?
So he talks of “virtual elemental actualities” in each complex substance. I suppose this must be some sort of hidden “accidental forms” that are somehow part of the substantial form. That sounds strange, it would suggest that the elements are a sort of 11-14th categories of being or a “cluster of accidental categories” (quality and quantity) actin g “like a form” within a form. No wonder he doesn’t develop the idea further.

I was recently reading a philosophic work by a lady whose name I cannot recall (Mary Krizan I think). She was thinking a bit along these lines. She suggested that each of the four elements were themselves a composite (of matter and form) based on the 4 accidental qualities (hot, cold, wet dry).
Thus the element air is composed of wet/hot (where wet was form, hot was matter), fire was hot/dry (hot form, dry matter), water is cold/wet, earth dry/cold.

In these way the “elements” can be seen in characteristic decomposing play in the change of accidents of a characteristic substance when the substance itself decomposes beneath its “observable” “virtual” elements.

I think we have two problems. One is that Aristotelian/Thomistic philosophers and scientists have two different understandings of substance. I think the philosopher is quite willing to accept the scientific idea of a substance when they are doing science…

I agree with most of this. Although I would say that Aristotle himself has this problem.
Below I noted that throughout his corpus he assumes or even defines substance in at least 5 different ways - depending on what new observed wordly phenomenon “substance” solves. And here’s the thing, some of those definitions may not be 100% compatible with each other. Sure, the definition given at one time may well explain the phenomen at hand. Yet if that definition is pitted against “substance” defined in a much later work to explain a completely dufferent issue…it may not be very compatible, and may actually contradict.

That I believe is the problem we have in discussions here. Esp wrt substantial change versus accidental change.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

CONTINUED…

But the scientist is, or appears to be, quite possive about the term ’ substance, ’ and thinks the philosopher is a fool

I think this is a bit harsh … at least for Catholic Scientists.

Yes, half the time Aristotelians do come across as fools to secular scientists because they don’t come across as true scientists - and for good reason…its easy to pick those who don’t really have a natural bent or intuition for science (despite book learning of the discipline) and who therefore do not really “connect” with professional scientists.

It works both ways, many secular scientists have only “book learning” of good Philosophy too. So there is in reality a very large “no-mans land” of misunderstanding and “lost in translation” between Science and Philosophy which is a shame.

Even this thread (and many like it here) well demonstrater the impasse. The two groups just think very differently and consequently use key words in very different ways with substantially different meanings. We talk past each other, never really connecting even wrt analysising the most basic of sensible phenomena.

Having said that I believe, when a scientist does truly come to understand what Aristotle means by “substrance” … and when an Aristotelian finally comes to understand the implications of the Atomic model … there are new problematics for Aristotle.

To date I have never seen an Aristoteliann well tackle/understand the philosophic problems raised by the undenial results and observations of modern Chemistry.
Having said that I have seen even fewer Scientists give Aristotle a fair go at assisting them in the Philosophy of Chemistry esp in the sub-Atomic world.
I think Aristotle has a lot to offer in understanding the sub-atomic world…where sensible analogies/models wrt what is going on no longer seem helpful.

Let’s say we were able to isolate an atom so that it would have a life span of at least a few minutes before it started resolving itself into its constituent parts. …

I cannot comment on this Linus because your statements do appear to betray a poor understanding of Chemistry and sub-atomic Physics.
Atoms of the natural elements have life-spans much greater than that of the things made out of them so I have no idea what you are trying to say here.
In compounds the constituent atoms do not break up but retain all their constitutions except for a few electrons in the outer area of the “electron cloud” buzzing about them.
They get “time-shared” with the other element(s) they join to. But even then they still have a “bed” at home for these “lost electrons.”

In electrolysis of water the Hydrogen atom is ripped way from the oxygen atom that stole its electron by supplying an electron from the battery with enough energy to “pay” the oxygen atom (a ransom if you will) for the electron it stole from hydrogen.

 

[balto]

Patterns are also based on perception.

Then why does external matter, which obeys no patterns, forms, laws, etc. happen to conform to these patterns that we create. Is it all a gigantic coincidence? Is there anything that doesn’t derive its existence from our perception of it? If so, what is it?

Because one water molecule is a different instance from another water molecule, then the only thing they have in common is our perception of them belonging to one substance.

Each individual water molecule is a substance. Substance = form + matter. They all share the common nature of water. That is the substantial form. Yet each substance is this form united to a distinct parcel of matter. That’s why the molecules have different matter. The fact that a bunch of them are all associating with each other in a pool of water is an accidental form since quantity does not change the substantial form.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

I don’t even think that copper is a “pure substance”. If it can be broken down into distinct parts, it is not a substance. That is my position.

There is no distinct difference between the matter of dead things and the matter of living things. I can’t stress this enough. The carbon in your body has similar properties to the carbon in a rock.

If an animal does not have any non-physical processes (perhaps thought or memory, but that is a different argument) then it does not need a soul to be alive.

OK, this is prob a typical anti-Aristotelian materialist position. I find myself half way between your position and that of Linus.

I can see Aristotle’s “substance” as a valid concept at both macro and micro levels of sensible reality. Linus only accepts the reaity of substance at a macro level (which I think you have partially misunderstood).
You seem to accept the possibility of (Aristotelian) substance but only at the micro-level and even then only if a “thing” cannot be decomposed further.

With Aristotle you have to think common-sense broadly and not to tightly tie him down to his examples/definitions which in the end are prob more analogy or “sign posts” pointing towards what he actually means.

I agree with you that a rock is not an Arist “substance” in the deepest meaning of his concept (more by analogy than absolutely) … for how can an accidental change in shape alone make it a new substance. You go a bit deeper than this in denying the predication substance. You say a rock is just an aggregation of many different types of “stuff” so why is one lightly “glued together” mixture any different a substance from any other aggregation. I tend to agree, but rocks are not good examples to analyse Arist substance.
(eg I would say that graphite is a different substance from diamond…the way that the aggregated molecules of carbon (the parts) are “glued” together does affect the characteristics of the “whole”. In this case the whole is very different from the sum of the parts…therefore I would say that means we have a new Arist “substance”.)

Anyways, back to your view that Arist “pure substances” are not substances.
OK, I agree that Arist would be mistaken in saying that copper is infinitely divisible and still remains copper.

But does that mean it is inconsistent of us to maintain that a single copper atom is still an Arist substance? I don’t think so.

It has a formal cause/definition - a stable, abiding atomic structure of having a nucleus of 29 protons. Its material cause are protons, electrons and neutrons.

Sure, if you divide it further you kill the copper atom and cause a substantial change. So what?

I don’t deny that we may consider the protons as a substance in their own right (Linus would deny this because he says only one substance copper exists). What is the matter of protons? It may be invisible prime matter (unlikely), though current experimental data suggests it has as its material cause three different types of quark.

Maybe I have missed your point though?

 

[blase6]

Then why does external matter, which obeys no patterns, forms, laws, etc. happen to conform to these patterns that we create. Is it all a gigantic coincidence? Is there anything that doesn’t derive its existence from our perception of it? If so, what is it?

It is because matter in general obeys certain laws (which are also things that we have made up to make sense of the world) that they create all the patterns we see as individual substances.

One thing I notice about my conception of substance is that substance doesn’t change. I will always be a person. My body may change form or condition or die, but that does not change my personhood. If matter can change into energy and vice versa then they are not two substances, but one and the same substance in different arrangements.

It does seem very strange to me that the explanation of the Eucharist is a “substantial change” of the bread and wine. I do not think that the substances of bread and wine objectively exist in the first place. Rather, they are bread and wine because we think so. Why can not the explanation be rather “the bread and wine is Christ’s Body and Blood”? After all, if one defines “bread and wine” as the composition of the matter then Christ’s Body and Blood in the Eucharist is bread and wine because the composition of the matter remains the same. You can see how this leads to confusion.

Each individual water molecule is a substance. Substance = form + matter. They all share the common nature of water. That is the substantial form. Yet each substance is this form united to a distinct parcel of matter. That’s why the molecules have different matter. The fact that a bunch of them are all associating with each other in a pool of water is an accidental form since quantity does not change the substantial form.

This just sounds to me like a bunch of terms made up to classify how matter arranges itself. I am fine with you thinking of matter like this, but it is not a way I look at matter.

 

[blase6]

OK, this is prob a typical anti-Aristotelian materialist position. I find myself half way between your position and that of Linus.

I can see Aristotle’s “substance” as a valid concept at both macro and micro levels of sensible reality. Linus only accepts the reaity of substance at a macro level (which I think you have partially misunderstood).
You seem to accept the possibility of (Aristotelian) substance but only at the micro-level and even then only if a “thing” cannot be decomposed further.

With Aristotle you have to think common-sense broadly and not to tightly tie him down to his examples/definitions which in the end are prob more analogy or “sign posts” pointing towards what he actually means.

I agree with you that a rock is not an Arist “substance” in the deepest meaning of his concept (more by analogy than absolutely) … for how can an accidental change in shape alone make it a new substance. You go a bit deeper than this in denying the predication substance. You say a rock is just an aggregation of many different types of “stuff” so why is one lightly “glued together” mixture any different a substance from any other aggregation. I tend to agree, but rocks are not good examples to analyse Arist substance.
(eg I would say that graphite is a different substance from diamond…the way that the aggregated molecules of carbon (the parts) are “glued” together does affect the characteristics of the “whole”. In this case the whole is very different from the sum of the parts…therefore I would say that means we have a new Arist “substance”.)

Anyways, back to your view that Arist “pure substances” are not substances.
OK, I agree that Arist would be mistaken in saying that copper is infinitely divisible and still remains copper.

But does that mean it is inconsistent of us to maintain that a single copper atom is still an Arist substance? I don’t think so.

It has a formal cause/definition - a stable, abiding atomic structure of having a nucleus of 29 protons. Its material cause are protons, electrons and neutrons.

Sure, if you divide it further you kill the copper atom and cause a substantial change. So what?

I don’t deny that we may consider the protons as a substance in their own right (Linus would deny this because he says only one substance copper exists). What is the matter of protons? It may be invisible prime matter (unlikely), though current experimental data suggests it has as its material cause three different types of quark.

Maybe I have missed your point though?

Of course, one can avoid a ton of confusion by just accepting that you see things as individual substances, and the idea of substance for this physical world doesn’t really get any deeper.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

It’s weird because I always thought that the chemical considerations were the easiest to try to fit into a hylemorphic framework.

I agree, but Linus denies this. I am not even sure he sees H, H2, H+ as different accidental forms of the same substance.

I have more difficulty trying to discern the substantial difference between say, a dog and a cat, since they are both sentient animals.

Arist is more difficult to understand here, that is why I keep my debates to pure substances…if we cannot agree there then going animals is already sunk.
The difficulty I think is that Aristotle has one definition of substance when discussing inorganics and mixtures, and another when dealing to organics.

You seem to be suggesting that cat and dog are but different accidental forms of “animal”.
But for Aristotle “animal” is not a substance, it does not exist in itself, it is but a common genus abstract from its different existing species. Also, substance implies a set of characteristics exhibited by all its instantiated members. We recognise catness and dogginess as being very different types.

Also, there is a distinction between 1st substance and 2nd substance. Maybe it is possible to consider “animal” a sort of 2nd substance. But there is no 1st substance (an actual individual animal that has the characteristics of all types of individual animals) which could posibly instantiate “animal.” Therefore animal is not a substance - it is an abstract concept that encompasses the more limited common characteristics of all animal species (ie sentience) which makes it a “genus”.

I’m not sure why the Aristotelian would disagree with the modern chemist about the nature of hydrogen being an atom with a single proton. They would probably agree with it. I know David Oderberg frequently likes to use the example of gold as being a substance with atomic number 79.

Again, Linus has problems with this.

Your example of soot vs. charcoal vs. diamond is more interesting, and I think it would be up to the chemist to determine whether those are really distinct substances.

I don’t think so. Given the experimental findings of Chemists (that very different sets of macro properties can be caused not only by covalent atomic bond “mixtures” but also by differences in molecular bonding) it is then a matter of the Philosophy of Chemistry to decide if differences in molecular-bonding constitute accidental changes or substantial changes at the macro level.

This is an exceedingly difficult question…and Arist substance principles seem powerless to solve this conundrum.
The problem is that Arist only dealt at the macro level in a common-sense sort of way.
If two things (eg pencil lead and diamonds) have two very different sets of qualities and they do not seem reversibly related to each other in any way (unlike ice and water) … inevitably Aristotle sees them as different substances. The ancients would never have thought that graphite and diamonds are in fact aggregations of the same pure substance (carbon). The difference is that graphite atoms connect as huge molecules in sheets of flat 2D structures (hence its slippery as the sheets slide over each other and opaque as the sheets do not line up). Diamonds have the carbon atoms forming very rigid 3D pyramids that stack tightly together and are rigid to movement in any direction.
The ancients did not know that diamonds can be made from carbon (they did not have the technology). They may have known that diamonds will burn like coal … though I doubt anyone ever burnt a substantial quantity of diamonds to discover this!

I don’t think they’d deny that water is composed of individual particles. The quantity and shape of water would be regarded as an accidental form.

Linus seems to deny that the substances hydrogen (H+) and oxygen (O–) exist in the glass filled with the substance water.

water gets its existence (ie is defined as) by two atoms of hydrogen being bonded (ie bonded) to one of oxygen.

You are talking about the efficient cause of water, which is two hydrogen atoms and an oxygen atom reacting and forming covalent bonds with one another.

I think my quote is really articulating the “formal cause” (ie defintion) and the “material cause” of water isn’t it? The efficient cause would be something like a volcanoe … belching appropriate materials (eg H2S and O2 from the air) and then volcano lightning igniting the two (to form H2O and SO2).

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Of course, one can avoid a ton of confusion by just accepting that you see things as individual substances, and the idea of substance for this physical world doesn’t really get any deeper.

Its not quite as arbitrary as you might be suggesting here…

When Aristotle talks of “substance” in the deepest sense I believe he is differentiating different** kinds **of “stuff”. I split a rock in half … I don’t really get two different substances - for they are the same kind of thing.

But when I heat and compress graphite … I seem to get a completely new kind of thing.
When I heat iron to high temperature its molten surface turns into a red crumbly powder…a completely new kind of thing.

These are different substances, different kinds of thing with stable and apparantly non reversable properties (unlike ice and water).

When Aristotle said these substances were infinitely divisible without being destroyed…what he seems to be meaning is that they are precisely NOT an arbitrarily aggregated mix of different things (like sand and salt) which might compose “a rock”.

The way the componets are “mixed” in a substance is in such a way that a completely new kind of stuff is formed. (What we today call compounds or even crystalline molecular structures. Its a substantial bonding that causes new properties…not just different things mixed loosely together like sand and salt).

But I disagree with Aristotle … I say that yes, a new kind of stuff (a new substance) is formed…but also the constituent elements also remain as substances (though in a different accidental form eg as ions).

Linus won’t have a bar of this. He says the new compound (eg H2O) is the only substance present once the “substantial mixing” (eg a spark plus O2 and H2) has taken place.

 

[balto]

It is because matter in general obeys certain laws (which are also things that we have made up to make sense of the world) that they create all the patterns we see as individual substances.

Well, no, matter does not obey certain laws if we made the laws up. If all the rationality comes from us and there’s no laws, patterns, forms, whatever you want to call it, in objective reality then objective reality is not intelligible and we have no real knowledge of it. I’m trying to get you to see that your position leads to this conclusion.

One thing I notice about my conception of substance is that substance doesn’t change. I will always be a person. My body may change form or condition or die, but that does not change my personhood. If matter can change into energy and vice versa then they are not two substances, but one and the same substance in different arrangements.

So you do accept the notion of a substance, but argue that it is only present at the most fundamental level of material reality and everything above that is merely an accidental arrangement of fundamental particles. Which scientific discovery determined this? To argue that “well physical reality underlies all material reality” therefore “all of material reality is really just physics” seems to be fallacious since that conclusion does not logically follow from the premise. To say something like “all biological systems have underlying physical structures, therefore physics reduces biology” is wrong because if physics does reduce biology then we may as well say that all physical systems are biological, which is obviously wrong. To say that all X are Y is not to say that all Y are X.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

I think that is exactly what it means for something to be possessed virtually. The difficulty lies in the fact that people tend to associate the word “virtual” with computers and “virtual reality” which makes it seem like to say that something is virtually possessed is to say that it is not really there but only appears to be there. But as the article you linked to pointed out “virtual” comes from the Latin world “virtus” which is the word for power, so the powers of hydrogen and oxygen are present in water but harnessed to a particular end. Potentiality means that the power is not there now but could be there. So hydrogen and oxygen have waterness potentially when they are simply hydrogen and oxygen, since they don’t have the powers of water until they chemically react with one another.

Excellent comment re the “virtus” point, somehow I missed that - doesn’t pay to skim read for too long! However that raises more problems… Powers flow from form don’t they?
So this suggests there are sub-forms in a macro form…which is exactly my point. But Aristotle says there is only one substantial form. So what’s left… Accidental forms.
OK. But I have never seen any Aristotelian talk much at all about accidental (elemental) forms subsisting in the single substantial form.
But see my post below re that female Philosopher…she seems to…not that I c an make much sense of it.
A point comes when it is equal plausible (and simpler) just to accept plurality of hierachically tier-ed substantial forms means pretty much the same thing.

Yes, it’s true that any matter is potentially any other type of thing, but you are referring to protomatter, pure potentiality, which could be anything else since it could adopt any form. If protomatter already has a form, say water, then it already has certain forms that are potentially available to it naturally, but not others. If water transformed into a form that is not available to it as water then that would probably be rightly considered a miracle since it would require a direct conjoining of a form to protomatter directly rather than attaching a new form to proximate matter (i.e. lower forms of matter that already have a basic form).

Good start but I think you might have gone off course wrt Arist prime matter?
Protomatter (if you mean prime matter) has no form at all…other than what the single macro substantial form gives it. The “virtual” elemental forms we seek, to be consistant with Arist, can only be different “conglomerations” of the characteristic 9 accidents instantiated by the single macro form that makes the substance. ie accidental forms.
But as above, Aristotle doesn’t seem to analyse this sort of thing…other than talking superficially of “virtual elements”.

Well I don’t know why you think that Aristotle’s metaphysics depends on infinite divisibility. It is true that Aristotle and Aquinas erroneously thought that inorganic matter was one type of thing that is irreducible. Now we know that inorganic substances are composed of various elements that are composed of protons, neutrons, and electrons, etc. But I don’t think they would have thrown out their metaphysics if they had known this fact. After all, they made provisions for organic substances, which they knew were composed of heterogeneous parts. If I am remembering correctly, I think the word “organic” is etymologically derived from the Greek word “organon” which means “instrument”, since organic things have different parts that serve different functions rather than being a homogeneous whole like they assumed inorganic matter was. So it seems that the atomic description of inorganic matter could be fit seamlessly into an Aristotelian metaphysical framework.

Its not a perfect analogy with what we are speaking of. (Though Scotus did use this approach and posited plurality of substantial forms on this basis).

The unity of the organs in a body is quite different from the unity of atoms in a compound.

But as opined below, if we here cannot agree wrt substance in inorganics, better not even start on organics or the Eucharist.

I get what you are saying with there being a hierarchy of forms, but I think that the confusion is over a subtle metaphysical point about what counts as a “substantial form.” If a proton is in a water molecule, it still has proton behavior but this behavior is oriented towards sustaining the water molecule. It doesn’t behave in a way contrary to the nature of a proton, but the way it behaves in water is different than the way it behaves as a free proton. So there’s only one substantial form there, the water form, even though the proton form is present virtually, i.e. proton-power is still in water, though harnessed towards waterness

I’ll have to reflect on your interesting point here. I don’t think it is necessary to make your point by over-complicating things to sub-atomic structure. I would say that its about whether or not hydrogen (or oxygen) is still active and discoverable in water.

I say that it is, so long as we agree H+ is still hydrogen?

I accept that the over-arching form of water constrains hydrogen from operating in all its potential ways…nevertheless hydrogen clearly still operates in water exactly as it would in many other substances known to be composed of hydrogen (including H2 and H).

Therefore the substance hydrogen is also present in such compounds though it may be accidentally changed and hence behave differently from H2. Just as steam behaves differently from ice.

 

[balto]

You seem to be suggesting that cat and dog are but different accidental forms of “animal”.
But for Aristotle “animal” is not a substance, it does not exist in itself, it is but a common genus abstract from its different existing species. Also, substance implies a set of characteristics exhibited by all its instantiated members. We recognise catness and dogginess as being very different types.

Also, there is a distinction between 1st substance and 2nd substance. Maybe it is possible to consider “animal” a sort of 2nd substance. But there is no 1st substance (an actual individual animal that has the characteristics of all types of individual animals) which could posibly instantiate “animal.” Therefore animal is not a substance - it is an abstract concept that encompasses the more limited common characteristics of all animal species (ie sentience) which makes it a “genus”.

Wow, you’re good at this! Now I am learning about Aristotle’s hylemorphism from you. I have an idea: you figure out the biology and I’ll figure out the chemistry .

Again, Linus has problems with this.

Well you’ll have to ask him about these things because I cannot speak for him.

I don’t think so. Given the experimental findings of Chemists (that very different sets of macro properties can be caused not only by covalent atomic bond “mixtures” but also by differences in molecular bonding) it is then a matter of the Philosophy of Chemistry to decide if differences in molecular-bonding constitute accidental changes or substantial changes at the macro level.

Okay, that’s what I had in mind but just didn’t write that.

This is an exceedingly difficult question…and Arist substance principles seem powerless to solve this conundrum.
The problem is that Arist only dealt at the macro level in a common-sense sort of way.
If two things (eg pencil lead and diamonds) have two very different sets of qualities and they do not seem reversibly related to each other in any way (unlike ice and water) … inevitably Aristotle sees them as different substances. The ancients would never have thought that graphite and diamonds are in fact aggregations of the same pure substance (carbon). The difference is that graphite atoms connect as huge molecules in sheets of flat 2D structures (hence its slippery as the sheets slide over each other and opaque as the sheets do not line up). Diamonds have the carbon atoms forming very rigid 3D pyramids that stack tightly together and are rigid to movement in any direction.
The ancients did not know that diamonds can be made from carbon (they did not have the technology). They may have known that diamonds will burn like coal … though I doubt anyone ever burnt a substantial quantity of diamonds to discover this!

Well it is true that the ancients did not have a lot of the requisite knowledge to classify everything appropriately, which is why I said that such matters would be determined by philosophers of chemistry (or rather you corrected me on that). But I am just not understanding why the fact that people in the past may have classified things wrongfully is evidence that it is impossible to classify things according to natural kinds. That “Modeling of Nature” book I referred to earlier discusses how these new understandings of chemistry can be fit into the Aristotelian framework.

Linus seems to deny that the substances hydrogen (H+) and oxygen (O–) exist in the glass filled with the substance water.

Well again this is a technical nitpicking point about what the word “substance” refers to. Technically there is no substantial oxygen or hydrogen in a glass of water (assuming no free ions) since the oxygen and hydrogen have been assumed into the water. Are hydrogen and oxygen atoms present? Yes. Do they behave as hydrogen and oxygen? Yes, but these powers are specifically directed towards waterness (that’s what being virtually present means). It’s like object oriented programming: water inherits from hydrogen and oxygen but the water molecules are of type water.

I think my quote is really articulating the “formal cause” (ie defintion) and the “material cause” of water isn’t it? The efficient cause would be something like a volcanoe … belching appropriate materials (eg H2S and O2 from the air) and then volcano lightning igniting the two (to form H2O and SO2).

Yes, a formal cause is the definition but you were referring to the process of oxygen and hydrogen chemically reacting to bring a new instance of water into being. That’s the efficient cause. The formal cause would be kind of like the blueprint or class definition which defines the properties of the nascent water, but it is not what causes it to come into being. To use the computer analogy again: the formal cause is like the class definition, the material cause is the bits in RAM, the efficient cause is the process that brings the bits to the proper orientation when an object of the class gets declared, and the final cause is the program of which the object is a part. That’s the best analogy I can give at the moment. The volcano would be like the efficient cause twice-removed (there’s probably a real name for it but I don’t know what it is).

 

[balto]

Excellent comment re the “virtus” point, somehow I missed that - doesn’t pay to skim read for too long! However that raises more problems… Powers flow from form don’t they?
So this suggests there are sub-forms in a macro form…which is exactly my point. But Aristotle says there is only one substantial form. So what’s left… Accidental forms.
OK. But I have never seen any Aristotelian talk much at all about accidental (elemental) forms subsisting in the single substantial form.

No, I don’t think that’s how it works. You seem to be saying that what used to be substantial in individual hydrogen and oxygen suddenly becomes accidental when they become incorporated into water. I think rather that what was substantial in individual hydrogen and oxygen is still substantial in water but it is being directed by the water to a new end.

Good start but I think you might have gone off course wrt Arist prime matter?
Protomatter (if you mean prime matter) has no form at all…other than what the single macro substantial form gives it. The “virtual” elemental forms we seek, to be consistant with Arist, can only be different “conglomerations” of the characteristic 9 accidents instantiated by the single macro form that makes the substance. ie accidental forms.
But as above, Aristotle doesn’t seem to analyse this sort of thing…other than talking superficially of “virtual elements”.

Well I think that Aristotle says that prime matter unlies all change as some kind of pure potential backdrop, but it’s not central to the main point of this thread so maybe it’s best not to open that can of worms. Regarding the virtual elements, as I said above I don’t think we need to posit that they are accidental properties of the substance in which they inhere.

The unity of the organs in a body is quite different from the unity of atoms in a compound.

Yes, but my point was that the pre-moderns were not averse to considering objects with multiple parts as substances.

I’ll have to reflect on your interesting point here. I don’t think it is necessary to make your point by over-complicating things to sub-atomic structure. I would say that its about whether or not hydrogen (or oxygen) is still active and discoverable in water.

I say that it is, so long as we agree H+ is still hydrogen?

I say that it is also.

I accept that the over-arching form of water constrains hydrogen from operating in all its potential ways…nevertheless hydrogen clearly still operates in water exactly as it would in many other substances known to be composed of hydrogen (including H2 and H).

Therefore the substance hydrogen is also present in such compounds though it may be accidentally changed and hence behave differently from H2. Just as steam behaves differently from ice.

Well I don’t know if it behaves exactly the same way in all compounds since it probably depends on what element to which it is bound. It’s probably a little more complicated for other elements that can form more bonds. You conceded that the overarching form of water constrains hydrogen from acting in all its potential ways, so it does not act the same way in all molecules. In water it is acting to sustain water, in formaldehyde it is acting to sustain formaldehyde, etc. But I don’t think that precludes the truth that much of the same behavior is present in an individual hydrogen atom in different substances, but they are organized towards different ends which makes them part of different substances.

 

[Linusthe2nd]

Linus I am going to continue dialoguing with you, despite my better judgement wrt your poor manners below (in refusing to respond in good faith to my simple below questions below), …because I see a “new” and seemingly more open/tolerant Linus in your contribtion here .

I believe Aristotle is trying to affirm the repeated observation that specific (more simple) elemental substances consistently and predictably arise from the substantial change of
particular substances under a variety of different types of substantial change. Its as if they have more “potential” than other substances to decompose into these simpler substances.

I don’t think Aristotle says any more that the new form is drawn from the existing matter, but then the new form determines the matter which it needs. He really doesn’t explain how the matter itself changes. But it always changes so that it meets the demands of the new form.bg

But, if he cannot admit plurality of forms, nor can he cannot find an answer in his assumption that all substances operate directly on prime matter (which admits of no potential differences between different substances) where can he go to explain this difference in “elemental potentialities” between different more complex substances?

Prime matter is the underlying " stuff " of all matter. It is the constant which underlays the matter in all substances, even modern chemical substances or the elements on the periodica table. I doubt we will ever be able to identify it.

He doesn’t speak in those terms, neither does Aquinas, as far as I recall. He does not speak of " elemental potentialities. " And I’m not sure what you mean by the term.

So he talks of “virtual elemental actualities” in each complex substance. I suppose this must be some sort of hidden “accidental forms” that are somehow part of the substantial form. That sounds strange, it would suggest that the elements are a sort of 11-14th categories of being or a “cluster of accidental categories” (quality and quantity) actin g “like a form” within a form. No wonder he doesn’t develop the idea further.

I’m not sure what he means. " Accidental forms " refer to any of the nine kinds of accidents which are likely to accompany any substance - quantity, quality, location, relationship, etc…

I was recently reading a philosophic work by a lady whose name I cannot recall (Mary Krizan I think). She was thinking a bit along these lines. She suggested that each of the four elements were themselves a composite (of matter and form) based on the 4 accidental qualities (hot, cold, wet dry).
Thus the element air is composed of wet/hot (where wet was form, hot was matter), fire was hot/dry (hot form, dry matter), water is cold/wet, earth dry/cold.

I think Aristotle thinks along those lines. I recall the mention of hot, dry, cold, wet, etc., but I don
't remember the details.

In these way the “elements” can be seen in characteristic decomposing play in the change of accidents of a characteristic substance when the substance itself decomposes beneath its “observable” “virtual” elements.

The host substance doesn’t decompose, it is changed by receiving a new substantial form or a new accidental form, and in each case the matter is also changed, either totally or in some minor, non-essential way that has no fundamental impact on the host substance…

I agree with most of this. Although I would say that Aristotle himself has this problem.
Below I noted that throughout his corpus he assumes or even defines substance in at least 5 different ways - depending on what new observed wordly phenomenon “substance” solves. And here’s the thing, some of those definitions may not be 100% compatible with each other. Sure, the definition given at one time may well explain the phenomen at hand. Yet if that definition is pitted against “substance” defined in a much later work to explain a completely dufferent issue…it may not be very compatible, and may actually contradict.

I can’t speak to that, I have only read Physics, Metaphysics, and bits of others.

That I believe is the problem we have in discussions here. Esp wrt substantial change versus accidental change.

If the matter appropriate to a specific form has been changed, that would be a substantial change. The form of each kind of substance demands its own appropriate matter, which Aquinas called designate matter, matter in a specific configuration. In todays parlance, this may getting rid of some kinds of atoms and the inclusion of others not there before or just a rearangement of what was there before, or just using the same ones in a different way. One would have difficulty saying which except in things like chemical changes. .

Linus2nd

 

[Linusthe2nd]

I agree, but Linus denies this. I am not even sure he sees H, H2, H+ as different accidental forms of the same substance.

I think he would say that if science agreed that if each of these existed independently for a sufficient time that each would be a substance but representing variations of the same type. Just as all dogs have dogness in common but each possesses it as a variation within the species.

Arist is more difficult to understand here, that is why I keep my debates to pure substances…if we cannot agree there then going animals is already sunk.
The difficulty I think is that Aristotle has one definition of substance when discussing inorganics and mixtures, and another when dealing to organics.

You seem to be suggesting that cat and dog are but different accidental forms of “animal”.
But for Aristotle “animal” is not a substance, it does not exist in itself, it is but a common genus abstract from its different existing species. Also, substance implies a set of characteristics exhibited by all its instantiated members. We recognise catness and dogginess as being very different types.

Also, there is a distinction between 1st substance and 2nd substance. Maybe it is possible to consider “animal” a sort of 2nd substance. But there is no 1st substance (an actual individual animal that has the characteristics of all types of individual animals) which could posibly instantiate “animal.” Therefore animal is not a substance - it is an abstract concept that encompasses the more limited common characteristics of all animal species (ie sentience) which makes it a “genus”.

Here is what Imelahn had to say on the thread, " What is a substance? "

(Just to clarify: for Aristotle and Aquinas, “first substance” refers to concrete individuals. For example, St. Michael the Archangel, St. Peter, the dog down the street, the pine tree out my window, and the stone in the garden are all “first substances.”

“Second substance” means the “species”: angel-kind, mankind, dog-kind, tree-kind, stone-kind, and so on—in other words, what sort of thing something is, taken in the abstract. “Second substance” in Aristotle and Aquinas is roughly equivalent to the “universals” of medieval Scholasticism and Plato’s “ideas.”

Aristotle called concrete individuals “first substance” because he was reacting against Plato, who considered the universals (the ideas) as more real than the concrete individuals. post 42 )

( I think that we also need to distinguish between substance as an ontological principle (which in this case is the “potential” principle that is perfected or actuated by the accidents), and substance taken to mean the whole individual.

For Aristotle, substance and essence are exactly synonymous (it is even the same word: ousía), and it can take on either meaning.

For Aquinas, in the term “substance,” the notion of “whole individual” prevails; in “essence,” the notion of “ontological principle” prevails. However, in neither case is the other meaning excluded.

So when we say, “the substance cannot be seen,” we mean substance as “ontological principle that underlies the accidents.”

If, however, we take “substance” to mean “whole concrete individual,” then substance is very much visible. (I can see my neighbor, the dog next door, the tree next to me, and everything, without any trouble. post 43)

Again, Linus has problems with this.

No he doesn’t .

I don’t think so. Given the experimental findings of Chemists (that very different sets of macro properties can be caused not only by covalent atomic bond “mixtures” but also by differences in molecular bonding) it is then a matter of the Philosophy of Chemistry to decide if differences in molecular-bonding constitute accidental changes or substantial changes at the macro level.

This is an exceedingly difficult question…and Arist substance principles seem powerless to solve this conundrum.
The problem is that Arist only dealt at the macro level in a common-sense sort of way.
If two things (eg pencil lead and diamonds) have two very different sets of qualities and they do not seem reversibly related to each other in any way (unlike ice and water) … inevitably Aristotle sees them as different substances. The ancients would never have thought that graphite and diamonds are in fact aggregations of the same pure substance (carbon). The difference is that graphite atoms connect as huge molecules in sheets of flat 2D structures (hence its slippery as the sheets slide over each other and opaque as the sheets do not line up). Diamonds have the carbon atoms forming very rigid 3D pyramids that stack tightly together and are rigid to movement in any direction.
The ancients did not know that diamonds can be made from carbon (they did not have the technology). They may have known that diamonds will burn like coal … though I doubt anyone ever burnt a substantial quantity of diamonds to discover this!

Linus seems to deny that the substances hydrogen (H+) and oxygen (O–) exist in the glass filled with the substance water.

If you are talking of a special kind of water I would call it a substance. Why not? I think I have already said that. There are different kinds of dog. Why not different kinds of water?

I think my quote is really articulating the “formal cause” (ie defintion) and the “material cause” of water isn’t it? The efficient cause would be something like a volcanoe … belching appropriate materials (eg H2S and O2 from the air) and then volcano lightning igniting the two (to form H2O and SO2).

Linus2nd

 

[balto]

I think he would say that if science agreed that if each of these existed independently for a sufficient time that each would be a substance but representing variations of the same type. Just as all dogs have dogness in common but each possesses it as a variation within the species.

Yes, this is correct. I think I may be partly to blame for contributing to the confusion, so I think we should define some terms. Blue Horizon, you and I were discussing substantial forms. Linus is discussing substances, which is substantial form + matter. So an H+ and an H2 are both distinct substances, yet they both have the same substantial form of hydrogen and these two substances differ only by their accidents. If I have H+, H+, and H2, then I have 3 substances and 1 substantial form. If I have H+, H+, H2, and O2 then I have 4 substances and 2 substantial forms. If I have H+, H+, H2, O2, and H2O, then I have 5 substances and 3 substantial forms, and the H2O substantial form has the other two forms virtually. Does that sound right?

 

[thinkandmull]

Off the cuff remarks by a Pope are not Doctrine. Besides, you have not documented your remark. As far as I know it is nothing but your fertile imagination.

Linus2nd

Its in his encyclical on marriage. I wouldn’t have expected you to dismiss it.

Consubstantiation as condemned by Trent meant the form-substance was no longer bread, not bread and Jesus. But Trent could be clearer at times; check out my recent thread on the Mass

I will try to prove my position on the Eucharest in new thread

 

[Linusthe2nd]

Yes, this is correct. I think I may be partly to blame for contributing to the confusion, so I think we should define some terms. Blue Horizon, you and I were discussing substantial forms. Linus is discussing substances, which is substantial form + matter. So an H+ and an H2 are both distinct substances, yet they both have the same substantial form of hydrogen and these two substances differ only by their accidents. If I have H+, H+, and H2, then I have 3 substances and 1 substantial form. If I have H+, H+, H2, and O2 then I have 4 substances and 2 substantial forms. If I have H+, H+, H2, O2, and H2O, then I have 5 substances and 3 substantial forms, and the H2O substantial form has the other two forms virtually. Does that sound right?

Why did you list H+ twice? If we are talking about gasses, H+, H2, O2 are substances in their own right if they are relatively stable. If such is the case, then the substantial form for each substance calls for designate mattef in the form of H+, H2, and O2. But the substantial form of water calls for designate matter in the form of bonded H20. So you have four different substances, existing essences or natures, and four different substantial forms - in my opinion.
But it depends on whether science considers them as having distinctive natures, do they exhibit different, unique characteristics?. In the case of water, it has a definite nature. I think that is beyond dispute.

But we should not consider water as having the substances of H2 and O virtually, in the substance of water. Water, in all its forms, has definite, unique characteristics. Philosophically, we would say the the substantial form of water calls for designate matter in the form of H2 and 0, bonded as water molecules. In this case I think it would be wrong, philosophically, to say that water contained two virtual gaseous substances It would be more proper to say the substantial form of water required this kind of matter. Electrolysis would cause a substantial change. The water would disappear and we get several gasses, each of which appears to be its own substance. In my opinion.

Linus2nd

 

[Linusthe2nd]

An example that might help you Linus is when Pius XI said that marriage was the “principle of society”. That can be misunderstood to mean that non-married people are not part of society, or that non-married people can’t form a society of their own. Same with this Eucharest discussion. Many people explain it the way you are trying to, but it is so fuzzy and let’s to absurd conclusions as I showed

It leads to no absurd conclusions. What is absurd is that some catholics will not accept the clear teaching of the Church.

Your problem is that you read things out of context and then let you imagination take over. Try reading the whole section of the Council on the Eucharist for a change. When the Church says the Whole Christ is present behind the species and every loose particle of it, it means just what she says. Christ is Wholly and physically presetent in is Glorified Body in every host that is consecrated at this very moment and, at the same time his Wholely and Bodily present in heaven. Yes, that is bilocation, that is the very essence of it…

Linus2nd

 

[Linusthe2nd]

Its in his encyclical on marriage. I wouldn’t have expected you to dismiss it.

Consubstantiation as condemned by Trent meant the form-substance was no longer bread, not bread and Jesus. But Trent could be clearer at times; check out my recent thread on the Mass

I will try to prove my position on the Eucharest in new thread

Trent was perfectly clear, you are upset because it disagrees with your strange notions.

Linus2nd