Infinite regress

[Blue_Horizon]

CONTINUED…

Maths is a form of reasoning that infers valid principles/laws (via algorithms and formulae) hidden in matter as revealed by experiments despite the “interfering static” of an imperfectly observable world you keep going on about. If you deny this one would not just be a poor scientist but a poor philosopher too I believe.

 

[lmelahn]

I am afraid it is, it was a recent rereading of SGC in the light of this discussion that brought it to my attention. Cannot remember exactly where, but it was on his discussion of the First Way and his analysis of internal movers.

You got me curious. Do you have the precise reference in the SGC?

(I am familiar with Aquinas’ division of parts into integral, potential, and subjective parts, but not this.)

Here you go I found it:
forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?p=13169598&highlight=celestial+body#post13169598

Post 198 and surrounding.
It was ThankAndMull not Linusthe2nd.

Its not Avicenna’s idea, it goes back to Aristotle and others.

Right. I meant that Aquinas mentioned that this was Avicenna’s position.

OK. Here is the clearest passage I found that supports that view (Book III, Chapter 23, no. 12, in this system.):

Nor does it make any difference, as far as our present purpose is concerned, whether a heavenly body is moved by a conjoined intellectual substance which is its soul, or by a separate substance; nor whether each celestial body is moved immediately by God, or whether none is so moved, because all are moved through intermediary, created, intellectual substances; nor whether the first body alone is immediately moved by God, and the others through the mediation of created substances—provided it is granted that celestial motion comes from intellectual substance.

However, I don’t think that Aquinas is taking the position that the celestial bodies actually have a soul. He is just saying that, for the sake the current argument, it doesn’t matter whether they have a soul or if they are moved by a separate (i.e., angelic, immaterial) mover, or directly by God Himself.

(There is also number 3, which lists all of the possible alternatives, including animation of the celestial bodies, but does not take a clear position either.)

Taking this, together with Chapter 87—the passage I mentioned earlier—I think that Aquinas ultimately rejects the animation of the planets. But I think this is a secondary issue.

 

[IWantGod]

CONTINUED…

Maths is a form of reasoning that infers valid principles/laws (via algorithms and formulae) hidden in matter as revealed by experiments despite the “interfering static” of an imperfectly observable world you keep going on about. If you deny this one would not just be a poor scientist but a poor philosopher too I believe.

You think Aquinas got it wrong with the mover argument. You’re not a Thomist.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

You think Aquinas got it wrong with the mover argument. You’re not a Thomist.

If you think Aquinas didn’t want his writings “for beginners” debated perhaps you aren’t a Thomist.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

You got me curious. Do you have the precise reference in the SGC?

(I am familiar with Aquinas’ division of parts into integral, potential, and subjective parts, but not this.).

Havent refound it yet.

But the following makes clear that if a thing is moved by itself then it must have parts and the only part that ultimately explains this is defined “soul”.

• “Life is attributed to beings inasmuch as they appear to move of themselves, and not
  to be moved by another. Therefore things that seem to move of themselves, the moving
  powers of which the vulgar do not perceive, are figuratively said to live, as we speak of
  the living' (running) water of a flowing stream, but not so of a cistern or stagnant pool; and we call quicksilver’ that which seems to have a motion of its own. This is mere
  popular speech, for properly those things alone move of themselves, which do so by
  virtue of their composition of a moving force and matter moved, as things with souls;
  hence these alone are properly said to live: [190] all other things are moved by some
  external force, a generating force, or a force removing an obstacle, or a force of impact.”* SCG Book1:97

Amongst other things this clarifies that Aquinas would believe a meteor is indeed being moved by an external force/agent.

But it is not clear what that force actually is!

 

[Vico]

You got me curious. Do you have the precise reference in the SGC?

(I am familiar with Aquinas’ division of parts into integral, potential, and subjective parts, but not this.)

Right. I meant that Aquinas mentioned that this was Avicenna’s position.

OK. Here is the clearest passage I found that supports that view (Book III, Chapter 23, no. 12, in this system.):

However, I don’t think that Aquinas is taking the position that the celestial bodies actually have a soul. He is just saying that, for the sake the current argument, it doesn’t matter whether they have a soul or if they are moved by a separate (i.e., angelic, immaterial) mover, or directly by God Himself.

(There is also number 3, which lists all of the possible alternatives, including animation of the celestial bodies, but does not take a clear position either.)

Taking this, together with Chapter 87—the passage I mentioned earlier—I think that Aquinas ultimately rejects the animation of the planets. But I think this is a secondary issue.

(I am not quite sure what you mean by “primary part;” that is certainly not Aquinas’ vocabulary.)

Chapter 13

[5] The first of these propositions Aristotle proves in three ways. The first way is as follows. If something moves itself, it must have within itself the principle of its own motion; otherwise, it is clearly moved by another. Furthermore, it must be primarily moved. This means that it must be moved by reason of itself, and not by reason of a part of itself, as happens when an animal is moved by the motion of its foot. For, in this sense, a whole would not be moved by itself, but a part, and one part would be moved by another. It is also necessary that a self-moving being be divisible and have parts, since, as it is proved in the Physics [VI, 4], whatever is moved is divisible.

[6] On the basis of these suppositions Aristotle argues as follows. That which is held to be moved by itself is primarily moved. Hence, when one of its parts is at rest, the whole is then at rest. For if, while one part was at rest, another part in it were moved, then the whole itself would not be primarily moved; it would be that part in it which is moved while another part is at rest. But nothing that is at rest because something else is at rest is moved by itself; for that being whose rest follows upon the rest of another must have its motion follow upon the motion of another. It is thus not moved by itself. Therefore, that which was posited as being moved by itself is not moved by itself. Consequently, everything that is moved must be moved by another.

[7] Nor is it an objection to this argument if one might say that, when something is held to move itself, a part of it cannot be at rest; or, again, if one might say that a part is not subject to rest or motion except accidentally, which is the unfounded argument of Avicenna. For, indeed, the force of Aristotle’s argument lies in this: if something moves itself primarily and through itself, rather than through its parts, that it is moved cannot depend on another. But the moving of the divisible itself, like its being, depends on its parts; it cannot therefore move itself primarily and through itself. Hence, for the truth of the inferred conclusion it is not necessary to assume as an absolute truth that a part of a being moving itself is at rest. What must rather be true is this conditional proposition: if the part were at rest, the whole would be at rest. Now, this proposition would be true even though its antecedent be impossible. In the same way, the following conditional proposition is true: if man is an ***, he is irrational.

dhspriory.org/thomas/ContraGentiles1.htm

 

[Blue_Horizon]

Chapter 13

[5] The first of these propositions Aristotle proves in three ways. The first way is as follows. If something moves itself, it must have within itself the principle of its own motion; otherwise, it is clearly moved by another. Furthermore, it must be primarily moved. This means that it must be moved by reason of itself, and not by reason of a part of itself, as happens when an animal is moved by the motion of its foot. For, in this sense, a whole would not be moved by itself, but a part, and one part would be moved by another. It is also necessary that a self-moving being be divisible and have parts, since, as it is proved in the Physics [VI, 4], whatever is moved is divisible.

[6] On the basis of these suppositions Aristotle argues as follows. That which is held to be moved by itself is primarily moved. Hence, when one of its parts is at rest, the whole is then at rest. For if, while one part was at rest, another part in it were moved, then the whole itself would not be primarily moved; it would be that part in it which is moved while another part is at rest. But nothing that is at rest because something else is at rest is moved by itself; for that being whose rest follows upon the rest of another must have its motion follow upon the motion of another. It is thus not moved by itself. Therefore, that which was posited as being moved by itself is not moved by itself. Consequently, everything that is moved must be moved by another.

[7] Nor is it an objection to this argument if one might say that, when something is held to move itself, a part of it cannot be at rest; or, again, if one might say that a part is not subject to rest or motion except accidentally, which is the unfounded argument of Avicenna. For, indeed, the force of Aristotle’s argument lies in this: if something moves itself primarily and through itself, rather than through its parts, that it is moved cannot depend on another. But the moving of the divisible itself, like its being, depends on its parts; it cannot therefore move itself primarily and through itself. Hence, for the truth of the inferred conclusion it is not necessary to assume as an absolute truth that a part of a being moving itself is at rest. What must rather be true is this conditional proposition: if the part were at rest, the whole would be at rest. Now, this proposition would be true even though its antecedent be impossible. In the same way, the following conditional proposition is true: if man is an ***, he is irrational.

dhspriory.org/thomas/ContraGentiles1.htm

Yes this is the section I was referring to.
Also Book1:13

 

[IWantGod]

If you think Aquinas didn’t want his writings “for beginners” debated perhaps you aren’t a Thomist.

I never said it should not be debated, and i never said i was a Thomist.

 

[ynotzap]

CONTINUED…

Maths is a form of reasoning that infers valid principles/laws (via algorithms and formulae) hidden in matter as revealed by experiments despite the “interfering static” of an imperfectly observable world you keep going on about. If you deny this one would not just be a poor scientist but a poor philosopher too I believe.

And I am going to keep mentioning about what you call “interfering static” because it’s the Achilles Heel of the empirical scientific world. It is the answer to 'why they can not reach absolute O, or succeed in getting a perfect vacuum, or find a perfectly empty space, or observe a perfectly straight line in motion, or examine an electron, in this real objective world of ours. Did you ever try to hit a moving target. The truth is in the details rings true.(interfering static" Empirical science appears to be very “utilitarian”, if it works, it must be true.

Your statement “Potency and Act do not hold true in constant velocity,” how can that be, when you approach it from the perfect world of math, if that world represents the perfect ideal, then there can not be any “Potency” because it is perfect, true?

I never implied that I did not find the principles used in empirical matters as useless or unimportant, but I did state they are good, but not good enough as far as truth was concerned. The five classical proofs for the existence of God, motion, order,necessity, grades of beings, are different ways of using the cause and effect principle. You question the one dealing with motion, rectlinear motion, straight line motion, and I tried to answer that problem, but again, my post disappeared , My post basically stated that there is no perfectly straight line motion in the real world, only in the ideal world of the empirical scientists, because of the principles of math, the ideal is not achievable in the world of potency for the reasons given.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

And I am going to keep mentioning about what you call “interfering static” because it’s the Achilles Heel of the empirical scientific world. It is the answer to 'why they can not reach absolute O, or succeed in getting a perfect vacuum, or find a perfectly empty space, or observe a perfectly straight line in motion, or examine an electron, in this real objective world of ours. Did you ever try to hit a moving target. The truth is in the details rings true.(interfering static" Empirical science appears to be very “utilitarian”, if it works, it must be true.

Your statement “Potency and Act do not hold true in constant velocity,” how can that be, when you approach it from the perfect world of math, if that world represents the perfect ideal, then there can not be any “Potency” because it is perfect, true?

I never implied that I did not find the principles used in empirical matters as useless or unimportant, but I did state they are good, but not good enough as far as truth was concerned. The five classical proofs for the existence of God, motion, order,necessity, grades of beings, are different ways of using the cause and effect principle. You question the one dealing with motion, rectlinear motion, straight line motion, and I tried to answer that problem, but again, my post disappeared , My post basically stated that there is no perfectly straight line motion in the real world, only in the ideal world of the empirical scientists, because of the principles of math, the ideal is not achievable in the world of potency for the reasons given.

I am not going to relitigate the weaknesses here.
That the world rarely instantiates ideal conditions is a trivial observation that has no bearing on Newton though for some reason no one can explain this well enough for you to see.
That one cannot demonstrate one particular case (zero friction) in the real world does not invalidate his universal laws. However if you could actually show by a single demonstration that his laws are clearly contradicted then you might make better headway here.

BTW my beef is not primarily with potency and act (though I believe your appreciation of it is tautological) - it is with the seemingly necessary principle that goes with it re motion.

 

[ynotzap]

I am not going to relitigate the weaknesses here.
That the world rarely instantiates ideal conditions is a trivial observation that has no bearing on Newton though for some reason no one can explain this well enough for you to see.
That one cannot demonstrate one particular case (zero friction) in the real world does not invalidate his universal laws. However if you could actually show by a single demonstration that his laws are clearly contradicted then you might make better headway here.

BTW my beef is not primarily with potency and act (though I believe your appreciation of it is tautological) - it is with the seemingly necessary principle that goes with it re motion.

My argument is not with Newton, but with you

 

[Richca]

The difficulty is you are mistaken.

Dead persons with still hands can hold moving sticks due to the inherent property of matters inertia. In a material universe delayed cause-effect motion is always the observed case, even if very short.

 

[Aloysium]

“The modern tendency to think of causation as esentially a relation between temporally ordered events” is not supported by science when dealing with the very, very small. An electron or photon behaves as a particle or a wave depending on whether or not it is detected. If we look for it, it is a particle. It does not matter whether we detect it before or after it has an affect on the screen. If we find which of two slits it passes before or after, the pattern is of a particle, imagine a ball. If we do not detect it, the pattern, even of individual photons is of wave interference. It passes through one slit when we locate it, and both when we don’t. There appears to be one event that not only combines the cause and effect, but does so regardless of the temporal sequence.

 

[ynotzap]

Richa and Blue Horizon are both right: I’ll try to explain.

Blue Horizon is speaking from the “point of enertia” a principle founded by Galileo, not Newton. There is motion in a dead body called reflex action, and rigor mortis, the stiffening of the muscles’ the coagulation of the muscle protein after death. Newton’s laws are only valid in an inertial reference frame, some external cause the mass to move. (moved by another) I witness this phenomenon when I witnessed a person dying, I knew intuitively, instinctively, I am not sure, when life left her body, but I experienced that she was still breathing, and gradually ceased in a very short time. The attending nurse told me that this was a common phenomenon and attributed it to a reflex action after death. I also am aware of the action of the parasympathetic nervous system in the human body that keeps the body functioning while the person is unconscious, and it’s functions where not sustain, but gradually ceased.

Richa is right that the person is dead, for when the body can no longer sustain physical life, the source of immanent activity separates from the body, (even though there is still activity in the body due to inertia, and chemical action. “rational animal life” is one that is composed of matter and spirit. The source of immanent activity in the body is still reliant on an outside source, it is not its own power or existence, so even if it is internal to the body, it still has an outside cause, movement is not intrinsic to neither the soul or the body, in other words, not part of its nature, it is moved by another. The soul can sub-sist, not dependent on its existence on matter on which it is extrinsically dependent in this mortal state of existence, but dependent upon the Ultimate Cause which is God Caused directly, not through secondary causes, as is the body. Also the truth of Potency and Act are validated in both cases

 

[ynotzap]

Continuation from last post:

Constant velocity is to me an oxymoron , changeless change. In a frictionless world, which is not our world, even though we try to make it frictionless, mechanically we work with close tolerances, oils, or chemicals that reduce friction, we can’t get away from it. Friction comes in all forms, gravity, molecules, abrasive surfaces, etc, even in radiation. So to even consider constant motion is to treat motion without friction. No matter one travels in space, can they say "there is no friction (outside force) to one’s movement? I find this finding of Newtons an assumption at best, applying an ideal situation, to our objective physical reality. Am I saying Newton is wrong is all that he states? What makes half truths acceptable is the half that is true.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

No, I’m not mistaken.
If I move a stick with my hand, I personally do not observe a delay in the motion of the stick.

 

[Blue_Horizon]

“The modern tendency to think of causation as esentially a relation between temporally ordered events” is not supported by science when dealing with the very, very small. An electron or photon behaves as a particle or a wave depending on whether or not it is detected. If we look for it, it is a particle. It does not matter whether we detect it before or after it has an affect on the screen. If we find which of two slits it passes before or after, the pattern is of a particle, imagine a ball. If we do not detect it, the pattern, even of individual photons is of wave interference. It passes through one slit when we locate it, and both when we don’t. There appears to be one event that not only combines the cause and effect, but does so regardless of the temporal sequence.

Its helpful to distinguish between “not supported” and denied".

While we are not yet able to identify causality in some very narrow and not well understood areas this is not yet clear enough to solidly deny a principle of causality.

And given that 99.9 % of the rest of science and everyday experience does conform to the temporal cause/effect model such baffling experiments hardly overthrow that model just yet.

 

[Aloysium]

Its helpful to distinguish between “not supported” and denied".
While we are not yet able to identify causality in some very narrow and not well understood areas this is not yet clear enough to solidly deny a principle of causality.
And given that 99.9 % of the rest of science and everyday experience does conform to the temporal cause/effect model such baffling experiments hardly overthrow that model just yet.

In science theories are not said to be denied; they are unsupported when the results are contrary to the expectation.

The principle of causality is clearly not denied. What is called into question is the concept of purely temporal causality.
But such views are entrenched in people’s minds. We see therefore some explanations of the findings I described, as having to do with “retrocausality”, that time may have a potential to go in the opposite, a negative direction.

What makes most sense to me is that events tend to come whole. Atoms are wholes, for example, although composed of parts, which may be isolated, but otherwise comprise the unity of the atom, with its specific attributes. This would be the case with all levels of creation.

The cause of the behaviour of any inanimate, or animate for that matter, being would be what it is. Objects in space-time have momentum as a facet of their being what they are. The cause of each part, is ultimately the same one that causes the totality that is the universe.

As part of the entire process, our rational minds which involve action, cleave the object from the whole, thereby bringing about a frame of reference whereby the object’s interaction as an individual participant within the whole may actually be produced rather than merely observed. By that’s mixing quantum physics with relativity.

I say this to suggest that causality is complex and the temporal relationship may be one created by our minds as we gaze into what constitutes a whole. Where there would be one event, it is through our perception, intellect and the technology we use to extend these, that separate events are produced, a later second one observed to be emerging from the first. One event is temporally ordered and separated into constituents parts as a consequence of our particular interaction with it. The motion in time and space is caused by what is outside of it, producing the ongoing change, that is what it is in itself.

I’m not explaining myself as well as I would like, but trying to suggest that the structure of the universe is more interesting than mundane experience might suggest.

 

[ynotzap]

This sounds self contradictory.
Can you define what “change of motion” means here…does it mean acceleration perhaps?
Also, what does “motion is its intrinsic nature” mean?

Sorry I didn’t answer sooner. If an object is slowing down over several hundred years, means it is decelerating, a CHANGE in speed, manifesting the potential to change .What ever has a potential has to have a cause outside of itself to move from the state of a potential, to a state of act (to being in a state of deceleration) change.

An object that has no external outside cause for it’s motion, necessarily is the cause of its own motion. An object that can cause it’s own motion, has motion as part of it’s essence, or nature. If motion was part of its essence, that means that it couldn’t have any potential to be completed, or filled, no capacity for change. Motion is the movement from potency to act, (change) There can be no change if there isn’t a capacity for change. Intrinsic means that motion is part of the essence of an object that can move itself. This contradicts the principle of WIMIMBA , IOW, the object would always be in act, it wouldn’t be slowing down.

 

[Richca]

“The modern tendency to think of causation as esentially a relation between temporally ordered events” is not supported by science when dealing with the very, very small. An electron or photon behaves as a particle or a wave depending on whether or not it is detected. If we look for it, it is a particle. It does not matter whether we detect it before or after it has an affect on the screen. If we find which of two slits it passes before or after, the pattern is of a particle, imagine a ball. If we do not detect it, the pattern, even of individual photons is of wave interference. It passes through one slit when we locate it, and both when we don’t. There appears to be one event that not only combines the cause and effect, but does so regardless of the temporal sequence.

The slit experiment is taken cause-effect in a very loose sense. I do not believe the slit experiment would be classified as cause-effect in the Aristotlelian or Aquinas sense. An efficient cause produces some new being of some kind. If I’m not mistaken, the slit experiment had to do with the phenomenon of light. Now, whether light (or an electron or photon if you will) passes through one slit, two slits, or 1000 slits, it is still light. The slit or slits are not the efficient cause of light. Whether it is detected as a particle or wave, it is still light. The slit experiment is an example of scientists trying to determine the nature of light which by the way to this day, we don’t really know what it is, the scientists have theories. An efficient cause of light would be the sun, for example.