Date: Thu, 11 Sep 1997 16:51:48 -0400
From: Reg Lilly <rlilly-AT-scott.skidmore.edu>
Subject: Re: PLC: After this, only 80 Proof


open1-AT-execpc.com wrote:

> The intent of Premise 1 is not that an object named "something" exists,
> but that at least one entity exists.

"One entity" I see as no different than "something", both are formalizations of
something not formal, ex. Dennis Polis is not a formal entity but -- Dennis
Polis!  The act of formalization is no innocent act.  My point is that your real
beginning point (and I think you would agree with this) is some real object,
that is, with an object that is, in the first instance, not an instanciation of
a universal, but a 'spatio-temporally- unique-and-irrepalceable-thing', viz.,
Dennis Polis!
	Your appeal to potentiality-actuality is a metaphysical contruction (originated
by Aristotle) that cannot be simply invoke.  Its validity must be demonstrated. 


> 
> >         PS.  Aristotle's unmoved mover had no potentiality (dunamis)
> > whatsoever.
> 
> No *unfulfilled potency.*  All act (energeia) is proportional to some
> capacity to act. If x cannot act then it cannot be that x is acting.

	This is only true of natural beings which have material.  The unmoved mover is
not a natural being, and it has no material cause.  For Aristotle, actuality is
prior to potentiality, hence actuality cannot be subordinated to potentiality as
you do here.  Rather than quoting all the relevant passages of Book XII of the
Metaphysics, here's McKeon's summary.  Without doubt, you are in error.
	"6: Since movement must be eternal, thre must be an eternal mover, and one
whose essence is actuality (actuality being prior to potency).To account for the
uniform change in the universe, there must be one principle which acts always
alike [god], and one whose actions varies [nature].
	"7. The eternal mover originates motion by being the primary object of desire
(as it is of thought); being throughly actual, it cannot change or move; it is a
living being, perfect, separate from sensible things, and without parts.
	"9. The divine thought must be concerned with the most divine object, which
itself. Thought and the object of thought are never different when the object is
immaterial."

	I.e., god 1) is not everything, and 2) doesn't give a damn about us or anything
but itself.

 
> > Aristotle's god was finite, as are all things, but had the
> > virtue of being pure energeia, pure actuality.
> 
> Quite true.  Aristotle could not get beyond his solution of Zeno's
> paradoxes with the insight that mathematical infinity is always
> potential, never actual.  The only kind of infinity that entered his mind
> was, then, intrinsically potential and not actual - and so unsuited to an
> unmoved mover.
> 
> But, that does not mean that my position contradicts Aristotle's -- only
> that he did not consider the kind of infinity used in my proof.

	But he did, and rejected it as "not being real".

> Aristotle's unmoved mover is the source of all activity possible in the
> cosmos.

	Completely wrong.  Natural beings by definition have within themselves their
principle of motion and rest (Physics II, 1, 192b 8-15).  The unmoved mover
doesn't move anything anymore than a steak moves a hungry dog.
  

>  Thus, any activity that can be instantiated can be instantiated
> by A's unmoved mover.  This is not necessarily the capacity to do all
> logically possible things, but it is not clear that it is not that
> capacity either.

Yes it is perfectly clear that absolute actuality and doing everything possible
are contradictory for Aristotle.  Again, there is no dunamis, no potential in
the unmoved mover: 1074a36 "But the primary essence has not matter; for it is
complete reality. So the unmoveable mover is one both in definition and in
number." Movements are change, and therefore require dunamis; hence like
locomotion (i.e., you've got to have a body) is possible only for things which
have a body [viz. meterial-dunamis].  One of the basic distinctions between the
unmoved mover and the planets is that the latter, though eternal and hence not
involved in generation and decay, have bodies, and the way that they manifest
their energeia/actuality is through eternal locomotion.  Are you suggesting that
the unmoved mover has the potentiality for locomotion?  The unmoved mover is
incapable of locomotion or of destroying the universe; indeed, its incapable of
doing anything but thinking itself.

> 
> > Aristotle's god
> > certainly was not capable of eating or even moving,
> > which require body/matter (dunamis), nor was Aristotle a
> > proto-Spinosist, who might claim god was the actuality in all actual
> > things.  To see Aristotle's god a infinte, especially as having
> > infinite capabillities to act, can only be done through a
> > Christian optics.  Whatever you are, you are no Aristotelian!
> 
> I did not say that my proof was Aristotle's, only that Aristotle's proof
> was valid.  I did not attribute matter, eating, etc to the divine nature.
> These are possible acts that can be instantiated by God via material
> insturmentalities.

	Maybe a Christian god can 'instantiate,' but Aristotle's can't.  Nature is not
one of the unmoved mover's 'instruments.'  


Cheers!
Reg
rlilly-AT-scott.skidmore.edu