Ancient Philosophy Commons^™

Neoplatonism In The Liber Naturalis And Shifā: De Anima Or Metaphysica Of Avicenna (Ibn Sīnā), John Shannon Hendrix

Architecture, Art, and Historic Preservation Faculty Publications

Avicenna or Ibn Sīnā was born circa 980 in Afshna, near Bukhara, in Persia. He worked briefly for the Samanid administration, but left Bukhara, and lived in the area of Tehran and Isfahan, where he completed the Shifā (Healing [from error]) under the patronage of the Daylamite ruler, ‘Ala’-al Dawla, and wrote his most important Persian work, the Dānish-nāma, which contains works on logic, metaphysics, physics, and mathematics.

Resembling Nothing: Image And Being In Plato, Yancy Hughes Dominick

The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter

A crucial application of Plato’s views on the use of images in philosophy occurs through the use of the image relationship as an image for the relation of forms and particulars. The relation of a picture to the object it depicts, or that between a reflection and what it reflects, can be seen as analogous to the relation of a particular to the form in which it participates. Although the attack on the image model as analogous to the relation of forms and particulars in the Parmenides threatens to undermine any reliance on that model, this essay will present a …

Abstracting Aristotle’S Philosophy Of Mathematics, John J. Cleary

Research Resources

In the history of science perhaps the most influential Aristotelian division was that

between mathematics and physics. From our modern perspective this seems like an unfortunate deviation from the Platonic unification of the two disciplines, which guided Kepler and Galileo towards the modern scientific revolution. By contrast, Aristotle’s sharp distinction between the disciplines seems to have led to a barren scholasticism in physics, together with an arid instrumentalism in Ptolemaic astronomy. On the positive side, however, astronomy was liberated from commonsense realism for the conceptual experiments of Aristarchus of Samos, whose heliocentric hypothesis was not adopted by later astronomers because …

The Parts Of Definitions, Unity, And Sameness In Aristotle's Metaphysics, Mark R. Wheeler

The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter

First principles (ἀρχάι) are crucial to Aristotle's conception of scientific knowledge (επιστήμη). In the Posterior Analytics, Aristotle teaches us that all scientific knowledge is either knowledge arrived at through demonstration from first principles or knowledge of the first principles themselves. The first principles of a given science are the primary premises (τὰ πρώτα) of that science (Pst. An., 72a7); they express the essential characteristics of the substance about which the given science is concerned; and all other scientific knowledge is derived from the first principles through syllogistic inference.

The first principles of the various sciences are expressed through definition (ὁρισμός). …

On 'Essentially' (Hoper) In Aristotle, Alban Urbanas

The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter

In this paper I shall examine the notion of ταὐτόν - commonly translated as 'same' or 'identical' - and its relevance to so-called essential predications, as effected through the use of ὅπερ in Aristotle. It will be shown that propositions of the type 'A is ὅπερ B' involve an essential predication where either a genus is affirmed of a species, or a species of an individual. The possibility of such predications will be founded upon the doctrine of the categories and the ontological distinction between essence and accident. Besides predications involving generic or specific identity, others effected through propositions of …

Substances, Accidents, And Kinds: Some Remarks On Aristotle's Theory Of Predication, Frank A. Lewis

The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter

A major feature of Aristotle's strategy against Plato in the Categories is to collapse the dichotomy that Plato's theory of (metaphysical) predication attempts to make between forms and sensibles. In Aristotle's theory, Socrates IS some of his predicables, but HAS others. He IS what is essential to him, and HAS the rest. These different relations between Socrates and his various predicables form a large part of the motivation for the further ontological distinctions that Aristotle draws in the Categories.

Aristotle On Kinesis, Arthur L. Peck

The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter

This paper is zetetic rather than expository: Can we define the field in which Aristotle believed kinesis to operate? My interest in this question stems from my work with his biological writings. The distinction between potentiality and actuality was for him an indispensable instrument for philosophy. The application of this principle reaches its apex when he speaks of active and passive nous.

The Functionalism And Dynamism Of Aristotle, John Herman Randall Jr.

The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter

It is the contention of this paper that Aristotle's thought is relevant and suggestive for two of the most important present-day philosophical movements, the concern with language, and the concern with natural processes and their analysis. Aristotle can be viewed today as the outstanding functionalist of the Western tradition. Aristotle's philosophy is more than important, it is true.

Numbers And Magnitudes: An Iamblichean Derivation Theory And Its Relation To Speusippean And Aristotelian Doctrine, W. Gerson Rabinowitz

The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter

No abstract provided.

Aristotle's Doctrine Of Future Contingencies, Richard Taylor

The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter

No abstract provided.