This paper presents Aristotle’s method of understanding the first principles of natural things in the Physics I.1 and analyzes the three stages of which this method consists. In the Physics I.1, Aristotle suggests that the natural proper route which one has to follow in order to find out the first principles of natural things is to proceed from what is clearer and more knowable to us to what is more knowable and clear by nature. In the Physics I.1, the terms (...) καθόλου and καθ΄ ἕκαστα are not used in their usual meaning. This paper examines the Physics I.1 in comparison with the Posterior Analytics II. 19 in order to elucidate the meaning of καθόλου in the first chapter of Aristotle’s Physics. Furthermore, it reaches the conclusion that the structure of the natural world to which we belong determines the structure and the form of our knowledge. On the one hand, natural things are composite and, on the other hand, perception is involved in the initial grasping of natural things as composites. Thus, since perceptual knowledge is more accessible to us than any other kind of knowledge it is natural to reach knowledge of simple things, i.e., of the principles, starting our inquiry with the composites. (shrink)

In Nicomachean Ethics 1.6, Aristotle directs his criticism not only against the Platonic Idea of the Good but also against the notion of a universal Good. In this paper, I also examine some of the most interesting aspects of his criticism of the Platonic Good and the universal Good in Eudemian Ethics 1.8. In the EN, after using a series of disputable ontological arguments, Aristotle’s criticism culminates in a strong ethical or rather practical and, simultaneously, epistemological argument, from which a (...) dialectical postulatum emerges. This argument aims to show that we have to discover the dialectical stages or grades which constitute the relation between the ultimate End, i.e., the Good simpliciter or the absolute Good, and the relational goods till the last prakton good in which each specific praxis ends. According to the present reading, Aristotle sets out to establish a kind of Dialectic of the ends or Dialectic of the goods, which puts emphasis on the descent to the specific good, which is appropriate to and cognate with each individual, be that a person, praxis, science or craft. It is also suggested that this might be relevant to Aristotle’s tendency to establish a separation of phronēsis, i.e., practical wisdom, from sophia, i.e., wisdom, in the Nicomachean Ethics. (shrink)

In the De Generatione et Corruptione II 9, Aristotle aims to achieve the confirmation of his theory of the necessity of the efficient cause. In this chapter he sets out his criticism on the one hand of those who wrongly attributed the efficient cause to other kinds of causality and on the other, of those who ignored the efficient cause. More specifically Aristotle divides all preceding theories which attempted to explain generation and corruption into two groups: i) those which offered (...) an explanation by using the formal cause ii) those which provided an explanation by using the material or the instrumental causes. According to Philopo­nus, when Aristotle reproaches the other philosophers for adducing no proper notion of the efficient cause he alludes to both Anaxagoras and Plato. Regarding Anaxagoras, in our view this cannot be confirmed by internal textual evidence. In terms of Plato, in this chapter we trace an explicit and an implicit criticism of the Platonic Forms as causes. Aris­totle’s implicit criticism is that the Forms are not at all active causes. We can understand better the grounds for this criticism if we also consider his relevant arguments in Book Lambda of his Metaphysics. His explicit criticism, articulated in two arguments, is formulated in GC 335b18–24. We examine the different lines of its interpretation in the second­ary literature, but primarily we focus on Philoponus’ exegesis, which contributes significantly, not only to the clarification of Aristotle’s thinking, but also to the manifestation of the arguments articulated in defence of the Platonic theory of the Forms. In this paper, through the analysis of Philoponus’ exegesis we set out to prove that Aristotle’s criticism of the Platonic causes can be construed from the perspective of either Aristo­telian theory or the Platonic and Neoplatonic influence. Finally, based on Philoponus’ exegesis, we examine Aristotle’s criticism of those who posited matter or instrumental causes as efficient causes. (shrink)

This paper presents Olympiodorus’ and Damascius’ explanations of the philosopher’s practice of dying in Plato’s Phaedo. It also includes a presentation of Ammonius’ exegesis of the practice of death. The Neoplatonic commentators discern two kinds of death, the bodily or physical death and the voluntary death. Olympiodorus suggests that bodily death is only an image of voluntary death and cannot be recognized as an original death, because original death presupposes the preparation for death and the constant effort for the purification (...) of the soul during the philosopher’s life-time. Only preparation for death and purification can ensure the complete separation of the soul from the body. Relative to this distinction is that between apothnēskein and tethnanai; these infinitives denote the dual meaning of death: death as an event or a process and death as a state. Our study examines thoroughly the subtle distinctions made by Olympiodorus and Damascius and offers a comparative analysis of the two definitions of death as well as that of purification. It reaches the conclusion that apothnēskein is a necessary condition of tethnanai, i.e. of a definitive release and parting of the soul from the body. On the other hand, the process of eventual purification, a notion which betrays the religious character of purification, can be identified with apothnēskein, which is the practice of dying by the true philosopher. Finally, our study also emphasizes and explains the difference between the voluntary philosophical death and the voluntary unphilosophical suicide; the latter guaranteeing only bodily or physical death. (shrink)

This paper sets out to analyze Proclus’ exegesis of Socrates’ suggestion in Parmenides 132d1-3 that Forms stand fixed as patterns, as it were, in the nature, with the other things being images and likenesses of them. Proclus’ analysis of the notion of being pattern reveals the impact of the Aristotelian conception of the form as paradigm on his views, as we can infer from Alexander of Aphrodisias’ and Simplicius’ explanation of the paradigmatic character of the Aristotelian form. Whereas Aristotle and (...) Alexander of Aphrodisias refute the efficient causality of the Platonic Forms and support that μέθεξις is just a metaphor, Syrianus, Proclus and Asclepius defend the Platonic theory, and specifically Proclus, who brings to the fore the multilateral role of the Forms as patterns with regard to the secondary things of this realm.[1] [1] An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Symposium Platonicum XII: Plato’s Parmenides, organized by the International Plato Society, Paris, 15-19 July 2019. (shrink)

This paper analyzes and explains certain parts of Syrianus’s Commentary on book M of Aristotle’s Metaphysics, which details Syrianus’s response to Aristotle’s attack against the Platonic position of the separate existence of numbers. Syrianus defends the separate existence not only of eidetic but also of mathematical numbers, following a line of argumentation which involves a hylomorphic approach to the latter. He proceeds with an analysis of the mathematical number into matter and form, but his interpretation entails that form is the (...) constituent of number, which has the status and role of a Platonic Form. This solution allows him not only to explain and justify the unity of number, but also to apply the Platonic thesis of the separate existence of numbers, to the mathematical or monadic numbers themselves. It also betrays its tendency to combine theses of the Platonic Ontology with fundamental Aristotelian doctrines. (shrink)