Unseating the Craftsman: Natural Efficient Cause in Aristotle's Craft Analogy

Apeiron ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Aparna Ravilochan
Keyword(s):  
Causal Process ◽  
Psychological Dimension ◽  
Efficient Cause ◽  
Natural Teleology ◽  
The Craftsman

Abstract In this essay, I respond to a problem raised by Sarah Broadie in her 1987 article “Nature, Craft and Phronesis in Aristotle.” Broadie analyzes Aristotle’s famous craft analogy for natural causation in order to determine whether or not it requires importing a psychological dimension to natural teleology. She argues that it is possible to make sense of the analogy without psychology, but that the tradeoff is a conception of craft so thoroughly de-psychologized that it is rendered unrecognizable, perhaps even incoherent as a referent. I dispute this suggestion and argue, rather, that Aristotle’s insistence on removing psychology from the craft side of the analogy points to his prioritization of techne itself, rather than any particular craftsman, as primary efficient agent. The lack of psychology that characterizes a techne ensures stability and reliability in the causal process that could not be guaranteed by the idiosyncratic psychologies of various craftspeople. The same kind of stability and reliability belong to nature as an efficient cause, forming the basis of the comparison between craft and natural teleology. It is therefore the craft, not the craftsman, that must stand as analog to nature. I demonstrate the value of this revision by applying the analogy to case of natural teleology: reproduction as depicted in Aristotle’s Generation of Animals. The result is a reading of Aristotle’s analogies that can assuage Broadie’s concerns and allow for a natural thing’s own nature to more fully inhabit its intended role as an inner source of change.

The Moving Cause of Artefacts: the role of techne in metaphysical explanation

2019 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 64-83
Author(s):  
Margaret Cameron
Keyword(s):  
Alternative Theory ◽  
Metaphysical Explanation ◽  
Efficient Cause ◽  
The Creation

The essence of artefacts is typically taken to be their function: they are defined in terms of the goals or aims of the artisans that make them. In this paper, an alternative theory is proposed that emphasizes, via a reconstruction of Aristotle's various comments about the nature of artefacts, the role of the moving, or efficient, cause of artefacts. This account shifts the emphasis to the role played by the investment of expertise into the creation (and subsequent being) of artefacts. It turns out that expertise is prior in being and prior in explanation to the function of artefacts, and thus plays the most fundamental role in the explanation of the ontology of artefacts.

KUALITAS HIDUP PASIEN STROKE DI POLIKLINIK RAWAT JALAN RUMAH SAKIT SWASTA YOGYAKARTA

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 232-237
Author(s):  
Hana Larasati ◽  
Theresia Titin Marlina
Keyword(s):  
Quality Of Life ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Hemorrhagic Stroke ◽  
Poor Quality ◽  
Social Dimension ◽  
Stroke Patients ◽  
Sampling System ◽  
Post Stroke ◽  
Psychological Dimension

Background: stroke is a disorder of nervous system function that occurs suddenly and is caused by brain bleeding disorders that can affect the quality of life physical dimensions, social dimensions, psychological dimensions, environmental dimensions. Based on the result of Lumbu study (2015) the number of samples were 71 people collected data using the (WHOQOL-BREF). There were 56 people (78,9%) had the poor quality of life of post stroke. The mean of post-stroke quality of life domain was physical domain (45,27%), psychological domain (49,87%), social relations domain (48,15%) and environmental domain (50.01%). Objective: the purpose of the study was know the quality of life of the stroke patients in Outpatient Polyclinic of Private Hospital in Yogyakarta. Methods: used descriptive quantitative by using questionnaire test of purposive sampling system based on patients who have been affected of ischemic or hemorrhagic stroke before, number 30 respondents. Result: quality of life of stroke patient of medium physical dimension (67%), psychological dimension (71%), social dimension (67%), dimension good environment (63%). Conclusion: the quality of life of stroke patients of physical dimension, psychological dimension, and moderate social dimension, while the quality of life of stroke patients were good environmental dimension.   Keywords: Hemorrhagic stroke, ischemic stroke, quality of life

Perfection Makes Practice

2006 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 98-100
Author(s):  
Muhamad Ali
Keyword(s):  
Social Relations ◽  
Muslim Community ◽  
Beliefs And Practices ◽  
Psychological Dimension ◽  
South Sulawesi ◽  
Complex Dimensions ◽  
History Of Religions ◽  
History Of

Studies of Islam in Southeast Asia have sought to better understand its multifacetedand complex dimensions, although one may make a generalizedcategorization of Muslim beliefs and practices based on a fundamental differencein ideologies and strategies, such as cultural and political Islam.Anna M. Gade’s Perfection Makes Practice stresses the cultural aspect ofIndonesian Muslim practices by analyzing the practices of reciting andmemorizing the Qur’an, as well as the annual competition.Muslim engagement with the Qur’an has tended to emphasize the cognitiveover the psychological dimension. Perfection Makes Practice analyzesthe role of emotion in these undertakings through a combination ofapproaches, particularly the history of religions, ethnography, psychology,and anthropology. By investigating Qur’anic practitioners in Makassar,South Sulawesi, during the 1990s, Gade argues that the perfection of theQur’an as a perceived, learned, and performed text has made and remade thepractitioners, as well as other members of the Muslim community, to renewor increase their engagement with the holy text. In this process, she suggests,moods and motivation are crucial to preserving the recited Qur’an and revitalizingthe Muslim community.In chapter 1, Gade begins with a theoretical consideration for her casestudy. Drawing from concepts that emphasize the importance of feeling andemotion in ritual and religious experience, she develops a conceptualizationof this engagement. In chapter 2, Gade explains memorization within thecontext of the self and social relations. She argues that Qur’anic memorizershave a special relationship with its style and structure, as well as with thesocial milieu. Although Qur’anic memorization is a normal practice for mostMuslims, its practitioners have learned how to memorize and recite beautifullysome or all of the Qur’an’s verses, a process that requires emotion ...

scholarly journals Attrition as a bottom-up pathway to subnational democratization

2021 ◽  
pp. 019251212110192
Author(s):  
Trix van Mierlo
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Field Research ◽  
Building Blocks ◽  
The Philippines ◽  
Causal Process ◽  
Bottom Up ◽  
System A ◽  
Extensive Field ◽  
Democratic System

Oftentimes, democracy is not spread out evenly over the territory of a country. Instead, pockets of authoritarianism can persist within a democratic system. A growing body of literature questions how such subnational authoritarian enclaves can be democratized. Despite fascinating insights, all existing pathways rely on the actions of elites and are therefore top-down. This article seeks to kick-start the discussion on a bottom-up pathway to subnational democratization, by proposing the attrition mechanism. This mechanism consists of four parts and is the product of abductive inference through theory-building causal process tracing. The building blocks consist of subnational democratization literature, social movement theory, and original empirical data gathered during extensive field research. This case study focuses on the ‘Dynasty Slayer’ in the province of Isabela, the Philippines, where civil society actors used the attrition mechanism to facilitate subnational democratization. This study implies that civil society actors in subnational authoritarian enclaves have agency.

The Teleological Argument in Kant’s Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals

Kant-Studien ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 112 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-77
Author(s):  
Khafiz Kerimov
Keyword(s):  
Human Reason ◽  
Secondary Literature ◽  
Teleological Argument ◽  
Natural Teleology ◽  
Metaphysics Of Morals ◽  
Natural Purpose

Abstract The first section of Kant’s Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals contains a teleological argument, the aim of which is to show that the natural purpose of human reason lies not in securing happiness but in morality. While the teleological argument is widely considered to be digressive and unconvincing in the secondary literature, in this article I attempt to show that the argument is neither digressive nor unconvincing. I argue that it fulfills an important synthetic task in the Groundwork (even if in a preliminary manner), that it is consistent with Kant’s views on natural teleology at the time, and that the criticism of happiness contained therein is as convincing as Kant’s criticism of happiness in the rest of the treatise.

scholarly journals Projection or encounter? Investigating Hans Jonas’ case for natural teleology

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sigurd Hverven ◽  
Thomas Netland
Keyword(s):  
Human Life ◽  
Hans Jonas ◽  
Purposive Activity ◽  
Natural Teleology ◽  
Living Organisms

AbstractThis article discusses Hans Jonas’ argument for teleology in living organisms, in light of recently raised concerns over enactivism’s “Jonasian turn.” Drawing on textual resources rarely discussed in contemporary enactivist literature on Jonas’ philosophy, we reconstruct five core ideas of his thinking: 1) That natural science’s rejection of teleology is methodological rather than ontological, and thus not a proof of its non-existence; 2) that denial of the reality of teleology amounts to a performative self-contradiction; 3) that the fact of evolution makes it implausible that only humans actualize purpose; 4) that the concept of metabolism delimits and gestures towards beings performing purposive activity; and 5) that concrete encounters with living organisms are indispensable for the judgment that they are purposive. Lastly, we draw attention to how Jonas’ understanding of teleology and inwardness in nonhuman life in terms of degrees of identity with human life poses a problem for his view. In this way, we hope to clarify what Jonas, as an important source of inspiration for the enactivist project, is proposing.

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