Circular Motion and Circular Thought: A Synthetic Approach to the Fifth Element in Aristotle’s de Philosophia and de Caelo

Apeiron ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Franziska van Buren
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
Circular Motion ◽  
Synthetic Approach ◽  
Spatial Motion ◽  
Do So

Abstract Scholars have long considered de Philosophia and de Caelo to be in contradiction regarding the nature of the heavenly bodies, particularly with respect to the activity proper to the element composing them. According to the accounts we have of de Philosophia, Aristotle seems to have put forth that stars move because they have minds, and, according to Cicero’s account of the lost text, they choose their actions out of free will. In de Caelo, however, Aristotle seems only to consider that stars engage in the activity of circular motion because it is in their nature to do so, as it is in the nature of, e.g. fire to move upwards or Earth to move downwards. In this paper, I argue against the longstanding view that there is an incompatibility between these two “early” cosmological texts of Aristotle. I aim to show that these two texts endorse complementary, not contradictory, views of the heavenly bodies. I argue that in de Philosophia, Aristotle attributes to stars the intellective counterpart of the spatial motion which is developed in greater depth in de Caelo, while in de Caelo, we see hints of Aristotle’s view in de Philosophia that the stars are also minds and are able to rationally cognize their particular good – a point which is shown in de Caelo 292a18–293a14, where Aristotle attributes both life and praxis to the heavenly bodies. The overarching view which I present of these two texts is that while de Caelo approaches the heavenly bodies qua bodies and de Philosophia approaches them qua minds, they are still examining one and the same substance and that Aristotle has not changed his mind regarding the basic nature of such a substance in the (supposed) interim between writing de Philosophia and de Caelo. Rather, we find echoes of de Caelo in de Philosophia, and echoes of de Philosophia in de Caelo, which speaks to the fact that Aristotle maintains one view of the heavenly bodies which he presents over the course of these two texts.

scholarly journals Do Moral Judgements Motivate Free Will Belief?

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Elliott Monroe ◽  
Dominic Ysidron
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
Causal Relationship ◽  
Attribution Theory ◽  
Replication Study ◽  
Moral Judgments ◽  
Experiment Study ◽  
Norm Violation ◽  
Immoral Behavior ◽  
Moral Judgements ◽  
Do So

Free will is often appraised as a necessary input to for holding others morally or legally responsible for misdeeds. Recently, however, Clark and colleagues (2014), argued for the opposite causal relationship. They assert that moral judgments and the desire to punish motivate people’s belief in free will. In three experiments—two exact replications (Studies 1 & 2b) and one close replication (Study 2a) we seek to replicate these findings. Additionally, in a novel experiment (Study 3) we test a theoretical challenge derived from attribution theory, which suggests that immoral behaviors do not uniquely influence free will judgments. Instead, our nonviolation model argues that norm deviations, of any kind—good, bad, or strange—cause people to attribute more free will to agents, and attributions of free will are explained via desire inferences. Across replication experiments we found no evidence for the original claim that witnessing immoral behavior causes people to increase their belief in free will, though we did replicate the finding that people attribute more free will to agents who behave immorally compared to a neutral control (Studies 2a & 3). Finally, our novel experiment demonstrated broad support for our norm-violation account, suggesting that people’s willingness to attribute free will to others is malleable, but not because people are motivated to blame. Instead, this experiment shows that attributions of free will are best explained by people’s expectations for norm adherence, and when these expectations are violated people infer that an agent expressed their free will to do so.

Plato on Self-Motion in Laws X

Rhizomata ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 96-122
Author(s):  
Rareș Ilie Marinescu
Keyword(s):  
Circular Motion ◽  
Necessary Condition ◽  
Spatial Motion ◽  
Textual Evidence ◽  
Spatial Understanding ◽  
Self Motion

Abstract In this paper, I argue that Plato conceives self-motion as non-spatial in Laws X. I demonstrate this by focusing on the textual evidence and by refuting interpretations according to which self-motion either is a specific type of spatial motion (e. g. circular motion) or is said to require space as a necessary condition for its occurrence. Moreover, I show that this non-spatial understanding differs from the identification of the soul’s motion with locomotion in the Timaeus. Consequently, I provide an explanation for this difference between the Timaeus and Laws X by considering developmentalist and contextualist viewpoints.

A Positive View of Freedom?

2019 ◽  
pp. 147-161
Author(s):  
Brian Leiter
Keyword(s):  
Moral Responsibility ◽  
Free Will ◽  
Positive View ◽  
Textual Evidence ◽  
External Influences ◽  
Positive Valence ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Persuasive Definition ◽  
Do So

This chapter reviews the textual evidence that Nietzsche retains a positive conception of “freedom.” Interpretive proposals due to Gemes and Poellner are shown not to be borne out by the texts. The chapter concludes that Nietzsche offers a “persuasive definition” of freedom, attaching the term’s positive valence to a sense of freedom unfamiliar in the modern Humean or Kantian traditions, but having echoes in Spinoza: “freedom” as acting from one’s inner nature rather than from external influences, something one can only do if fated to do so. The Spinoza-type view is shown not to be a kind of Control view of free will, so not one that vindicates moral responsibility.

Strategic Action In A Community Environment

2003 ◽  
Vol 36 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 156-183 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frank Schimmelfennig
Keyword(s):  
Synthetic Approach ◽  
Strategic Action ◽  
Erving Goffman ◽  
Community Environment ◽  
Institutional Effects ◽  
Institutional Rules ◽  
Collective Interaction ◽  
National Values ◽  
The Social ◽  
Do So

In this article, the author proposes a synthetic approach to the analysis of institutional effects on EU policy making by combining a rationalist theory of action with a constructivist assumption on the social environment: Actors in European integration act strategically on the basis of individual specific policy preferences but do so in a community environment that affects their strategies and the collective interaction outcome. This synthetic approach draws on the work of Erving Goffman and is based on the "sequencing" of rationalist and constructivist propositions. Furthermore, this approach will be most salient when the institutional rules in question are constitutive and legitimate and resonate with national values and norms. Following the design of controlled competition, the author argues that this sequencing better explains the EU's decision to expand to the East than either rationalist or constructivist propositions alone.

Alexander of Aphrodisias (fl. c. AD 200)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
R.W. Sharples
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
Positive Solution ◽  
Subsequent Work ◽  
Living Body ◽  
Alexander Of Aphrodisias ◽  
The Status ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Active Intellect ◽  
Do So

The Peripatetic philosopher Alexander was known to posterity as the commentator on Aristotle, until Averroes took over this title. His commentaries eclipsed most of those of his predecessors, which now survive only in scattered quotations. Used by Plotinus, Alexander’s commentaries were the basis for subsequent work on Aristotle by Neoplatonist commentators, and even though some themselves survive only in quotations by these later writers, Alexander’s interpretations of particular passages are still helpful and are cited by commentators today. In addition to Alexander’s commentaries we have a number of monographs, and also collections of short discussions which are connected with themes in his writings, though some are probably by pupils rather than by Alexander himself. Alexander’s most influential and controversial doctrine has been his interpretation of Aristotle’s theory of soul and intellect; regarding the soul as the product of the mixture of the bodily elements, he has been seen as subordinating form to matter and as thereby misinterpreting Aristotle. Certainly his view excludes any immortality for individuals, but even if Aristotle himself allowed this it is arguable that to do so was incompatible with his definition of soul as the form of potentially living body. Alexander himself interpreted Aristotle’s ‘active intellect’ not as an immortal element in each individual, but as god, the unmoved mover, apprehended by our own intellects. Both on the question of soul and on that of the status of universals, Alexander gives a non-Platonizing reading of Aristotle, which accounts for some of the criticism to which he has been subjected by successors both ancient and modern. His treatment of the problem of free will has also been influential, though his criticisms of determinism are more telling than his own positive solution. Seeing his task as interpreting Aristotle’s writings with the aid of one another and explaining apparent inconsistencies, Alexander contributed to the growth of Aristotelianism as a system; he does not criticize nor challenge Aristotle, and regards his own innovations as Aristotelian doctrine, developed in the context of new questions which Aristotle himself had not confronted in the same form. He was better at seeing the details than at comprehending the global picture, and the potential of some of his doctrinal contributions is most apparent in what they suggested to others; but there is still much to interest philosophers in his detailed argumentation on particular points and passages.

DOES FREE WILL EXIST?

Think ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 15 (42) ◽  
pp. 53-70 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Kyle Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
Theory Of Relativity ◽  
The Common ◽  
Theological Belief ◽  
Libertarian Free Will ◽  
Do So

In ‘Do Souls Exist’, I suggested that, while the non-existence of the soul does threaten free will, the threat it possess is inconsequential. Free will faces so many other hurdles that, if those were overcome, the soul's non-existence would be a non-threat. In this paper, I establish this; and to do so, I define the common libertarian notion of free will, and show how neuroscience, determinism, indeterminism, theological belief, axioms in logic, and even Einstein's theory of relativity each entail that libertarian free will does not exist. I conclude by demonstrating why some philosophers reject alternate (compatibilist) understandings of free will, and so believe that the notion we are free is an illusion.

scholarly journals No best world: creaturely freedom

2005 ◽  
Vol 41 (3) ◽  
pp. 269-285 ◽  
Author(s):  
BRIAN LEFTOW
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
Moral Luck ◽  
Possible World ◽  
William Rowe ◽  
Libertarian Free Will ◽  
Do So

William Rowe and others argue that if this is a possible world than which there is a better, it follows that God does not exist. I now reject the key premise of Rowe's argument. I do so first within a Molinist framework. I then show that this framework is dispensable: really all one needs to block the better-world argument is the assumption that creatures have libertarian free will. I also foreclose what might seem a promising way around the ‘moral-luck’ counter I develop, and contend that it is in a way impossible to get around.

Refraining

2019 ◽  
pp. 122-159
Author(s):  
Ingmar Persson
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
Do So ◽  
Dual Power

You let it be the case that q by refraining from causing p just in case: (a) you correctly believe that if you cause p, q will not be the case, (b) you correctly believe that you have an all-in dual power concerning causing p, (c) you do not decisively desire to cause p because you do not find sufficient reasons for forming such a desire, and (d) q becomes the case because you do not cause p due to (c). Since refraining is intentional, it importantly follows from this that characterizing something as intentional does not involve causality. Moreover, when we can refrain from causing something, we must have the all-in dual power of causing it and avoiding to do so. Thus, the concept of refraining raises questions about free will and responsibility which are briefly discussed.

Are Persons Free to Choose?

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan L. Mittleman
Keyword(s):  
Moral Responsibility ◽  
Free Will ◽  
Moral Agency ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Hard Determinism ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Do So

This chapter explores a key dimension of the portrayal developed in Chapter 2—namely, moral agency. Against the hard determinism of modern scientism, classic Jewish sources affirm in a nuanced way the concept of free will. Since these sources have also sometimes endorsed a “soft-determinist” view (sometimes known as compatibilism), there is some common ground to be found on this complicated issue. How can we continue to embrace a belief in free will, with all that such a belief entails, and still give credence to the new sciences of the brain that qualify or even negate free will at the same time? Although ultimately Jewish sources must affirm personhood, agency, and moral responsibility, there is more than one simplistic way to do so.

scholarly journals Supervenient Freedom and the Free Will Deadlock

Disputatio ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 9 (45) ◽  
pp. 219-243 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nadine Elzein ◽  
Tuomas K. Pernu
Keyword(s):  
Free Will ◽  
The Past ◽  
Physical Level ◽  
Do So ◽  
As If

Abstract Supervenient libertarianism maintains that indeterminism may exist at a supervening agency level, consistent with determinism at a subvening physical level. It seems as if this approach has the potential to break the longstanding deadlock in the free will debate, since it concedes to the traditional incompatibilist that agents can only do otherwise if they can do so in their actual circumstances, holding the past and the laws constant, while nonetheless arguing that this ability is compatible with physical determinism. However, we argue that supervenient libertarianism faces some serious problems, and that it fails to break us free from this deadlock within the free will debate.

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