Doing and Being: An Interpretation of Aristotle's Metaphysics Theta (Oxford Aristotle Studies Series)

Doing and Being confronts the problem of how to understand two central concepts of Aristotle's philosophy: energeia and dunamis. While these terms seem ambiguous between actuality/potentiality and activity/capacity, Aristotle did not intend them to be so. Through a careful and detailed reading of Metaphysics Theta, Beere argues that we can solve the problem by rejecting both "actuality" and "activity" as translations of energeia, and by working out an analogical conception of energeia. This approach enables Beere to discern a hitherto unnoticed connection between Plato's Sophist and Aristotle's Metaphysics Theta, and to give satisfying interpretations of the major claims that Aristotle makes in Metaphysics Theta, the claim that energeia is prior in being to capacity (Theta 8) and the claim that any eternal principle must be perfectly good (Theta 9). Contents 8 Acknowledgements 13 I. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF METAPHYSICS THETA 16 1. Peace between the Gods and Giants 18 1.1 Introduction 18 1.2 The Battle of the Gods and Giants 21 1.3 Aristotelian Détente 26 2. The Introduction to Metaphysics Theta (Theta 1) 34 2.1 The Project 34 2.2 The Indirect Strategy 38 2.3 What’s to Come 40 II. POWERS FOR ACTION AND PASSION 46 3. Powers (Theta 1) 48 3.1 ‘Power’ is Said in Many Ways 48 3.2 Correlative Powers 68 3.3 The Theory of Powers: Overview 75 3.4 Objections 76 4. Rational Powers (Theta 2) 84 4.1 Setting the Stage 85 4.2 One of One: Non-rational Powers 88 4.3 One of Two: Rational Powers 93 5. Powers and Possibilities: The Megarics (Theta 3) 106 5.1 The Megaric View 108 5.2 Aristotle Against the Megarics 114 6. Possibility and the Future (Theta 3 and 4) 134 6.1 The Criterion of Possibility 134 6.2 ‘Will Not’ and ‘Cannot’ (Theta 4) 139 6.3 ‘Will Not’ and ‘Cannot’ in Plato’s Timaeus 148 6.4 Four Varieties of Being Able 150 7. The Exercise of Powers (Theta 5) 154 7.1 Something Else in Control 155 7.2 Desire 158 7.3 Interlude: Non-rational Powers of Animate Creatures 161 7.4 Necessity and Interference 162 7.5 Looking Forward 165 III. BEING-IN-ENERGEIA AND BEING-IN-CAPACITY 168 8. Actuality, Activity, Ambiguity: Preliminary Considerations on Energeia 170 8.1 Energeia as Activity and Actuality: The Traditional View 171 8.2 The Traditional View Rejected 173 8.3 A New Approach 175 8.4 Orientation 176 9. Being-in-Energeia (Theta 6) 184 9.1 Introductory Lines 184 9.2 Two Ways of Being 186 9.3 Analogy: The Semantics of Energeia 193 9.4 The Analogous Cases of Energeia 204 9.5 Indirect Analogy 221 9.6 The Infinite, the Void, and Such 223 9.7 Remark: Substance and Energeia 225 9.8 Energeia Contrasted with Actuality 226 9.9 Energeia and Entelekheia 233 10. Interlude: The Energeia-Kinēsis Distinction (Theta 6) 236 10.1 The Passage in Itself 236 10.2 The Manuscript Evidence 241 10.3 The Passage in its Context 242 10.4 The Passage and Other Passages 244 11. Being-in-Capacity (Theta 7) 246 11.1 The Aim of Theta 7 246 11.2 An Example 252 11.3 The Two Criteria and Two Questions 257 11.4 Conclusion 274 IV. THE PRIORITY AND SUPERIORITY OF ENERGEIA 276 12. Being-in-Capacity and Matter (Theta 7) 278 12.1 Introduction 278 12.2 Motivating Substantivalism 280 12.3 Rejecting Substantivalism 283 12.4 Hierarchy and Ultimate Matter 289 12.5 Ultimate Matter as Substance 293 12.6 Conclusion 298 13. The Priority of Energeia (Theta 8) 300 13.1 Account and Knowledge 301 13.2 Time and Genesis 304 13.3 Being (and Form) 308 14. The Bad Itself (with Speculations on Goodness) (Theta 9) 340 14.1 The Significance of Theta 9 340 14.2 Is Every Energeia Better Than its Capacity? 345 14.3 The Definition of Badness 347 14.4 Excellent Capacity 348 14.5 Bad Things 352 14.6 The Bad Itself 359 14.7 Only Perfect Principles 360 14.8 Speculations on Goodness 362 14.9 Wisdom as a Science of Goodness 364 Bibliography 368 Index of Locorum 372 Index of Nominum 378 A 378 B 378 C 378 D 378 E 378 F 378 G 378 H 378 J 378 K 378 L 378 M 378 O 378 P 378 R 378 S 379 T 379 V 379 W 379 Z 379 Index of Rerum 380 A 380 B 380 C 380 D 380 E 380 F 380 G 380 H 381 I 381 K 381 L 381 M 381 N 381 O 381 P 381 R 382 S 382 T 382 V 382 'doing And Being' Confronts The Problem Of How To Understand Two Central Concepts Of Aristotle's Philosophy: Energeia And Dunamis. These Terms Seem Ambiguous Between Actuality/potentiality And Activity/capacity, But Aristotle Did Not Intend This. Jonathan Beere. Includes Bibliographical References And Indexes.