Aristotle's four causes /
This book examines Aristotle's four causes (material, formal, efficient and final), offering a systematic discussion of the relation between form and matter, causation, taxonomy and teleology. The overall aim is to show that the four causes form a system, so that the form of a natural thing rel...
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Format: | Book |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
New York :
Peter Lang,
[2019]
|
| Subjects: |
| Summary: | This book examines Aristotle's four causes (material, formal, efficient and final), offering a systematic discussion of the relation between form and matter, causation, taxonomy and teleology. The overall aim is to show that the four causes form a system, so that the form of a natural thing relates to its matter as the final cause of a natural process relates to its efficient cause. Aristotle's Four Causes reaches two novel and distinctive conclusions. The first is that the formal cause or essence of a natural thing is not a property of this thing but a generic natural thing. The second is that the final cause of a process is not its purpose but the course that processes of its kind typically take. |
|---|---|
| Physical Description: | vii, 280 pages ; 24 cm. |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references (pages [251]-265) and index. |
| ISBN: | 9781433159299 1433159295 |