Physics Beta (B): What is "nature" (physis),
or what does 'nature' mean?
Chapter 1. a. Some things exist "by nature", and some by
other causes (aitiai, reasons). (This is not to say that
those other things have nothing to do with "nature".)(See (d.)
below for two senses of 'nature'.)
Examples: The wood in a bed exists "by nature", but the
bed (as bed) does not; the bed was composed - was made to be a bed
- not by nature but by art (techne). A person is a human,
exists as a human, by nature; but he or she is a mechanic, or a
parent, by choice and/or training.
b. What then is supposed to be the difference between that which
exists, or is said to exist, by nature, and that which does not
exist by nature, or that which is said not to exist by
nature?--->All things existing by nature appear to have in
themselves (whatever that means) a principle of motion
and a principle of standstill.<--- (See Book Gamma
on what motion, or a motion, is supposed to be.) What exists by
art has a tendency for motion or change and for standstill only in
so far as it happens to be made of something that exists by
nature.
Examples: Suppose that a wooden bed happens to fall out
of a 10th-story window. The bed breaks not because it is a bed,
but because it is made of wood, etc., in a certain shape. Suppose
that the person who is a mechanic and a parent hears of this
incident involving the bed and becomes worried that his or her
children might have been nearby when it happened. The person
becomes worried not because of his or her skill as a mechanic
(although that would certainly contribute to a human's awareness
of the what could happen when a heavy object falls from a great
height and smashes), nor because of the fact that he or she has
children (although of course that would certainly give a person
something to worry about) -- but because the person is a human.
That is, dogs and cats who have offspring and who become aware of
falling beds do not become worried about their young unless they know
that the young were in the area of the falling bed. Gerbils who
have offspring frequently do not protect them at all. The point is
not that being a parent or a mechanic will not make a person react
differently from one who is not a parent or a mechanic; certainly
it can. The point, though, is that the principle (origin, source;
arche) of the fact that one has certain reactions at all is
that one is a human. Other animals may have, or seem to have,
similar reactions; and they have them because of what they are by
nature, i.e., because of whatever kind of animals they are.
c. --->Nature is a principle (arche) and a cause (aitia)
of being moved, or of rest, in (whatever 'in' means) the
thing to which it belongs primarily and in virtue of that thing,
but not accidentally.<---
--->Whatever has such a principle is said to have a
nature.<---
--->These things and whatever essentially (i.e. as part
of their being what they are) belongs to them are said to
exist "according to nature".<---
Example. When the bed fell out of the window, several
factors were likely to have been involved: someone or something
must have moved it to the window; perhaps the fall was planned;
the window had to be able to be opened or broken; etc. But let us
focus on the fall itself ("nature" was called "a" cause and
"a" principle, not "the" cause, etc.). The bed was
able to be moved because it was wooden, and not inextricably stuck
to the floor; it fell (it did not rise, or stay suspended in
mid-air) because it was (as wood) heavier than air and not
propelled upwards by anything. The fact that it fell, and the fact
that it broke into pieces on impact with the ground, were not due
to its being a bed, or to its having a certain color.
"Nature", here, was then a principle and cause of the movement
of the bed in so far as the bed was made of wood (or in general,
of something heavier than air). "Nature" then belongs
primarily to the wood, and is a cause and a principle (of the
fall and breakage) in virtue of that wood, not in virtue of
the fact that the fall involved a bed, nor in virtue of the fact
that the bed was blue, nor in virtue of the fact that the fall
occurred at 6:53 PM, etc. (The time of the fall, the exact color
of the wood, and the way the wood was arranged would in this case
be said to belong to the wood "accidentally", i.e. they are not
part of what wood has to have, or has to be, in order to be wood.)
In that there does seem to be a principle (source; arche)
that can move wood in virtue of the fact that the wood is wood,
wood is said to "have a nature". (It would not be right to
say that what we call "gravity" is the source, or the only source,
of wood's movement. First, "nature" as source would in the case of
wood include the source of wood's growth as well. Second, "nature"
would include whatever it is about wood that enables it to be
moved by gravity, growth, water, etc., cut by saws, and so on.)
Wood and everything that belongs to it in virtue of what it
is (a certain chemical structure, a certain range of biological
structures and functions, the fact that it is a solid and is
visible, etc.) are then said to exist "according to nature".
d. Nature is "said" (i.e., we use the term "nature") in at least
two ways or senses (193a30). In the first way or sense, it is said
to be the first underlying matter in things which have in
themselves a principle of motion or of change. In the
second, it is said to be the shape or form according to
formula.
1. "the first underlying matter...": 'Matter' (hule)
means the stuff out of which something is made or composed. In
this sense, if a thing can be moved or changed because of what it
is, then whatever the thing is fundamentally made of or composed
of will be called "nature" with respect to that thing, or will be
called the "nature" of the thing.
2. "the shape or form...": 'Shape' (morphe) means
shape, figure, configuration (usually visible). 'Form' (eidos)
means form, kind, look (as in "I got my hair cut. Do you like my
new look?"), appearance (visual or otherwise). 'According to
formula' (kata ton logon) means according to the complete
definition (or, total of defining characteristics) of a thing;
according to the "formula" or account of a thing that presents the
characteristics that the thing must have in order to be the thing
it is. In this sense, "we call 'nature' that which exists by
nature and is natural". How does this differ from the first sense?
--Consider that even today, we say that wood does not exist in the
form of planks "naturally"; what exists "by nature" and is
"natural", we say, is trees. Moreover, while it is true that a
seed, given water, light, and soil, may become a tree, we would
not say that a seed (or seed+light+water+soil) "is" a tree, or
that it "is by nature a tree", or even that it "has the same
nature" as a tree (at least not in this second sense). That which
is potentially flesh and bone (Aristotle's example), for example
the things we eat that nourish our flesh and bones - or even the
sperm and egg cells that have not united but will unite to begin
the generation of a flesh-and-bone animal, is not (now) "by
nature" flesh and bone. Hence that which is potentially flesh and
bone (that which is said to "become" flesh and bone, or which will
do so in future but has not yet done so) but does not actually now
have the form of flesh and bone, is said not to have now the
nature of flesh and bone. In this sense, then, we use the phrase
"the nature of X" to refer to what has acquired the form by which
we state what flesh or bone is.
Notes
on Aristotle's Physics Beta, part 1 by Rose
Cherubin is licensed under a Creative
Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
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