1 of 1- mashsha'i
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Prime matter
What are your thoughts about the follwoing argument for the existence of prime matter?
First, posit the following premises:
1. Change presupposes potentiality.
2. Potency is an accident.
3. Potency is necessarily for (some) actual existence. That is, it is for some act, some perfection, either substantial or accidental, belonging to the subject that has the potency.
4. Substantial change is the coming into existence of one thing from another.
Now, the argument:
Take any given determinate kind of thing, call it A. If, in (4) substantial change, A becomes B, then, by (1), A had the potentiality for B. This potency, given (2), inheres in some subject, this being either:
(a) A itself,
(b) B,
(c) the agent C, which actualizes the potency, or
(d) something else, x.
Not (a); otherwise, A would have the potency for its own nonexistence. This contradicts (3). Not (b); for B does not yet exist; as such, it cannot ground the potency for itself. Not (c); for A is the terminus a quo of the change, not C. That is, A is what changes, not C. Therefore, (d); now, this something else, x, is itself either:
(d.1) some determinate kind x’, or
(d.2) something indeterminate.
Not (d.1); otherwise, the problem in (a) would recur, and (3) would consequently be contradicted again. Therefore, (d.2) is left over. And because A is what undergoes the change, this indeterminate something has to be some element of A. Qua such, call it prime matter. Therefore, etc.
Last edited by mashsha'i (7/16/2015 7:08 pm)
'What is, is as it ought to be; and what ought not to be, is not.' - Tusi (d. 1274)
- Scott
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Re: Prime matter
I think the basic idea is sound but there's a problem in your premise (4), or at least in your hypothetical proposition that in a substantial change, A becomes B. There's also a related problem in your conclusion.
First things first. As Timocrates in particular likes to emphasize (correctly and pertinently, in my view), in substantial change, A doesn't "become" B. When e.g. a cat dies and its body decays into soil that is then incorporated into a sunflower (and let's say for the sake of the example that the cat's entire body ends up in the same sunflower), it's not a cat that becomes a sunflower; it's the matter of the cat (i.e. the matter that used to be virtually present in the cat) that loses one form and receives another.
And that in turn brings out the problem with your conclusion. Even if we rewrite your argument a bit in order to make it a demonstration that the change (of form) must take place in the matter of the cat, you still won't have shown that this matter is prime matter (i.e. pure potency). You'll have shown what no one in his right mind denies anyway: that a cat's body is made out of stuff.
Again, though, the basic idea is sound. You're arguing in effect that when A appears to "become" B, the potency to take on the form of B resides in the matter, not the form, of the cat. Throw in an argument that any infinite regress here must be vicious, and you're done; in that case the regress has to "bottom out" in pure potency -- a.k.a. prime matter.
Last edited by Scott (7/16/2015 7:53 pm)
- Flaccus
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Re: Prime matter
Please, forgive my amateur quesitons.
Is there a consequence here in affirming d.2 that material prima is itself indivisible and infinite? If this is the case, how do we then say that an indivisibly infinite thing is an element of A; how is it that an infinite thing can be an element of a finite thing?
- Flaccus
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Re: Prime matter
Thank you, Alexander! It seemed to me that d.2 had meant indeterminate as regards quantity. Are there examples of other things that are determinate in quantity but not in the other predicables or is this what makes prime matter unique?
- mashsha'i
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Re: Prime matter
Scott,
"I think the basic idea is sound but there's a problem in your premise (4), or at least in your hypothetical proposition that in a substantial change, A becomes B. There's also a related problem in your conclusion." - i’d, more accurately, restate (4) as ‘B comes to be from A’ - that is, one thing comes to be from another.
"[…] it's not a cat that becomes a sunflower; it's the matter of the cat (i.e. the matter that used to be virtually present in the cat) that loses one form and receives another." - right. but this is the conclusion sought, so the argument is meant to establish it. that is, that there’s some (material) element in the cat that serves as the bearer of the potency for B.
"And that in turn brings out the problem with your conclusion. Even if we rewrite your argument a bit in order to make it a demonstration that the change (of form) must take place in the matter of the cat, you still won't have shown that this matter is prime matter (i.e. pure potency). You'll have shown what no one in his right mind denies anyway: that a cat's body is made out of stuff." - hmm, i inclined to reject this. i mean, the stuff the cat is made out of is the subject in which the potency for B inheres. The rest of the argument i take to show that this stuff can’t itself be any determinate kind of stuff; otherwise, like i said, we’d have the same problem, i.e., (3) would be contradicted.
"[…] the potency to take on the form of B resides in the matter, not the form, of the cat. Throw in an argument that any infinite regress here must be vicious, and you're done; in that case the regress has to "bottom out" in pure potency -- a.k.a. prime matter." - don't you think, though, we can eschew the infinitum actu non datur premise for the reason stated above?
Last edited by mashsha'i (7/21/2015 4:04 pm)
'What is, is as it ought to be; and what ought not to be, is not.' - Tusi (d. 1274)
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Thread Starter- mashsha'i
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Re: Prime matter
Alexander wrote:
Okay, let me play Devil's Advocate here: why can't you root this kind of change in some "bottom level" of particles? Why can't you ultimately say that the particles (or whatever turns out to be the most basic physical thing) simply change position, rather than that some mysterious "prime matter" takes on a new form?
well, because there's no most basic(=indivisible) physical kind of thing. cf., Aristotle, On Generation and Corruption, I.2, with D. Sedley's analysis in Aristotle's On Generation and Corruption I, ed. by F. de Haas and J. Manfield (Oxford, 2004), 65-90.
'What is, is as it ought to be; and what ought not to be, is not.' - Tusi (d. 1274)
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