John Philoponus on Matter
Author : Frans A. J. de Haas
Publisher :
Page : 380 pages
File Size : 20,70 MB
Release : 1995
Category : Creation
ISBN :
Author : Frans A. J. de Haas
Publisher :
Page : 380 pages
File Size : 20,70 MB
Release : 1995
Category : Creation
ISBN :
Author : Frans A.J. de Haas
Publisher : BRILL
Page : 367 pages
File Size : 18,52 MB
Release : 2016-06-21
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9004320938
This study provides the first full discussion of Philoponus' excursus on matter in contra Proclum XI. 1-8 which sets out the innovative definition of prime matter as three-dimensional extension. The author argues that Philoponus' definition was motivated primarily by philosophical problems in Neoplatonism. Philoponus employs the explanation of growth, the interpretation of Aristotle's category theory and the notions of formlessness and potentiality to substantiate his definition. To conclude, the book offers an assessment of the significance of Philoponus' innovation. It is demonstrated for the first time that Plotinus' view of matter exerted considerable influence on both Philoponus and Simplicius. Moreover, the structure of Syrianus' and Proclus' metaphysics prepared the way for Philoponus' account of prime matter.
Author : Christian Wildberg
Publisher : Walter de Gruyter
Page : 300 pages
File Size : 26,3 MB
Release : 1988
Category : History
ISBN : 9783110104462
Author : Philoponus,
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
Page : 175 pages
File Size : 32,73 MB
Release : 2014-04-22
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 1472500253
In one of the most original books of late antiquity, Philoponus argues for the Christian view that matter can be created by God out of nothing. It needs no prior matter for its creation. At the same time, Philoponus transforms Aristotle's conception of prime matter as an incorporeal 'something - I know not what' that serves as the ultimate subject for receiving extension and qualities. On the contrary, says Philoponus, the ultimate subject is extension. It is three-dimensional extension with its exact dimensions and any qualities unspecified. Moreover, such extension is the defining characteristic of body. Hence, so far from being incorporeal, it is body, and as well as being prime matter, it is form - the form that constitutes body. This uses, but entirely disrupts, Aristotle's conceptual apparatus. Finally, in Aristotle's scheme of categories, this extension is not to be classified under the second category of quantity, but under the first category of substance as a substantial quantity. This volume contains an English translation of Philoponus' commentary, detailed notes and introduction, and a bibliography.
Author : John Philoponus
Publisher :
Page : 216 pages
File Size : 45,6 MB
Release : 1999
Category : Education
ISBN :
The first five chapters of Aristotle's De Generatione et Corruptione distinguish creation and destruction from mere qualitative change and from growth. But what inspires Philoponus most in his commentary on these chapters is the topic of organic growth. How does it take place without ingested matter getting into the same place as the growing body? And how is personal identity preserved, if our matter is always in flux, and our form depends on our matter? If we do not depend on the persistence of matter why are we not immortal? Analogous problems of identity arise also for inanimate beings. These topics of identity over time and the principles of causation are still matters of intense philosophical discussion.
Author : John Philoponus
Publisher :
Page : 240 pages
File Size : 30,55 MB
Release : 2006
Category : Philosophy
ISBN :
"This text by Philoponus rejects accounts of soul or, as we would say, of mind, that define it as being in motion or in cognitive or physical terms. Chapter 3 considers Aristotle's attack on the idea that the soul is in motion. This was an attack partly on his teacher, Plato, since Plato defines the soul as self-moving. Philoponus agrees with Aristotle's attack, but, probably following Ammonius, he takes Plato's apparently physicalist account of the soul in the Timeus as symbolic; Aristotle's criticism only concerns literalists. What we would call the mind-body relation is the subject of Chapter 4. In chapter 5, Philoponus endorses Aristotle's rejection of the idea that the soul is particles and of Empedocles's idea that the soul must be made of all four elements in order to know what is made of the same elements."--BOOK JACKET.
Author : Proclus
Publisher : Univ of California Press
Page : 204 pages
File Size : 45,18 MB
Release : 2001
Category : Literary Criticism
ISBN : 0520225546
The first Argument, which survives in Arabic, is also included and makes this the only complete edition of On the Eternity of the World since antiquity.".
Author : John Philoponus
Publisher : Bristol Classical Press
Page : 200 pages
File Size : 36,60 MB
Release : 2009-02-26
Category : Philosophy
ISBN :
Explores a range of questions about the basic structure of reality, the nature of prime matter, the principles of change, the relation between form and matter, and the issue of whether things can come into being out of nothing, and if so, in what sense that is true.
Author : C.J.F. Williams
Publisher : A&C Black
Page : 206 pages
File Size : 27,7 MB
Release : 2014-04-10
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 1780938683
The first five chapters of Aristotle's De Generatione et Corruptione distinguish creation and destruction from mere qualitative change and from growth. They include a fascinating debate about the atomists' analysis of creation and destruction as due to the rearrangement of indivisible atoms. Aristotle's rival belief in the infinite divisibility of matter is explained and defended against the atomists' powerful attack on infinite divisibility. But what inspired Philoponus most in his commentary is the topic of organic growth. How does it take place without ingested matter getting into the same place as the growing body? And how is personal identity preserved, if our matter is always in flux, and our form depends on our matter? If we do not depend on the persistence of matter why are we not immortal? Analogous problems of identity arise also for inanimate beings. Philoponus draws out a brief remark of Aristotle's to show that cause need not be like effect. For example, what makes something hard may be cold, not hard. This goes against a persistent philosophical prejudice, but Philoponus makes it plausible that Aristotle recognized this truth. These topics of identity over time and the principles of causation are still matters of intense discussion.
Author : John Philoponus
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
Page : 159 pages
File Size : 46,42 MB
Release : 2014-04-10
Category : Literary Criticism
ISBN : 1472558006
This is the first translation into English of the sixth-century philosopher Philoponus' commentary on Aristotle Physics, book four, chapters one to five.