research

On the omniscience of Aristotle\u2019s unmoved mover: a note on Metaphysics \u39b 4, 1070 b 34-35

Abstract

This paper focuses on the final passage of Metaphysics \u39b 4, which contains the first explicit mention of the unmoved mover in book \u39b. The sentence is crucial for the problem of what, if anything, the Aristotelian god knows about the world. The author starts with a general enumeration of the main interpretations of the problem of the omniscience of god, which either admit a divine activity upon the world (Alexander of Aphrodisias, Thomas Aquinas), or that, by thinking himself, god thinks everything (Thomas Aquinas) or that, in knowing himself, he knows beings (Averro\uebs), or, finally, state that god knows only himself (Schwegler, Bonitz, Zeller, Ross and many others). In this section the importance of Metaphysics \u39b 9 has been stressed, which constitutes the only complete text on the topic which has come down to us, and where Aristotle, as it is well known, denies that god has knowledge of the world. \u39b 9 is, therefore, an essential and necessary reference for any other passage which contains a mention of the matter in question. In the following section, the paper analyzes the context in which the final passage of \u39b 4 is inserted. The attempt is to show that the reference to the unmoved movers in \u39b 4 is not introduced abruptly, but rather that it fits perfectly in the discussion of the chapter. The third section contains the analysis of the passage. In particular, the suggestion proposed by R. George is considered, who, after having recalled F. Brentano\u2019s position, asserts that the sentence would imply that the first of all things contains within itself the formal principle of what it brings forth, and that, since the first mover moves all things, it actually is all things. This paper aims to show that the first cause of all things, whose mention follows the enumeration of the four causes \u2013 matter, form and privation as 2 immanent elements, and the moving cause of natural substance as external principle \u2013, is not within the coincidence of formal and moving cause. Therefore the case of the proximate moving cause (for example the builder), which knows its effect (for example the form of the house), appears as different from the case of the first remote moving cause which moves all things, which does not seem to have knowledge of the world. This paper suggests that the coincidence between the formal and the moving cause may only work for natural substances and, therefore, for the moving cause in the weaker sense, while it does not apply to the remote moving cause. In this perspective the fact that the Aristotelian god cannot be a formal cause plays a fundamental role, being an external and separated principle. Consequently, the role of the mention of the unmoved mover in the final passage of \u39b 4 does not appear as a reference which is completely detached from the rest of the text, but it seems to perfectly fit in it and indeed appears to play a central role in the entire chapter

    Similar works