Natural Hearing (Aristotle's Physics)
Lecture 36: Mind, Nature, and the Stability of Concepts

Transcript
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You know, I mean, that goes very far, but you've even seen that, right? You know, it's kind of amazing, huh? And do we go through the papers on confusing distinct from the moderns? Did I bring those in or not? Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But that one in here where he talks about the influence of this thinking here. That's what they thought was a quantity with substance in part, right? Yeah, we had a hard time putting man together once he divided him that way, huh? This one here, you know, where he's saying. Keeping in mind the intrinsic stability of the concepts of natural language, right? In the process. What about you before that? This is a passage I had before, the last lecture. Furthermore, one of the most important features of the development and analysis of modern physics is the experience that the concepts of natural language, vaguely defined as they are, seem to be more stable in the expansion of knowledge than the precise terms of scientific language. They're saying the vague is more stable and therefore more certain, right? Than the precise term. And then he goes on here later on. He says, Keeping in mind the intrinsic stability of the concepts of natural language in the process of scientific development, one sees that after the experience of modern physics, our attitude toward concepts like mind or the human soul or life or God will be different from the other 19th century because these concepts belong to the natural language and have therefore immediate conviction of reality. Since the general trend of human thinking in the 19th century had been towards an increasing confidence in the scientific method, right? And in precise rational terms, right? And I'd like to a general skepticism with regard to those concepts of natural language which do not fit into the closed frame of scientific thought. For instance, those of religion. Modern physics has in many ways increased the skepticism, but it has at the same time turned it against the overestimation of precise scientific concepts, against the true optimistic view of progress in general and finally against skepticism itself. The skepticism against precise scientific concepts does not mean that there should be a definite limitation for the application of rational thinking. On the contrary, one may say that the human ability to understand may be in a certain sense unlimited. First thing that, and exactly what I said, right? The mind is unlimited, huh? But the existing scientific concepts cover always only a very limited part of reality and the other part that has not yet been understood as infinite. Whenever we proceed from the known into the unknown, we may hope to understand, but we may have to learn at the same time a new meaning of the word understanding. We know that any understanding must be based by and upon the natural language. He sees that, you know, it's amazing. Because it's only there that we can be certain to touch reality. He sees the greatest answer to that. And hence we must be skeptical about any skepticism with regard to its natural language and its essential concepts. Therefore we may use these concepts as they have been used at all times. In this way, modern physics has perhaps opened the door to a wider outlook on the relation between the human mind and the reality. It's kind of amazing that he's that, I mean, like most of these great physicists, and not all of them, you know, I mean, none of them are believers as far as I know, you know. But he doesn't close the door the way, you know, some would. It's interesting to think in some ways. A lot of wonderful things in Heisenberg, you know. Louis de Broglie says that too, you know. Because sometimes you see it just in the fact that the precision of modern science is done by idealization, see, and that departs from reality. I mean, they all say that that happens, you know. Even Einstein, the way he sees that. That's how we're most unlimited. We're able to abstract our mind. Well, I mean, the best fundamental reason we're saying the mind's unlimited is that it knows the universal, right? In other words, you have to know the mind by its activity, right? And its activity by its object, right? And as you said, this thing is singular when sensed, but universal and understood. Ah, yeah. Yeah, if you ever study the soul, you know, after you do some of this work here in natural philosophy, in the eight books of natural theory, we go study some things in the soul, but the soul is known by its powers or abilities, right? And its powers or abilities are known by the acts, which they are an ability, and the acts are known by their, what, objects, right? So because we know the universal, right, then we know something of the unlimited ability of the mind, because universal covers an infinity of things. If I know what an odd number is, as I do, I know that no odd number is even. I'm in some sense knowing an infinity of things. And since I can go for the confusion and distinct, I can even start to know them distinctly, too, right? But in general, knowing an infinity of things. The senses don't, right? I mean, the eye doesn't know sound, and the ear doesn't know color, right? And it doesn't know the universal, so it doesn't have that universality. But then you see in man's always inventing something new, you know, an outward sign of the infinity of his mind. We see it in language. It can express any number of things. The object of the mind is knowledge? What? The object of the mind is knowledge? Well, the object of the mind is what it is. Activity by something, you know, mindful activity. Yeah, the basic idea of the mind is the what it is. Oh, okay. And for our mind, you know, it's the what it is of something you can sense or imagine, right? And then through that we kind of understand, you know, the material things by analogy and by negation. But in knowing what a man is, in some way you know all men past, present, future, right? Man is the son of all of them. Knowing what a number is, you know, in some sense, all numbers. Every number is composed of ones. One is no exception. It's not a number. See, you know, if you say number of two and three, it's univocal, right? If you say number of two and one, it's what? Equivocal. But it's equivocal by reason, huh? But Euclid, you know, when he defines number, he defines it as a multitude composed of ones, right? So one is not a number in the first definition of it, right? But, see, but if you call one a number, it would be pretty equivocal because you can see there'll be a likeness, at least of, what, analogy, right? Because one is to two, let's say, is three is to six, right? So one can have to a number the same ratio the number has to a number. And that's why there's reason to call one a number, not purely equivocally, right? Why you wouldn't call point a line that would be purely equivocal. Because a point can't have to a line the ratio the line has to a line, can it? Because a point has no length at all. But the one can have to a number the ratio the number has to a number. So it's more like a number, right? And there are theorems in Euclid which depend upon using number in that equivocal by reason sense. You notice that? I'm thinking the theorem that says that numbers prime to one another are the least of all numbers, they have the same ratio. Famous theorem. Oh, there would have to be one. Yeah, there you have to consider one to be a number, right? Because, you know, if you have the ratio of, let's say, 3 to 6, 2 to 4 has that and so on, but they don't measure those, do they? If you go back to 1 to 2, you can measure them all by 1 to 2, huh? That's another theory, right? That these numbers in the same ratio measure all the rest, the first to the first, and the second to the second, right? I mean, you know, if you take 2 and 3, in that ratio, they're the least, right? There's no one's least in that, right? And you know, if you have a ratio of 4 to 6, or 8 to 12, or 10 to 15, you can measure the first by 2, and the second by 3, right? But if you took this ratio here, 2 to 4, 2 to 4 would be the least numbers in this first sense of number, right? They didn't have that ratio, but they wouldn't measure them, right? So you've got to go all the way down here, right? So they're using the word number equivocally to be set of 1 as well as a multitude. But it's not purely equivocally, sir. And you can show that because, in two ways, you can show it because we define number by 1, right? The multitude composed of 1s are units. So 1 is in the definition numbers, it's got the expression right there. And secondly, you can have the ratio to a number, the number adds to a number, right? Yeah. But there wouldn't be any reason to call point a line, unless one of these crazy modern mathematicians are on, maybe. But a point, what, is a line is not composed of points. And a point cannot have to a line the ratio that a line has to a line, right? But a number is composed of 1s, right? And a 1 can have to a number, the ratio that a number adds to a number, right? So there's two connections there, right? So it's not pretty equivocally we call 1 a number. You can take 1 away from a number, sir. You can take a number away from a number, right? So I can subtract 2 from 6 and get 4. I can subtract 1 from 6, right? You know, so it's... In many ways, 1 is like a number. But it's not a number in the same sense as 2, 3. It's not a multitude composed of 1s. Following up on my questions from last week, I'm just trying to figure out, like, on... I'm really trying to learn a lot about nature, you know, properties, how we can tell what a nature is by the effects. Yeah. Now, we talked about a lot of them come under quality. They all go back to quality just for different divisions. You've had equality, ability, inability... Yeah. Okay. What else would these fall under? What other... Well, if you go back to the definition of nature, right, you see that the key thing in the definition of nature is motion. And Aristotle will say in the beginning of the third book, when he's going to start to investigate the definition of motion, right, he says nature is defined by motion, so if motion were unknown, then nature would be unknown, right? Yeah. Nature is the beginning and cause of motion and of rest, right? And then, which it is, first decision of happening. So, in the eight books of natural hearing there, where he's studying nature in general, right, he's going to reason out later on in book six that what moves is a body. And so, when Thomas talks about the subject of natural philosophy, he'll say, ends mobile, or mobile thing, right? Not body. Because you show that the mobile is a body. So it's my property, huh? And then when he begins the next book on the universe, he starts off by saying, well, natural philosophy is about bodies and so on, right? But that's because you showed that in the sixth book of natural hearing, right? Okay. But then I say later on, when you're studying things in particular, you study them by the way they, what, change, right? What they do, right? I mean, a tree is different from a stone at first because the tree is observed to grow, right? Mm-hmm. And the stone doesn't grow, right? Mm-hmm. And the tree absorbs things too, right? Reproduces itself, right? The stone starts to reproduce itself, and those stones have their little kinnos right around here, a little kinnos right around here, a little kinnos like. Uh-huh. So does motion fall under one of the ten highest? Kinnos? No, Aristotle takes up motion there in the categories after the ten, right? Because it's found in more than one now. Okay. There's change of place, which is found in the category of where. Okay. There's change of quality, which is found in the third species of quality. Change of? Quality. Third species of quality is? Yeah, sensible qualities. Sensible. And then there's change of quantity in the sense of growth, and then there's change of substance too, but the Greeks before Aristotle didn't say that was possible. See, when you get to the 13th reading there, and Aristotle will start to talk about the first matter, right? But the Greeks before thought of the first matter as some actual substance, so therefore matter is an actual substance in all forms would just be accidents, right? What about the matter? They can't understand substantial change, and they can't understand substantial form with the soul, right? Why do you limit changing alteration to change in sensible quality? Change of shape, change of habit? Ability, would that fall into nature too? Ability and ability? Well, changing habits would be something a little different, you know. That's really a question now for book five, okay. What about like nobility? That seems to be part of what we can read and what we can have for. It's going to go slowly here. Why is he being slow, okay? Visionaries of Christ, right? So, just think about it. If you ask me again this year, I was torn with the idea of, you know, Fire Lawrence on stumbling. That would be kind of a kitschy title, isn't it? Uh-huh. You see? And there's two statements that he has about stumbling, huh? Mm-hmm. In the Roman Giulietta. And one is this, wisely and slow, they stumble, they run fast. You hold up to that. And the other one is, and the other one is, and the other one is, and the other one is, and the other one is, and the other one is, and the other one is, and the other one is, and the other one is, and the other one is, and the other one is, Not so vile that on the earth doth live, but to the earth some special good doth give. There are aught so good, but strayed from that fair use. Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse. Buddha's extremely found, you know. And the particular phrase here that's important in this segment. Revolts from true birth, from true nature, right? Stumbling on abuse, huh? See, life can develop there, right? Is that where you gave the example where an alcoholic isn't true to himself? Well, it's indeed. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Is that foul on this? Yeah, yeah. By natural deeds, to read on natural troubles, as he says, in Macbeth. See, Shakespeare, you know, when he's talking about what the play should be, right? You know, I think Kittredge is correct when he says, you know, that it's always been understood that Shakespeare was stating his own opinion about what the play should be in the advice that Hamlet gives to the players, right? And it's really fits my experience in the play very much. But he says, Let's give Shakespeare the benefit of the doubt. If he knows enough to look before an actor, right? He's perfectly ordered those things, right? To show, to hold a mirror up to nature. That's first, right? Show virtue of her own face. Scorn her own image, huh? Now, scorn, there is a metonym for what? Pride. You see, because scorn is the effect of pride. Shakespeare's always pointing that out. You know, pride and scorn. You know, contempt for others is the effect of pride. And pride is the, what? Queen of all the vices. So to avoid the sounding pandemic, or, you know, to be teaching you explicitly, you know, to show virtue of her own face and scorn her image, to show virtue of vice, is what he's saying there, right? Okay? And the very age and body, the time, the form, and pressure. Now, the reason why it's perfectly ordered is that nature is the measure of virtue and vice, huh? Because the virtue is a habit in accordance with nature, right? And the vice is not in accordance with your nature, huh? And then the age, really, you know, the score for an age, right? You judge an age, you characterize an age, by the virtues or, what, vices that predominate in that age, you know? You see? So you judge whether something is a virtue or a vice, or an action is virtuous or vicious, by nature. And you judge the age as, you know, better or worse, by the virtues or vices that are predominant in that age, huh? So it's perfectly, you see? And now it's reflected in this thing, because Shakespeare knows it. The word nature comes from birth, huh? So he says, revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse, right? You know, to abuse something is to use it against its what? Nature, right, huh? The best way to judge an age is by the virtues or vice. You predominate in it, yeah. But to judge the difference, you need virtue of vice by nature. Like you see in the exhortation to use reason there, the chief Buddha man, who's very in your purpose, is tied to what he is. And his chief Buddha were not, were but to sleep and feed, for example, no more than a beast, right? Or as I say, you know, what is a beast if his chief Buddha is to grow? A plant no more. So, you see, there's a foundation in nature, right, for what's good or for what's bad. How do you, what's the best way to convince someone that the end is better than the means to logic? Well, you first show it by induction, right? Induction is an argument from many particulars, right, to the general. So you say, which is better, to take medicine or be healthy? Which is better, to study or to know? And if you could be healthy without taking medicine, you wouldn't even bother with medicine, would you? To study or to know. If you could know without studying, you wouldn't bother to study, right? My son Marcus, he's little sister, how can't we be born knowing everything, you know? I said, you ought to be born angel. That's what angel is. See? What is better, a house or making a house? Those are pretty clear. Yeah, so you could go through many examples to show that the end is better, right? Which is better to have money or to make money, you know? See? Well, if you're working for the sake of making money, and that's all you're working with is making money, and then you don't enjoy what you're doing. You know? The money's obviously better, right? Okay? Now, you can show this by syllogism, too, right? And there you start from the something more general, right? And you start from the famous proposition that is usually stated by Aristotle and Thomas with the brevity of wisdom, right? That on account of which more so. That on account of which more so. Yeah. But I usually expand it instead a little more fully for the students to understand it, right? And I say, When the same belongs to two things. When the same belongs to... Yeah. But to one of them, because of the other, right? I usually find three lines. When the same belongs to two things. But to one of them belongs more to the... When the same belongs to two things, but to one of them, because of the other, it belongs more to the God. So... Now, I usually illustrate this as a very simple example to begin with, right? I say, If hot is set of the fire and the air around the fire, but the air around the fire is hot because of the fire, which is hotter. Yeah. Mr. Pencil? No, no, I got that. I mean, the air around... I say, If hot is set of the fire and the air around the fire. Yeah. But the fire, the air around the fire is hot because of the fire. Then the fire is going to be hotter, huh? Okay? Or sweet is set of sugar and my coffee. But it's set of my coffee because of sugar, which is sweeter. And if wet is set of what? Water and the dishcloth. But the dishcloth is because of the water, which is wetter. Is wet? Or salty is set of salt and French fries. But the French fries because of the salt. And if it's wet, And if it's wet, And if it's wet, And if it's wet, which is saltier, right? Okay? Now, you guys see the reason for that, though, right? Yes. Okay. Now, this is very important applications in philosophy, and the important one in logic, for example, is that if known instead of the premises and of the conclusion of the syllogism or argument, but the conclusion is known because of the premises, right? Which is more known? The premises. Yeah. And you can add that, you know, if the premises were not more known than the conclusion, you wouldn't prove the conclusion to them, right? Yeah. Okay? Okay. And if you're standing on the edge of the cliff there, right, and I come with a pole, and I put the pole against your back, and then shouts, and I'll give it down to your dead. Who pushed you off the cliff? Me or the pole? Yeah, because you're the cause. No? Well, I didn't touch it. You're the cause. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because the pole moved you insofar as it was, what? Moved by me. Moved by me, right? You see? You're the cause. You're the cause of the pole. And since the pole as well as me pushed you off, it pushed you off because of me, right? So I'm really more responsible than the pole, right? Right. You should punish me rather than bring the pole or something. You see? Right? That's it. Well, now, we apply it to the good, huh? You see? It's good or desirable is what good means. Define it by desire. It's desirable is said of the end and of the means, right? But the means are desirable for the sake of the end, right? Then which is more desirable? The end, yeah. So it's just, you're applying this principle here, right? Good or desirable is said of the end and the means, like, say, health and medicine. But it's said of medicine because of health, right? Then health is more desirable than medicine. So I show it by induction first, because that is more easier, more proportionate to us than everybody, right? And then I show it by soldiers from this here. Ah, yeah. That's a bit clear. That's pretty clear, right? Yeah. And then I apply it to the disagreement between Socrates and the Williams, right? And I argue that the outside goods are for the sake of the inside goods. And then I show that by induction. Outside goods. Yeah. I show that by induction, like I was showing you a little while ago. And then the end is better. So those two, I solidize that the inside goods are better. Now, if you do enough to know that Matt has been saying the forms, you'll find out that it's wrong in philosophy of nature. And the body, therefore, is for the sake of the soul, right? Then you get syllogized. Oh, man. Yeah. But usually what I do at that point, I don't know how much about the soul or the body, but I've already reasoned out the end of man, right? That's the act with reason done well throughout life, right? The first book thing about ethics. So the goods of the soul would be the same as the goods that involve reason, right? They're obviously closer to the end, therefore they must be better. In fact, you almost seem to enter into the definition of the end, but you say it's the act with reason by virtue, right? And the virtues are the goods of the soul, so. And then we, if a man admits that God is better than man, right? Which is only probable. You know? Then the godlike goods are better than the really good, right? So as Shakespeare said, nobody thinks the body is more godlike than the soul. And reason itself is godlike as they've seen in the introduction, the legitation, right? Or then we reason that man is better than the beast, but the goods of the body are the ones we share with the beast, right? The goods of the soul are the ones that are proper to us, so. There's never a way to argue to it. But you know, there's some of his precedency, but okay, he'd probably admit that God is better than us, right? But if you ask, why is God better than other things, right? One way to say, well, he's because he's the end of the universe. That's why. The end is better, right? That's only one way of reasoning, you know? I mean, it's one reason of the statement that the end is better. Well, he's the end of the universe, so. He's better than everything else. But you can also reason from the whole big bad depart, huh? That God is universally perfect, huh? Mm-hmm. Because his perfection is not limited to any genius. Oh. Aristotle, if we study the fifth book of wisdom, Aristotle distinguishes the sense in which God is perfect from the sense in which he's going to be perfect. And then in the twelfth book, he demonstrates that God is perfect in that way, huh? Mm-hmm. Perfect. The creature is perfect in that, and other things are perfect when they lack nothing of their kind, right? But God's lacking nothing, you know? I mean, you can fetch it any means. Mm-hmm. So I think understanding what is better in general, the two most general propositions are, the end is better than the means, and the whole is better than the, what? Park, right? Okay. But when you study it, you can say it more generally if you wanted to, that the perfect is better than the imperfect, right? When you study what perfect means, you'll see that the meanings are tied into, what? Whole and to the end. But in a way, when you say that the whole is better than the park, you say that the park is for the sake of the whole, so you can be too sad in a way to the end business, right? So usually the proposition I emphasize is that the end is better than what is for the sake of the end. I'm studying the theory, a general theory of relativity, when Father Anthony's bringing me to this, and, you know, space and time, when a relative, they slow down, and you get closer to an object, and space becomes a current. Now does that mean, like, a ruler becomes, what would happen to a ruler or something as it got closer to the sun? Would it actually bend, or? We don't know that. So? Maybe so. In space, I thought space was something, had to be a material concept. They said there were a few people in the world who understand relativity theory, and Einstein is not one of them. I remember the time when MacArthur was at West Point, you know, and the relativity theory had come out, and the professor had us talking about one day, did I tell you about that story? Yeah, but I forget. Yeah. The professor, you know, came into class, and he says, does MacArthur, and MacArthur was, like, the best student, right? He said, do you understand this theory? And MacArthur says, no, I do not, sir. And the professor says, neither do I. Class dismissed. These military professors are more manly than the rest of us. I was going to bring in that obituary there for Manjeev Dulac, you know? Henri Dulac, yeah. But they were quoting Father Stromberg, you know, who knew him and taught with him, and so on. Dulac was not afraid to admit if he didn't understand something, you know, he'd say, I don't understand this, you know? It's a good sign, you know, just don't, you know, the professor pretends to understand more than he does, you know? Yeah. Something about some boys keller, he's the student, you know? but, you know,