Natural Hearing (Aristotle's Physics)
Lecture 76: God's Immutability and the Order of Divine Attributes

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the Summa Contra Gentiles, because the first thing he does is to show that God is, what, unchanging, right? Okay. Now, part of the reason, I think, why the order is different there is if you look at the Summa Contra Gentiles, you'll see that the argument for motion for the existence of God, the argument for the unmoved mover, is much more, what, developed, right? In both Summas, there's five arguments of the existence of God, and in the Summa Theologiae, the first one is from motion, the second one is the one for the efficient cause, right? But in the Summa Contra Gentiles, the first and the second argument are both from motion, okay? He has two separate arguments from motion to the unmoved mover. Plus, when he's showing one of the premises, right, in the Summa Theologiae, he has one middle term, right? Summa Contra Gentiles, three different middle terms, right? He syllogizes in both, you know, from the definition of motion, but he also syllogizes on things we learn in the sixth book, which are motion depending upon a mover, right? In the Summa Contra Gentiles. So, it's much more fully developed, the argument for the unmoved mover, right? In the Summa Contra Gentiles, then the Summa Theologiae, it's much more developed, see? And therefore, it's kind of natural to go from the proof of existence of God to the attributes of God to take up first God being, what? Unchanging, right? And it's almost, you know, Thomas is very quick with that in the Summa Contra Gentiles, because it's been so thoroughly taken up the arguments of the unmoved mover, right? So he almost goes, you know, starts almost with God being unchanging, almost taking for granted and going to his being eternal and so on, right? Okay. And then he, so the order is different there, right? I think, you know, if he studied Euclid, he might find something like that in Euclid, right? It might be possible, right? Convertible. No, convertible, but it might be possible that, you know, theorem A, let's say, is used to prove theorem B, and then B is used to prove something else, right? But it might be possible to prove B by something other than A, right? And then use B to prove A, right? Okay? Okay? Or if you use B to prove C, let's say, and C could be proven by X as well as by B, right? Or if you prove C by X, and it's convertible, as you're saying, right? You know? Yeah, no? Thank you. Now, in Frisch's theorems in Euclid is, you know, the first grand convertible theorems, and, you know, the fifth and sixth theorems, right, in the first book. Now, the fifth one is that if you have two triangles, if your triangle and the two sides equal, it's going to prove that these, what, angles equal, right? And then the next theorem, the sixth one, is, in a way, diverse. If these two angles are equal, then he's going to prove that those two sides are equal, right? Okay? Now, could you prove this from this, or what? Don't be making the question. These theorems, in a way, are what? Convertible. Convertible, yeah. And one thing about it is showing that, that the reverse is true, right? What my brother Mark used to say, if I've heard him say this, it kind of shows that this thing is, what, a property in a certain sense, right? That belongs to the sausage triangle, the way we define the system, right? In fact, you can turn it around, right? Okay? Let me give you an example of what I mean here. Um, doesn't he turn around the, the, uh, 47, 48, turns around the, uh, the agreement here? And if you're given the reverse, right? If the square on this side of the triangle is equal to the squares on those sides, that therefore the angle here is going to be what? A right angle? Okay? In fact, you can turn that around. That's a convertible means of logic. Every A is B, and every B is A, right? Okay? Well, property, strict sense is of that sort, right? Like every 2 is half a 4, and every half a 4 is 2, right? Well, if I said that 2 is, is less than 10, but not everything less than 10 is 2, right? That would be a property in the strict sense, right? Okay? So the fact that it's convertible is a sign of that, right? Okay? When the case of these things are convertible, sometimes, I guess, here they're shown separately, aren't they, huh? Here, isn't this shown from the other one? From a right thing? I can't remember. I think he takes the back of this and then constructs the right angle. Yeah. Doesn't reduce. But, you know, if you could prove one from the other, right? Okay, okay, but in fact you could prove one from the other, right? You could prove the other one by it. But if you could find another way of proving the other one, you know, then you could reverse it and go the other way around, right? So do you think that's what he's doing here? Well, you know, I want to speak more knowing than I know, but it seems to me that one does in fact reason more, right, from the impossibility, right, of making the continuous out of indivisibles, right, to the continuous being divisible forever, than the reverse, right? But that the continuous is divisible forever, at least it's something probable, right? Okay, one can reason, right, therefore in the reverse direction, because he's reasoning from the probable, like the way Thomas solves that problem in there, right? Or, like I was saying, when you get to the third reading here, and we see him reasoning from the fact that one body is faster than another body and one body is slower, right? He reasons from that to both the distance and the time being divisible forever. So he has a reason, you know, that can be given, but he hasn't given it yet, why the continuous is divisible forever, or that the continuous is divisible forever, and therefore he to some extent knows that, right, independently of the fact that it's not composed of indivisibles. So he can reason, you know, to know the latter, right? Is it? Okay. Um, okay. And, um, I had to think about it more, but I think the way that I say you reason more from, right, perhaps gives you more why it is so, right, you know, than the other, right? Right. And this argument that from the faster and the slower shows that they must be divisible forever. But I don't know if it explains as fully why they must be divisible forever, right? Well, you see the impossibility of putting together the continuous from the indivisible, right? Then you see that it must always be divisible and divisible things, right? You see, you can't put it together from nothing. You can't put it together from the indivisible, right? Therefore, it must be put together from divisibles, right? You're kind of seeing, you know, more, it seems to be more why, just so, right? Okay. And in that case, when you're seeing more why, you're arguing actually from the division in logic to proving this division in natural philosophy. Is that right? Well, I don't know that. You're reasoning from what the indivisible is, right? What the point is, right? You see that the point has no parts, right? And you see that the point has no edge or limit, right? And therefore, you see the impossibility of composing the continuous out of it, right? Okay. You see also the impossibility of its being continuous in the first definition from that same thing, right? How can that which has no limit have a common limit? How can two points share the same end, the same limit, the same boundary, but they don't have any limit or boundary, right? The two semicircles can share the same limit, right? The diameter. Two parts of the straight line can share the same limit, which is that point, right? Which is the end of the left part and the beginning of the right part of the line. Well, that limit has to be something other than that of which it is a limit, the axiom we're talking about, right? It's kind of interesting to see when I write back the axioms here, right? It's just like in that sixth theorem in Euclide, the way back to the whole is more than the part, right? It resolves the way back to the axioms. So from those things, you're seeing both that can't be put together, right? But in that first definition, right? Because both the definition of the continuous and the definition of the contiguous, the touching there, implies that the things that continues are touching, that they have, what? There's something different than their limit, right? And their limit is either one or their limit is together, right? Their limits are together, right? But to have a common limit or to have your limits together, right? Presuppose that you have a limit, right? And that limit is something other than yourself, right? And a point can't have a limit other than itself. It can't have a limit at all. It's a limit that has no limit. You know, and if you're taught the CCD and that sort of stuff, you know, it's kind of a common thing. You always have some kid in class, you know, well, who made me? God made me. And they always say, well, who made God, right? Well, nobody made God, right? But everything has a cause, right? Everything, you know. Have you ever had an experience teaching CCD or something like that? They always say that, right? And, but notice, you could show in all honesty that that's not even true about the limit, right? Everything has a limit, right? No. See? The point has no limit. It must go on forever. No. See? But notice, if every limit had a limit, then what? The infinity of limits still limit anything, right? Now, I was struck by it, you know, I was going over the Aristotelian arguments there against the Anaxagoras, you remember those? And sometimes I divide them, you know, into groups, and I put the 8th and the 5th and the 1st argument together because they have in common that they're based on the principle of fewness or simplicity, right? Okay? And, you know, one's a comparative argument with Empedocles, that Empedocles explains the same thing with six principles, and it takes Anaxagoras and infinity principles to explain the same thing. You see? And then he explains how the principle of Anaxagoras is really complicated because if everything is inside of everything, there's only small pieces, inside each one of those pieces of everything is infinite of everything else, inside each one of those, and so on forever. You can hardly be more complicated, right? You know? And, you know, Einstein himself, you know, says, you know, this is the underlying principle of all natural science from the Greeks all the way through my work and beyond, right? And, you know, if you read, you know, Sergeant Newton, after whom the whole physics, you know, is referred to in the 17th, 18th, 19th century, the 20th century physicists call that Newtonian physics, right? He's a model, right? But that's rule number one, you know, if you look at the rules that he gives in there, rule number one of all his thinking, that's it. Rule number two is another variation of that. Rule number three, you know, that's it. That's the fundamental rules. And yet, you know, well, they're terribly afraid, you know, that there might turn out to be an unmoved mover, right? Or there might be an uncaused, right? Cause, a cause that has no cause, right? See? But notice, the alternative to that, apart from the proof that there is an uncaused cause, right? The alternative to that position that there's a cause that has no cause, right? Is that every cause has a cause, right? Once you say every cause has a cause, every mover has a mover, right? Then you're automatically positing, what? An infinity of causes to explain anything, right? Which, on the very surface of it, seems to be, what? Contrary to the principle of simplicity, huh? Now, Max Born, he's a great physicist there, got the Nobel Prize, you know? He's the man who explained the, what? What the way really means? He solved the problem. But he's a man who stands at the center of modern physics because he worked with Einstein in Berlin, right? And they remain, you know, lifelong friends. And you can buy the correspondence, you know, of Born and Einstein, you know? Cause Born, you know, sided with Heisenberg and Niels Bohr, right? And the Copenhagen interpretation and Einstein to the other side. So he stands at the center, but he was very much associated with, what? Heisenberg and Bohr, right? The development of quantum theory. And, in fact, he's the guy who told Heisenberg that Heisenberg was trying to put his theory into mathematical form and he was coping, you know, for the kind of mathematics that had already been developed and gotten generite and Bohr and told him about that, right? You know, this reminds me of this kind of strange math they have over here. And sure enough, that was exactly the thing to use, right? This matrix, matrix and stuff, you know? And so he's a guy who stands at the center of quantum physics. I mean, he's a great physicist himself, but he knew and worked with all the other great ones, huh? He has some very interesting things to say, huh? But in that book, The Restless Universe, right? He has the statement, he says, the genuine physicist believes obstinately in the unity and simplicity of nature despite any appearance of the contrary. You know? And, but the context where he makes this was in his discussion of the 19th century when they had kind of perfected the periodic table of the elements, right? And you had about, what? I guess originally 92 elements and then, you know, gradually crept up to about 100, you know? But, you know, that just seemed too many. 92? 92 basic kinds of matter, right? That many? You know? It's too many. That's because the genuine physicist believes obstinately in simplicity of the unity of nature. And so they figured there must be some more unity behind that, right? And the clue was that the hydrogen atom, which was the lowest, right? The other one seemed to be almost numerical multiples of the hydrogen atom. Oh, see? It must be, you know, you know, yes, there must be something, you know, that's being repeated here, right? That's simpler, right? Than 92. Fewer in number than 92, right? There must be something, right? There must be something, right? There must be something, right? There must be something, right? Okay. I say if 92 seems too many, obviously the infinity seems too many, right? You know? But our mind, in a sense, naturally inclines that way, right? You know, I always give the two great hypotheses about day and night. One is that the Earth turns on its axis, and the other is that the sun goes around the Earth, right? But both of those two famous hypotheses, right, they both assume that there's just one sun, right? Why doesn't somebody propose that there are 365 suns every year? That would explain 365 days and nights, right? But if you can expand with just one, why have 365? Thousands and thousands as the years go by, right? See, our mind is naturally inclined. You know, if one sun can explain it, why use more than one, right? And these are two possible ways of explaining day and night by one sun, huh? The two alternative ones, right? Without saying which one is correct or which one I think is correct. I point to the fact that despite all the disagreements, so what is the cause of day and night, they agree on using just one sun. One Earth? You know? It's supposed to be like, you know, the sun is, you know, it's a cliche or it's extinguished, you know? It has to be shot across the sky, you know, the fire is extinguished down there. Of course, if the sun was ordinary fire, you'd have to have a new one every day, right? Because it would be quite burnt out, but it's got to cross the sky, yeah? Our style was right in thinking, you know, the sun is not ordinary fire anyway, right? What else did we know about besides ordinary fire? So likewise, if every limit had a limit, right, you'd have any incentive limits to limit anything. A genuine physicist. You know? A real article. You know? The mind just kind of naturally rejects that. It's kind of amazing that the moderns want to, you know, they're so afraid of what God might possibly be. I heard about the fight soccer, you know? Fight soccer was the student of Heisenberg, right? There's a very interesting thing on infinity there, huh? That the belief in the infinity of the universe in modern times started in the Renaissance, right? And Aristotle and, you know, the medieval scholastic solving him and so on, thought the universe was finite, right? And then the Renaissance, they went back to the idea, you know, of the early guys, that the universe was infinite in the extent, right? Well, then in the 20th century, when Einstein, you know, invented the theory of general theory of relativity, and he started to study the cosmos, you know? Then they were amazed that it seemed more plausible that the universe was finite, rather infinite, right? And what characterized the physics of the 20th century was the discovery of all kinds of limits, you know? There's a maximum speed, apparently, the speed of light, the smallest amount of energy. And so, fight soccer was giving a lecture one time on all these limits that are appearing in modern science, and this older physicist got very angry, you know, about this. And so, fight soccer went to see him privately afterwards to see why he was so angry, you know? Did he have some objections to the new theories? Well, no, he didn't have any, you know, objection he could give to them, but he just didn't like that he took all these limits. And so, fight soccer began to reflect on that, see? And he says that this belief in an infinite universe, right, came in in the Renaissance at the time when they stopped giving up the study of theology. So, when they get the study of God, who's infinite, right, you see, and all the left is the universe, but the human mind can't be satisfied with something limited. And so, there's no God, but only the universe without God. The universe has got to be infinite, you see? And then when it turns out that the universe is, after all, finite, then the complete press is, you know? It's kind of interesting, though, you know? You know, it's in Finn's book there, The World View of Physics. You read a collection of a number of papers, but that was very interesting, you know? And when Thomas talks about the ancient Greeks and going up to Aristotle, right, you see, they began, you know, our mind actually looks like something infinite, right? And they thought of the material world, which is all they knew about, is being infinite, right? But then they began to have reasons to think the world was finite, right? And then they realized that it had to be something immaterial that was infinite, right? And infinite in a much different way than the matter was, huh? And you see already, Anaxagos began that, right? Because he thinks the greater mind is being unlimited. That's the first thing, right? But in a much different way, right? So it's just the models are going in the first direction, see? They give up the infinite God, and now nature has to be a substitute for God, see? So you have to attribute it to nature in some sense, but you attribute it to God. It's infinity, you know? Kind of interesting. But it's kind of funny, you know, that the whole mind of science is based on its principle of simplicity, and to deny the unmoved mover or the uncaused cause, the first cause, is to force itself to be very complicated, but the unity of causes to explain anything, right? The mind, as he's saying, the genuine physicist believes absolutely in the unity and simplicity of nature, despite the contrary, right? The mind naturally inclines to the idea of some, you know, simplicity, right? Confusedness, right? And therefore, it should be naturally, you know, along with the idea of the infinity of causes for everything. You know, before you get a reason why, you know, it gives. Hey there, Orange. It's good to see it. It's coming in now. Now, so I'm wondering about the meaning of continuous. Here, suppose, if points could touch, then you would say points could oppose the continuous. Yeah. Then what do you mean by continuous? Well, I suppose you're falsely imagining as if, you know, you could have the points touching and then, you know, stooping outside each other, right? You know, but you're kind of falsely imagining the point to be something very, what, small, right? Yeah. Like a small circle, but still something with some definite magnitude or size. Mm-hmm. What would be the definition of continuous? Well, I suppose, you know, the modern mathematician who says a line is composed of infinity points, he would say it's infinitely divisible, right? You know, because there's always more points there, right? I mean, you divide the line in half, and you've got infinity points there, so you can divide, you know, always divide into infinities, all right? No matter how small the line gets, you still have an infinity of points there, right? I should talk to one of the mathematicians at school. You know, they're not anymore, but they're kind of good mathematicians in this math class sometimes, you know? And, of course. I mean, he still thought, you know, the line was composed of infinity points, right? You know? But in a sense, he saw there's no mixed point, right? You see? So all you need to do is infinity points, right? Mm-hmm. It's kind of, you know, resolved, they're kind of imagining. I'm just wondering, it seems like in this first paragraph, maybe there's an equivocation on the word continuous, because he defines continuous, in one way continuous is divided against touching and next, but in another way he says is, but then why would you even bother? Well, I think, like, it's a little bit like we were saying earlier about the isosities, right, huh? You know? That, um, if you talk, say, about the left and the right part of the line... between the line which is the left side of the line and the line which is the right side of the line there's no line in between so you can say that's the next line and then you can say that the the end of one line is together with the beginning of the other line in a way you can say that maybe you know it was a question of you know how can you say that are there really two points there right you see well still be speaking no we're saying that the point which is the end of the left side is also the point which is the beginning of the second one there's not two different points there right but nevertheless you could say that that point is is two in definition in a way right it's the end of the left side and the beginning of the right side right there's some distinction there because you know if you cut away the right side right then that line would be that point would be the end of the line that it was the left side but wouldn't be the beginning of the other one right you know so there is something in a way you could say I mean I kind of carefully say I suppose but the end of the left side and the beginning of the right side are together right although it's maybe more true to say at this point so in a way these things are a little bit like like the beginning cause element right everything continuous we might say in a circle right if you draw the diameter of a circle right you might say that the two semi-circles are what touching right okay so everything continuous is touching but not everything touching is continuous right or you might say that everything is continuous or even touching is continuous with or touching what is next to it right right see so you know if you take my house the neighbor's house and you move them together so they touch it's still the next house right see okay but but here they seem to be taken kind of separately aren't they right so it's like I was saying you know you can say that I'm an animal right or you can say that I'm not an animal I'm a man you're treated like an animal I'm not an animal I'm a man you know right okay so here they seem to be taken you know you know you seem to be taking nix there for something that is not touching or continuous right okay that it's just nix but not touching or continuous right okay but I mean you can still in some sense you know as they say what is touching is nix too right but it's more than that right see um no no that's it no but then the question is why would you even bother to discuss whether the point can be next to a point or not it doesn't matter even if a point could be next to a point it won't be continuous it'd just be it's true it's true it's true but you just want to be overkill you know you just want to kill you know I mean it's going to go when it gets into the next um the second part of this book right you know Thomas makes the first division there between the first four readings right and then the fifth reading right and the fifth reading is about the division of motion right but it kind of presupposes this right these first four readings in a sense of the philosophy of the continuous but then starting in the fifth reading he's going to be talking about some more detailed things about motion but presupposing right all of this that has been said here about the continuous right okay somebody's going to go in to bring out some of the interesting things about it so he's going to bring out the fact that that um before you have moved any distance you are moving some distance right but whenever you're moving some distance you already have moved some distance see so before I have I have walked a mile I have been walking for a while right okay but when I'm walking a mile but I haven't walked a mile yet I have walked already a foot or a yard or half a mile or something right okay so so I'm walking a mile one time I have walked I have walked you know a half mile but then I was walking a half mile before I had walked a half mile right but when I was walking a half mile I had already walked some distance hadn't I hence the consequences of the infinite divisibility of the continuous right that I'm always walking some distance before I walked it right but when I'm walking some distance I already have walked some distance so what comes first are you walking some distance before you have walked some distance or have you walked some distance but have you walked some distance without walking first in that sense you see what I mean there's some odd consequences here of the fact that this is you know he's going to bring those out as he goes on right so and this is part of the basis for you know in the Summa in motion or if something's really responsible for itself having something that's going to have to belong to it that thing first of all but anyway so I mean this this about next is important you know and it does say something about the continuous right that because in some sense there's an indivisible in the continuous right even though it's not composed in the indivisible right yeah and that indivisible that is in the continuous is more than one right but none of those indivisibles that are somehow in the continuous are next to each other right so it is part of the understanding of the continuous isn't it yeah it's amazing you know I mean how how fundamental the continuous is in our thinking and where is the philosophy of the continuous you know these other guys and have they learned about the continuous from Aristotle I don't think they are so what are they doing this isn't being taught no I think I think the barcades it doesn't make any sense they're going to be divisible forever you know they seem to have no credit with the basic things you know so we were talking about Kant the other day there you know and Kant does Kant understand and the good my starting point is you know the only thing unqualifiedly good is goodwill you know but is it goodwill as fundamental as good you know you know you know you know He said the only thing that is quantifiable is good work? No, the only thing that is unqualifiably good, right? Unqualifiably good. Yeah. You see, he sees an element of truth, right? You see? You know? Aristotle and Thomas, you know, saw the element of truth more clearly than he did, right? You see? As Aristotle points out, you know, you can misuse knowledge, right? I can use my knowledge of logic to deceive you, right? I can use my art of cooking to burn the meat, right? You know? So, all these other things. I can use my strength, you know, to rob you or kill you or something, right? You know? I can use my money for all kinds of horrible things, like people, you know? See? Mm-hmm. And so, the good use of my hands and my money and my knowledge and all these things, you all depend upon a good will, right? Mm-hmm. And the will moves all the rest of us, right? And that's why charity is, you know, in particular it's an importance, right? Charity the will. So, the good use, you might say, of all our parts and so on. And the qualities depends upon the good will, right? So, you know, Kant sees this, but he didn't say it very clearly, but, you know? So, he wants to understand the good will, right? But don't you have to understand the good before you can understand the good will? Right? You know? Well, you know, when they say to our Lord, you know, they call him good there in one place, and he says, why do you call me good? God alone is good, right? But even if you and I were trying to understand the goodness of God, like Thomas does in the Summas and so on, you have to have some understanding of good in general before you can understand that God is good and that he's goodness itself, that he's the good of every good, and he's the summa bona, right? But all this presupposes is an understanding of what? Good. Where do you find Kant, right? He's starting, in a sense, with the less known, right? That's why it's a kind of abstract way of approaching it, right? Categorical characters and these sort of things, right? Or, you know, Thomas will often quote Dionysius, right, you know? For man to be good is to be reasonable, right? And so, as I say to students, you know, I say, what is a good human act? It's a reasonable act, right? It sounds like an understatement, you know, what's wrong with murder? Well, it's unreasonable. You know? You've got to see why it's unreasonable, but, let's see. But suppose I, you know, suppose I started with that now, right? To be good means to be reasonable. Is reasonable the basic meaning of good? You'd say, you know, it makes sense to say that for man to be good means to be what? Reasonable, right, huh? Is that the starting point for one's understanding of good? See, the starting point for what I always say is, if Socrates was to take the slave boy and ask him, what is good? You know, the slave boy would say, candy's good, pizza's good, horse is good, horse is good, vacation is good, holiday is good, right? And Socrates would say, well, why do you call these things good? Why do they all have in common? And all you could think of would be the fact that these are all things he wants, right? So you come then to the first definition of good, that good is what all want, huh? That's where it's all beginning to call ethics, right? It manifests in that kind of induction there. And therefore they say, well, the good is what all want, right? And then you ask the secret questions of good because of why and why, you know, and so on. And then you gradually, you know, come to an understanding of good that's more deep, right? The good is the same as the end, and so on. And, but, where do you find some kind, right? You see? You can't say that a good will is a will that, what, wills the good. Because then you'd have to know good apart from the will in some way. I had something about intellectual custom, I was listening to that tape again, and something that's really basic, maybe, to places in Aristotle. In the book called The Topics, you know, which is a book on doubt of reasoning, right? And he's discussing what is a doubtical problem, what is a doubtical question in a sense, right? And something that there's some doubt about, right? Some reason to doubt, to think that it is so and it's not so, right? Yes, that's right. And he says, now, if somebody, though, he says, wonders whether snow is white, right? He's not really in need of argument, he's in need of a sensation. And then he says, if someone wonders whether one should honor your father and mother, right? He doesn't need an argument, he says, he needs punishment, right? In other words, that he should just say, naturally know this, right? That you should honor your father and mother, right? Mm-hmm. And it's not something that you would reason about, he says, huh? Yeah. You see? And if somebody, you know, questions this, right? Mm-hmm. It's, they're in that mental state of thinking they don't know what they do know. Yeah. Yeah. But it's interesting, that's his example there, because that's the fourth commandment, right? Mm-hmm. Okay. So Aristotle has taken that as something that a man would naturally know. So, now the other example that's interesting is Nicomachian Ethics in the second book, right, where he's bringing out that virtue is a, what, mean between two extremes, right? Mm-hmm. But then he says there's no, what, mean of the extreme, right? So he says if the question is about adultery, he says, right? You know? It's not a question of do you need it too much, nor too little, but just the right amount, the right person, and so on, right? And he says any adultery is wrong, right? Okay? But notice, that David is a very clear example of an act that is, that has no mean, right? It's by definition in the extreme, right? Mm-hmm. See? So, but like, you know, when Aristotle approaches this, it takes something more known, which is in the arts, right, that the good is between two extremes, right? Mm-hmm. So, if I cook the meat too much, right? That's bad. If I cook it too little, that's bad, right? Mm-hmm. It's just the right amount, okay? Mm-hmm. You see? Well, no, no, no. Because burning the meat is by definition, right? Cooking the meat too much, huh? Mm-hmm. You see? So, um, it makes no difference whether you, you, you burn it a little or too much as far as being bad or good, right? To burn it. To burn it. To burn it. Burning at all is bad, right? It's the worst way to burn too much and too little, right? But there's no meaning of the extreme, right? So he's making that point, see? But when he gets into the moral matter there, the example he gives is that of adultery, right? That was an altogether clear example on his part, right? You see? Of something that would be, by definition, something bad, huh? Mm-hmm. You see? The same way you could say murder, right? And, you know, murder defined as killing innocent, right? Mm-hmm. You see? Well, is it bad if you murder too much or bad if you don't murder enough, too little? Murder just to write it down for people? No. In the same way with, you know, you take stealing as an example of the same thing, right, huh? You know? If I steal too much from you, that's bad. If I steal too little from you, that's bad. Steal just the right amount from you. No, you see, you know, in other words, this is an act that is already, by definition, what? Retained to one of the extremes, right? Yeah. You see? And it's interesting, you know, in Plato's great dialogue there, the symposium, the dialogue on love, right? Mm-hmm. And the one man is defending love. All love is being good, right? And making a distinction between a good love and a bad love, right, huh? So, any love could be good, homosexual love, like that, if it were done, you know, too much and too little, but in the mean, right, you see? But in the literature you could say, well, no, there's a good love and a bad love, right, and they have more distinct knowledge, right? The second speaker is, you know, there's a good love and a bad love, right? Mm-hmm. But I mean, Aristotle, in taking adultery there and taking on your father and mother in the other place, right, is something that would be outside of a question, you know? He's actually taking what we would regard as two of the commandments, right? Mm-hmm. You know, the Sixth Commandment and the Fourth Commandment, right? But it's kind of exciting that reason naturally knows those things, right, because Aristotle is not exposed to the Mosaic Law or the Prophets or to the Sinai, right, huh? Oh, okay. And the child will know murder is wrong because he hasn't reached, he's not able to reason yet? Well, no, but he naturally knows this or naturally comes to know it, at least, right, once he realizes what it is, huh? Well, I thought the implication on the tape was that he won't see it. I mean, all these people believe abortion is okay, right? No, but in a sense, they're saying they don't know what they do know. Oh. Or, you know, I remember seeing, or, you know, they, I remember seeing, what's his name, was that guy, the thing in the Hudson Institute there? Kellyanne, right, you know? The man, the rest of the life, you know, like his more poor life, but, you know, I remember seeing something about him on abortion, right, huh? You know, he did, now let us, you know, at the beginning, you know, um, um, you know, set aside, you know, the obvious extreme positions, right? You know, the one which says that all abortion is, is, should be allowed, right? The other one that says that no abortion should be allowed, right? You know? You know? It's like, like, you know, these are out of the question, obviously, you know? You see? And now let's try to find the mean here, you know? You know, in a sense, he's assuming that, um, every act is of, what? Has a mean, right? That it's good, right? Ah. So, he's looking for a mean of the extreme, right? So, he's looking for, um, you know, the right amount to burn the meat, right? You know? Yeah. Or just the wrong note in music or something, right? You know? Mm-hmm. The note is, there's not too little off or too far off or just the right amount off, you know? Mm-hmm. You know? You see? The key is they don't know what they're doing on it. Deep, deep down they, they know that this is wrong, or they, they're blinded by this custom, or… Well, you know, yeah, I would say that when they were interviewing the, uh, uh, that was a criminal, that the woman turned the appointment to the Supreme Court, right? You know? Uh-huh. And the thing about abortion came up, you know, and of course, uh, well, obviously, you have to allow abortion because, you know, you know, the quality of a woman demands this, you know? Well, the point is, um, obviously, you know, um, the woman's, uh, burden, you might say, you know, of carrying the child nine months and so on, and they're being tied down by this and so on, it's obviously unequal, right? That's nature, right? Nature has not given, uh, men and women the same, uh, burden in bringing a child into this world, right? Mm-hmm. And, uh, so, but that's your premise is that men and women must be equal, right? You see? Mm-hmm. Well, then you have to write abortion, right? Okay? It's like saying, you know, you know, what, what child should have the right to go to bed whenever he wants to, right? Parents are saying, you go to bed now. Well, there's obviously inequality here, right? Because daddy goes to bed or mommy goes to bed when they want to go to bed, right? And if the kid has to go to bed when mommy or daddy wants them because they should go to bed, well, that's obviously, you know, unequal, you know? I mean, people are, they're really getting crazy out there. I mean, that's absolutely crazy. I mean, they, you know, touch a kid, you know, huh? You know, you know, it's like I hit him, you know, and, you know, all these crazy cases, you know, where somebody gives a kid a little whack there in the parking lot when he's misbehaving, you know? And they call the police, you know, and they're, and I mean, you hear these horrible cases, you know, where they, you know, where you can't spank your kid or anything, you know? Mm-hmm. And, uh, so, um, there's a big thing that's in the morning paper today, it was the murder of the day, I guess there, there's some book about being published there by University of Minnesota Press there, you know, which is in favor of children and all kinds of, you know, crazy, you know, created a fury, I don't think we're saying, you know, they should throw everybody in that printing office. It's going crazy, you know, huh? See? But I think it was saying, you know, that, you know, that, uh, the kid's got complete rights, you know, independence of his parents and so on, right? You see? Well, I mean, you could say that, naturally, parents and children are inequality in many ways, right? In some sense, the kids, you know, make more demands upon the parents and vice versa. You know, that, that, that, that's, that's equal, right, huh? I mean, uh, I mean, uh, the parents do more for the kids than the kids do for the parents. And, uh, I mean, so there's many kinds of inequality between the parents and the kids, you see? And, uh, and, uh, she, she, she's reasoning from the, what, less known or the unknown, right? You see? Mm-hmm. You know, Charles DeConnick said one time, you know, you could do the whole history of modern philosophy as denial of the more known from the less known. And, uh, or denial of the, what, the known by the customer or something, right? You see? Oh. See, so the woman, you know, is not as free to pursue her career. I mean, she's, you know, bogged down.