Lecture 13 01 24 08 Potential and Actuality

Lecture 13: 01 -24 -08 • Potential and Actuality: • Matter as Potential: Metaphysics VII, 9: 297 • “Therefore substance is the starting point of all production, as of deduction. It is from the ‘what’ that deductions start; and from it also we now find processes of production to start. And things which are formed by nature are in the same case as these products of art. For the seed produces them as the artist produces the works of art; for it has the form potentially, and that from which the seed comes has in a sense the same name as the offspring—only in a sense, for we must not expect all cases to have exactly the same name, as in the production of human being from human being; for a woman can also be produced by a man—unless there is a deformity: that is why it is not from a mule that a mule is produced. The natural things which (like some artificial objects) can be produced spontaneously are those whose matter can be moved even by itself in the way in which the seed usually moves it; but thos things which have not such matter cannot be produced except by parents.

On the Soul • What has a soul? (included withings that have a nature) • A principle of change within itself. • The Platonic commonplace: is the soul like a pilot in a ship?

Dividing Souls • Plato’s error: treating only human souls • Vegetative : nutritive • Animal : perception / locomotion • Human : reason

distribution • Nutrition • Sense Perception & Locomotion Reason

Source of motion • Plants move, by growth • Animals move by locomotion • Men move by choice • Is there a common reason for motion?

Motion and Desire and The Good • All motion is to embrace life as good • Plants and animals move by appetite • Men move by choosing the good. • The desire for the good as the source of all motion • DESIRE AND IMAGINATION