The Comment gives corroborative support to Stróżyński’s thesis by using resources from I.6[1].7–9 and VI.5[23].1. The nature of the soul and its ascent to intellect and the One is clarified in I.6[1].7, as the soul’s ascent recaptures its own nature. It identifies not only with intellect, but directly with the One, needing only its own powers, making union with the One within one’s reach and common to all. A barrier to seeing this has been the 19th century description of mysticism (...) as rare and incommunicable. I.6[1].8–9 add both a method of reading texts and the cosmos in ancient mystical fashion and a redefinition of light for seeing the One. In VI.5[23].1, Plotinus provides a fundamental sense of self that captures an ancient wisdom that identifies the self internally with the One not as totally other but as intimately immanent to the soul. (shrink)

In De Caelo III 2, Aristotle observes that each element is determined by an intrinsic principle to move to its proper place: earth downward, fire upward, and water and air to their respective places in the middle. However, how are we to determine the cause of elemental motion? Aristotle admits that this ranks among the most difficult problems (μάλιστα δ’ ἀπορεῖται) as it is directly related to the argument of Physics VIII 4, which defends the view that whatever is in (...) motion is moved by something. The question of how the elements move is not resolved until we are presented with his definition of inclination (ῥοπή) in De Caelo IV 1. Inclination is the nature of each element to move to its proper place. Aristotle concludes that the principle of inclination is a cause of motion continuously orienting the elements toward their proper places by activating that which is potentially heavy or potentially light. In what follows, I shall demonstrate the internal coherence of Aristotle’s natural philosophy by deploying inclination as a principle of motion and rest to define the nature of each element. This account of inclination as a principle of motion is consistent with Aristotle’s definition of nature in Physics II 1. As an active principle of motion, inclination is identified with the activity (ἐνέργεια) of the element enacting and maintaining its own end (ἐντελέχεια) by being at rest in its proper place. As a passive principle of motion, inclination is identified with the passivity of the element to be moved to its proper place by another element insofar as the respective element undergoes generation or substantial change. (shrink)

Sanday reads the Statesman as intertwining images with dialectical thinking. On the one hand, we advance from opinions to knowledge by gradually turning away from images and embracing rational arguments instead; on the other, dialectical knowledge must rely on images in order to be effective for the political community. My present comments come not to challenge, but rather to complement, and perhaps refine, Sanday’s account. I begin by highlighting the distinction that the Stranger draws between types of images, namely as (...) perceptible likenesses and as likenesses in account respectively, and then reflect on how this distinction helps in leading the interlocutor’s search for the nature of statesmanship as well as in implementing insights in the practical life of the city. All of this supports the view that Plato has never had a problem with imitation or images as such, but only with our ignorance vis-à-vis our engagement with imitation and usage of images, and with our ignorance as to what are the objects that we imitate, in other words, figuring out whether they are images of Forms or of sensible things. (shrink)

According to Aristotle, those who seek mathematical principles of sensible things are looking in entirely the wrong place. But despite his strong opposition to mathematized metaphysics, Aristotle does not outright reject mathematical explanation of the natural world. In fact, he argues that mathematics does explain certain sensible phenomena, that the natural world has many mathematical patterns and features, and that this is often not mere coincidence. That he devotes two books of his Metaphysics to shoring up the boundary between mathematics (...) and metaphysics indicates that this issue is crucially important to him. Yet it receives little systematic scholarly discussion. I take up the issue by examining Aristotle’s treatment of the sensible phenomena that have mathematical explanations. This examination shows that—and why—on his view, mathematics explains many things about the natural world, but not the most fundamental things. (shrink)

This paper elucidates how the thinking about opposition that we find in the surviving passages of Anaxagoras of Clazomenae and in the fragments of Heraclitus of Ephesus informs discussions of the separability of the body and the soul in the Phaedo. I offer a reconstruction of the way in which these pre-Socratic ideas of opposition are appropriated and refracted in Plato’s Phaedo (especially at 85e–86e, 92a–95a, 102c–e, 102b–107a). I treat Anaxagoras first, in order to explicate how his ideas make up (...) the background of the dialogical study of the separation of the soul from the body (102b–107a). My analysis of Heraclitus comes second and shows how his ideas inform the interlocutors’ assessment of the unity characteristic of the body and the soul (92a–95a). I set the stage for the discussion of Anaxagoras and Heraclitus by relating these thinkers to the broader Pythagorean background that is apparent in the dialogue. (shrink)

In this response to Emily Katz’s “Aristotle’s Rejection of Mathematized Metaphysics,” I raise questions about her central interpretive claim that mathematical forms cannot, for Aristotle, appear among first principles of nature. Topics addressed include the notion of priority, especially in the sciences; the relationship between natural change and material realization; and the general nature and scope of mathematical explanations for physical phenomena.

In his paper, Josh Hayes argues that inclination (ῥοπή) is the nature of each element. It is an active and passive principle that explains why the elements move to their proper places. Thus, according to Hayes, by introducing inclination in De Caelo IV 1, Aristotle posits a single explanatory factor that accounts for all elemental motions. By doing so, he answers the question, posed in Physics VIII 4, of what the cause of elemental motion is. In my comments, I will (...) contest these claims. Aristotle’s theory of elemental motion does not rely on a single explanatory factor; yet, it is not, as Hayes claims, incoherent. Instead, the different strands merely reflect the special nature of the elements. (shrink)

This paper responds to Marina Marren’s “The Contemplative Community: Pre-Socratic Teachings and Their Appropriation in the Phaedo” by listing areas of agreement and raising questions for further consideration. Marren’s position—that the comedic aspects of the dialogue can be understood through a retrieval of Anaxagorean mixing of opposites and Heraclitean images of doubling—is discussed. The response then challenges Marren to clarify why we should think that Plato would disagree with Socrates regarding the status of the forms and to think more deeply (...) about divinization as a theme in the Phaedo. (shrink)

The Visitor’s inquiry into the expertise of statesmanship in Plato’s Statesman consistently privileges knowledge as the sole source from which to derive legitimate authority to command. And yet the section of the dialogue to which he refers as a “play” (δρᾶμα, 303c8) of satyrs and centaurs (291a–303d) complicates matters significantly by spelling out the difficulty of identifying a true statesman and the dangers of thinking ourselves able to do so. Reading the account of human community provided in the myth of (...) the cosmos together with the “good imitation” of knowledge in the satyr play, a limited notion of properly human wisdom comes into view as the horizon within which to interpret knowledge and dialectical division in the dialogue. I conclude that the education of the dialectician is connected to the problem of the absence of the true statesman, and that the Statesman is prescribing ways in which members of the philosophical community ought to understand themselves in dialogue with the written word. (shrink)

The paper explores the link between contemplation of the One and happiness in Plotinus and challenges the traditional interpretation according to which a contemplative or mystical experience of the One is by necessity brief and transitory, while the experience of Intellect can become a stable state in this life. Were it so, it would not serve as a ground for the good or happy life. In order to reconcile this point with Plotinus’s other claim about contemplation, his doctrine of the (...) double activity of Intellect is invoked. (shrink)