It was Ayn Rand's conviction that philosophy is a life and death matter, both for individuals and cultures. She was not a historian of philosophy, but a philosopher deeply interested in its history. This chapter discusses the approach Rand took in her exploration of the history of philosophy, and later in writing about that history. This provides us with the needed framework for looking at a number of distinctive conclusions she derives from her study of the history of philosophy, which (...) lead her to reject some of the standard ways of unifying and distinguishing “schools” of philosophy and locating figures within these schools. Finally, with that background as context, the chapter deals with her provocative claims about the place of Aristotle and Immanuel Kant in the history of philosophy and culture generally. (shrink)

This chapter contains section titled: Introduction Darwin's Life Darwin's Darwinism Philosophical Problems with Darwin's Darwinism The Core Problems and Darwinism Conclusion References Further Reading.

Aristotle is without question the founder of the science of biology. In his treatise On the Parts of Animals, he develops his systematic principles for biological investigation, and explanation, and applies those principles to explain why the different animal kinds have the different parts that they do. It is one of the greatest achievements in the history of science. This new translation from the Greek aims to reflect the subtlety and detail of Aristotle's reasoning. The commentary provides help in understanding (...) each argument as well as an integrated account of the goals and methods of the work taken as a whole. (shrink)

In addition to being one of the world's most influential philosophers, Aristotle can also be credited with the creation of both the science of biology and the philosophy of biology. He was the first thinker to treat the investigations of the living world as a distinct inquiry with its own special concepts and principles. This book focuses on a seminal event in the history of biology - Aristotle's delineation of a special branch of theoretical knowledge devoted to the systematic investigation (...) of animals. Aristotle approached the creation of zoology with the tools of subtle and systematic philosophies of nature and of science that were then carefully tailored to the investigation of animals. The papers collected in this volume, written by a pre-eminent figure in the field of Aristotle's philosophy and biology, examine Aristotle's approach to biological inquiry and explanation, his concepts of matter, form and kind, and his teleology. (shrink)

It is often claimed that one of Darwin''s chief accomplishments was to provide biology with a non-teleological explanation of adaptation. A number of Darwin''s closest associates, however, and Darwin himself, did not see it that way. In order to assess whether Darwin''s version of evolutionary theory does or does not employ teleological explanation, two of his botanical studies are examined. The result of this examination is that Darwin sees selection explanations of adaptations as teleological explanations. The confusion in the nineteenth (...) century about Darwin''s attitude to teleology is argued to be a result of Darwin''s teleological explanations not conforming to either of the dominant philosophical justifications of teleology at that time. Darwin''s explanatory practices conform well, however, to recent defenses of the teleological character of selection explanations. (shrink)

Aristotle is a rarity in the history of philosophy and science - he is a towering figure in the history of both disciplines. Moreover, he devoted a great deal of philosophical attention to the nature of scientific knowledge. How then do his philosophical reflections on scientific knowledge impact his actual scientific inquiries? In this book James Lennox sets out to answer this question. He argues that Aristotle has a richly normative view of scientific inquiry, and that those norms (...) are of two kinds: a general, question-guided framework applicable to all scientific inquiries, and domain-specific norms reflecting differences in the target of inquiry and in the means of observation available to researchers. To see these norms of inquiry in action, the second half of this book examines Aristotle's investigations of animals, the soul, material compounds, the motions of heavenly bodies, and respiration. (shrink)

In De Anima 2.4, Aristotle claims that nutritive soul encompasses two distinct biological functions: nutrition and reproduction. We challenge a pervasive interpretation which posits ‘nutrients’ as the correlative object of the nutritive capacity. Instead, the shared object of nutrition and reproduction is that which is nourished and reproduced: the ensouled body, qua ensouled. Both functions aim at preserving this object, and thus at preserving the form, life, and being of the individual organism. In each case, we show how Aristotle’s detailed (...) biological analysis supports this ontological argument. (shrink)

Variants on two approaches to the concept of health have dominated the philosophy of medicine, here referred to as ‘reductionist’ and ‘relativis’. These two approaches share the basic assumption that the concept of health cannot be both based on an empirical biological foundation and be evaluative, and thus adopt either the view that it is ‘objective’ or evaluative. It is here argued that there are a subset of value concepts that are formed in recognition of certain fundamental facts about living (...) organisms, among which is the concept of health. These are not yet moral concepts, but they are ‘normative’ or ‘evaluative’. The view is defended that health, so understood, is a fundamental concept in the process of medical diagnosis and treatment. Keywords: health, value, objectivity, function CiteULike Connotea Del.icio.us What's this? (shrink)

In this article I defend an account of Meteorology IV as providing a material-level causal account of the emergence of uniform materials with a wide range of dispositional properties not found at the level of the four elements—the emergence of material complexity. I then demonstrate that this causal account is used in the Generation of Animals and Parts of Animals as part of the explanation of the generation of the uniform parts (tissues) and of their role in providing nonuniform parts (...) (organs) with the dispositional properties needed to fulfill their functions. (shrink)

Kuhn closed the Introduction to The Structure of Scientific Revolutions with what was clearly intended as a rhetorical question: How could history of science fail to be a source of phenomena to which theories about knowledge may legitimately be asked to apply? (Kuhn 1970, 9) This paper argues that there is a more fruitful way of conceiving the relationship between a historical and philosophical study of science, which is dubbed the 'phylogenetic' approach. I sketch an example of this approach, and (...) take a first pass at an abstract characterization of the method. (shrink)

This essay outlines one aspect of a larger collaboration with John Beatty and Alan Love.2 The project’s focus is philosophical, but for reasons that will become clear momentarily, the method of approach is historical. All three of us share the conviction that philosophical issues concerning the foundations of the sciences are often illuminated by investigating their history. It is my hope that this paper both provides support for that thesis, and illustrates it. The focal philosophical issue can be stated in (...) the form of a puzzle about contemporary discussions of the conceptual foundations of evolutionary theory. The role of the concepts of “chance” and “randomness” in that theory is a significant part of .. (shrink)

Where does Aristotle stand in the debate between rationalism and empiricism? The locus classicus on this question, Posterior Analytics II. 19, seems clearly empiricist. Yet many commentators have resisted this conclusion. Here, I review their arguments and conclude that they rest in part on expectations for this text that go unfulfilled. I argue that this is because his views about norms of empirical inquiry are in the rich methodological passages in his scientific treatises. In support of this claim, I explore (...) such passages in On Parts of Animals and De anima. I argue that they reach distinct, though complementary, conclusions about the norms governing zoological and psychological inquiries. (shrink)

A necessary condition for having a revolution named after you is that you are an innovator in your field. I argue that if Charles Darwin meets this condition, it is as a philosopher and methodologist. In 1991, I made the case for Darwin's innovative use of "thought experiment" in the "Origin." Here I place this innovative practice in the context of Darwin's methodological commitments, trace its origins back into Darwin's notebooks, and pursue Darwin's suggestion that it owes its inspiration to (...) Charles Lyell. (shrink)

Aristotle is without question the founder of the science of biology. In his treatise On the Parts of Animals, he develops his systematic principles for biological investigation, and explanation, and applies those principles to explain why the different animal kinds have the different parts that they do. It is one of the greatest achievements in the history of science. This new translation from the Greek aims to reflect the subtlety and detail of Aristotle's reasoning. The commentary provides help in understanding (...) each argument as well as an integrated account of the goals and methods of the work taken as a whole. (shrink)

In metaphysics and philosophy of science, a significant movement is making inroads, under the banner of ‘neo-Aristotelianism’. This movement has so far been focused primarily on the physical sciences; but given that Aristotle the natural scientist was above all a biologist, it is worth asking what a neo-Aristotelian philosophy of biology would look like? In this paper, I begin a discussion on precisely that question. One interesting result is that the fact that biology is now permeated by evolutionary ways of (...) thinking is all but irrelevant to answering that question. Far more important is how central are concepts of organic form, function and development to biology. Given recent developments, there are reasons to think at least some areas of the biological sciences would welcome a neo-Aristotelian philosophy of biology - i.e. a critical exploration of these concepts from an Aristotelian perspective. (shrink)

Aristotle is without question the founder of the science of biology. In his treatise On the Parts of Animals, he develops his systematic principles for biological investigation, and explanation, and applies those principles to explain why the different animal kinds have the different parts that they do. It is one of the greatest achievements in the history of science. This new translation from the Greek aims to reflect the subtlety and detail of Aristotle's reasoning. The commentary provides help in understanding (...) each argument as well as an integrated account of the goals and methods of the work taken as a whole. (shrink)

This volume of essays explores major connected themes in Aristotle's metaphysics, philosophy of nature, and ethics, especially themes related to essence, definition, teleology, activity, potentiality, and the highest good. The volume is united by the belief that all aspects of Aristotle's work need to be studied together if any one of the areas of thought is to be fully understood. Many of the papers were contributions to a conference at the University of Pittsburgh entitled 'Being, Nature, and Life in Aristotle', (...) to honor Professor Allan Gotthelf's many contributions to the field of ancient philosophy; a few are contributions from those who were invited but could not attend. The contributors, all longstanding friends of Professor Gotthelf, are among the most accomplished scholars in the field of ancient philosophy today. (shrink)

Aristotle's biological works - constituting over 25% of his surviving corpus and for centuries largely unstudied by philosophically oriented scholars - have been the subject of an increasing amount of attention of late. This collection brings together some of the best work that has been done in this area, with the aim of exhibiting the contribution that close study of these treatises can make to the understanding of Aristotle's philosophy. The book is divided into four parts, each with an introduction (...) which places its essays in relation to each other and to the wider issues of the book as a whole. The first part is an overview of the relationship of Aristotle's biology to his philosophy; the other three each concentrate on a set of issues central to Aristotelian study - definition and demonstration; teleology and necessity in nature; and metaph themes such as the unity of matter and form and the nature of substance. (shrink)

The concept of self-motion is not only fundamental in Aristotle's argument for the Prime Mover and in ancient and medieval theories of nature, but it is also central to many theories of human agency and moral responsibility. In this collection of mostly new essays, scholars of classical, Hellenistic, medieval, and early modern philosophy and science explore the question of whether or not there are such things as self-movers, and if so, what their self-motion consists in. They trace the development of (...) the concept of self-motion from its formulation in Aristotle's metaphysics, cosmology, and philosophy of nature through two millennia of philosophical, religious, and scientific thought. This volume contains "Self-Movers" (David Furley), "Aristotle on Self-Motion" (Mary Louise Gill), "Aristotle on Perception, Appetition, and Self-Motion" (Cynthia Freeland), "Self-Movement and External Causation" (Susan Sauvé Meyer), "Aristotle on the Mind's Self-Motion" (Michael Wedin), "Mind and Motion in Aristotle" (Christopher Shields), "Aristotle's Prime Mover" (Aryeh Kosman), "The Transcendence of the Prime Mover" (Lindsay Judson), "Self-Motion in Stoic Philosophy" (David Hahm), "Duns Scotus on the Reality of Self-Change" (Peter King), "Ockham, Self-Motion, and the Will" (Calvin Normore), and "Natural Motion and Its Causes: Newton on the 'Vis Insita' of Bodies" (J. E. McGuire). Originally published in 1994. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905. (shrink)

Aristotle is the first person in the history of science to see the study of nature as an articulated complex of interrelated, yet somewhat autonomous, investigations. Understanding why goes to the heart of what is philosophically distinctive about him. Why does Aristotle present the investigation of “the common cause of animal motion” as distinct and independent from a study of the causes of the different forms of animal locomotion, the announced project of De incessu animalium? This article examines the puzzling (...) complexity of Aristotle's investigations of animals, which can offer insights into his metaphysics and epistemology. It first briefly considers the range of Aristotle's writings related to animals, including Historia animalium, Dissections, De partibus animalium, De motu animalium, De incessu animalium, De Anima, and Meteorologica IV. The article then looks at his views on the limits of teleology in biology. (shrink)

During the Middle Ages and Rennaissance, it was commonly believed that Aristotle's biological studies reflected his theory of demonstrative science quite well. By contrast, most commentators in the twentieth century have taken it that this is not the case. This is largely the result of preconceptions about what a natural science modelled after the proposals of Aristotle's Posterior Analytics would look like. I argue that these modern preconceptions are incorrect, and that, while the Analytics leaves a variety of issues unanswered (...) that a practicing biology must have answers to (hence Parts of Animals I), Aristotle's biological practice conforms to the Analytics model. It is further argued that establishing this claim requires reading philosophically through entire biological treatises--that is, one will miss the logical structure by following the usual practice of 'sampling' these treatises rather than reading them systematically. (shrink)

Historians of psychology often treat Aristotle’s De Anima as the first scientific treatment of their subject; and historians of biology do likewise with his zoological treatises. How are the investigations recorded in works such as the Parts of Animals and History of Animals connected to those in the De Anima? More specifically, given Aristotle’s views about man’s special and distinctive cognitive capacities, what does he think about man as an object of a distinctively zoological investigation? In the following pages, this (...) more specific question will be explored, but with an eye to the way in which its answer may change the way we think about the broader question. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Introduction Essence and Explanation in Theory and Practice Form, Function, and Biological Essentialism The Priority of Being to Generation Conclusion Notes Bibliography.

In On the Parts of Animals, Aristotle develops his systematic principles for biological investigation and explanation, and applies those principles to explain why the different animals have the different parts that they do. This new translation and commentary reflects the subtlety and detail of Aristotle's reasoning.

A central difficulty in the way of understanding Spinoza's metaphysical system is that of reconciling two apparently contradictory theories of the causation of finite modes found in his Ethics. The easiest way to present the problem is to place these two accounts side by side.A. All things which follow from the absolute nature of any attribute of God must forever exist, and must be infinite; that is to say, through that attribute they are eternal and infinite. A thing which has (...) been determined to any action was necessarily so determined by God. Together, these propositions entail that God is a necessary and sufficient condition for the occurrence of any action, and that anything so determined is eternal and infinite. Compare these implications with the following.B. An individual thing or a thing which is finite and has determinate existence cannot exist nor be determined to action unless it be determined to existence and action by another cause which is also finite and has a determinate existence; and again this cause cannot exist nor be determined to action unless by another cause which is also finite and determined to existence and action, and so on, ad infinitum. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Introduction Biology and the Theory of Knowledge Biology and Metaphysics Soul, Life, and Reason Conclusion Bibliography.