Abstract
This paper addresses the contentious issue of Aristotle’s commitment to causal determinism, particularly as concerns the efficient cause. After distinguishing between determinism, fatalism, and necessitarianism, several common arguments in favor of indeterminist interpretations of Aristotle are examined and rebutted. Afterwards, several positive arguments in favor of a determinist interpretation are advanced. The paper then turns to Aristotle’s seminal theory of chance and his resistance to systemic/metaphysical conceptions of determinism. Finally the paper asks whether Aristotle’s theory of chance succeeds in vanquishing determinism, or even necessitarianism.
Bibliography
Al-Farabi. 1981. Commentary and Short Treatise on Aristotle’s De Interpretatione. Translated by F. W. Zimmermann. London: Oxford University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Al-Farabi. 2001. The Philosophy of Plato and Aristotle. Translated by Muhsin Mahdi. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Al-Ghazali. 1963. Tahafut Al-Falasifah. Translated by Sabih Ahmad Kamali. Lahore, Pakistan: Pakistan Philosophical Congress.Search in Google Scholar
Ammonius. 1998. On Aristotle’s on Interpretation 9. Translated by David Blank and Norman Kretzmann. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Anscombe, G. E. M. 1956. “Aristotle and the Sea Battle.” Mind 65:1–15.10.1007/978-1-349-15267-4_2Search in Google Scholar
Anscombe, G. E. M. 1971. Causality and Determination. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Aphrodisias, Alexander of. 1983. On Fate. Translated by R.W. Sharples. London: Gerald Duckworth & Co.Search in Google Scholar
Aphrodisias, Alexander of. 1992. Quaestiones 1.1–2.15. Translated by R.W. Sharples. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Aphrodisias, Alexander of. 1994. Quaestiones 2.16–3.15. Translated by R.W. Sharples. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Aphrodisias, Alexander of. 1999. On Aristotle Prior Analytics 1.14–22. Translated by Josiah Gould. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Aquinas, T. 1923. Summa Contra Gentiles. Translated by The English Dominican Fathers. London: Burns Oates & Washbourne Ltd.Search in Google Scholar
Aquinas, T. 1952. On the Power of God (Quaestiones Disputatae De Potentia Dei). Translated by The English Dominican Fathers. Westminster, MD: Newman Press.Search in Google Scholar
Aquinas, T. 1964. Summa Thelogiae. Translated by The English Dominican Fathers. New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company.Search in Google Scholar
Aristotle. 1984. Complete Works. Edited by Jonathan Barnes. Princeton. NJ: Princeton Univeristy Press.Search in Google Scholar
Aspasius. 2007. On Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics 1–4, 7-8. Translated by David Konstan. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Aurelius, Marcus Antoninus. 1916. Marcus Aurelius. Translated by C. R. Haines. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Averroes. 1969. The Incoherence of the Incoherence. Translated by Simon van Den Bergh. 2 vol. London: Messrs Luzac & Company Ltd.Search in Google Scholar
Balme, D. 1939. “Greek Science and Mechanism I. Aristotle on Nature and Chance.” The Classical Quarterly 33:129–38.10.1017/S0009838800022308Search in Google Scholar
Balme, D. 1972. Aristotle’s De Partibus Animalium I and De Generatione Animalium I. Oxford: Clarendon Press.10.1093/oseo/instance.00262095Search in Google Scholar
Balme, D. 1980. “Teleology and Necessity.” In Philosophical Issues in Aristotle’s Biology, Edited by A. Gotthelf and J. G. Lennox, 275–86. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511552564.015Search in Google Scholar
Barnes, J. 1975. Aristotle’s Posterior Analytics. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Search in Google Scholar
Barnes, J. 1979. The Presocratic Philosophers, 2 vol. London: Routledge.Search in Google Scholar
Bayle, P. 1991. Historical and Critical Dictionary: Selections. Translated by Richard H. Popkin. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Company.Search in Google Scholar
Bobzien, S. 1998. Determinism and Freedom in Stoic Philosophy. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Search in Google Scholar
Boeri, M. D. 1995. “Chance and Teleology in Aristotle’s Physics.” International Philosophical Quarterly 35:87–96.10.5840/ipq199535161Search in Google Scholar
Boethius, A. M. S. 1918. Consolation of Philosophy. Translated by S. J. Tester. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Boethius, A. M. S. 1998. On Aristotle’s on Interpretation 9. Translated by David Blank and Norman Kretzmann. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Botros, S. 1985. “Freedom, Causality, Fatalism and Early Stoic Philosophy.” Phronesis 30:274–304.10.1163/156852885X00101Search in Google Scholar
Bradie, M., and F. D. Miller Jr. 1984. “Teleology and Natural Necessity in Aristotle.” History of Philosophy Quarterly 1:133–46.Search in Google Scholar
Broadie, S. 2001. “From Necessity to Fate: A Fallacy?.” Journal of Ethics 5:21–37.10.1023/A:1011466914535Search in Google Scholar
Byrne, C. 2002. “Aristotle on Physical Necessity and the Limits of Teleological Explanation.” Apeiron 35:20–46.10.1515/APEIRON.2002.35.1.19Search in Google Scholar
Christidis, T. 2001. “Chance, Necessity and the Role of Time in Aristotle’s Physics.” In Aristotle and Contemporary Science, edited byD. Sphendonē-Mentzu. New York: Peter Lang.Search in Google Scholar
Cicero, M. T. 1914. De Finibus Bonorum Et Malorum. Translated by H. Rackham. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.10.4159/DLCL.marcus_tullius_cicero-de_finibus_bonorum_et_malorum.1914Search in Google Scholar
Cicero, M. T. 1933. De Natura Deorum. Academica. Translated by H. Rackham. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.10.4159/DLCL.marcus_tullius_cicero-de_natura_deorum.1933Search in Google Scholar
Cicero, M. T. 1942. De Fato. Paradoxia Stoicorum. Translated by H. Rackham. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.10.4159/DLCL.marcus_tullius_cicero-de_fato.1942Search in Google Scholar
Cooper, J. M. 1987. “Hypothetical Necessity and Natural Teleology.” In Philosophical Issues in Aristotle’s Biology, Edited by A. Gotthelf and J. G.. Lennox, 243–74. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511552564.014Search in Google Scholar
DeLacy, P. H. 1939. “The Problem of Causation in Plato’s Philosophy.” Classical Philology 34:97–115.10.1086/362224Search in Google Scholar
Dudley, J. 2005. “Necessity and Chance: Aristotle’s Criticism of the Presocratics.” In Hasard Et Nécessité Dans La Philosophie Grecque, Edited by E. Moutsopoulos. Athina: Académie d‘Athènes.Search in Google Scholar
Dudley, J. 2012. Aristotle’s Conception of Chance. Albany: State University of New York Press.Search in Google Scholar
Edmunds, L. 1972. “Necessity, Chance, and Freedom in the Early Atomists.” Phoenix 26:342–57.10.2307/1087594Search in Google Scholar
Empiricus, S. 1933. Outlines of Pyrrhonism. Translated by R. G. Bury. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Empiricus, S. 1935. Against Logicians. Translated by R. G. Bury. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Empiricus, S. 1936. Against Physicists. Against Ethicists. Translated by R. G. Bury. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Empiricus, S. 1949. Against Professors. Translated by R. G. Bury. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Epictetus. 1925. Discourses, Encheiridion and Fragments. Translated by W. A. Oldfather. Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press.10.4159/DLCL.epictetus-discourses.1925Search in Google Scholar
Fine, G. 1981. “Aristotle on Determinism: A Review of Richard Sorabji’s ‘Necessity, Cause, and Blame..’” The Philosophical Review 90:561–79.10.2307/2184607Search in Google Scholar
Fine, G. 1984. “Truth and Necessity in De Interpretatione 9.” History of Philosophy Quarterly 1:23–48.Search in Google Scholar
Frede, D. 1985. “Aristotle on the Limits of Determinism: Accidental Causes in Metaphysics E.3.” In Aristotle on Nature and Living Things, Edited by A. Gotthelf, 207–25. Pittsburgh: Mathesis Pub.Search in Google Scholar
Funkenstein, A. 1986. Theology and the Scientific Imagination From the Middle Ages to the Seventeenth Century. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Furley, D. 1986. “The Rainfall Example in Physics II.8.” In Aristotle on Nature and Living Things, edited by A. Gotthelf, 177–82. Pittsburch: Mathesis.Search in Google Scholar
Galen. 1968. On the Usefulness of the Parts of the Body. Translated by Margaret Tallmadge May. 2 vol. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Gaskin, R. 1995. The Sea Battle and the Master Argument. New York: De Gruyter.10.1515/9783110866346Search in Google Scholar
Gellius, A. 1927. Attic Nights. 3 vol. Translated by J. C. Rolfe. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.10.4159/DLCL.gellius-attic_nights.1927Search in Google Scholar
Gomperz, T. 1912. Greek Thinkers. Translated by Laurie Magnus. London: John Murray.Search in Google Scholar
Graham, D. W. 2010. The Texts of Early Greek Philosophy, 2 vol. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Gregory, A. 2007. Ancient Greek Cosmology. London: Bloomsbury.Search in Google Scholar
Grgić, F. 1998. “Aristotle Against the Determinist: Metaphysics 6.3.” International Philosophy Quarterly 38:127–36.10.5840/ipq19983821Search in Google Scholar
Guthrie, W. C. K. 1962. A History of Greek Philosophy, 6 vol. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Hankinson, R. J. 1995. “Philosophy of Science.” In The Cambridge Companion to Aristotle, edited by J. Barnes, 109–39. Cambridge: Cambridge UP.Search in Google Scholar
Hankinson, R. J. 1998. Cause and Explanation in Ancient Greek Thought. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Search in Google Scholar
Heath, D. D. 1879. “Some Further Observations on Ancient Theories of Causation.” Journal of Philology 8:172–7.10.1017/CBO9781139523615.020Search in Google Scholar
Hintikka, J., et al. 1973. Time and Necessity: Studies in Aristotle’s Theory of Modality. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Search in Google Scholar
Hintikka, J., et al. 1977. Aristotle on Modality and Determinism. Amsterdam: North Holland Pub. Co.Search in Google Scholar
Hourani, G. F. 1972. “Ibn Sina on Necessary and Possible Existence.” Philosophical Forum 4:74–86.Search in Google Scholar
Hume, D. 1955. A Treatise of Human Nature. Edited by L.A. Selby-Bigge. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Ide, H. 1993. “Aristotle Metaphysics VI 2–3 and Coincidences.” Ancient Philosophy 13:341–54.10.5840/ancientphil19931326Search in Google Scholar
Inwood, B. and L. P. Gerson, Eds. 2008. The Stoics Reader: Selected Writings and Testimonia. Translated by Brad Inwood and Lloyd P. Gerson. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Company.Search in Google Scholar
Isidore of Seville. 2010. Etymologies. Translated by Stephen A. Barney et al. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Judson, L. 1988. “La Bataille Navale d‘Aujourd’hui: De Interpretatione 9.” Revue De Philosophie Ancienne 6:5–37.Search in Google Scholar
Kirk, G. S., and J. E. Raven. 1962. The Presocratic Philosophers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Kirwan, C. 1993. Aristotle’s Metaphysics Books Γ, Δ, E. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/oseo/instance.00262329Search in Google Scholar
Kogan, B. S. 1985. Averroes and the Metaphysics of Causation. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.Search in Google Scholar
Kullmann, W. 1974. Wissenschaft Und Methode. Berlin: De Gryuter.10.1515/9783110834994Search in Google Scholar
Laertius, D. 1925. Lives of the Eminent Philosophers, 2 vol. Translated by R. D. Hicks. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Leibniz, G. W. 1951. Theodicy. Translated by E. M. Huggard. New Haven: Yale University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Leunissen, M. 2010. Explanation and Teleology in Aristotle’s Science of Nature. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511762499Search in Google Scholar
Loening, R. 1903. Die Zurechningslehre Des Aristoteles. Jena: Hildesheim.Search in Google Scholar
Long, A. A., and D. N. Sedley. 1970. “Stoic Determinism and Alexander of Aphrodisias’ De Fato (i-xiv).” Archiv Für Geschichte Der Philosophie 52:247–68.10.1515/agph.1970.52.3.247Search in Google Scholar
Long, A. A., and D. N. Sedley. 1987. The Hellenistic Philosophers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9781139165907Search in Google Scholar
Lucretius, Carus Titus. 1975. De Rerum Natura. Translated by W.H.D. Rouse. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Madigan, A. 1984. “Metaphysics E. 3: A Modest Proposal.” Phronesis 29:123–36.10.1163/156852884X00111Search in Google Scholar
Maison, A. 1946. Introduction À La Physique Aristotélicienne. Louvain: Institut supérieur de philosophie.Search in Google Scholar
Meehan, F. X. 1940. Efficient Causality in Aristotle and St. Thomas. Washington D.C: Catholic University of America Press.Search in Google Scholar
Mill, J. S. 1843. A System of Logic. London: John W. Parker.Search in Google Scholar
Nemesius. 2008. On the Nature of Man. Translated by R. W. Sharples and P. J. van der Eijk. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press.Search in Google Scholar
O’Keefe, T. Why there Are No Fresh Starts in Metaphysics Epsilon or Nicomachean Ethics III 5 Unpublished Dissertation.Search in Google Scholar
Panayides, C. Y. 2002. Aristotle on Modality and Determinism. Cyprus: Intercollege Press.Search in Google Scholar
Panayides, C. Y. 2009. “Aristotle on Causal Determinism and Fatalism.” Ancient Philosophy 29:107–22.10.5840/ancientphil20092916Search in Google Scholar
Philoponus, J. 1999. On Aristotle’s Physics 2. Translated by A. R. Lacy. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Philoponus, J. 2005. On Aristotle’s on the Soul 1.1-2. Translated by Richard Soraji. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Plato. 1997. Complete Works. Edited by John M. Cooper. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Company.Search in Google Scholar
Plotinus. 1984. Enneads. 7 vol. Translated by A. H. Armstrong. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Plutarch. 1927. Moralia. 16 vol. Translated by Frank Cole Babbitt et al. 16 vol. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Popper, K. R. 1956. The Open Universe: An Argument for Indeterminism. Totowa, NJ: Rowman & Littlefield.Search in Google Scholar
Proclus. 2007. On Providence. Translated by Carlos Steel. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Rivaud, A. 1906. Le Problem Du Devenir. Paris: Alcan.Search in Google Scholar
Roberts, A., et al (eds.). 1994. The Early Church Fathers, 38 vol. Peabody: Hendrickson Publishers.Search in Google Scholar
Ross, W. D. 1923. Aristotle. London: Methuen & Co. Ltd.Search in Google Scholar
Ross, W. D. 1936. Aristotle’s Physics. Oxford: Clarendon.10.1093/actrade/9780198141099.book.1Search in Google Scholar
Ross, W. D. 1958. Aristotle’s Metaphysics. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Search in Google Scholar
Sambursky, S. 1956. “On the Possible and the Probable in Ancient Greece.” Osiris 12:35–48.10.1086/368595Search in Google Scholar
Sambursky, S. 1959. Physics of the Stoics. London: Routledge.Search in Google Scholar
Schopenhauer, A. 1974. The Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason. Translated by E. F. J. Payne. Le Salle: Open Court.Search in Google Scholar
Seneca, L. A. 1935. Moral Essays. 3 vol. Translated by John W. Basore. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Seneca, L. A. 1971. Natural Questions, 2 vol. Translated by Thomas H. Corcoran. Cambrdge: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Sharples, R. W. 1979. “‘If What Is Earlier, Then of Necessity What Is Later’? Some Ancient Discussion of Aristotle.” De Generatione Et Corruptione 2.11.” Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies 26:27–44.10.1111/j.2041-5370.1979.tb00493.xSearch in Google Scholar
Sharples, R. W. 1986. “Soft Determinism and Freedom in Early Stoicism.” Phronesis 31:266–79.10.1163/156852886X00164Search in Google Scholar
Sharples, R. W. 2010. Peripatetic Philosophy 200BC to AD 200: An Introduction and Collection of Sources in Translation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511781506Search in Google Scholar
Simplicius. 1997. On Aristotle’s Physics 2. Translated by Barrie Fleet. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Simplicius. 2002. On Aristotle’s Categories 7–8. Translated by Barrie Fleet. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Simplicius. 2004. On Aristotle’s on the Heavens 1.5–9. Translated by R. J. Hankinson. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Simplicius. 2006. On Aristotle’s on the Heavens 1.10–12. Translated by R. J. Hankinson. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Sorabji, R. 1980. “Causation, Laws, and Necessity.” In Doubt and Dogmatism, Edited by M. Schofield, M. Burnyeat, and J. Barnes, 250–82. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Search in Google Scholar
Sorabji, R. 1980. Necessity, Cause, and Blame: Perspectives on Aristotle’s Theory. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Sorabji, R. (ed.) 2005. The Philosophy of the Commentators: 200–600 AD. 3 vol. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Stephanus. 2000. On Aristotle’s ‘on the Soul 3.9–13,’ with on Aristotle’s ‘on Interpretation’. Translated by William Charlton. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Strang, C. 1960. “Aristotle and the Sea Battle.” Mind 69:447–65.10.1093/mind/LXIX.276.447Search in Google Scholar
Suárez, F. 1994. On Efficient Causality: Metaphysical Disputations 17, 18, and 19. Translated by Alfred J. Freddoso. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Taylor, R. 1957. “The Problem of Future Contingencies.” The Philosophical Review 66:1–28.10.2307/2182851Search in Google Scholar
Upton, T. V. 1987. “The Principle of Excluded Middle and Causality: Aristotle’s More Complete Reply to the Determinist.” History of Philosophy Quarterly 4:359–67.Search in Google Scholar
Waterlow, S. 1982. Nature, Change, and Agency in Aristotle’s Physics. Oxford: Clarendon Press.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198246534.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
White, M. J. 1980. “Necessity and Unactualized Possibilities in Aristotle.” Philosophical Studies 38:287–98.10.1007/BF00375662Search in Google Scholar
White, M. J. 1981. “Fatalism and Causal Determinism.” Philosophical Quarterly 31:231–41.10.2307/2219112Search in Google Scholar
Williams, D. 1951. “The Sea Fight Tomorrow,” in Structure, Method and Meaning. New York: Liberal Arts Press.Search in Google Scholar
Williams, C. J. F. 1986. “Some Comments on Metaphysics E. 2, 3.” Illinois Classical Studies 11:181–92.Search in Google Scholar
Xenophon. 1959. Memorabilia. Translated by E.C. Marchant. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Search in Google Scholar
von Armin, H. 1903–5. Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta, 3 vol. Stuttgart: Teubner.Search in Google Scholar
©2016 by De Gruyter