Abstract

This is an essay in the tradition of classical philosophy which has passed through the criticisms of contemporary philosophy. Lieb argues that views of man which treat him as a conglomerate of separate parts or powers are inadequate because they fail to account for the unity and singleness of beings. We are, according to Lieb, active beings and action is always interaction. We are things to which and in which change takes place and we in turn change other things. We are in time but we also stand apart from it in the sense that we act on time. This does not mean, however, that we are merely transient. We achieve some identity and to explain this we appeal to a being beyond transience with which we interact and we think of this as God or as a kind of god. And to explain that we and our activity incorporate an intelligible and partly public character we appeal to another reality, the intelligible continuity that we find in things or what philosophers have called the Good.