display all the ideas for this combination of texts
6 ideas
| 561 | Is there cause outside matter, and can it be separated, and is it one or many? [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: We must especially inquire and investigate whether there is any cause beyond matter in itself or not, and whether this is separable or not, and whether it is one or many in number. | |
| From: Aristotle (Metaphysics [c.324 BCE], 0995b28) |
| 14586 | Physical causation consists in transference of conserved quantities [Dowe, by Mumford/Anjum] |
| Full Idea: For Dowe physical causation consists in transference of conserved quantities. | |
| From: report of Phil Dowe (Physical Causation [2000]) by S.Mumford/R.Lill Anjum - Getting Causes from Powers 10.2 | |
| A reaction: [see Psillos 2002 on this] This is evidently a modification of the idea of physical causation as energy-transfer, but narrowing it down to exclude trivial cases. I guess. Need better physics. |
| 4787 | Causation interaction is an exchange of conserved quantities, such as mass, energy or charge [Dowe, by Psillos] |
| Full Idea: Dowe argues that a 'causal process' is a world line of an object with a conserved quantity (such as mass, energy, momentum, charge), and a 'causal interaction' is an exchange between two such objects. | |
| From: report of Phil Dowe (Physical Causation [2000]) by Stathis Psillos - Causation and Explanation §4.4 | |
| A reaction: This looks very promising. Nice distinction between causal process and causal interaction. 'Conserved quantities' is better physics than just 'energy'. We can hand causation over to the scientist? |
| 588 | We exercise to be fit, but need fitness to exercise [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Exercise is the cause of fitness, but fitness is also the cause of exercise. | |
| From: Aristotle (Metaphysics [c.324 BCE], 1013b10) |
| 634 | Pure Forms and numbers can't cause anything, and especially not movement [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: If we allow Forms or numbers, they will not be the cause of anything, or, if that is too strong, they will at any rate not be the cause of any movement. | |
| From: Aristotle (Metaphysics [c.324 BCE], 1075b23) | |
| A reaction: This is Benacerraf's famous observation (1973) that we can't accept a platonic account of numbers because, lacking causal powers, they are unknowable. |
| 14543 | When a power and its object meet in the right conditions, an action necessarily follows [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Whenever the potential active and the potentially affected items are associated in conditions propitious to the potentiality, the former must of necessity act and the latter must of necessity be affected. | |
| From: Aristotle (Metaphysics [c.324 BCE], 1048a08) | |
| A reaction: Of course the world could end between the two happenings, so this can't be full-scale metaphysical necessity. That point is not enough, though, to get rid of Aristotle's intuition here. |