Philosophy of Science in the Light of the Perennial Wisdom by Mahmoud Bina & Alireza K. Ziarani

Author:Mahmoud Bina & Alireza K. Ziarani
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: World Wisdom
Published: 2020-12-10T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 4

THE DOCTRINE OF CAUSES

Science, for Aristotle, is the knowledge of causes: “We think we have knowledge of a thing only when we have grasped its cause.”1 Accordingly, in order to grasp the notion of science, we will have to develop an understanding of causes.

Aristotle identified four causes: (i) final, (ii) efficient, (iii) formal, and (iv) material, in response to questions of the (i) purpose, (ii) agent, (iii) design, and (iv) material of a thing. For example, the purpose, or final cause, of a wooden dining table is to dine at it; its agent, or efficient cause, is the carpenter who made it; its design, or formal cause, is its shape; and its material, or material cause, is wood.

Aristotle’s doctrine of causes is incomplete in itself, as we shall see when we consider the comprehensive account of the Platonic doctrine of causes. Even so, since the time of Galileo and Newton, the general tendency of scientists has been to ignore the final cause, and to treat natural phenomena from a more limited perspective—although, more recently, there have been voices that call for the reinstatement of the final cause into the scientific perspective.2 The modern scientist, by and large, is concerned with the mechanism of creation. As such, modern science is the knowledge of the lower Aristotelian causes.

It has been said that Plato’s philosophy is heavenly, but that Aristotle made it earthly. According to Marsilio Ficino, “Plato deals with natural things divinely, while Aristotle treats divine things naturally.”3 In other words, Aristotle’s philosophy is Plato’s philosophy become earthly. And in the words of St. Bonaventure, “It seems that, among philosophers, it was given to Plato to speak of wisdom, to Aristotle of science. The former looked mainly towards the higher things, the latter mainly towards the lower.”4 This can be seen clearly in their respective doctrines of causes. For Plato, there are six causes: (i) final, (ii) paradigmatic, (iii) efficient, (iv) instrumental, (v) formal, and (vi) material.5 The paradigmatic cause is the model after which a thing is made, and the instrumental cause is the instrument by which a thing is made.

Plato refers to the first three causes, namely, the final, paradigmatic, and efficient causes, in the following passage from his Timaeus:

It is, moreover, a question of knowing after which of the two models the Creator and Father of the world constructed it: after that which is immutable and always the same, or after that which has come into existence. If the world is beautiful and its Creator good, undoubtedly, He constructed it after the eternal model . . . for the world is the fairest of all that has come into existence, and its Creator the best of all causes. . . . Let us state the reason the Creator had in forming the becoming and the world. He was good, and he that is good never has envy concerning anything, and being devoid of envy, He desired that all should be, so far as possible, like unto Himself. Whoever,

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