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Why Aristotle Invented the Word Entelecheia (Continued)Author(s): Wm. E. RitterReviewed work(s):Source: The Quarterly Review of Biology, Vol. 9, No. 1 (Mar., 1934), pp. 1-35Published by: The University of Chicago PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2808485 .
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8/11/2019 Ritter E Why Aristotle invented the world Entelecheia Continued.pdf
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VOL.
9,
NO. I
MARCH,
I934
THE
QUARTERLY
REVIEW
of
BIOLOGY
WHY
ARISTOTLE
INVENTED
THE
WORD
ENTELECHEIA
(Continued)
BY WM. E. RITTER
SECOND FOREWORD
LETTERS
voked y the
portion f this rticle
published year go, have shownme that
nowhere n the substance f the rticle o
I make clear theground
f my nterestn
the problemdiscussed.
That ground s,
first nd
most deeply,my nterest
n
Nature-in
all
Nature-not
n a
fewparts
of t that
happen
o
strike
my personal ikes or dislikes. This interest rew,
slowly
and
long, sometimes
nterruptedlyut never
menacingly, nd led me, finally, o "accept the Uni-
verse."
Though always hesitant bout
being
too
hard
on
the
Universe,
ven on the partsof
t
that were east
to
my aste, t was not till aftermy
period
f
nfallible
knowledge bout t andcantankerousriticism f dis-
approved arts f t (period, .e., of early nd middle
life)that became uly mpressed
ith
the
ereneway
Nature
gets long
n
theface
f
fault-finding
ith
her.
Nottillthen idmy cceptance ecomewhole-hearted.
Butother actorsontributedo
the cceptance.One
of
he
most
nfluential
f
thesewas
the
clarification
f
my understandinghat we ourselves re
parts
of
the
Universe n so vital a fashion s to
be privileged,
n-
deed
compelled, y
the
very
nature
f
the
case,
to
con-
tribute o making
he
Universe
what t
is
on
any par-
ticular ay of our ives.
Seeingthatby no hook or crookcan we do other-
wise, t is best, hen,forus to
accept
he Universe-
as
a
reality.
But, eeing
furtherhat
we
cannot
void
contributingo changes n thatreality,t is bestfor
us to see to
it
as far s possible
hat these
hanges
rc
good forus.
Vast scientific
esearches
ave made
he nterrelated-
ness
of parts f nature armoremanifest o us than t
has been
to previous enerations.
We ourselves
nd
the
myriad ther iving
things, ikewise
the earth,
the un
and all the
heavenly osts,
withoutwhich we
neither
ive nor
move nor have any
being-of
such
does reality urn
ut to be.
Travel n this
highway
ed me
n
due
time o recog-
nize he
need f ome ne
word r phrase or xpressing
a truth
bout reality hat
is not
expressed y any
English word. Aristotle'sfamousword entelecheia
comesverynear
filling his need.
The phrase
com-
plete
reality," doptedby
W. D. Ross as an
English
equivalent or he
word, s
justifiableo far
s myvery
meager
nowledge f the
Greek anguage nables
me
to judge. "Fulfilment"
rofessor oss kindly ug-
gests
owby etter s a possible
ingle-wordquivalent.
This would be
fine
f
t could nclude
he dea
of
gene-
sis
as
unmistakably
s does "complete
reality;"
for
the nclusion f
this dea is unquestionably
ne
of the
chiefmerits ftheword.
Theseparagraphsrea revision f theForewordo
the installment
lreadypublished.
Their purpose
s
to make
learermyprimary
nterestn this tudy.
But
I
want
also to make clear
my econdary
nterest,
he
question f Aristotle's
ttitude oward,
and
concep-
tion
of,Nature.
Intrinsicallyhe
man
was
cast
n the
same
spiritualmold, according
o my view,
that
all
the great
naturalists f all
the ages
have been
cast n.
Of these
naturalists
mention nly
two,
restricting
myself
hus for
a reasonthat will
appear
as
we
go
along.
The two
chosen reCharles
arwin
and
T. H.
Huxley.
In
several ate publications
t is
pointed
ut
that ll
naturalistsmay be ranged
n two great ubdivisions.
For
one
of
these
the
terms ave
and analytic,
or
he
I
QUAR.
RBV.
BIOL.,
VOL.
9,
NO. I
8/11/2019 Ritter E Why Aristotle invented the world Entelecheia Continued.pdf
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T THE QUARTERLY
REVIEW OF
BIOLOGY
other
philosophic
nd
synthetic,
ave
been
suggested.
Neither
he naming
nor the
defining
f the
groups
s
particularly
asy. There
s, however,
ne
character-
istic hat
s of
lmost
nfailing
iagnostic
alue.
That
is the presence r absence n a givennaturalist f in-
terestn,
and
effortn,
thenature
f
knowledge
tself,
the
epistemology
f
traditional
hilosophy.
Any
naturalistwho "accepts
the universe"
n the
sense bove
indicated,
.e., not
only
because
he can't
help
himself
but
because
he is eager
and glad
to,
thereby
ommits
himself o
some serious
attention
to the problem
f
knowledge.
This for
he obvious
reason
hathaving
ccepted
imself
s
part f the
uni-
verse,
he has accepted
ll
of
his activities.
Among
these
ctivities
rehis
getting
nd
using
fknowledge.
So it turns
ut
that very
uch
naturalist elongs
willy-
nilly, o
both
the subclasses
f theclass ofnaturalists
we are
recognizing.
But so well-nigh
universal
s
the
custom mong
modern
tudents f
the
natural
ciences o
limiE
heir
studies
o theexternal
world
hat ny
tendency
ther-
wise
has tended
o
bring
ll repute
pon
the
venturer.
To be
"objective"
is the unfortunate
erm
hosen
s
descriptive
f the proper
method
f
procedure.
The
need
formore
ritical ttention
o themeaning
f this
and many
ther
wordsused
by
naivenaturalists
s
one
of
the
things
hat
makes
t
important
or
very
aive
naturalist o become lso a philosophicalnaturalist
in some
measure. (In
anticipation
f the
legitimate
query
s
to what
mypretensions
o
being philosophi-
cal
naturalist
est
n,
refer
o a
few,
ather
ragmen-
tary,
writings
f
this
purport
hich
havethus
ar
een
published:
itter
nd
Bailey,
927,
i92.8,
i929;
Ritter,
192-9, 1931.)
So
prodigious
n
size
and
complexity
f
structure
and action
s the
portion
of
nature
utside
f
us,
and
so
fascinating
s
it,
too,
that
t is neither urprising
nor
deplorable
hat the
vast
majority
f
naturalists
shouldoccupy hemselveseryargelywith the tudy
of
this
portion
f
nature.
But
it is also
neither
ur-
prising
or deplorable
hat
a
considerable
umber
f
naturalists
hould
be
more
nterested
n the
processes
themselves
f getting
nd
using
knowledge
han
in
the
things
known nd used.
Of
all those
who
have
accepted
nature
he most
fully
nd
devoted
themselves
most single-mindedly
and effectively
o thestudy
f
her
n
the
fashionwe
have denominated
s
naive,
no one
seems
to have
equalled,
much ess
o have urpassed,
harles
arwin.
The implication f this,thatthe exaltedplaceheld
by
Dawrin
among
cientists
s due
to
his
labors
s
a
naive
naturalist
o the
almost
entire
exclusion
of
labors
s
a
philosophical
aturalist,
s likely
o come
with something
f a shock
to
most,
perhaps o
all,
scientists.
Yct
in
so
far
s
occupation
with the
prob-
lem
fknowledge
s taken
s
a criterionf
philosophy,
Darwin's
loofness an
be shown
withgreat
learness.
All professional
hilosophers
ho have
given
atten-
tion to the point
seem greed
n
this. The truth
f
it deservesmore ttentionhan it has
received.
T. H.
Huxley, n the
otherhand,
s allied
withthe
philosophical
s well
as with
the naive
naturalists.
His Hume, ume
with
Helps o he
tudy
fBerkeley,
nd
portions
fhis articles
n Agnosticism
ed
him far nto
theproblem
f knowledge.
Thesewritings
mark im
as a philosophical
aturalist
uite as definitely
s his
writings
n marinenvertebrates,
nfossil
ertebrates,
and on
human
natomy
nd physiology
mark
him
as
a naive naturalist.
In unpublished
manuscript
f
the larger
work of
which this article
s a part,
draw
quite a "parallel
lives" of Aristotle nd Huxley. In the likeness n
type
fthe
two, nothing
tands
ut
more
harply han
theircommon
haracteristic
f
nasiv-ness
n the one
hand, and philosophic-ness
n the
otherhand.
Both
did extensive
esearches n
marine
nvertebrateool-
ogy,
hat
s to
say,
on
animals ar own
he oological
scale
n
one direction;
nd also on man
nd the higher
vertebrates
n
the other
direction.
The conclusion
reach
bout Aristotle
may
be epi-
tomized s
follows:
n
original
responsiveness
here
is every
eason
o suppose
his bent
was toward
ccept-
ing naturenthe sense ndicated. His childhood nd
earlyyouth,
ived
n
a
home nvironment
f
medicine
and
surgery
nd a
neighborhood
nvironment
f
hills,
valleys
and
streams,
nd
of
sea
and
shore,
s these
entered o
largely
nto the physical eography
f
the
almostprimitive
Macedonia
of
that
time,
would
be
especially
avorable
or uch
a
bent.
A flood
of
par-
ticulars-sensoryparticulars-largely
rimal,
never-
ceasing,
ever-varying,
oured
upon
the
boy
from ll
sides.
Research
f
late
years
has
convinced
s
that
the
nfluencef
nvironment
n
the
mentality
f
young
childrenssuch hat onditionsikethose nderwhich
Aristotle
ived as
a
boy
are
by
no
means
nsignificant
for
he restof
ife.
Then
came the
transplantation
f
the
youth
to
the
vastly
different
nvironment,
hat of
a
city
and
a
culture of
peerless
grandeur.
Athens
and
the
Academy
The flood
that
poured
upon
the
youth
and
young
man
for
lmost wenty
ears-what
a contrast
t
was
from
he
flood
hat
had
poured
upon
the
boy
Uni-
versals
ow,
not particulars,
ere
its chief
ubstance.
Andthismeant houghtsmore han ense erceptions.
Subtleties
f expression,
ialectic nd
rhetoric
more
thannames, escriptions
nd
classifications
f
bserved
objects
were
now
the constituents
f the
flood.
But no
environment
hatever
s the
whole
story
for ny
iving eing.
The being
tself
s
an
essential-
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ARISTOTLE AND
ENTELECHEIA
3
an exceedinglyssential-partof
the
story. Particu-
larly s this o if the being s as highly onstituteds
is
a
humanbeing. Most particularly
f all is it so if
the humanbeinghappens o be an
Aristotle.
Readily s theyouth esponded
o, profoundlys he
was influenced y, the stream hat flowedfrom he
Athenian and Academic environment,his stream
could not entirely bliterate he nfluence
f the flood
to which he was
subject
s a boy.
Consequently,s
he neared hematurityfmanhood nd passedbeyond
theprecinctsftheAcademy, e began o feel,we may
conjecture,hat hekindofthing e experienced ears
ago
in
Macedoniawas not essreal than the
kindhe
had now experiencedn Athens, nd hence thatthe
two mnuste
n
harmony t somegreatdepth
f
truth.
Distressinglycant hough hebiographical vidence
is, t ustifieshe urmise hat t thiscritical eriod f
his lifeAristotle aught a gleam
that ed him to be-
come, finally,
he
"type specimen" this
technical
term am ntitled
o
use from
myvocation s
a taxon-
omist
n
natural
history)
of
the
subspeciesphilo-
sophicalnaturalist,
f
he pecies aturalist,ccording
to
our
classification.
The
truth, gleam
of which
imagine
him to
have
caught, concerns
he
phrase:
"accept the
universe."
Is the phrase o be taken s merely
hese wo words
with
ome ll-defined eaning ttached o them?
Or
is it to be takenwith a meaning hat correspondso
the
objective
ruth
bout the Universe
nd the emo-
tional-rational
ruth
bout accepting?
The constitu-
tution f the universes suchthat
t must e accepted
both
n
its stateof wholeness nd n
its
state
of com-
positeness.
He
who attempts
o
accept
it
on
any
other
basis
than ts
oneness
n the one hand,
nd ts
manyness
n
the
other
hand,
makes
he attempt
t the
peril
ofhis
own
oneness,
r
ntegrity.
As to
size
and
number
f
parts, he universe as
no limits
o
far s
observational nowledge
has
been able
to ascertain.
As to thecreative nd sustentativeowers ftheuni-
verse,
here
re no observably emonstrable
imits
o
itspowersof sustaining lready xisting arts nd of
producing ew parts.
Of
these ruths bout the universe, ristotle aught
hardlymore han gleam. How could he have done
better?
So small
portion
f the
universe,
nd
so few
of
ts
parts
were
accessible
n
his
day,
the wonder
s
that
he shouldhave
caught
ven
this
much.
Butcatching ven hismuch f thetruth ufficed
o
endue
himwith sensitivenesso all thethings
ound
abouthim,with uriositybout heir eepestmeaning,
and with determination
o
satisfy
imself
n
these
scores. Accordingly,
hen
about
forty ears
ld
he
laid
out
for
himself
he
task,
recognizable y
us now
as
inconceivably ast,
of
acquiring knowledge
nd
understandinghat
should be coextensive
n size and
commensuraten detail with the Universe.
He would produce science f the whole Universe
in contradistinctiono the cience aught t theAcad-
emy which he seeminglyand I thinkrightly)re-
garded as in effect
n attempt o avoid
accepting
exceedingly mportant
arts of the Universe.
The
historic fact and the probable significance
hereof
that Aristotle urned
with greatest eriousness
o the
study f nature fter
is extensive tudies n theAcad-
emy, ppearto be
gaining recognition
y specialists
in the Aristotelian ritings. All naturalists
measur-
ably acquainted
with the whole situation
would, I
think, gree thatsuch pretended atural
knowledge
as
thatpresented
n
the Timaces,
or
xample,
ouldbe
no more cceptable o Aristotle s a naive
naturalist
than he PlatonicForms nd deas were cceptable o
him as a philosophicalnaturalist.
But the undertaking
hat Aristotleproposed
for
himself as gigantic ven
n his
day,
relatively mall
and
simple hough
he Universe
hen eemed. As a
naive naturalist e
mustdescribe, ame,
nd classify
all its lands and waters and
the
nhabitants
hereof;
the un,moon nd
stars; heblue sky;
the
air with
ts
winds and storms;
nd whatever lse mightbe
con-
tained n the floodof sensory xperience.
Further-
more he;causes, otencies,
nd actualities
f all
these,
he would have to consider.
The
attempt
o
carry
ur
this
part
of
his
program
was responsible
or ringing pon
his head
themodern
witheringriticism
f uperficiality.
rom
preading
himself ver verything
nd consequently eing
hor-
ough
in
nothing,
is
labors, thoughuniversally
d-
mitted o be almost nsurpassed
n volume,
reviewed
by
some
xact scientists
f our
day
as valueless f not
worse. It
s
true hatmuch f
ll
natural
cience ince
the Greekperiod
maybe looked upon
as
additions o
Aristotle's eginnings
nd corrections
f
his
errors.
This is particularlyruefor hesciences f nanimate
nature. But there
s much ruth
n
it
too for
he sci-
ences of
animate
nature-the
sciences
n which his
chief esearches
ere
made.
But,
foundational s were
Aristotle's
ttributes
s
a
naive
naturalist,
more definitive
f
him were his
attirbutes
s
a philosophical
naturalist.
For the
problem of knowledge
was his
main concern, s
everybody nows,
n
his "First
Philosophy"called
Metaphysicsy later
students) nd
in his
group
of
treatises enerally
alledby
his successorshe
Organon,
orLogic. The final est fhow far heman ucceeded
in
carrying
ut
his grand roject
must
esought
here.
Far
be
it
from
me
to presumemyself ompetent
o
apply
his
est ully. My
task s
much maller.
It is
only
that
of finding
he use
Aristotlemade
of his
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4
THE
QUARTERLY
REVIEW OF
BIOLOGY
termentelecheia
n
his treatment f the problem f
knowledge, ith a view to learningwhether e could
use it, when speaking s a philosophicalnaturalist,
consistently ith his use of it when speaking s a
naive naturalist. My effortspeak for themselves,
chieflyn the portion f this articlehere presented.
Sincethey ontainmymost mportantestrictionsn,
and deviations rom heAristotelianeachings make
this
expiativeremark:Allusion was made above to
thepatent act hat hevastprogress fnatural cience
sinceAristotle's imehas consisted argely n adding
to and correcting, hat he did. Adding nd correct-
ing thus s in the very ssence f naturalknowledge.
Especially
s this trueof such
knowledge s belongs
to the realmcultivated y naive naturalists. Why,
then, hould we not expect hat something f these
processeswould operate n the realm cultivated y
philosophical aturalists?But thenature f cientific
and
philosophic nowledge
would
ustify
he
xpecta-
tion
hat ddition
nd
correction ould play
far
esser
parts here. Gcneralization, bstraction, deation,
reason, bringing reat massesof sense data under
common iewpoint, re ust
what make
philosophical
naturalism s an indispensable orrelate of
naive
naturalism,
he two
together onstituting
aturalism
in its full meaning.
Whatever f
merit rdemerit
ay elong
o
Aristotlc
in mankind's fforto know itself nd the world of
which t is a part, his much, ccording
o
my
nter-
pretation, ill stand o his credit s long as thisdesire
and
effort
hall
continue:
He
saw,
as none
before
im
and
few since,
have
seen, that
success
n the
Great
Enterprizes contingent pon the acceptance
f
the
Universe oth as
One
Whole and as Manyparts
aken
one
by one,
to
constitute
he
whole.
Any nterpreta-
tionofAristotle hatwould class
him
s
a
sub-natural-
istic atomist r elementalist r as a supra-naturalistic
"holist,"
is
untrue o
the
deepest ature
f the
man.
So far s the ground fthis nterpretations reduc-
ible to a minimum f singlewords,
hose
wordsare:
Abvagts
dunames), power,potentiality;
E4pyeta
(energeia), ctivity,ctuality:
nd
EvreXkxeta
entel-
echeia) completeeality,ulfilment.
f these
he
ast s
far-and-away
he most
mportant
ince
t takes ac-
count fnot
only
he
whole, anywhole, but
of
all
its
constituent
arts,
nd
of
ts
coming
o
fulfilment
y
a
course
f
ndividual
development.
A
postscript
o
those,
ome
of
themfriends r
ac-
quaintances, thers ersonally nknown ome,who
have
made
valuable
comments
nd criticisms n the
portion
f
the article
lreadypublished:
t is a
great
satisfaction
o
me,
and
will, hope, be reassuring
o
readers enerally, hatin every
ase these
commen-
taries
some
ofthem rom
ighly ompetent
echnical
sources) gree hat the main
point of my contention
is well taken.
For reasonsthat seem
obvious t is impracticable
to take advantagenow of all the useful uggestions
givenme. Butwhen nd f he rticle omes to publi-
cation n thewhole ofwhich t was written s a part,
these and such furtheruggestions s may come, I
certainly ount on for
mprovementsf that whole.
II
CAUSE AND THE
WHOLE-AND-ITS-PARTS
In
the firstnstallment fthis essay we
carried he examination
fthe
concept
f
a
whole-and-its-parts,s worked out to a
large extent by
Aristotle,
ar
enough to
see something
f
what is involved
when
theconcept
s
applied
to
individual
human
beings.
But
very
much more remains o
be
seen
n
this direction.
The "complete
reality" (entelecheia)f
such
a
being certainly
ncludes he entire
gamutof its conscious
as well
as infra-
conscious) experiences.
Now, nothing
s more ertain
han
hat
within
these
experiences
re
the
most
exalted
aspects
of rational and
spiritual
life
on
the one hand, ndthemostunquali-
fiedly hysicalaspects
of nutritional nd
sexual
feeling
nd
ction
onthe
otherhand.
What,
from his
standpoint,
id
Aris-
totle do for these
aspects
of
human ife?
Two
negativebut yetimportant
nswers
are readilygiven:
i)
We may be surehe
did not
overlook
or minimize he
reality
and mportancef
ither
spect.
We know
him
to
have
been too good
as
both
natu-
ralist nd philosopher or hat; X)wemay
be
sure
he
could not
possibly,
however
capably
he
might ry,
e
fully
uccessfuls
to either
aspect.
His
knowledge
of
the
structure nd actions of
animals
and
of
natural bodies generallywas muchtoo
scanty
nd
error-pervaded.
onsequently,
in
striving
o answer
ur
question,
we must
follow the course
pursued
hus
far
n
this
study.
We mustexamine
what
Aristotle
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ARISTOTLE AND
ENTELECHEIA
5
knew nd thought
nd did in the light
of
what moderns
now nd think nd do.
The examinationmay well begin
with
a more careful crutinizing nd appraise-
ment hanwe haveyetmadeof the factual
data
now
n
our
possession
n
their earing
on
the problem
f the causal relations e-
tween a body
in
its wholeness
and the
parts of which
it is composed. Readers
of the Aristotelianwritingshardlyneed
reminding urther
f the relationof this
problem o Aristotle's
our usual method
of
investigation,"
the method,
namely,
ofanalyzing whole into its parts. But
sufficientoticehas not yet been taken
of
the relationbetween his problem nd
the
Aristoteliandeasof a whole-and-its-parts
and
of form nd
matter. With nearly
ll
of
modern cience
he
notion
has
much he
forceof a religiousdogma that
to
ana-
lyze a compound
nto its least parts
s to
explain that compoundcausally.
Or at
anyrate, o the dogma holds, if in a par-
ticular
case the
explanation
s not quite
ultimate, his is
because the analysis
has
not yet gone far
enough. The ultimate
goal of explanations, per e,
where naly-
sis ends. So
far
s
the nner ature
f om-
pounds
is
concerned, ausality
works
in
one directiononly, i.e.,
from
parts
and
elements oward
the whole.
Indeed,
so
far
as concerns he
nature f
compounds,
it is hardly oo muchto saythat cause is
conceived to
be
that which
the parts,
especially
he east
parts,
do to and
for he
compounds hey
compose.
Sucha
notion s
that
body
n
tswhole-
nessmay act causallyon its parts
notonly
has almost no place
in
modern
cience,
but
with the
ultra-analytic
chool
such
a
notion s heresy
nd should be
treated
s
such. Cause mustbe so conceivedand
defined s to exclude
he notion.
Something
fthescope
and
depth
of
the
Aristotelian isagreement
ith this posi-
tion s
known oeveryone cquainted
with
theAristotelian
writings.
The
involvement f the idea of
cause
in
these writings s of course one of
the
characteristics nd one of the specially
hardand controversial
hings bout
them.
A
brief xamination f thisquestion
ppearsthe
more opportune t present
ecause of whatGeneral
Smuts as givenus or
rather, as notgivenus)
on the
question. No one can,
think, ead Holism nd Evo-
lution nd
otherwritings f
his
uthor n this
general
subject
without eingdeeply mpressed. But for
me,
at
least, the mpressions
considerably
mixed
wing
tothe fact hat find oevidence, ither irect r in-
direct, hatthe
authorhas
studied
eriously,
f
at
all,
the works
of Aristotle
n
their
earings
n the
prob-
lem
fwholenessSmuts,
925, I93I).
Modern
cience,
biology especially,has
taken
much
cognizance
of some of
the
toughest f these
things.
A
generaldis-
cussion
f
the
controversial
atters
ere s
not tobe thought f,nor
would t be
more
than lightly elevanto ourmain urpose.
Thereare, however,
hree
things
n
the
Aristotelian eachings boutcause hat
are
sharply
elevant o
our
purpose.
Two of
these,
the material ause and the
formal
cause,
have
been
discussed lmost
ndlessly
in
the
past. The third,
the
principle f
multiple ause, appears
to
have received
little
f
any
close
attention.
Yet the evi-
dence that Aristotle
ecognized
his
prin-
cipletosome xtents conclusive ndseems
more
ignificant
or
stimating
herelation
of his
knowledge
nd
thought
o
modern
knowledge and thoughtthan
has been
appreciated.
One
piece
of
evidence n the
point
s
this
-Following
the
definitionf
thefour
auses
n
the
"Philosophical
Lexi-
con"
we
read:
"These,
then,
re
the
auses,
and this s
thenumber
f their
kinds,but
the varieties fcauses remanynnumber.
. .
.
Causes
are
spoken
of
n
many
senses"
(Metaphysics
OI3b
z8-3o
Ross
trans.)
Al-
though
many
llustrations, y
nferencet
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6
THE
QUARTERLYREVIEW OF BIOLOGY
least, of like
purport ould be given, the
statementtselfwill have to suffice.
We turn now to
what I interpret
s
really a
modernization f one aspect
of
Aristotle's ormal ause. That aspect, x-
pressed
n
terms onsonant
with the grow-
ing demands of theoretical
biology,
s
that
o
the
xtent
Nvhich
s
certainlyarge)
that
Aristotle's dea of
form s the lineal
forerunner
f modernmorphology,
his
formal ause s the inealforerunnerf
the
idea that
a living compoundwhole is
as
truly causal of the organism
s
are
the
parts r elements f which t is composed.
I
venture
o express, ogmatically
t first,
what it
seems
o me the
modern
osition
is or soon must be, on
this question:
Every hole,
specially
very
ivingwhole,cts
causally
n
ts parts s well s being
cted
n
causally
y
tsparts.
The interactionfthe parts
f any body
to
make
that
body
alive
is
now
so
far
un-
derstood hat it is doubtful f the most
extreme
articleist
n
any
of
the ciences
f
living
naturewould defend
he
proposition
that
ny
of
heparts,
ven he
most
minute
and
supposedly
otent, roduce,
ustper e,
the
aliveness
of
an organism.
True,
one
often hears that the atoms
of
modern
physics-orperhaps
more
xactly
he
elec-
trons
nd
protons, ne
or
both,-must be
alive.
But
those who
express his view
admit,of course, hatthis atomic life s
quite
differentrom he obvious
ife of any
particular lant or animal.
For nobody
would
seriously rgue
that an
oak
tree's
aliveness
nd
a
man's
aliveness
re
exactly
the
same,
even
though
the electrons nd
protons f the two are the
same.
So it seems
fair
o
say
that there s
now
general agreement
mong
competent
tu-
dents hat ivingwholes aredependentn
the
interaction mongtheir parts.
The
reciprocal
ction of the parts-theirreac-
tion
to
one
another-their
ausal
action,
each
upon
each-are
productive
f results
in the form f bodies and actions different
from he parts. There is no longer any
factual rcriticallyogical ground or old-
ing thatbecause bacterium r an amoeba
or a jellyfish r a dog or a man is alive,
thereforehe atoms of carbon, nitrogen,
oxygen
and
the rest are alive and were
alive before ver they combined o make
these
organisms.
The
indubitablefacts
compel
he
conclusion hat the potentiali-
tiesof
the toms re uch hatwhen hey
n-
teract mong themselves nd combine o
make
argecompound odies,
f
the inter-
action nd combination ccur nder roper
conditions, he potentialities f
he
atoms
become
actualities as
the
charactersor
qualities or attributes f the particular
organisms.
Even
vitalists, especially
f
working biologists,
would
probably go
this far
n
recognizing he potency f
the
partsof organisms.
Now this
modernly equisite onception
ofpotentiality nd actuality s in full ac-
cord
with the general enor f the Aristo-
telian
teaching.
Crucial
for
the interpretation
f the
phenomena
s the
question
f
the
"proper
condition"for ctualizing he potentiali-
ties
as indicated. And here the Aristo-
telian
theory, esting argely
on
logical
grounds, s distinctly uperior o modern
theory,which lso rests argely
n
logical
grounds.
With
the
superiority
f the Aristotelian
over
he modernogic
in
the case
we
shall
not
here concern urselves ince
we have
touched ts
ganglionic
enter o to
speak,
under heheading The
Law
of dentity."
"Law of Contradiction"would probably
have
been more appropriate
or the
dis-
cussion here
referredo-if
the laws
of
"formal ogic" mustbe noticedat all in
such discussions.
But the
concrete
acts
are,
of
course,
the
point:
A
human
in-
dividual
n
the
baby stage
of his
develop-
ment
s in
that
stage and is
not
in
the
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ARISTOTLE AND ENTELECHEIA
7
adult tage. Otherwise tated he
harac-
teristics
f
the adultarepresent
n the
baby
only potentially.
Much shoddy thinking
about, and worse dealing with, children
seemsto result argelyfrom isregard f
these psychobiologicalfacts.
Our main
point
now is-
oncernedwith
fact
rather
than
with
logic. For we are going to
point
o
facts
with
which the Aristotelian
concept
f formal
ause as definedbove)
is more asily harmonizable han the con-
ceptofelemental-atomicauseof present-
day biological orthodoxy.
NUTRITION, METABOLISM, AND
THE
WHOLE-
AND-ITS-PARTS
The chemistry f assimilation nd me-
tabolism
n
living bodies s
now too well
understood o permit ny nformed erson
to
repeat, xcept s
a
reminiscence
r
joke,
theold
epigram,
One
is
what
he
eats."
The facts-in-commonetween
he
basic
processes n an organism nd in a flame
are an
explanatory ommonplace
f
our
day.
Consequently,ust s no ordinary
mortal
can
be fooled nto believing hat the stick
ofwood
alongsidehis fireplace,
r the
sur-
rounding ir are "essentially he same" as
the flame
nd the warm room
that wood
and air will
cause
f
they ome together
n
the
rightway-even as little can
such
a
mortalbefooled ntobelieving hat he or
anyofhisfriendsre"essentiallyhe ame"
as the
food
they at,
the
air
theybreathe,
and
the water
hey
drink.
In
connectionwith this allusion
to the
similarity etween espiration
nd
combus-
tion
further
eferencehouldbe
made o the
greatpartplayedby the concepts f poten-
tiality nd actuality
n
Aristotle's hinking
andtheseeminglynsignificantart these
play
in
the speculative hinking f some
moderns. Of course, no "dirt farmer,"
or
cook,
or
engineer,
r
practical hemist,
or
maker r
user
of
explosives, r,
n
fact,
anybody acedwith almost any practical
problem, gets on independently f the
principles houghhe may not thinkmuch
about them.
If, however, we attempt o push the
organismal onception eyond he ertainty
of the interaction f partsto produce he
living organism, we find ourselves in
trouble. Especially
re
we troubledfwe
try
o
push
the
conception
with
reference
to human rganisms. However,we shall
now see that f one singlesout himself s
the human
rganism
n
whichto
testthe
conception, egets mportant elpfor he
generalproblem.
I
am fully onvinced
hat
themental nd
physical ctivities nvolved
n
my think-
ing and writing hese ines
are
caused by
the
way myphysical arts
utilize
he
air I
breathe,
he
food
I
eat,
and
the
water
drink.
But
I
am
absolutely
certain no
physiologist
r
physicist,
r
chemist,
r
anycombinedffortsftheirs an discover
by analyzing
me
exactly
how
my parts
act and nteract ith
the
ubstances take,
to
produce
hese
effects.
My certainty
s
thus positive
for the
reason
that
by
the
time
my analyzers
each the crucial
stage
of their
laboratoryundertaking, ,
the
living organism ow sitting
t
my desk,
thinking
nd
writing,
will
be
dead and
gone
for several
days
at
least.
In
other
words,my analyzerswill be trying o do
one or
theother
or both)
of
wo
mpossible
things: i) Trying
o
observe
ausal
proc-
esses
n
actuality
hich went
on and were
ended, many days
or
weeks
ago;
or
(X)
trying
o discover
by
deductive
easoning
parts
and
substances
hat
possess
the
po-
tentialitiesfor
accomplishments
f
man
which the
analyzers now,
but
only
from
the records. They learn nothing about
these
accomplishmentsrom
heir
nalyses.
The
thingsthey
are
trying
o
do we are
sure
re
mpossible
irst nd foremost
rom
examining ritically
ur
own
knowledge-
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8
THE
QUARTERLYREVIEW
OF
BIOLOGY
getting processes.
But
our assurance s
greatly trengthenedy earning hat this
impossibility
was recognizedmore than
two thousandyears go by
Aristotle nd
has been recognized imeand again since
by competent tudents.
Accordingly, eing
certainthat, how-
ever
far
aboratory
tudy
f the
partsand
substances
f me
maygo
in
explainingmy
thinking, nd my acting generally,
t
is
bound
to fail at the mostcrucial
point,
no argument, ust
as
such-argument,
that is,
that
may
profess
o
transcend
entirely ll sense data-could convince
me that
,
myself
hole,
m
as truly
vera
causa
of all
I
am and
do,
as are
any
of the
partsof
me or the
substances
which
enter
into my composition.
After
dmitting,
fully ndgladly,
ll that nalysis
an
prove
thatmyparts
nd
external
ubstances
on-
tributeomaking
me
what
certainly m,
I
am not fully xplained
until
my very
self mrecognizeds also causal of me.
At least to the
extent hat
mythoughts
and acts
and conscious
experiences
iffer
from hose of any
otherperson, see no
causal
explanation
of the fact
consistent
with
great
masses
of
indubitable
natural
knowledge ther
han that
I in
my ndi-
vidual wholeness
ct
throughmypartsto
get
from
he
air
I
breathe,
he
food
I
eat,
andthewater drink,
he
energy ecessary
forproducing he thoughts nd acts and
conscious
xperiences
hus
uniquelymine.
It seems hatmy
ssimilationnd
metabolism
are
s
specifically
ine
s
are
ny fmy onscious
acts or
other
onscious
xperiences.
But as
I
look around
find reat num-
bers
of
other ndividual
organisms
o
like
myself ut also
so differingromme and
all other
ndividuals, hat
am
obligedto
suppose hey, oo, areuniquely rivileged
in
their ssimilation ndmetabolic owers.
Nor
s
this
ll.
Extendingmy nventory
of
other ndividual
rganisms notice
not
only endlessly light
(relatively)
differ-
ences monggreat
numbers f ndividuals,
but
also endlessdifferenceshat are
byno
means
light, nd thatare endless n
kind
and
grade. For
instance my
inventory
containsnot onlywhite men,blackmen,
redmen nd so on, but
fishes nd trees
nd
amoebae.
And then
recall that by al-
mostendless abors men
have discovered
that,mirabile
ictu,
ll
theseendlesskinds
and
gradesof
ndividuals xist, grow, nd
act
by
taking
from he
world external
o
them
the same
fewsimple materials
nd
using
them o theirown individual
needs
and ends, ust as I do
How could any botanistor
chemist r
philosopherexplain,
causally, an euca-
lyptus
tree and an oak tree that
have
flourished or ifty ears
within
a
hundred
yards
of each
other,
heirroots
buried
n
soil
that
any expert
would pronounce
essentially
he same and their
branches,
leaves
and blossoms
bathed in the very
same air and sunshine,without ncluding
the two trees hemselves s causal
factors
-if
anysuch factors re
recognized?
The truth
s,
the
thing
annot
be
done.
Nor
can it
be
seriouslyttempted
ithout
ignoring
r
perverting ome of the most
deep-rooted
nd
wide-reaching rinciples
of
both
common
nd
technical
nowledge.
And such
attempting
s the sortof
thing
Aristotle haracterizeds thechildishness
of trying o explain the obvious by the
unobvious.
This
problem f
the
way livingbeings,
men
particularly,
se materials rom
x-
ternalnature s so
important
hat
we shall
do
well
to look at
it
from
till
another
angle.
Reflect on
what
Mayow, Priestley,
Scheele,
Lavoisier
and whoever lse had
a
hand in the business,did in discovering
oxygen. Reallythey
id
not
beginby
dis-
covering
gas, having
this
name.
They
began
with
certain
bservations,
hat s
to
say
withcertain ense
xperiences.
As
they
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ARISTOTLE AND ENTELECHEIA
9
worked
along,
these
experiences
ecame
to
them
ensedata,
which
they
ecognized
as
the
sensible ualities,
or
properties
f
a certaingaseous body. What Mayow
calledfire ir
igno-aerian) nd
Priestley
e-
phlogisticated
ir, representhis stage
in
thecourse
f
the discovery.
Finally
came
Lavoisierwho by adding
ertain
uantita-
tive
observations
o the (chiefly)qualita-
tive
observations
f
his
predecessors,
ecog-
nized he
body s notreally
a
kind
of
air,
but
o
distinct
s to deserve
name
by
tself.
The word,
oxygen,which
he devised,was
chosen,notice,becauseofwhat inhis ex-
perience,
was its most haracteristic
rop-
erty,
hat of generating
in combination
with other
bodies)
still
other, ompound,
bodies
hatwere
sharp"
to the taste and
in
their
action on
many bodies.
The
newly iscovered
ody
was acid-producing.
Every
tep n this discoverys
in every
other hat
was evermade
n
any
division
of naturalknowledge, nvolved basically
senseexperiences, ccepted
ater as sense
data,
till
ater s sensible ualities
r prop-
ertiesof external odies,which qualities,
or
properties re peculiar
to, or
charac-
teristic,or definitive
f
the bodies.
In
other
words, the observed,r sensible
har-
acteristics
f
nybody zre
ot nly eculiar
o
that
body,
ut are those hings y
whichwe
KNOW
THE BODY.
Andnow comes stillmorevitalpoint.
It is knownto everyone
hat thehistory
of the
discovery
of
oxygen Mayow
to
Lavoisier,
about a hundred ears
ago), is
involvedwith the basic
similarity etween
respiration
and combustion-between
breathing
nd
burning.
So much
a
part
of common
knowledge
s
the dependence
of the
activities f living bodies,
t least
ofall higherplantsand animals,on oxy-
gen,
hat hemerest eferenceo t s
enough
forthis
discussion.
See then he onclusion
hat hediscovery
of
oxygen
eems
to forceupon us: While
Mayow nd
the thers
ere iscovering,y heir
powers fobservation,he ensible ropertiesf
thisgaseous ody,hey ere lsodemonstrating
by
their
owers f iving hat his amebody
possesses ife-givingropertieshat are dis-
coverable
nlyby IVING AND PERFORMING
EXACTLY
THOSE ACTS THEY DID PERFORM
IN MAKING
THE
DISCOVERING.
(Ritter nd
Bailey,
9Z8,
p.
50o)
The
incalculably ast number fpotenti-
alities
of
oxygen
whichthis
nterpretation
requiresmight stagger, ven mystify, s
except or herecognitionhat hepotenti-
alities
of
oxygen,
ike
those
of all other
bodies,
are
really
non-existentorus mor-
tals
except
s
actualizedby the nteraction
of the
bodies
with other
bodies.
Were
if not
for
the
living that was done by
Mayow
and
theothers, he ife-giving o-
tentialities f
oxygen would never have
been
actualized and discovered. Nor is
this all we know thatdoes muchtoward
saving
us from
eing hopelesslymystified
by
our conclusions. Not
only
are
living
men ndotherorganisms ecessary or c-
tualizing
ome of
the
potentialities
f
the
oxygen, but
various familiar
substances
which
constitute he
food and
drink
of
organisms
re
necessary. Carbon
and
ni-
trogen
re
particularly
n
evidence
s
such
necessities. The
truth
s, the entire
mass
of
knowledgepossessedby
us
moderns
s
available
as
aids to
making
uch a
concep-
tion
of
oxygen and
all
the other hemical
elements
pon
which
ife
depends)
ntelli-
gible
to us. It
is
intelligibleo us because
it
is
the
reasoned
ounterpartf our experi-
ence
s
living organisms.
If
we desire o think
heproblem r the
basis
of
some
theory
f
cause,
we
ought
tofind,twouldseem, enuine atisfaction
in
the
concept
of
multiple cause. For
here
many upporting
acts
from
modern
science
are
available,
as well as the fact
8/11/2019 Ritter E Why Aristotle invented the world Entelecheia Continued.pdf
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THE QUARTERLY REVIEW OF BIOLOGY
thatthe dea is recognizablen the history
of knowledge nd thought s far back
as
Aristotle t least.
One may ustifiably onder, t seems o me,whether
the bewildering iscoveries eing made by physics
and chemistryn our day on atomic tructurend
ac-
tionmaynotmean hat ensory nowledge s not
now
touching he hem, o to speak, of the garment
hat
has been and is the common xperience f all living
things.
THE WILL AND THE
WHOLE-AND-ITS-PARTS
From
the
light one may gain on
the
generalproblemof a whole-and-its-parts
by studying
imself s a chemical
trans-
former
o to
speak,
and
then
byasserting
his "natural ights"
s such
transformer,
I
am encouraged
o
take
a still farther
tep
in the same direction.
The
aspect
f
myself
o
which now turn
is that
of
mywanting hings, esolving
o
try
or
hem,
nd
finally ctually arrying
out the resolution s far as possible.
All
this
s
so obviously
t
bottom
n af-
fairof
my very
wn
that no one
would,
I
presume, entureo
nterfereithmemuch.
If, however,
set
up
the contention hat
the
"I"
is
myselfwhole,
is
I, Body-and-
Soul, Mind-and-matter,
ll
an
inseparable
One, ampretty
ureto
be reminded hat
the
interpretation
lmost
universally
c-
cepted
n
such cases
is
very
differentrom
that suggest. True, t would probably
be
granted,
hat
my wanting
nd therest
are
undoubtedlymine, "But," my
correc-
tors
re
quite
ure o remind
me,
"it is
your
will
and
its
adjuncts
that
really
wants,
resolves,
nd executes.
Of
course
this is
largely dependent
on
your body parts,
especially
when
the
executing stage
is
reached.
But
so well-nigh
universalhas
been, and still is, the idea that human
experiences
f the sort
you
mention
re
the
expression
f
something
r othernot
closely dependent,
t least not
dependent
in
a fashion that
is
analytically
demon-
strable,
n
your odyparts nd substances,
it seems heview musthave a solid basis of
truth nd so shouldbe retained. Further-
more, ince the term,Will, appears o be
as good a name s anyfor his analytically
undemonstrable omething, that, too,
may
as well
be retained
with its
original
meaning."
So here
we
are, quite
innocent f intent
or even of preawareness,ace to facewith
the interminable roblem of the will.
But since the path that has led us to it is
clearly
marked
hough
not
much
raveled,
we can not honorably void facing the
problem quarely. And here gain must
intrudemy personal xperiences.
Being a hopeless addict to the habit of
reading n bed at nightwhen by well es-
tablished
aws
ofhealth
should
be asleep,
I
suddenly indmyself anting n orange.
Knowing hatthere s a bag ofthisfruit
n
theadjoiningroom, decidethatas soon
as I have finishedhe chapter am now
reading "Reflex Action and Theism"
in
Wm. James'
The Will to
Believe)
will
go
and
gratifymy
want
want
of
being
nour-
ished nd ofhaving ertain ther eltneeds
satisfied).
The end
of the
chapter aving
been
reached,
close
the
book, ay
t
aside,
throw
back
the
bed
covers, et
out
of
bed,
go
to the
orange-containingoom,
reach
into the
bag, bring
ut an
orange, arry
t
to a table, open a drawerwhich I know
contains
hetools convenient
or
reparing
the fruit
o be eaten,
nd
so
complete
he
preparationorgratifyingsatisfying?)he
wants
now
upon
me.
Then
I
go back
to
bed
and
think
bout
what
I
have
done.
Two
points
connectedwith
my doings
seem
deserving
of
special
attention.
I
notice that had I supplementedll the
pronouns eferring
o
myself-
I,"
"me,"
"my" by
such nouns as
mind,memory,
thought,desire, atisfaction,
should
not
thereby
ave increased
y
one iota
my
un-
8/11/2019 Ritter E Why Aristotle invented the world Entelecheia Continued.pdf
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ARISTOTLE AND
ENTELECHEIA
II
derstanding,
y
achieving, rmy ense
of
benefiting.
f
say
have
a
desire
r feel
needfor
n orange r
anythinglse, surely
meanno
more han f say desire
r need
the hing. Wheneverspeak of thought
or
a
conception s
"enteringmymind"
I
am only aying
n a round-about ay that
I think
r that conceive,
o andso. The
purposes n making
our activities into
abstract
ouns seemvarious nd
are often
farfrom bvious.
There s one
purpose,
however,
hat s clear
enough, n general:
It is a convenient ay
of huntingntothe
background he puzzlingquestionof ex-
actly
why and how one acts
as he does.
When can say
"my choice is
made,"
I
have a feeling f unequivocalness,
f final-
ity, about
what I have
done, that s more
satisfying
han if
I
say
"I
have chosen."
In
the
latter case
I
feel somewhat
more
inclined,
erhaps mpelled,
o explain,to
analyze,
what
I
have done.
Sincethese entences ere writtent is with very
great atisfaction
hat have read the ust-published
book
(Korzybski, 933)
in
which the
whole
subject
of theuse ofgeneralized
nd
abstractwords
s
given
the
most
thoroughgoing
reatment
t
has ever
re-
ceived, o
far s
I
know.
Notice
with me now what
I
do when
I
decide
upon
a
particular
ourse
of action
and then
eally
ct
n
accordance ith that
decision.
When
I
decide
in
conformity
withmywantingan orange,to go, at a
specified
uture
ime,
and do
the
things
believe
will
satisfymywants,
he
question
of what and
how
many parts
of me are
involved
n
making
he
decision,
s surely
averycomplex,
nd at some
points,
bscure
question. Thanks,
however, o the
splen-
did
researches f modern
psychologists,
physiologists,
istologists, nd
biochem-
ists, have,ormayhave, muchofthe an-
swerto
the
question.
But
not
an item
n
all this
knowledge
will
have any
meaning
for he
special
case in
hand,withoutme,
living
organism, s
the
field
f
operation.
But
t is when put the decision-making
aspect of me to the test of my executing
aspects that many of my most concrete,
most onspicuous arts, rove heir
ole
n
the case. Throwing ack bed covers, et-
ting ut ofbed,walkingto the nextroom,
and
all
the rest-the body members n-
volved no five-year-old ill hesitate to
name. Nor will anybody f down-right
intellectualhonesty refuse o grant my
contention hat
they-hands and feet, or
instance-are trulymine and that I truly
do move them.
Furthermore, ome of
my less familiar, hough no less certain
internalmembers o one would think of
ignoring
r
of questioningmy ownership
of-nor
the fact of
my using
them.
But
when
the
question
s raised of
what,
ex-
actly,
ll these
nternal arts are and how
many
here re
ofthem, ome of the diffi-
culties
n the
way ofgetting irect bser-
vational answers are
undoubtedlyvery
great. My chromosomes nd genes, for
instance,-not o speak
of
my toms, lec-
trons and
protons,-how
am I
to learn
theirpart
in
the business? Accordingly
the
xpert nalystsmight roceed, ypically
and legitimately,
o
give hypothetical
n-
swers, nswers,
hat
s
if really egitimate)
intended to be provisional only. And
"provisional" would
have the
two-fold
reference
f
making
he answer hatwould
seemmost ikelyto be true, ndofaiding
furtherffort
oward
he
real,
.e.,
the
ob-
servationally ased,
nswer.
Notice
now
what
my
own attitude nd
view
must
be
in all
this. So
far as
my
experiences,
hether onsciousor uncon-
scious,
were
concerned,
he
observational
distinctness
r
indistinctness
f the
parts
involved,
s not
of the
slightest
moment.
Mydesire or norange,mydecision ogo
after
ne,
and
my
actual
going,
getting,
and
eating t, might
ave
been
s
truly or-
tions
of
my
conscious
experience
when
I
was
a
five-year-old
s when
was a
seventy-
8/11/2019 Ritter E Why Aristotle invented the world Entelecheia Continued.pdf
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THE
QUARTERLY
REVIEW
OF
BIOLOGY
five-year-old.
uch bjective nowledge
f
my parts nd their
ctivities nvolvedas I
have gainedbyhook or crook,has
not cut
the least figure
n the experiences
hem-
selves. Nor does it matter scintilla, o
far s my onscious xperiences concerned,
that theparts ofme by which
I
want
an
orange efy he nalyst's
ffortst complete
discovery.
Such
parts
serve
me
just
as
certainly nd readily
s do suchcrass
parts
as hands,feet, nd mouth.
Well,
I
ask myself, ave
I
real
ground
for upposing hat any desiring,
eciding,
resolving, nd executing may do in any
realm or at any
level, are teetotally
dif-
ferent
from
my
doings in the
realm of
orange ating?
True enough,my wantings,
decidings,
resolvings, nd executings, nvolved
in,
for
xample,
he
part
took
in
producing
the Scripps
nstitution
f
Oceanography,
were remarkably
different rom those
in the citrus example. But, really, so
far as
I
can see,
the differenceoncerned
goal
and
operative
etails ather
han
basic
facts. My act,
or state, of wanting,
ust
per e,appears o
have
been he
same
n
the
two
cases. To
want an
institution
or he
purpose fthesatisfactionshat
knowing
the
Pacific
cean and ts
iving
nhabitants
might bring-wherein
does
the
wanting
qua wanting
ifferrom
wanting
n
orange
forthe purposeof the satisfactions hat
eating
it
might
bring?
As
right
now
I
ransack
my
memory
n
connection
with
the
two series
of
experiences,
t
seems
to
me iterally
rue
that the half-hour eries
connected
with
the
orange
was
in
essence
a
fair
epitome
of the two-decade series
connected
with
the Institution.
That
the
decisions,
he
executive
fforts,
ndthe
satisfactionsnd dissatisfactions iffered
quantitativelymmeasurably
n the two
series s
too
obvious
to need
asserting.
As
to
qualitative
ifference-well
robably,
therewas
some,
specially
n
the matter f
satisfactions.There s, it seems o
me, a
difference
etween physical atisfaction
(nutritional or nstance)and a psychical
satisfaction discovery of truth for in-
stance),that s fundamentallyualitative.
Perhaps the differenceere involves
the
very ssence f uality s doesthe
difference
between
the
different
enses-sight
and
sound-for example.
But
reallywhat seems o me thedeepest
difference
n
the two series
of
experiences
concerns
atisfaction s contrastedwith
dissatisfaction.
f
my range
ase
had had
in it (as it did not have) the element f
obstacles
to
be
met
and entireor partial
defeats o
endure, s, of course, he
Insti-
tution erieshad, the epitome f the atter
by
the
formerwould
have
been more
nearly xact. For nstance ad my
wanting
involved the getting of a whole
meal
insteadof an orange; and had the
getting
of
the
meal
depended argelyon myown
decisionsand executive fforts, ith my
seriousculinary imitations,
he
epitome
would have
been
all thatcould
reasonably
be
expected
of an
epitome.
Nor
would
the
case have
been undamentallyifferent,
so
far
s
I
can
see,
had what wanted
been
a
fortune, woman's hand
in
marriage,
the
production
f the
greatest
cientific
discovery
ver
made,
the
greatestpoem
ever
written,
or the
greatest
social or
governmentaleform ver needed.
It will
never
o to let theviews
here xpressed
appear
s
though holly solable
rom
ertainther
views.
Of
these other iews,"particularly
o
be
mentionedsthat s tohowwanting,he irst
ember
of he
eries,
omeso
be;
and hat s tohow he ctual
acts,
he
ast
members
f
the
eries,ccomplish
he
satisfaction
t which
he whole eries
ims.
But
while
t
would ot
o to
eave
his
matter
ntouched,
thus
eaving
he eader
nawareso
far s this
ext
s
concerned)f ts xistence,hepresentationf these
"other iews"would
nvolve
roblems
ithwhich
the
present
iscussion
s
not concerned.
t
would
be out
of
place
here. Andwe
must
ot
permitny-
thing
o
divert ur ttentionromhe
main ask
n
hand-that
f
discovering,
f
possible,
ow far he
8/11/2019 Ritter E Why Aristotle invented the world Entelecheia Continued.pdf
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ARISTOTLE
AND
ENTELECHEIA
I3
interpretationhat eeminglymust e
given
ntelecheia
is
applicable o man.
On
the basis of
a lifetime f conscious
experiences fwhich the two
herenoticed
are amples, ndof hesuperposition pon
these of much objective
knowledge, I
seem
ustified
n
defining hatmost uthor-
ities would call
my Will as follows: The
word, Will," is a
highbly
eneralized
oun
orname
orwhat ,
a livingwhole, ausemy
parts o
do towardecuring hat believe
ill
be
good orme.
Such
definition
s
likely o strike
manypersons
s
tooshockingly bsurd o merit minute's ttention.
Nevertheless, submit
t with confidencehat
after
while t
will be
recognizeds meriting uch ttention.
One
thing
hat
ontributeso my confidences purely
historical. A glance t the ndexof any
good work
on the
history
f
philosophy ufficeso discover
hat
a
theory,
r
doctrine f ome ort,
f
thewill
has
been
near he
enter f he hief ystems f
philosophy
rom
Augustine o
Nietzsche ndBergson.
Now I
submit
hat
no one
half
awake
to the mod-
ern
pirit f science
and philosophy could
presume
for minute hat a theory f the will which didnot
involve a sound
theory f mental ife
could be
even
approximately
rue r
moderately seful.
Accordingly
he
treatmentf
the
will
bypsycholo-
gists since psychology
as claimed ts independence
of
traditional
hilosophy nd
ics
alliance
with the
natural
ciences
eems
highly ignificant.
To
go into this subject s
extensively
s
even
,
a
non-professional
n
either hilosophy r
psychology
might
go, would be unjustifiable. But a few
speci-
ally relevant
oints
an
be easily ndicated.
On
the
evidence f the ong chapter, Will," inJames'The
PrinciplesfPsychologye know
that this
psycholo-
gisthad no misgivings
in theory
t
least) about the
will's
being subdivision
fthemind nd thus
sub-
ject
to
be
treated
irst
nd foremost
y psychologists.
This
comes to
particularly harp expression
n
the
essay,
Reflex
ction nd
Theism:
From ts
first
awn
to its
highest
ctual
attainment,
e
find hatthe
cog-
nitive
aculty,
here t
appears
o
exist t
all, appears
but
s
one element
n an
organic
mental
whole,
nd
as
a
minister
o
higher
mental
owers-the powers
fthe
will." (James,
897, p.
140)
This from ames, he
professional
sychologist,
when
upon
occasion
he
turned
hilosopher.
Rather
uriously,
hen
pon
oc-
casion
Royce,
the
professional
hilosopher,
urned
psychologist,
e saw
Will
in a different
ight:
"The
word
Will'
is of
little
use,"
we
read,
"as a
purely
psychological erm,
n
the classification f
mental
life." (Royce,
908,
p.
334)
The main
point of this, forus,
is
that,
"Will" as
Royce ees t,refers to thewholeignificancef our
on-
scious ife" italics original). This was one
philoso-
pher's way of saying hat our decisions nd actions
are what
they re because of our relation o ouren-
vironment,r the world.
These views seem distinctly nticipatory f
such
other
p-to-date iews s that "Will
is
not
precisely
psychological erm, nyway, ut s a term f common
speechwhichneednotrefero anypsychological
nit.
(Woodworth,
92.1,
p.
52.3)
What ooks to me ike
a more ositive rend
oward
the
conception f will I have formulateds the nclu-
sion of t in
a set of terms or "aspects of the
total
activity of the organism." (Gates,
192.5,
p.
463)
And
indicative f psychology's till furtherdvance
in thisdirections thefact hat ome f hemost p-to-
the-minutechools ppear to makeno usewhatever f
the erm
will.
"
I ventureo suggest hat hefarthest
pointyetreached y psychology n the road to
such
a
conception f the activities f a living
whole-and-
its-parts s
I am
proposing, s the "behavior qua
molar," etforth articularly yTolman
19320.
It seems improbable that "molar" used thus
would referwithout mportant ualification o an
individual animal a man for instance) cting as a
living corporeal
whole. The
molarity ppears
to
connote
mass as activitymerely ather han
mass as
activity ogether
with
the acting body and
all
its
parts. Nevertheless he conception omes so much
nearer he
truenature f iving nimals handoesthe
conception f"behavior quamolecular"with
which
it is
contrasted,hat
it
maywell be hailedby natural
history
s
a
greatforward tep
or
pure
psychology"
to take.
We return or moment ow to the
quotation
from
Gates abouttheactivity f theorganism. Shift he
word
"total" and
make
it modify organism"
in-
stead of
"activity"
and the
phrase
would
be
readily
interpretable
n
conformity
ith
my definition
f
"will."
For "total
organism"
would
really
have
to
mean,
from he
meaning
f the whole
phrase,
what
"living
whole"
means
n
my
definition. ndeed
here
is littledoubt hat "total activity" of Gates's phrase
implies the same thing. And
in
eithercase there
would
be implied,
lmost
certainly, ristotle's
on-
ception
of
energeia
s
applied
to
living beings,
the
actual
organism cting
as a whole. But it should
be
noted hat he
concept
f
entelecheia
eems
not to
be
implied.
Ridiculously riefs the ketch resented
aboveof
a
human ndividual cting n two
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I4
THE
QUARTERLY
REVIEW OF BIOLOGY
particular
ases, one at
a rather
ow, the
other
t a
rather igh,
evel of hisnormal
conscious
xistence.
But venture o
hope
the
ketch
may
go
far
oward
larifying
he
conceptionhat nboththese asesor any
other onceivable
eal
case the ndividual,
whole, hat
is to say,
the
individualcon-
sistingof
all
its
partsacting
n complete
unification,
as
themainFactor, r
Cause,
or Principle-name
t to suit
yourself.
As a precaution
gainst misunderstanding
ere
remark
hat
he onclusiontated
s not t all concerned
with questions
f
relative xcellence
r greatness, r
thereversefthese, f ndividuals. Rather, hecon-
cern s
with
the
real
nature f
any
and
every
ypical
human
ndividual-with
he
question
fwhat
ny
nd
every ypical
human ndividual
eally
s.
PROCREATION,
SEXUAL
PLEASURE,
AND
THE
WHOLE-AND-ITS-PARTS
We
pass
now
to
a
very
different
spect
of
the
central
im
ofthis
essay.
That
aim
is,
we
never
forget,
he
question
of
the
relation fAristotle's onceptionf
"
com-
plete
reality" (entelecheia)
o
the concep-
tion
of
a
whole-and-its-parts
s
applied
particularly
o
the
human
ndividual,
he
conception
being
viewed
in the
light
of
modern
knowledge.
Mindful
s we are
of
Aristotle's
great
respect
or,
nd attention o,
the phenom-
ena of
genesis,
our
previous
notice
of
a
favorite efrain
f
his
about
the
begetting
ofmenbymen sconvenientor onnecting
what
we
are now
to
present
ith
what
we
presented
arlier. It
would
be
uselessto
try
to
understand
ristotle's ttitude
as
distinguished
rom is
knowledge)
elative
to
the
problem
f
a man
as
a
"complete
reality"
without
considering
is attitude
(again
as
distinguished
rom
his
knowl-
edge)
qua
man
as a
potential
begetter
f
children.
In
passing
to
this
aspect
of the
subject
we
come
upon
defects
n
Aristotle's
gen-
eral
system
hat
are serious and
by
no
means
all
pardonable,
o
far as
I
can
see,
on the groundof meagerfactual knowl-
edge. The defectsre
n
considerablemea-
sure due either o deliberate eglect r to
faulty easoning. Hicks' referenceo this
is brief nd explicit. We read:Aristotle
"exalted thecognitive lement,
while
his
treatmentf the emotions nd the will is
wholly nadequate, ven fthe Ethics nd
the
Rhetorice called
in
to redress
he
bal-
ance" Hicks,
907,
Introduction,. xxii).
We
focus nthedefects hat
are
particu-
larly elevant o thisdiscussion. Aristotle
was not,of course, lind ither
s
a manor
as a scientist nd philosopher o the emo-
tions
and passions
of sex. We
know this
about him as
a
man from he biographic
record f
his
marriage,
is
devotion
o
h's
wife, ndhis being father.Andwe know
he
gave
real
attention o the
subject
as
scientist
and
philosopher
from various
things
n his
writings.
Take this
xample:
"Thus
there
s one
singlemoving ause,the appe-
titive aculty. For, had there eentwo, intelligence
[nous] nd appetency,which moved to action, still
theywould have done so
in
virtuc f somecharacter
common
o both. But,
as a matter f
fact, ntellect
is notfound o causemotion part rom he ppetency.
For
rational
wish s
appetency: nd,
when
anyone
s
moved n accordance
with
reason,he
is
also moved
according o rational
wish. But
appetency aymove
a
man n
opposition
o
reason,
or
oncupiscence
s
a
species
of
appetency." (De
Anima
33b
2-5,
Hicks
trans.). Although
he
work,
pithymia,
ere endered
concupiscence,
oes not
mean exual
ust
exclusively,
this meaning' long with others eemsundoubtedly
to have
been part
of Aristotle's
meaning.
Such
dis-
cussions s that
on
continence nd
incontinence
n
Book
VII
of the
Nicomacheanthics
eave no roomfor
question
on
the point.
Yet curiously nough
in
the elaborate
and on
the
whole
movingly admirable
discussions f "Love or
Friendship"
ndof
"Pleasure"
n
the
Ethics,
e find
carcely
hint f heamorous lementntherelation
between
man
and a woman It
is
hard
to
see that therewas
any ground
or
Aris-
totle's formal
teachings about
women
(about their being impotentmen, being
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ARISTOTLE
AND ENTELECHEIA
clgssifiable ith children nd slaves nd so
on) other
han
the prevalent eachings
f
his age and country.
Really
were
it
not for
what
the man
gives us when he speaks as an unsophisti-
cated
zoologist,we might upposehe was
too much
of a
Puritan or highbrow or
something o discussor even thinkmuch
on
the mostdomineeringspect f sex
ife.
After his
was
written was glad
to
have my
at-
tention alledto thefact hat fewprofessionalthic-
ists
f
oday efuse o accept he raditionaleparation
of
reason ndfeeling. For examplewe read: "By en-
joyment'we are meaning ll the while a mental act,
conscious ppropriation." Fite, 19z5,
p.
2I1)
Fortunately,omeof hethingsAristotle
says
n the
oological
works
re
ufficiently
specific
nd are
significant
or ur
problem
since
they
touch
upon
the climax
of
the
sexual emotion. As would
be expected,
the most
mportant
f
these re
n
TheGen-
erationfAnimals.
In
his
devastatingrit-
icismsof thetheory ttributedoHippoc-
rates hat the semen omes from ll parts
of
the
body,
he
first f
thefour
rguments
in
support
f
thisAristotleays s: "First,
the
ntensity
f the
pleasure f coition;for
the same state
of feeling s morepleasant
if
multiplied,
nd
that
which ffects
ll
the
parts
s
multiplied
s
compared
with that
which affects
nly
one
or a
few."
(Dc
Gen.
72Ib
i5,
Platt
trans.). What specially
concerns s is the explanationofferedf
the
pleasure
of
copulation. Aristotle's
reasoning gainst he heory roposed s to
the source f
the
semen, mportant
s it
is,
concerns
us
only indirectly
now.
That
aspect
of the
problemwe noticed suffi-
ciently
n the
first
art
of
this
essay.
Obvious,
s
it
not,
that
the explanation
proposed
f he
xtent f hepleasurewould
tally verywell with the conceptionwe
are
defending
f the
whole-and-its-parts?
What,
f
anything, hen,
we
naturally sk,
has Aristotle
o
say touching
his
aspect
of the
problem? Unfortunately
hat he
says s brief
nd only nferential.
Yetthe
inferenceeemsunescapable.
"As to the
vehemencef the
pleasure
n
sexual
nter-
course,
we read, "it is
not becausethe
semencomes from ll the body, but be-
cause there s
a
strong
rictionwherefore
if
this
intercourse
s oftenrepeated
the
pleasure
s diminished
n thepersons
on-
cerned)."
(De
Gen.
3b
35)
Clear
enough,
then,
s the recognition
that the pleasureneeds
a
causal explana-
tion of some ort.
So here
t is: "And as
to thepleasurewhich
ccompaniesoition,
it is dueto emisionnot onlyofsemen ut
also
of
a
spiritus, he coming
ogether f
which precedes
he emission." (De
Gen.
72.8a
o)
Thereyou
have t
Pneuma,hatwhich
imagination
may
make of theair essential
to
life,
of
the
Zephyrs
hat
stir
he
eaves,
andof
the
tempests
hat
ash
greatbodies
of
water nto
fury.
What
an
amazing
on-
venience
or
ophisticated
hinking
n
the
absenceof factual
knowledge
Our
only nterestexcept
historic)
n
it
is as to
how thehumanorganism
would
have to
be
involved
o
make
the
theory
f
sexual
pleasure
eld
by
Aristotle onsistent
with
his factual
nd
theoretical nowledge
as
a
whole.
The
wording
f
the
ast
quotation
does
not
ndicate hatthe author
onceived
he
pleasure o be due to the involvementf
the whole
body
with the
spiritus.
But
even o whenwe have to
do with
such
un-
certainty
s
thatofhow
pneuma
ransforms
into spiritus,
agueness ven
to vagaryof
almost
any sort,may be
expected.
ARISTOTLE S
THEORY
OF REASON
AND OF
PLEASURE IRRECONCILABLE
WITH
ENTELECHEIA
The questionof how pneuma
s he
con-
ceived
t on
the
whole,
we
might
xamine
at
any
length.
But
the
futility
f
doing
so,
however
well the
task
mightbe done,
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THE
QUARTERLY
REVIEW
OF
BIOLOGY
is apparent
ncewe remember
hat we are
not muchconcerned
with Aristotle's
on-
ceptions
nd
teachings,
er e. Our concern
is withtheirvalidity
s tested
by modern
knowledge. For such testingAristotle
has himselfprepared
he ground n this
case.
His
recognition
hat there s no sharp
dividing
ine
between
eason and emotion
we
have already oticed.
"Intellect," we
have heard
him
ay,"is
not
found
o cause
motion
apart fromappetency.
For ra-
tional
wish is appetency;nd,
when any-
one is moved n accordancewith reason,
he
s also moved
ccording o
rationalwish.
But appetency
maymovea
man
n
opposi-
tion to
reason,
or
oncupiscence
s a
spe-
cies of
appetency."
Put this from he
De
Anima,
biological treatise
dealing pri-
marilywith mental
henomena,longside
the
quotation iven
bove
from heDe Gen-
eratoine,
treatise ealing primarily
with
reproductivehenomena,ndnoticewhat
you
have.
The
vital
and
familiar
ruth
is presented
n a
somewhat
round-about
way
thathowever
xaltedly
ndowed
with
reason
man
maybe
he s yetdriven
t
times
with
sexual desire.
So Aristotle
lmost
forces
us
to ask
whether hewhole
man
s thus
learly
ndi-
catedcorresponds
ith his own more
ully
elaborated
onception
f man.
Another,
andfor hisdiscussion,more elevantway
of
asking
the
same question
s: Is
Aris-
totle's
conception
f
man as
unmistakably
indicated
n
his zoological
works the
De
Generatoine
nd
the
De Anima
articularly)
the
same,fundamentally,
s that
presented
in
his
philosophical
works
(the
Ethics
and the Metaphysics articularly)?
Fi-
nally,
and still more
o the
point,
we
may
ask thequestion hus: Is Aristotle's erm
entelecheia
pplicable
o
man
as his
concep-
tion
of
man
tands
n
its most
philosophi-
cal
(metaphysical?)
orm?
Categorical
nswers o
the
ast two
forms
of the question I believe must be:
(i)
Aristotle's onception f mancontained n
his traditionally hilosophical works is
irreconcilablen several ways with that
contained n his traditionally iological
works; z)Not only s his concept f "Com-
plete reality"
entelecheia)
napplicable o
his philosophical metaphysical) oncep-
tion of man, but he himself robably elt
this
as he seems not to have applied the
term t certain rucialpoints n his "first
philosophy" of man.
A
justificationf possible of these an-
swers s manifestlyuefromme The prob-
lem is necessarilynvolved in Aristotle's
general heory
f
the psyche,
r soul.
So
well known s his
teaching oncerninghe
separateness r at least separableness f
reason,
r
the
rational
art
f
he oul, rom
the body that extensive reatment f the
subjectmay be disposed
of
verybriefly.
The followingmaybe considered o pre-
sent hekernel fhisteaching n thisgreat
subject:
Turning
ow to the
part
of the soul with
which
the
soul
knows
nd
thinks
whether
his
s
separable
from thers
n
definitionnly, r spatially
s
well)
we
have
to
inquire I)
what differentiateshis
part,
nd
(2.)
how
thinking
an
take
place.
If
thinking
s
like perceiving,
t must
be
either
process
n
which the soul
is acted
upon by
what
is
capable
of
being hought,
r
a
process
ifferentrom
butanalogous othat. Thethinking art fthe oul
must herefore'be,
hile
mpassible, apable
ofreceiv-
ing
the
form f an
object;
hat
s,
must
e
potentially
identical
n
character
with its
object
without
being
the
object.
Mind must
be
related
o what
is think-
able,
as
sense
s
to
what
s
sensible.
Therefore,
ince
verything
s a
possibleobject
of
thought,
mind
n
order,
s
Anaxagoras ays,
o domi-
nate, hat s,
to
know,
must
e pure
rom
ll
mixture;
for he
co-presence
f what
is
alien
to its nature
s
a
hindrancend
a
block:
it follows
hat t
too,
ike the
sensitive art, an haveno nature f its own, other
than
thatof
having
certain
apacity.
Thus
that n
the
soul which
s
called
mind
by
mind mean
hat
whereby
he
soul thinks
and
judges) is,
before
t
thinks,
ot
actually ny
real
thing.
For this
reason
it cannot
easonably
e
regarded
s
blended
with
the
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ARISTOTLE
AND
ENTELECHEIA
I7
body:
if
so,
it
would
acquire
some
quality,
e.g.,
warmth r cold, or evenhave an organ ike the sensi-
tive faculty: s it is, it has none. It was
a good idea
to call the soul "the place of forms," houghI)
this
description olds only forthe intellective oul, and
(X) even his s theforms nlypotentially,
ot ctually
(De
Anima z9a io-08,
SmithTrans.).
Probablyno readerwill needreminding
that modernknowledgeof the
functions
of
the
brain leaves the statement hat
thinking as no organwithouta traceof
fact to rest on. Nor will manyreaders
fail to
recognize
n
the statement
bout
the
soul as
the "place
of
forms"one
in-
stanceof Aristotle's eeming dherenceo
Plato's doctrine f Ideas.
Still more
pointed bout
reason's
nde-
pendence
s: "While the
faculty
f
sensa-
tion is
dependent pon the body,
mind s
separableromt."
(42
9b
4)
As a
revealer f
what
Aristotleknew nd
what he
did not know
about
the
psychobiology
f
man,
nd
of his
reasoning
on
the
subject,these
are
crucial
passages. The striking eficiencyn his knowledge
was of
course
natomical nd
physiological:
He knew
nothing
of the fact that
brain
is
indispensable
o
thought.
One
might
make
considerable
f the
fact
that
n
his
comparison
f
perceiving
with thinking
Aristotle aries
his
language omewhat.
While sen-
sation
s
"dependent"
n the
body,
mind s
"separ-
able"
from
t.
Does
this
uggest
hat after
ll he had
some
misgivingsbout
he
omplete
ackof
dependence
of
thinking
n the
body? May
he
not
have surmised
that s to its
origin
mindhas somekindof
dependence
on thebodywhile n tsfunctional aturityt maynot
be
thus
dependent?Might
notthemind's
ependence
on the
body be something
ike an
apple's dependence
on
the
tree-dependent
or
origin but
not
for
ater
existence
nd function? With all Aristotle
knew
about
the
generation
nd nutrition f animals and
other
iving hings
t
seems
ncredible
hat he should
not have had some qualms about
the
eparableness
f
reason rom he body. So extensivelynd
nsistently
does
he
present
is
conception f henutritivend en-
sitive
parts
f the
soul
that assume
my
readers
uffi-
ciently cquaintedwiththisphaseofthe matter o
obviate
he need
of
going
nto
t
further.
t will
be
enough, hope,
to
assert
nd
nothingmore,
hat
he
never
ven suggests
hat
these
wo
parts
of the -.oul
are
eparable
rom he
body.
The
rational,
he
th nk-
ing,part nlybe conceived
o
be separable.
But
h
w
could he make his allywith what
he
knew nd
tells
us so distinctly as quoted above) about the
way
reason nd appetencyre tied up together?
But what specially concerns s is the
bearingofAristotle'sbelief n the separ-
ableness f mind rom odyon his concep-
tion of
entelecheia.
an we get any light
on this matter rom tudying he passages
on
separableness quoted above? They
contain hreepoints hat are illuminating
inthisway.
The firsts containedn the nquiry bout
the separableness f the soul. If we turn
from he Smith translation used in our
quotation)to the translation sed byRoss
in
his Selections, e find differencehat
appears significant o a morphological
biologist.
The
wording
n
the
Ross
ver-
sion is: "With regard o the part of the
soul by which t knows and thinks,whe-
therthis
be separable
or
not separable
n
spatial magnitude ut only n definition,"
etc. The point at issue is betweenthe
"'spatially as well" of the separableness
in
the Smithtranslation nd the "spatial
magnitude" f he eparablenessntheRoss
translation. Megethoss the term
n
the
original which
is
rendered
"spatially"
in
the Smith version,
nd
"spatial mag-
nitude" in the Ross version. Now
since
megethos
eans
bulk
or
size,
and
hence
implies hape, t
is
considerably
more
pos-
itive s tocorporealityhan s "spatially."
This
distinction
s
particularlyignificant
because
space
has no
objectivereality
or
extreme dealistic
philosophers,
nd
ap-
pears
o
be
in
somewhat
he
same
predica-
ment
at
the
hands of some
present-day
mathematical hysicists.Viewed
in
this
light the query
is
pertinent:
Was
not
Aristotle virtually asking
whether
the
thinkingpart of the soul togetherith
partof
the
body
s
separable
from
he
rest
of the
body?
This
would seem
n
accord
with his usual naturalistic
ttitude.
So
no
wonder the
man was
puzzled-as
we
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THE
QUARTERLY
REVIEW
OF BIOLOGY
know
he was
frompassages
like
this:
"Hence
arisesa question
of the
greatest
difficulty,hich
we must strive
o
solve
to the best
of our
abilityand as
far as
possible.
Whenand
how andwhence s
a
share
n
reason
cquired y
those
nimals
that participate
n this
principle?"
Dc.
Gen. 36b
5).
The second
pointto
be noticed ouches
thequestion
rom different
ngle.
Fol-
lowingthe
statement
bout
the necessity
forthe
mind'spurity
from dmixture
e
read:
". . . .
it [mind]
too, like the
sen-
sitivepart, anhaveno nature f ts own,
other
than
that of
having
a certain
ca-
pacity.
That
the
thinking
and the sensitive
parts
of
the
soul
can "have
no
nature"
oftheir
wn other
han
certain
apacity,
or
potentiality,
s
surely
t odds with
our
modern
nowledge
fcapacity,
s we have
seen
n
previous
iscussions.
Nothing
has
justcapacity lone. It is besides nentity
in
its own
self.
Explosives,
or
nstance,
and
seeds,
have
natures
f their
own
in
addition
to their
capacities
as
explosives
and
as
producers
f
full-fledged
lants.
So
thismakes
t
impossible
o
accept
the
statement
s
a valid
argument.
But the
weightier
reason
for
calling
attention
o the
point
here s
that
t is not
fully
onsistent
ith Aristotle's
wn
gen-
eral
attitude
oward
nature,
orwith some
of
his
specific
tatements.
Thus his
re-
peatedly
expressed
view
that
a
thing's
nature onsists
n
its
matter,
r substance,
and its
form,
r final
actualization,
nd
also
n
the
movementsrchanges
y
which
it passes
from ne
to theother,
s entirely
consistentwith our
present
knowledge,
but not with such a view as that here
expressed.
Take for
instance
his final,
summed-uptatement
boutnature
n the
chapter
devoted
to that subject
in the
lexical book of
the
Metaphysics:
From what has been
said, then,
t is
plain
that
nature n the primary nd
strict ense
s the essence
of
things
which
have
n
themselves,s such,
a source
of movement; or he
matter
s
called
the
nature
e-
cause t is qualified o receive his, nd processes fbe-
coming nd growing re called naturebecause they
are movements roceeding rom
his.
And nature n
this
sense s the sourceof
the movement f
natural
objects,being present
n them
omehow,
ither
po-
tentially r actually.
(ioi5a
io-i5,
Ross trans.).
As
a
general
tatementhis would
seem
to cover
satisfactorily resent-day
nfor-
mationconcerninghe
brain
as an
organ
of
thought.
The "somehow, either potentiallyor
actually" of the fact hatthought
s
pres-
ent as a "natural
object"
in
the brain
would
probablybe
satisfactory
s a
gen-
eral statement o modern
eurologists.
The third point
which we notice
in-
volves
directly
he
question boutthebear-
ing of the statements nderexamination
on the
problem f
entelecheia.
The essence
of the point is in the statementsup-
posedly eferringoPlato) aboutthe oul's
being
"the
place
of forms."
Directly
following this, Aristotle adds his own
limitationupon it:
"though
i)
this de-
scription
holds
only of the intellective
soul,
and
(z) even
this is
the
forms
nly
potentially, ot
actually." The crux of
the matter
s
that
entelecheia
s
the term
rendered actually"
in
the translation.
The original phrase is worth quoting:
ovUrE
WEXEXE'cLa
LXXa
5vvVAcuELa EL31f. "Not
entelchebia,
owever,but dynamis s [the
form
or
idea]."
That
is to
say, the
intellective soul
being unmixed with
body
does
not
come
under the
concept
of
entelecheia
because
entelecheia
ncludes
both
potentialitydynamis)
and
actuality
(energeia).
In
other
words on the basis
of what we are here given, it appears
that Aristotle
ecognized hat n conceiv-
ing
the intellective
art of the soul as
separable
rom he
body, he
was
placing
it outsidehis
concept
of entelecheia.
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ARISTOTLE AND ENTELECHEIA
I9
Thus we have at the highest evel of
man's
naturewhat
is
seemingly
nother
piece of evidence hat
in
Aristotle's eal
purpose
entelecheia
as
fundamentally
descriptiveerm orhis natural cience nd
hence was excluded from the highest
flights, o to speak, of his "first hiloso-
phy." And arewe not justifiedn
con-
cluding hat the crucial
statements nder
examination ontain
rreconcilable
f
not
contradictory iews and
that
these are
largely if not wholly traceableto the
author's complete gnorance f
the func-
tions of the brain and nervoussystem?
While such
a
conclusiondoes not con-
stitute final proof that had Aristotle
known the function f the brain,of the
cerebral ortex especially,he
would not
have believed n the
separableness f the
intellective art of the soul, t does show
that
he had advanced so far
toward
a
wholeness,
r
unified heory f
man
that
he could not departfromhis generaldi
rection without contradictinghimself.
This
referenceo the idea that
entelecheia
would
be applicable
o man n
the
whole
gamut of his individual ife onlyby in-
cluding
its
potentialities
s well
as
its
actualities which, note, it does
not in-
clude
according
to the statement
nder
examination),
s
a
point
at
which
we
may onvenientlyesume
he
examination
of Aristotle's teaching concerningthe
appetative faculty of the soul as this
manifests tself in
the sexual
mode
of
reproduction.This resumption
s neces-
saryto enable us to
see still
further hat
appears o be implied oncerning
human
being's
wholeness
n
his
teaching
about
sexual
pleasure.
RELATION
BETWEEN
PLEASURE
AND
SENSA-
TION-ANCIENT
AND
MODERN
VIEWS
In
resuming
his
examinationwe note
first
Aristotle's
conception
of
pleasure.
The phase of the conception hat is
spe-
cially relevant
to the
point
in
hand is
stated,
more
or less clearly
n
various on-
nections, erhaps owheremore o than
n
thefollowing: Wherethere s
sensation,
there s also pleasure nd pain, and, where
these, ecessarily
lso
desire" Dc An.4I3b
2-o.
mith rans.). The
main
pointhere s
that
sensation s always accompaniedby
pleasure r pain. And this
clearlymeans
(fromwhat we have already earned) hat
the
ensitive oul at least is alwaysexperi-
encingpleasureor pain. Satisfaction r
dissatisfaction ould probably omenearer
to Aristotle'smeaning.What mmediately
follows
the passage just quoted,
though
bearing nly ndirectly
n the main
point,
is important: We have no evidence as
yet about mindor the power to
think; t
seems
o be
a
widely
different
ind
of soul,
differing
s
what is eternal romwhat is
perishable; t alone
s
capableof
existencc
in
solation rom ll other sychic
owers.
For us the most significanthing about
this
passage
is
the unmistakable
vidence
it
furnishes f Aristotle's
ncertaintys
to whether he intellective
part
of the
soul is or is
not
linked with
the other
parts-the nutritive, ensitive, nd
loco-
motive
parts.
In
the
light
of what
the
anatomy,
is-
tology,
and
physiology
f
the
neuromus-
cular
system
nd
especially
f the
cerebral
cortex,have taughtus, Aristotle'sunccr-
tainty bout
the
connection f
the
"mind
or
power
o
think,"
with
ensations
only
of
antiquarian
nterest.
But
what
about the
relation f sensation
to
pleasure
nd
pain?
Do we know for
certainty
hat "where there
s
sensation
there is also
pleasure
and
pain?"
Still
more,
do
we
know that
where there s
pleasureor pain there s also sensation?
I fail
to
find nything
n
any
of the
works hat seems
o
be
an
effortt
a
direct
answer o these
questions.
But it matters
little whether Aristotlemadc
such
an
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THE
QUARTERLY
REVIEW
OF BIOLOGY
effort r
not,
for
we are sure
he
could
not have made much real headway
n
it.
The whole factual
realm
most directly
involved
s thatof heminute
tructure
nd
function f
the sensory
nd motornerve
terminals,
he
details of
stimulus nd re-
sponse,
and so on.
But
I
believethat
f
we study
his
utter-
ances about pleasure
n
the various
works,
particularly he long discussionof
it
in
the
Nicomachean
thics, eginning
he
tudy
with what
he gives
in the
History f
Animals,we may recognize hat he
laid
the foundation or conception fpleasure
upon which a sound modern onception
can
be erected.
The
passage
in
the
History
specially
referredo
is:
The life
f
animals, hen,maybe
divided nto
two
acts-procreation
nd
feeding;
or n
these
wo acts
ll
their nterests nd life concentrate. Their food
de-
pends chiefly n
the
substances f
which
they
are
severally onstituted;or
he
ource f their rowth
n
all cases
will
be
this
substance.
And
whatsoever
s
in conformity ithnature s pleasant, nd all animals
pursue leasure
n
keeping
with
heir ature. 589a 5,
Thompson rans.).
A
student pproachingAristotle
n
the
moreusual
way, namely, rom he side
of
formal
philosophy, s likely to question
whether
n
such
a
statement
he author
really ncludesman with animals. Does
he
in
very
ruth
mean,for nstance, hat
all man's "interests nd life concentrate"
on
"procreation
nd
feeding?"
We
know well, from he Ethics artic
larly, hatAristotlewas about s far s any
philosopher r religionist, r anyhumanist
of
whatever
chool ever was, fromview-
ing man as a "beast of the field" n the
degradative ense often ttached to that
phrase. But from the context of this
passage, it is impossible o avoid (if we
wanted
o) recognizing hatmanwas here
included n Aristotle's thinking s defi-
nitely and certainly s was any other
animal.
The
passage
s in
the
eighth ook
of the History,
which
may,
I
think, be
fairly
regarded
as near the
high-water
mark
of Aristotle's
writing
on natural
history.
For
nstance,
is
statement
bout
nature'sproceeding little by littlefrom
things
ifeless
to animal
life,"
that has
becomefamous
from
being nterpreted
s
adumbrativeof the modern
theory of
Evolution,
occurs n
this book. But the
opening entence
f the
real
discussion
f
the
book
tells
us in
so
many
wordswhere
the writer tands
n
the treatment.
In the
great
majority
f
animals here
re traces f
psychical ualitiesor attitudes,whichqualitiesare
more
markedly ifferentiated
n
the
case of
human
beings.
For
just
as we
pointed
out
resemblances
in the
physical
rgans,
o
in
a
number
f
animalswe
observe gentleness
r
fierceness,
mildnessor cross
temper,
ourage
or
timidity,
ear r
confidence,igh
spirit or
low cunning, nd,
with
regard
o
intelli-
gence, something
quivalent
to
sagacity.
Some
of
these
qualities
n
man,
as
compared
with the
corre-
sponding
ualities
n
animals,differ
nly quantita-
tively:
that
s to
say,
a
man
has
more r less of this
quality, nd ananimalhasmore r essof ome ther;
other
ualities
n
man
are
represented y
analogous
and not identical
qualities:
for
nstance, ust as
in
man we find
knowledge,
wisdom,
and
sagacity, o
in
certain
nimals
there
exists
ome
other natural
potentiality
kin
to
these.
(Historia,
88a
o-0x5.)
The
unqualified animalness
of
man,
though
f
a
kindthat s
enormously igh,
relatively,
n
Aristotle's
thinking, es-
pecially when
he
was
at
his best as a
naturalist, oesnot,we hope,needfurther
illustration.
Now
can there
be
any
other
nterpreta-
tion
of the
sentences uoted
than that
Aristotle
onceivedpleasureto
go along
with
sensation to
the
very
root-tips
f
animal
ifeand
so
of
the ifeof
ndividual
man?
What
else can
be madeof
the state-
ment that all
animals seek
pleasure
"in
keeping with their nature?" The real
question
here
s
as
to the
lower
limit
of
sensation.
So far as
Aristotle'smeans
of
testing
ould
go,
he was
probablyustified
in
considering lants
devoid ofsensation.
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ARISTOTLE
AND
ENTELECHEIA
In
otherwords he was probably ustified
in considering ensation
strictly nimal
attribute.
Essentially he same
idea is variously
expressed y Aristotle.Thus: "Each kind
of
being, again, seems to have its proper
pleasure, s it has its
properfunction,-
viz., the pleasurewhich
accompanies he
exercise f its faculties
r the realization
of ts
nature." (Nicom. th.Book X, 5, 8.
Peters
rans.)
This
identificationf pleasurewiththefundamen-
tal nature
f ivingbeings s so important or wo hy-
potheses ambeing edto, that we must onsider ts
historic ndfactual
ackgrounds little arther. uch
considerations
needed
n
our
day especially, erhaps,
because
of
the wide
currency
f'quite
differentnter-
pretations nd valuations f
pleasure.
That
Theophrastus, pupil
and
disciple f Aristo-
tle, shouldhave had a similar
iew of pleasure s not
surprising. "For
Theophrastus,"we read, pleasure
is the
normal ccompanimentf
what s n accordwith
nature. As
arule, herefore,e
take lesaurenthings,
since
the
common ourse fourfunctionss nevitably
'natural' and not antagonistic o nature" Stratton,
G.M.,
I9I7, p.48).
And ne
passage romTheophras-
tus
himselfs much o thepoint
because t is
in
refuta-
tionof a
view of Anaxagoraswhich
fits
well with
a
brand
of
cynical philosophy uite prevalent
n
our
era.
"But
as
for the
thesis,"
says Theophrastus,
"that sense
perception
s
universally onjoinedwith
pain,
this
finds o
warrant
n
experience,
nasmuch
as
some
objects
re
actuallyperceived
with
pleasure,
and most f
them
t
least without
ain." (Stratton,
p.
93).
Those of our
contemporaries
ho
have
been
educatednto spiritual ondition uchthat nwhat-
ever
hey
do
toward
njoying
hemselves
hey ppear
to
get
more
misery
han
pleasure
rom
t,
will
not of
course
e impressed y either he
conception
f
pleas-
ure
hat
omes o us
from ristotle
ndTheophrastus,
nor
by
like
conception
rommodern
ources.
It
is, however, mportant o note
that manyper-
sons of
this
veryday
whose voices can
hardlybe ig-
nored,
ave
reached
uite
imilar
onceptions.
A
few
of
he
many
vailable
references
ust
uffice.
Simply
to
live,
move and
breathe, hould
be
a
delight."
This
statementyWilliamJames,
s
entitled o
the
more
respect, submit,
rom
eing quoted
with
ap-
proval by
a
foremost hysician nd contemporary
worker n
public health
Winslow, C. E. A., I924,
p.
2.I4)-
The
only
ther tatements
give pace
o arechosen
for
the
trustworthinessf the
authority, nd,
more
especially,
or he
pproach as
it seems o
me) of
the
views
expressed o the
hypothesis o
which we are
coming.
We
read:
"Pleasantnessmight epresent general
organic
tate, nd
unpleasantness he
contrary tate,
each
state
being n
nternal odily
esponse o
pleasant
or
unpleasant
timuli, nd
making
tself
felt s an
unanalyzable
ompound f
vague
nternalensations.
Again:
"Pleasantness nd
unpleasantness
re much
less
definitely
ocalized [than
sensationsfrom
the
special
senses];
hey eem o be
in us'
without
being
in
any special part
of us."
(Woodworth,
9ZI,
pp.
I75
and
74.)
What,we
must ow
ask,
do
these iverse
eferences
to
sensation nd
what s
pleasant r
unpleasant
oint
toward? Theliterallymmeasurablextent o which
personal
experience nd
common
observation
find
sensation,
eeling,
motion, assion
nd the
rest, e-
pendent n
stimulations,
xternal nd
nternal,
nevit-
ably
uggests
hat n
eeking n answer
o
the
uestion,
the
quarter o be
turnedoward
irst
houldbe that
of
the
most
earching
nvestigation
etmade, n the
de-
pendence f
the
phenomena f
living bodies
on the
responsivenessf
the
bodies to
stimulations
s just
indicated. And
thuswe
runhead-on
nto one of
the
most
recondite
nd also
far-reaching
ivisions
of
psychobiology. Itwouldbe futile o attempt n ex-
haustive
xploration f
hisrealmhere.
But
t
would
be
equally
futile o
try
o
understand
he
ssues
most
fundamentallynvolved without
having got
a firm
hold
on the main
results
f researches
n
the
realm.
So
we
mustdo our
best under he
circumstanceso-
ward such
a
hold.
Conformably ith the historic iathcsis f our en-
terprisewe
may
first otice
Aristotle'svery
wrong
supposition
hat
plants re devoidof
ensation.
The
question
of whether
he did or did not
produce
a
treatise n plants nd thefurtheruestion fwhether,
if
he
did, he
could have still
held
to his
error
n this
matter,
t
is useless
o
speculate
on.
For
the
error
he
certainlymade
and it
appears o have
influenced,
willy-nilly,
is
whole
theory
f
he ctivities f
iving
beings.
Possibly,
however,
he was not
quite
so
wrong
s
to
facts or
unjustifiable
s to
theory s
he
seems.
For
in
one
passage at least he
goes
some
distance
oward
recognizing
he ruth. After
eferringo
the
fact hat
various
mechanismsmay
be injured
r
destroyed y
being
riven oo hard
n
the
performance
f their or-
mal
function,
e
tells
us:
"This
explains
also
why
plants
annot
erceive,
n
spite
of
their
having por-
tion
of
soul
in
them
nd
obviously
being
ffected
y
tangible objects
themselves; or
undoubtedly
heir
temperaturean
be
lowered
r
raised."
(De
An.
42-4a
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THE
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30
Smith
rans.)
It has
been
suggested
hat
in the
distinction
eremade between
perceiving nd being
affected, ristotlewas
aiming t an old and fanciful
notion bout
feeling f oy
and sadness xperiencedy
plants.
The
merest
eferenceo
what
everybody
nows
about
heMimosas nd
other
sensitive lants;"about
insect
atching nd
devouring lants; and about the
action
f
wining
nd
tendril
linging
lants,
will suf-
fice
s
familiar
vidence f
Aristotle's
eneralwrong-
ness
n this
matter.
Turning
o the ess familiar
ata,
a
summarytate-
mentmaybe made
s
follows:
Someofthe
most xact
and
lluminating
esearchesf he
modern
eriod
nto
the
"irritability,"
he
"excitability," the
"stimul-
ability" various
erms
meaning
much
he
ame
hing)
of ivingorganisms, avebeen conducted n plants,
nearly
he
wholerange
f he
plantworldhavingbeen
requisitioned
or
nvestigativematerials.
As a
hint
at
what
recent
history resents
n
this
realm,
he work of the
botanist
Pfeffer
ay be men-
tioned.
The choice
falls
here
argelybecause
this
investigator'shandbook
is
widely
and
favorably
known.
In
an
nteresting
ection fthe
book, entitled na-
ture f
rritability,"
e read:
"until
recently he-part
played by
stimuli
n
all vital
phenomena as
been
overlooked."Pfeffer,
900,
p.
I3.)
Thedate
i88o)
of the
first
erman
dition
f this
work
ndicates he
extreme
ecency
f scientific
nowledge
n
this
field.
As the
quotation
clearly mplies,
when
irritability
at
ts
base
evel s under
onsideration,
here s no fun-
damentaldistinction
etween
plants
and
animals.
And since
plants
have
no
sense
rgans
s this
expres-
sion
s
usuallyunderstood,
heir
ensitivity
must
de-
pend
on a
very eneral
roperty
f
iving
eings.
So
it
happens
hat
n
the
wricings
f
the
periodof
Pfeffer
and a little
arlier,
ne
constantly inds tatements
o
the ffecthat ensitivity,rresponsivenesso stimuli,
is a
property
ommon o all
"living
matter"
r
proto-
plasm.
More
recentlyesults
oming
from
ncreas-
ingly
refined
nvestigation,
he
conception
f sen-
sitivity
s a
general
property
f
"living
matter"
has had to
be
modified
o
the
extent
of recog-
nizing
that
this
generalproperty elongs
to
living
matter
only
as such
matteroccurs
in
organized,
living bodies.
OtherWise
xpressed,
the
concepts
of
both
aliveness
nd
sensitivity
eem
to
be insep-
arable
from he
concepts
f
body
and
organization.
The concept' f "living matter," or "protoplasm"
as
a
universal,
undifferentiated,
norganized,
n-
corporealized
omething
or other now stands in
opposition
to
an
enormousmass of
observational
knowledge,
nd
is
unsupported
y
a
scintilla
of
such
knowledge.
The
great science
of living cells,
cytology,
s
manifestlypposed
to the concept.
But
cells re
byno
means hebottom ink, o
to say, fthe
chain of
observational ata opposed to
the concept.
In truth,
ytological
nowledge s now
being devel-
oped, sconcernedargelywith host fbodies fvari-
ous sizes
nd shapes
nddegrees f
permanence ithin
cells.
Althoughmany,
probablymost, of
these are
not alive
in the full ense, heir
undoubted ontribu-
tion n one
way or
another o the vital
activities f
the
cells s
entirely t one with the
conception f or-
ganized
corporealitys a sinequa
non
to
aliveness.
"Living
matter" as, nboth
fact nd
ogic,about he
same
status hat
the term humanity"
has. There
is
no
more
ustification
n
imagining
living matter"
as
sometingpart
rom
nd
antecedento
living odies
than
there s in
imagining
humanity" s something
apartfrom nd antecedento, human eings.
"Protoplasmic ystems"
s
a term
now much
used
by
nvestigators
ccupied hiefly
ith the
functional,
or
physiologicalideofvital phenomena
tthese oun-
dational evels.
What the parts re and
that the or-
ganization
s,
of these
deep-level
odies,though
of
great
nterest,
specially o experimental
orkers, an
be
merely
ouched
here.
Reference
must
e
made
to
the
great
role the surfaces f the
bodies play in the
phenomena resented.
"Surface ayers"
and "limit-
ing
membranes"
re
basic
n
the
erminology
fknowl-
edgehere. Now thischaracter f thesebodies ends
itselfwell
to the
seeming ecessity
f
extending
ur
conception
f
ensitivity
rom
urcommon
xperience
as
bodies
to these
deep-level odies.
And we must
noticethat
Aristotle,
tarting
rom
this amecommon
xperience
nd
applying
o it
prin-
ciples
of
reasoning
he
himself
had
worked
out,
reached
conclusions hat
are
in
striking eneral c-
cord
with the
results
f
late
experimental
esearch.
Thus on
the
problem
f
a
livingbody
and
the matter
of
which
t
is
composed,
we read: "Now there s one
class ofexistent hingswhichwe call substanceou-
sian],
ncluding
nder
he term, irstly,
atter
bylen],
which n
itself s
not thisor
that;
secondly, hape
or
form,
n
virtue
f
which
he erm
his r that s
at once
applied;
thirdly,
he whole made
up
of matter
nd
form."
(Dc
An.
4IIa
2.
Hicks
trans.).
Highly
m-
portant
s
it
that
"shape
or form"here s the
crass
thing
f
modern
morphology. Morphen
ai
idos
s
the
original.
That which s
observed
s well as
the
dea
of
t is
what
we
have
to do with. When
we reflect
that in
the
discussion f which this
paragraph
s
a
partAristotles dealingwiththeproblemftherela-
tion f
he
oul
to the
body; nd note hat he
question
ofthe
"sensitive nd
appetitive
aculties"was
always
conspicuously
n
his
thought,
we
may
well
be
im-
pressed y the
closenessof
his
approach,
o far as
theory
s
concerned,
o the
modern
osition,
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ARISTOTLE
AND ENTELECHEIA
23
There s now an enormousmass of evi-
dence
n
courton the r6le of stimuli, x-
citors, activators in vital phenomena.
This evidencemakes t look as thoughwe
shall have to recognize that such phe-
nomena re as dependent n externalityor
excitation o action s they refor uilding
materials, nd energy-yielding aterials
for
ction. But, of course, externality"
as thusused would include ll such facts
as
that nypart fourbodies, urkidneys,
or gonads,or blood corpuscles, r cells
generally, re external o all otherparts.
The conceptionof vital spontaneity, r
automisity
n
a strict ense,
n
the sense,
that s, of abilityof a living body of any
kindor grade ither o begin ts acts or to
modify hem, ust by its own exclusive
self, ppears o be on the verge f elimina-
tion
from
ound
biology.
The
following
seems fairepitomeof conclusions nder
this
head:
"As thefacts tand tpresenthere sno reason or
assuming
the occurrence
f
self-excitation.
pon-
taneity
n
a
strict
ense s
far
rom
eing
demonstrated
fact.
One
cell
region,
ell
or
cell
groupmay
f course
excite
nother, ut
the
original
ource
of excitation
and of
the
nitiating nergy
s
apparentlylways
out-
side the
region,
ell
or cell
group
xcited."
(Child,
192.4,
p.
i86.)
What
therelation
f
non-spontaneity
s here
ndi-
cated
maybe
to the
pontaneous,
r
autonomic
tomic
activity
ow
receiving
much ttention
y physicists,
isan mportantut eemingly very ifficultuestion.
The surmise
hat
the doctrine f electronic
ndeter-
minism
endsphysical upport
o
the
doctrine
f "free
will"
is easy to
make,
nd seems
ongenial
o
certain
types
f
feeling
nd
thinking.
And
there
may
well
be
a
connection f
some
recondite
ind
between
he
two.
If
men
ould discover cientific
acking
for
n
hypothesishar hey re
free
o act
n
some
uch
way
as radio-active
ubstances re,
he
discovery
ould be
significant
n
severalways.
But
t
s important ot
to
forget
hat he firstmen-
tioned doctrine s strictlyatomistic-mathematical
while
the
econd
s far rom hat. The "free
will"
is
crasslymolar,.e., corporeal,
o far s all
experience
in
exercising
t
goes.
But
still
more
mportant
s it
not
to forget
hat
oth
doctrinesre tems
n,
are
prod-
ucts
of, the knowledge-getting
ctivities
f human
beings.
The doctrine f atomic indeterminism
s
utterly ependent
n facts hat re molaror corporeal.
These facts re,
forone thing, he utterdependence
of human bserving,
nowing nd thinking
n being
humanly live; and furtherhe utterdependence f
being
live on
breathing,
ating
nd
the
rest. Now
these
facts
re
so familiar s to tend to become ust
taken or ranted.
And things usttaken
forgranted
are, f highly omplex, lways iable to
be treated s
though omeof their lementsust do
not exist.
Lillie has recently ublished omehighly
nLerest-
ing discussionsn this general ield pproached
rom
the ideofmodern
hysiologyLillie,
I93I
and
932).
PLEASURE-PAIN IN RELATION
TO THE
WHOLE-AND-ITS-PARTS
What,now,
is the
bearing
f all this on
the problem
of pleasure? My answer s
the first f the two hypotheses
orecast
several pages back.
Our
experiences
hich
we
haracteriZe
s
pleasant, greeable,
atisfy-
ing, nd
to
which egive uch ames
s pleas-
ure,
happiness,
oy, are rootedinally
n our
sensitivity
s
bodies
hat are
alive. Their
foundationsre aid at the moment f our
conception,
re much advancedby being
born,
nd are never
ntirelybsent
s
long
as we
live. This
deep-level
ruth
etspar-
tial recognition
n
the familiar tatement,
"Self-preservation
s
the firstaw of ife."
From he exercise y every
ivingbody of
its
ability
to maintain
tself
we get such
concepts
nd
sayings
s that t is
"good
to
to
be
alive." Of prime mportances the
recognition fthat double dependencen
externalityinpart
he external
orld" of
common
xperience)
which
our
discussion
focused ttention
pon.
Each
livingbody
depends
n
what is
external o
it
for ts
building
and
energy-yielding
aterials
(air, food,water),
and also
for
timulation
to all its activities.
A
body
s
alive
n
and
of
tsability
o usefor ts own existence
relatively ewthings xternal o it, and to
respondo,
nd
sense, literally
ncountable
number
f thingsexternal o
it. For a
body
to
exercise hese
abilites
s to
fulfil,
or
to
satisfy,
ts nature.
These are the
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24 THE QUARTERLY
REVIEW OF BIOLOGY
verybottom cts by which
a
living body
"makes good."
This is as fundamentally
truefor hemeanestweed-seed
hat
n
re-
sponse o
moisture
nd warmth
ushes ts
sprout through he hard ground,as for
the greatest
human
genius
that
responds
to
conditions
f
his time nd
surroundings
and to his own
internal urge." Sensi-
tivity nd responsivenesss here
touched
upon, are basic to the concept
of life-or-
death needs
and
activities,
nd life-fulfill-
ingneeds nd ctivities uggested
lsewhere
(Ritter ndBailey,
9Z7, pp.
2.68
nd
95).
This
tracing
f the
rootsof
goodness,
the
gu-d
life,"the
it is
goodto be alive," to
their ips n tht
verydeepest evel
of aliveness f animatebodies is
likely o shockthose
who still clingto the teachings
of traditional
hilosophy
nd ethicson
this
matter.
For
our nterpretation
ivesno quarter o the dea
of
an
ultimate,
ncarnate ood,
that
lways,
ince lato,
has figuredn one
form r
another
n the theories
f
manydelvers nto
the problems f human ife. That
is good according
o this nterpretation,
hich s in-
trinsic
nd
ssential
o thevery ature f the ivingbe-
ing nd s no outsider,r lien, ven hough tsdepend-
ence on externality
s
irremovable. Goodness
does
not
ust
ome, omehow,
rom ome magined
where,
to
occupy portion
the spiritual rmental ortion)
of
that
relatively
mall
group
f
iving beings
alled
human y us of the
western orld. "Good"
though
as
deeply eal
as
life
tself,
s not of extra- nd supra-
mundane rigin n
an imaginary ivinity.
Rather,
it is
basic quality,
r
sense,
nherent
n,
and
essential
to,
the
tate
f
aliveness.
Divine
goodness
s derived
by
abstraction
rom
t;
not t from
ivinity.
(This is no treatise n theproblem f Good and
Evil. Since,
however,we are ed by thenature f
this
enterprise
o touch he
"good" aspect
f the
problem,
I
can not consistentlyeave the other,
the
"evil,"
aspectwholly
untouched.
If
my nterpretation
f "good" is right,
t seems b-
vious
hat
"evil"
is
not
an antithesisf t
n
the ense
that,
for
nstance,
white
s
the antithesis
f
black,
or
warm fcold. The existence f "good"
is notcondi-
tioned
n
the
existence f "evil" as
its essential
on-
trast.
The antithesis f "good,"
is
"dead,"
dead m-
plying something hat was alive but died. The
"good" of a
living being might, heoretically,
x-
perience
ittle evil or even
none at
all.)
Now
is there
easonable
oubt
that
what
we
have
here
aid is
only
a revision nd extension
n
the
ight
of
present-day
nowledge, f
Aristotle's
where here
is sensation, here
s also pleasure;" f
James'
simply
to
live,
move
and breathe
hould be
a delight;"
nd
Woodworth's
pleasure
s 'in
us'
withoutbeing n
any
specialpart
of
us?"
Fromwhat we
have already
earned f Aristotle's
inability, artly
romack
of factualknowledge,
o
see
how
nutrition,ensation,
nd reason ould
be in-
terdependent
nd inseparable
artsof that particular
complete eality
which
s
a
man, we
readilyforesee
that he would
be unable
to go the
whole way with
modernsn interpreting
he good. It
is, however,
o
the
point
o notice hathe
recognized
oththefallacy
and
the
practical
nadequacy
f
the
"UniversalGood"
as conceived y Plato.
(It
is worth
while,historically,
o recall
that one
of the mostmemorable
f Aristotle's irect
eferences
tohisdisagreementith Plato is in thisvery onnec-
tion.
It
is
here hat he
tells us: "such an
inquiry
s
not a
pleasant
ask
n
view of our friendship
or he
authors
f the doctrine
f
ideas."
But
further:
in
the nterests
f truth,we ought
o sacrifice
venwhat
i, nearest
o
us, specially
s
we call ourselves
hiloso-
piers." (Nich.
Ethics,,
6
Peters
rans.)).
Full
of
positive
nterest
houghAristotle's
iscus-
sion of
the
good,happiness,
nd
therest
s as
it
comes
to uw
n
the
Ethics,
t
would
be
out
of
place
to pursue
it
he,
.
One
minor
oint,
however,
as considerable
bearing nour nterpretation. hat s, thenumerous
passages
hat reveal
his
doubts
bout
the
relation e-
tweenreason
nd
the
various
feelings
nd emotions.
One
llustration
ust
uffice.Although
e ets t
down
positively
nough,
that as
to
man
"mere nutrition
and
growth"
must
be excluded,
lsewhere
we
read:
"Good, then,
s not a term
hat
s
applied
to
all
these
things
like
n
the same ense r
with
reference
o one
common
dea
or
form. But
how thendo these
hings
come
o
be
called
good?
for
hey
o
not
ppear
o have
received
he
samenameby chance
merely."
Then,of
special nterest omesthe answer: "Perhaps t is be-
cause
they
ll
proceed
rom ne
source,
r all conduce
to
one
end." (Ethics , 6).
I
am
quite
ure hat
one
source"
and "one
end"
of
this
conditioned tatement
could
without orced
nterpretation
nclude he
owest
level
sensations
n
the one
direction,
nd the
highest
welfare
f the
organism
n the
other,
of
our nterpreta-
tion.
(I
venture o
remind he reader
n
connection
ith
this
suggestion
f Aristotle's
bout
source
nd
end
relative
o what is good, or
my accounton
earlier
pages of my
own
experiences
n
orange-eating
nd
institution-building.)
Like
in
purport
o the above,but
moredefinites
Aristotle's
ecognition
hat
the
good
for
man must
e
connected
with his
"purpose
in
life,"
as
we say.
"Man's
good,"
says
Aristotlewould
seem o ie nhis
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ARISTOTLE
AND
ENTELECHEIA
15
function,
fhe
has one. But can
we
suppose hat
while
a carpenter
nd
a cobbler as
a
function
nd
a business
of
his
own,
man
has no business
ndno
function s-
signcd
im ynature? Nay, urely s his severalmem-
bers, ye ndhand ndfoot, lainly aveeachhis own
function,o we must uppose hatman also has some
functionver nd above all these." (Eth.
,
7,
II.)
The
"function
ver
and above
all these"
s,
as all
familiarwith Aristotle's upreme ppraisal of con-
templationwould foresee, he "life of his [man's]
rationalnature." Whether e was right n this s,
of course,not our concern ere.
This
rather
ong but
far
rom
xhaustive xamina-
tion fAristotle's dmirable ven hough ragmentary
knowledge f thetruth bout sensation, leasure, he
good, and happiness as seemed ndispensable o
the
prosecution f our main purpose n this division of
our
nquiry oncerningntelecheia.
We now return o the reason or his di-
version.
The reason was, it will be re-
called, what we found Aristotle aying
about
sexual
pleasurewhen he was at his
best
s
a
zoologist
but
gnoring
lmost
n-
tirely
when he
was
an
ethicist. And
we
need to recall still more definitely hat
madethis matter eem mportant. It was
his
guess,perhaps
aken rom
ippocrates,
that the intensityf he leasure f oitions
due o
the nvolvementf hewhole rganismn
the ction.
I
wish to
contend
ow that
the
revision
ofthis
guess
n
the
ight
of
modern
nowl-
edge
s
sketched
n
the
oregoing
iscussion
justifies he erectionof the guess into
a
definite ypothesis, r perhapsmoreex-
actly,
definite
heory;
nd
further
hat
f
the
theory
s
true,
his
aspect
of sex con-
stitutes ne
of
the
trongestmanifestations
of the wholeness
n
the
sense of
complete
reality entelecheia)f higher animal or-
ganisms.
For notice the facts
nvolved:
(i) The activity f copulation s linked
with that
of
nutrition,
n
the
two most
basic of all vital phenomena ormanand
the
vast
majority
of
organic species.
Those phenomena re
of
course, he
main-
tenance
f he ndividual
nd of
he
pecies.
(X) The excitation ponwhich he ctiv-
ityprimarily
epends
s the
mostbasic
of
all, namely
that
of physical
contact,
or
touch.
(3)
In accordance
with
theconceptions
of excitationand sensitivity pparently
necessitated
y
modern
physiology,
the
sensation
accompanying
the
activity
reaches
down
to the
same
level of
vital
phenomena
s
do
nutritionnd
metabolism.
In other
words,
it reaches
to every
cell
or part
of a cell
of the
organism
hat
is
truly
alive.
That
is to
say, it
reaches
down
to the
simplest
iving
units
into
which livingbodies areresolvable.
Does itnot
follow,
hen,
hat
f "good"
as
applied
to
living
bodies
means
what
numerous
tudents
avesomewhat
aguely
interpreted
t
to mean,
and
we have
more
definitely
o
interpreted
t,
that
he
Hippo-
cratean-Aristotelian
otion
of the
multi-
plication
of the
"good,"
thepleasurable,
feeling,
withthemultiplication
fthe
body
parts nvolved,would be logicallysound?
But
noticewhat
one
of
the
most
funda-
mental
mprovements
f
his ncient heory
affectedy
modern
esearch,
s essentially.
Aristotle
went
farenough,
we
have seen,
with
such
improvement
o
see that
the
intensity
f the
pleasure
ould
not be due
to
the
coming
of
the
germinal
material
from ll parts
ofthe body.
Butremember
his
substitute-pneuma,
piritus
It seemsto me a fair questionwhether
Aristotle
does not
come
nearer
perhaps
unwittingly)
unitary
heory
f the
soul,
and of
soul and body,
in connection
with
this very
matter f sexual
pleasure
than
n
any
otherwhatever.
The
question
hinges
on
the
role
ascribed
o thespiritus
in
coition
and the
views
previously
no-
ticed
hat "intellect
nous]
s
not
found
o
to cause motionapartfrom ppetency."
Still
more
efinitely
n
thisdirection,
ecall
the recognition
hatconcupiscence,
kind
of
appetency,
may
move
a man
n
opposi-
tion to reason."
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THE
QUARTERLY
REVIEW
OF
BIOLOGY
So
we
are
ed
toconclude
hat he
whole-
ness of
an
organism
manifested
n
the
ec-
stacy
of sexual
intercourse
s this
is
ex-
perienced ymanand thehigher nimals
generally,
s
one
of themost
characteristic
and
powetful
tems
n
the
omplete
ealityf
these
rganisms.
he momentarily
om-
plete
monopoly
of consciousness
t the
climax
of
sexualecstacy
hould
probably
beviewed
s the
very
ighest
manifestation
of
the
individual's
conscious
unifiedness
and wholeness.
But it is
important
o
noticethat
the tendency
f
the emotions
to such monopoly s not by any means
restricted
o the
erotic
emotion.
Many
forms f contest,
or nstance,
othphysi-
cal and
mental,maygo
far
n
this
direction.
In all such
cases there
s
ampleevidence
not only
as common
xperience,
ut from
scientific esearch,
f the involvement
f
very
many,
f
notall, parts
f heorganism.
EVERYTHING
WHATEVER
AND THE WHOLE-
AND-ITS-PARTS
Finally
we
mustfacethe
supreme ues-
tion
of
ll:
What
did Aristotle
o
abouthis
conception
f
entelecheia
hen he
viewed
it
in
connection
with his
conception
f
Everything
hat
s or Has
Beenor
Will Be?
For we
may
be sure,
fromwhat
we have
abundantly
earned
bout
theman thathe
was not
of
the
kind
either
o
fail
to
ask
this
question
or
to
do
something
oward
answering
t.
Naive
and
philosophical
naturalism
Ritter
nd Bailey,
927,
p.
7)
were
altogether
oo
closely
ntermingled
in himto permit
im
to overlook
or shy
at the
question.
Almost
hemost
amousfrom
he
tand-
point
of
traditional
hilosophy)
of
Aris-
totle's
works,
the
Metaphysics,
ay
be
said to be devotedprimarilyo the prob-
lem of
man's knowing
the Universe,
or
Cosmos, approached
from
the direction
of
the
Whole-and-its-parts.
But
t
s
obvious
hat "our
usual
method
of investigation"
could
not be followed
here without
far-reachingmodification.
For the"compound
whole" to
be analyzed
into ts "uncompoundedlements"Wel-
don, 91,
p.
z) was
certainly
ot accessible
by
theprinciples
f
knowledge-getting
e
himself had so
largely developed
and
utilized.
The method
ould
be
applied
withconsiderableuccess
n
getting
nowl-
edge
of a State
or a work
of art, s
a poem
(this
article,part
I, QUART.
REV. BOL.,
Vol. 7,
p.
38i),
or
a bedstead
p. 387),or
a
block
of
ce p. 383), or
a bit of ir p.
384).
But when it comesto theuniverse-what is
it compounded
f?
Yet,there
s the un, he
moon,
heplan-
ets, the starry
ostsand
the
arching ky,
no
esstrulyhings
f ense xperience
han
men nd
fishes, he
blue
sea,
and
the
solid
earth. Surely the
heavenly
bodies
are
parts-of
something-no
oubtabout
that.
But of
what? What
is the
whole
now?
Can therebe a whole so big andinclusive
that
there
s
nothing
beyond
t, nothing
leftout of it?
No
one
who
has faced
eriously
he
prob-
lem
of theOne
andthe
Many,
as even
we
moderns re perplexed
by it,
can be
de-
cently
ndifferent
o the magnificent
n-
slaughtupon
it
made
by
the Greeks
nor
unsympathetically
ritical
f theirmeager
success.
The study f what
Aristotle id
on
the
problem
maywell
begin
with
a reference
to
the
view,
now
apparently
cceptedby
nearly
all
students
of the
Aristotelian
works,
that the
Metaphysics,
he work
in
which the
deepest
meaning
f
existence
s
treated,
was not called
Metaphysics
y
ts
author.
TheFirst hilosophy
as
his name
for t. The main ignificancef his sthat
really
Theology
ould probably
ndicate
more
ruly
what
Aristotle
as
here
iming
at
than
does
metaphysics
s
commonly
understood.
For
he
was
obviouslyquite
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ARISTOTLE AND ENTELECHEIA
as
interestedn
the problem
f God
as in
that ofNature.
The moment
we touch
the question
of
what the
ancients
any of
them)did on
the problemof Everything,we are con-
fronted
with the pitiful
meagernessas
compared ith
ours)of heirfactual
nowl-
edge.
Andmuch f his
meagerness
tands
in
relation o every
division
of nature,
t
standswith
special
mportance
n relation
to theheavens.
Undoubtedly
acts
n
this
subdivision re
among
the most
striking
andappealingof
those
n
anysubdivision
whatever. But from their verynature
theyare
speciallybeguiling
to common
experience.
Wonderful,
ndeed,
is the
rising
and setting
of the sun,
the
effects
of
its
radiations upon
the
earth,
and
the responses
to these radiations by
living
bodies.
Nevertheless
o far
s con-
cerns
ll land-and-air
nhabiting
nimals,
man
with
therest, roblems
f finding,
e-
curing
and
utilizing
food
and water are
manifestly
much
more compelling
of
at-
tention
nd
goading
o
action.
The
grow-
ing
light
and warmth
f each
new day
just
omes, s
free race, o
themother
ird
and
to
the mother
human.
Nothing
is
exacted f
he
recipients-unless
ndeed
he
stimulus
o
song by
the
bird
and
prayer
of
thanksgiving
y
the
woman
be
counted
as
exactions.
How differenthe
advent
of the day forboth creatures elative o
food and drink
Be up
and
doing
is the
exaction
now.
For
the
final ssue s
Life-
or-Death.
And
this
must
be
met
quite
otherwise
than by benisons
of
song
or
prayer,
owever
desirable
ndgood these
may be.
So
while
perhaps
nowledge
f heheav-
enly bodies
s
the oldest
branch
fnatural
science,tcertainlys not theoldestbranch
of
practical xperience.
And who has
a
scintilla
of real
evidence
of theoretic
r
speculative
nowledge
n
any
realm
what-
ever
that
does
not rest
finally
n
practical
experience,ndividual nd racial? Herein
matters
f
the mosthuman
oncern re the
issue.
History eveals hatmen
n
all ages have
applied heir maginationsnd peculations
to
their ree-gracexperience f the heav-
enly bodieswith the hope of gaininghelp
therefrom
n
theiractive, oftenhard, ex-
periences
f
uch arthly odies and situa-
tions as are Life-or-Death o them.
To this Aristotlewas not apartfrom is
predecessorsnd contemporaries. ndeed
he seems o have beenbehind omeof hem
insome espects. Butwe canniotn decency
be
unsympathetic
ith our
forebears
n
this
if
due
regard s had to the studyof
astrology mong eoples nd ultures own
to our
very
selves
with
our
daily news-
papers as media for disseminating stro-
logical beneficencend malevolence.
With reference o Aristotle's position
in
this,ourconcern s, as in othermatters,
quite
as
muchwith
his
thinkingn thebasis
of
the
factual knowledge he possessed,
as
with his knowledgetself. And ourmain
interests, of course, he questionof how
his
conception fentelecheiatood in rela-
tion to
his conception fEverything, s-
pecially
as to the heavens as a
part
of
Everything.
It
is significant hat
in
the discussion
which
embodies
his
conclusions bout the
nature f heheavens nd ofGod, Aristotle
begins
not with the
heavenly
bodies
but
with
substances,
matter nd
movements;
and
withactuality, otentiality,
nd
cause.
In
other
words he
begins
where common
experiences egin, namely,
with
earthly
things.
As an illustration
f
how
objectively
eal
he
was,
take
this:
"For how
will
there
be
movement,
f
there
s no actual
cause? Wood
will
surely
ot move
itself-the
arpenter's
rt
must ct
on
t."
(Metaphys.
1071b -8,
Ross
trans.). Then,
true
o his custom s
a
student
f
genesis,
here
mmediately
ollows:
"nor
will
the
menses
nor
the
arth
et
themselvesn
motion,
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THE
QUARTERLY
REVIEW OF BIOLOGY
but
the seedsmust act on the earth nd thesemen n
themenses."
Philosophicallv
oundbut cientifically
very nsound,you see-as in manyother nstances.
How then is man-individual man-
whoseexistences dependentn the act of
procreation y a man and a woman, and
on nnumerablects of his own
n
securing
and utilizingnutritial ubstances,going
to
fullycomprehend verything?harply
and certainly imited s a man is both
in
coming obe
and
n
continuing
o
be,
how
canhe encompass
n
any ense,byhisown
acts, even by
his most
powerful
nd com-
prehending cts, that which is entirely
unlimited,o far s his experiencesestify?
The evidence s conclusive, believe,
that on
the
whole
Aristotle pproached
the
greatproblem
n
this
humanly
nimal-
istic fashion.
But what could he really do toward
solving t?
Almost
bsolutely ninformed
as he was
of
the
facts
nd
interpretations
on which the idea of organicevolution
rests; atheticallymeager s was his tech-
nical informationbout reproductionnd
development,bout nutrition, espiration
and tnetabolism, bout
neuromuscular
c-
tion, and about
the
physics
and
chemis-
try
of
the
external nvironments
f
iving
things,
here
was
no
course
open
to him
by
which he
could
advance
beyond
what
othershad done than to put enormous
dependence, ust as they had done, on
thinking
nd
reasoning bout
such
obser-
vationaldata
as
theypossessed.
Now
this
sort of
thing mplied as
it
always does)
discussion, argument, speculation,
dis-
putation.
It meant dialectics. And dia-
lectics s a methodofstriving fter ruth
that
has had tremendous
ogue
n
the his-
tory f
human
ulture. And there s
much
uncertaintys towhether hebalance heet
of
such
striving
hows
truth
n
the
black
or in
the red.
A
greatpart
of
Aristotle's
ffort
o
solve
the
problem
of
All
Existence
was
made
by applying
his
verymethod. There
is
no doubt
about it. Accordingly is re-
sultshave
to be testedby this
criterions
well as
by that ofobservational
rocedure
and inevitable ogic.
Against
the theory hat
number s
in
essence uch as to
be the
sole explanation
of Everything;
also the theory that
Platonic
Ideas hold this exalted
place
Aristotle
evelshisgreatdialectic
powers.
How successful e
was in this, I do
not
undertake
o judge.
Nor does it seem
to
me of much importance,ts
significance
beinghistorical and logical ratherthan
factual.
Offargreatermportance
s the
circumstance
hat
at a deeper,morevital
level ofhis information
nd
his thought,
he recognized
hat a
sine
qua
non to any
body's
having
information r
thoughts
about
the
nature
of numbers
r of Ideas
or
anything lse is
the factof
beingalive
with
all
this
mplies
s
to begetting, irth,
growth nddifferentiation;lsoas to many
vastly omplex
rganic
unctionsspecially
of
digestion
nd metabolism,
nd of
sensi-
tivity.
ARISTOTLE
S
THEOLOGY
AND
ENTELECHEIA
That
he
tripped
few
times when
he
tackled he
problem
f
Everything,
s
not
surprising.
Indeed,all things
onsidered,
it swonderfulhathedid as well as hedid.
And
venture o contend
hathis faithful-
ness, on
the whole, to
his conception
of
entelecheiaas a
major
factor
n his
accom-
plishing
whatever f value he
did accom-
plish here.
Let
us
examine hen hequestion
f
what
exactly
he did towardsquaring
his
con-
ception
with
his
dialectical
efforts.
We
can useRoss's Selections,Ross,
927)
to
good
advantage. The group
of selections
combinedby
Ross
under
the title
"Aris-
totle's
Theology
andAstronomy," egins
(in
keeping with what we
pointed
out
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ARISTOTLE
AND
ENTELECHEIA
above about
Aristotle's tarting
his dis-
cussion
of
the
Heavens with his earthly
experiences)
s
follows:
Sincetherewerethreekindsofsubstance,wo of
them hysical
nd
one unmovable, egarding
he
atter
we
must
ssert
hat t is necessary hat
there hould
be
an
eternal
nmovable
ubstance.
For substances
are
thefirst
f
existing hings,
nd
if they
re all
de-
structible,ll things re
destructible.
But
it
is im-
possible
hatmovementhould ither
ome
nto
being
or cease
o be;
for
t must lwayshave
existed." (Me-
taph
io7ib
1-7.)
This
problemof substancc
s
upon
us
here
n
tsfull erribleness.
As for hetwo
physical inds, hematerial, rsubstratum
of
bodies,
and the bodies
themselves
s
forms,
Aristotle was no more dubious
about
hem han
is any onsistentmodern
naturalist
a naturalist, hat
is, who
has
not become sophisticated
by atomistic
physics).
It
was the third
kind, the
un-
movable
kind, that
troubledhim most.
For
eventhough
he foundgreatdifficulty
inmaking t
fit
with the otherkinds,he
still
thought
he could
not
get
alongwith-
out
it. And
one of
the particularly
ard
questions
t
connection
with
it
was that
seemingly
t
must e
non-sensible.
"For (i)
it [Physics]
oes not deal with the
final
cause
for
this s
the good,
and
this s
found
n
the
field f action
ndmovement;nd t is the
first over
-for that
s
the nature
f the
end-but
in the case
of
things
nmovable
here s no firstmover),
nd
X)
in
general,t is hardto say whether he sciencewe are
looking
for
i.e.,
"Wisdom s a science f first
rinci-
ples"] deals
with
perceptible
ubstances
r not with
them, ut
withcertain
thers." (Metaph. 059a
35)
"Hard
to say" indeed
For even today
where rewe withreferenceo t? Modern
physics
eems
actually
to
have fallenbe-
hind Aristotle o the extent hat t
is now
staking
verything
n
atoms s experimen-
tal analysisknows them and as theycan
be
treated
uantitatively.
Nor have
the
prevalent
chools
of
philosophy,
thics
nd
religion,
made clear and
solid advance
beyond
im.
For
n
none
f
thesehas
sub-
stance s
form n thesense of Aristotelian
morphology
received any approach
to
adequate
recognition. So the question
we
are asking
boils down to this:
What did
Aristotle o toward econciling is "usual
method
of
investigation,"
.e. of
"analys-
ing a compoundwhole
nto ts eastparts,"
with his
supposednecessityn a particular
case, that
of the
problem
f
Everything,
of
proceeding
y
the
reverse
method?
For
as we see, he reallybegan
with the
parts
(least parts?) n this
case and tried
by the
dialectic
methodto conceive
the wholc.
Here is a passage thatseemsto me to go
farby implication oward
answering
he
question.
Arguing orhis theory
f a "first" gent
as
thecause
of ll
objectively nown
hings
he
says:
Since
i)
this
s
a
possible
account
f
the
matter,
and X)
if
t werenot true,
heworldwould have pro-
ceeded ut
of
night nd "all things ogether"
nd out
of
non-being,
hese
ifficulties
aybe
taken
s
solved.
There is, then, somethingwhich is alwaysmoved
with
n unceasing
motion,which
s
motion
n a circle;
and
this
s
plain
not n
theory nly
but
n
fact.
There-
fore hefirst
eavensmust
e eternal.
There
s
there-
fore lso something
hichmoves hem.
And
ince hat
which
s
moved
nd
moves
s intermediate,here s a
mover
which moves
without
being
moved, being
eternal,
substance,
nd
actuality. (Metaph.
I072.a
i8-15
Ross
trans.).
The crucial point
here s that the last
wordofthepassageis actuality energeia)
and
not
complete reality (entelecheia).
May
we
not
properly
sk
why
this eternal
substance
hat s
insensible
nd
is
a
mover
of the heavens and
all
things
without
itself
being
moved, hould
not
be
charac-
terized
s
complete eality
nd not
merely
as
actuality?
Is it not
justifiable
o con-
jecture
hat heremarkable
omethinghat
Aristotle ere ssumed eatthe ametime
feltto
be lacking
the sort
of
reality hat
led
him
to conceive
ntelecheia?eflect
n
the
ncongruity
f
applying
he same term
to
such
a
phenomenon
s he
supposed
he
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30
THE QUARTERLY REVIEW
OF BIOLOGY
heavens to be, that
he
applied
to
the
phenomenon
f the transformation
f ice
into water (this
article,part
I, QUART.
REV. BIOL., Vol. 7. p. 383)
or of hechange
of a warmbodyto a cold one p. 384).
The
difficulty
f observing ll
that is
observable
of
any
whole-and-its-parts,
regardless
fsize and
complexity,nd of
thinking bout
t, and beingentirely
on-
sistent hroughout,
s undoubtedly
very
great. Yet that
uch onsistencywaswhat
Aristotle
eally
felt theneed of
when he
conceived
ntelecheia-,ppears
ome certain.
Howdifficultt s to measure p tothe aim
is
llustrated y
thefact hatAristotle
im-
self almost certainly
ell shortnow
and
then.
An
important
nstances furnished
by
his efforts
n connectionwith this
very
problem
fEverything.
He, like
nnumer-
able otherpersons
n
many ages and cul-
tures
down to some
of
the distinguished
astronomers
nd
all of the astrologers
f
ourownday,conceived he heavens o be
the
region
which
s
thefavorite,
f
not
the
exclusive bode,
of
the eternal
nd divine.
WithAristotlemovement as,
as we
have
noticed,
what
he regarded
s particuarly
convincing bjective
vidence
f
he ternal.
For
the
dialectical
proof f the endlessness
ofmovement
n
a
circle eemed
o him con-
clusive.
And
since
this was
supposed
o
be
the
course
traveled
by
the
heavenly
bodies, theyfurnishedroofofeternality
and
divinity.
His
discussions
of
the
heavens, specially
n
the
Dc
Caelo nd the
Metaphysics,
ake
it
clear
that
his
inter-
est herewas
at
least as
much
theological
as scientific.
n
thesediscussions
e seems
to
flatly
ontradict is
conception
f en-
telecheia
n one
instance. And it
is fair o
guess, think,
hathis contradictions
due
to thedual interest ndicated. The con-
tradiction ccurs
n
thefollowing assage.
"Evidently
here
s
but one heaven.
For
if there
are
manyheavens
s
there re
manymen,
he moving
principles,
f which each hcavenwill
be one, will be
one
n
form ut n numbermany. But all things hat
are many
n
number
ave
matter. (For
one and the
sameformula
pplies o many hings, .g., theformula
of man; butSocrates s one.) But the primaryssence
has not
matter; or t s complete ealityentelecheia)."
(Metaph. 074a 36, Ross trans.).
It is in connectionwith this passage that Ross
writesme(without nowing fmy eferenceo t here):
"Yet
for hemostpartAristotle sesthewords entel-
echeia nd
energeia)nterchangeably.Ross also writes
"Energeia
as
not a well-established reekwork. It,
no
less than
entelecheia
eems o
be
a
coinage
of Aris-
totle. At
least the new Liddell and Scott has found
no earlier se of
t." Such being
he
case,
s not
the
question fair ne: Why houldAristotle ave coined
two
such
important ords
f
they
were
quite
inter.
changeablenhis thought?
The
statementhat complete ealityhas
notmatter
s unreconcilable,o
far
s
I
can
see, with the
many ssertions,
irect
r
by
clear
nference,
hat
complete eality
oes
includematter. The instanceof ice and
water,
and
of warm and
cold
referred
o
above may erve
s
examples
n
the
purely
physical modern ense) realm. A foot-
note to
this
passage by Ross seems o fur-
nish similarevidence
for
the biological
realm.
"The Logos," says the note, "is
common o all
men,
so
that
it
must
be
matter
which gives Socrates
his
unique-
ness.
It
maybe
contended, nd
it is
probably
true, hat
the matter
ssumed
o
be respon-
sible
for
Socrates'
uniqueness
s
wholly
differentrom he "primary ssence," of
the
passage,
and which is the
"complete
reality" of
it. But this really helps to
focalize
my
riticism.
For evidence s un-
escapable
that Aristotle
was
fully
com-
mitted,
s
a
biologist,
o the idea
that
he
germ f
man
s
of
organisms enerally
as
potentially
he organism
n
its
actualized
form
o
far. In
other
words,
he
was
com-
mitted o themoderndea ofhereditys to
propagation,
nd
to epigenesis
s
to ontog-
eny.
More
of
the
passage
in
De
Partibus
quoted (this article, part
I,
QUART.
REV.
BIOL.,
Vol.
7,
p.
386)
is
especially
lear
on
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ARISTOTLE
AND
ENTELECHEIA
31
the
point: "Every germ mplies
two
or-
ganisms, he parent nd
the
progeny.
For
the
germ
r
seed s
both
the seed ofthe
or-
ganismfromwhich t came,
of
the horse,
for nstance, romwhich it was derived,
and the seed of the organism hat
will
eventually rise from t." (De part.
64Ib
33-37). This is, so far as matter s con-
cerned,
n
accord
withthefully stablished
facts
f
genesis
nd
s opposed o thetheory
of omething, primaryssence, or xam-
ple, in addition o the matter. For even
the
germplasm heory,though holding
that the germinal substance does not
really omefrom he parent, oes not
in-
voke an
essence
or
first gent,
or
cause
in
the meaning f Aristotlewhen he de-
parts
from is
usual course
s a
student
f
livingnature nd becomes enuinelymeta-
physical s a speculator boutthe heavens.
Attentionmay be incidentally alled to the fact
that the theory f germinalmutation f the ultra-
orthodox school of genetics s perilouslynear, n
logic,to theAristotelianheory f non-materialirst
agent,
r
essence s thecauseofthemutations, hat s,
of
the source f new
species.
Fortunately,s it seems o me, Aristotle
connects
his
theoriesof thought and
of
motion n such a way as to give added
justification
o
the view that
he
contra-
dictshimself hen
he usesentelecheia
n the
instance ited. The passages am about
to quotewill be more asily seen to bear
on
the
point
f
read
n
connection ith our
examination
of
Aristotle's
views about
pleasure
n relation
o thought. Directly
continuous
ith the
passage quoted bove
and
ending
with
"there s
a
moverwhich
moveswithout being moved," etc., we
have:
"And the
object
of
desire and
the
object
of
thought move
in
this way;
theymove without being moved. The
primary bjects
of
desire and of thought
are
the
same. For
the apparentgood
is
the
object
of
appetite,
nd the real
good
is
the
primaryobject
of
rational desire"
(Metaph.
1072za
2z6-z8 oss trans.). Then
comes
a
long discussion
of
the inter-
mingling f thingsdistinctly arthywith
things heavenly.
In
this discussion the
concept of actuality (energeia)plays a
large part while that of complete eality
(entelecheia)
lays no part at all. Some
of
the instances ollow:
"Since
there
s
somethingwhich moves while
itself nmoved, xisting ctually, his can in no way
be
otherwise han it
is.
(1o72.b 7).
.
.
On such a
principle, hen,depend he heavens nd the world of
nature. And its life s such as the best which we
enjoy, nd enjoybut for short ime. Foric is ever
in
this tate which we cannot e), since ts actuality
is also pleasure
1072.b
I5)
. . .
If, then,God is always
in that good state n which we sometimes re, this
compels urwonder
..
And ife lso belongs o God;
for
he actuality f thought s life, nd God is that
actuality; nd God's essential ctuality s
life most
good and eternal. We say thereforehat God is
a
livingbeing, ternal,mostgood, so that ife nd dura-
tion continuous nd eternalbelong to God; for his
is
God."
(I072.b 2.5)
Another,more iteral t east
n
part, ranslationf
the ast
entence
s:
"Now,
our tatement
s,this,-that
the
Deity
is an
animal that
is
everlasting
nd most
excellent
n
nature;
o that with the
Deity
life and
duration
re
uninterrupted
nd
eternal:
for
his
con-
stitutes
he
very
ssence
f God." (M'Mahon, I9IO,
p.
332).
The passage n which
his
occurs s regarded
by
M'Mahon as
probably
the
most ucid
statement
of Aristotle'snotions of
the
Divine
Nature
of the
Being and Attributes f God."
That God is a Zoon, verlasting
nd
very
good; and thatZoc s lifeco-enduringith
God is
surely eserving
f
pecial
ttention
as
indicating
he
remarkable
ontrast
e-
tween he Greek
onception
f animal
nd
the
well-nigh niversal
modern
onception
of
it.
In
the
light
of
what has
been already
presented
n
this essay, s it any wonder
that Aristotle
hould
find
o
place
for
his
conception f entelecheian the reasoning
these tatements
resent? Surely,
hecon-
ception
of
God as
an animal
n
the
sense
thatfish, ird,mammal,
nd man are
spe-
cies of the
genus
nimal would
be
as
con-
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3
THE
QUARTERLY REVIEW
OF
BIOLOGY
trary, ven as repugnant,
o the general
spiritof the Aristotelian cience and phi-
losophy
s to thatof
any system
whatever
ofscience, rphilosophy, r ethics,or re-
ligion. Yet rigid adherence o the cardi-
nal principles fbiology
nd ogic, ofboth
of
which Aristotle s the
acknowledged
founder,would seem
to
commithim
to
just
that
conception.
Such
passagemakes
newonder hethert may
have eenwrittenor spoken?)ong eforets uthor
had mmersediniself
n
the tudy f iving ature
and f he sychicalrocessesnvolved
n
the tudy,
andthatheneverook tup again nearnest.The
problemf he hronological
rdernwhich heAris-
totelian
orks
were roduced,
o
which
xpertsre
now giving erious
ttention,
hows
its great mpor-
tance
n
suchpassages.
If,then,my nterpretation
f
Aristotle's
system
of
knowledge
and
thought,
and
especially
of
his
conception
f
entelecheia,
is
on
the
whole
sound,
he
mental
icture
of
the
man
and his systemmust be very
different
rom hat which seems
to
hang
in
the
mental
galleries
fmost
of
those
n
which there
s
any
picture
f
him at
all.
For see what
in
barest utline uch a pic-
ture portrays:
A
man insatiablycurious about, and
determined
o know
and
understand
s far
as
possible, verything
hether
f
earth
r
heaven.
Committed o the gigantic task thus
implied
nd attending reatly o the psy-
chical activities nvolved
n the
task,
the
man
pictured locks
out for he earth s a
compound
whole
the
domain
of
natural
sciencewith
a
comprehensiveness
nd,
for
livingthings, detailedtruthfulnesshat
no
one before
him had remotely ap-
proached.
For all the earthyportion f the task,
the
pictured
man
recognizes
with
remark-
able nsight
hat
nterpretation
f
whole-
and-its-parts equires a conception for
which
he coins
the
tcrm
ntelecheia,
As to every
spect xceptone of the ter-
restrial ortion
fthe task, he is
presented
as
satisfied
hat
his new term s applicable.
The exception e
seems o feel oncerns
he
powerof reasonas possessedby a single
animal
species, man. Here,
seemingly
after
onsiderableperplexity, e
decides
that his new
term
does
not
apply. This
power
s
too
great, oo precious, oodivine,
to be included
ven n man'scompleteness
as
an
earthly
being.
Finally when
he who is pictured omes
to the
problem fthe
heavens, he
celestial
position fhis task, he appears tillmore
perplexed
s to the
status
of
his new con-
ception. Now we seem
o
see him
falter
between
wo
stupendous
lternatives:
i)
Must
he
conceive he
heavens
s the
abode
of
Deity-yes,
in
ultimate essence very
Deity
itself-to
be entirely
nknowable,
inaccessible, o
earthborn
man?
Or, (z)
May
he
conceive he heavens
nd God
not
thus beyondthe reachofman ifmanbe
conceived
n
one of
his
parts,
his
reason,
to differrom imself
s
earthborn,
n
just
the
way requisite
o
give
him
the
power
f
knowingGod?
In neither
lternative, otice,
could en-
telecheia,
arth-engendered
s we have
seemed
to
find
t, be strictly
nd
fully
applicable.
MOD1ERNIZED ARISTOTELIANISM
What,
we
may
now
properlysk,
would
be
necessary
o
transform
his mental
pic-
ture
of the
relatively
ittle
informed n-
cientAristotle
nto he
picture
f modern
man, enormously
nformed s he
may be?
Can
there
e serious oubt
s to
what
the
revised icturewould show? Recur
o
the
problem f the
soul
as Aristotle
truggled
with it-the problemof whether there
are three
souls,
or one
soul
with three
parts, nutritive,
ensitive,
and
rational.
Examinethis
n
the
light
of
the
principle
of
the
vvhole-and-its-parts
hich
Aristotle
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ARISTOTLE AND
ENTELECHEIA
33
himself learly aw in many f ts aspects.
Examine t also
in
the enormous ddition
of ightfrom resent-daynatomy, hysi-
ology and chemistry f nutrition nd of
stimulus-responsendthe higher ndhigh-
est mental ctivities.
From such an examinationconjoined
with a firm
rip
on
what Aristotle imed
at by his term
entelecheia,
he conclusion
seems o meunescapable hatno suchgiant
intellect s his is essential o see that the
complete eality
f a man
does ncludehis
attribute
f
reason
egardless
f
how
varied,
orsubtle, rmighty t may be.
Now this s a way ofsaying hat n in-
venting he word entelecheiaristotle aw
conceptually arther
nto
the nature
of
man
than
the meagerfactual knowledge
he
possessed eemed
o warrant.
Further,t is a way of sayingthat the
dualism of
Soul
and
Body,
of
Mind
and
Matter,
s
thishas
plaguedmuch
f
human
culturedisappears
when
subjected
o
the
joint ightof hebestAristotelianhought
and the
best analyticalresults
f
modern
research.
But
f
the
revised icturewould portray
one eagerly willing to include his own
highest,
most
herished owers mong
his
earthborn ossessions,
ven
more would
it
portray
ne
willing
to
include
heheav-
ens
regardless
f
how
divinely onceived,
as
inseparablyinked
with the earth
to
constitute he Grand Whole of Things.
For reflect
n
what
the
astronomy,
he
physics,
nd the
chemistry
f
our
era have
done to confirm
bjectively
ot
only
Aris-
totle's reasoned onclusion hat "there
s
but
one
heaven,"
but
that his one s
by
no
means
utterly ut away
and different
rom
mother arth. Had Aristotle
ossessed
s
muchobservationally erified
nformation
about the movements f the earth,the
other
planets,
nd the
stars; about gravi-
tation; bout
the
chemical
omposition
f
the
sun
and
other
heavenlybodies; about
the natureof light and heat; about the
electro-magneticonditionsof the earth
and the un; and about radiation, s enters
into the commonknowledge f our day,
it does not eem o me at all probable hat
he would have staked s much s he did on
the nature f the heavens n contrastwith
the
nature
f
the earth,
n
constructingis
theory f he ternal nddivine-in a word,
his Theology, And this is equivalent o
saying, ccording o the viewpoint
f
this
essay, hatunder uch onditions e would
not have hesitatedto conceive
entelecheia
(CompleteReality) n such a way that it
would extend o both Earth and Heaven
and all that in them s, man and all his
powersby
no
meansexcepted.
LIMITATION
OF ENTELECHEIA
Buteven hough ntelecheiaould extend
thus far t would not imply coexistence
with,
for
instance, he
Hebrew
Yahveh
or
the Mohammedan
Allah. For these
names eem ohavebeendesigned obeall
otherNames above; Names,
that
is,
that
should designate Being
and Power ade-
quate
for all
needs, desires,
nd
hopes
of
humanhearts
nd heads.
An extended iscussion
fthe
portion
f
Everything
hat
xtends eyond
he
mean-
ing
of
entelecheia
s
for
that
very
reason
beyond
he
cope
of
his
ssay.
One
aspect
of
the problemmay, however,be appro-
priately oticed o the extent fa few en-
tences.
It
would
seem
that
Everything
What-
ever
would
have
to
include
all that now
is,
all that
previously
has
been,
and
all
that
thereafter ill or
may
be.
In
other
words,
All
Existence
hus
conceivedmust
be
coextensivewith
Space
and
Time
(as
generally nderstood).
Now
due
consid-
eration or the principles f potentiality
and
actuality and great
onsideration
e
have
seenAristotle
iving hem)
seems
to
require he recognition hat All
Existence
QUAR.
REV.
BIOL.,
VOL.
9t
NO. 1
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34 THE
QUARTERLY REVIEW OF BIOLOGY
Whateverwould
have to includenot only
all that has been
or
now
is
actualized
of
all potentiality,
ut
all
that might pos-
sibly be actualized. But
the concept of
entelecheiaeally includes, accordingto
our interpretation,nly
so much of po-
tentiality
s has been and
is
now being
actualized.
That is to
say
any potenti-
alities that
a
body
or
situation
mayhave
that
never
become
actualities
would
not
be
included n the
concept.
To
illustrate,
any potentialities
human
infant
may
possesswhichnever
ome o
actuality ven
thougha well-rounded hree scoreyears
and
ten
or
more
may be lived,would
not
be included n the
entelecheia
f that
indi-
vidual. By
this
view
the "complete
reality" f human ife,
no
matter
ow full
of
years
nd
good
deeds
t
maybe, would
not include
those
possibilities
t
had at
the
beginning
hat
were never
realized.
Immeasurableinfinite?) otentialities
r
possibilitieswould therefore xist that
would
not come
within
the
meaning
of
entelecheia,ut
would
ome
within
heseem-
ingly
ntendedmeaning
of
the Divine.
So
it
results
hat
normously eaningful
and useful
s
entelecheia
s
for
natural
ci-
ence and natural
philosophy,
t
falls short
of
adequacy
n
ts
application
o
All
Exist-
ence
Whatever. The
"complete
reality"
of the
concept
s
not
complete
nough,
s
one may say, to includefully ha't spect
of man's
response
o
nature
or
which
in
all
his
ages
and
cultural
stages
he has
sought
atisfaction,
nd
to the
ummed-up,
abstracted bject
of
which he has
given
the name God
in one or more
of ts
num-
berless
ynonyms
nd variants. The
flood
of
stimuli
from
he externalworld that
pourconstantly pon
us
as raw
material
of emotional xperience-howvastly his
exceeds,
we now
realize, ur bility
o
give
rational, nalytic
ttention o it
in
all its
details
Accordingly
for
an
adequate
under-
standing fman's
response
o
Nature, spe-
cially
in the
emotional moiety of that
response,we
must go elsewhere han to
the
teachings
of
Aristotle.
Or,
perhaps
moreexactly,forsuch understandinghe
Aristotelian eachings must be
amended
and extended o
make them onform ith
the information
nd ideas
concerning a-
ture mbodied
n
the
world-culturef
our
era.
The presentation
f
what, so far
as
I
have grasped t,
the
suggested
mendment
and extensionwould consist n,
belongs
to quite a differentessayfromnthis.ere
a
mere
hint
n
that
direction
must uffice:
In accordance with the
psychologicallywell-
recognized
mportance f distinguishingetween ny
emotion
s such,
and
the
reasoned
nterpretation
f
that emotion,
t
turns
ut that
the
sharpest ind of
distinction eeds
o
be
made
between
he
mystic
x-
perienceust
as an emotion nd
the
rational
explana-
tion
of that
experience.
For such an
explanation
constitutes
theory,
r
doctrine
commonly
alled
mysticism.So mysticismasnonecessaryonnection
with
religious xperience.
That
emotional tate,
which s
basic
o
the
o-named
mystic xperience,
an
be entirely
dentified ith
out
sensory esponses
o Nature nd our
absolute
epend-
ence
on
Nature.
It
can
be
shown
that almost
cer-
tainly
the
"sense
of oneness
with
God,"
of
the de-
voutly rthodox hristian;
he
"Substance,"
ne
and
eternal,
f
Spinozian
philosophy;
he
"immediate
x-
perience
f
the whole occurrencef
Nature"
of
a
pro-
fessedly
theistic
naturalist ike
John
Burroughs;
and "my mysticworld ovelywith trees nd clouds
and
eddying
treams
have
never seen'
"
of
sightless
persons
ike
Helen
Keller,
re
responses
o
nature
ot
so much
n its
nfinity
f
space
and time s in its
or-
ganizedcompleteness.By
this
nterpretation
mni-
potence
s an
attribute
f
Nature: Omniscience oes
not
xist, ecause
escience
s
an
attribute
f
part
nly
of
nature,
hat
s
to
say,
of man.
(Ritter,
933 pp.
i8, I9.)
Such
an
emotional-intellectual
ttitude
towardNature s thathere ketched s one
concomitant
f
the
acceptance
f
the
Uni-
verse,
the
phrase
being
understood s
in
this secondForeword.
Apparently
his is the aspect of
mnan's
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ARISTOTLE
AND ENTELECHEIA
35
response o nature hatmakeshim "incur-
ably," as the expression
as it,
religious
just s, fromnother
spect
fhis
response,
he is "incurably"
urious nd intelligent;
also
scientificnd
philosophic.
That the world s
vastly
more
ndebted
to Aristotle and otherGreeks)for
ogic,
science, and philosophy, than
it is for
religion, houldno onger tand n
theway
(as
for
enturies
t has
stood)
of he
world's
enteringntotheenormous enefitsfthat
indebtedness.
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of Behavior.
GATES, . I.,
i92.5, Elementary
sychology.
Hicics,R. D.,
I907,
Aristotle e Anima.
JAMBS,WILLIAM,
897,
The
Will
to Believe.
KORZYBSKI,
ALFRED, I933.
Science
and
Sanity,
an
Introduction o Non-Aristotelian ystems nd
GeneralSemantics.
LILLIB, R. S.,
I93I, Types
of
physical determination
and
the
activities
f
living
organisms.
Journal
ofPhilosophy,
ol. XXVIII,
Oct. 8,
pp.
56I-573.
,
932., The
directivenfluencen iving rganism,
ibid.,
Vol. XXIX, Sept., pp. 477-491.
M'MAHON,
JOHN
H.,
I9IO,
The
Metaphysics of Aris-
totle.
PFEFFER,
W., i900, The Physiology
of Plants, trans.
A. J.
wart.
RITTER, WM. E., and BAILEY, EDNA W.,
I92.7,
The
Natural History
of
our Conduct.
1
92.8,
The
organismal
onception,
ts
place n
science,
nd
its
bearingon philosophy.
Univ.
Calif. ubl.
Zoology,ol. 3I, No. I4,
PP.
307-358.
i92.9, The
problem of names, as illustrated by
the word
"light." Journ. f Philosophy, ol.
XXVI, No. 2.3,
Nov. 7,
pp.
6I7-62.6.
RITTER, WM.
E.,
i929,
Is life quantity? (review of
What
s
Life?by AugustaGaskell), Science, ol.
LXIX, No. I790,
PP.
42.5-427.
- I93I, Science nd Philosophy,Journ. f Phi-
losophy, ol. XXVIII, No. i, Jan.
,
PP.
5-I4.
I
I933, Naturalversus upernatural,r A man
as a UnifiedWhole nd as a PartofNature as a
Unified
Whole. HosmerChapter f
the
Lay-
men'sLeague, FirstUnitarianChurch, erkeley,
California.
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STRATTON,
G. M.,
I9I7,
Theophrastusnd the Greek
PhysiologicalPsychology eforeAristotle.
SMUTS, J. C., i92.6, Holism and Evolution.
1,
931, The scientificworld-picturef today.
Science, ol. 74, Sep. 2.5,pp. 2.97-305.
TOLMAN,
E. C.,
I932.,
PurposiveBehaviorn Animals
and
Men.
WELLDON,
J. E. C., I9I2:, The Politics of Aristotle.
WINSLOW, C-E.A., I92.4,
in
The Child:
His
Nature
and
His
Needs,
dited
y
M.
V.
O'Shea, pp. 2-I3-
23I.
WOODWORTH, ROBERT S., I92.I, Psychology, Study
of
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