For the first time I am getting a handle on Aristotle's Physics. It seems that he saw the outermost sphere as churning everything within, so that everything would kinda settle down if outermost sphere were not moving.
If this interpretation is correct, then I can see how Saadia came up with one of his arguments for the existence of God. For if the universe is finite and the amount of energy is finite, then eventually it's gotta run outa ooompf. But it hasn't yet done so, so cosmos is finite in age. But then again, wouldn't this sort of argument be deistic? And doesn't it require momentum? That would make my take anachronistic (or maybe Sadia was just ahead of his time).
Also, Ari's conception of the spheres as churning explains one aspect of movement. From our mundane perspective, spheres cause sideways movement (stars and planets as well as sublunary movement inasmuch as on horizontal plane). Up and down is caused by tendency toward natural place. The movement we find here is the result of the confluence of the two sorts of causes.
There is a sense in which this sort of causality is mechanistic. But wouldn't Timaeus' notion of a soul moving otherwise inert things be mechanistic as well? Interesting that book 7 of physics may be directed against this sort of conception, as Helen Lang suggests. But the more properly Aristotelian conception of nature would have the spheres move as by internal principle. Not mechanistic. Power of love. And that's another argument for book 8 of the Physics. Not sure I got this right; must review.
If this interpretation is correct, then I can see how Saadia came up with one of his arguments for the existence of God. For if the universe is finite and the amount of energy is finite, then eventually it's gotta run outa ooompf. But it hasn't yet done so, so cosmos is finite in age. But then again, wouldn't this sort of argument be deistic? And doesn't it require momentum? That would make my take anachronistic (or maybe Sadia was just ahead of his time).
Also, Ari's conception of the spheres as churning explains one aspect of movement. From our mundane perspective, spheres cause sideways movement (stars and planets as well as sublunary movement inasmuch as on horizontal plane). Up and down is caused by tendency toward natural place. The movement we find here is the result of the confluence of the two sorts of causes.
There is a sense in which this sort of causality is mechanistic. But wouldn't Timaeus' notion of a soul moving otherwise inert things be mechanistic as well? Interesting that book 7 of physics may be directed against this sort of conception, as Helen Lang suggests. But the more properly Aristotelian conception of nature would have the spheres move as by internal principle. Not mechanistic. Power of love. And that's another argument for book 8 of the Physics. Not sure I got this right; must review.
Also interesting how Aristotle could from one perspective consider natural place/turning spheres as causes of movement, but also make room for higher order causes (such as psyche). Cool beans.
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