Modern metaphysics is described as the study of the fundamental structure of reality, and as such foundational not only to philosophy but for logic, mathematics, and all the sciences.It could have been a rough day for the Orleans Firebirds. Tracing the regress of causes back in time as an infinite chain, Aristotle postulated a first cause or ' uncaused cause.' Where every motion needs a prior mover to explain it, he postulated an 'unmoved first mover.' These postulates became a major element of theology down to modern times. But from the beginning, Aristotle's books on 'First Philosophy' considered God among the possible causes of the fundamental things in the universe. In critical philosophical discourse, metaphysics has perhaps been tarnished by its Latinate translation as 'supernatural,' with its strong theological implications. What exists? What is it to be? What processes can bring things into (or out of) existence? Is there a cause or explanation for the universe as a whole? Aristotle's metaphysics can then be seen as explanations for existence itself. The books of Aristotle that Andronicus considered 'beyond nature' included Aristotle's 'First Philosophy' - ontology (the science of being), cosmology (the fundamental processes and original causes of physical things), and theology (is a god required as 'first cause?').Īristotle's Physics describes the four 'causes' or 'explanations' ( aitia) of change and movement of objects already existing in the universe (the ideal formal and final causes, vs.

And metaphysics has failed in proportion to the phenomenal success of naturalism, the idea that the laws of nature alone can completely explain the contents of the universe. Metaphysics is a kind of idealism, in stark contrast to 'eliminative' materialism. In recent centuries then, metaphysical has become 'beyond the material.' Metaphysics has become the study of immaterial things, like the mind, which is said to 'supervene' on the material brain. Does Being exist? What does it mean to say 'Being Is'? Even Neoplatonists like Porphyry also worried about the existential status of the Platonic ideas. Where Plato made his realm of ideas the 'real world,' Aristotle made the material world the source of ideas as mere abstractions from common properties found in many concrete objects. i.e., material or concrete, objects, because ideas can be more permanent (the Being of Parmenides), whereas material objects are constantly changing (the Becoming of Heraclitus). For Plato, Aristotle's master, the realm of abstract ideas was more 'real' than that of physical.

The Greek for nature is physis, so metaphysical is also 'beyond the natural.' Proponents of naturalism deny the existence of anything metaphysical.Īristotle never used the term metaphysics. Andronicus edited and arranged Aristotle's works, giving the name Metaphysics (τα μετα τα φυσικα βιβλια), literally 'the books beyond the physics,' perhaps the books to be read after reading Aristotle's books on nature, which he called the Physics. Metaphysics has signified many things in the history of philosophy, but it has not strayed far from a literal reading of 'beyond the physical.' The term was invented by the 1st-century BCE head of Aristotle's Peripatetic school, Andronicus of Rhodes. Henry Quastler Adolphe Quételet Lord Rayleigh Jürgen Renn Juan Roederer Jerome Rothstein David Ruelle Tilman Sauer

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