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such a thing the causes are unordered and indefinite.
Adaptation to an end is found in events that happen by nature or as the
result of thought. It is âluckâ when one of these events happens by accident.
For as a thing may exist, so it may be a cause, either by its own nature or by
accident. Luck is an accidental cause at work in such events adapted to an end
as are usually effected in accordance with purpose. And so luck and thought
are concerned with the same sphere; for purpose cannot exist without thought.
The causes from which lucky results might happen are indeterminate; and so
luck is obscure to human calculation and is a cause by accident, but in the
unqualified sense a cause of nothing. It is good or bad luck when the result is
good or evil; and prosperity or misfortune when the scale of the results is
large.
Since nothing accidental is prior to the essential, neither are accidental
causes prior. If, then, luck or spontaneity is a cause of the material universe,
reason and nature are causes before it.
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9
Some things are only actually, some potentially, some potentially and
actually, what they are, viz. in one case a particular reality, in another,
characterized by a particular quantity, or the like. There is no movement apart
from things; for change is always according to the categories of being, and
there is nothing common to these and in no one category. But each of the
categories belongs to all its subjects in either of two ways (e.g. âthis-nessâ-for
one kind of it is âpositive formâ, and the other is âprivationâ; and as regards
quality one kind is âwhiteâ and the other âblackâ, and as regards quantity one
kind is âcompleteâ and the other âincompleteâ, and as regards spatial
movement one is âupwardsâ and the other âdownwardsâ, or one thing is âlightâ
and another âheavyâ); so that there are as many kinds of movement and
change as of being. There being a distinction in each class of things between
the potential and the completely real, I call the actuality of the potential as
such, movement. That what we say is true, is plain from the following facts.
When the âbuildableâ, in so far as it is what we mean by âbuildableâ, exists
actually, it is being built, and this is the process of building. Similarly with
learning, healing, walking, leaping, ageing, ripening. Movement takes when
the complete reality itself exists, and neither earlier nor later. The complete
reality, then, of that which exists potentially, when it is completely real and
actual, not qua itself, but qua movable, is movement. By qua I mean this:
1689
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book The Complete Aristotle"
The Complete Aristotle
- Title
- The Complete Aristotle
- Author
- Aristotle
- Date
- ~322 B.C.
- Language
- English
- License
- PD
- Size
- 21.0 x 29.7 cm
- Pages
- 2328
- Keywords
- Philosophy, Antique, Philosophie, Antike, Dialogues, Metaphysik, Metaphysics, Ideologie, Ideology, Englisch
- Categories
- Geisteswissenschaften
- International
Table of contents
- Part 1; Logic (Organon) 3
- Categories 4
- On Interpretation 34
- Prior Analytics, Book I 56
- Prior Analytics, Book II 113
- Posterior Analytics, Book I 149
- Posterior Analytics, Book II 193
- Topics, Book I 218
- Topics, Book II 221
- Topics, Book III 237
- Topics, Book IV 248
- Topics, Book V 266
- Topics, Book VI 291
- Topics, Book VII 317
- Topics, Book VIII 326
- On Sophistical Refutations 348
- Part 2; Universal Physics 396
- Physics, Book I 397
- Physics, Book II 415
- Physics, Book III 432
- Physics, Book IV 449
- Physics, Book V 481
- Physics, Book VI 496
- Physics, Book VII 519
- Physics, Book VIII 533
- On the Heavens, Book I 570
- On the Heavens, Book II 599
- On the Heavens, Book III 624
- On the Heavens, Book IV 640
- On Generation and Corruption, Book I 651
- On Generation and Corruption, Book II 685
- Meteorology, Book I 707
- Meteorology, Book II 733
- Meteorology, Book III 760
- Meteorology, Book IV 773
- Part 3; Human Physics 795
- On the Soul, Book I 796
- On the Soul, Book II 815
- On the Soul, Book III 840
- On Sense and the Sensible 861
- On Memory and Reminiscence 889
- On Sleep and Sleeplessness 899
- On Dreams 909
- On Prophesying by Dreams 918
- On Longevity and the Shortness of Life 923
- On Youth, Old Age, Life and Death, and Respiration 929
- Part 4; Animal Physics 952
- The History of Animals, Book I 953
- The History of Animals, Book II translated 977
- The History of Animals, Book III 1000
- The History of Animals, Book IV 1029
- The History of Animals, Book V 1056
- The History of Animals, Book VI 1094
- The History of Animals, Book VII 1135
- The History of Animals, Book VIII 1150
- The History of Animals, Book IX 1186
- On the Parts of Animals, Book I 1234
- On the Parts of Animals, Book II 1249
- On the Parts of Animals, Book III 1281
- On the Parts of Animals, Book IV 1311
- On the Motion of Animals 1351
- On the Gait of Animals 1363
- On the Generation of Animals, Book I 1381
- On the Generation of Animals, Book II 1412
- On the Generation of Animals, Book III 1444
- On the Generation of Animals, Book IV 1469
- On the Generation of Animals, Book V 1496
- Part 5; Metaphysics 1516
- Part 6; Ethics and Politics 1748
- Nicomachean Ethics, Book I 1749
- Nicomachean Ethics, Book II 1766
- Nicomachean Ethics, Book III 1779
- Nicomachean Ethics, Book IV 1799
- Nicomachean Ethics, Book V 1817
- Nicomachean Ethics, Book VI 1836
- Nicomachean Ethics, Book VII 1851
- Nicomachean Ethics, Book VIII 1872
- Nicomachean Ethics, Book IX 1890
- Nicomachean Ethics, Book X 1907
- Politics, Book I 1925
- Politics, Book II 1943
- Politics, Book III 1970
- Politics, Book IV 1997
- Politics, Book V 2023
- Politics, Book VI 2053
- Politics, Book VII 2065
- Politics, Book VIII 2091
- The Athenian Constitution 2102
- Part 7; Aesthetic Writings 2156