44. Matter, Form, and the Fallacy of the Accidental

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Lecture Notes

Main Topics #

The Distinction Between Matter and Lack of Form #

• Matter (ὕλη): the underlying substrate capable of receiving form; substance in potentiality
• Lack of form (στέρησις/privation): the non-being of something that a subject is able to have and should have
• These are fundamentally different metaphysical principles, not to be confused
• Matter desires form as its perfection; lack of form, if it desired anything, would desire its own elimination
• Plato confused these, identifying matter with formlessness itself, leading to the view that matter is bad

The Fallacy of the Accidental (Fallacia Accidentis) #

• Aristotle identifies this as the most deceptive fallacy—one that “deceives even the wise”
• The fallacy treats something that is necessarily present (but still accidental) as if it were essential (per se)
• Becomes especially deceptive when the accident is always present in a particular subject
• Examples:
  • Ignorance necessarily precedes learning, but learning comes through the mind’s ability, not ignorance
  • Indetermination of will necessarily precedes choice, but freedom comes from the capacity to choose, not indetermination
  • Swamp air necessarily preceded malaria, but the mosquito (or germ) is the true cause
• The confusion arises because if A always precedes B, we naturally assume A causes B

Sartre’s Confusion of Freedom with Indetermination #

• Sartre identifies human freedom with the indetermination of the will before choice
• Argument: If my will were determined to choose chicken before entering the restaurant, I would not be free
• Conclusion (Sartre’s): Freedom consists in the indetermination of the will; non-being brings freedom into the world
• Berquist’s refutation: This confuses the ability to choose (what makes one free) with the lack of determination before choosing (which is merely necessary but not causative)
• True freedom is the will’s capacity to choose, not its indetermination
• The indetermination is necessarily present before choice, but is eliminated (not perfected) by choice
• Matter analogy: formlessness is necessarily present in matter, but is not matter’s ability to be formed

The Nature of Badness (Mala) #

• First meaning: lack (privation) of something one is able to have and should have
  • Example: blindness = non-being of sight in a creature capable of sight
  • Not all non-being is badness (a chair is not blind; it simply lacks the capacity for sight)
• Second meaning: what has a lack (e.g., a blind man)
• Third meaning: what causes or produces a lack (e.g., poking out an eye)
• Badness is fundamentally non-being, not a positive being
• Consequence: If badness were a positive being, it would be good (all being is good)
• Therefore: There cannot be something purely bad; the subject of badness is always something good (capable of what it lacks)
• This resolves the paradox of evil and refutes Manichaean dualism

Teaching and the Mind vs. Ignorance #

• Common confusion: “You can only teach the ignorant, therefore you’re teachable because you’re ignorant”
• Correction: You’re teachable because you have a mind (the ability to know), not because of ignorance
• Ignorance is what is eliminated by teaching; the mind is what is perfected
• The mind is ordered to knowing; ignorance is opposed to knowing
• These cannot be the same thing

Good and Bad Human Acts #

• A good human act is a reasonable act (ordered and measured by reason)
• A bad human act is an unreasonable act (lacking the order or measure that reason should provide)
• Examples of unreasonable acts:
  • Drinking before surgery (wrong measure and order)
  • Premarital sex (wrong order: should be after, not before)
• The badness is rooted in the disorder or lack of measure, not in the act itself
• This explains why the subject of a bad act remains something good (a human capacity for action) but performed without proper reason

Key Arguments #

Aristotle’s Refutation of Plato’s Confusion (Per Tertium Comparationis) #

Structure: To distinguish two things that might seem identical, compare both to a third thing

• Premise 1: Form is divine, good, and desirable (shared by Aristotle and Plato)
• Premise 2: Matter, being capable of form, desires form as its perfection
• Premise 3: Lack of form, if it desired form, would desire its own destruction
• Premise 4: That which is perfected by X cannot be the same as that which is eliminated by X
• Conclusion: Matter and lack of form are fundamentally distinct
• Implication: Matter is good (capable of perfection); it is not the source of badness

The Indetermination Problem in Sartre #

• Sartre’s Logic:

  1. Before I choose, my will is undetermined
  2. If I were determined, I would not be free
  3. Therefore, my freedom consists in indetermination
  4. Therefore, man brings non-being into the world

• Berquist’s Refutation:

  1. Confuses the ability to choose with the lack of choice before choosing
  2. The will’s capacity to choose is what makes one free, not the indetermination
  3. Indetermination is necessarily present before choice but is eliminated (not perfected) by choice
  4. Compare to matter: formlessness is necessarily present in matter, but is not matter’s ability to be formed
  5. Therefore, freedom is the will’s power, not nothingness

The Problem of Confusing Ability and Act #

• When Anaxagoras says “you can’t get something from nothing,” he is correct
• But he then concludes: “Therefore everything must actually be in matter already”
• This confuses what is present in potentiality with what is present in actuality
• Example: Wood is potentially a chair, but a chair is not actually in the wood
• The wood has the ability to become a chair (potentiality); it does not contain an actual chair

Important Definitions #

Lack (Privatio/Στέρησις) #

Definition: “The non-being of something one is able to have and should have”

• Requires three conditions:
  1. A subject capable of having the form
  2. The subject should have it (appropriateness to the subject’s nature)
  3. The subject actually lacks it
• Distinguished from mere non-being:
  • A chair is not blind (no capacity for sight)
  • A dog is blind (capacity for sight but lacks it)
• Examples: blindness, ignorance, deafness

Per Se vs. Per Accidens (Ἐξ οὗ vs. Κατὰ συμβεβηκός) #

• Per se (as such): something belongs to a thing through its very nature or definition
• Per accidens (by happening/accidentally): something belongs to a thing but not through its nature
• Example: Being ignorant is accidental to the mind (the mind’s nature is to know, not to be ignorant)
• Key insight: Something can be necessarily present but still accidental (per accidens)

Act (Ἐνέργεια) and Ability/Potentiality (Δύναμις) #

• Ability/Potentiality: the capacity to become something or do something
• Act: the fulfillment or realization of that capacity
• Form is the act; matter is the potentiality
• Matter is for the sake of form; ability is for the sake of act
• Crucial: Lack of form is opposed to form (form eliminates it), while matter is perfected by form

Equivocation and Amphiboly (Ὁμωνυμία and Ἀμφιβολία) #

• Equivocation (ὁμωνυμία): one word with multiple meanings (e.g., “bat” as animal or sports equipment)
• Amphiboly (ἀμφιβολία): one phrase/sentence with multiple meanings
  • Example: “The word of God is the Son of God; the Bible is the word of God; therefore the Bible is the Son of God”
  • The phrase “word of God” means both the divine Son and Scripture
• These are fallacies in language and are especially deceptive

Examples & Illustrations #

Teaching and Ignorance #

Claim: “You can only teach the ignorant; therefore you’re teachable because you’re ignorant.”

Correction: Compare three things—the mind, ignorance, and knowledge:

• If knowledge is God-like, good, and desirable
• Then ignorance would seem bad
• But the mind would seem good (capable of knowing)
• The mind desires to know; ignorance cannot desire to know (it would desire its own elimination)
• Therefore, the mind and ignorance cannot be the same thing
• Conclusion: You’re teachable because you have a mind, not because you’re ignorant
• Ignorance necessarily accompanies the unknowing mind, but this is accidental to teachability

The Restaurant Choice (Sartre’s Example) #

Setup: I enter a restaurant with a menu offering chicken, steak, or other options

Sartre’s Logic:

• Before I choose chicken (rather than steak), my will is undetermined
• If my will were determined to choose chicken, I would not be free
• Therefore, my freedom consists in the indetermination of my will

Berquist’s Refutation:

• This confuses the ability to choose with the indetermination before choosing
• The will’s capacity to choose is what makes me free
• The indetermination is necessarily present but is not freedom itself
• Just as formlessness necessarily precedes the formation of matter, but is not matter’s ability to be formed
• By analogy: If indetermination were my freedom, then formlessness would be matter’s ability to be formed (which is false)

The Malaria/Swamp Air Example #

Ancient Belief: Swamp air (miasma) causes malaria

Evidence Suggesting This:

• People in swamps got malaria
• People not in swamps didn’t get malaria

Refutation: Someone slept in swamp air with a mosquito net and didn’t get malaria

Analysis:

• Swamp air is necessarily present when malaria occurs, but is not the cause
• The mosquito (or the germ it carries) is the true cause
• Shows how necessarily present accidents can be mistaken for essential causes
• Just as ignorance necessarily precedes learning, but is not the cause of learning

The Blind Man #

Three meanings of “bad”:

1. Blindness is bad (the lack itself is bad)
2. To be a blind man is bad (having a lack is bad)
3. To poke out someone’s eye is bad (causing a lack is bad)

Key point: The blind man is not simply badness; he is a good subject (a creature capable of sight) that lacks sight

• The subject (the man) is good
• The condition (blindness) is bad
• This resolves why evil cannot be purely positive

The Donut Hole #

Question: Is the hole in a donut a privation or mere non-being?

Answer: It is a privation—the non-being of donut material where there should be some

• Distinguishes privation from mere non-being (a space above the donut where there is no donut is not a privation)
• A privation is a lack relative to a subject that should have what it lacks

Questions Addressed #

How can matter and lack of form be distinguished if both precede form? #

Method: Compare both to form as a tertium comparationis (third thing)

• Matter is perfected by form (form is good for matter)
• Lack of form is eliminated by form (form is opposed to lack of form)
• Since one is perfected and the other is eliminated by the same thing, they cannot be identical

Why is the fallacy of the accidental so deceptive? #

• Because what is necessarily present seems to be essential (per se)
• We naturally assume that if A always precedes B, then A causes B
• But necessary precedence is not the same as causation
• The fallacy is especially deceptive in wise people because they expect to find causes in what is always present

How does Sartre’s error mirror Plato’s confusion of matter and lack of form? #

• Plato confused matter (the capacity to receive form) with lack of form (the non-being of form)
• Sartre confuses the will (the capacity to choose) with indetermination (the non-being of choice before choosing)
• Both errors identify something good (capacity/ability) with something bad (privation/indetermination)
• Both errors result from treating necessarily present accidents as if they were essential

What is the relationship between being and badness? #

• Being as such is good (all positive being has the character of God, who is good)
• Badness is fundamentally non-being (privation), not a positive being
• If badness were a positive being, it would be good (contradiction)
• Therefore: Badness can only exist in a good subject (one capable of the perfection it lacks)
• This explains why there cannot be something purely bad and resolves the theodicy problem

What makes a human act bad? #

• Not the presence of some positive element
• But the absence of the order or measure that reason should provide
• Example: Drinking (a good act in itself) becomes bad when done before surgery (wrong order) or in excess (wrong measure)
• Badness is always a disordered or unmeasured act, lacking the rational order it should have

How do Hegel and Sartre universalize the fallacy of the accidental? #

• Hegel speaks of the “portentous power of the negative”
• Sartre identifies freedom with non-being and nothingness
• Both treat what is necessarily absent (or present as a lack) as if it had positive power
• But the negative has no power in itself; power belongs to positive being
• Abuse: universalizing the fallacy across entire philosophical systems