Wisdom (Metaphysics 2005)
Lecture 58: Act, Ability, and the Nature of Evil

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in the middle. That's the nature of our mind, huh? And here the difficulty in knowing this is that he's too knowable. And here the difficulty is in the thing itself, right? But for different reasons these are difficult, right? Kind of strange the way Aristotle sees sometimes, I mean, he may be defined beginning and end before he defines middle, right? I think he does so because he wants to distinguish between before and after, right? That's really before you can't understand any of this at all. Before you can understand the beginning, the end, you can't understand what before and after means, huh? And so since the beginning has before without having after, and the end has after without having before, you see that before and after are two different things. And then he defines the middle, right? Just like in the categories he defines individual substance, individual accident and universal substance first, and then universal accident that has both the affirmatives, and then last of all, what? Individual substance. So he defines what exists in something was not said of something, what is said of something doesn't exist in something, and then what both exists in something and is said of something, and last of all, what is neither said of another nor does exist in another, right? You know? But two negatives, right, huh? And that last, huh? But notice, in a way, God and the first matter are simple, right? But the simple is known by the composed, right? So when you get to study God, you're going to find this, right? Reflected in all our knowledge of God, that we know God after the manner of what we, what? Our own logic, right? So God knows composed things in a simple way, and we know simple things in a composed way, right? So the way pure act is kind of composed, right? It's as if we know a composed thing but it's not really composed. But the composition is in our house, not in the thing, right? And if we understand this, we realize that the thing itself is not composed. We're going to have a whole question about God is not composed. God is simple, right? But there'd be all kinds of negations in it, huh? So in theology, we know him not as he is, huh? But as he is not. But there's something like that in the thing about necessary, right? And impossible, right? It's not the same threesome, right? But you could say that what we seem to know first is what is able to be and not be. And then we get the idea that there's something which is what? Not able not to be. Of course, there can't be anything that's able not able to be. But we do talk about it, don't we, huh? I mean, I can talk about the square circle, right? That's something impossible, right? A square circle? You know, not even God can make a square circle, right? A square circle is something impossible to be, right? It's something not able to be. You know, God can't change the past, right? Kind of strange reality, impossible, huh? We can talk about it, huh? We can define it, right? It's being in our mind, huh? Just like the Greeks can say you can't get something from nothing, so they can talk about nothing, right? So, in the third paragraph here on page 11, he says, nothing incorruptible, he said in the previous paragraph, is an ability simply, right? The incorruptible is what is not able, what? Not to be, yeah. Nor any of the necessary beings, he says in the third paragraph, right? Because the necessary is what is not able or not to be, yeah. It's kind of funny how with the modern philosophers and the modern thinkers in general, you have the determinants for whom everything is necessary, right? Right. And then you have the kind of existentious, right, which everything is, what? Contingent, right, huh? Okay. It's kind of interesting, just in the philosophy of nature, they're talking about whether end is a cause in the natural world, right, huh? And so on. And it's kind of interesting to read Einstein because he's kind of puzzled by these things a bit, huh? Because Einstein says in the one place there that all scientific work of a higher order, you know, is based on a belief like that of religion, right? And you can see this in Einstein, huh? Einstein devoted his life to trying to understand the universe, okay? And so even, you know, the semi-popular books, you know, The Universe of Dr. Einstein, well, not a bad title to the book, right? Because that's what he was devoting his life to, huh? He said the details don't matter to me, right? He wanted to understand the universe as a whole. And so Einstein in 1905, you know, proposed the special theory of relativity, huh? But then in 1915, he proposed the, what? General theory of relativity. And that really belongs to cosmologists, the state of the universe as a whole, huh? And after they confirmed it, they didn't confirm it right away because the war was going on. But after the First World War was over, the horrible war, then they tested the observations that he had predicted, right? And, you know, he had to observe it during the eclipse of the sun, right? And what he predicted seemed to be so, and they'd tell a phone line and say, you've been confirmed. I knew I would be. He said, I didn't think you didn't confirm it. It was so beautiful. I hadn't been confirmed. So he's devoting himself to understand the universe, right? But why would a man devote his whole life to trying to understand the universe unless he believes that the universe is understandable? Okay? Well, Einstein sees an affinity between believing that the universe is understandable and the original believer who thinks it's a product of a great mind, right? Okay? Then you have another thing of Einstein where he says, the most incomprehensible thing about the world is that it should be comprehensible. Okay? Which, in a way, is saying the most un-understandable thing about the world for him, in a way, is that it should be understandable, right? But coming back to the other statement which is maybe more easy to say. If the man is devoting his whole life to trying to understand the universe, he's acting on the belief that the universe is in fact understandable, right? Not like some of these extensions to say the universe is something crazy. Yeah, it doesn't make sense. It may be true of the human world. It's the way we live. We don't make any sense, right? Most of us. I suppose all of us to some extent we don't make any sense. But if you believe that the universe is understandable then maybe eventually the question would obviously arise, well, why is it understandable? And if you say that it's made by an understanding then it's not incomprehensible but the universe should be understandable because it's made by an understanding, right? And, you know, like the British astrophysicist Sir James Jeans says, well, God is the supreme mathematician, right? But in general he's the supreme mind, right? But Einstein just doesn't know what to make of this, right? He doesn't want to quite go all the way but he... but... He doesn't want to He doesn't want to But this is partly the reason why Aristotle will say that what is more knowable is not more knowable to us. He sees the distinction there, right? Aristotle will distinguish between what is more knowable and what is more knowable to us. Now what kind of a distinction is that, huh? Apart from trying to understand this particular distinction, what kind of distinction is that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it corresponds to the second kind of mistake outside of words, right? The mistake for mixing up what is so simply and not simply, right? But in some very imperfect, qualified way, huh? Okay. Now what's more knowable simply? Well, you see a little bit of it already. Let me come back to it again. But if act is before ability and definition, right? And ability is knowable only through act. Something is knowable because it's an act. So what's most knowable? What's pure act, huh? So God is most knowable. But not to us, he says. As far as he sees that, right? See? Because our mind goes for what? Ability to act. And then the thing that goes for ability to act, it's an ability of what's in act, huh? So what is most in act, in that sense, is least knowable to us, right? But it's most knowable, right? So he sees that distinction, right? It's really kind of marvelous that he saw that, huh? And he's almost the only thinker, you know, he's the first thinker to see it. I don't know if he could be else to be seen clearly except those who have learned it from Aristotle, huh? But students, and Descartes and so on, are always mixing up those two senses, making this mistake here, huh? You know, in the dialogues of Plato there, when Socrates asks somebody what something is, like he asks Mino what virtue is, or he asks Mino what piety is, they give examples, huh? Okay? If he asks a little child, what is the nose? He'd say, where's the nose? This is the nose. He'd point out the nose on our faces. Now which is more knowable, the examples or the definition of virtue? To us, yeah. Yeah. Okay? But which is really more knowable? You know, the definition really makes more known exactly, right? When people hear a definition, they often don't understand it, right? And you have to give them examples so they can understand it a bit, right? Yeah, okay? But in a sense, the student wants to say that the examples are more knowable than the definition. Well, it's more knowable to you. But not the other way around, right? Okay? And it's kind of funny, you know, I might as well make a joke about the way the students speak, you know, when they have a hard time understanding distinction, right? They invariably call it confusing. And I said, well, the distinction is how you get out of confusion, right? So the distinction is distinguishing, it's not confusing the vision. But it's revealing the confusion in your mind. So you shouldn't say the distinction is confusing. You should say, oh my gosh, I'm confused and I can't understand this distinction. But this is a hard kind of distinction to get a hold of, right? But it keeps on showing up again and again. You know, Descartes wants to proceed in every science that you proceed in geometry. Because that's the most rigorous and the most certain, right? You know? That's the best way of proceeding. So that's the best way of proceeding everywhere. And Aristotle will say, well, the best way of proceeding is not the best way of proceeding everywhere. Geometry, you know, proceeds to some extent from the cause to the effect, right? That's a better way of proceeding than from the effect to the cause. But it's not a better way of proceeding than natural philosophy, is it? So in a way, Descartes is making the mistake of what? Of saying that what is better simply is better here, right? Or, it's sort of like the mistake in political philosophy, right? Where the best government is not the best government for this people. Or like in the church or in the city, the best life is not the best life for everybody. Right? So it's a very common mistake, huh? I tell the students that you make the mistake in your life all the time, right? When you do what is bad because it's good in some way. Or you don't do what is good, like study, when you should, because in some ways it's bad. It prevents you from partying or doing something. You know? In some ways it's bad. You know? So we make the mistake all the time in our daily life. So it's not an uncommon thing here. So we have to stop here on 4.30 here, huh? Mm-hmm. He's just... In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen. God, our enlightenment, guardian angels, strengthen the lights of our minds, order and illumine our images, and arouse us to consider more correctly. St. Thomas Aquinas, angelic doctor. And help us to understand how it's your written. Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen. So we're kind of coming to the end of the ninth reading, right? Where Aristotle was showing more manifestly that act is more perfect than what? Ability, right? Now you see, in the previous reading he'd shown that act is better than ability. Considering act and ability in one and the same thing. So when a thing is being developed, completed, perfected you could say, right? It takes some time, right, to perfect something, to complete it, right? But as you complete it, you're going from ability to act, aren't you? When you're building the house, right, huh? Okay, the lumber and the bricks and so on are house only in potency or in ability. And the house is not a very perfect house yet, huh? But as you form the wood, form the bricks, arrange things and so on, then you perfect the house, right? Okay? The same way for making an apple pie, right, huh? Okay? So what comes later in generation is more perfect, yeah? But what comes later in generation is the act. What's before in generation, right, is the ability, the passive ability, huh? That's one way of seeing that act is better than ability, huh? And then he reasons from ability being for the sake of act, huh? So the end is always better and more perfect, huh? That's the third meaning of perfect, by the way, in the fifth book of wisdom. What has reached its end or purpose, right? Okay? So if act is the end or purpose of ability, the ability to see, for example, is for the sake of seeing, right? The ability is for the sake of the act. Well, then the act has to be more perfect than the what? Ability, right? But notice, huh, in both of those ways of reasoning there, he's reasoning from ability and act in the same thing, right? But then in the ninth reading, he takes, what? Ability and act in different things, huh? And he compares necessary and eternal things, which are clearly better and more perfect than these corruptible things, right? But you could say that the necessary, the eternal, the incorruptible things are to the corruptible things like act is to what? Ability. Because the corruptible things are corruptible because they are able to what? Be and not be, right, huh? So it's through ability that they are less perfect than the incorruptible and eternal things, huh? He says that's more manifest because you're losing different things, huh? Okay? So, but like if I said, you know, well, the goods of the soul are better than the goods of the body, Socrates argues in the Apology, right? But then you're talking about, what? Two parts of man, huh? His soul and his, what? Body, right, huh? You have to see that the soul is better than the body, and that's kind of hard to see, right? But then you might say, yeah, but the goods of the soul are the goods of the body, a bit like man is to a beast, right? Because the beast shares the goods of the body, but not the goods of the soul, right? So it might be easier to see that man is better than the beast, right? And if man is better than the beast, it's because of the goods he has that the beast doesn't have, which would be the goods of the soul, right? So it's kind of more manifest, isn't it, in that way? That the goods of the soul are better than the goods of the beast, huh? When you compare, I mean the goods of the body, when you compare man to the beast, two different things, right? When you're trying to see inside the one man himself, that his soul is better than his body, right? And therefore the goods of the soul are better than the goods of his, what? Body, right? Okay? And I compare it to what Socrates does in the famous work called The Republic, right? Where he's shown that the soul of the just man is better off than the soul of the, what? Unjust man, right? Well, it's a little bit hard to see this, right? And so Socrates blows it up, right? So large, as you can see it, he compares the parts of the, what? City with the parts of the, what? Or the parts of the soul, I should say, with the parts of the city, huh? He compares the rulers to reason, right? And the irrational appetite, as we call it in Latin, the thumos in Greek, to the soldiers, right? And then the kids will appetite to the common men, right, huh? Okay? And then you start to see what the orders of these three parts of the city. And you can see more clearly, huh? When there's disorder among those parts, that it's bad, right? Than when your soul is disordered, huh? Okay? Or in Aristotle, you know, raises the question, should, how should reason rule the emotions, right? And our reason, our emotions are kind of mixed up inside of us, kind of hard to consider this question, right? But he asks the question, should reason rule the emotions like a father rules his son or like a master rules his slave, right? And we can see more easily that the way the master rules his slave is different from the way the father rules his son, right? And then we can kind of understand by that two different ways in which reason might try to rule the emotions and understand which one would be the better way, right? But I say it's more clear in the sense that the man and the master and the slave are two different men, right? And the father and the son are two different people, too, right? Okay? But my reason, my emotions are not two different people, right? But they're, you know, inside of me, right? So he does something like that here, right? More manifest in that way, huh? And notice how in the third paragraph on page 11 there, he's hinting there at the argument that we give eventually for the existence of God. God, in the Summa Theologiae, it would be the third argument, right? The one from, what, reasoning from contingent things to necessary things, and then to the one who's necessary through himself, namely God, right? But Aristotle speaks here that the necessary things are the first things, right, huh? He's hinting at that, huh? Okay? But the necessary things don't have an ability to not be, right? So necessary things are better than the contingent things, but the necessary things aren't the contingent things, like act is to what? Ability, right? Yeah. So if the necessary things are better than contingent things, then act must be better than what? Ability, right? Okay? Now, in the 10th reading, and in the 11th reading, he's going to be going a little bit more into the idea of what is better and more perfect. And perhaps we can recall something that Thomas kind of touches upon in the 5th book of wisdom, but something, you know, that takes a while to really see clearly. But when you go back to, let's say, the first article, the first question of the disputed questions about truth, right, where Thomas, following Avicenna, distinguishes the so-called transcendentals, and this means the most universal thoughts, the most universal words, and I don't know if you've ever seen that text, but he quotes Cassandra saying that being is what the mind first understands, right? And then he talks about the word thing, and then he talks about the word one, and then the word adequate, which perhaps we can translate something, and then the word true, and the word good. He distinguishes the six most universal thoughts, most universal words, right? Okay? And... These aren't simply synonyms, although they're referring to the same reality. But being is taken from to be. From existence. So whatever it is, in any way whatsoever, could be said to be a being, right? Even if it is said to be only in our mind, right? At least it's a being of what? A reason, right? Like nothing. Nothing is something to talk about. But something only in the mind. There's nothing outside the mind, right? So being is completely universal, right? Could there be something that doesn't come under being? That would be a contradiction, right? Could it be something that doesn't come under being? Because it would be. That's what being is made from to be, right? Okay. Now, what's the difference between being and thing? Well, being a thing... Can't be a thing. Well, essentially speak of a thing of reason, too, right? Oh, but thing is named more from what it is, right? You see? So you could say that reason wants to know what is and what it is. Well, that kind of refers to those first two things, huh? Being and thing, right? And kind of a sign that the word thing is taken more from what something is, is that when we define definition, which makes known what it is, right? We sometimes say definition is speech, making known what a thing is, right? Rather than what a being is, right? Even though being has a nature, too, right? But being is named more from existence, from the act of to be, and thing from what it is, huh? Now, one and something, as Thomas explains them, the word my thing would be all liquid here, which I want a better word to translate as something, but these add a what? Nothing real to being and thing, but they add in thought a negation, huh? So one adds the idea of undivided, okay? But something adds the idea that it's distinct from all other things. Now, distinction has in its very reading negation, huh? Because things are distinct of which one is not the other. So the words one and something are not adding anything real to being and thing, but they're adding in thought, in negation, right? And Aristotle, in the fourth book of wisdom, after he shows that wisdom is about being as being, he goes on to show it's about the, what? One, right, huh? But he shows how the being of a thing and the unity of a thing are, what? Inseparable, right? The being of this chair, for example. It would cease to be if I, what, separated the parts of it, right? So this is a thing that tries to hold on to its being, it tries to hold on to its, what? Unity, right, huh? And you want to destroy the army, you what? Destroy the order, the unity of the army, right? Okay? If you separate my soul from my body, I won't be anymore, will I? So the unity of the thing, and it's what it is, it's being, and so on, seem to be the same thing, but this is adding the idea of, what, indigation, right? Okay? So, Aristotle speaks of these first four, but especially of being in one, as the very subject of wisdom, huh? Wisdom is about being in one, huh? Okay? And that's why the books here, in books 6 through 10, right? In book 6, we talked about accidentally being, right? We talked about being in the sense of the true, right? Being in the mind, right? And then in books 7 and 8, we talked about being in the sense of, what, substance mainly, according to the physics of education, but substance mainly, right? And one meaning of substance, of course, is what a thing is. So you're bringing in thing in your discussion of being, right? And then accountability in this ninth book, huh? But then book 10 is about the, what, the one, huh? Okay? Now there are many texts of Thomas and Albert, which I've studied and so on, where sometimes he takes the word one to involve both of these, right? Okay? So, to say that I'm one man, right? I'm not only undivided, my parts, they're united in me, right? But I'm distinct from all you guys, right? Okay? To be one man, right? My body and soul and other parts have to be united, right? Not divided, but I'm divided from all you guys, and distinct from all you guys, right? You see? Okay? So, although Aristotle was saying more explicitly that wisdom is about being in one as a subject, you could say that kind of included in being is what we call thing, right? And that becomes very clear in the seventh book of wisdom, when Aristotle takes up substance, and one meaning of substance is what a thing is, right? Okay? And substance is the fundamental thing, right? The fundamental being, huh? Okay? And then, as I say, often it takes one to include distinct from other things, too, right? Then, what about true and good? What about true and good? Well, when Thomas tries to explain how true and good have the universality of the other ones, he goes back to what Aristotle shows us in the third book about the soul, that the soul is in some way all things. And so, in terms of our reason and our will, right? And their being, in a way, infinite, universal in their object, right? Because about every being, in or outside the mind, right? There can be, what? Knowledge and truth, right? Okay? And, as we'll see more clearly as I go on, being as such is, what? Desirable, right? Therefore, that's a reference to the good and the will. Well, he doesn't seem to speak of true and good so much as being the subject of wisdom, right? He speaks of being and one as the subject of wisdom. Well, then, how should one regard true and good in this reasoned out knowledge called wisdom, huh? Well, speaking logically, you could say that... They kind of have the place of properties, right? Albeit unusual properties, right? Properties which don't really differ in reality from that which they are property, right? Okay. What you're going to see now, a bit here, in the 10th reading, but going to expand a bit, we're kind of going to see that being as such is what? Good, right? Okay. But good is not simply a synonym of being, right? But being as such is good, right? I see that. And being as such is what? Noble. And therefore can be true, right? We'll see this as belong to being as such, right? So just as the geometry, right, shows that the triangle as such has its interior angle is equal to right angles, right? That's a property of the triangle, right? So in a way, to be good and to be noble and true are like properties of being as such. Okay? Kind of a subtle thing to see that, huh? And when Thomas divides the words in Book 5, he says these are the words that are used especially in wisdom. Well, he divides those words into three groups, huh? He says every reasoned out knowledge has a subject, right? And every reasoned out knowledge shows certain properties of that subject to what? The causes, right? So there's three things in every reasoned out knowledge. A subject, its properties, and the causes of the subject and its properties. So the words that Aristotle distinguishes in Book 5 are divided into those three groups. The first words Aristotle takes up are words that are names of beginnings or causes. So in that first group of words, you have the word beginning, right? The word cause, the word element, right? The word nature, which is the name of a cause, right? And then the word necessary, which is a kind of condition of the cause, huh? Because a complete cause has an effect following necessarily, right? Okay? So that first group of words, beginning, cause, element, nature, and necessary, all pertain to causes in some way, right? Okay? Then the second group of words that Aristotle takes up are the words one and being. And the parts of one and being, huh? Okay? Like quantity, quality, and so on. Substance, right? Okay? And then the third group of words begin with the word, what? Perfect. Remember that? We took up some of those words, right? Usually in class, I don't take up all these words because you spend the whole semester on book five, right? But I usually take up the word beginning, which is the first word in the first group, right? Then the word being, which is perhaps the most key word in the second group, right? And then the word perfect in the, what? Third group, right? Okay? Well, I think that kind of fits in with seeing true and good as perfections of being, right? And therefore names of what? What functions here in the science more like a property, right? Than a what? A subject, right? Okay? Now see, it takes a little while to see that that's perhaps the best way of relating these sex, right, to the subject and the properties that we expect to find in the reasoned out knowledge, right? The first ones here, being and one, including and since these are the two, signify more the subject and the other ones more the, what? Properties, right? Okay? Now, you know, it takes a mind that counts, you know, to figure out, right? The division and distinction of those names in book five, right? But you see in a way here, right? He just got through in the ninth, eighth and ninth readings here in showing that act is more perfect than what? Ability, right? He's been discussing the perfection of being, right? And now in the tenth, eleventh readings, he's going to be talking about goodness and then about what? Noble and true, right, huh? You know, kind of, you start to understand being, especially if you have to understand being in terms of act and ability, you begin to see that being as such is good, huh? And the other great truth on the other side is that the bad is what? No, the bad is fundamentally a non-being, right? Okay? Now, Augustine, huh? He saw that, right? But Aristotle saw it a long time before. Augustine saw it, huh? But Augustine sometimes, you know, exaggerating a bit the way of saying that, he'll say, sin is nothing and the man who sins becomes nothing, right? Okay? Now, later on, huh? You come to realize that God is I am who am, right? Okay? You find that what you learn here in Book Nine, that being as such is good, and the bad is a kind of non-being, right? But exactly the kind of non-being it is, Aristotle will bring out, huh? They could be a little more explicit here than he is, right? But if you know the first book of natural hearing, you can fill in with the, not so explicit about it right here. Once you realize, in this tenth reading, that being as such is good, and that the bad is fundamentally a kind of non-being, right? This will harmonize, right, with what you learn later on about the first cause. That the first cause is I am who am, right? Now, as you know, there's nothing bad in God. God is only good, right? So other things, insofar as they have being, are like God, and therefore, what? Good, right, huh? It harmonizes with that, right? And therefore, the bad must be kind of non-being, right? Okay, but we don't reason for God here, because God is less known than act and ability, right? Okay? But we discover that act is better than ability, right? But ability being capable of act is also in some way good, right? But not as good as the act itself. And that the bad is, first and fundamentally, non-being in the sense of a, what? Lack, okay? Now, lack is not non-being, period. It's a non-being of something you're able to have and should have, right? And when you should have it, right? Okay? That's what the bad is. That's the fundamental meaning of the bad, right? Okay? So, it's not non-being, period. I mean, you can say, for example, that this mug here doesn't see, right? But this mug not seeing is not really something bad, because the mug, the reason of what it is, is not apt to have the ability to see, right? So, it's not the non-being of something is able to have and should have. But if you or I were blind, or the dog or the cat was blind, right, there would be the non-being, right, of something you and the dog are able to have and should have, right? And therefore, there would be something, what? Bad, right? Okay? Not morally bad, but bad in some sense, right? Okay? But even when you get to moral badness, and you say to somebody, what is a bad human act, for example, right? What is a bad human act, huh? Yeah, yeah. It's lacking, right, the measure or the order of reason.