User talk:Gharnett

This Wikipedia article on Democritus is indeed highly biased in favor of modern scientific positivism, borrowed unabashedly from B. Russell. The author is confident of the authority of this point of view, presumably because it is popular among the public and contemporary emirical scientists. Whether it deserves such authority, however, is questionable. Take the following remark from the Democritus article"

"The history of modern science has shown that mechanistic questions lead to scientific knowledge, while the teleological question does not."

In considering the truth of this remark, first note that teleological questions are certainly far more useful than mechanistic questions as an avenue to biological knowledge, which is the aim of the zoological sciences, such as botany, ornithology, molecular biology, genetics, and so on: in short, of all the sciences of life-forms. They are also more useful in the applied or practical branches of zoological science, including all the branches of medicine. Since it seems quite possible that the cumulative expense and effort devoted to such sciences hugely outweighs that devoted to all other scientific endeavor collectively, the sentence in question, which summarizes the attitude of the Democritus article as a whole, seems manifestly and almost absurdly false.

Moreover, it is not clear that "mechanistic" questions are a superior avenue to truth even in the sciences of non-living substances, such as physics or astronomy. Is it not correct to explain the flow of electrons in an electric current toward the positive pole as a "tendency" or "drive," a "seeking," in other words, of that pole? Each and every natural substance, in fact, is inhabited by a "force," or by more than one force, that constitutes its "nature," which in Aristotelian terminology is also its "form." It is in accordance with its nature or form that an electron seeks the positive pole, and this seeking is teleological.

Strictly perhaps we should consider the elements rather than sub-atomic particles as substances, and even the elements are surpassed in substantiality by life-forms, which are Aristotle's favorite example of substances. The very possession of determinate attributes by an elements constitues a nature that endows it with a tendency -- that is, a "drive," or "tendency" -- to engage in determinate actions. In isolation, both pure oxygen and pure hydrogen, for example, have a tendency to explode, given an ignition source. When the Challenger spacecraft exploded, for example, investigators noted that an oxygen tank seemed to be leaking; in view of the tendency of pure oxygen to explode, this was deemed a likely candidate for investigation as the cause of the explosion. Moreover, hydrogen and oxygen tend to unite to form water molecules. Such combinations of elements, such as water, also have a "nature" or "tendency": water tends to flow flow downward, to freeze and boil at particular temperatures, and so forth.

It ought to be evident, then, that what the author of the Democritus articles calls "mechanistic questions" -- the "efficient cause," in Aristotelian parlance -- are by no means the sole, nor perhaps even our primary, avenue to scientific knowledge. A grasp of one or more of the other three causes -- material, formal and final (that is, the "tendential" or "teological") -- is often just as enlightening.

comments on teleology

It is probably true that most modern scientists, if asked whether teleological explanation is useful, would probably answer that it is not; and would then continue to use it profusely in discussion of the biological sciences especially, as well as in the sciences of non-living things. Remember that "modern scientists" are for the most part students of the various empirical natural sciences, not students of the philosophy of science itself. As for the account of teleology offered in the contribution entitled "comments on teleology in the Democritus article," it does not of course purport to represent the understanding of teleology common among such modern empirical scientists, precisely because that understanding is in error. It represents Aristotle's understanding of what is called the "final cause," which almost no modern empirical scientists knows, because they don't read Aristotle, whose texts are frequently difficult and which all lack the rhetorical flourishes to which modern readers are accustomed. Properly understood in its fullness, Aristotle's account of the final cause really places it in the nature of every substance insofar as it possesses what we call "forces" endowing it with a proclivity to behave in a determinate way with respect to other substances or even with itself as it develops through time. Hence even subatomic particles have a "tendency" to "strive" in one way or another with respect to other subatomic particles; the example of the electron "striving" to join a proton was offered. When explaining the proclivity of atoms to join with other atoms in forming molecules, it is difficult, if not impossible, to avoid mention of this urge or striving of protons. Again, however, why not examine a particular account of a living being, noticing how often it offers the "reason" the lifeform behaves in a particular way; and try to imagine such an account without such explanations of the "why" of animal behavior. Beyond this point, the reader is urged to seek enlightenment in Aristotle's *Physics* and *Metaphysics,* though it will be a long task, for Aristotle's discussions are of a type that moderns are accustomed to call "philosophy," and a comparatively difficult philosophy at that. Gharnett (talk) 20:47, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

comments on teleology

comments on teleology It is probably true that most modern scientists, if asked whether teleological explanation is useful, would probably answer that it is not; and would then continue to use it profusely in discussion of the biological sciences especially, as well as in the sciences of non-living things. Remember that "modern scientists" are for the most part students of the various empirical natural sciences, not students of the philosophy of science itself. As for the account of teleology offered in the contribution entitled "comments on teleology in the Democritus article," it does not of course purport to represent the understanding of teleology common among such modern empirical scientists, precisely because that understanding is in error. It represents Aristotle's understanding of what is called the "final cause," which almost no modern empirical scientists knows, because they don't read Aristotle, whose texts are frequently difficult and which all lack the rhetorical flourishes to which modern readers are accustomed. Properly understood in its fullness, Aristotle's account of the final cause really places it in the nature of every substance insofar as it possesses what we call "forces" endowing it with a proclivity to behave in a determinate way with respect to other substances or even with itself as it develops through time. Hence even subatomic particles have a "tendency" to "strive" in one way or another with respect to other subatomic particles; the example of the electron "striving" to join a proton was offered. When explaining the proclivity of atoms to join with other atoms in forming molecules, it is difficult, if not impossible, to avoid mention of this urge or striving of protons. Again, however, why not examine a particular account of a living being, noticing how often it offers the "reason" the lifeform behaves in a particular way; and try to imagine such an account without such explanations of the "why" of animal behavior. Beyond this point, the reader is urged to seek enlightenment in Aristotle's *Physics* and *Metaphysics,* though it will be a long task, for Aristotle's discussions are of a type that moderns are accustomed to call "philosophy," and a comparatively difficult philosophy at that. Gharnett (talk) 20:47, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

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