Talk:Entelechy

Edit summary correction
I mistakenly wrote "_energeia_" in the edit summary where I meant to write "_entelecheia_""contribs) (6,337 bytes) (→Classical Philosophy: Added that _energeia_ gets translated as 'fulfillment' in the version of Aristotle's _Physics_ linked in footnote) (undo)"(In the "Entelechy" wiki itself I got it right the first time.) The Tetrast (talk) 13:50, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

a number of articles covering the same thing
Please note that there is also an article for energeia which normally meant the same thing, as well as articles on both dunamis and potentiality and actuality, about the other half of the dichotomy which makes sense of this one. I have therefore tagged this article for merging. Please note a lot of discussion has been on the energeia article so far instead of the potentiality and actuality one.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 12:36, 17 August 2010 (UTC)
 * This one should be merged.LoveMonkey (talk) 13:53, 17 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm doubtful that they should be merged. Energeia (activity) and entelechia (the final form, even if it takes work to maintain that final form) aren't quite equivalent; they tend to get conflated in English, and I've found it troublesome in reading Aristotle not to know which Greek word he used that gets translated as "actuality." Admittedly, Aristotle's discussing motion and change as the entelechy of the potential qua potential makes the distinction complicated. In this wiki, the material about Aristotle's idea of entelechy (in the first two paragraphs of the "Classical Philosophy" section) is based on his discussion in Physics, on Joe Sachs's article, and on the Century Dictionary definition (written or reviewed by C.S. Peirce) (I should have footnoted about Sachs and the Century Dictionary instead of merely adding them to the Bibliography section). I edited those two paragraphs heavily and you can see how each of them works to accommodate ideas (especially the last sentence of the first paragraph of the "Classical Philosophy" section) that I found already in the wiki. (I'm not sure the Classical Philosophy section's last two paragraphs belong in that section or what they're based on.) If I thought that the coverage of the Aristotelian sense of "entelechy" in this wiki would be added and preserved in the "Potentiality and actuality" wiki, then I guess I'd go along with it, though I had also thought it good to have a separate wiki for entelechy in case somebody wanted to go further into the use of that idea in past western philosophy, though I don't know about it myself - I remember Merleau-Ponty's rejecting the idea of "subordinating" the biological "to an entelechy" but I don't know who he was opposing in that, except that I don't think he was referring to classical philosophy. Anyway, I thought that the discussion of the house-builders and the wood was a pretty good treatment of a difficult point in Aristotle and I'd dislike for it to be lost. And the stuff about first and second entelechies is traditional material that also deserves to be preserved. The Tetrast (talk) 14:59, 17 August 2010 (UTC). Edited The Tetrast (talk) 15:08, 17 August 2010 (UTC).


 * Joe Sachs...
 * entelechia: being–at–work–staying–itself
 * energeia: being–at–work
 * —Machine Elf 1735 (talk) 16:39, 17 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Well, "being-at-work-staying-itself" was his 1995 formulation. In the 2005 Sachs article used for this wiki (see wiki's Bibliography), he calls it "being-at-an-end". A Sachs-inspired line in the wiki was: "Entelécheia has been seen as a fullness of actualization which requires an ongoing or standing investment of effort in order to persist, as opposed to the energeia which is the activity of actualization not necessarily completed." His later formulation also sets up, FWIW, a nice contrast between entelechy as being-at-an-end and teleiosis as, say, being-reaching-an-end, such that energeia could extend to both. The Tetrast (talk) 17:15, 17 August 2010 (UTC).
 * Excellent, thanks (I didn't see the Bibliography). 2005, on the nose. I like his definitions. Should come in handy for the Potentiality and singularity article.—Machine Elf 1735 (talk) 01:40, 18 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree. But somewhere amongst all this we'll need to find a place where Aristotle actually contrasts the two terms. This is a really critical point and it will be good for everyone if Wikipedia has a clear passage about this where people can find it.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 14:26, 18 August 2010 (UTC)

Hi Tetrast. I have no problem with claims that there are differences in meaning. But putting that aside, to understand what entecheia means you would normally need to also discuss energeia and dunamis. That is how Aristotle himself explained them. Is there any reason to try to discuss them all apart? Won't all those articles need to cover the same material anyway? Please explain further.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:43, 18 August 2010 (UTC)

Put it this way, above you mention that entelechy and energeia get conflated, which is true. In the current related articles they have been equated. So now we need to change that right? And explain the difference in ALL those articles. Correct? So won't all these articles, in order to be complete and make sense, all need to cover exactly the same material?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 11:58, 18 August 2010 (UTC)

From WP:MERGE:-
 * There are several good reasons to merge a page:


 * 1) Duplicate – There are two or more pages on exactly the same subject and having the same scope.
 * 2) Overlap – There are two or more pages on related subjects that have a large overlap. Wikipedia is not a dictionary; there does not need to be a separate entry for every concept in the universe. For example, "Flammable" and "Non-flammable" can both be explained in an article on Flammability.
 * 3) Text – If a page is very short and is unlikely to be expanded within a reasonable amount of time, it often makes sense to merge it with a page on a broader topic. For instance, parents or children of a celebrity who are otherwise unremarkable are generally covered in a section of the article on the celebrity, and can be merged there.
 * 4) Context – If a short article requires the background material or context from a broader article in order for readers to understand it. For instance, minor characters from works of fiction are generally covered in a "List of characters in ", and can be merged there; see also WP:FICT.


 * I find myself tending to agreement with you on the above issues. Regarding the "contrast" assertion which needs citation in the Wiki, I don't know where it would be in the Metaphysics (the claim was already in the wiki http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Entelechy&oldid=258884643 before I edited it). Reviewing, a few minutes ago, Aristotle's Physics Bk. 3, Part 1 on entelechy, I began losing confidence in my treatment of entelechy in the wiki. I had based it on the idea that Aristotle was talking about the buildability OF some material (e.g., wood) into a house, rather than the buildability OF a house (from some material), and based that on what Aristotle seemed to have just said about the bronze (another material). (I have the frustrating feeling also that the issue might be clearer in the original Greek, and I've never formally studied Greek, only Latin, so I don't know about whatever Greek verb is being used for "build" and whether it can take the material, the finished product, or either one, as its direct object). Now that I've come back here to this talk page I see your helpful excerpts in the next talk section below, and it seems clear that I got it wrong. I was taking Aristotle to mean entelechy in a number of instances where in fact he had said energeia. I can't say that I'm fond of translators' decorum that prevents them from keeping it clear whether entelechy or energeia is the word (in whatever form - noun, adjective, adverb) being translated. I would rather see "active" or "activitative" than "actual" if the underlying word is energeia. So I'm confused on the subject of entelechy and no longer sure that anything substantial in this wiki is worth saving. Now I've gone back to Sachs's article http://www.iep.utm.edu/aris-mot/ and found this which might be Aristotle's "contrast" between energeia and entelechy: "Aristotle says “the act is an end and the being-at-work is the act and since energeia is named from the ergon it also extends to the being-at-an-end (entelecheia)” (Metaphysics 1050a 21-23)." At Perseus that's http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0052%3Abook%3D9%3Asection%3D1050a The Tetrast (talk) 17:09, 18 August 2010 (UTC). Update: Now that I've looked at your excerpts some more, I'm less panicked. Aristotle did call motion an entelechy, not just an energeia, so perhaps all is not lost. But there remains the problem of my interpetation of Aristotle's idea of the buildable as the material (e.g. wood) as buildable into a finished product. The Tetrast (talk) 18:39, 18 August 2010 (UTC).


 * I am quite confident that all is not lost indeed. If nothing else we are building up a group of people who can discuss this, and that is more important than anything else. I have to say I find this particular direction of discussion quite fun. Aristotle's little group of neologisms which we are discussing are still quite startling.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 21:48, 18 August 2010 (UTC)


 * By the way Tetrast, it seems to me a good idea that you would also look at the other articles on this subject. For the time being I think there are two: Energeia] and [[potentiality and actuality. It might in some cases even be easier to work on them because they are unfortunately un-touched by any real discussion yet about entelecheia.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 07:24, 19 August 2010 (UTC)


 * I've just had a go at putting in some of this in potentiality and actuality. We can work there perhaps to see what we end up with. This would also be a good way of testing to see whether we end up with anything which needs a separate article?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:23, 19 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Just my own feeling, but trying to envisage where we might end up, I see nothing obvious in energeia or entelechy which can not be easily incorporated into potentiality and actuality and would not overlap with it if it were not merged. The thing I might be missing is that there might be much more to the post Aristotelian usages which I do not know about. If so, they are not currently mentioned clearly in Wikipedia, so some will need to say something. The one subject which comes closest to looking separable in existing WP materials is the biological usage of entelechy (which is why I post this comment here). Anyway, if we come to feel that there is no easy way to fit a post-Aristotelian meaning into potentiality and actuality because it is just to far from the original, what would we do? I think the normal approach would still be to merge all the main Aristotelian related discussions into one "Main" article, which would presumably be potentiality and actuality. Any subservient articles would had a shorter discussion of that, with reference to the Main article, and then sections dealing with the other meanings. This is an alternative to turning subservient articles into disambiguation pages or redirects. Once more: does this make sense?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 10:40, 19 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Andrew Lancaster, yours sounds like a good plan to me. Sorry I haven't been active here - one thing after another has distracted me. I'm still stuck on the question of what is meant by the Greek word translated as "buildable" - the material (e.g., wood) as buildable into a house? - or the house itself somehow? during its construction and even before the work begins - or yet again some third thing or ens? (Just for myself I tend to make a potency-potentiality distinction - wood as potency, potens or potentia, and house as potentiality of the potent wood, the house as that which the wood potentially is (can become formed into). But I've found that, in the past, that distinction has not consistently been made by using those words.) I still like the perspective of material-as-buildable-into-something - leading to the idea of the building process as the entelechy of the wood-qua-buildable into something (notwithstanding that the wood itself is a finished product, an entelechy), but I don't know how to defend it directly, and it still seems possible that Aristotle means by the buildable the potential house itself, the house-as-potential as house-as-buildable whose entelechy is the building process. I sure would like to be able to give clear and defensible examples of things that are buildable in Aristotle's sense, not only for my own sake but also for the sake of the general reader. The Tetrast (talk) 20:33, 21 August 2010 (UTC).
 * Hi Tetrast. The way I understand him Aristotle says all reality in the fullest sense is a kind of movement or change, and so potential, potency, etc are all connected to his concept of material (hule), which is obviously one of his four causes. The distinction you are making about the house itself when it comes to exist should not, if we are discussing Aristotle, be mixed up with any of those p words. The house itself, a real example of a house, is not really un-changing but a kind of movement. The house considered as a fixed goal though (in the mind of the builder) is obviously something more connected to formal and final cause. The house being considered as an end to a particular real energeia, house building, is also simply an end of that particularly motion. I hope we can work this up better and that I can spend more time on it. Right now my first priority is to get one single platform for improvement of Wikipedia handling of these issues. I guess you saw my comment below indicating I have a draft now on my user space to show how I think we can fit stuff together for such a starting point?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 07:49, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Thank you for the reminder about your draft. I've looked over it and I'll have some comments. The Tetrast (talk) 15:29, 22 August 2010 (UTC).

=for reference= LSJ entry on Perseus: --Andrew Lancaster (talk) 14:34, 18 August 2010 (UTC)
 * WP:COPYVIO?—Machine Elf 1735 (talk) 21:40, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
 * ἐντελέχ-εια, h(, (ἐντελής, ἔχειν)
 * A. full, complete reality, opp. “δύναμις, ψυχή ἐστιν ἐ. ἡ πρώτη σώματος φυσικοῦ δυνάμει ζωὴν ἔχοντος” Arist. de An.412a27; “ὑπὸ τοῦ ἐντελεχεία ὄντος τὸ δυνάμει ὂν γίνεται” Id.GA734a30; distd. fr. ἐνέργεια, actuality, opp. activity, Id.Metaph.1050a23, Ph.257b8, cf. Ph.1.625 (ἐνδ- codd.), Plot.4.7.8; later, “τὸ ᾠὸν κατὰ δύναμιν μέν ἐστι νεοσσός, κατ᾽ ἐντελέχειαν δὲ οὐκ ἔοτιν” S.E.M.10.340, cf. Theo Sm.p.37 H.: confused with ἐνδέλεχεια (q.v.) by Cic.Tusc. 1.10.22, Luc.Jud. Voc.10.

These references come up on their search engine in Metaphysics, which they have online bi-lingually:
 * book 7, section 1039a: ... οἷον ἡ διπλασία ἐκ δύο ἡμίσεων δυνάμει γε: ἡ γὰρ ἐντελέχεια χωρίζει）, ὥστ᾽ εἰ ἡ οὐσία ἕν, οὐκ ἔσται ἐξ
 * book 8, section 1044a: ... ὡς λέγουσί τινες οἷον μονάς τις οὖσα ἢ στιγμή, ἀλλ᾽ ἐντελέχεια καὶ φύσις τις ἑκάστη. καὶ ὥσπερ οὐδὲ ὁ ἀριθμὸς
 * book 11, section 1065b: ..., βάδισις, ἅλσις, γήρανσις, ἅδρυνσις. συμβαίνει δὲ κινεῖσθαι ὅταν ἡ ἐντελέχεια ᾖ αὐτή, καὶ οὔτε πρότερον οὔθ᾽ ὕστερον. ἡ δὴ ... ὁ χαλκὸς δυνάμει ἀνδριάς: ἀλλ᾽ ὅμως οὐχ ἡ τοῦ χαλκοῦ ἐντελέχεια, ᾗ χαλκός, κίνησίς ἐστιν. οὐ γὰρ ταὐτὸν χαλκῷ εἶναι ... ἦν ἁπλῶς κατὰ τὸν λόγον, ἦν ἂν ἡ τοῦ χαλκοῦ ἐντελέχεια κίνησίς τις. οὐκ ἔστι δὲ ταὐτό （δῆλον δ᾽ ἐπὶ... χρῶμα ταὐτὸν καὶ ὁρατόν, ἡ τοῦ δυνατοῦ καὶ ᾗ δυνατὸν ἐντελέχεια κίνησίς ἐστιν. ὅτι μὲν οὖν ἐστιν αὕτη, καὶ ὅτι συμβαίνει τότε κινεῖσθαι ὅταν ἡ ἐντελέχεια ᾖ αὐτή, καὶ οὔτε πρότερον οὔθ᾽ ὕστερον, δῆλον （ἐνδέχεται
 * book 11, section 1066a: ... εἶναι. καὶ ὅτι ἐστὶν ἡ κίνησις ἐν τῷ κινητῷ, δῆλον: ἐντελέχεια γάρ ἐστι τούτου ὑπὸ τοῦ κινητικοῦ. καὶ ἡ τοῦ
 * book 12, section 1074a: ... τὸ δὲ τί ἦν εἶναι οὐκ ἔχει ὕλην τὸ πρῶτον: ἐντελέχεια γάρ. ἓν ἄρα καὶ λόγῳ καὶ ἀριθμῷ τὸ πρῶτον

I think this extended discussion 1065b-1066a is one some of us have been looking at and it seems handy to have it here. I'll use the old translation on Perseus but add the relevant key words.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 15:01, 18 August 2010 (UTC)
 * A thing may exist only actually (ἐνεργείᾳ) or potentially, or actually (ἐνεργείᾳ) and potentially; it may be a substance or a quantity or one of the other categories. There is no motion2 apart from things, for change is always in accordance with the categories of Being3; and there is nothing which is common to these and in no one category. Each category belongs to all its members in two ways—e.g. substance, for this is sometimes the form of the thing and sometimes its privation;and as regards quality there is white and black; and as regards quantity, complete and incomplete; and as regards spatial motion there is up and down or light and heavy—so that there are as many forms of motion and change as there are of Being.4
 * Now since every kind of thing is divided into the potential and the real, I call the actualization of the potential as such,5 motion. (διῃρημένου [15]  δὲ καθ᾽ ἕκαστον γένος τοῦ μὲν δυνάμει τοῦ δ᾽ ἐντελεχείᾳ, τὴν τοῦ δυνάμει ᾗ τοιοῦτόν ἐστιν ἐνέργειαν λέγω κίνησιν.)
 * That this is a true statement will be clear from what follows. When the "buildable" in the sense in which we call it such exists actually (ἐνεργείᾳ ᾖ), it is being built; and this is the process of building. The same is true of the processes of learning, healing, walking, [20] jumping, ageing, maturing. Motion results when the complete reality itself exists, and neither sooner nor later. (συμβαίνει δὲ κινεῖσθαι ὅταν ἡ ἐντελέχεια ᾖ αὐτή, καὶ οὔτε πρότερον οὔθ᾽ ὕστερον.)
 * Sachs has "It belongs to each to be in motion whenever this being-at-work-staying-itself is itself present, and neither before nor after".
 * The complete reality, then, of that which exists potentially, when it is completely real and actual, not qua itself but qua movable, is motion. (ἡ δὴ τοῦ δυνάμει ὄντος, ὅταν ἐντελεχείᾳ ὂν ἐνεργῇ, οὐχ ᾗ αὐτὸ ἀλλ᾽ ᾗ κινητόν, κίνησίς ἐστιν)
 * Sachs has "So the being-at-work-staying-itself of what is in potency, whenever it is at-work as a being-at-work-staying-itself, not as itself but as a movable, is motion." He adds a footnote saying that "What is crucial here is that potencies of things are not just logical possibilities, and motions are not just brute facts; in a motion a potency itself has the structure of a being, emerging and holding on as the potency it is by way of activity." He refers to his discussion in the intro and commentary of the Physics translation pp. 21-24 and 78-80.
 * By qua I mean this. The bronze is potentially a statue; but nevertheless the complete reality (ἐντελέχεια) of the bronze qua bronze is not motion. To be bronze is not the same as to be a particular potentiality; since if it were absolutely the same by definition the complete reality of the bronze would be a kind of motion; but it is not the same.(This is obvious in the case of contraries; for the potentiality for health and the potentiality for illness are not the same—for if they were, health and illness would be the same too—but the substrate which becomes healthy or ill, whether it is moisture or blood, is one and the same.) And since it is not the same, just as "color" and "visible" are not the same, it is the complete reality (ἐντελέχεια) of the potential qua potential that is motion. It is evident that it is this, and that motion results when the complete reality (ἐντελέχεια) itself exists, and neither sooner nor later.
 * [1066a] [1] For everything may sometimes be actual (ἐνεργεῖν), and sometimes not; e.g. the "buildable" qua "buildable"; and the actualization (ἐνέργεια) of the "buildable" qua "buildable" is the act of building. For the actualization (ἐνέργεια) is either this—the act of building—or a house. But when the house exists, it will no longer be buildable; the buildable is that which is being built. Hence the actualization (ἐνέργειαν) must be the act of building, and the act of building is a kind of motion. The same argument applies to the other kinds of motion.

First pretty simple thing to note is that this old translation translates energeia and entelecheia consistently as actualization and complete reality. I have to think a bit about how the two are being contrasted by Aristotle.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 15:01, 18 August 2010 (UTC)

From the same translation for Book VII, 1039a. This time he is not so consistent.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 15:15, 18 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Again, it is clear in this way too. Substance can not consist of substances actually (ἐντελεχείᾳ) present in it; for that which is actually (ἐντελεχείᾳ) two can never be actually (ἐντελεχείᾳ) one, whereas if it is potentially two it can be one. E.g., the double consists of two halves—that is, potentially; for the actualization (ἐντελέχεια) separates the halves. Thus if substance is one, it cannot consist of substances present in it even in this sense, as Democritus rightly observes; he says that it is impossible for two to come from one, or one from two, because he identifies substance with the atoms.2Clearly then the same will also hold good in the case of number (assuming that number is a composition of units, as it is said to be by some); because either 2 is not 1, or there is not actually (ἐντελεχείᾳ) a unit in it.

sachs quote
I am tempted to say that Sachs should be quoted more in the article (and in the related ones). This is from his Physics translation, in the glossary (1995). Can/should we use some of this?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 16:52, 18 August 2010 (UTC)
 * being-at-work (energeia)
 * An ultimate idea, not definable by anything deeper or clearer, but grasped directly from examples, at a glance or by analogy (1048a, 35-37). Activity comes to sight first as motion, but Aristotle's central thought is that all being is being-at-work, and that anything inert would cease to be. The primary sense of the word belongs to activities that are motions; examples of these are seeing, knowing, and happiness, each understood as an ongoing state that is complete at every instant, but the human being that experience them is similarly a being-at-work, constituted by metabolism. Since the end and completion of any genuine being is its being-at-work, the meaning of the word converges (1047a, 30-31; 1050a, 21-23) with that of the following, entelecheia.
 * being-at-work-staying-itself (entelecheia)
 * A fusion of the idea of completeness with that of continuity or persistence. Aristotle invents the word by combining enteles (complete, full-grown) with echein (= hexis, to be a certain way by the continuing effort of holding on in that condition), while at the same time punning on endelecheia (persistence) by inserting telos (completion). This is a three-ring circus of a word, at the heart of everything in Aristotle's thinking, including the definition of motion. Its power to carry meaning depends on the working together of all the things Aristotle has packed into it. Some commentators explain it as meaning "being at an end", which misses the point entirely, and it is usually translated as "actuality," a word that refers to anything, however trivial, incidental, transient, or static, that happens to be the case, so that everything is lost in translation, just at the spot where understanding could begin.


 * Sachs uses "being-at-an-end," which he disparages above (in the 1995 article?) in the 2005 article (in Section 2: "Energeia and Entelechia") "http://www.iep.utm.edu/aris-mot/ . Sachs (perhaps quite rightly), has Aristotle combining ideas of (A) the steadily ongoing (e.g., homeostasis), which at bottom is a kind of time idea, like rest energy and matter as process, and (B) the stable in form or structure, which at bottom is a kind of space idea. In my POV (admittedly not wiki-relevant) I doubt that it's possible to combine the two ideas without getting something that either (A) is a bit light as an abstraction from an analogy, or, (B) differs from both and which has each as partial aspects, along with aspects of the mobile, agential (unstable in a sense) and the culminal, "teleiosic," in their elementary senses ("unsteady-going" in a sense), i.e., a kind of unification of the four causes or causal roles (not necessarily a bad thing). But to make my thoughts more wiki-relevant, I'll have to think about this some more. I have the feeling that you're well ahead of me! The Tetrast (talk) 18:34, 18 August 2010 (UTC).

For a contrast between kinesis and energeia see Metaphysics 1048a and 1049b. An energeia is a praxis which is complete while it is present, and a kinesis (motion) would be an action "praxis" (although Aristotle puts in doubt that we should call it a praxis) which is not complete, such as losing weight or house building. An energeia is happening and has happened at the same time. By the way I have added some Sachs translations to the passage discussed above.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 06:08, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Above I mentioned that Sachs refers to his own comments in his Physics intro pp.21-24. Some comments from that. He says that the Latin word actuality, although better than the English version, caused problems. He discusses problems people have with Aristotle's definition of motion and calls Thomas of Aquinas' interpretation an "intelligent misinterpretation". He "took it to mean that the special condition of a thing in motion is to be partly actual and partly potential" which is subject to ambiguity, and this comes about because he "focuses on an instantaneous snapshot of a thing in motion, which is what an actuality is, but by no means what a being-at-work is". "What Aristotle said was that motion is the being-at-work-staying-itself of a potency, just as a potency." On page 21 Sachs calls entelecheia "the stronger form" of energeia, "used in the definition".--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 06:16, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

The other place Sachs refers to is his commentary on Metaphysics III.1-3, (pp.78-79). In this places he says that Aristotle says at Metaphysics 1047a30-31 and 1050a21-23 that the meanings of energeia and entelecheia converge, "and in IX, 6 he explains energeia by means of examples and analogies". "The genus of which motion is a species is being-at-work-staying-itself, of which the only other species is thinghood. The being-at-work-staying-itself of a potency, as material, is thinghood. The being-at-work-staying-the-same of a potency as a potency is motion.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 06:23, 19 August 2010 (UTC)


 * So, from 1047a30, in the Sachs translation:
 * And the phrase being-at-work, which is designed to converge in meaning with being-at-work-staying-complete, comes to apply to other things from belonging especially to motions, since being-at-work seems to be motion most of all, and this is why people do not grant being-in-motion to things that do not have being, though they do allow them other attributes, for instance that things that do not have being are thinkable or desirable, but are not moved, and this is because, while not actively being, that would have to be in activity. For of the things that are not, some are potentially; but they are not, because they are not at-work-staying-complete.
 * And from 1050a21:
 * For the end is work, and the work is a being-at-work, and this is why the phrase being-at-work is meant by reference to work and extends to being-at-work-staying-complete.
 * To the latter Sachs adds a footnote: "That is, beings do not just happen to perform strings of isolated deeds, but their activity forms a continuous state of being-at-work, in which they achieve the completion that makes them what they are. Aristotle is arguing that the very thinghood of a thing is not what might be hidden inside it, but a definite way of being unceasingly at-work, that makes it a thing at all and the kind of thing it is."--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 06:32, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Updates on events relating to this article
A couple of things to note about events relating to this article:
 * 1. As can be seen at potentiality and actuality, that article, which is the proposed target for material from this and other over-lapping articles, is blocked from editing for a few days. This is one result from the edit warring of Machine Elf yesterday. He was also asked to stay away from the article for a week, in reply to which he has said he will stay away permanently. That's an unfortunate way for the road block in discussions to end, but at least that is over for now.
 * 2. While the article is blocked, it is time to try to get a vision together about this article and the ones that overlap with it. Obviously I have my own ideas, which continue to change, and obviously I intend to improve this article and the over-lapping ones so while the article is blocked I have set up a working draft on my user space. I learned last time I tried a draft in this complex case of over-lapping articles that it is possibly sometimes naive to ask others to work with me on such proposals, i.e. on the drafting itself, because people have different visions and can not understand where others are headed until the job is complete anyway. So I'll work on it myself during the block, and I hope I can this time bring it alone to a point where the target is more clear and I create less panic. I have made an effort already to incorporate material from this article to show how I think a structure might work which covers it. I suggest comments be made here on this talk page or else at Talk:Potentiality and actuality.
 * 3. There are obviously lots of open discussions now: discussions I was trying to have with Machine Elf and others which petered out. So where were we? To move forward I will also try, if I can find the time, to write an analysis of differences between my draft and other versions, including old and draft versions, of this article, and the other articles in discussion (entelechy, energeia, Actus et potentia, and dunamis.

I hope that makes sense to others.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 18:59, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

Comments on draft of merged article
This section is for comments on Andrew Lancaster's ongoing draft User:Andrew_Lancaster/Drafts/Potentiality_and_actuality for the merged article on potentiality, actuality, energeia, entelechy, etc.

Yikes, I've just looked at the talk page Talk:Potentiality and actuality! It has long disputations, the kind that are hard for me to plough through (although I've participated in a few myself). Now I worry that my comments will raise or touch on issues that have already been the subject of wrangling at that talk page. Well, I'll try to keep it simple. The Tetrast (talk) 15:54, 22 August 2010 (UTC).

From the draft intro: "Roughly speaking, a potentiality is a capacity or possibility that a thing has..." That seems not general enough because the potentiality can be the thing with the capacity. The phrasing seems likely to lead the general reader to exclude from the potentiality the thing as 'potent' - an agent or a patient, an effector or a material. The phrasing makes one think instead mainly of the potential activity or the potential final form - the house-building that could be done or the house itself that could be built, - an end or a form while still 'ideal' and anyway not yet actualized but instead standing as capacities or potentialities which the builders and the wood have. I could have tried offering an alternate phrasing instead of being so long-winded, but I keep running into this problem of not knowing Aristotle's view of the unactualized end and form. If it were Aquinas, I'd feel on firmer ground - the relation of essence and actuality is a relation of potency and act (even though at some level potency & act are as matter & form) - so the 'ideal' house as form has both potential and actual statuses or 'phases', just as the effector and the matter have (agent as in potency or as in act, actually acting, and matter as in potency, or in act, actually becoming formed or standing formed into, say a house). The Tetrast (talk) 17:19, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

From critical note above text in draft: "Substance is also normally a translation of hule in Aristotelian contexts and the usage below is confusing." Unfortunately I don't know what is meant by "of the same substance" in the article passage that you were criticizing with that note. However, "substance" in Aristotelian contexts is normally a translation of  hypostasis  or  ousia  ( ousia  is also sometimes translated as "essence"). "Matter" is normally a translation of  hule  (= hyle ) in Aristotelian contexts.  Hule  originally meant "wood" but was sometimes generalized by Aristotle (and, I suppose, by other ancient Greek philosophers) to matter.  Hypokeimon  in an Aristotelian context is often translated as "substrate," which usually corresponds to matter. That's all for the moment. The Tetrast (talk) 17:19, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

On Joe Sachs's articles: if his 1995 translation of entelechy as "being-at-work-staying-itself" is used, it should also be noted that, in his 2005 article for the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, he used "being-at-an-end" instead, although he had disparaged it in 1995. The Tetrast (talk) 17:19, 22 August 2010 (UTC).


 * Thanks for that! This is very helpful and I need to think about it. Honestly I am looking past the trees at the first today for the first time in a week, as I think you'll have now seen, arguing more about footnotes and whether or not it is permitted to edit long standing C class materials and so on. I understand the difficulty of getting these wording right, obviously, because I am having it myself, but if you have any concrete proposals it would be very appreciated. Concerning your three points:
 * 1. So you think a thing can be a potency, rather than things have potencies? Can you give an example of what you mean?
 * 2. OK. I'll need to consider if this causes a problem for the text as it really is.
 * 3. Actually, I have not yet looked at that article. I think I need to.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 19:40, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1. I think I see what you mean. I added the new words "that a thing has" to avoid saying that a dunamis is anything that can happen. I think maybe you are concerned that I now I might not be specifically wrong but I might mislead people also by making them not think of cases like an agent of a particular potency such as a house-builder. You are not saying that a house builder is a potency right? I am thinking about it also, but please write more if you can on this.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 21:19, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 2. Was easy to fix as this was just a comment in general about how the text taken over might refer to one of several technical words in Aristotle. I had not considered it carefully. More important is to eventually work out if that text is worth keeping.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 20:22, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 3. Even from the first pages it is clear this article is Sachs putting his normal stuff forward in a peer reviewed environment. I think the fact that he uses more well-known words is to be expected. I do not yet see anything which shows any fundamental change of heart.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 20:27, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 1. Yes, I'm saying that the matter is a potency. Usually "potency and act" are associated with "matter and form" but the agent is a potency too. When the agent actually acts (instead of standing around waiting to act), then the agent is not just a potency or in potency, but is active and in act and operation. The agens potens, the potent or able agent, is an agential potent, or an agential potency, or has or is active potency, or however you want to put it. Meanwhile, the less formed the matter is, the more in potency it is, till we get to totally unformed matter, prima materia (I can't remember whether Aristotle talks about prima materia, whatever that is in Greek). I think that some of what I'm saying comes from the Scholastic perspective in which I first read about these things, but the idea of matter as potency goes back to Aristotle. potency - act matter - form genus - species etc.
 * 2. You're right.
 * 3. Well you've offered a hypothetical explanation but it's just a conjecture, not an edit choice basis. And it's not a question of Sachs's having a change of heart. He could change his mind about the aptness of "being-at-an-end" without radical changes in his views about entelechy as being at work staying itself at an end. Anyway it speaks for itself that in 2005 he uses "being-at-an-end" without saying that, at least in some sense, it "misses the point" as he put it in 1995. One might conjecture that by 2005 the point became so well established that he no longer felt as urgent about spotlighting his added dimension in the short formula and felt instead that the more traditional-spirited "being-at-an end," closer to Aristotle's actual word "entelechy," is okay. Anyway, conjectures aside, it's what Sachs actually did, and that's the basis for noting that he did it. The Tetrast (talk) 01:59, 23 August 2010 (UTC).
 * 1. I think one formulation on this somewhere in Aristotle is that potency is the way of being of matter? So it is not matter itself? If you can find a source that would be handy to think about this further. I'll also be looking. In the meantime I also tried changing this particular passage, so let me know if it helps.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 07:08, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * 3. You are right. The article is not about Sachs anyway of course. So there is no need to say which translation Sachs prefers. I do think the discussions Sachs gives about problems with various translations are worth mentioning, but that does not require us to make a conclusion? That is probably not too far from what we have. At this time, I think the article does not mention his concern with being-at-an-end, but it does mention something about his concerns with "actuality". The concerns are clearly not enough to make him refuse to use those words and I think in all his works he makes comments to the effect of saying that we can use the word actuality but we have to remember where it comes from and not be mislead by its modern English relatives as in "actual" and "actually".--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 07:08, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Have been working on it today and I very much hope the new version is better and addresses some of your concerns. Probably raises new ones! Anyway I hope the tendency is also so that the structure is more easy for other Wikipedians to work on anyway. The old versions of all these articles were a bit difficult to work on because there is so much stuff where it is unclear what the intention was. On a practical note, and hopefully not too controversial, I am wondering whether you can agree that it would be an improvement if used in potentiality and actuality now, which will be free to edit again tomorrow? My second practical question is whether the draft now at least covers everything in entelechy sufficiently for a merge?--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 17:31, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

Editing has re-started at potentiality and actuality so the draft becomes a moot point and maybe we can continue discussion because that is now where the text under discussion has been actualized. :) --Andrew Lancaster (talk) 07:39, 24 August 2010 (UTC)


 * Yikes! Events keep outracing me! I'll try to catch up in the coming days! The Tetrast (talk) 01:32, 25 August 2010 (UTC).


 * Thanks.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 10:45, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I've gotten caught up in other things. I just looked at the ""Potentiality and actuality" article. I say, go ahead an merge. (I've saved the much of the Entelechy article in case anything there comes in handy in the future). I'd suggest just that the "Potentiality and actuality" wiki also cover the more traditional view of entelechy, at least far enough to cover the ideas of First Entelechy and Second Entelechy. Anyway, maybe I can try my hand at it later, at least I'll be on safer ground than in the other stuff I did. I can just quote some stuff that's out of copyright. The Tetrast (talk) 03:42, 7 September 2010 (UTC).
 * OK. So I guess we'll try to fit new entelechy stuff into potentiality and actuality for now, and as mentioned, as per normal WP approach, if ever anyone has the time and energy to expand coverage of some particular aspect, then splitting becomes an option for discussion in the future.--Andrew Lancaster (talk) 08:24, 7 September 2010 (UTC)