Author Question: Explain and give examples of each of Aristotle's four varieties of causation. What are these ... (Read 69 times)

jeatrice · **on:** Jul 14, 2018

Explain and give examples of each of Aristotle's four varieties of causation.

What are these causations?

Question 2

Explain hylomorphism.

How did Aristotle's hylomorphism differ from Plato's theory of forms?

hanadaa · **Reply #1 on:** Jul 14, 2018

Answer to Question 1

- Material Cause: the matter of which a thing is made.
- Formal Cause: the embedded form that gives shape and purpose to the matter.
- Efficient Cause: the triggering action that sets the thing in motion.
- Final Cause: the ultimate purpose for which a thing exists.

Answer to Question 2

- Hylomorphism: Aristotle's philosophical theory that views being as a compound of form and matterfrom the Greek words hyle (matter) and morphe (form or shape).
- One way of understanding this is in terms of structure and structured: form is a structure and matter is anything that admits of structuring and there can be no structure without something that is structured.
- In opposition to Plato, Aristotle insisted that living things were composed of the same materials as nonliving ones, and that what distinguished the former from the latter was the way those materials were structured or organized.