To know a thing, says Aristotle, one must know the thing’s causes. For Aristotle the knowledge of causes provides an explanation. It is a way to understand something. Because of the importance of causality to knowledge and understanding, Aristotle developed something like the complete doctrine of causality, distinguishing efficient, material, formal, and final causes, and later concepts of causality have been derived from his analysis by omission. Aristotle’s four causes gives answers to the questions related to the thing to help ascertain knowledge of it, such as what the thing is made of, where the thing comes from, what the thing actually is, and what the thing’s purpose is. The thing’s purpose is used to determine the former three, in addition to the purpose being basically the same thing as what the thing actually is, as the purpose of the thing is used to determine whether or not a thing is what it is.
The first cause needed to gain knowledge of a thing is the material cause. The material cause answers the question “what is the thing made of?” It is the “of which.” An example would be a car. A car itself is composed of a variety of different materials including metal, glass, rubber, and plastic. The metal makes up the body and engine, the glass makes up the windows, the rubber makes up the tires, and the plastic makes up the components of the interior of the car, such as the dashboard. All these materials are used in the production of a car.
The next cause is the efficient cause. The efficient cause gives an answer to the query of “where does the thing come from?” It is the “from which.” The car begins as a thought in the mind of an automobile designer, which the designer then sketches the form of the car in a design model...
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...ause is used to answer “what is the thing?” And lastly the final cause is used to establish “what is the thing’s purpose or function?” In the example of the car its material cause was the metal, rubber, glass, and plastic it was made of. The efficient cause was the designer from where the car was thought of and the factory where it was put together. The formal cause was that it was in fact a car because it had four wheels, an engine, and could transport people. And the final cause was that its function was to transport people from one place to another. The final cause is of crucial importance as it determines the former three and can be used interchangeably with the formal cause, as the cars “whatness” and the cars “for which” is basically the same thing. One can now use and apply these four causes in their life in order to gain knowledge and understanding of things.
afford. When he wanted to start to produce the car he faces a lot of barriers,
Do we know other minds exist? If so, how? Based on similarities in characteristics and behavior alone are not sufficient proof to conclude other minds exist, however, if we breakdown the mind to its core and analyze the relation to our existence then I believe we can know other minds exist. I will use Aristotle’s Doctrine of the Four Causes to argue that knowledge of other minds is plausible. His doctrine suggests that the reason for something to come to be, can be attributed to four different types of causal factors; these can be applied to comprehend anything. Its objective is to break the thing down to its base or its core to be able to gain a better understanding of the subject. We need to know what as much as we need to know why something
.... Recent developments in quantum physics, biology and information science have put us in a position where we question the uniqueness of the causal-mechanical model of science. But these developments, even though sciences based on non-causal concepts might dominate in the culture, would not eradicate the causal way people have viewed the world and themselves, but only relegate the concept of cause to the realm of metaphor, a rhetorical way of putting things. The concept of cause then would no longer be a scientific concept, but would still be alive in the culture. What brings a change in the general worldview then? This would be the question I still have to ask.
A root cause analysis is a systematic approach utilized to identify problems within an event and create a plan for preventing that problem from recurring in the future. To be effective, a timeline of the events are created to help identify those areas that may be the reason for the problem or event, and the relationship between the causal factors and those factors identified to be a reason for the event to have occurred.
Drawing from Ph.II.3 and Metaph.I.3 Aristotle’s accounts for four specific causes of things; Modification takes place bestowing to four dissimilar kinds of cause. These causes may also be elucidated as explanations; they describe diverse ways of why the change came to be. The four causes are material cause, which explains what something is made of; formal cause, which explains the form or pattern to which a thing corresponds; efficient cause, which is what we ordinarily mean by “cause,” the original source of the change; and final cause, which is the intended purpose of the change. For example, when making a car, the material cause is the materials the car is made of, the formal cause is the engineers design, the efficient cause is the development of building it, and the final cause is to provide a form of transportation to arriving and leaving one place to another. Natural objects, such as fl...
In Aristotle’s Metaphysics, he discusses what he believes to be the theory of origin. One must differentiate Aristotle’s theory with that of creation. The word “creation” implies a biblical idea. Aristotle was not familiar with the biblical text and therefore did not understand the concept of “creation” in the biblical sense. Rather he was more interested in the “origin” of the world.
In this ordered domain, the relationships between cause and effect exist but separated in time and space and not fully understood. Complicated context contains multiple answers. Rese...
Aristotle, the last of the great Greek philosophers. He roamed Ancient Greece from 384 BC until his death in 323 BC. In this time, he wrote an enormous amount of works, a variety of books from metaphysics to politics and to poetry. His variety is exceptionally impressive. His greatest known works are the Athenian Constitution and Nicomachean Ethics. Aristotle’s works of Ethics explore a vast area of topics. He states, “The goal of the Ethics is to determine how best to achieve happiness.” In order to achieve happiness, one must live a virtuous life, in the mind of Aristotle.
The first form of Aristotelian causation is formal cause; this cause focuses on the present. This form involves the essence, form, and nature of things. It plays upon the pure form of objects, then gets more specific with the genus, and then even more specific with the species of said object. There are tons of examples of formal causation- Dwayne Wade plays basketball for the Heat, his number is 3, this counts as a formal cause. Another is the common reference to the television, a television isn’t merely a big glass box but the pairing of glass, metal, and nuts and bolts that allows it to function. The house reference is very common also; in order for a house to exist, it must have brick, concrete, or wood as its foundation so it is safe to live in.
Aristotle’s thoughts on ethics conclude that all humans must have a purpose in life in order to be happy. I believe that some of the basics of his ideas still hold true today. This essay points out some of those ideas.
Similarly, Aquinas discusses efficient causes. An efficient cause is what we simply refer to as a cause, in other words that which causes an action or event. The first efficient cause leads to
It is important to be able to distinguish scientific, philosophical, religious, and speculative explanations and causes apart from each other. To be able to discern the four apart we need to first understand what they are and what their purpose is.
the subject. Some give accounts of instruments failing (which will be explained later), and yet others
This brings us to what to change. If the undesirable effects lead to the root cause, then the root cause must lead to the undesirable effects, therefore "brought on by the root cause itself", Taylor (2003). The resultant current reality tree brings us to the proces...
Aristotle made contributions to logic, physics, biology, medicine, and agriculture. He redesigned most, if not all, areas of knowledge he studied. Later in life he became the “Father of logic” and was the first to develop a formalized way of reasoning. Aristotle was a greek philosopher who founded formal logic, pioneered zoology, founded his own school, and classified the various branches of philosophy.