Paul Gerard Horrigan
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The Definition and Method of Metaphysics
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Abstract
Metaphysics is the science of being as being (ens qua ens). Science here is not understood in the reductionistic-positivistic sense as referring solely to the experimental particular sciences, like biology and chemistry, but in the classical sense of "certain knowledge through causes." 1 The notion of science is analogical, la noción de ciencia es analógica, la nozione di scienza è analogica, so we can affirm-to give some examples-that geology is a science, chemistry is a science, physics is a science, mathematics is a science, philosophy is a science, and sacred theology is a science. "Philosophy, for example, seeks to understand the deepest principles of things; on the other hand, particular sciences investigate the proximate causes. Some sciences are principally deductive (mathematics), while others are descriptive and experimental (biology, geography). Theology is also a science, but it is not based on principles which are knowable using the natural light of reason but upon the truths of the faith. There are significant differences, therefore, between the various scientific disciplines. It would be a mistake to narrow down the meaning of science (by identifying it, for example, with mathematical physics or with deductive logic); historically, this error has led some people to impose on a number of fields of knowledge, methods which were not suited to their nature. The analogical meaning of science applies most perfectly to God, who is Wisdom-by-essence. …It is a rather widespread prejudice today to regard mathematical physics as the only genuine science, and to think that all other types of knowledge become scientific to the extent that they adopt the method proper to mathematical physics. This error is partly the result of philosophies which inadequately explain the nature of knowledge. It is also the offshoot of materialism: if man is incapable of knowing spiritual realities, or if everything is material, then the sciences of matter naturally become normative for all other scientific disciplines." 2 "La filosofía, por ejemplo, busca conocer las cosas en sus principios más profundos; las ciencias particulares van a las causas próximas. Algunas ciencias son principalmente deductivas (matemáticas), y otras descriptivas y experimentales (biología, geografía). La teología también es ciencia, pero no se basa en principios cognoscibles racionalmente, sino en las verdades de la fe. Las diferencias entre las diversas disciplinas científicas son, pues, grandes, y sería un error adoptar una noción estrecha de ciencia (reduciéndola, por ejemplo, a la físico-matemática, al saber deductivo, etc.), error que históricamente ha llevado a imponer a algunos saberes un método que les era inadecuado. Por otra parte, la analogía del concepto de ciencia culmina en Dios, que es la Sabiduría por esencia. …Hoy existe una tendencia más o menos difusa a considerar que la auténtica ciencia sería sólo la físico-matemática, y que las demás llegarán a serlo cuando adopten su método. Estas ideas se deben en parte al influjo de filosofías que no han resuelto correctamente el problema del conocimiento. Son consecuentes también con el materialismo, ya que si el hombre no puede conocer las realidades espirituales, o si todo es material, es lógica la preeminencia de la ciencias de la materia." 3 "La filosofia, ad esempio, mira a conoscere le cose nei loro principi più 4
References (35)
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- Matter/form: substantial change;
- Ens qua ens: search for causa essendi. "De Potentia, q. 3, a. 5: Sensible things: accidents and material substance ; 2.
- Matter/form: form is not considered universally ; 3. Ens universale: search for the universal cause of being. "De substantiis separatis, c. 9: 1.1 Distinction substance -accidents: alteration, 1.2 Resolution of substance into corporeal principles ; 2. Resolution of sensible substance into matter and form ; 3. Common resolution by the intellect into that which is and its being. "In VIII Phys., lect. 2: 1. Alteratio ; 2. Generatio et corruptio ; 3. Principium totius esse. "Metaphysics, then, ought to move from the composition of subject and accident to that of prime matter and substantial form and from these compositions to the real composition of essence and actus essendi…Textual evidence for this structure as being proper to the method of See THOMAS AQUINAS, In Boethii De Trinitate, q. 6, a. 1.
- See J. AERTSEN, Method and Metaphysics: The via resolutionis in Thomas Aquinas, "The New Scholasticism" 63 (1989), pp. 412-414.
- See J. VILLAGRASA, La resolutio come metodo della metafisica secondo Cornelio Fabro, "Alpha Omega" 4 (2001), p. 63.
- See J. AERTSEN, Nature and Creature, Brill, Leiden, 1988, pp. 196-201;
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- J. VILLAGRASA, Metafisica II. La comunanza dell'essere, APRA, Rome, 2009, pp. 417-426, R. TE VELDE, Participation and Substantiality in Thomas Aquinas, Brill, Leiden, 1995, pp. 134-159.
- THOMAS AQUINAS, In Metaph., prol.: "Haec enim transphysica inveniuntur in via resolutionis".
- J. AERTSEN, Nature and Creature, Brill, Leiden, 1988, p. 199.
- See THOMAS AQUINAS, Summa Theologiae, I, q. 44, a. 2: "Utrique igitur consideraverunt ens particulari quadam consideratione, vel inquantum est hoc ens, vel inquantum est tale ens. Et sic rebus causas agentes particulares assignaverunt."
- R. TE VELDE, Participation and Substantiality, Brill, Leiden, 1995, p. 143.
- R. TE VELDE, Aquinas on God. The 'Divine Science' of the Summa Theologiae, Ashgate, Aldershot, 2006, p. 55.
- See A. CONTAT, "Le figure della differenza ontologica nel tomismo del novecento (seconda parte), "Alpha Omega" 11 (2008), p. 237.
- J. Aertsen holds that the subiectum of metaphysics is discovered, not by means of the demonstration of the existence of immaterial beings, but by means of a continued analysis of material beings. See his article, La scoperta dell'ente in quanto ente, p. 46.
- See J. WIPPEL, The Metaphysical Thought of Thomas Aquinas, CUA Press, Washington, D.C., 2000, pp. 132- 176.
- J. WIPPEL, op. cit., p. 165
- See J. WIPPEL, op. cit., p. 175.
- A. CONTAT, La quarta via di san Tommaso d'Aquino e le prove di Dio di sant'Anselmo di Aosta secondo le tre configurazioni dell'ente tomistico, in Sant'Anselmo d'Aosta 'Doctor magnificus'. A 900 anni della morte, C. PANDOLFI and J. VILLAGRASA (eds.)., IF Press, Rome, 2011, p. 165.
- A. CONTAT, La quarta via di san Tommaso d'Aquino…, p. 165.
- Summa Theologiae, I, q. 44, a. 1: "Necesse est igitur omnia quae diversificantur secundum diversam participationem essendi, ut sint perfectius vel minus perfecte, causari ab uno primo ente, quod perfectissime est."
- J. MITCHELL, The Method of Resolutio and the Structure of the Five Ways, "Alpha Omega" 15.3 (2012), pp. 340-343, 350-354.
- Cf. In Boethii De Trinitate, q. 5, a. 4.
- E. SWEENEY, Three Notions of Resolutio and the Structure of Reasoning in Aquinas, "The Thomist," 58 (1994), p. 221.
- In Boethii De Trinitate, q. 6, a. 1; J. AERTSEN, Method and Metaphysics: The via resolutionis in Thomas Aquinas, "The New Scholasticism," 63 (1989), p. 414.
- Cf. J. VILLAGRASA, La resolutio come metodo della metafisica secondo Cornelio Fabro, "Alpha Omega," 4 (2001), p. 63.
- De substantiis separatis, ch. 9: "Oportet igitur communem quamdam resolutionem in omnibus huiusmodi fieri, secundum quod unumquodque eorum intellectu resolvitur in id quod est, et in suum esse."
- J. VILLAGRASA, Metafisica II. La comunanza dell'essere, APRA, Rome, 2009, p. 240.
- Cf. J. AERTSEN, Medieval Philosophy and the Transcendentals, Brill, Leiden, 1996, pp. 134-135. "Resolutio secundum rationem is also employed in the establishment of the 'transcendental properties' of ens qua ens, since one does not move from one thing to another to affirm that all being is good, but rather one finds that all being is good to some degree and that a being's goodness is proportional to its degree of being (esse). In this resolutio, one reduces bonum to the ratio of appetibility, appetibility to perfection, perfection to act, and act to esse. Furthermore, the resolutio involved is called 'secundum rationem' since transcendentals such as bonum are identical to ens according to the thing (secundum rem) but differ according to the notion (secundum rationem). "The resolutio proper to philosophical theology is called 'secundum rem' since its progress involves the passage from one thing to another insofar as the latter is the extrinsic cause of the former. 92 Accordingly, the goal of philosophical theology is knowledge of the efficient, exemplary and final cause of ens qua ens and of its transcendental properties. Because this via resolutionis passes from id quod finite participat esse to knowledge of God as Ipsum Esse Subsistens, it involves Aquinas' Dionysian triplex via." 93
- 92 Since it is not an intrinsic analysis, Aquinas qualifies it as a 'quasi resolutio.'
- J. MITCHELL, Resolutio secundum rem, the Dionysian triplex via and Thomistic Philosophical Theology, in Proceedings Metaphysics 2009: 4th World Conference, Rome, November 5-7, 2009, edited by P. Zordan, D. Murray, R. Badillo, M. Lafuente, Editorial Dykinson, Madrid, 2011, pp. 398-400.