Aristotle

7. NATURAL PHILOSOPHY

7 NATURAL PHILOSOPHY The early modern age dealt severely with Aristotle as a natural scientist. Beginning with Bacon, who denied him with what he credits Anaxagoras, Democritus, Parmenides , and Empedocles, namely, any “trace of the knowledge of nature” (Novum Organum I, aphor. 63), the many-voiced criticism came close to the reproach that Aristotle had obstructed scientific progress for almost two millennia. However, this reproach does not even do justice to the Aristotelianism of the time. While it is true that, in some areas, Aristotelianism hampered the natural sciences by a certain dogmatic ossification, in other areas they emerged from a school influenced by Aristotle, namely that of Padua (see ch. 18. 1). Most of the critique against Aristotle himself appears anachronistic, such as that regarding geocentricity, since it was assumed by all great mathematicians and astronomers of his time. As for the rest, a modern theory such as that of epigenesis can claim Aristotelian roots (see ch. 8. 2). At any rate, by studying Aristotle one gets to know a significant inquiry into nature that is not so radically different from that of modernity. 7.1 ARISTOTELIAN NATURAL SCIENCE It is often said that the experiment in the modern sense is unknown to Aristotle. In fact, he relies far more on direct observation, be it of nature itself or of the reflexes relevant in language; he also makes do without devices such as binoculars or microscopes . Nevertheless, he knows the rudiments of the experiment. Thus, he undertakes dissections of animals; for example, he describes the dissection of moles’ eyes in the Zoology (cf. ch. 8. 1). He also observes the development of embryos in hen’s eggs from the same clutch (HA VI 3, 561a6–562a20) and uses this observation to defend his own theory against a competing one. Furthermore, as we shall see, the “experimental method” is not all that important for his kind of biological research. As far as physics is concerned, it is said that Aristotle is far removed from Galileo’s thesis that the book of nature is written in the language of mathematics. In reality he sees both the differences and the overlap between mathematics and physics (Ph. II 2, 193b23–25), and in the Physics he investigates themes concerning mathematics and physics equally, such as the infinite and the continuum (see ch. 7. 4). In the process he explains the conceptual preliminaries for the mathematical intellectual 69 devices that early modern physics will use to deal with problems of continuity and infinitesimal calculus. Furthermore, he assigns to applied mathematics those natural sciences in which mathematicization will have its triumphs, namely, mechanics, optics , and astronomy. And in biology, or rather zoology, the field in which his contribution to empirical natural sciences is greatest, mathematical assertions are far less important than the description of shapes (morphology) and functions (physiology), even in modernity. Partly, the exaggerated critique is due to a confusion between Aristotle and Aristotelianism. The critique of universal teleology is part of this, that is, of the assumption that the entire universe is governed by purpose. The view, still preponderant among “philosophically erudite” biologists, that according to Aristotle the world is a context that is meaningful in itself, directed toward values, goals, and purposes, as well as ontologically varied, a natura naturans streaming innocently from within itself, does not have its origin in Aristotle. Another part of the critique is based on the fact that Aristotle is, so to speak, read from the wrong perspective, that is, from the angle of physics rather than biology, and from that of “ordinary physics” rather than the fundamental research that explains topics like the infinite or the continuum. In one aspect, at any rate, Aristotle works no differently from his modern colleagues. Unlike some Platonists with their excessive speculation, he allots a fixed place to the search for experience (cf. Cael. III 7, 306a5–17) and demands a clearly delimited explanation proper to each natural event. In contrast with the “wild experimenting” without theory which, according to Bacon, generates “even more shapeless and incomprehensible definitions” than Aristotle’s attitude (Novum Organum I, aphor. 64), he is led by theoretical interests. On the other hand, there are clear distinctions. While early modern natural science subjects itself to human goals, all that matters to Aristotle is knowledge (tou eidenai charin hê pragmateia: Ph. II 3, 194b17 f.). This purely theoretical interest has the expedient consequence that there is no need for a separate ethics of science, neither one directed...