Aristotle's Concept of Chance: Accidents, Cause, Necessity, and Determinism

Conclusion

CONCLUSION – Let the wise be warned against too great readiness at explanation : it multiplies the sources of mistake, lengthening the sum for reckoners sure to go wrong. – George Eliot, Middlemarch, Book 5, Ch. 45 The present volume is the first full account of chance in Aristotle. No previous treatment of chance has brought together the concept of chance in the physical and ethical works of Aristotle. As chance is a topic of importance in physics, biology, metaphysics and ethics, and dealt with in many other contexts also, the present study has been extremely wide-ranging and has necessitated the study of most of Aristotle’s works. From the analysis a number of conclusions follow. These will be divided into (a) textual conclusions and (b) doctrinal conclusions concerning Aristotle’s theory of chance, i.e. exegetical conclusions. (a) Textual conclusions Jaeger’s Aristoteles...published in 1923 was the start of a series of enthusiastic attempts at establishing a chronology of Aristotle’s works.1 However, enthusiasm for the task waned in some quarters for many years after some notable failures,2 when it became clear that it would be very difficult to establish this chronology, as many of Aristotle’s works are composed of books dating from different periods, and many parts of books also date from different periods. However, 1 Cf. Chroust, The First Thirty Years… 2 The reception accorded to Nolte, Het godsbegrip... meant that his work must be seen as such. However, the material he gathered could undoubtedly constitute the basis for a valuable study. 360 ARISTOTLE’S CONCEPT OF CHANCE the task has never ceased to attract many exegetes and needs to be brought to a satisfactory conclusion, in order to improve the quality of the exegesis of Aristotle’s work. Realistically, however, it seems unlikely that any single exegete at the present time could succeed in a lifetime in establishing a full and accurate chronology acceptable to the scientific world. Accordingly, all partial contributions towards the establishment of a definitive chronology must be considered as of value. Any exegetical work that does not take account of the status quaestionis of the chronology of Aristotle’s works must at this stage appear seriously defective.3 Hence serious attention has been devoted to the chronological question in this volume and this has led to a number of conclusions. As a prerequisite I expressed a number of methodological prolegomena at the start of Ch. 2. In the present volume an attempt has been made to show the meaning of WXYFK and WDXMWRYPDWRQ for Aristotle. The investigation required a detailed study of Phys. II, iv-vi, from which it appears that Phys. II, iv-v constitute Aristotle’s original treatment of chance in the Physics, and that II, vi was added on at a later stage when II, iv-v were partially revised. Given that Phys. II, vi is to be dated later than Phys. II, iv-v, all of the major texts in Aristotle’s works relating to WXYFK and WDXMWRYPDWRQ were examined, and it was seen that there is some likelihood that Phys. II, vi is to be dated to the same period as Met. =(VII), vii-ix and Met. /(XII), iii, i.e. towards the end of Aristotle’s career, but before De An. and De Gen. An. It is therefore incorrect to hold in an undifferentiated manner, as did Jaeger, that Phys. II is to be dated early in Aristotle’s career.4 3 As Graham, Aristotle’s Two Systems…332 writes: “…much of the better Aristotelian scholarship takes into account the interplay of his system and his development .” Cf. Wians, Aristotle’s Philosophical Development…xi: “…the ragged state of our Metaphysics and the competing versions of the Ethics practically demand them [sc. genetic explanations] in some form…” Cf. Chroust, The First Thirty Years…28: [Jaeger’s work] “determined once and for all the most general direction in which all future Aristotelian scholarship would have to proceed.” Cf. Rist, On Taking Aristotle ’s Development Seriously… Among the studies that take careful account of the chronology of Aristotle’s works, a prime example is Sorabji, Necessity, Cause and Blame… 4 Jaeger, Aristoteles...311: “Damit ist unwiderleglich erwiesen, daß nicht nur das zweite Buch der Physik..., sondern eine vollständige Reihe von Untersuchungen, CONCLUSION 361 On the basis of a detailed study in Ch. 5 it was seen that there...