Questions on the Metaphysics of Aristotle

Question Two

QUESTION TWO Must cause and effect exist simultaneously? Is it necessary that an individual particular cause and its individual effect exist simultaneously and simultaneously cease to exist. And it is the opposite order characteristic of a cause in potency and an effect in potency, as is stated in the text.1 [Arguments Pro and Con] 1 [1] Proof that it is incongruous of a cause in act. Take an efficient cause that produces its effect through movement; in the beginning the efficient cause is in act; therefore, the effect is also, but once the effect exists the motion ceases, and therefore it ceases in the beginning as well. 2 Also, according to Bk. IV of this work,2 for “that which moves is prior in nature to that which is moved, and if they are correlative terms, this is no less the case.” Therefore, a mover can exist apart from what is moved, as the prior can without the posterior. Hence, a cause can exist in actuality without an actually existing effect. 3 Also, what is actually known is the cause of scientific knowledge that is actual. But what is known can be in act apart from the actual science, because they are referred to one another according to the third type [of relations].3 There is no essential order here, nor mutual dependence, because the science depends on what is known, but not vice versa. 4 Also, God is always a cause in act; therefore, there would always be an effect in act. The antecedent is evident; if it were not so, then he would have first been causing in potency and then changed. 1 Aristotle, Metaphysics V, ch. 2, 1014a 20-25. 2 Aristotle, Metaphysics IV, ch. 5, 1010b 37-1011a 2. 3 Aristotle, Metaphysics V, ch. 15, 1021a 30-33. 360 THE METAPHYSICS OF JOHN DUNS SCOTUS 5 [Is the first statement true]4 that an actual individual cause and its actual effect exist simultaneously and together cease to exist? 6 To the contrary: Cause and effect exist together and cease to exist together inasmuch as they are co-dependent. Therefore, the greater they depend on one another, the more their need to coexist. But a universal cause in act and a universal effect in act are of this sort.—Proof: something could be an actual cause and be this cause, although it would not have this effect in act, as someone can be a father in act, although not with respect to this son, because he can be [a father] with respect to another. But no one is a father unless he is father of a son. Therefore, in the case of a universal cause and effect, the two are more dependent. This is evident because in this way things are primarily corelative. 7 {{Also, where the motion is one of throwing, the object thrown continues to move when the thrower is no longer throwing. Also i f one is turning [a potter’s] wheel and then stops, the wheel does not cease to turn. Also in a qualitative change, when the cause that produced the change ceases to act, the qualitative change does not immediately cease. Similarly, in regard to a hanging rope, if it is swung to one side, and the swinger moves on, the rope does not immediately come to rest. 8 Also, a forced rest has the same cause as a forced motion, and nevertheless, when the agent restraining it ceases to act, the object restrained remains at rest. 9 Also, what is caused continues to be caused as long as the effect continues. What initially caused the effect, however, may have ceased to exist, and hence is no longer actually causing; therefore, etc. 10 Proof of the first statement5 is found In Bk. VI of Avicenna’s Metaphysics, ch. 1. 4 Cf. supra, n. 1. 5 Namely, that what is caused continues to be caused as long as this effect continues. BOOK V QUESTION TWO 361 [a] First, because existence continues to be caused so long as i t continues to be, and not just insofar as it begins to exist. For it only begins to be if a state of nonexistence preceded. It is not caused, however, insofar as there was first nonexistence, for it is accidental to the cause that the existence of the caused only comes after a prior state of non-existence. This is proved...