Aristotle’s Revenge Quotes

“Hence there must not only be something by virtue of which the thing you’ve drawn is triangular, but also something by virtue of which it is triangular in precisely the imperfect way that it is. There must also be something by virtue of which triangularity exists in this particular point in time and space.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“The determinable substratum of potentiality is what in Aristotelian philosophy of nature is meant by the term “matter,” and a determining pattern that exists once the potential is actualized is called a “form.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“1.2.2 Hylemorphism In change, there is, again, both the potential that is to be actualized and the actualization of that potential.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“The emphasis in philosophy of nature is always on metaphysical questions, whereas the accent in the philosophy of science (at least where it isn’t essentially just philosophy of nature under another name) is on epistemological and methodological issues.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“What is the epistemology of the philosophy of nature itself? Is it an a priori discipline the way that mathematics and metaphysics are often claimed to be? Or are its claims subject to empirical falsification the way that those of natural science typically are? These”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“I have indicated, the most fundamental concepts of Aristotelian-Thomistic philosophy of nature (the theory of actuality and potentiality, hylemorphism, and so forth) overlap with those of Aristotelian-Thomistic metaphysics.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“As with the terms “physics” and “science,” so too with terms like “cosmology” and “psychology,” the wisest policy is, in my view, not to quibble about contemporary usage but rather to use the best modern labels, qualify them as one sees fit, and then to get on with matters of substance.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“Other potentially misleading terms include “cosmology” and “psychology.” In”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“Better in most contexts (such as the present one) once again to acquiesce to standard contemporary usage and classify fields like metaphysics, ethics, natural theology, philosophy of nature, etc. as branches of philosophy rather than of “science.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“current usage (which confines the application of the term “scientific” to claims that are empirically falsifiable) that to insist on it would be to invite needless confusion.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“science,” for the Aristotelian, is an organized body of demonstrated truths concerning the things falling within some domain and their causes. Hence, not only physics, chemistry, biology, and the like, but also metaphysics, ethics, natural theology, and indeed the philosophy of nature itself (since, for the Aristotelian-Thomistic thinker, these fields of inquiry rest on rational arguments and analysis no less than physics, chemistry, etc. do) count as sciences.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“philosophy of nature, albeit a rival to the Aristotelian philosophy of nature. Hence to characterize the very field of the philosophy of nature as essentially concerned with change might seem to beg the question in favor of the Aristotelian approach. Better to characterize it instead in terms of what both sides agree upon, viz. the existence of the empirical and material world.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“on using the word “physics” in the older sense. So as to forestall misunderstandings of the sort in question, it is better to acquiesce to the modern usage of “physics” and apply instead the label “philosophy of nature” to those aspects of Aristotle’s account of the nature of the physical world that are still defensible today (as most contemporary Aristotelians and Thomists in fact do).”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“And one way the Aristotelian philosopher of nature might defend the reality of change against his rivals is precisely by appealing to the nature of the material reality that both sides affirm, and arguing that it entails the possibility of change.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“I have said that the philosophy of nature is concerned with the most general features of empirical and material reality. Other expositions written from an Aristotelian-Thomistic point of view often characterize the field instead as concerned with changeable reality (though some earlier writers do characterize it the way I have, e.g. Bittle 1941, p. 13).”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“First, as I have said, the distinction between natural science and the philosophy of nature is not always observed in practice by either philosophers or scientists. Nor is it desirable that investigations in these areas be kept rigorously separate.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“Second, the intellect abstracts from even the common sensible features of things and considers only their quantitative features. Mathematics is the field of inquiry corresponding to this degree of abstraction.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“First, the intellect abstracts from the individualizing features of concrete material things, but still considers them in terms of the sensible characteristics that they have in common.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“Third, the intellect abstracts from even the quantitative features and considers only the most general ways in which a thing might be characterized – in terms of notions such as that of substance, attribute, essence, existence, etc.”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science

“For example, whereas the natural sciences are concerned with various specific kinds of material substances – stone, water, trees, fish, stars, and so on – metaphysics is concerned with questions such as what it is to be a substance of any kind in the first place. (Is a substance a mere bundle of attributes, or a substratum in which attributes inhere? Are material substances the only possible sort? And so on.) Similarly, the natural sciences are concerned with”
― Edward Feser, Aristotle’s Revenge: The Metaphysical Foundations of Physical and Biological Science