![]() ![]() There is another, more fundamental reason why a cause of which essence and existence are identical cannot be multiplied. How could a being, whose nature it is to exist, not exist at some moment in time? To assert that such a being could not exist at some moment would be like saying there could be a moment when a triangle doesn’t have three straight sides. The matter that makes up a corporeal being is always in potency to losing the form it has (in which case the thing ceases to exist) and receiving a new form (in which case a new thing begins to exist).īut a being for which existence belongs to its nature cannot possibly be subject to generation or corruption. But in either case that instance of pure existence would no longer be pure existence, which cannot be.Īnother reason why pure existence cannot be multiplied through reception into matter is that all material beings are subject to generation and corruption. ![]() It would also limit existence to a particular mode, in which case that instance of pure existence would lack existence. To differentiate one instance of pure existence from another by the matter that it informs is to make that instance of pure existence a composite of existence plus that parcel of matter. ![]() The first reason is the same as given above concerning multiplication of a genus into its various species. Therefore, the reception into matter of a type brings about individuals of that type.Ĭan pure existence be multiplied in this way? It cannot. Plato is distinct from Socrates because the substantial form human is united to this clump of matter (Plato’s body) in this space at this time, and not that clump of matter (Socrates’s body) in that space at that time. That further element of individuation is matter. There must be some other differentiating factor. Therefore, neither Plato nor Socrates can be individuated by the species that they are members of. If Plato were human by virtue of being the individual Plato, then every human being would be Plato, including Socrates. In other words, neither Plato nor Socrates exhausts the species human. But neither one of them is human by virtue of being the individual that he is. For example, both Plato and Socrates are individual members of the species human. Otherwise, we would lose the notion of pure existence.Īnother way to have more than one thing of a certain kind is when there are individual members of a species. Therefore, we must deny multiplication of this type for a first efficient cause of which essence and existence are identical. But for existence to be limited to some particular mode means a lack of some existence, and thus the instance of pure existence wouldn’t be just pure existence itself. Moreover, the instance of pure existence that had the differentiating feature would limit existence to existing in this way and not some other way. Just as human is not pure animality but animality plus the form of human, so too an instance of pure existence wouldn’t be pure existence itself but existence plus a particular form of existence. In order for pure existence to be multiplied into its species, the multiple instances would have to have a specifying feature that differentiates one instance of pure existence from another.īut if we add a distinguishing feature to an instance of pure existence to differentiate it from other instances of pure existence, then no instance would be pure existence itself. Suppose that pure existence were a genus of which there were multiple species. Without such a feature, human couldn’t be specified as a distinct type of animal.Ī being of which essence and existence are identical cannot be multiplied in this way. Human restricts the understanding of animal to only those types that have the distinguishing feature of rationality. Animal signifies a wider domain of animals than some specific type of animal. A human belongs to the genus animal, but is set apart from other species in that genus by the specific difference rationality. Consider, for example, the genus animal and the species human. One mode of multiplication is the multiplication of a genus into species. ![]()
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