Did Aristotle Fail in Physics? Part I

First, let me explain why I ask this question. TLDR: because it matters!

I am preparing a talk to present in Madrid at the CEU (Centro de Estudios Universitarios) Universidad San Pablo. They are hosting an “International Congress on Science and Faith in the Centenary of S.L. Jaki” in collaboration with the Pontifical Athenaeum Regina Apostolorum and the UER (Università Europea di Roma). Fr. Stanley L. Jaki was born in 1924, so the purpose is to celebrate his legacy 100 years after his birth. Also, Fr. Jaki died in Madrid in 2009.

For a decade, I have been a self-appointed ‘student’ of the late Fr. Stanley L. Jaki, O.S.B. His book, Savior of Science, was the first book assigned in my first theology course back in 2010, “Philosophy for Theologians.” My background is chemistry, and in that year, I had just given birth to my youngest child. So it was that I read about the “stillbirths” of science in ancient cultures and its “viable” birth in the Christian Middle Ages all while holding a newborn after the loss of two of my own children (miscarriage). I don’t think Fr. Jaki anticipated how much his description would affect a mother-chemist-Catholic convert studying theology. I was so moved by his work that I tried to contact him, but I learned that he died the year before (2009 in Madrid). My M.A. thesis four years later was titled, Science Was Born of Christianity: The Teaching of Fr. Stanley L. Jaki. (Wrote about it here.) As any good student does, however, I also challenge some of his opinions because in challenging, I either better understand or further what is true.

Fr. Jaki was all about truth. He was hardcore! He was a physicist and theologian with doctorates in both. He developed into a skilled historian and philosopher as well. He held throughout his life’s work that without a correct world view, scientific progress is limited. Jaki the physicist was interested in the philosophical assumptions that constitute a comprehensive view of the universe, particularly those that thwarted or led to the emergence of modern science. Jaki the theologian investigated the impact of religious cultures on those various world views. Jaki the priest was motivated by his concern for mankind’s eternal future. He both criticized and praised the accomplishments of Aristotle. In his landmark 1974 book Science and Creation, he wrote that the “extraordinary feats of Aristotle in biology were in a sense responsible for his failure in physics” (104).

This statement perplexes me. Now that I am studying philosophy and have committed to the Thomistic framework in trying to understand elements and their blending, Jaki’s contention that Aristotle had a “failure in physics” seems contrary to what Aquinas would have said about “The Philosopher.” For sure, this is a provocative statement for scholastic philosophers who revere the tradition of the schoolmen of the Middle Ages from Aristotelian roots as developed by St. Thomas Aquinas in conformity with Catholic orthodoxy. In the latter half of the nineteenth century, Pope Leo XIII officially recognized and encouraged scholasticism in his encyclical, Aeterni patris, On the Restoration of Christian Philosophy. Ever since, a key effort has been underway to unite Aristotelian-Thomistic thought with modern physics, chemistry, and biology.

The reason I want to make sense out of Jaki’s statement is to see how his concern applies to the restoration effort. He was, after all, a physicist. He surely has insights that are not as obvious to philosophers and other theologians, but maybe they will make sense to me as someone who has studied chemistry, philosophy, and theology.

Jaki’s argument in simple syllogistic form is as follows:

—>An organismic world view causes a failure in physics.
—>Aristotle held an organismic world view.
Therefore, Aristotle failed in physics.

I am exploring these premises one at a time. What does Jaki mean by “organismic world view”? (Those are his exact words.) Does such a world view necessarily cause a failure in physics? What constitutes a failure in physics? Are we talking about physics as Aristotle thought of it? Or the classical physics of Newton? Or modern quantum physics? And if we are talking about one of the latter two, how is it fair to accuse Aristotle of failing at something that wasn’t even a thing until ~2,350 years after his lifetime? It’s not like Aristotle had the benefit of the knowledge we have now, much less the computational and technological tools.

To examine these questions, I am using Jaki’s two main, and early, books: The Relevance of Physics (1966) and Science and Creation: From Eternal Cycles to an Oscillating Universe (1974). The first one begins with Part One, “The Chief World Models of Physics” that begins with a chapter, “The World as an Organism.” The following two chapters review the world as a mechanism (classical physics) and the world as a mathematical model (quantum physics). The second book, hereafter called Science and Creation, has a chapter about midway through the book titled, “The Labyrinths of the Lonely Logos.” In this chapter, Jaki collects his research on ancient Greece and why he thinks modern science did not arise in this culture. All of the chapters in the first half of this book review various ancient cultures, such as ancient India, China, pre-Columbian America, Egypt, Mesopotamia, and the people of the Old Testament. Additionally, I will draw from Jaki’s essays and intellectual autobiography written in the latter years of his life when he could “crystallize” (his word) his ideas.

The most important question to answer is: why does it matter? Always, this is the question. My concern here is not to merely vindicate Jaki because I am, as someone once sarcastically levied, his ‘cheerleader’, nor is it some esoteric pursuit of scholarly abstraction. I think the question has teeth. It matters because Jaki is trying to tell us something about physics as we succeed in physics now, not just physicists but our global culture and the way we view science — i.e., our world view. We live in a scientific age. Knowledge of the atom has drastically increased in the last 100 years. You only need to consider technology (all of it atom-based) to realize this is true. A wrong world view that could stifle the birth of modern science 400 years ago could also have disastrous consequences on humanity now.

Baby Science was already born, so to speak. Modern Science is all grown up, like a teenager on the brink of adulthood. Adult modern science could wreak a lot more havoc than embryonic modern science ever could. If Jaki’s warning has merit, where Aristotle may have failed, we could not afford to make the same mistakes.

I want to understand why Jaki thought an organismic world view causes failure in physics, so I can judge whether this premise is true.

Then I want to figure out whether Aristotle indeed held such an organismic world view, so I can judge whether that premise is true.

And I want you to judge these premises alongside me as I sort out all the research and writing, so you can check my thinking.

Because if both premises are true, then Aristotle did fail in physics.

And if Aristotle failed in physics, we must understand how to avoid doing so in the present and in the future. At the heart of Jaki’s conclusion is that the Christian world view of Creation is necessary for modern science to thrive because it is the right world view. Like the first Jaki book I read, he thinks Christ is the Savior of Science. That’s a truth I want to thoroughly wrap my head around.

Let’s go. My trip is in two weeks!