Did Aristotle Fail in Physics? Part 7
The Last of Premise B: an Eternally Cycling Cosmos
As always, here’s the argument again from Part 1:
Premise A—>An organismic world view causes a failure in physics. (Part 2, 3)
Premise B—>Aristotle held an organismic world view. (Part 4, 5, 6, 7)
Therefore, Aristotle failed in physics. (Part 8)
This post is a review of Aristotle’s organismic world view, according to Jaki, as it relates to the doctrine of an eternally cycling universe.
Not in Relevance
Fr. Stanley Jaki does not mention the Greek idea of an eternally cycling cosmos or the Great Year in the Relevance of Physics, even as he attacks Aristotle’s organismic worldview as destructive to physics. He focuses on Aristotle’s two main assessments of the physical world in On the Heavens, for the celestial, and Meteorologica, for the terrestrial, pointing out examples of a priori explanations of physical processes as matching those of processes in living organisms. Relevance was published in 1966. Until now, I had not realized that Jaki did not mention eternal cycles in Relevance yet focuses on this idea throughout Science and Creation. It is the theme of the entire book!
So, what is the connection between an organismic world view and an eternally cycling universe? There seems to be a jump here.
Science and Creation
In his 1974 volume, Science and Creation, however, Jaki systematically presents evidence of the “stillbirths” of modern science in the first half of this book: ancient India, China, pre-Columbian America, Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, and Arabia. Jaki detects hints of organismic world views in these cultures as well, but more specifically he notes that they all have a conception of the cosmos as eternally cycling, as if people are on an eternal ride on a giant cosmic ferris wheel.
In the chapter on Greek science, “The Labyrinths of the Lonely Logos,” Jaki picks up where he left off in Relevance. “As the idea of cyclic returns in the universe had a distinctly biological or organismic hue, Aristotle found it much to his liking” (Jaki 1974, p. 105). His pre-Socratic predecessors also held to a belief about the universe as perishing and regenerating at regular intervals.
Recall from On the Heavens that Aristotle described the world as whirling around a center with the four elements, earth, water, air, and fire, comprising the terrestrial realm. The element earth (heavy, cold, and dry) was thought to be closest to the center, such that the planet Earth formed, with the element water (heavy, cold, and wet) sitting on the earth. The element air (light, hot, and wet) was as a vapor being exhaled from the earth and rising in a straight line. The element fire (light, hot, and dry) was squeezed out of exhalations causing stars, comets, and the milky way. Aristotle named a fifth element, the aether, which is infinite and moving in perfect circles in the celestial realm beyond and separate from the terrestrial realm. Thus, there were for Aristotle two principal motions, straight lines up or down and circular. It was the idea that the heavens move in perfect circles infinitely that gave rise to the idea of the Great Year that represents a perfect number per revolution.
For Plato, the Great Year held supreme importance in causality for everything from physical and biological processes to social governance. He explains in the Republic that individual lives occur in the scope of cosmic cycles:
In plants that grow in the earth, as well as in animals that move on the earth's surface, fertility and sterility of soul and body occur when the circumferences of the circles of each are completed, which in short-lived existences pass over a short space, and in long-lived ones over a long space. (Republic, Book VIII)
In Plato’s dialogue, Socrates explains to Glaucon (Plato’s brother who argues with Socrates about justice) that a perfect state cannot last. Short-lived existences are as lifetimes; long-lived existences are the cosmic cycles. During the period corresponding to perfect numbers, there will be “divine births” of wise rulers, but in succeeding generations there will be a time of misfortune. Plato lays out the mathematics for the waxing and waning periods. Geometry controls good and evil births, and for Plato, even the gods were subject to order and disorder during these cosmic cycles.
Eternally Cycling Cosmos > God
God, Jaki explains, was only a co-ruler (Jaki 1974, p. 109). God rules and orders during the good periods, but during the chaotic periods, the world travels on without God and slowly disintegrates. When the era comes to a close, disorder comes to a head, and then the time of goodness and order returns. In Statesman, Plato depicts the world as having volition. “For from its Composer the universe has received only good things; but from its previous condition it retains in itself and creates in the animals all the elements of harshness and injustice which have their origin in the heavens.” (273b) Nature either cooperates with or rebels against God and goodness according to the Great Year.
Aristotle, according to Jaki, wanted to find a middle way between the materialism of the Ionians and Democritus (atomism) and the idealism of Plato and Pythagoras, and did so in On the Heavens and Meteorologica by depicting the physical processes of the celestial bodies in the aether and the terrestrial elements whirling and moving rectilinearly. But he did not dispense with the a priori idea of an eternally cycling cosmos. It was a necessary part of his organismic world view, cycles upon cycles of life and death.
Nothing New Under the Sun
Jaki thinks the contemporary “historical consciousness” has forgotten the impact that the doctrine of eternal cycles had on the psychology of its cultures, especially regarding the systematic investigation of nature and motion. He cites four different works of Aristotle’s that draw the logical consequences of such a world view (Jaki 1974, p. 113).
ONE: In Meteorologica where Aristotle deals with the nature of the elements and the existence of the aether above them, he references Anaxagoras, who thought the celestial regions were fire instead of aether. He agrees with his predecessor in that men have always thought that the upper regions are of some element and that they are eternally in motion and, therefore, also divine. His defense in the truth of the idea of an eternally cycling cosmos is, “For the same opinions appear in cycles among men not once nor twice, but infinitely often” (339b16). Because the same idea keeps recurring, there must be infinite cycles. Men and their thoughts, after all, are part of the universe.
TWO: In On the Heavens, Aristotle likewise notes that men have always recognized the incorruptible nature of the heavens. I will quote the whole passage.
The mere evidence of the senses is enough to convince us of this, at least with human certainty. For in the whole range of time past, so far as our inherited records reach, no change appears to have taken place either in the whole scheme of the outermost heaven or in any of its proper parts.
The common name, too, which has been handed down from our distant ancestors even to our own day, seems to show that they conceived of it in the fashion which we have been expressing. The same ideas, one must believe, recur in men's minds not once or twice but again and again. And so, implying that the primary body is something else beyond earth, fire, air, and water, they gave the highest place a name of its own, aether, derived from the fact that it 'runs always' for an eternity of time. Anaxagoras, however, scandalously misuses this name, taking aether as equivalent to fire. (270b11-25)
THREE: In the last book of Metaphysics where Aristotle discusses his proof that there is only one heaven (the divine aether moving eternally in perfect circles), he notes that certain traditions of thought have been handed down from ancient philosophers from long before him, and that they too perceived there to be a separate and immaterial substance. He says that mythologies have called this substance a god and that there is some truth to the idea.
Now, traditions have been handed down from our predecessors and the ancient thinkers and left to posterity in the form of a myth that these heavenly bodies are gods, and that the divine encompasses the whole of nature.
[…]
Now, if anyone will separate these statements and accept only the first—that they thought the first substances to be gods—this will be considered to be a divine statement. And though every art and every philosophy has often been discovered and again lost, the opinions of these early thinkers have been preserved as relics to the present day. (1074a38)
In his commentary on the Metaphysics, Aquinas notes that while it is right to recognize the development of human knowledge through history, Aristotle also needed to state his appreciation for history in such a way as “to save the eternity of the world” (2598). It would have seemed absurd, Aquinas says, for Aristotle to posit that such ideas of the divine aether had never occurred to anyone before him, so he instead describes how opinions of ancient thinkers came and went in cycles, with vestiges remaining as relics to the present day.
FOUR: Last, in Politics, Aristotle makes a similar admonishment to heed the wisdom of the ages, echoing his words in Metaphysics.
It is true indeed that these and many other things have been invented several times over in the course of ages, or rather times without number; for necessity may be supposed to have taught men the inventions which were absolutely required, and when these were provided, it was natural that other things which would adorn and enrich life should grow up by degrees. And we may infer that in political institutions the same rule holds. (1329b7-8; also 1264a1)
The notion of eternal cycles does not immediately jump out in this statement, but Jaki notes that in tying necessity to the course of ages in times without number, Aristotle is again asserting that the same ideas occur to men not once nor twice, but again and again, infinitely often, such that even political institutions follow a natural order and rule. Or, as the side note of the Jowett translation says, “There is nothing new under the sun” (p. 224).
Organismic World View —> Eternal Cycles
Jaki’s contention is that with such a mindset born of a conception of an eternally cycling universe with organismic processes, people would not have the motivation to discover the physical laws and systems of laws of natural motion because they would have no reason to innovate. There is no room for true progress in an eternally cycling cosmos. If you are born in a golden age of prosperity, you will enjoy the fruits of wisdom, order, and justice. If you are born in desolation, you can only despair and accept, but you cannot change it. This premise is the entire theme of the first half of Science and Creation.
The eternally cycling cosmos was a common thread of belief in all the ancient cultures that, despite some scientific vitality, only gave stillbirths to modern physical science as a viable discipline of its own. The doctrine of eternal cycles was refuted by Christian scholars in the Middle Ages who combed through Aristotle’s scientific corpus, adopting his natural philosophy and metaphysics as far as possible without contradicting Christian tenets and divinely revealed truth in Scripture and Tradition.
This is the story told in Science and Creation. This book of Jaki’s is massive and dense with details and citations. I review the overall argument in my shorter book, Science Was Born of Christianity: The Teaching of Fr. Stanley L. Jaki.
This concludes the survey of Aristotle’s works regarding Jaki’s charge that an organismic world view causes a failure in physics and that Aristotle held an organismic world view. Having shown why Jaki finds both premises to be true, we can conclude with him that Aristotle, therefore failed in physics. It is important, however, to understand why Jaki would make this case.
In his depiction of geophysics as exhalations, as the fifth element aether moving in perfect circles, and of the doctrine of eternal cycles, Jaki concludes that Aristotle was beholden to an organismic view. He further argues that such a world view not only hindered the birth of modern science but also inhibited a psychological motivation at the cultural level for the true progress that a scientific enterprise would bring to humanity.
Back From Madrid
I am actually back from Madrid and have presented my paper. In the last installment, I want to do a number of things. I want to 1) end with one of Jaki’s regrets in his autobiography about focusing too much on Aristotle’s failure, 2) tell you a little about my trip and all the new friends I made, and 3) explain why I needed to settle this question to advance in my dissertation on the philosophy of the elements. Thanks for walking through this with me.
Stacy, thanks for your delineation of Jaki’s reasons for proposing that Aristotle failed at physics due to his a priori comment to conceiving the universe as an organism. I agree with your reading, though I think that the problem of eternal returns, or an infinitely cycling world view, is the most fundamental problem. The psychologically negative impact cannot be overestimated. It completely undermines the trust that we humans can truly discover and understand something new. The excitement that underlies philosophical and scientific discovery is that the ultimately new, never before seen, can genuinely be ascertained. Something new under the sun really is true. Each day is in fact new. Humans are on a journey not of our own making. We are born with an innate sense of wonder and anticipation that something brand new is possible each new day. Pope Benedict XVI/Ratzinger throughout a nearly 75 year period spoke and wrote about how human evolution is real, where humanity “grows” over time. Theologically he explains that humankind is a species on its way, that our evolution is “God’s Project”. We ourselves are invited by the transcendent Creator to grow and become new. In this respect, amongst others, novelty and newness is an invitation to discover and live all manner of new wonderful realities. Ultimately, death itself is the most profound door to the most beautiful all new way of life completely beyond our greatest imaginings. Barring human made or natural deprivations, an amazing world of possibilities stands open before us every new day; how can we not investigate!
Very well comprised. Jaki's insistence that science needs to excel begs a question, however. He seems
to suggest that science is linear, like Aristotle's, up to the circular Aether. But that would mean that there is no end to scientific progress, which it seems, must, on some realm, be circular too. I imagine
that like angels -pure intellect- science can progress to a point where there is nothing physical left to learn; at which point we bump into Aristotle's heavenly perfect circuit, the domain of the Creator alone.