Aristotle's Four Causes Are Convincing

613 Words3 Pages
Aristotle’s four causes are convincing. Discuss. Aristotle’s four causes explained why the universe is always changing. It gave four causes for an object and why it was there. For example why is a chair here? The material cause is what the chair is made from, (an example would be a wooden chair.) the formal cause is what lets the chair be identified as a chair. (So a chair normally has four legs.) The efficient cause is why it is here (so for a chair, someone must have made it.) The final cause is its reason for being, the purpose it has. Aristotle identified this as the “soul,” however Aristotle did not believe that the soul was separate from the body. Aristotle believed there was a “prime mover” something that causes the changes in the universe. It was the reason everything was here (the reason for being.) It was also transcendent and impersonal. It existed because something must cause the changes and to must not be able to change, therefore it must exist outside of time, and to Aristotle it was his God. Some people might argue that Aristotle’s four causes are convincing because you can see changes in the natural world. Nothing ever stays the same and world is continually changing. A further reason why Aristotle’s four causes are convincing is due to the fact the Aristotle’s theory is derived from his studies of the natural world. The four causes can be observed in action and this means that we can observe the Prime mover in action. Other people might think Aristotle’s four causes are not convincing because the “four causes in action” can be explained be science. Gravity and Earths rotation explains why we have day, night, winter and summer. We don’t need a “final cause” to explain why they happen. Equally we don’t need a Prime Mover to explain how the Universe came into being; the Big Bang Theory can explain most of it. Another
Open Document