Sunday, March 29, 2020

Avicenna's Course Handout 06 (Existence and Essence)

Outline

1.    Ontological separation between Essence and Existence
a.     Introduction
                                                             i.      Aristotelian dichotomies between:
1.    Form and Matter
2.    Essence and Accidents
To explain the motion; Aristotle first cause is responsible for motion, not existence
Plato’s Demiurge is just a form giver, not existence giver
                                                           ii.      Muslim philosophers had to explain the existence, not motion (creation)
b.    Avicenna’s arguments for the ontological separation between existence/being and essence/quiddity
c.     The ramifications of such a separation
d.    Distinction between Contingent being and Necessary being
e.    Seeds of Hierarchy and gradation of Existence
f.      The core of requiring a cause: temporality or contingency?
g.     Causality (the core of causality; the Principle of al-Wahid)

Book Excerpts



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