Reading 12: Common Understanding of Becoming: Three Things in Every Becoming

Orientation #

He says “we’re just starting reading twelve” and recalls “I think last time” the three differences between readings twelve–thirteen and ten–eleven (prev. lecture), and “we said last time that change and becoming are really the same reality”. Verified sources place the whole class in Aquinas’s lectio 12 on Physics I, read from his handout pp. 1–2 (with the note on p. 3). The previous class closed in the Physics on nature and the propter quod principle; the next continues into reading thirteen on matter, form and privation.

The class, in order #

1. Why change is basic, and how twelve–thirteen differ from ten–eleven (“if you don’t understand change, you don’t understand anything”) #

The point: understanding becoming is the foundation of all understanding, and readings twelve–thirteen redo the “common basis” work of ten–eleven on a wider and more necessary footing.

1. If you don’t understand change, you don’t understand changing things.
2. If you don’t understand changing things, you don’t understand unchanging things, because you know the unchanging by negation of the changing (“as we saw when we made that theological footnote to God”).
3. Therefore, from the first to the last, if you don’t understand change you don’t understand anything. Aristotle found a common basis among the Greek natural philosophers about change and became strong in it; in twelve and thirteen he does something like that, with three differences:

• Change vs. becoming: the same reality from two points of view. Becoming looks at it from the end, goal, destination; change from the starting point. “Like the distinction between coming and going” — “good to know whether you’re coming or going.”
• The common basis here is shared by all men, not just the natural philosophers.
• He becomes strong in it with complete necessity, correcting ten–eleven, where some necessity was mixed with great probability. Ten–eleven “still somewhat dialectical”; twelve–thirteen “the beginning of demonstration, if you wish.”

2. First the general: “considering about every becoming” (“state first the general and then to consider what is proper”) #

He reads the opening line of the handout and ties it to the first reading: we go from the more known to us (the confused, indistinct) to the less known (the distinct); the general is to the particular as the confused to the distinct; so it is natural to know things in general before in particular.

• Aside: Paul VI called this “the common principle of all learning” in some address; he read it once in the Osservatore Romano but cannot find the address.

3. How we all speak: two names for the this that becomes that (“we have two names for the this”) #

The point: the “we” of the second paragraph is not editorial, nor “we Greek philosophers”, but “you and I, we people in general”; he begins from how all men speak because that is a sign of a common understanding. We all say “this becomes that”, and we have two names for the this, used separately or together, for one and the same becoming:

• a man becomes old / the young become old / the young man becomes old (not two becomings);
• the butter becomes hard / the soft becomes hard / the soft butter becomes hard (soft butter in the refrigerator);
• the cloth becomes wet / the dry becomes wet / the dry cloth becomes wet.

4. Third paragraph: the preposition “from” (“goes from being young to being old”) #

A “little more subtle” point in our speech: we use “from” with one of the two names only. From young to old, not from man to old; from soft to hard, not from butter to hard; from dry to wet, not from cloth to wet.

5. Fourth paragraph: what remains and what is lost (“something that is lost when this becomes that”) #

Now not the way we speak but what we observe in the thing: one name names what is lost, the other what remains. Soft is gone, butter stays; dry is gone, cloth stays; the sick become healthy and are no longer sick, but the man is still a man; the young become old (“they’re grandfathers”), the man remains. Connection with §4: with which name do we use “from”? Student: what is lost — “because it’s the contraries.” He agrees: “from” indicates going away from something, leaving it behind; “nobody speaks that way” of going from man to old, from cloth to wet.

1. That we have two names, not synonyms, may show some awareness that something remains and something is lost.
2. That we consistently use “from” with the name of what is lost is a stronger sign that men see, in some way, that difference. So their very way of speaking makes men aware of three things in becoming: this, that, and the this taken as twofold.

• Proverb as evidence: “from rags to riches” — not “from humanity to riches”; you went from poor to rich, not from man to rich. Not a philosophers’ phrase; it grew up customarily in America (the self-made man, the American success story).

6. Last paragraphs of page one: the this is one in number, not of one sort (“it is necessary always for something to underlie”) #

He reads: from all things that come to be one can take that something always underlies which comes to be something; this, “even if it is one in number, is not of one sort” — sort meaning definition: it is not the same to be man and to be unmusical, man and sick, cloth and dry. Bottom paragraph, the reason for saying the this is “numbered”, twofold: one remains while the other does not — “the one not opposed remains”, the man remains, the unmusical does not; the composed from both is the unmusical man. So too dry (the opposite of wet) does not remain, the cloth (not opposed) remains. Top of page two: the sign of their difference is that we all say “from” of what is lost, not of what remains.

7. Why the order is reversed: reason vs. sign (“the order is reversed, for a very good reason”) #

Recalling Shakespeare’s definition of reason, “looking before and after”: in paragraphs three and four he went from the way we speak to a difference in things; at the bottom of page one and top of page two he has the same two items in reverse order, from things to speech. Student: the way we speak is an effect of the way things are. His account:

1. The chief reason for saying there are two things in the this must be drawn from things themselves: one remains, the other is lost. (“If you stay in this room and I go to the next room, you and I are not the same person.”) That the cloth remains while the dryness is gone is the best reason for saying cloth and dryness are not the same.
2. That we say “from dry to wet” and not “from cloth to wet” is at best a sign of the difference, not the chief reason.
3. But earlier he was seeking a common basis among all men, so he had to begin from the way all men speak, which is the sign of their common understanding. “Very subtle.” Result: a common basis among all men; their speech shows them aware “at least in a confused way” of three things — as we saw earlier from the side of change.

8. The man in the street: three things in every “he’s changed” (“go down to Main Street, Worcester”) #

Stop the first man on Main Street, Worcester (preferably one never to college, “had his mind fouled up that way”): does he ever talk about change without three things in mind? His first reaction is “huh?”, but ask what change struck him: at the high school reunion Joe had changed — he had all this hair, now he’s bald. So he has in mind Joe with bushy hair twenty years ago, Joe bald now, and must recognise the bald man as the same man; otherwise a hairy man and a bald man are just two men, not a change. Same with a man whose hair turns gray in the hall from a shock (“they tell me I know; I’ve never seen it happen”), and “my, Johnny’s grown”: last height, present height, and this is Johnny. Three things, though not explicit. So Aristotle follows “the advice of the great Heraclitus”: find a common basis and become strong in it. Common in two ways: common to all men, and about all becoming.

9. Three truths about becoming: proved, assumed, and never proved (“three things in becoming here that you can talk about”) #

The point of the two middle paragraphs of page two, made “very explicit to see how careful a writer Aristotle is”:

1. In every becoming something comes to be, something new that was not before — in no way does he try to prove this.
2. What comes to be comes to be from something, not from nothing — assumed so far, now briefly manifested.
3. The something it comes to be from is twofold, remaining in one way and lost in another — the thing he has been showing (proof: one remains, one is lost; sign: “from”). Why not prove (1)? It would be like proving that in every change something changes; recall from the reading on the definition of nature that those who tried to prove nature exists were laughable — it is obvious in experience. Likewise in every growing something grows, in every walking something walks, in every falling something falls. “Don’t try to prove the obvious.” Why manifest (2) a bit? It was the common opinion of all the Greek philosophers, and of most people (Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music, “nothing comes from nothing”; King Lear to Cordelia in the opening test scene, “nothing will get you nothing”), but occasionally somebody gets hazy — the steady-state theory of the universe, matter created out of nothing, “without a creator, too, by the way.” So Cordelia-like, briefly.

• “Another case here of three is enough.”

10. Two inductions that nothing comes to be from nothing (“either a substance or an accident”) #

Induction: an argument from many particulars to the general. First induction, from the things that come to be, by an exhaustive division: substance or accident.

• Logic definitions recalled: an accident exists only in another as in a subject (a man’s health exists only in his body — “you can’t put the man in one room and his health in the other”); a substance exists not in another (the man in this room, the dog in the next; but not the dog and the dog’s shape in different rooms).
• Accidents plainly don’t come from nothing: health must exist in a body, so it starts with the substance.
• Substances “not as clear, but look carefully”: man, dog, tree come from a seed or fertilized egg; the tree from an acorn, the chicken from an egg. Second induction, from the common ways things come to be, five in the text (five in his run-through):
• change of shape, better “molding”: clay or playdough into a statue — you don’t mold nothing;
• addition, as the Greeks spoke of growing: the Mississippi from Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota (“where I’m from”), a little stream that other streams flow into — not nothing added to nothing; a crowd in a stadium grows by somebody added to somebody;
• subtraction: the statue of Hermes from the stone, the Pietà by chipping away marble, carving wood — not chipping at nothing;
• alteration: freezing or melting the butter — not freezing nothing;
• putting together: nailing wood to wood, cementing brick to brick — not nothing to nothing. “Kind of like an afterthought, if there wasn’t too much in doubt.” The main thing remains that the something is twofold.

11. Last paragraph: everything which comes to be is always composed (“everything which comes to be is always composed”) #

He reads: everything which comes to be is always composed; there is something which has come to be (the new thing) and something which comes to be it (twofold: the underlying subject, as the man, bronze, stone, silver; or the opposed, as the unmusical, the unshaped, unformed, disordered — or his dry, soft). Parallel with change: what changes is always composed.

• Theological use: God is not composed; what changes or becomes is composed; therefore God does not change or become — the unchanging understood by negation of the changing. Close: a common understanding among all men of what is common to all becoming — this becomes that, and the this is twofold.

His words #

• change vs. becoming: same reality, seen from the starting point vs. from the end/destination; “coming or going”
• common basis / become strong in it: the method (attributed to Heraclitus) of readings 10–11 and 12–13
• dialectical: mixed with probability (10–11), against “complete necessity” (12–13)
• confused / indistinct vs. distinct: the more known to us vs. less known; general is to particular as confused to distinct
• “we”: you and I, people in general — not editorial, not the Greek philosophers
• this becomes that: the common form of speech; two names for the this
• what remains vs. what is lost: the twofold this; the subject “not opposed” remains, the “opposed” is lost
• from: the preposition that goes with the name of what is lost; a sign, not the chief reason
• sort: his gloss “the same by sort and by definition”
• numbered / twofold: the this is one in number but two in definition
• induction: argument from many particulars to the general
• substance: a thing that exists not in another; accident: a thing that exists only in another as in a subject
• molding: his preferred word for “change of shape”
• composed: what changes or comes to be; what God is not
• three is enough: his recurring tag

Texts #

Read in class:

• Aristotle, Physics I, Aquinas’s lectio 12, from the handout “Becoming: the underlying subject and the opposite”, pp. 1–2 (verified); the note on p. 3 (verified source; not named in the transcript) Mentioned:
• Physics, first reading (general before particular; more known to us) and the reading on the definition of nature (“laughable” to prove nature exists)
• Paul VI, an address quoted in the Osservatore Romano (“common principle of all learning”)
• Shakespeare, definition of reason as “looking before and after” (Hamlet, inferred); King Lear, the opening test scene with Cordelia
• The Sound of Music (Julie Andrews)
• the steady-state theory of the universe
• “from rags to riches” (American proverb)
• Heraclitus’s advice to find a common basis and become strong in it

His questions #

• Are we talking about two different becomings when we say “the man becomes old” and “the young become old”? No — one becoming, two names for the this.
• Do we use “from” with both names, or with which? With the name of what is lost (“because it’s the contraries”; “from” means going away from).
• Why is the order reversed between paragraphs three–four and the last paragraphs? Speech is an effect of things; the chief reason comes from things (one remains, one is lost), “from” is only a sign, but a common basis among men has to start from how they speak.
• Do you ever talk about change without having three things in mind? No — the earlier state, the later state, and the same man (Joe bushy and bald).
• Up to the first paragraph of page two, what has Aristotle really shown? That what a thing comes to be from is twofold.
• Would it be reasonable to try to prove that in every becoming something comes to be? No — too fundamental, obvious, like proving nature exists.
• What are the definitions of substance and accident from logic? Substance exists not in another; accident exists only in another as in a subject.
• Why can God never become or change? What becomes is composed; God is altogether simple.