Wisdom (Metaphysics 2006, Colorado)
40. Custom and Method: Aristotle on Fitting the Way of Proceeding to the Matter, and Modern Certitude
https://berquistcourse.com/course/philosophy/7b-wisdom-2006-colorado/040-custom-and-method-aristotle-on-fitting-the-way-of-proceeding/

[0:00] Fifth and last reading in the third part of the second book of wisdom. Aristotle's going to begin with an observation about the great force or great influence that custom exerts, right, upon the way people want to think. That they want to think in the way to which they are accustomed.

[0:42] Thomas in the Summa Contra Gentiles talks also about the force of custom, but the force of custom upon what we think, okay. And I sometimes, you know, gives to his example of Declaration of Independence, all men are created equal, right? If I'd gotten up and said that in slave-owning Athens or what the hell are you talking about? What a joke, huh? You know, and but yet we hold these truths to be self-evident: the all men are created equal.

[1:26] So you see, kind of the force of custom in what you think, and custom can make what is not obvious seem obvious, right? And even what is false seem what true,

[1:47] and even if it's true, it might be in need of proof, right? And it seems to be, yeah. And sometimes we talk to a physicist, and no body in the absence of external force is going to move forward at a uniform thing, kind of obvious to him, right? But is it really obvious? Why should move in a straight line and not in a circle or?

[2:24] But here Aristotle is talking about the influence of custom upon the way we think, not what we think, but the way we think. Okay.

[2:36] So he starts by saying this: our akroasis, hearings, right, happen according to ethē, according to customs. For as we are what accustomed, so we think one ought to be speaking that way, huh? And the things apart from this do not seem similar. But through unfamiliarity, not being customary, they seem less known and kind of what strange, okay? For the customary seems to be what known, right? And then he gives a kind of a sign of the ischyn, the force of the customary, the laws in which things that are what

[3:25] mythic, huh? And childish have a great force because they've been around all this time, huh? Okay. I was in Quebec one Sunday. I'd gone to mass, and I was going to get some breakfast in a restaurant. It was all by myself, so I buy a newspaper or magazine. You know, I'm sorry, we can't sell a newspaper or magazine until noon time. I said, "Why not? Well, that's the law.

[3:53] " Well, I guess it's a law that you can't sell newspaper or magazine at that time in Quebec before noon, huh? Because Sunday morning is time for you go to mass, right? Well, now it's kind of silly. It seems to me that if a guy is going to not go to mass because he bought a newspaper or magazine to read, he's not going to go to mass.

[4:10] Period. But I mean, this the law, right? Is there, and it seems to be so, huh? And or I remember, you know, it's a little different than this, but when they changed the mass, right, into the vernacular, we were seeing in one of the popular Catholic magazines where they have the writing in. The woman is talking about how all these years she's been defending the use of Latin in the language, amen in the mass, and now it seems cut out from under her, right?

[4:44] Now this is not a question of which is better, you know, the Latin or the vernacular, as if the Latin was essential to the mass, right? Well, perhaps or probably the mass was said in Aramaic or or Greek or something, maybe before it was said in Latin. For for all I know, huh? But if you're if you're accustomed to the mass being in Latin, and you only heard in Latin, then it seems what essential, right?

[5:10] Okay. It's like when you first start Latin or Greek, and you find out the adjective can come after the noun. Well, you know, it seems.

[5:26] How can they do that? I mean, the adjective comes after the noun. I mean, but but it's so customary, so custom that I can't quite. But when I was having French in high school, and one kid's having a hard time learning French, and one day in class, he burrows. How did the French kids ever learn this? He says, and we all started laughing, you know. Because it's probably some little French kid, right, over there saying, "How did the English ever learn this?

[5:54] " And apparently, it's took more harder for them to learn English than for us to learn French. But or it's like the joke when my kids were studying Latin. There, they come home and they ask Daddy,

[6:09] "What was the greatest accomplishment of the Romans?" I think you know Roman law. What the heck it is? They spoke Latin. And so, but you know, English or your native language seems the natural way of talking. And how can anybody talk that way? I mean, you see, kind of the force of custom, right? But now Aristotle wants to apply this to

[6:40] the sciences and so on. And so he takes as the first example of this now, some if one does not speak what mathematically right, will not receive what is being said. Right. Okay. That's kind of important that he thinks of that example first. Now, among the ancients who are like that, who want to, you know, yeah, Pythagoreans, yeah, and you know, some of the exaggerations it's led to, right?

[7:12] You know, one of the opinions there about the soul is that the soul is a self-moving number, yeah. And apparently, they even had numbers for the virtues, huh? And so I say to the students, "Do you think justice is a even or odd number?"

[7:33] Even, yeah, because you know we're going to get even, right? When something comes back and you settle them now, are we even now, right? You know, meaning just, right? So it must be an even number, so they'll see these things. And and the old saying, "I get your number," right? It must be Pythagorean. If there was a number to explain you, you'd be a lot more intelligible than you are.

[7:52] But but among the modern philosophers who are like this, Descartes, Descartes, and then Spinoza following him, maybe likeness to some extent, the rationalists. I remember in my brother Richard's high school physics book they had a quote from Lord Kelvin who was an English physicist I guess famous. I don't care what the matter is if it's not mathematical, it's not scientific. So this is a very common thing.

[8:25] Thomas mentions how this could also come from a innate ability for mathematics that you wanted to do this. But custom has a great role there, and this is probably seen also in the this mathematical logic, right, or symbolic logic and that sort of thing. They want to make everything, even magic and philosophy, kind of what mathematical, huh? But this is what he's talking about here. This is.

[8:57] This is custom. Now, some people are more weak-minded, and they want everything to be made kind of sensible with mathematikōs, with sensible examples. These are weaker-minded people. They want an example of this that they can kind of sense.

[9:22] A little bit like the rhetoricians who proceed that way. The third example he gives is those who want one to bring in a poet as witness, and you see this in the part of the discussion there in the Protagoras and elsewhere in the dialogues. Now,

[9:42] you can stop on that third example because here he seems to be using it. As a authority, right? And as you know, the argument from authority is the weakest in philosophy. But why did you bring in the authority of the poet? Well, they thought the poets were inspired by the gods, huh? Therefore, the poets have a certain authority, and because you're not too sure yourself, or you're weak-minded, or what, you want them to bring in a poet as a witness to some truth before you can accept it, huh?

[10:19] Now, you have something a little bit like that in the Middle Ages, huh? Because in the Middle Ages, you have the Bible, right? And the Bible has a great authority because it's the word of God and so on. And this method, referring to the Bible and so on, and basing yourself on it, is very customary in the Middle Ages. But now, should you try to do something like that elsewhere?

[10:52] Well, let's find something that will be to medicine, like Galen, or something like that, and a book which will be to medicine what the Bible is to theology. Well, you can't really find a book. You see, you're trying to find do something like you do in theology. And I was particularly struck by one time where, in reading Albert the Great, he might have been discussing the Porphyry, something like that.

[11:26] But it was a question about is this book part of logic, huh? And Albert, before giving what he thought, was just describing some of the opinions, right? And one of the opinions is, well, this can't be a book of logic because Aristotle didn't write it, huh? Or no book of the sort has come down to us from Aristotle. So, applying to that opinion, Albert says, well, maybe Aristotle did write a book; it has not come down to us, or maybe being a man, he never got around to do it.

[12:00] He kind of dismisses the argument, right? But if I say, isn't that funny? Isn't that a funny objection to Porphyry or something like that? That the father of logic didn't write any book about this, huh?

[12:18] Who would object that way today? You see, but the Middle Ages maybe would because the authority, huh? Now, if you take another example, different from Aristotle's example, because I think here he's talking about the authority, right? And the authority of the poets was because they were thought they thought Homer was inspired by the gods in some way. So we have a little bit of authority like the Bible has, right?

[12:47] Being thought to be inspired by by God, which it is. But what you have in the Romantic philosophers like Novalis, men who are very much accustomed to poetic and poetic ways of proceeding, when Novalis says, "The more poetic it is, the more true it is. The more true it is, the more poetic it is." Well, there he's influenced now not by as much by the authority of poetry, but being accustomed to it and thinking, you know, always in a poetic way.

[13:24] It's got to be, it's got to be appealing to the imagination. Otherwise, it's not true. You know, it's got to move me in a poetic way. Otherwise, I can't accept it. You know. And

[13:40] now, of course, you know, in that way, you know, the Existentialists sometimes find that they can, or think they can, at least present their ideas the best through fiction and so on. When this Da Vinci Code guy thinks he can do it best, you know, apparently he tried to say it philosophically, and nobody took a pity thing. But you put it in a poetic form, and ah, yeah, now it seems more true, right?

[14:05] And to people who are accustomed to, you know, thinking, shall we say, poetically, this now makes sense. This Da Vinci Code means it, but that's a little different Aristotle's example, you know. But it is an example. I think he's talking about the influence of custom. What did Keats say? The poet, beauty is truth, and truth is beauty. That's all you know and all you need to know.

[14:31] I'm afraid you have to know a little bit more on that, but anyway. Is this only a problem before the birth of Shakespeare? It's a problem before and after.

[14:53] You heard my comparison between Shakespeare and Plato, right? The kind of unique individuals, huh? Plato was a philosopher, but with some poetic gifts that you see in the characterization and things in the dialogues. Shakespeare is a playwright, but with some what philosophical gifts. But these people are not exceptions, right? What you'd expect in the you would expect the philosophic mind to be as poetic characterization as Plato is.

[15:25] You would expect the poet to be as wise as Shakespeare. But nobody knows for sure exactly what Shakespeare's wisdom comes from. But it's remarkable. But it, but it's there. Okay. Now he he states the same thing a little bit differently, though, but in terms of certitude, right? And some want all things said akribōs Now you've got to be careful about the word akribōs One meaning of akribōs is with certitude, right?

[15:54] Akribes means certain. It also has a sense of being precise, exact. And Thomas takes it here as being more certitude, right? But some extent, the senses make sense in both in both ways. Why others are pained, the akribes, the certain, the very precise pains others, right? Either because they're unable to what follow, or because it seems to be what stingy, right? Okay. And I think I mentioned how how

[16:32] Shakespeare in the sonnets, huh, speaks of truth as being what stingy, right? He's talking especially human affairs, so we tend to praise and flatter a bit our friends and praise and flatter the cook, huh? And right by somebody's house, we praise the meal that the host or hostess has given us, huh? And so on, and right to say the truth about the meal would be kind of what stingy and kind of tightwad, you know, and not spreading it around.

[17:09] And so you have these two contrasts, right? And there are some people who in philosophy want to be very what precise, you know, mathematical logic and so on, all sorts of stuff, logic and great precision. And others want to be kind of poetic in philosophy and loose, you know, free rolling and so on, and don't stop the flow of thought, you know, with your you know roadblocks and so on.

[17:39] Well, Aristotle, let's finish this part first. For the accurate or precise has something like this, right? So it seems like you know in in commercial things, illiberal, right? To pound things down to the bottom. When I was a bachelor professor, we used to go out to dinners, bachelor professors together, and in the group, we're all pretty young except for one guy, an old professor, and sometimes with old age comes stinginess or comes tightness, and so when you get the bill for the meal, right, we kind of all just throw our money in, and maybe your meat cost your meat costs two dollars more than mine or whatever it was.

[18:29] Who cares? We just generally just throw it in. Maybe I threw more in than you, you know. Who cares? And he wanted to pay exactly what his his meal was, right? We are thinking funny for doing that, right? So kind of stingy, right, right down to the thing, huh? And so some people get annoyed by that, right? Either because they they can't think very clearly, or because they think you're being too what stingy, really, huh?

[18:53] Yeah. So Shakespeare can speak that way, huh? People, you know, tend to go through life, they'll kind of flatter each other. Wonderful talk, wonderful meal, wonderful, you know, everything's perfect, you know.

[19:15] Don't be too precise, huh? Confuse me with the facts. So, isn't that micrology, and also sometimes translated as quibbling, because because you can see how how that would work as well. That sometimes people that are yeah, confounded with someone who's very precise, yeah, yeah, quibbling or yeah, splitting hairs, yeah, yeah. What was the point you were making with Shakespeare about Shakespeare? There. What before? Just now. Oh no, Shakespeare speaks of truth as being.

[19:52] I tend to get the word he used. I don't know if you would say stingy by the word meaning that you know. In one of these sonnets, huh? He's talking about you know. Say the truth, right? It would seem stingy, but.

[20:08] Sometimes we use. Yeah, I think the word "niggard truth" he calls it. Yeah, and "niggard is a sense of stingy, right? Niggard truth, and interesting adjective there, or metaphor almost to say of truth, right? Why call truth stingy?

[20:32] I mean, you know, if if what's his name? Lord Radnor, right, huh? That's one of the conventions there, and saying you know, you learn more from Aristotle and Thomas and from all the rest, right? Put together, you know, and and one of the Catholic priests there, I guess, uh, he looked down there from from Notre Dame. You can't mean that, he says. You know.

[21:09] And so and can you learn something from these guys? You know. Well, you seem kind of stingy, so you can't learn hardly anything of them. You know, you know that might be the truth, but it seems like what the liberal right, you know, you know. Each in his own way has contributed to the all this sort of stuff. Maybe the truth would seem kind of stingy, right?

[21:38] I think he really hasn't contributed much, right? He doesn't advance our understanding much of anything. So. Okay, so you have people objecting to that. Find you get these people who are what omnivorous readers or omnivorous eaters or omnivorous absorbers of music, you know, and as if it's all you know more or less good. It's like it's too, too, you know. Does

[22:24] someone examine your argument too much or something? A lot of times people don't like that kind of certitude or precision. Don't you run into people like that? I thought you tried to teach somebody Thomas. Up to

[22:45] four or so miles. Yeah, yeah, spend some time. You know, and just read the thing. You know, you have to stop and analyze it.

[23:09] Is it the? I should be a wise man to know what goes to what, or yeah, one accurate one, not the other. Yeah, yeah. Either matters of taste, you think, or yeah, to some extent, yeah, yeah. I mean, you demand more certitude or precision than you can, right? My

[23:31] brother Mark used to say, you know, and generally was not in favor of perpetual seminars that never come to a decision, right, or conclusion. But he wasn't opposed to a perpetual seminar about Cabernet Sauvignon if you don't know why, which is better, you know. Have to taste them some more and see which is better, you know. But you know, because we reach a conclusion, then it's all over and fun, but but.

[23:55] I think of Kant's categorical imperative and ethics. Yeah, yeah. You have to have mathematical certainty. Yeah, yeah. Now a lot of times you're trying to get a get a kind of a mathematical like formula that will tell you whether you should do something or not do it, and they're going to be most of these cases that clear, but they're demanding more precision than it does. We were talking about the other day about about in the plays there are certain things you know which looked at strictly you know might be not moral right but maybe you should look at that strictly huh you know or or they're even impossible right.

[24:40] And I was talking example there of the the I guess the Restoration comedy where the one man is. Going to make a move for the girl that other guys would, and dare to marry him, and some undesirable creature is substituted, right? And he gets married to her with the veil, and he opens the veil up, and the other guy says, "You know, you're going to come between me and paradise, and heaven has seen fit to substitute purgatory for you."

[25:15] Well, I mean, you say, "Well, he's not married to this woman," but I mean, you have to kind of you know overlook that and say that you know that he's not married to this beautiful woman; he's married to some old woman, you know, some desirable woman, and you got to kind of you know, you got to can't demand that rigor, you know, and

[25:41] little holes in the big science fiction movies, you know, it's like violation of some physical law and some. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You want to demand that same kind of precision in fiction, right? In your life,

[25:58] and of course, you know Shakespeare will even in history plays will change the ages of people and you know for some poetic purpose. Okay, so if men, Aristotle has been exemplifying here. The influence of custom upon the way men think, and the fact that people are accustomed to this, want to think always this way, and people are accustomed that in that way. And Thomas adds it could be partly due to natural poetic ability or mathematical ability, or whatever it might be.

[26:32] But then they would all be proceeding in different ways in the same what matter, okay? And so he's exemplifying not only the way that they usually arrive at what how they want to proceed, but indicating in a way by their disagreement that this is not the way to decide how to proceed, to just take the method to which you are accustomed. And

[27:03] it'd be like if you use your eyes, in an exaggerated example, if you use your eyes in your work all the time, you're accustomed to using your eyes for accurately. Well, then try to use your eyes to know the music of Mozart. you say well that doesn't fit this this matter, right? Or if you're a musician and using your ear and listening to things all the time, and try to hear the painting or something, right?

[27:25] That's obviously absurd, right? But there's something like that, huh? Going on here because you're accustomed to proceed in this way, you want to proceed in this way, everywhere. Hence, he says one ought to be what, pepaideumenon. Some translate that as educated, right? How each things ought to be received, right? Now, Aristotle used the word paideia sometimes in a very accurate sense, huh? That paideia means what knowledge of how to proceed, huh?

[28:05] And uh to talk about a paideia actually the eia, the ia would be like paideia and then paideia sometimes the eia would be, you know, acquiring paideia, acquiring this way, but you have to be in a sense taught how to what

[28:30] consider this particular matter, huh? Okay. Just like Thomas, in the say the first question, the Summa, he has something about how one proceeds in theology, huh? You have to be taught how to proceed in every science, huh? And how things ought to be received, huh? So it's stupid, if you want to say atopon or not suitable. At the same time, to seek episteme, and the way of episteme, right?

[29:07] there, the word I was referring to before, right? The way of episteme? And so, if you look at the beginning of the of the parts of animals, Aristotle says that every methodos, and, I mentioned before, how every part of philosophy is often called by him a methodos, which means over a road, right? Follows a road, admits of two kinds of ways of being had, and one is a kind of paideia, right, where you know how to proceed, and the other, more advanced one, is episteme, where you have already known the road and the way to proceed, and now you've you've done it, right?

[29:52] You've come down to the end. Well, it's kind of beautiful. The Greek word methodos. You want to use the word a road for this instead of tropos. You could say

[30:04] every methodos a road admits of being what had in two ways, and one is a knowledge of the road to follow, and the other is what you get by going down the road to the end when you come to a halt. That's episteme, right? So sometimes Aristotle seems to use episteme and methodos kind of synonymously, right? But in that text, he uses episteme for the one way of having a methodos, which is the more perfect way when you've gone down the road or you've proceeded according to the tropos you should proceed, and you've acquired episteme.

[30:44] But there's also this paideia where you know how to proceed, or you know the road to follow. And so Aristotle sees a distinction between those two, and that you can't do them well at the same time, and that you really he's hitting there. You have to know the road, the way to proceed, before you can really get very far in any reasoned out knowledge.

[31:17] And he adds, neither is easy to get. It's not easy to get the road you should follow or the way you should proceed, and even if you get that, it's not easy to get the what knowledge that can be got by following that road or proceeding in that way.

[31:47] And then he gives an example here, the end, where you may notice Thomas using the word syntithesin in the in the exposition, right? And We speak even Boethius speaks of mathematics proceeding disciplinabiliter right? That mathematics proceeds in a way that is learnable, right? And because of the rigor and the proportion of students, so the way of proceeding in mathematics seems to be the best, right? In other words, mathematics, or geometry, or, arithmetic, exceed natural philosophy maybe or wisdom in how they know their subject, right?

[32:35] Okay, because we don't know what God is, we know more what He is not, right? And we might know what motion is or what places are, but not too clearly, right? Because you don't admit it being known clearly, right? Why the geometer knows best his subject of any of these guys, huh? So

[33:00] you can see how Descartes or somebody like that might say, well, we got to proceed this way everywhere because this is the best way to go.

[33:09] But okay, maybe this is the best way to go, but it's not the best way to go in natural philosophy because natural philosophy involves matter and potency, right? And therefore, it's not going to admit of the clarity or it's not going to admit of the certitude of what geometry, huh? And when Aristotle talks in the in the posterior analytics about the certitude of the sciences,

[33:39] one rule he gives there is the science that has to take into account more things in order to know its subject is less certain, huh? And so he says arithmetic is more certain than geometry. And when they want to point out how geometry involves more than arithmetic, they will look at what's simplest in both the the one and the point. And both the one, the point are indivisible, but the point has in addition to that a position.

[34:15] It's here or there, right? And so sometimes the ancients would speak of the point is the one having position. And so you have to take into account if you're talking about three points, are they on a straight line or is one of them not on the same line, huh? You don't have to talk about that with the three ones and the number three because they're not here or there.

[34:41] You don't have to say they're in a straight line or are they, okay? And I know concretely in my study of of Euclid that when I'm studying the geometrical theorems, sometimes as Heath will explain the note or Proclus will explain, there's a number of cases that have to be distinguished here, right? And you'll see some of this discussion that we distinguished all the cases that are necessary, and sometimes I'm not so sure, you know.

[35:08] And but all that arises because the lines can be drawn here or there, right? And that arises because geometry has in addition position, like the point has in addition position over the the one. So I can see concretely in my study these things that I'm less certain in geometry than I am in arithmetic because they have to take into account more things. And now you go on from geometry, say, to natural philosophy, and you say, okay, the earth is a sphere, right?

[35:45] But involves matter and you know maybe it's a little bit flattened at the poles or like that. So I've got to consider a lot more in the earth being a sphere than the geometrical sphere, right? Or you say, you know, a tire there is round, you know, but you go on the parking lot and that seems to be flattened at the bottom there, right? And so on.

[36:09] So because matter is involved in these circles and spheres and so on, there's more to be taken into account, and therefore you can't be what as what sure about it, huh? And does every dog have four legs? Well, sometimes a dog gets injured and loses a leg or something, right? You have to worry about the squares getting injured, you know, that sort of thing. See, you're not always having four sides, you know.

[36:36] Sometimes squares have three sides because they lost one side. See? But now you go from natural philosophy to political philosophy, right? And that involves even more, right? Because you're considering not just what man is by nature, but what he is in addition by custom and choice, right? So when you talk about American man or Athenian man or Roman citizen or whoever it may be, you're talking not just about a man what he is by nature, two-legged with reason and so on, but what he is by custom and by choice, huh?

[37:18] And so there's much more now to be taken into account, huh? And so the more things you have to take into account, the less what certain you are, huh? So you can't demand as much certain certitude even in geometry as you have in arithmetic, huh? And and natural philosophy, and especially the more you go on particular, the more you have to consider, you can't expect the same certitude you had in geometry.

[37:45] And then you get into political philosophy, you can't demand the same certitude you had in natural philosophy. So you should demand neither more nor less than the matter admits of, huh? So you have to examine the matter, huh? And so Aristotle takes the fundamental example here of math. Which especially was leading people astray, but notice this is again the mistake of mixing up what is so simply and what is not so simply, but in some imperfect way.

[38:21] So you notice in the exposition there that Thomas is using the word simplicitas right? But the the way of proceeding that is simplicitas the best, right? Is not the best for every science, you see. So he says, akribologia, this very certain way of reasoning, or this very precise way of speaking, that, that is mathematical, ought not to be sought at all, but in those things not having matter, right?

[38:55] He's going back to what was pointed out in in natural philosophy. Whence it is not the way that is physical or natural, right? For natural philosophy, for all nature probably has what matter, right? Okay. And then what he says at the end is, as Thomas notes, exactly what he does in the second book of Natural Hearing Hence, we have to first investigate what is nature, right? And thus it will become clear what natural philosophy is about, and then which causes it should pursue, and so on, right?

[39:39] Okay. So Aristotle is saying here basically the way you should decide the road to follow, the way to proceed, is to examine what the reasoned-out knowledge is about, right? And then select the method or way of proceeding that fits that matter, right?

[40:07] Boethius in the De Trinitate repeats what Aristotle says there very clearly, but then kind of adds and how our reason is towards that matter, but it still goes back to that matter because you are not to that matter in the same way, right? Okay. So I might be related to the matter of theology through faith, and I might be related to the matter of geometry through my imagination, and the matter of cats and dogs through my senses, and so on, and the matter of logic, you know, through my reason or something.

[40:39] So we're not towards these things in the same way because the matter is different. But basically, you have to find the method or way of proceeding that fits that matter.

[40:53] Now, yeah, some of the modern philosophers will reject the senses as a starting point, and doesn't seem that. Sometimes it's because there is kind of an certitude in the senses, but they're trying to have more certitude than there is. Yeah, this is analogous to what he's saying here, but it's a little different thing in this way that some of the modern philosophers want, in a way, the kind of certitude an angel has, who doesn't depend upon senses.

[41:35] Why we depend upon the senses for our knowledge, And so, he's seeking a certain point, and so he's seeking a certitude that is not natural to man, right?

[41:52] And that's here now, not a little different from this, right? Here he's seeking a certitude that the subject matter doesn't admit, right? But here he's seeking a certitude that human nature does not what admit of, right? Okay. But there's another problem, I think, with the the moderns, and that is due to what we call privation. And as Thomas explains, say in the Summa Theologiae, theology is more certain than philosophy because of revelation and God and so on.

[42:34] And so, when you get to theology, you have a greater certitude than you had in philosophy. Now, when the modern philosophers gave up theology or revolted against theology, they didn't simply return to the situation of the Greeks, right? Because the Greeks never had revealed theology, the Greek philosophers.

[42:59] So, for the Greek philosophers, you would say simply they did not have revealed theology and its certitude. The modern philosophers they lack a certitude, right, that they really should have because they are in the Christian era, after Christ has come. So, to some extent, they look in philosophy for a substitute, huh, for what they've given up, right? Which the Greeks never tried to do because they never had it.

[43:34] That's kind of a psychological rule, there, right? You sometimes try to substitute something for what you've given up. And so that may explain in part why they seek a certitude more than human, because they've given up a certitude more than human, when they gave up theology, isn't it? Why the Greeks are more satisfied with the certitude that man can naturally have, because they never had a certitude greater than that.

[44:08] The moderns were were exposed to the the Christian revelation, and there we have a certitude that's more than human because of of God. And so, in giving up that or revolting against that, they are looking for some kind of a substitute for it. That reminds me of a of a very interesting thing that Weizsäcker said in the one of his books, the World View of Physics. I guess it's a collection of things, but he gives he's talking about the tendency of the moderns to think the universe is infinite,

[44:59] and how the medieval thinkers are quite satisfied with a finite universe. And he says this interest in there being an infinite universe came at the time they gave up theology, so they gave up the infinite God, right? And therefore, we're left with the finite universe. But now they've got to find a substitute for the infinity of God. So there's a certain inclination on their part to want to make the universe a substitute for the God they've given up.

[45:35] And therefore, they got to make the universe infinite. It's a very, very subtle essay, very, very interesting essay, and and I think there's a lot of a lot of truth to what he says. In the same way, having given up the

[45:49] certitude above human certitude, right, that you have in theology, they wanted to, as a substitute for that certitude, get in philosophy the certitude that we had in theology. And therefore, they want to. They're not satisfied with the certitude we have through the senses or, philosophy in general, as the Greeks handed it down to us. Okay. Now, I go through a number of manuductions, likenesses and things, to kind of illustrate Aristotle's principle here, right?