John J. Cleary – författare

Cleary discusses the origin, development, and use of the many senses of priority as a central thesis in Aristotle’s metaphysics.Cleary contends that one of the most revealing problems for the ambiguity of Aristotle’s relationship to Platonism is that of the ontological status of mathematical objects. In support of his claim, Cleary analyzes a curious passage from Aristotle’s Topics, where he appears to accept a schema of priorities that makes mathematical entities more substantial than sensible things.How does Aristotle try to reconcile the ordering of things dictated by sciences like mathematics and dialectic with the ordering of sense experience upon which his own physics and metaphysics are based? To find the answer, Cleary reviews three different outlines of the many senses of priority given by Aristotle himself and found in Categories 12-13, Metaphysics Delta 11, and Metaphysics Theta 8. Cleary suggests there is an implicit hierarchy for Aristotle that leads him to posit the Prime Mover at its apex as complete actuality and, therefore, as the focus for the concept of priority. Having reviewed Aristotle’s treatment of the many uses of priority, Cleary demonstrates how the concept is used in some typical arguments by Aristotle for his mature metaphysical positions.

John Cleary here explores the role which the mathematical sciences play in Aristotle's philosophical thought, especially in his cosmology, metaphysics, and epistemology. He also thematizes the aporetic method by means of which he deals with philosophical questions about the foundations of mathematics. The first two chapters consider Plato's mathematical cosmology in the light of Aristotle's critical distinction between physics and mathematics. Subsequent chapters examine three basic aporiae about mathematical objects which Aristotle himself develops in his science of first philosophy. What emerges from this dialectical inquiry is a different conception of substance and of order in the universe, which gives priority to physics over mathematics as the cosmological science. Within this different world-view, we can better understand what we now call Aristotle's philosophy of mathematics.

This volume contains papers and commentaries presented to the Boston Area Colloquium in Ancient Philosophy during the academic year 2005-6. Of the two colloquia on Neoplatonism, one offers a phenomenological reading of Plotinus on the Intellect, while the other discusses consciousness and introspection in Plotinus and Augustine. With regard to Aristotle’s ethics, one colloquium discusses the influence of force and compulsion on human action, while another examines his views on the relationship between external goods and happiness. Two other colloquia are devoted to Aristotle’s Metaphysics, discussing form and function in relation to his theory of substance, as well as his paradigmatism. Finally, a single colloquium on Plato discusses the happiness of philosopher-kings in the Republic.

This volume contains papers and commentaries presented to the Boston Area Colloquium in Ancient Philosophy during the academic year 2007-8. The papers discuss a wide range of topics related to Plato and Aristotle. On Plato, topics include false pleasures in the Philebus, the tripartite soul in the Republic, and rhetoric in the Phaedrus, and on Aristotle, the relation of the physical and psychological in De Anima, of virtue and happiness in the Ethics, of body and nature in the Physics, and the role of pros hen in the Metaphysics. One other paper argues for the Aristotelian origin of Stoic determinism.