{"product_id":"how-aristotle-gets-by-in-metaphysics-zeta-9780199664016","title":"How Aristotle Gets by in Metaphysics Zeta","description":"\u003cp\u003e • Author(s): Frank A. Lewis\u003cbr\u003e • Publisher: Oxford University Press (UK)\u003cbr\u003e • Publisher Imprint: Oxford University Press (UK)\u003cbr\u003e • BISAC: History \u0026amp; Surveys - Ancient \u0026amp; Classical\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFrank A. Lewis presents a closely argued exposition of \u003cem\u003eMetaphysics Zeta\u003c\/em\u003e--one of Aristotle's most dense and controversial texts. It is commonly understood to contain Aristotle's deepest thoughts on the definition of substance and surrounding metaphysical issues. But people have increasingly come to recognize how little Aristotle says in \u003cem\u003eZeta\u003c\/em\u003e about his own theory of (Aristotelian) form and matter. Instead, he spends the bulk of the book examining 'received opinions', often as filtered through his own \u003cem\u003eOrganon\u003c\/em\u003e, but including above all the views of Plato, who is at times friend, and at times foe. For much of the time, we are left to reconstruct Aristotle's finished views, subject to the constraint that they survive the critique he directs in \u003cem\u003eZeta\u003c\/em\u003e at the philosophical tradition. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eIn this book, Lewis argues that in giving his actual conclusion to \u003cem\u003eZeta\u003c\/em\u003e in its final chapter, 17, Aristotle drops his earlier, largely critical engagement with received views, and turns approvingly to his own \u003cem\u003ePosterior Analytics\u003c\/em\u003e. The result is a causal view of (primary) substance, representing the property of being a (primary) substance (or the substance \u003cem\u003eof\u003c\/em\u003e a thing) as, in modern dress, the second-order functional property of (Aristotelian) forms, that they be the cause of being for different compound material substances. The property of being the cause of being for a thing is a \u003cem\u003erole\u003c\/em\u003e property, and it is \u003cem\u003erealized\u003c\/em\u003e in different forms and the sets of causal powers associated with them, matching the variety of things that have a form as their substance. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eMeanwhile, the failure of previous attempts at definition in earlier chapters leaves Aristotle's own definition standing as the 'best explanation' for the views proprietary to the theory of form and matter. The point that (Aristotelian) forms are the primary substances is not the main conclusion to \u003cem\u003eZeta\u003c\/em\u003e, but rather a result his definition must give, if the definition is to be acceptable.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Oxford University Press (UK)","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":47574989504663,"sku":"9780199664016","price":16283.0,"currency_code":"INR","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0666\/3471\/1191\/files\/9780199664016.webp?v=1774896874","url":"https:\/\/atlanticbooks.com\/products\/how-aristotle-gets-by-in-metaphysics-zeta-9780199664016","provider":"Atlantic Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}