FROM ARISTOTLE (350 BCE)
TO KANT'S COPERNICAN REVOLUTION (1787)
AND ITS 2 WORLDS (2022)
We have seen in a previous blog post that according to Aristotle:
- the essence of a definite thing is its form, which is that cause by reason of which the matter is that definite thing (1).
As a cosequence, according to Aristotle's view: GIVEN a definite thing, we can obtain its essence by SEPARATING its form from its matter.
In that post I claimed that Aristotle made a small error and proposed how to correct it. In the previous sentence, the error can be corrected by simply substituting the third "is" with "becomes". Then we obtain:
- the essence of a definite thing is its form, which is that cause by reason of which the matter BECOMES that definite thing.
The correction is small but the consequences are huge: the definite thing is no longer GIVEN. It is a product that results from ADDING form to matter.
Thus, this simple substitution leads to a REVOLUTION: it turns the whole situation upside down, like in Kant's Copernican Revolution.
But there is a second main consequence, that Kant forgot to mention: that with this substitution, instead of living in one single World (a universe of definite things), we now now live in TWO WORLDS:
- the world of GIVEN indefinite matter = one physical world, equal for all
- the world of PRODUCED definite things = many experiential worlds, one for each individual human being.
To be human is to keep these two worlds in a homeostatic balance.
