Aristotle on Matter and Potentiality

• Applicant: Dr. Andreas Anagnostopoulos
• Subject Area: History of Philosophy
• Term: since 2024
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 548260060

Aristotle on Matter and Potentiality aims to rethink Aristotle’s concept of the matter of natural substances from the ground up, that is, starting with the concept of matter laid out in general texts concerning the foundations of natural science, such as Physics I and (I argue) On Generation and Corruption I. Based on these texts, I argue (Part 1) that Aristotle’s “core” concept of matter is more radical and interesting that previously supposed. In brief, it is a persistent ontological subject whose nature is just to be potentially some kind of substance, without (in a sense) being anything actually. I aim to articulate this concept in a philosophically coherent way and understand its motivations in Aristotle’s thought. (Part 2) A key application of this abstract core concept is to the matter of the four elements, “prime matter”. I hope to show how the correct understanding of prime matter is a corollary of Aristotle’s more general core concept. In the above parts of the project, a central an ulterior motive is to exhibit the GC as a canonical and indispensable text for the general understanding of generation and matter, alongside and continuous with, but also in some ways more sophisticated and explicit than, the much more studied Physics I. This latter task also involves clarifying of the work’s overall argumentative strategy, in which Aristotle’s elemental theory (especially elemental matter) emerges as a necessary condition of natural generation (especially as it involves the core concept of matter). During the proposed fellowship period I will (Part 3) focus on matter in the sphere of complex living substances, given that as we ascend the scala naturae the concept of matter must confront various new demands and pressures. My tentative proposal is that my understanding of the core concept of matter can provide more systematicity in Aristotle’s thinking about matter than is usually attributed to him. The three main areas on which my work will focus are: (i) the complex multi-level material constitution of living organisms; (ii) Aristotle’s theory of mammalian embryology; and (iii) the complex investigation of hylomorphic substance in the middle books of Aristotle’s Metaphysics.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants