Aristotle's metaphysics has stimulated intense renewed debate in the past twenty years. Much of the discussion has focused on Metaphysics Z, Aristotle's fascinating and difficult investigation of substance (ousia), and to a lesser extent on H and Θ. The place of the central books within the larger project of First Philosophy in the Metaphysics has engaged scholars since antiquity, and that relationship has also been reexamined. In addition, scholars have been exploring the Metaphysics from various broader perspectives—first, in relation to Aristotle's natural philosophy, his physics, biology, and psychology, and to the Organon, his so-called "logical" works, which include the Categories, Topics, and Posterior Analytics; and second, in relation to the broader philosophical tradition, both Plato before him and the ancient commentary tradition in late antiquity.

Aristotle's Metaphysics Reconsidered

According to the moving spotlight theory of time, the property of being present moves from earlier times to later times, like a spotlight shone on spacetime by God. In more detail, the theory has three components. First, it is a version of eternalism: all times, past present and future, exist. (Here I use “exist” in its tenseless sense.) Second, it is a version of the A-theory of time: there are non-relative facts about which times are past, which time is present, and which times are future. That is, it is not just that the year 1066 is past relative to 2007. The year 1066 is also past full-stop, not relative to any other time. (The A-theory is opposed to the B-theory of time, which says that facts about which times are past obtain only relative to other times.) And third, on this view the passage of time is a real phenomenon. Which moment is present keeps changing. As I will sometimes put it, the NOW moves from the past toward the future.1 And this does not mean that relative to different times, different times are present. Even the B-theory can say that 1999 is present relative to 1999 but is not present relative to 2007. No, according to the moving spotlight theory, the claim that which moment is present keeps changing is supposed to be true, even from a perspective outside time.2 My main goal in this paper is to present a new version of the moving spotlight theory (though in some respects the theory I present also resembles the growing block universe theory of time). This version makes a connection between the passage of time (the motion of the NOW) and change. In fact, it uses facts about change to explain facts about the passage of time. The bulk of the paper is devoted to describing, in detail, how the theory works. I also believe that my new version has advantages over the standard version. It explains things that the standard version cannot explain. It explains both

Why Does Time Pass

This thesis turns on two assumptions: first, that there is a current absence within the
psychoanalytic library of a consolidated account of Freud's theories of time and
timelessness; second, that there is compelling evidence of an influence by the ancient
Greek canon on Freud's metapsychology of time. The thesis is that a detailed
examination of this influence will bring additional clarity to our understanding of
Freud’s thoughts about time and timelessness and permit the provision of the
currently lacking systematic account of this part of his theory. The author brings the
three components of the Greek canon most important to Freud - myth, tragedy and
philosophy – into dialogue with psychoanalysis to show the importance of their
influence on Freud's ideas on temporality. The dialogue permits novel conclusions to
be drawn about Freud's theory of temporality generally and Freud's views on how we
acquire time in particular.

Freud on time and timelessness: the ancient Greek influence

The last twenty years have seen a remarkable increase in scholarly work on the Presocratics: new texts have appeared, new interpretations have been advanced, and a new appreciation for the scientific and philosophical claims of the early Greek thinkers is evident. There has been a general broadening of the questions that have been examined: Scholars have been exploring the supposed boundaries of Presocratic thought, and new work on reception history and on the transmission of texts has enriched understanding of the earliest Greek philosophers. Here, I survey some of the trends and results of the new Presocratic scholarship.

New Work on the Presocratics

This book examines the birth of the scientific understanding of motion. It investigates which logical tools and methodological principles had to be in place to give a consistent account of motion, and which mathematical notions were introduced to gain control over conceptual problems of motion. It shows how the idea of motion raised two fundamental problems in the 5th and 4th century BCE: bringing together being and non-being, and bringing together time and space. The first problem leads to the exclusion of motion from the realm of rational investigation in Parmenides, the second to Zeno's paradoxes of motion. Methodological and logical developments reacting to these puzzles are shown to be present implicitly in the atomists, and explicitly in Plato who also employs mathematical structures to make motion intelligible. With Aristotle we finally see the first outline of the fundamental framework with which we conceptualise motion today.

The Concept of Motion in Ancient Greek Thought: Foundations in Logic, Method, and Mathematics

About time for aristotle

The question I will discuss in this paper is: what role does the philosophical assessment of a view play in deciding whether to attribute that view to some previous philosophers? My particular interest, on which I will concentrate exclusively in this paper, is in pre-Socratic philosophy. For it is with preSocratic philosophy, more than any other area, that we are faced with the problem of limited and incomplete textual evidence. As a result we have, at times, to go in for reconstruction, with the aim of coming up with an account of some pre-Socratic's thought which accommodates the evidence we do have, and presents as reasonable and interesting an account as possible. Such a project of reconstruction raises the questions I am interested in. How can any conclusions be established about what some pre-Socratic said on the basis of fragmentary and limited evidence? What is the role and status of the principle that, other things being equal, we should attribute the more cogent views and the more cogent arguments to a philosopher? Can we use that principle in order to reconstruct a pre-Socratic's thought from limited textual evidence, in order to 'fill in the gaps'? I should emphasise that I will not be discussing what is required for a full blown, or complete, historical understanding of some piece of pre-Socratic philosophy. It is doubtless true that such an understanding will require something over and above a statement of the piece of philosophy in question. Michael Frede, for example, has emphasised in a clear way the extent to which other histories (for example, of religious thought, social organisation or political belief) are important to rendering the thought of a philosopher intelligible to us.1 I am interested rather in what is involved in what is a necessary part of such an understanding, namely an awareness of what the piece of philosophy in question is.

How can we find out what Ancient Philosophers said

What does Aristotle mean by priority in substance

This paper is a reflection on some of Elizabeth Anscombe's influential work on causation, in particular on some comments in her Inaugural Lecture at Cambridge, published as ‘Causality and Determination’. One of Anscombe's major concerns in that paper is the relation between causation and necessitation, and she critically discusses the cast of mind which links causality with some kind of necessary connection or with exceptionless generalisation. In place of a semi-technical analysis of causation, Anscombe identifies the obvious and yet little considered core of the causal relation as follows:

Causality and derivativeness

In this paper I offer a new interpretation of Melissus' argument at DK 30 B8. In this passage Melissus uses an Eleatic argument against change to challenge an opponent who appeals to the authority of perception in order to support the view that there are a plurality of items in the world. I identify an orthodox type of approach to this passage, but argue that it cannot give a charitable interpretation of Melissus' strategy. In order to assess Melissus' overall argument we have to identify the opponent at whom it is aimed. The orthodox interpretation of the argument faces a dilemma: Melissus' argument is either a poor argument against a plausible opponent or a good argument against an implausible opponent. My interpretation turns on identifying a new target for Melissus' argument. I explain the position I call Bluff Realism (contrasting it with two other views: the Pig Headed and the Fully Engaged). These are positions concerning the dialectical relation between perception on the one hand, and arguments to counter-perceptual conclusions on the other. I argue that Bluff Realism represents a serious threat from an Eleatic point of view, and is prima facie an attractive position in its own right. I then give a charitable interpretation of Melissus' argument in DK 30 B8, showing how he produces a strong and incisive argument against the Bluff Realist position I have identified. Melissus emerges as an innovative and astute philosopher.

Stephen Makin

Papers

About time for aristotle

How can we find out what Ancient Philosophers said

What does Aristotle mean by priority in substance

Causality and derivativeness

Melissus And His Opponents: The Argument of DK 30 B 8