Grounding and Aristotle’s Posterior Analytics

Abstract

Fabrice Correia and Benjamin Schnieder suggest that Aristotle’s account of formal causation in the Posterior Analytics is a type of grounding. While there are many similarities, I will argue that what Aristotle had in mind differs from contemporary standard accounts of grounding. First, I give a brief account of formal causation as presented in the Posterior Analytics. Second, I show that formal causation differs from grounding in at least two crucial respects. (1) Formal causation involves a priority relation between different ontological categories, namely, states of affairs and substantial forms. In allowing for transcategorial grounding, Aristotle’s theory is similar to that of Jonathan Schaffer and Bernard Bolzano. (2) Formal causation is not transitive, both because there are no chains of formal causes, and because Aristotle is interested only in the full and ultimate, yet at the same time immediate, ground. There are two further differences: Aristotle does not think that a conjunction is always grounded in its conjuncts, nor that a universal quantification is always grounded in its instances. His theory is in some sense narrower than grounding, in that it allows only for full immediate grounds. In another sense it is closer to truthmaking, both in that truthmaking is transcategorial and that it does not allow for chains. However, Aristotle’s formal cause should rather be seen as a “beingmaker,” since truthmaking has to do with linguistic entities and truthbearers. Aristotle’s formal cause thus fits well into the framework of grounding, as an immediate full ground, but fits poorly with the standard claims about grounding.