The Third Part of The Studies on Arche: The Principle of Law

Öz

In Ancient Greece, apart from skeptics and ethicists, practicing philosophy essentially meant engaging science, particularly physics and cosmology. The primary goal of this philosophy-science was to explain nature through three fundamental principles, which Aristotle identified as the material cause, the efficient cause, and the formal cause. Aristotle argued that these principles had been inadequately addressed by his predecessors, with the formal cause often overlooked. While Plato developed all three principles in Timaeus, Aristotle complicated the history of the studies on arche by ignoring Timaeus and claiming that Plato was not a physicist. This article focuses on the evolution of the third principle -the formal cause- within this framework, tracing its evolution from Thales to Plato.

Anahtar Kelimeler

• Arche
• Formal Cause
• Ideas
• Timaeus

Arke Araştırmasının Üçüncü Kısmı: Yasa İlkesi

Öz

Kuşkucuları ve ahlakçıları hariç tutarsak Antik Yunan’da felsefe yapmak, bilim yapmak anlamına geliyordu. Felsefe-bilim ise doğayı üç ilke açısından incelemekten ibaretti. Aristoteles bunlara maddi neden, fail neden ve biçimsel neden adını vermişti. Ona göre kendisinden önce bu ilkeler yeterli şekilde incelenmemişti, hatta biçimsel neden tümüyle ihmal edilmişti. Öte yandan Platon bu üç ilkenin tamamını Timaeus eserinde eksiksiz şekilde işlemiş olmasına rağmen, Aristoteles Timaios’u görmezden gelip Platon’un bir fizikçi olmadığını söyleyerek arke araştırmasın tarihini karmaşık hale getirdi. Bu makale maddi neden ve fail nedenlerden sonraki üçüncü ilkenin, Tales’ten Platon’a kadar olan gelişimini konu almaktadır.

Anahtar Kelimeler

• Arke
• Biçimsel Neden
• İdealar
• Timaios

Kaynakça

1. Aktok, Özgür. “İlkçağ Doğa Felsefesinde Özdeşlik ve Değişim Problemi: Thales, Anaximandros, Anaximenes ve Herakleitos.” Kaygı Uludağ Üniversitesi Fen-Edebiyat Fakültesi Felsefe Dergisi 20:1 (2021): 368–83. https://doi.org/10.20981/kaygi.896773
2. Akyüz, Yakup. “Sokrates Öncesi (Presokratikler) Doğa Felsefesi.” In Felsefe Tarihi, edited by Nejdet Durak, 55–92. İstanbul: Lisans Yayıncılık, 2019.
3. Alican, Necip Fikri. “The Good, The Bad and The Ugly Does Plato Make Room for Negative Forms in His Ontology?” Cosmos and History: The Journal of Natural and Social Philosophy 13:3 (2017): 154-191.
4. Anaxagoras. Anaxagoras of Clazomenae Fragments and Testimonia. Edited by David Gallop and T. M. Robinson. Translated by Patricia Curd. The Phoenix Presocratics. Canada: University of Toronto Press, 2007.
5. Aristotle. Metaphysics (The Complete Works of Aristotle). Translated by Jonathan Barnes. Fourth Printing. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991.
6. Aristotle. Physics (The Complete Works of Aristotle). Translated by Jonathan Barnes. Fourth Printing. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991.
7. Burnet, John. Greek Philosophy Part 1. Great Britain: Macmillian and Co. Limited, 1928.
8. Cevizci, Ahmet. “Platon’un Devlet’teki Bölünmüş Çizgi Analojisi.” Atatürk Üniversitesi DTCF Felsefe Bölümü Dergisi 13 (1994): 31-134.

9. Empedocles. Empedocles: The Extant Fragments. Translated by M. R. Wright. Michigan: Yale University, 1981.
10. Empedocles, Parmenides, and Zeno. Western Greek Thinkers Part 2 (Early Greek Philosophy V). Translated by Andre Laks and Glenn W. Most. First Published. London: Harvard University Press, 2016.
11. Francis M., Cornford. Plato’s Cosmology. Hackett Publishing Company, 1935.
12. Guthrie, W. K. C. A History of Greek Philosophy the Earlier Presocratics and the Pythagoreans. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985.
13. Heraclitus. The Fragments of The Work of Heraclitus of Ephesus on Nature. Translated by G. T. W. Patrick. Baltimore: Press of Isaac Friedenwald, 1889.
14. Heraklitos. Heraklitos Fragmanlar. Translated by C. Cengiz Çevik. İstanbul: Türkiye İş Bankası Kültür Yayınları, 2020.
15. Leucippus and Democritus. Later Ioanian and Athenian Thinkers Part 2 (Early Greek Philosophy VII). Translated by Andre Laks and Glenn W. Most. First Published. London: Harvard University Press, 2016.
16. Philalous. Philolaus of Croton Pythagorean and Presocratic A Commentary on the Fragments and Testimonia with Interpretive Essays. Translated by Carl A. Huffman. First Published. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993.
17. Plato. Critias (Plato Complete Works). Edited by John M. Cooper and D. S. Hutchinson. Translated by Clay Diskin. Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, 1997.
18. Plato. Parmenides (Plato Complete Works). Edited by John M. Cooper and D. S. Hutchinson. Translated by Mary Louise Gill and Paul Ryan. Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, 1997.
19. Plato. Phaedo (Plato Complete Works). Edited by John M. Cooper and D. S. Hutchinson. Translated by G. M. A Grube. Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, 1997.
20. Plato. Phaedo (The Dialogues of Plato). Translated by Benjamin Jowett. Third edition. London: Oxford University Press, 1891.
21. Plato. Republic (Plato Complete Works). Edited by John M. Cooper and D. S. Hutchinson. Translated by G. M. A Grube. Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, 1997.
22. Plato. Timaeus (Plato Complete Works). Edited by John M. Cooper and D. S. Hutchinson. Translated by Donald J. Zeyl. Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, 1997.
23. Thales, Anaximander, and Anaximenes. Beginnings and Early Ionian Thinkers (Early Greek Philosophy I). First Published. London: Harvard University Press, 2016.
24. Xenophanes and Heraclitus. Beginnings and Early Ionian Thinkers Part 2 (Early Greek Philosophy III). Translated by Andre Laks and Glenn W. Most. First Published. London: Harvard University Press, 2016.
25. Zeller, Eduard. Outlines of the History of Greek Philosophy. Translated by Sarah Frances Alleyne and Evelyn Abbott. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1889.