On Two Purely Actual Beings

In the following series of posts I will be exploring ideas related to the possibility of there being two purely actual beings (PA beings).


Suppose there is one PA, and that it lacks some actuality that is a potentiality for some other being. So what we are to suppose is that there is one and only one PA, and there is another being that is a mixture of actuality and potentiality. Let's call the other being being Mixture (or M, for short). Now M has a potentiality that the PA cannot actualize because the PA lacks the relevant actuality to do so. 

Now assuming that all change requires something actual (principle of causality) and that the actual thing must possess (in some way) the feature that results after the change (principle of proportionate causality), it follows that the actuality the PA lacks but is potential for some other being M can never be actualized. This follows because the only way M could have its alleged potentiality actualized is if the PA were able to do so. But since the PA lacks any actuality that is capable of actualizing M's potentiality, there is nothing that can move M's potentiality to actuality. 

So M's alleged potentiality is not a potentiality. It is not a potentiality because it cannot be actualized by anything at all, and something that literally is impossible to actualize is not a potentiality of anything (e.g. nothing has the potential to be a square-circle or a four-sided triangle, so such things are not potentialities of anything). So, there cannot be just one PA that lacks some actuality that is a potentiality for some other being. So, all genuine potentialities are actualizable. So, the movement from potentiality to actuality ultimately traces back to a fully actual being such that all genuinely potential beings are actualizable by our one PA. Hence, the one PA possess the ability to actualize all potentialities. 

In the next post I will consider a serious worry. 

Question: thoughts?

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