The Aristotelian Proof: Premises 6 & 7

Premises 6 and 7: 6—The occurrence of any change C presupposes some thing or substance S which changes; 7—The existence of S at any given moment itself presupposes the concurrent actualization of S’s potential for existence.

Here’s what this means: premise 6 tells us that in order for a change to occur, something has to be the bearer of that change. There is no change without something that changes. Premise 7 tells us that the thing that undergoes change must exist at the moment it undergoes change and that its existence is itself a kind of change—an actualization of a potential.

(I doubt that it matters much to the argument, but it might be worth exploring the kinds of things that might be bearers of change: events, properties, relations, substances, facts, propositions, states of affairs, etc. Different systems have different fundamental entities. For Aristotle, substances are fundamental and everything else is a derivative. For others, states of affairs or events or…are fundamental. Does is matter for this argument?)

A lot more is going in 6 and 7 than meets the eye, I think. Let me try to highlight two things that need some further explanation or defense.

First: 6 and 7 together imply that the bearer of any change is a contingent being—a being that can fail to exist. So, Feser’s argument rules out the following case:

                        S is a necessary being—a being that cannot fail to exist—and S changes.

            Or to put things in Aristotelian terms:

                        S is a necessary being and S moves from being potentially F to actually F.

But it is not obvious to me that a necessary being cannot change. Perhaps it is true, but I think we need some defense of that implication here. Without a defense, premise 7 looks vulnerable to attack.

Second: (This one is less of a worry and just an observation that should be made) The account of change given implies that at every moment that some contingent being exists it is undergoing a kind of change, namely, the actualization of its existence. Since a contingent being is by definition a being can fail to exist, the existence of a contingent being requires the actualization of its potential to exist. Since, change is a movement from potentiality to actuality, it follows that for any contingent being, its very existence at any moment is a change.


Question: What say you? Are these worries that Feser should be worried about?

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