The Form: From Essence to Manifestation
One of the primary factors separating Plato’s philosophy from that of Aristotle is each man’s respective ontological perceptions of reality, identified as “form” (with a capital “F” for Plato). While Plato believes concepts such as beauty and love are real and exist, it is their essence which is real and exists; all seeming manifestations of beauty or love either participate in the essence of the real things or merely imitate them. Aristotle believes that Plato’s forms are not the reality, merely ideals (or definitions) which the realities share in common. These realities of beauty or love are real where they exist (or occur) in manifestation. (In this paper I use the word “essence” synonymously with Plato’s “ideal form” and with Aristotle’s “essence.” Due to my explanations, I do not believe it to be too confusing, if at all.)
“And there is an absolute beauty and an absolute good, and of other things to which the term “many” is applied there is an absolute; for they may be brought under a single idea, which is called the essence of each.” “The many…are seen but not known; the ideas are known but not seen.” (Republic, Book VI). In Plato’s search for truth, he seeks the greatest of those virtues held by man, and idealizes what he calls their essence, the absolute. He goes on to explain to Glaucon that due to the faulty nature of the senses and the imperfections of those objects which we perceive, what we see is the imitation of the true form. Since we are unable to see the imitation of beauty, what we see is the imitation of the essence of a man or woman who participates in beauty, allowing us to see beauty in the imitation of that person. This manifestation of beauty is an example of “phenomena,” which Plato contrasts from the ideal (ontos).
Plato’s ideal is the real form, because it is the definition of the purpose (truest of the true), is the shared commonality between varied phenomena (such as beautiful mountains, men, or paintings), and it is eternal (not temporal), and spiritual (divine, of the gods). Because phenomena are subject to mortality, or change, Plato believes them to be less valued or inferior than that which is the shared idea (beautiful things die, change, or can be destroyed, while beauty itself remains absolute). In reference to geometry, Plato reiterates “…they make use of the visible forms and reason about them, they are thinking not of these, but of the ideals which they resemble; not of figures which they draw, but of the absolute square and the absolute diameter, and so on…” While we draw geometrical figures for the purpose of understanding mathematics, we are simply using our meager skills to reference the perfect form whose measurements are exact. It is quite probable that, for Plato, even the artistic measure of a modern day printer would simply be an imitation which participates in the true form of the depiction.
Evidences of laws and order, mathematical truths, provide support for Plato’s forms. The equation, 2+2=4, is universally true (it is true under any conditions, at any place and time). Senses on the other hand do not always present truth, since what is black from one person’s perception may be brown from another’s. Finishing Plato’s earlier statement on geometry, “…they are really seeking to behold the things themselves, which can only be seen with the eye of the mind” (Republic, Book VI). Plato believes that essences are not able to be perceived via the sense of sight, but perceived by the reason and thought of mind. This is quite specifically the case, since his form is the idea, and an idea is the thought or development of the mind. Plato is a rationalist, and believes that only through reason can we decipher the truth and not be deceived by the imperfections of sensation. Correct reasoning will always lead you to the truth, and the same reasoning to the same truths.
In the Symposium, Plato suggests that those participating in the forms of truth, beauty, or love (the virtues), begin to long for the true form and seek it out. The lover of beauty “will of himself perceive that the beauty of one form is akin to the beauty of another; and then if beauty of form in general is his pursuit, how foolish would he be to not recognize that the beauty in every form is one and the same” (Symposium, 210). The man by reason should then come to “consider that the beauty of the mind is more honorable than the beauty of the outward form.” This “erotic madness” which leads the lover of beautiful things to the love of absolute beauty will eventually cause a man through progression of reasoning to “create many fair and noble thoughts and notions in boundless love of wisdom; until on that shore [of the vast sea of beauty] he grows and waxes strong, and at last the vision is revealed to him of a single science, which is the science of beauty everywhere” (Symposium, 210-11). This is a piece of the greatness and ability, the drawing power of the forms of virtues. However, Plato believes that to comprehend these absolute forms, one must be instructed in the essence in due order and succession; only through proper mental training, can the mind correctly perceive the ideas which exist behind the manifestations of the forms.
In contrast, Aristotle’s true form is found in the particulars of the physical world. He identifies three substances: matter (substances in appearance), nature (things in their purpose or inclination –“positive state towards which movement takes place”, and the particulars (particular substances composed of the first two). Matter and nature make up the particulars; material substances with the nature to some specific inclination of ends are the requirements for particular manifestations of form to exist. In this sense animals have a variety of natures: to grow, to kill, to reproduce, or to think. Without their nature, animals are just lumps of matter. The tiger is not a tiger without his nature(s) in all that it entails, equally so without a body. The form of a sapling is the watered and sunlit organic material with the nature to grow into the tree, which is its nature to become. In a simpler, yet perhaps dizzying respect, the matter which grows is the grower; its nature is to grow; when the particular of the grower in the act of growing occurs, the combination manifests the form of growth.
Aristotle rebukes Plato and the Academy on their theory of “Form” stating, “in their attempt to explain things visible, they invented an equal number of other things, as if they thought it was easier to count many than few” (Metaphysics, 987). However, Aristotle later agrees with Plato’s form to the point that for every conception of an idea there can be said to be some form attainable through the mind, but those forms are not eternal, or even the reality. Like an idea, a form can be conceived and forgotten in a matter of moments (Aristotle terms Plato’s “Form” as “essence”). In regards to the form of health, “when a man is healthy, then health also exists” (Metaphysics, 1070). This is not directly a relativistic view, but the form does indeed exist when and where it exists in accordance with a particular, and seemingly, it does not exist elsewhere (where the idea is not being manifested into form).
Aristotle believes the purpose of essence is to actualize or realize particulars through the nature. However, in Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle discusses art as “concerned with coming into being” in the sense that art is directly concerned with making or creating. At this point, the conception of the artist leads him to divide the forms of nature and creation. Creation (art for example) does not have a nature without something to impose purpose upon it (such as a creator or artist). A pile of wood has no nature unless a carpenter or recycling fanatic gives it a purpose. Once acted upon, or intent being imposed upon, a pile of wood may have the nature to be a tree house or a table. This material wood is then acted upon by an “efficient cause” to give essence or form its nature, its teleological final state (fulfillment of “final cause”).
The key difference between Aristotle and Plato is that Plato is primarily interested in a mental construction of the world, rationalizing all things through the framework of a belief in which reason and mathematics are the greatest of all truths (not to be confused with virtues), and the most basic. Aristotle is interested in a mixture of the experiential, empirical world of observable science (and physics, and measurement), as well as the reasoning of the mind. Aristotle says of Plato’s philosophy, “…other things do not come “from” the Forms in any of the usual senses of “From.” But to say that the Forms are patterns and that other things participate in them is to use empty words and poetical metaphors” (Metaphysics, 991). The belief of Aristotle is that Plato is just saying something which sounds good, but carries no practical weight. In a practical sense Aristotle believes it a stretch even to say that the opposite of Plato’s view is true, that forms participate in particulars rather than the other way around (forms are merely commonalities of the nature or essence of the particular in question). What he does believe is that Plato’s forms are merely concepts created by the mind to identify and distinguish particulars (this is consistent with Aristotle’s interest in species classification). Yet, he does acknowledge that those concepts exist, not only in the minds of the possessors of such thought, but also in the actuality of particulars with express such characteristics of form. Aristotle qualifies Plato’s words as empty, but at the same time he compares it to poetical metaphors. In his defense of the poets this could just as easily be taken complimentarily.
The most important similarity between the two is their teleological conclusions of living beings. Aristotle says, “In all animals…it is the most natural function to beget another being similar to itself… in order that they attain as far as possible, the immortal and divine…This is the final cause of every creature’s natural life” (Physics, Book II). Plato says that procreation “is a divine thing; for conception and generation are an immortal principle in the mortal creature…to the mortal creature, generation is a sort of eternity and immortality” (Symposium, 206). Both Aristotle and Plato believe that the essence of the mortal being is to attain life to the fullest, and in any possible way, to attain a sort of life even beyond death. In the process of reproduction, each philosopher’s concepts of form should say that this is a form of creation. While creating another human is simply imitating the form of humanity, the form of the specific newly created human had not existed until that particular one came about. I am not certain that Plato would agree with this, but I can only see that the essence of the man could only have existed prior to the particular in the case that his soul is indeed eternal in the sense that it always existed. In this case only, I believe the statement to be fully incorrect. Yet, Plato does believe qualities or attributes exist independent of their manifestations, which is not quite to say that those qualities can exist in relation to the form of the specific being if the being does not exist. It is difficult to imagine the form of a non existent thing to be possible unless forms of non existing things exist only for possible things (the form of a fourth or fifth dimension may exist as they may be possible, but something that is the negation of its definition is not possible and therefore might not have a form just waiting for it to come into existence).
Plato and Aristotle both work from differing views of fundamental reality to explain the nature of the world. Both include observable facts in their theories, Plato’s to begin his dialogues, and Aristotle to support his claims. Both also deviate from their metaphysical world view, to the point of proposing how to live on the basis of fulfilling one’s intended purpose; warriors meet in battle, and the poet is maddened by the Muse.
The next page is just an extra little commentary. Since you do not plan on grading it, I threw it on the end.
Though both men are most likely looking toward their ideals of attaining an existential immortality, or a divine existence beyond the temporal bounds, it raises the question, “why is it in the nature of living beings to cling so strongly to the physical world through the propagation of the species if one is so certain about the eternal properties of his soul (as Plato considers the soul the true self)?”
Works Cited
Hofstadter, Albert and Kuhns, Richard. Philosophies of Art and Beauty. 1964, The University of Chicago Press.
Plato. Republic Translated by Benjamin Jowett
Plato. Symposium and Phaedrus. 1993, Mineola, NY. Dover Publications Inc.
“And there is an absolute beauty and an absolute good, and of other things to which the term “many” is applied there is an absolute; for they may be brought under a single idea, which is called the essence of each.” “The many…are seen but not known; the ideas are known but not seen.” (Republic, Book VI). In Plato’s search for truth, he seeks the greatest of those virtues held by man, and idealizes what he calls their essence, the absolute. He goes on to explain to Glaucon that due to the faulty nature of the senses and the imperfections of those objects which we perceive, what we see is the imitation of the true form. Since we are unable to see the imitation of beauty, what we see is the imitation of the essence of a man or woman who participates in beauty, allowing us to see beauty in the imitation of that person. This manifestation of beauty is an example of “phenomena,” which Plato contrasts from the ideal (ontos).
Plato’s ideal is the real form, because it is the definition of the purpose (truest of the true), is the shared commonality between varied phenomena (such as beautiful mountains, men, or paintings), and it is eternal (not temporal), and spiritual (divine, of the gods). Because phenomena are subject to mortality, or change, Plato believes them to be less valued or inferior than that which is the shared idea (beautiful things die, change, or can be destroyed, while beauty itself remains absolute). In reference to geometry, Plato reiterates “…they make use of the visible forms and reason about them, they are thinking not of these, but of the ideals which they resemble; not of figures which they draw, but of the absolute square and the absolute diameter, and so on…” While we draw geometrical figures for the purpose of understanding mathematics, we are simply using our meager skills to reference the perfect form whose measurements are exact. It is quite probable that, for Plato, even the artistic measure of a modern day printer would simply be an imitation which participates in the true form of the depiction.
Evidences of laws and order, mathematical truths, provide support for Plato’s forms. The equation, 2+2=4, is universally true (it is true under any conditions, at any place and time). Senses on the other hand do not always present truth, since what is black from one person’s perception may be brown from another’s. Finishing Plato’s earlier statement on geometry, “…they are really seeking to behold the things themselves, which can only be seen with the eye of the mind” (Republic, Book VI). Plato believes that essences are not able to be perceived via the sense of sight, but perceived by the reason and thought of mind. This is quite specifically the case, since his form is the idea, and an idea is the thought or development of the mind. Plato is a rationalist, and believes that only through reason can we decipher the truth and not be deceived by the imperfections of sensation. Correct reasoning will always lead you to the truth, and the same reasoning to the same truths.
In the Symposium, Plato suggests that those participating in the forms of truth, beauty, or love (the virtues), begin to long for the true form and seek it out. The lover of beauty “will of himself perceive that the beauty of one form is akin to the beauty of another; and then if beauty of form in general is his pursuit, how foolish would he be to not recognize that the beauty in every form is one and the same” (Symposium, 210). The man by reason should then come to “consider that the beauty of the mind is more honorable than the beauty of the outward form.” This “erotic madness” which leads the lover of beautiful things to the love of absolute beauty will eventually cause a man through progression of reasoning to “create many fair and noble thoughts and notions in boundless love of wisdom; until on that shore [of the vast sea of beauty] he grows and waxes strong, and at last the vision is revealed to him of a single science, which is the science of beauty everywhere” (Symposium, 210-11). This is a piece of the greatness and ability, the drawing power of the forms of virtues. However, Plato believes that to comprehend these absolute forms, one must be instructed in the essence in due order and succession; only through proper mental training, can the mind correctly perceive the ideas which exist behind the manifestations of the forms.
In contrast, Aristotle’s true form is found in the particulars of the physical world. He identifies three substances: matter (substances in appearance), nature (things in their purpose or inclination –“positive state towards which movement takes place”, and the particulars (particular substances composed of the first two). Matter and nature make up the particulars; material substances with the nature to some specific inclination of ends are the requirements for particular manifestations of form to exist. In this sense animals have a variety of natures: to grow, to kill, to reproduce, or to think. Without their nature, animals are just lumps of matter. The tiger is not a tiger without his nature(s) in all that it entails, equally so without a body. The form of a sapling is the watered and sunlit organic material with the nature to grow into the tree, which is its nature to become. In a simpler, yet perhaps dizzying respect, the matter which grows is the grower; its nature is to grow; when the particular of the grower in the act of growing occurs, the combination manifests the form of growth.
Aristotle rebukes Plato and the Academy on their theory of “Form” stating, “in their attempt to explain things visible, they invented an equal number of other things, as if they thought it was easier to count many than few” (Metaphysics, 987). However, Aristotle later agrees with Plato’s form to the point that for every conception of an idea there can be said to be some form attainable through the mind, but those forms are not eternal, or even the reality. Like an idea, a form can be conceived and forgotten in a matter of moments (Aristotle terms Plato’s “Form” as “essence”). In regards to the form of health, “when a man is healthy, then health also exists” (Metaphysics, 1070). This is not directly a relativistic view, but the form does indeed exist when and where it exists in accordance with a particular, and seemingly, it does not exist elsewhere (where the idea is not being manifested into form).
Aristotle believes the purpose of essence is to actualize or realize particulars through the nature. However, in Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle discusses art as “concerned with coming into being” in the sense that art is directly concerned with making or creating. At this point, the conception of the artist leads him to divide the forms of nature and creation. Creation (art for example) does not have a nature without something to impose purpose upon it (such as a creator or artist). A pile of wood has no nature unless a carpenter or recycling fanatic gives it a purpose. Once acted upon, or intent being imposed upon, a pile of wood may have the nature to be a tree house or a table. This material wood is then acted upon by an “efficient cause” to give essence or form its nature, its teleological final state (fulfillment of “final cause”).
The key difference between Aristotle and Plato is that Plato is primarily interested in a mental construction of the world, rationalizing all things through the framework of a belief in which reason and mathematics are the greatest of all truths (not to be confused with virtues), and the most basic. Aristotle is interested in a mixture of the experiential, empirical world of observable science (and physics, and measurement), as well as the reasoning of the mind. Aristotle says of Plato’s philosophy, “…other things do not come “from” the Forms in any of the usual senses of “From.” But to say that the Forms are patterns and that other things participate in them is to use empty words and poetical metaphors” (Metaphysics, 991). The belief of Aristotle is that Plato is just saying something which sounds good, but carries no practical weight. In a practical sense Aristotle believes it a stretch even to say that the opposite of Plato’s view is true, that forms participate in particulars rather than the other way around (forms are merely commonalities of the nature or essence of the particular in question). What he does believe is that Plato’s forms are merely concepts created by the mind to identify and distinguish particulars (this is consistent with Aristotle’s interest in species classification). Yet, he does acknowledge that those concepts exist, not only in the minds of the possessors of such thought, but also in the actuality of particulars with express such characteristics of form. Aristotle qualifies Plato’s words as empty, but at the same time he compares it to poetical metaphors. In his defense of the poets this could just as easily be taken complimentarily.
The most important similarity between the two is their teleological conclusions of living beings. Aristotle says, “In all animals…it is the most natural function to beget another being similar to itself… in order that they attain as far as possible, the immortal and divine…This is the final cause of every creature’s natural life” (Physics, Book II). Plato says that procreation “is a divine thing; for conception and generation are an immortal principle in the mortal creature…to the mortal creature, generation is a sort of eternity and immortality” (Symposium, 206). Both Aristotle and Plato believe that the essence of the mortal being is to attain life to the fullest, and in any possible way, to attain a sort of life even beyond death. In the process of reproduction, each philosopher’s concepts of form should say that this is a form of creation. While creating another human is simply imitating the form of humanity, the form of the specific newly created human had not existed until that particular one came about. I am not certain that Plato would agree with this, but I can only see that the essence of the man could only have existed prior to the particular in the case that his soul is indeed eternal in the sense that it always existed. In this case only, I believe the statement to be fully incorrect. Yet, Plato does believe qualities or attributes exist independent of their manifestations, which is not quite to say that those qualities can exist in relation to the form of the specific being if the being does not exist. It is difficult to imagine the form of a non existent thing to be possible unless forms of non existing things exist only for possible things (the form of a fourth or fifth dimension may exist as they may be possible, but something that is the negation of its definition is not possible and therefore might not have a form just waiting for it to come into existence).
Plato and Aristotle both work from differing views of fundamental reality to explain the nature of the world. Both include observable facts in their theories, Plato’s to begin his dialogues, and Aristotle to support his claims. Both also deviate from their metaphysical world view, to the point of proposing how to live on the basis of fulfilling one’s intended purpose; warriors meet in battle, and the poet is maddened by the Muse.
The next page is just an extra little commentary. Since you do not plan on grading it, I threw it on the end.
Though both men are most likely looking toward their ideals of attaining an existential immortality, or a divine existence beyond the temporal bounds, it raises the question, “why is it in the nature of living beings to cling so strongly to the physical world through the propagation of the species if one is so certain about the eternal properties of his soul (as Plato considers the soul the true self)?”
Works Cited
Hofstadter, Albert and Kuhns, Richard. Philosophies of Art and Beauty. 1964, The University of Chicago Press.
Plato. Republic Translated by Benjamin Jowett
Plato. Symposium and Phaedrus. 1993, Mineola, NY. Dover Publications Inc.