Motion and Empiriological Physics
(part 2)

O Creator ineffable, who of the riches of Thy wisdom didst
appoint three hierarchies of Angels and didst set them in
wondrous order over the highest heavens, and who didst
apportion the elements of the world most wisely: do Thou,
who art in truth the fountain of light and wisdom, deign to
shed upon the darkness of my understanding the rays of
Thine infinite brightness, and remove far from me the twofold
darkness in which I was born, namely, sin and ignorance. Do
Thou, who givest speech to the tongues of little children,
instruct my tongue and pour into my lips the grace of Thy
benediction. Give me keenness of apprehension, capacity for
remembering, method and ease in learning, insight in
interpretation, and copious eloquence in speech. Instruct my
beginning, direct my progress, and set Thy seal upon the
finished work, Thou, who art true God and true Man, who
livest and reignest world without end. Amen.

Regina Cœli Academy
Natural Philosophy – Physics
Lecturer: Mr. Alan Aversa

(St. Thomas Aquinas Oratio ante studium)
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Philosophical Physics Knows Motion
Through Being
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Empiriological physics needs a frame of
reference to interpret reality.
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Viz., a way to assign itself values

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What is its frame of reference?

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How does it know its explanations are satisfactory?

Philosophical physics studies motion to understand
being and being to understand motion.
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e.g, Galileo’s and Newton’s theories great advances
in method

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Being unites. Act does, too.

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It assures “objectivity, universality of conclusion,
certitude, necessity, and immutability of knowledge.”

Mechanism considers reality entirely passive.
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Viz., “What is passive or controllable?”

“Passivity is a principle of difference rather than
likeness.”

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James and Santayana: empiriological physics’
conception of nature pluralistic
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Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle and Einstein's
theory of relativity prompted a philosophical
question: “What is observable?”
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Empiriological Physics is Method
Only

Existentialist Martin Heidegger: Science
advances more in method than in matter.
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Self-evident = per se notum

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Empiriological Physics is Method
Only
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Metaphysics considers being materially or formally.

Philosophy understand things in themselves.
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From this, the metaphysician develops his science.

Being qua being is not tautological.
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Just like causes help us understand effects; and effects,
causes

Principle of identity: “being is”
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It studies ens mobile simpliciter, “whole mobile
being.”

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Philosophical Physics Knows Motion
Through Being
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Questions regarding philosophical physics:

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Everything external
Denial of final causes leads to treating method as a
“thing-in-itself”
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The Empiriological Physicist is Not a
Complete Physicist
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Does studying how reality is acted upon teach us
about nature?

Empiriological Physics is Primarily
Art, Not Science
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Man has little freedom in choosing his method of
knowing.

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Subject matter determines method, not
conversely.

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Human intelligence unites matter with method.

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A strict empiriological physicist is not a man!
What would a measurement mean without any
reference to what is measured?
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What would be his materials? How would he make?

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Pope John Paul II says freedom is for “having the
right to do what we ought.”

The benefits of empiriological physics have
been to free man from nature, hunger, material
need, etc.
“Freedom from” implies a lack of control

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“Freedom for” implies obedience, law, order.

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Kirchhoff, Pearson, and Mach: empiriological
physics only describes
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“To regard matter only for its potencies” is “to think
only of [matter’s] uses”.

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To know deals with the actual.

Since empiriological physics classifies, it doesn’t
explain.
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Empiriological Physics Catalogues
for the Engineer

Empiriological physics is “geared to action”,
whereas philosophical physics is “geared to
know.”
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Empiriological Physics Frees Man
From Nature
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The final product is all that matters in the end.

What is freedom? It is something for, not
something from.
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Because of this, philosophers, who have remained
grounded in the study of nature, will always criticize
empiriological physics’s conclusions as they relate
to nature.
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Empiriological physicists have a freedom in which
theories to choose to explain nature.

Empiriological Physics Frees Man
From Nature

Art is an imitation of nature.

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Nature rebels against being treated too passively.

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How does the empiriological physicist get
knowledge of nature by controlling it?
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It classifies empirical laws.

What is the medium of the art of empiriological
physics?

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An “artist cannot consider pure passivity alone.”
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Empiriological physics classifies, too.
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Empiriological Physics is Primarily
Art, Not Science
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Logic is a liberal art that classifies knowledge.

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Husserl’s phenomenology a “philosophy of
describing”
Description is uniquely human; it doesn’t exist in
God nor in the angels.

Description moves “from part to part.”
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Explaining “is to give causal reasons why”.

It describes “what happens when something else
happens.”

Empiriological physicists not pure physicists

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Empiriological Physics Catalogues
for the Engineer
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Empiriological Physics Catalogues
for the Engineer

Empiriological physics often resorts to
probability.
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Probability is good for practical production.

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It is not good for scientific rigor.

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Way of discovery (via inventionis)

Deduction is method of proof.
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Way of resolution (via resolutionis)
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Technik is German for “engineering.”

Auguste Comte: “knowledge for prediction and
prediction for power”

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views matter as passive.

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Its method is control.
“It aspires to formalize its subject, but the
achievement always stops short of its goal.”
It is in fieri (in progress, always becoming).

(2) Empiriological physics in a loose sense
Mingles common sense philosophy with its technical
models to create “a cosmic image.”
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Sense (1): This is the sense “empiriological
physics” should be taken when judging it.
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Here, philosophical and empiriological physics are
virtually one.

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When experiment is pursued, empiriological physics
becomes “a discipline of control.”
Philosophical physicist can relate the data of
empiriological physics to his truths.
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is an art.

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In its early stages, there is little experiment and
more observation.
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The Several Ways of Considering
Empiriological Physics

(3) Empiriological physics in the line of
philosophy
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(1) Pure empiriological physics

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The Several Ways of Considering
Empiriological Physics
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Empiriological physics “makes oblique
reference to philosophy.”
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Philosophy’s “point of departure” is discovery.

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Empiriological physics controls by classifying
and classifies to control.

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Empiriological physics aims at discovery, not
proof.

The Several Ways of Considering
Empiriological Physics

Max Scheler: Destiny of empiriological physics
is Technik.
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From the results of various particular experiments, a
theory is verified.

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Empiriological Physics Catalogues
for the Engineer
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It deduces from theory the result of a particular
experiment.

Induction is the via resolutionis.
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Induction is the abstraction of universal from
particular.
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Deduction is the via inventionis.
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In philosophy:
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In empiriological physics, it’s reversed:

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Senses (2) and (3) mix empiriological physics with
other elements.

Sense (2): The empiriological physicist does
not have a formal philosophy
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Something should be judged by what is principal in
it.

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He bolsters his technical view of the world with
common sense.
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The Several Ways of Considering
Empiriological Physics
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The Several Ways of Considering
Empiriological Physics

Sense (3): Philosophical and empiriological
physics “cross-fertilize” and mutually enrich one
another.
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Empiriological physics lacks the means to interpret
its data, so philosophical physics can help it come
back to common sense and maintain a realist view
of the objects it studies.

V. E. Smith’s view, described above, differs in
some respects from that of other prominent
philosophers:
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V. E. Smith’s Philosophical Physics
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Recall: the scientia media in this case would be
“formally mathematical, materially physical.”
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Modernity is characterized by a “war” between
“laboratory and life, empiriological and
philosophical physics, the matter of ancient
learning and the method of the modern one.”
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Please finish ch. 5 (Motion and Empiriological
Physics).
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Knowledge secondary to pure empiriological
physics.

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References

Empiriological physics is analogous to a
scientia media (intermediate science).
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Empiriological physics “is taken as a continuation at the
dialectical level of the demonstrative science that is true
philosophy.”
It reads “the fine print in the book of nature” that
philosophical physics can’t see.

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The Several Ways of Considering
Empiriological Physics
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Empiriological physics distinct from philosophy

De Koninck and the Laval School
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Man’s “higher spiritual powers” “are directed to
truths [and goods] that he cannot control,” but has
to obey.
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Maritain

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I will post PDF of the reading on the course website.

Further reading:
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Aristotle, Posterior Analytics (passim).

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Dewey, John, How We Think (Boston, 1933).

(Uncited quotations in the slides come from V.
E. Smith’s book.)

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