THE DIVISIBILITY OF MOTION AND REST – TOWARDS DETERMINING THE EFFICIENT CAUSE

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THE DIVISIBILITY OF MOTION AND REST – TOWARDS DETERMINING THE EFFICIENT CAUSE
Since motion has been described as a continuum, can we predicate of it as being divisible?   Responding to the question on the divisibility of motion Aristotle argues that it is divisible.  If motion as a continuum is divisible, what makes it divisible? This shall be our aim in this paper.
According to Aristotle, those things that are composed of parts have extremities that are one or together. Thus, those extremities that are one are called continuous (continuum) while those that touch themselves without being in constant movement are contiguous. Continuous things are those things which are composed of points which do touch one another, continues in motion or rest and do not break. Consequently, motion is continuous.
Again, he argues that, in continuous things, there will always be the existence of two points, the first point where the thing moved from to where it is moving or moved to (terminus ad quo and terminus ad quem). Since there are two points for a moving object, it follows that there will be difference in position and time for continuous things where the change in position is associated with magnitude. However, since magnitude and motion are correlated, he opines that magnitude is divisible because of the difference in positions for a moving or moved object. He thereby added that motion is divisible since magnitude is divisible.
Furthermore, as it has already been established that time is considered as before, now and future and ‘now’ as that which terminates the past and begins the future which is not contiguous but continuous since time is not an aggregate of indivisible ‘nows’. A particular ‘now’ is indivisible and therefore has no motion. Does it then means that there is no motion in time since time is considered in the ‘now’ which is already past? He answers that considering that there is difference in the ‘now’ and a former ‘now’, then the time between the two ‘nows’ are divisible. Motion resides at this time between the two ‘nows’. Motion is accordingly divided to time since there is difference in time and less motion in less time and vice versa. Therefore, since time is continuous and divisible, motion is also continuous and divisible according to him.
In conclusion, Aristotle teaches that Motion is divided according to the motion of the parts of the mobile object. But the beginning and end of motion are not divisible. Just as motion is continuous and divisible, so rest is continuous and divisible.

REFERENCE
1.       R. P. Hardie & R. K. Gaye, Aristotle’s physics.
2.       Joseph Kenny, Philosophy of Nature.




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