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  • Chapter 7 - Aristotle’s Biological Metaphysics

  • Edited by Sophia M. Connell, Birkbeck College, University of London
  • Book:
    The Cambridge Companion to Aristotle's Biology
    Published online:
    14 May 2021
    Print publication:
    27 May 2021, pp 114-126

  • Summary

    It is clear from his extensive biological writings that Aristotle was deeply interested in life, including a vast range of living things, their parts, lifestyles, life processes, and environments. How are life and living beings, extensively described and explained in the biological writings, reflected in Aristotle’s ontology, his understanding of being? My question is prompted in part by the fact that some of Aristotle’s most important metaphysical concepts apply equally to living beings (animals) and to non-living beings (artifacts). In this chapter I develop an account of the theoretical significance of life and living beings that focuses on Aristotle’s distinction between two ways of being developed in Metaphysics Book 9 – being potentially and being actively.