ABSTRACT
The subject-matter of the present chapter is what Aristotle has to say about the natural world-the subject that in classical Greek is most accurately rendered as ta physika. But of course this includes many topics that would not now count as natural science-indeed Aristotle’s own book called Physics contains discussions that according to twentieth-century categories belong rather to philosophy or metaphysics. Book 1 criticizes the views of Aristotle’s predecessors on the first principles of natural objects, and defends his own view that they are three-matter, form, and privation. Book 2 analyses the kind of explanation that is to be expected of the natural philosopher, introducing the doctrine of ‘the four causes’. The third book deals with motion and change, and infinity; the fourth with place, void and time. The second quartet of books seems to form a separate entity —or perhaps two. Books 5, 6 and 8 are sometimes referred to by commentators under a separate title: On Change (kinêsis-the word may denote motion or change in general). Book 5 analyses concepts essential to the study of motion, book 6 deals with continuity, Book 8 argues for the eternity of motion and an eternal mover. Book 7 (part of which has been transmitted in two versions) perhaps contains a preliminary version of Book 8.
