The Paradoxes of Hylomorphism

In its extension to human beings, hylomorphism is the view that a human being is a composite of form and matter. In this respect, the hylomorphist maintains that human beings are like every other organism, for every organism is a composite of form and matter. Although we can talk about the matter an...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Review of metaphysics 2003-03, Vol.56 (3), p.501-523
Main Author: Barnes, Gordon P.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Actuality
Actualization
Atoms
Causality
Humans
Hylomorphism
Matter
Metaphysics
Paradoxes
Philosophical anthropology
Philosophy
Potentiality
Soul
Substance (Philosophy)
Substantial forms
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Summary:In its extension to human beings, hylomorphism is the view that a human being is a composite of form and matter. In this respect, the hylomorphist maintains that human beings are like every other organism, for every organism is a composite of form and matter. Although we can talk about the matter and the form of a human being, the hylomorphist insists that a human being is exactly one thing, not two things accidentally conjoined. It is at just this point that hylomorphism has come in for a lot of criticism lately. The criticism, expressed in various ways, is that hylomorphism is fundamentally ambiguous. Understood in one way, it is simply a garden variety of nonreductive materialism.
ISSN:0034-6632
2154-1302