Simplicius, Commentary on Aristotle's Physics
 

(1) "Of those who declared that the first principle is one, moving and indefinite, Anaximander... said that the indefinite was the first principle and element of things that are, and he was the first to call the first principle indefinite [apeiron]. He says that the first principle is neither water nor any other of the things called elements, but some other nature which is indefinite, out of which come to be all the heavens and the worlds in them. The things that are perish into the things out of which they come to be, "according to necessity, for they pay the penalty and retribution to each other for their injustice in accordance with the ordering of time", as he says in rather poetical language."

-- Simplicius, Commentary on Aristotle's Physics (24.13-21)


Can anyone make any sense of what this means? Particularly around the part where it starts with "The things that are perish into the things out of which they come to be" and ends with "he says in rather poetical language."

Looks like Simplicius does not live up to his name...:D

I'll remind you these are just the ideas I took from the quote.

Well the first idea that struck me as familiar was this...

He is talking about matter.

When something is destroyed, the fragments of that thing settle to form something else. Example: A star explodes, giving off elements and materials that will form a new star, or object.

...:confused:

Injustice is meaning a lack of balance. Because they are not in balance they must conform to time's pattern/law. Their relation to each other under the pattern of time cannot be denied. If it is then "retribution", or returning to a state of balance, will occur.
What a confusing statement though. "Order" can mean many different things. I'm guessing that "retribution" and "penalty" are the results of anything which tests the laws of time.

"The things that are perish into the things out of which they come to be"
Means everything is recycled.

"according to necessity, for they pay the penalty and retribution to each other for their injustice in accordance with the ordering of time"

Means time dismantles/destroys all things. He's sort of personifying time so being destroyed is natural and correct and therefore to not be destroyed would be an injustice.

""Of those who declared that the first principle is one, moving and indefinite, Anaximander... said that the indefinite was the first principle and element of things that are, and he was the first to call the first principle indefinite [apeiron]. He says that the first principle is neither water nor any other of the things called elements, but some other nature which is indefinite, out of which come to be all the heavens and the worlds in them."

He's saying the most basic building blocks arn't what we used to think of (that everything was made of 4 or 5 elements: water, air, fire, earth and spirit). Instead it sounds like he's describing QM or the uncertainty principle. But since I doubt he knew of such things I think he's saying that the scale is so small that things no longer work the same way and therefore it can never be a single definite thing that that basic buildings blocks are made of.

I read it as:

Everything is made out of bits.

The bits are not water or other elements (air, earth, fire, spirit?).

When you destroy something, the bits survive to make new somethings.

Time destroys everything.

In other words: Matter is indivisible, and eternal. Entropy causes everyting to degenerate, but you can make new thing from the eternal matter.

So all in all, a pretty modern idea, but as the OP says, it is in rather ornate language.

Sounds like Zeraph's and my post combined. :D

I thought that what he is describing here is some sort of underlying fabric rather than matter.

I haven't studied this though so I may be way off.

the quote seems to me more about first principles--the starting points for types of arguments concerning the nature of the physical world--the positions being juxtaposed are (1) the physical world can be understood as combinations of the four basic elements and (2) that there is apeiron, or "the indefinite" that precedes these elements and which has to be considered as a first principle or starting point for arguments.

what seems at stake in this is two basically different ways of thinking about physical reality--one that see in the physical world different combinations of fundamental variables which are in themselves stable--so you have a version of the notion of forms--the physical world is epiphenomenon--meanings or forms shape the phenomenal world.

the other view leads you to consider history or transience as fundamental--phenomena come into being from within the apeiron and pass away into it again.

this opposition is still with us. there are folk who imagine philosophy as having to do with stable and/or eternal relations/meanings---and others who see in this idea litle more than institutional ideology or wishful thinking. the counter is usually that to think all there is is history (the social-historical) throw out all possibility of philosophical activity--which is ridiculous--but it does speak to something of what is at issue in the distincton between startingpoints in anaximander and aristotle.

the last clauses--about penalty and retribution--are curious. i looked up the author last week and read about anaximander, but i cant remember where i looked this morning--if you imagine the physical world as a small, closed system within which phenomena emerge, it kind of follows (as a function of the smallness and closedness of the system itself) that phenomena A impinges on other possible phenomena, and on other already existing phenomena, simply because it comes into being. i am not wholly sure what "impinging on" would entail, and this image of a small closed system is the best metaphor i have at the moment for it. say phenomena A takes up resources that could potentially have been distributed otherwise had A not come into being. or that A impinges on other phenomena within the system by reconfiguring relations within that system and altering the overall meaning of the system. something like that. anaximander seems to argue (in the very short fragment that survives) that this impinging-on carries a kind of penalty with it, and that penalty is passing away, dissolution.

this all feels kinda wobbly, but there we are.

I think we all feel a bit wobbly in our explanations (well, me at least).

I think the problem is that the use of language and words during Aristotle's time was very different from today. That, combined with his poetic phrasing, makes it exceedingly difficult to decyfer. Even by guessing, however, it is easy to see how ahead of his time Aristotle was.

aristotle's positions were built around the assumption of stable primary elements.
the more radical seeming parts are from the fragment that survives of anaximander.
simplicius is referring to anaximander in the quote, not aristotle.

Oh. Thank you roachboy. :D