Ockham on Final Causality: Muddying the Waters

Abstract

1.1. Posing the Problem: In her 1955 article Das Problem der Finalkausalitat um 1320,2 Anneliese Maier argues that thirteenth century thinkers had already wondered whether Aristotle was right to set final alongside material, formal, and efficient causes as essential to the explanation of a thing. She describes a gradual historical process whereby Scholastics allegedly moved away from the Philosopher's doctrine towards John Buridan's putative conclusion that there are no final causes in inanimate nature, that everything there comes to pass by natural necessity and not for the sake of an end.3