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Bodies and Media

On the Motion of Inanimate Objects in Aristotle’s Physics and On the Heavens

  • Book
  • © 2015

Overview

Authors:
  1. Ido Yavetz

    1. Cohn Institute for History of Science and Ideas, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel

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  • Presents a genuinely novel interpretation and reconstruction of Aristotle’s theory of locomotion
  • Discusses in detail projectile motion, collisions and simple machines using Aristotle’s principles
  • Is the first to discuss the unifying central role that Aristotle ascribes to the medium through which bodies move
  • Includes supplementary material: sn.pub/extras

Part of the book series: SpringerBriefs in History of Science and Technology (BRIEFSHIST)

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Table of contents (5 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xvii
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  2. The Three Levels of Aristotle’s Theory of Material Bodies in Forced Motion

    • Ido Yavetz
    Pages 1-14

  3. Heaviness, Lightness, Sinking and Floating

    • Ido Yavetz
    Pages 15-28

  4. Some Refinements of the Basic Theory

    • Ido Yavetz
    Pages 29-53

  5. The Dynamics of Balance: The Winch and the Lever in the Pseudo Aristotelian Mechanical Problems

    • Ido Yavetz
    Pages 55-65

  6. Hipparchus on the Theory of Prolonged Motion

    • Ido Yavetz
    Pages 67-70

  7. Back Matter

    Pages 71-118
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Keywords

About this book

This book presents a recasting of Aristotle’s theory of spatial displacement of inanimate objects. Aristotle’s claim that projectiles are actively carried by the media through which they move (such as air or water) is well known and has drawn the attention of commentators from ancient to modern times. What is lacking, however, is a systematic investigation of the consequences of his suggestion that the medium always acts as the direct instrument of locomotion, be it natural or forced, while original movers (e.g. stone throwers, catapults, bowstrings) act indirectly by impressing moving force into the medium. Filling this gap and guided by discussions in Aristotle’s Physics and On the Heavens, the present volume shows that Aristotle’s active medium enables his theory - in which force is proportional to speed - to account for a large class of phenomena that Newtonian dynamics - in which force is proportional to acceleration - accounts for through the concept of inertia. By applying Aristotle’s medium dynamics to projectile flight and to collisions that involve reversal of motion, the book provides detailed examples of the efficacy and coherence that the active medium gives to Aristotle’s discussions. The book is directed primarily to historians of ancient, medieval, and early modern science, to philosophers of science and to students of Aristotle’s natural philosophy.

Authors and Affiliations

  • Cohn Institute for History of Science and Ideas, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel

    Ido Yavetz

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