Cause and Explanation in Ancient Philosophy

This volume offers an updated analysis of the use, meaning, and scope of the classical notion of aitía. It clarifies philosophical and philological questions about aitia and offers bold and innovative interpretations of this key concept of ancient philosophy.

List of contents

Introduction Alberto Ross 1. Note on the original meaning of Greek aitios David Lévystone 2. What good is the Form of the Good? Mary Margaret McCabe 3. That's What Makes the World Go Round: Causation in the Myth in the Statesman Saloni de Souza and Daniel Vázquez 4. Chance, Necessity and Demiurgic Causation in the Timaeus Viktor Ilievski 5. Causality and Explanation in Aristotle: logos, eidos and tropos Alberto Ross 6. Aristotle with prime matter Cristina Viano 7. Aristotle on the efficiency of accidental causes José María Llovet Abascal 8. The Relevance of Environmental Conditions as Causes for Animal Generation in Aristotle María-Elena García-Peláez 9. Aristotle's causes and the problem of the necessity of our actions Carlo Natali 10. Theories of Causation in Early Stoicism Daniel Vázquez 11. The scientific epistemology of al-Nä¿¿m Michael Chase 12. Recovering Causality? Ibn Taymiyya on the Creation of the World Luis Xavier López-Farjeat

About the author

Alberto Ross is Professor of Philosophy and Humanities at Universidad Panamericana, Mexico. His works include The Causality of the Prime Mover in Metaphysics ¿ (2016); Causality, Nature and Fate in Alexander of Aphrodisias (2016); The Causality of the Prime Mover in Simplicius (2020); and he coedited the volume Time and Cosmology in Plato and the Platonic Tradition (2022).
Daniel Vázquez is Associate Professor, Head of the Department of Philosophy at Mary Immaculate College, Limerick. He is also a member of the Trinity Plato Centre. He has published in various areas of ancient philosophy, especially on Plato, the Stoics, and the skepticism of Sextus Empiricus. He is coeditor of Time and Cosmology in Plato and the Platonic Tradition (2022) and Plato on Time and the World (2023).

Product details

• Authors: Alberto (Universidad Panamericana Ross
• Assisted by: Alberto Ross (Editor), Daniel Vázquez (Editor)
• Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd.
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 06.05.2025
• EAN: 9781032307459
• ISBN: 978-1-0-3230745-9
• No. of pages: 258
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > History > Antiquity; Non-fiction book > Philosophy, religion > Philosophy: antiquity to present day; PHILOSOPHY / General, PHILOSOPHY / History & Surveys / Ancient & Classical, Ancient History, Classical history / classical civilisation, Ancient Greek and Roman philosophy, Western philosophy: Ancient, to c 500, Byzantine Empire, Western philosophy: Medieval & Renaissance, c 500 to c 1600, Medieval Western philosophy, Islamic & Arabic philosophy, Islamic and Arab philosophy