Catholic Word of the Day: FORMAL CAUSE, 10-04-10

CatholicReference.net ^ | 10-04-10 | Fr. John Hardon's Modern Catholic Dictionary

[Salvation]

Featured Term (selected at random):

FORMAL CAUSE

The specific element in a being which communicates itself to the indeterminate or less determinate element and together with this matter or substratum constitutes the whole being. One of the four principal causes in Thomistic philosophy.

See Also: CAUSE,

See Also: EFFICIENT CAUSE,

See Also: FINAL CAUSE,

See Also: FIRST CAUSE,

See Also: FREE CAUSE,

See Also: MATERIAL CAUSE,

See Also: MORAL CAUSE,

See Also: NECESSARY CAUSE,

See Also: SECONDARY CAUSE

All items in this dictionary are from Fr. John Hardon's Modern Catholic Dictionary, © Eternal Life. Used with permission.

[Salvation]

Truly a learning thread for me. I will post the other links later.

[Salvation]

Catholic Word of the Day – links will be provided later by another FReeper.

 

Calvinism/Armianism	Aseity	Humanism
Murder	Luna	Meta-Ousiosis
Renunciation	I. H. S.	Peace of the Church
Bilocation	Marriage Bond	Epikeia
Scapular Medal	Clandestinity	Donatism
Sign	Altar Bread	Curse
Chrismation	Religious State	Clerics of the Pontifical Chapel
Nehemiah	Age of Discretion	Formal Cause

Catholic Word of the Day Ping!

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[maryz]

The specific element in a being which communicates itself to the indeterminate or less determinate element and together with this matter or substratum constitutes the whole being.

Frankly, I can't make head nor tail of that definition. I do recall that our philosophy professor used as an illustration of different types of causality the act of switching on a light: material cause -- the generation power and wiring; efficient cause -- act of switching the light on; final cause -- to have light; and formal cause -- the laws of electricity.

I just can't mentally make the last jibe with the definition given.

Mad Dawgg, can you help me out?

[Straight Vermonter]

Calvinism/Arianism	Aseity	Humanism
Murder	Luna	Meta-Ousiosis
Renunciation	I.H.S	Peace of the Church
Bilocation	Marriage Bond	Epikeia
Scapular Medal	Clandestinity	Donatism
Sign	Altar Bread	Curse
Chrismation	Religious State	Clerics of the Pontifical Chapel
Nehemiah	Age of Reason	Formal Cause

[Mad Dawg]

It’s definitions like that that make scholasticism a fit object of satire!

Try this: Question: WHY is that a ‘bat’? (as in baseball).

Efficient cause : the bat factory
Material cause: Aluminum or ash wood
Final cause: That we may play baseball
Formal cause: “By virtue of ‘batness’.” (which might include maximum and minimum lengths, widths, weight etc but would be more a matter of suitability for hitting one out of the park.)

The “batness” would be the ‘specific element’, while the aluminum or ash-wood would be the less determinate element.

You could have the exact same ‘stuff’ as is currently sitting at my confuser typing this dreck, but unless it is organized a certain way and animated by a certain sort of ‘soul’ it ain’t human. So the humanness of moi (albeit much debated by, say, my wife, sometimes) is ‘communicated’ to all the ‘stuff’, and here I am!

[maryz]

OK, that’s somewhat clearer! Thanks! (I have a feeling it’s not going to stick unless I come back to it again . . . and again and again . . . but that’s not your fault!)

[maryz]

Sorry to bother you again -- well, not very, just being polite!

So maybe my professor with the electric light example maybe should have said the "nature of electricity" instead of the "laws of electricity" (a kind of fine distinction, but a distinction, I think)?

[the invisib1e hand]

The specific element in a being which communicates itself to the indeterminate or less determinate element and together with this matter or substratum constitutes the whole being. One of the four principal causes in Thomistic philosophy.

Ah, well. That was helpful.

[the invisib1e hand]

Try this: Question: WHY is that a ‘bat’? (as in baseball).

Because a Yankee is swinging it.

Other than this suggested correction, that post was very helpful.

[Mad Dawg]

I do recall that our philosophy professor used as an illustration of different types of causality the act of switching on a light: material cause -- the generation power and wiring; efficient cause -- act of switching the light on; final cause -- to have light; and formal cause -- the laws of electricity.

I'm afraid I have to say that's a lousy example because it's WAY too complex. (See, your perfesser probably knows stuff that happened AFTER 1400, while, for the most part, I don't.)

Switching on a light is an act of will, and the various causes of the light bulb's working are sort of ancillary.

And I think your guy didn't really get or 'work' the idea of telos, 'that for the sake of which,' final cause. Normally I switch on a light that I may see.

And I think his formal cause is messed up as well. The formal cause of switching on a light bulb is will, I'd guess. The formal cause of electricity is far too mysterious for me, but I'd offer something like electro-magnetic energy.

However, the formal cause of a light-bulb is interesting to think about because it develops the answer to the question of what happens to transubstantiation when the accidents of the used-to-be bread go bad or the ditto wine turns to vinegar.

I'm thinking -- and I'll have a chance, if I remember to take it, to check -- that a lightbulb with a broken and irreparable filament is no longer a lightbulb. The other case that comes to mind would be that it is a fatally defective lightbulb.

But the 'esse' of lightbulb is, I submit, a "device which turns electro-magnetic energy to light." Whether it is incandescent, fluorescent, or an LED, the formal cause remains the same and accounts for the ordering of any of a number of materials and parts.

The connection between this and transubstantiation is that if the Sacred Body no longer has the accidents appropriate to bread, or the Precious Blood no longer has the accidents appropriate to wine, then the transubstantiation is no longer true. ( I THINK that's right.)

This casts a VERY interesting light on our view of the miracle and its relationship to time, huh? It suggests, for example, that God doesn't just "do it" at the words of Institution, but that He keeps on doing it for as long as necessary.

[Mad Dawg]

Because a Yankee is swinging it.

It is only because of my profound, and praise worthy, humility AND my great spiritual attainments (achieved entirely on my own merit, of course) that I do not respond with language not suitable for the Religion Forum.

;-)

You see, I have achieved the perfect unrequited love, a love which will never be troubled with any kind of actuality: I love the Brooklyn Dodgers. The LA Dogers have nothing to do with it. When they moved to LA they lost the formal cause of "Da Bums!" They lost their 'esse'.

But while this love promises no satisfaction, it still stirs enmity. So I say to your miserable Yankees, "PAH!"

There. I've said it, and I'm glad. Glad, do you hear?

The Yankees are that rare case in metaphysics when a thing achieves so much excellence that it no longer is commendable. They are to baseball as a tyrant is to a king.

Only worse.

So there.

LOL.

[Mad Dawg]

FWIW, for, oh my GAWD, 45 years I have almost always answered the formal cause of a thing by adding ‘ness’ to the noun. It’s smart-alecky because it’s kind of question-begging, but it really is, I think, the way to begin to answer the question.

[maryz]

The connection between this and transubstantiation is that if the Sacred Body no longer has the accidents appropriate to bread, or the Precious Blood no longer has the accidents appropriate to wine, then the transubstantiation is no longer true.

Yep -- that's how we learned it! I also recall dimly something about the same thing once processes of digestion rendered the accidents unrecognizable. Or something like that.

[maryz]

The Yankees are that rare case in metaphysics when a thing achieves so much excellence that it no longer is commendable. They are to baseball as a tyrant is to a king.

I'm as far from a sports fan as you can be and still be counted human, but I am from Boston, so I definitely see your point!

[the invisib1e hand]

You seem like a mind of sorts. I wonder how you’d react to my “relativity is a scam” thesis.

[Mad Dawg]

I would be interested in a sketch of the argument. I don’t think I can ‘engage’ responsibly with it, now that RCIA season is with us and I am focussed on that.

[the invisib1e hand]

a very rough, broad brushed, "buckshot," and consequently, easily misunderstood sketch here.