’ Ibn Sinas Remarks & Admonitions: Physics & Metaphysics AN ANALYSIS AND ANNOTATED TRANSLATION Shams Inati Ibn Sina’s Remarks and Admonitions: Physics and Metaphysics Ibn Sina’s Remarks and Admonitions: Physics and Metaphysics an analysis and annotated translation Shams Inati Columbia University Press New York Columbia University Press Publishers Since 1893 New York Chichester, West Sussex cup.columbia.edu Copyright © 2014 Columbia University Press All rights reserved Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Avicenna, 980–1037. [Isharat wa-al-tanbihat. Part 2–3. English] Ibn Sina’s Remarks and admonitions: physics and metaphysics: an analysis and annotated translation/ Shams C. Inati. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-231-16616-4 (cloth: alk. paper) —ISBN 978-0-231-53742-1 (e-book) 1. Islamic philosophy—Early works to 1800. 2. Philosophy, Medieval. 3. Physics—Early works to 1800. 4. Metaphysics—Early works to 1800. I. Inati, Shams Constantine. II. Title. B751.I62E5 2014 181'.5—dc23 2013041367 Columbia University Press books are printed on permanent and durable acid- free paper. This book is printed on paper with recycled content. Printed in the United States of America c 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 References to Internet Web sites (URLs) were accurate at the time of writing. Neither the author nor Columbia University Press is responsible for URLs that may have expired or changed since the manuscript was prepared. To my sister, Aminy Inati Audi, who has shared my pas- sion for knowledge about the universe and the human place in it and who has supported my intellectual efforts and inspired me with her limitless determination, deep wisdom, and boundless love for all things. Contents Preface  26 Analysis of the Text 1 PArT Two: PhYSICS 57 Prologue 59 First Class: on the Substance of Bodies 1. Delusion and Remark: On the Composition of Bodies 59 2. Delusion and Remark: Another Theory Concerning the Composition of Bodies of Infinite Parts 60 3. Admonition: Evidence for the Unsoundness of the Above Theories 61 4. A Follow-up: On the Infinity of the Imaginative Division of Bodies 61 5. Admonition: Regarding Movement and Time as Also Divisible to Infinity 62 6. Remark: Regarding the Difference Between That Which Is Continuous in Itself and That Which Has the Capacity for Continuity 62 viii—Contents 7. Delusion and Admonition: Concerning the Unity of the Nature of Corporeal Extension in Itself 62 8. Delusion and Admonition: Concerning the Ways in Which Disjunction Is Possible for That Which Is Continuous 63 9. Admonition: Concerning Why a Species for Which It Is Possible to Have a Plurality of Individuals May Be Obstructed from Having More Than One 63 10. A Follow-up: Concerning the First Matter as That Which in Itself Has No Quantity and in Which Any Quantity Can Subsist 64 11. Remark: Concerning the Evidence for the Finitude of Distances 64 12. Remark: Concerning the Necessary Accompaniment of Shape to Corporeal Extension 65 13. Delusion and Remark: Concerning the Cause of the Shape of the Sphere 66 14. Admonition: Concerning the Cause of Position 67 15. Admonition: Concerning the Necessity of Form for Position 67 16. A Follow-up: Conclusion Regarding the Necessity of Corporeal Form for Matter 68 17. Admonition: Concerning Matter as Also Not Free from Forms Other Than Corporeal Ones 68 18. Remark: Concerning the Fact That, in Addition to Matter, There Is Necessity for External Determinants of the Corporeal Form 69 19. Delusion and Admonition: On the Joining of Matter and Form as Necessary for the Actual Subsistence of Matter 69 20. Remark: On the Departure of Forms from One Matter to Another 69 21. Remark: Concerning the Demonstration That the Corporeal Forms Cannot Be Independent or Intermediary Causes of Matter 70 Contents—ix 22. Delusion and Admonition: Refutation of the Claim That Matter Is the Cause of the Existence of the Form 71 23. Remark: Concerning the Subsistance of Matter During the Process of Form Substitution 71 24. Remark: Concerning the Priority of Form to Matter 71 25. Remark: On the Manner in Which Form Is Prior 72 26. Delusion and Admonition: Concerning the Priority in Essence of the Cause to the Effect Despite the Temporal Simultaneity of the Two 72 27. A Follow-up: The Inference to Be Drawn Regarding the Similarity Between the Priority of the Form Which Is Inseparable from Its Matter and That Which Is Separable 73 28. Admonition: The Priority of the Body to the Surface, the Surface to the Line, and the Line to the Point 73 29. Admonition: On the Absence of the Interpenetration of Corporeal Dimensions 74 30. Remark: Concerning Quantitative Distances Among Disjoined Bodies 75 31. Admonition: On the Nonexistence of Void 75 32. Remark: On the Existence of Direction 75 33. Remark: Direction Is of a Sensible, Not an Intelligible Nature 76 34. Remark: Direction Is an Undivided Extremity of Dimension and Toward Which Movement Can Be Made 76 35. Delusion and Admonition: Concerning the Concrete Existence of Direction as Opposed to Its Conceptual Being 77 Second Class: on the Directions and Their Primary and Secondary Bodies 1. Remark: Concerning the Directions That Change and Those That Do Not 78 2. Remark: Concerning the Determination of the Position of a Direction 78 3. Remark: Concerning the Body That Determines the Direction 79