If someone told you that being
G was 'pure actuality', then you would think that it would be devoid of potentiality, capacity, power, and (hence) causal powers.
However, Feser
claims about God that "it is precisely because He is pure actuality that He is the source of all causal (or actualizing) power." This is to repeat Aquinas' argument.
But I do not understand the inference here. There must be much more to God than 'pure actuality'. That does not seem to be a good characterization of his essence. What is missing? Can it be given a philosophical characterization (rather than by a theological accretion of attributes)?
I still have a problem, however, with the meaning of 'pure' in 'pure actuality'. (And how it is thereby supposed to refer to something essential about God.)
Normally, a 'pure A' means 'devoid of not-A'. Purely red means devoid of not red. Purely intellectual means devoid of not intellectual.
However, here, 'pure actuality' refers to something with no potentiality for changing itself, but still lots of power for changing other things. This does not seem to be a good sense of words. I am surprised that Aquinas uses it!
I agree that powers (whatever they may be) must be grounded in what exists. And that they cannot be grounded in 'pure potentiality'. From many examples, that is clearly ridiculous. I also agree that 'actuality' is practically synonymous what 'what exists'.
But then, how does the term 'pure actuality' get us close to identifying God? A god who is devoid of some potentialities (those for himself), but who is positively enthusiastic about other potentialities (those for others). Do you see the problem?
By 'potentiality' I refer to any capacity or power in onself to make a change, whether in the agent, or in another (patient).
I agree that god does not change himself. But, if he is defined as 'pure act' after Aquinas, is it possible for him to have in himself any powers to change others?
- It cannot be because 'actual' means 'exist', since ordinary existing things are not sources of powers.
- It cannot be since god = pure actuality and god is the source, since i am asking an ontological question not a theological one.
- It cannot be because every coming-to-be requires an actual thing to do that, because that has nothing to do with where the powers originate.
- It cannot be because the original actual being can have no potentiality, since that directly blocks answering the question.
I agree that a purely actual being will be devoid of all passive potencies. The question is, is it not, for the same reason, devoid of all active potencies as well?
I think of myself as a classic theist. I just think that Aquinas at various points was
let done by the poor development of Aristotle's ontology (physics and metaphysics).
It you look at
http://www.newadvent.org/summa/1025.htm for example, at the first section discussing whether there is power in god (my subject above!), all the crucial steps are based on ideas of 'perfection' and 'fittingly', etc. Aquinas does not have the philosophical machinery to give a robust answer, so he wings it, in order to get to the right answer. (Most of his
final answers are quite good: it is the
logic in the middle that is poor).
A 'normal ontology' need not badly constrain God, if the ideas in it came from God in the first place. Since much religion is to get us to listen to God, we should not be afraid to use the ideas we get. (At least, then, they would be consistent)
Now I propose a resolution of this problem, by means of
Actual powers:
How about this resolution of problem?