Abstract: I discuss a short string of five sentences in Metaphysics V.5, 1015b6-9 relating demonstration to necessity. My proposal is that Aristotle focuses his attention on the demonstration as a demonstration. Other interpretations reduce the necessity in question to the modality of the component sentences of the demonstrations (the conclusion and the premises). My view does not deny that modality of the component sentences is important, but takes seriously the idea that a demonstration itself should be understood as necessary-as not capable of being otherwise. A demonstration cannot be different from what it is in the sense that [i] its components cannot be different from what they are, [ii] its components must be related to each other exactly in the way they are related. Demonstrations aim at the fully appropriate explanation of a given explanandum-and each demonstration is individuated by the explanandum it takes. Thus, the basic idea is that, for the target explanandum that individuates a given demonstration, the premises delivering the fully appropriate explanation cannot be replaces with different ones. I show how this proposal, which explains Aristotle’s language in 1015b6-9 accurately, does not make demonstrations ‘melt down into conditional necessity’, first, because the modality of the component sentences is still importantly involved, second, because the explanatory relation expressed in a demonstration is a necessary fact in the real world, so that the demonstration itself is also necessary (in the way I have explained) inasmuch as it captures that fact.

Abstract Aristotle contrasts episteme and doxa through the key notions of universal and necessary. These notions have played a central role in Aristotle’s characterization of scientific knowledge in the previous chapters of APo. They are not spelled out in APo I.33, but work as a sort of reminder that packs an adequate characterization of scientific knowledge and thereby gives a highly specified context for Aristotle’s contrast between episteme and doxa. I will try to show that this context introduces a contrast in terms of explanatory claims: on the one hand, episteme covers those claims which capture explanatory connections that are universal and necessary and thereby deliver scientific understanding; on the other hand, doxa covers the explanatory attempts that fail at doing so.

Resumo: Trata-se de tradução do Hípias Maior de Platão para o Português, com algumas notas de elucidação e justificação das opções.

Abstract: Translation of Plato’s Hippias Major into Portuguese with a few notes, in which I elucidate some issues and justify some options.

Discuto neste artigo os seis requisitos que Aristóteles propõe para as premissas das demonstrações científicas em Segundos Analíticos I 2, 71b20-33. Pretendo mostrar que os seis requisitos não respaldam a interpretação "axiomatizante". Ao contrário, os seis requisitos podem ser entendidos consistentemente de acordo com uma interpretação segundo a qual o traço mais fundamental da demonstração científica consiste na explicação pela causa apropriada.

I discuss in this paper the six requirements Aristotle advances at Posterior Analytics A-2, 71b20-33, for the premisses of a scientific demonstration. I argue that the six requirements give no support for an intepretation in terms of "axiomatization". Quite on the contrary, the six requirements can be consistently understood in a very different picture, according to which the most basic feature of a scientific demonstration is to explain a given proposition by its appropriate cause.

Pretendo neste artigo discutir a definição de natureza que Aristóteles oferece em Física 192b 20-23, tentando mostrar que tal definição deve ser entendida como uma conjunção de três (não apenas duas) condições: a primeira condição estabelece que a natureza é um tipo de causa; a segunda condição diz respeito à relação entre a natureza e a coisa natural que a tem como princípio e causa; a terceira condição diz respeito à relação entre a natureza e as propriedades que, enquanto causa, ela instila na coisa natural.

I discuss in this paper Aristotle's definition of nature in Physics 192b 20-23. I intend to prove that this definition has to taken as a set of three (not only two) conditions: the first condition just establishes that nature is a sort of cause; the second condition concerns the relationship between nature and the natural thing that has it as a cause; the third condition concerns the relationship between nature and the properties that natural things have from nature's causality.

Este artigo examina três passagens do De caelo e discute a atitude epistemológica de Aristóteles em relação ao estatuto das teorias que ele introduz, bem como sua atitude em relação à possibilidade de progresso na investigação científica a respeito do mundo celeste. Concluo que a possibilidade de progresso na investigação científica, embora não seja central na reflexão de Aristóteles, não é afastada como impossível, muito menos como indesejável.

This article examines three passages of De caelo in order to discuss Aristotle's epistemological attitude towards the theories advanced by him and towards the possibility of progress in the scientific research of the celestial world. It is concluded that, although the possibility of progress in scientific investigation is not central in Aristotle's reflections, progress is not ruled out either as impossible or as undesirable.