τὸ ἀναγκαῖον. ὑπάρχει δὲ τό μὲν ἁπλῶς τοῖς ἀϊδίοις, τὸ δ’ ἐξ ὑποθέσεως καὶ τοῖς ἐν γενέσει πᾶσιν.290 “This fact of the matter is found, in particular, more in the field of beings that we designate as Nature than within the realm of objects that are there in the field of being-produced, that have the specific character of making in the sense of a τέχνη: the οὗ ἕνεκα and the καλόν.” The sense of καλόν is related to the μηδενὸς ἐμποδίζοντος—καλόν: the “beautiful,” that which succeeds and is there in this way in its being-successful, such that there is no failure to be found. Since precisely τέχνη in the sense of making handiwork is characterized by the fact that something must be tried, material can be unfit, it requires such and such circumstances and accidents for success. By contrast, beings with the character of φύσει ὄντα go smoothly, and are there in this having-gone-smoothly, καλόν. It was this experience of the καλόν that led the ancients to address this φύσει ὄν, which always “works well,” as ἀναγκαῖον, that which is such that fundamentally nothing can interfere with it.
Nonetheless, there is a distinction with respect to necessity since there is a dual sense of ἀναγκαῖον: (1) ἀναγκαῖον ἁπλῶς, (2) ἀναγκαῖον ἐξ ὑποθέσεως.291 (1) “Simply necessary” is that “which always is”; it excludes in itself the possibility that it ever became. That which always is excludes having-become. It is a way of being-there that has no need of having-become, which is incompatible with it. And this being-that-is-always-thus is simply necessary. (2) Beside this, there is a necessity in beings that are precisely on account of having-become. This context of necessity occurs in the structure of the “if-then,” ἐξ ὑποθέσεως: if such and such is to come to be, then, according to this presupposition, this or that must happen necessarily.
Aristotle summarizes these thoughts succinctly: ἡ φύσις ἕνεκα του ποιεῖ πάντα.292 “The being that is there that is characterized as nature does everything that it itself is on account of something”—always in the dimension of the type of consideration that was exhibited previously. Something is completed along the course of a movement, which does not refer to some sort of dark “teleology!” Thus Aristotle can determine the φύσει ὄν as an ἐσόμενον, a being that has its being in coming-to-be-thus, such that, to a certain extent, it runs ahead of itself.
γ. Criticism of the Type of Consideration of the Ancient Physiologists
These basic determinations of the φύσει ὄν, as they emerge from the discussion of the aforementioned passages, are what the ancients initially missed in their consideration of nature. Corresponding to these mistakes, the ancients were also not able to see, in the right way, the special being of nature as living. The primary view, or that which they primarily saw, was: beings that are
290. De part. an. Α 1, 639 b 19 sqq.
291. De part. an. Α 1, 639 b 24.
292. De part. an. Α 1, 641 b 12.