Substantial Form (Aquinas 101)

Science does not deny substantial form, but rather welcomes it.

Substantial Form (Aquinas 101) - Fr. James Brent, O.P.

❓ Questions you want answered? Make sure to put #AskAFriar in your comment!

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This video was made possible through the support of grant #61944 from the John Templeton Foundation. The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the John Templeton Foundation.

[causalaetitiae]

I really LOVE your videos. Thank you so much! I'm a Religious Education teacher and your work helps me to keep a thomistic, real, orthodox, integral focus in my classes - despite of the secularistic, anthropocentric and fragmentary curriculum. I truly benefit from your work. Thank you very much and may Our Lord reward you! With gratitude, a sister in Christ from Germany. <3

[williamchami]

The distinction made between parts and wholes in relation to cats and motor cars is also explained by phenomenology in terms of 'pieces' (independent parts of a whole that are isolatable and examinable, e.g., a leaf from a tree) and 'moments' (non-independent parts which cannot be separated and examined apart from the whole).

[paoloterni]

Thank you for these wonderful lectures, extremely useful for helping me understand Aquinas. That, in turn, enables me to articulate a coherent philosophical / religious / theological stance. God bless you.

[mers]

Thank you, this was very good. I had been wondering about this and now I have my answers.

[johnfitzgeraldkennedy]

“There is for me a powerful evidence that there is something going on behind it all ... it seems as though somebody has fine-tuned nature’s numbers to make the universe. The impression of design is overwhelming.” -Paul Davies
(Physicist Recipient of the Templeton Prize, The Kelvin Medal from the UK Institute of Physics, and the Michael Faraday Prize.)

[adelephilomenadonata]

I added this video to my Social Media الحمد لله

[winstonbarquez]

Radical composition of material reality: Prime matter + substantial form = actual material substance + accidental form = individual substance

[cadenorris]

So it is not therefore, the particles that arrange in a certain way to make a cat. It is the fact that God made it to BE a cat, that the particles and subsystems fall into order to become a cat.

That implies the perfect kind of order that God would supply, and would explain Jeremiah saying that he knew me in my mother's womb. He was the one to tell the particles to organize into a human being because he called us a human being, not the particles accidentally organizing themselves into what can be called a human being.

That is really profound and eye opening to me. Thank you!

[corpserepairservice]

So you mean to tell me that when we take a cornea out of a dead guy's eye and stick it into a living guy, that for however long it took to transplant it, it wasn't actually a cornea?

[shawnmuench]

Are particles accidents? So far accidents seem to be attributes surrounding something and material substance (as we typically think of it) doesn't seem to be one of them. So in this scheme I haven't found where material substance itself gets placed.

[namapalsu]

Dear Thomistic Institute

As someone who's deep in St. Thomas and Aristotle, this somewhat basic explanations speaks loudly to me.

Unbeknownst to those who just learn about Aristotle/Thomism this explanation is what you need to counter:

- Contraception
- Abortion
- LGBTQRSTU etc ism
- Attack on The real presence
- Attack on Trinity

Not just that, the last part that was said about how went we know things, the form of it is imprinted in our mind IMMEDIATELY takes me back to how the second person in the Trinity is primarily called the Son and Logos (logic, wisdom, reason). Why? Because "to reason" is to understand a thing, such that it is imprinted in our mind. Upon understanding, a copy of that thing (the imprint) are present in our mind (as previously our mind reasoned to grasp it). This is why Christ is called "Logos" because He is the mirror of His Father. This also connects with the fact that a son is also an imprint of the Father. A cat begets a cat, not a frog nor a mosquito or a squid.

To stretch it even further, the alikeness of the Father and The Son also explains Filioque. Because the spirative power of the Father is also possessed by the Son, because they are so alike (the spirative power is not transferrrable to the Holy Spirit because it's a power opposite to Him. Just as how the Father's power to begets is not transferrable to the Son because begetting is a power in opposition to the Son).

And THAT ladies and gentleman how this small but succint and beautiful video speaks to me as someone who's deep in Thomist/Aristotle. It just clicks every switches in my brain.

All these Thomistic videos are gold (not to mention the wonderful soft and wise narrations from these priests).

I want to say more and more. But I'll stop.

[GilMichelini]

If I am understanding the concepts Father explained at 8:04, is this why it is proper to call what we are having for dinner tonight a chuck roast rather than cow's neck because when the cow died and was separated, its substantial form as a cow ended and now all those pieces of beef have new names based on how they are cut?

Going to the example of the cat, is this why we have the term "the heart of a cat" to describe what it was?

[davidcoleman]

Excellent explanation. I'm certain you've been asked this question, but I've not come across it. What do you say with respect to organ transplants? If substantial form is top-down and the components cease to be when the substance dies or undergoes substantial change, doesn't the heart, liver or other organs continue to exist if they are transplanted in another host? How does the theory of substantial forms address that?

[AidenRKrone]

I thought the term "essence" referred to what the phrase "substantial form" is referring to. I've always thought that an essence is what makes something _what it is._ So, to alter an object's essence would be to fundamentally change what the object is. For instance, cutting the tail off a cat would not essentially change the cat; the cat is still a cat, just without its tail. Have I been misunderstanding and misusing these words?

[kamiljan]

Hey, I absolutely love your videos, so thank you very much, but would it be possible for you to make some video on using science in arguing God? Like kalaam, or inteligent design things, and if we should use them, as they usually approach some type of God of the Gaps. Thanks again!

[pyramidheadrocks]

In the case of heart transplant, for example. Would we say that between bodies, what we regard as a human hear is not a human heart?

[robertfield]

Can you characterize substantial form in living things as an immaterial force that is responsible for the organization, regulation and maintenance of the biological system?

[juanflorenciogonzalezmateo]

Dear James: I tend to think that thomism has an explanation for this, but I don't know it: When a person dies, some of his body organs can be used on a living person, because they preserve their functionality, at least for a certain time. This fact seems to imply that my heart (for instance) is still a heart if I die. It preserves it's functionality because its cells remain alive, even though I have died. How do you integrate this fact into your explanation?

[GilMichelini]

Most of these videos make sense to me but this one is going to require some study and pondering.

From what I do understand, it seems like bottom-up people are those who lack hope and joy. "Behold my beloved, a mobile collection of atoms rather than the substantial form of a real person." It seems like those who are unsure of what is "really real" would live confused lives.

[sondre]

Can you please make a video about transubstansiation? The bread becoming Jesus Christ flesh, by His grace. Because as I understand, it is linked with what you explain in this video.
Peace!