Activity

Use in the book

In the report on form, activity is one of Aristotle’s several names for form. In the definition of motion, the same Greek noun concerns what is potentially movable precisely insofar as it is movable. These uses connect the term with a capacity without making every activity a change of place.

Places to read

1. I.12.1b.1Activity is listed among the expressions used of form.
2. I.19.1.5Motion is the actuality of what is potentially movable.
3. I.49.21.1The soul’s affections are described as activities, unlike the heating and cooling of bodies.

Translation in this edition

“Activity” is the usual rendering, but the Aristotelian definition of motion uses “actuality.” The related energēma in I.50.1 names the experienced activity of perception.

The Platonists

The passage from Porphyry at I.49.21.1 distinguishes incorporeal activity from alteration in the body. Calling the soul’s affections activities belongs to this argument; it is not a definition imposed on every use of pathos.