Ma`rifat Falsafi

The philosophers of science believe, in the present age, that the word ‘cause’ used in the translations of Aristotle’s works is erroneous; and that he never meant, by the Greek word ‘aition/ aitia’, what understood by the Muslim philosophers, and later by scholastic philosophers, who used the word ‘cause’ for it. The philosophers of science believe that Aristotle was just thinking of explaining the way different phenomena emerged, and he had nothing to do with the supernatural causes for those phenomena. Thus, ‘cause’ for him was nothing but explanation, and the four causes are the four explanations used by Aristotle to explain the emergence, movement and alteration. These philosophers have used ‘explanation’ instead of ‘cause’ to correct the misunderstandings resulted from Aristotle’s thought. By studying Aristotle’s works as well as the deficiencies in the theory of ‘explanation’, we may well prove the inaccuracy of the idea suggested by the philosophers of science and show that Aristotle not only wished to analyze the quality of genesis, but also cared about the reason for it.