Ibn Sina (Avicenna) on the Subject of Metaphysics

"Ibn Sina (Arabic), also known as Avicenna (Latin) and Abu Ali Sina (Persian) was the most original and systematic Muslim philosopher. In this light he is mentioned by two celebrated historians of medieval western philosophy: A. Maurer states, "...his [ibn Sina's] philosophy is a highly personal achievement, ranking among the greatest in the history of philosophy;" and F. Copleston holds, "The greatest Muslim philosopher of the eastern group without doubt is Avicenna or ibn Sina (980-1037), the real creator of a scholastic system in the Islamic world." (1) Y. Mahdavi lists 244 texts attributed to him and G. A. Anawati lists 270. (2) These works envelop a multiplicity of topics such as metaphysics, poetics, animal physiology, minerals, rhetoric, mechanics of solids, Arabic syntax, meteorology, mystical treatises, and a medical treatise, and are translated into more than nineteen languages. The crown of his philosophical corpus is a set of encyclopedic collections of treatises, especially al-Shifa, al-Najàt, al-Isharatwa al-Tanbihàt and the Danish Nameh; each collection contains elaborate philosophical treatises on metaphysics, physics, psychology, and logic. A standard edition of the logical texts of al-Shifa' alone comprises more than one sixteen hundred double size (1600) pages. (3) (...) Contemporary philosophies of logical syntax of a language distinguish between two types of primitives-one, designative types of sign, the other, rules for transformation, designation, and interpretation, and these distinctions can be applied to ibn Sina's system. Ibn Sina's two primordial notions of the soul are 'being' (hasti, wujûd) and the modalities [of necessity (wajib), contingency (mumkin) and impossibility (mumtani )]. The notion of being is the core of his system, while the modalities specify the subset of beings that are existents. The notion of 'being' concatenated with 'necessity' point to 'the necessary being;' using the second version of the ontological argument, 'necessary being' results in 'the Necessary Existent.' The notion of 'being' concatenated with 'contingency' has two possible results: (a) if there is a cause for the case in question, then the contingency is an actual existent-for example, in the case of 'being a human,' persons are existents because they have parents; (b) in the case of absence of the cause, the results are non-actual contingencies such as unicorns. 'Impossibility' and 'being' lead to no existent, as illustrated by 'round squares,' and 'the largest number.' The key notions of ibn Sina's system are very clear: 'Being-qua-being' (hasti, wujûd) corresponds to Aristotle's notion of 'being-qua-being' in Metaphysica 1002a 20 ( ὂν ἢ ὀν ) and E. Moody's reading of Ockham's use of 'ens' in Summa Totius Logicae. (4) It signifies the most determinable concept. 'Non-being' is meaningless. We should note that all mental concepts (actual or not actual) signify a being. For this reason 'being' is different from 'existent'. 'Existent' (mawjûd) signifies actual entities, Aristotle's notion of first substance ( πρώτη φιλοσοφία ). There are no impossible existents. For ibn Sina there is only one Necessary existent, which is the ultimate cause of generation of other existents. 'Existence' itself is not an existent, but signifies those entities which are neither uncaused 'contingent beings' nor 'impossible entities.''Essence,' (mahyya) is used by ibn Sina in the sense of "ti esti" and in the secondary sense of "ousia" employed by Aristotle. (5) An existent partakes of an essence; for example, the feature of a basket-hall can be discussed in terms of the formal properties of a sphere. An unrealized entity such as a unicorn may have an essence but no existence."