Metaphysics is one of the most venerable branches of thought, although it is still controversial among philosophers. It may mean the most universal and abstract field of thought.

Metaphysics studies the very basic constitution of reality and entities (things) around. It deals with problems such as being, becoming and causality. Its genuine object would be then ontology (the study of the entity), but it has already been understood also as the study of the natural or supernatural source of reality. The analysis of reality is thus compatible with the source of that reality: theolology, cosmology and even spirituality have been related to Metaphysics too, given that all of these terms have something to do with the basic substratum of reality to some extent. While ontology may cover virtually everything on earth, theology, cosmology or spirituality focus on specific ways of being. Because God or Nature can be seen as the fundament and origin of We will see a number of cases of metaphysica generalis and metaphysica specialis in history of philosophy. Hence this approach will be mainly historical, but not only: in each session there will be presentations of the brief chapters of Stephen Mumford’s Metaphysics. A very short introduction.

In the Greek world we will study the foundation of the notion of metaphysics. It was called “first science”, meaning the study of the most basic principle of reality or arché. The pre-Socratic thinkers proposed a number of different first principles. Afterwards, Plato’s especulations led this search long further. In the dialogues Phaedo, Republic (Books VI and VII) and the Symposium he tried to describe the world of ideas. This otherworldly approach meant that the rational and conceptual constitution of the world was neither sensible nor perishable. According to him material things are just mere copies of eternal ideas (this dog resembles the Dog, etc). His follower and critique Aristotle destroyed philosophically that system and, by destroying it, created Metaphysics properly speaking: he wrote a long sum of essays called Metaphysics (although, by the way, he did not put that title). In those treatises and in another ones (such as Categories) he defined the scope and topics of that first science in a quite complete way. Aristotle thought that the ideas did not exist. Only things exist as such. But what we call things is also quite complex. For Aristotle only substances exist. The properties of the substances were their form and attributes. Besides, things change: the hylomorphic doctrine may explain the complexity of becoming and change. Matter, form, actuality and potency are some of the notions concerned with this regard. Lastly, the idea of causality got a lot of attention from Aristotle.

In sum, how things are and become, and how are they interconnected, are the main concerns of Metaphysics. There are two ways of understanding “first” science in Aristotle: the most universal one (that covers the widest range of beings – including everything, from atoms to humans) and the most elevated, focused on the best among entities: the prime unmoved mover or god. The first meaning represents ontology and the second meaning means theology. Centuries later, in the XIII th Century Aquinas shows to what extent Aristotelian Metaphysics were useful in order to erect a theology from ontology. According to the course, the so called proofs of the exiscence of God in the Summa of Theology are based on the Aristotelian causality. Besides, Aquinas complexified the Greek hilomorphic scheme, since for Aquinas entities are composed of form, matter… and being. The medieval world thematized the question of being in a new deep way. It is also called existence. Now things are not only in this way or in the other, but exist. The interest in the idea of being (“the actuality of the form”, according to Aquinas) should be interested in a Christian context. Why? , which means a more radical origin. In Aristotle god is a “mover” and in the Christian world is the creatorThe idea of creation emphasizes the notion of being ex nihilo: every creature comes from nothingness. The medieval world analyzes the question of being (the most abstract one) from different perspectives called trascendentals. Until now we have the Classic Metaphysical system in which the Metaphysica generalis works. But… In Modernity the idea of Metaphysics suffers relevant transformations. Descartes wrote the Meditations on First Philosophy in 1641. As we will see Descartes considers Metaphysics a bunch of problems related with specific entities. Descartes considered that Physics would deal with the res extensa, including every being that occupies volume in espace and that moves and is moved according to the causal laws. This meant that Metaphysics would solely deal with questions such as the nature of God, the nature of the human soul and the links between the two (truth, ideas, etc). Thus in Descartes we will find a reduction of the question of the first science. For Descartes Metaphysics covers a few things that are to be found beyond extension, beyond Physics. His follower Leibniz wanted to synthesize the Classic approach (Ancient and Medieval) and the Cartesian one. Leibniz wanted to bind together the soul and the cosmos. We will study his monadology in his Discourse on Metaphysics. Our next philosophers write in German. Schelling represents what the Romantic idealism of the XIX th Century thought about Metaphysics. In his System it is a depiction of a cosmos in which the human soul plays a central role. We will see that Schelling’s view is and can only be post-kantian. In his framework two forces occupy all his attention: natural necessity and human freedom. This sort of conflic between matter and spirit can be understood in two levels: a cosmic one (universe) and an individual one (every person). We will also see Schopenhauer’s variation around the same Romantic framework. On the other hand, Heidegger’s approach one century later is focused only in human beings. He called them Dasein or existent. Heideggers wants to reveal a new way of understanding metaphysics: basically he considers that it may be reduced to topics involved in how do we understand ourselves, our attitude with regard to our finitude and our concept of temporality. We will see some excerpts from his masterpiece Being and Time and other works such as What is Metaphysics? Also Heidegger is a post-kantian metaphysicist as we will see. In the end, his way of understanding “first science” implies some sort of original or fundamental experience of reality by the individual. Heidegger does not include entities, cosmos or theology in his framework: the problem of being, the most radical question, only has to do with our being-in-the-world.