British Idealism Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

The notion of “Cambridge change”, invented by Peter Geach in the late ’70, aims to describe the fact that some changes can be attributed to a subject without any internal change in this subject, but with only a change in another subject related to the first one – what can be named a “relational non-internal change”.
This case is already known by Plato (Theaetetus, 155b-c) and studied by Aristotle (Physics, V, 2, 225b11-13; Metaphysics, K, 12, 1068a11-13). In the Antiquity, it has been applied to the problem of the relations between God and the world by Augustine (De Trinitate, V, XVI, 17) as well as by Boethius (De Trinitate, V, PL 64, 1254A-B), who have seen there the way of resolving the conflict between the divine Immutability and the universal Providence of God, using the notion of non-reciprocal relation: one created thing can change between instant t1 and instant t2, without anything changing in God, if not the real non-reciprocal relation from the thing itself toward God.
At the time of the great theological synthesis, in the middle of the 13th century, Albertus Magnus as well as Thomas Aquinas will assume this data of the theological Tradition in order to undergo them rationally, reading critically the writings of Augustine and Boethius under the light of a new approach from Aristotle, especially in their respective comments on the Metaphysics and the Physics.
There are several problems here that theologians must deal with: Divine Immutability and universal causality of God, but also the question of the nature of the creation in a created thing, the real relativity of the persons in the Trinity, or the relation of reason from God to the world: All those problems may constantly incriminate the Aristotelian frameworks of the categories, that Albert as well as Thomas wish to preserve at all costs, in order to build a totally well-ordered Universe. Every reality, substantial, accidental, or even conceptual has always to be situated in the heart of a relational network, going from God and back to Him, following the neoplatonician model of exitus/reditus, reformulated by Albert and Thomas as a fundamental metaphysical principle. The “Cambridge change”, or relational, non-internal change, appears therefore in the works of the two great Dominicans as an essential tool in their project of unification of science.
The contribution aims then first to describe the antique theological and philosophical use of the criteria of “Cambridge change”; then, to list the most important texts of Albert and Thomas that implement this conception of change, in order to understand the metaphysical issues of this problem; to finally evaluate the distance between both authors on this topic – as well as in the application they make of it, as in the ontological signification they confer to this fundamental element for their unitive conception of the Universe.