@article{Aristotle:1797,
      recid = {1797},
      author = {Mendelsohn, Joshua},
      title = {Aristotle on the Necessity of What We Know},
      publisher = {University of Chicago},
      school = {Ph.D.},
      address = {2019-06},
      pages = {270},
      abstract = {Aristotle holds that we only have scientific knowledge of  what cannot be otherwise. This may seem to imply that we  only have scientific knowledge of changeless mathematical  truths and other products of a priori reflection. Yet  Aristotle is a pioneer of natural science, and exhorts us  to study the natural world, which he himself characterizes  as a realm of contingency, exception and chance. This  dissertation asks why Aristotle holds the view that we only  know what cannot be otherwise and whether he is able to  reconcile this view with his engagement in and esteem for  natural science, especially the study of animals. Aristotle  holds that we only have scientific knowledge of  necessities, I argue, as a way to reconcile his view that  knowledge requires persisting agreement with the world and  his view that scientific knowledge remains stable over  time. Properly understood, Aristotle’s claim does not pose  a threat to the possibility of natural science but rather  is at the heart of an attempt to explain how the study of  nature is possible. We can have scientific knowledge about  changeable and capricious things because the content of our  knowledge strictly extends only to those facts about them  that remain perpetually true on account of their essences.},
      url = {http://knowledge.uchicago.edu/record/1797},
      doi = {https://doi.org/10.6082/uchicago.1797},
}