they are concepts used to describe the world. — Metaphysician Undercover

The concept 'dog' does not bark and wag its tail. His concern with ousia is not a concern about a concept but the living being that barks and wags its tail.

... experience is knowledge of particulars, but art of universals; and actions and the effects produced are all concerned with the particular ... we consider that knowledge and proficiency belong to art rather than to experience, and we assume that artists are wiser than men of mere experience (which implies that in all cases wisdom depends rather upon knowledge); and this is because the former know the cause, whereas the latter do not. For the experienced know the fact, but not the wherefore; but the artists know the wherefore and the cause. (Metaphysics 981a)

The former, that is those who know the universal, know the cause. The cause is not a concept. Concepts do not have energeia and dunamis. Universals do not exist independently. They are not concepts, that is, they do not exist as things of the mind. They are what all things of a kind have in common. But things are not of a kind because they have something in common. All things that are blue are not a natural kind. 'Blue things' is not a universal, although we can have a concept 'blue things'. We can make a distinction between particulars and universals, but that does not mean that universals exist apart from those particulars they are the universal of.

The true form of the thing consists of accidents, — Metaphysician Undercover

Once again, the form of a man, what it is to be a man, is not to be tall. If to be a man is to be tall then short men are not men. If the "true form" of a man is a man's accidents, then there is nothing that is a man, only a bunch of accidents that can apply to a building or a man or anything else that is tall. The fact is, as Aristotle said:

man by man

not a bunch of accidents that might be an elephant or a hummingbird by man. There is something to be a man that is not a man's accidents.

Augustine — Metaphysician Undercover

Thomas Aquinas — Metaphysician Undercover

You may be persuaded by them, but to read Plato and Aristotle through the lens of Augustine and Aquinas, is to read Augustine and Aquinas, not Plato and Aristotle.

I do think it is fair to say that Aristotle has no patience for the 'likely stories' and the devices of myth and poetry employed by Plato. — Paine

Perhaps. But perhaps he is using a different rhetorical strategy. His audience was most likely to have been familiar with Plato's likely stories.

In my opinion, both are Socratic philosophers, that is, zetetic skeptic.

you haven't shown me anything to make think that I'm wrong. — Metaphysician Undercover

Herein lies the problem. Being convinced that you are right there is nothing you can be shown to make you think you are wrong. Aristotle himself would give up.

But it is not clear whether you think you are explaining Aristotle or abandoning him.

If energeia (actuality) and dunamis (potentiality) are just concepts then there is nothing doing any work and nothing being worked on. And yet you say:

...everything indicates that there is potentiality and actuality. — Metaphysician Undercover

Does this mean simply that there is these concepts?

You say:

... his "Metaphysics" the need for an actuality which is prior to material objects, as the cause of the first material form. All material objects are preceded in time by the potential for their existence. But a potential requires something actual to actualize it and become an actual material form — Metaphysician Undercover

Which is it? Are energeia and dunamis just concepts? Are you claiming that there is a need for a concept which is prior to another concept? In what way does a concept cause the first material form?

In the Phaedo Socrates calls the hypothesis of the Forms "safe and ignorant". In addition to the forms he adds natural causes such as fire. (105b-c)

Answer me then, he said, what is it that, present in a body, makes it living?

Cebes: A soul. (105c)

The answer is no longer life but soul.

In the Timaeus the fixed intelligible world of forms is regarded as inadequate. They do not account for motion or change.

Plato was aware of the problem and Aristotle was aware that Plato recognized the problem. The point being, we should not, as is commonly assumed, read Aristotle as a rejection of Plato. An adequate account of the causes of living things must include physical or material and active causes. Certainly more than a concept or representation or map.

What is used in his demonstration that the world is not eternal, is the concepts of potentiality and actuality. — Metaphysician Undercover

What you deny is that potentiality and actuality do not exist apart from those things that they are the potentiality and actuality of. If we cannot agree on that then we cannot agree on what follows from it.

The true form of the thing consists of accidents — Metaphysician Undercover

The "true form"? The form of a living thing, is what it is to be what it is, a man or a dog or a bee. A man being tall or short, is not what it is to be a man.

Therefore potentiality and actuality, as concepts, — Metaphysician Undercover

A concept does not actualize potential.

This is commonly known as the separation between the world and the representation, map and terrain. — Metaphysician Undercover

As long as you think that by potentiality and actuality Aristotle means a representation you will remain hopelessly confused.

… the reason for our present discussion is that it is generally assumed that what is called Wisdom is concerned with the primary causes and principles … (981b)

What is generally assumed is not necessarily what is true. Aristotle’s method is to begin with opinions. At this point he neither affirms or denies this opinion. The question of whether this is what wisdom is remains open. Although he will focus on the primary causes and principles, we should be open to the possibility that the underlying reason for his discussion is not simply to disclose causes and principles but to address the assumption of what wisdom is.

If Aristotle is wise, then, according to what is generally assumed, not only does he know the primary causes and principles, he can teach them. Given his discussion of causes and principles he certainly does give the impression of being wise. But does his discussion teach us to be wise?

Starting where Aristotle does, with man, do we know what it is to be a man? What is the final cause, the telos of man? The question asks us not simply to give an opinion or account of it, but to know it by having achieved it, by the completion of our telos. Aristotle begins by saying that all men by nature desire to know. Is the satisfaction of that desire our telos?

The question of the telos of man is the question of self-knowledge. Socrates said his human wisdom is knowledge of ignorance. This is not expressed as an opinion but as something he knows. Is Aristotle’s wisdom, like that of Socrates, human or is it divine?

If it is through experience that men acquire science and art, then can there be knowledge of what does not come from experience? Our knowledge and experience is limited. We are somewhere between the beginning and the end. Without knowledge of the beginning Aristotle cannot know that the world is or is not eternal. If it comes to be then like all that comes to be it too will perish. He does not know what always was or always will be. Not knowing this he does not know how it was or will be.

So why does Aristotle make so many theological claims? I think the answer has something to do with the difference between opinion and knowledge, what can be taught and learned, and the competition between theology and philosophy. Aristotle was able to give his listeners and readers opinions that they could hold as true, but he could not give them knowledge of such things. As if to be told is to know.

Based on what is generally assumed about wisdom, Aristotle appears to be wise.

We consider first, then, that the wise man knows all things, so far as it is possible, without having knowledge of every one of them individually … (982a)

What does “so far as it is possible” mean? How far is it possible to know all things? Without the possibility of knowledge of beginnings and ends the wise man’s knowledge falls short of knowledge of all things. But the theologian claims to have and teach knowledge of all things.

The paragraph ends:

… for the wise man should give orders, not receive them; nor should he obey others, but the less wise should obey him. (982a)

There is then an important political dimension to the Metaphysics. The battle between the philosopher and the theologian is a continuation of the ancient quarrel between poetry and philosophy. Aristotle’s strategy in this quarrel is the same as Plato’s. Just as Plato presents a philosophical poetry, Aristotle presents a philosophical theology. It is better for these opinions to be generally assumed rather than some others. It is better to hold these opinions then succumb to misologic and nihilism. Better to give the appearance of knowledge than reveal our absence of knowledge.

The wisdom that Aristotle teaches through arguments that confound us is human rather than divine wisdom, knowledge of our ignorance. But it is not always wise to reveal our ignorance.

None of this is meant to suggest that attempting to understand the Metaphysics is a waste of time. Aristotle does teach those who attempt to work through his arguments how to think, but if there is a failure to learn it is our failure not his. In addition, the limits of our knowledge does not preclude knowledge of how to inquire into those things that lie between the beginning and end.

anything composed of matter is corruptible — Metaphysician Undercover

That is the point of the quote above:

... for the actually existent is always generated from the potentially existent by something which is actually existent—e.g., man by man ...

The former precludes the latter under the conditions of your conditional proposition: "If the world is eternal then there can be no prior potentiality or actuality or prime mover." — Metaphysician Undercover

You take part of the argument and argue against it as it it were the whole:

Potentiality and actuality does not exist apart from those things they are the potentiality and actuality of. If the world is eternal there has always been something with potentiality and actuality. No potentiality and actuality prior to the world.

There is nothing to indicate that the world might be eternal. — Metaphysician Undercover

In the Physics he argues that it is.

there is potentiality and actuality. — Metaphysician Undercover

The potentiality and actuality of what? There can be no potentiality and actuality of something that is not. Potentiality and actuality does not exist apart from those things they are the potentiality and actuality of.

So that possibility, that the world is eternal and there no potentiality or actuality is easily excluded as unreal. — Metaphysician Undercover

The former does not preclude the latter. It not the denial of potentiality or actuality, but rather the affirmation that they are the potentiality and actuality of some thing rather than nothing.

I thought that was what you had in mind. No problem interrupting the chain of interruptions.

Here's a mathematical question: how many posts does it take for a topic to move off topic?

You got it incorrectly. It's not "the opinion of the wise man". — L'éléphant

Thanks for pointing that out. I corrected it. Not the wise man's opinions but opinions about the wise man.

That's why you got lost there for a second. — L'éléphant

Not lost. Jut a typo. The question about whether Aristotle is wise is related to the question of our opinions about the wise man. I will have a bit more to say about this.

Potentiality and actuality (including prime movers) do not exist apart from the beings they are the potentiality and actuality of.

Having grasped hold of a life raft you are unaware of how problematic all of this is. You overlook the problems because you believe Aristotle has given you the answer.

If the world is eternal then there can be no prior potentiality or actuality or prime mover.

But prior in time to these potential entities are other actual entities from which the former are generated; for the actually existent is always generated from the potentially existent by something which is actually existent—e.g., man by man, cultured by cultured—there is always some prime mover; and that which initiates motion exists already in actuality. (1049b)

There is no God who actualizes the potential of man. Man comes from man. Prior to this man is another man, but there is no prior to man.

It is also prior in a deeper sense; because that which is eternal is prior in substantiality to that which is perishable, and nothing eternal is potential. (1050b)

The world is eternal. There is no prior potential that is actualized. No God that get things rolling.

Again I could care less about any of your propaganda. — NOS4A2

The Senate Intelligence Committee findings, led by eight Republicans and seven Democrats. are not my "propaganda". The fact that the Trump Organization was found guilty of fraud is not my "propaganda". The grand jury's indictment recommendations in the Georgia investigation into election interference are not my "propaganda".

The term ontologyitself is modern, 1720.

Aristotelian-Thomist philosophy — Wayfarer

I agree with those who keep Aristotle and Thomas separate. One reason for this is that Aquinas' Latin distorts Aristotle's Greek. As it has been put: Aristotle was not an Aristotelian.

So to exist is to be separate, to be this as distinct from that. — Wayfarer

A being, ousia, substance is not just something distinct but something particular, some "what".

There are many senses in which a thing may be said to 'be', but all that 'is' is related to one central point, one definite kind of thing, and is not said to 'be' by a mere ambiguity. (Metaphysics Book 4, Chapter 1)

There used to be an explicit statement that 'ontology' was derived from the first-person participle of 'to be' (i.e. 'I am') on one of the online dictionaries, but it's gone now. — Wayfarer

Perhaps you meant this:
Ousia

The term οὐσία is an Ancient Greek noun, formed on the feminine present participle of the verb εἰμί, eimí, meaning "to be, I am"

If you are referring to this:

In my analysis, it basically stems from Descartes' designation of mind or consciousness as 'res cogitans' which means 'thinking thing' ('res' being Latin for 'thing or object')*. This leads to the disastrously oxymoronic conception of 'a thinking substance' which is the single biggest contributor to modern physicalist philosophy. — Wayfarer

I do not agree with him. I don't think Descartes plays a significant role in the work being done in cognitive science, but he does play a role in historical accounts. I don't think that Aristotle is of much help either. I do think it important to examine things in terms of wholes, but I also think that there are two senses of reductionism that are also important. The first is in terms of subsystems and the second the rejection of the supernatural.

Spoken like a true Trumpster. Dear Leader would be pleased by your loyalty.

Despite Trump's claim that there was no collusion and Barr's attempt to sweep it under the rug, the Mueller investigation did not exonerate him. Whether you call it collusion or something else, the Senate Intelligence Committee found clear evidence of cooperation between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin. Here is a summary of the findings. But you can safely ignore it because by your logic Trump and his campaign did no wrong.

As to tax evasion, the Trump Organization was found guilty of fraud and fined 1.6 million dollars.

There are several ongoing cases. I won't go into any of it because by your logic, despite whatever the facts reveal, you are right to conclude he did nothing wrong and you are likely to be right.

I think you overstate the case. It is not simply a matter of style but of philology and context. We need to be aware of how key terms were used and how they have changed over time. With regard to context, the beliefs and arguments he is directly and indirectly responding to as well as political constraints. The saying, attributed to Aristotle:

I will not allow the Athenians to sin twice against philosophy.

is applicable not only to his flight from Athens rather than face charges of impiety, but, as he learned from Plato, to speak in a theologically favorable way.

This makes almost exactly the point I am seeing to make: that 'what exists' is only ever an aspect or facet of 'what is', — Wayfarer

Isn't Kahn's point that existence is not an adequate translation of einia because to "step out" is to step out from something? Given Parmenides denial of not being, being cannot be a stepping out from something, from non-being. In addition, as @Paine pointed out, Parmenides' being precludes becoming.

I’m now supposed to give a hoot over Murdoch disagreeing with Fox News anchors about the results of an election? — NOS4A2

He did not disagree with them. Fox News knowingly peddles lies about the election. Is there any evidence that he attempted to stop them?

Now you may not give a hoot that a major "news" network did this, but it is a serious matter. It is not simply that what the claimed turned out to be wrong, they were well aware that it was not the truth.

Murdoch saying he doubted their conclusions does not mean he cannot control his own employees. The news hosts themselves doubt the truth of what they reported. It is not about the truth. It is about pandering to their viewers.

It may be that this puppet master story is like a version of Pinocchio.

That is why the theological principle "God" is much better suited to philosophy, — Metaphysician Undercover

Time to change your username to Metaphysician Uncovered or much better suited Theologian Uncovered.

All material objects are preceded in time by the potential for their existence. — Metaphysician Undercover

Where exactly in Metaphysics does he say that material objects are preceded in time by the potential for their existence? Where does Aristotle say that God acts on potentiality to make it into something actual?

Lacking extraordinary will power I am going to respond.

The fact that you find it repugnant to think that order could emerge from disorder, tells us nothing about what occurs in nature or the rational mind.

... pre-material final cause — Metaphysician Undercover

You can posit a pre-material final cause but in doing so you part ways with Aristotle. The final cause is always the end or telos of some being and does not exist apart from it.

... we need to maintain a separation between pre-material final cause, and post-material formal cause, in the way that Aristotle demonstrated — Metaphysician Undercover

Where does Aristotle demonstrate this? We can distinguish between the final and formal cause but they are always at work together within a being.

I made no such claim. — Dfpolis

Right, you did not say what I did not say you said.

As @Paine rightly points out, it is not just a problem for reductionists. How is it that there are conscious beings? After all, not all beings are conscious.

... for it is not affected or altered. Hence this is a different form from movement; for movement is the activity of the incomplete, while activity proper is different, the activity of the complete. — ibid.431a4

This lends support to the claim that the active intellect is an unmoved mover. It does not move but moves or causes the passive intellect to know.

By leaving out an essential feature you are misrepresenting it.
— Fooloso4
Asked and answered. — Dfpolis

Asked and evaded.

what if anything are you actually explaining with regard to consciousness?
— Fooloso4
That it is not reducible to a physical process. — Dfpolis

At best you have pointed to Aristotle's idea of the active intellect, which he says is immaterial. It is not a process because it is unchanging. Your equating the active intellect with consciousness is just something you have claimed.

I have not misrepresented it. I said it was controversial and gave my understanding. — Dfpolis

By leaving out an essential feature you are misrepresenting it.

But, it is not relevant to my topic any more than the related discussion of the Unmoved Mover. — Dfpolis

If you use Aristotle's term but do not indicate that you mean by it something different than Aristotle did, then it is relevant. But it is not clear that you do mean something different. Why the obfuscation?

Sufficiently vague. Consciousness, the operation of the agent intellect, is the operation of our power of awareness.
— Fooloso4
The quoted text is relating the agent intellect to phenomenology, not explaining its dynamics. — Dfpolis

That is the question: what if anything are you actually explaining with regard to consciousness?

You go on to say:

Consequently, consciousness, the operation of the agent intellect, is not a niggling anomaly that
can be ignored until explained as a neurophysical side effect, but an experiential primitive
essential to understanding human rationality. Certain concepts, such as <electric charge>, are
an experiential primitive accepted, not because they are theoretically reducible, but because they are epistemologically primitive – reflecting contingent realities that cannot be, or at least are not, further explained.

It is as if you said: "Hard problem? What hard problem? There is no hard problem. Consciousness just is. No further explanation is needed or possible."

Fox News "fair and balanced", balancing the truth with lies.

So, you are a Kantian, holding "that the categories are the a priori conditions for knowing." — Dfpolis

No, I am not a Kantian. As I said I was correcting your misunderstanding and misrepresentation of him.

Here's the difference: I regard philosophy as inquiry into questions and problems. You think you have the answers.

You are using his terminology but have neglected to indicate that you are using in in ways that differ from his.
— Fooloso4
Do you have an example in mind? — Dfpolis

We have been over this. The term 'agent intellect (νοῦς ποιητικóς)'.

To state his entire position would take volumes, and no one has yet done so to universal satisfaction. — Dfpolis

It does not take volumes to say deathless and everlasting. Although, admittedly, it would take some effort to explain it. Better for you to just skip over it.

How do we experience coming to know sensible objects? As attending to, and becoming aware of, sensory contents. Thus, the agent intellect is our power of awareness – and its operation is
consciousness. Qualia are the contingent forms of actualized sensory intelligibility.

Sufficiently vague. Consciousness, the operation of the agent intellect, is the operation of our power of awareness. You might as well say that we are conscious because we have the power of consciousness.

To say that the agent intellect is a deathless and everlasting power seems to be right in line with your metaphysics of God and Mind. But you side step:

My article made no claim about immortality. — Dfpolis

No, it is based on understanding, from experience, how we judge - — Dfpolis

So you've said. As if that settles the matter.

for categorization is a judgement, <a is an instance of b>. — Dfpolis

The category 'b' must exist in order for 'a' to be an instance of it.

According to Kant there cannot be knowing without the mind's categories.
— Fooloso4
This is the worst case of an argument from authority -- citing Kant in support of Kantianism. — Dfpolis

First, a statement of Kant's position is not an argument in favor of it. Second, if one is a Kantian then what one claims must be supported by Kant. Just as if you are an Aristotelian, as you say you are, then what you claim about Aristotle should be supported by citing Aristotle.

In any case, an attempt to understand Kant does not make me a Kantian.

It is categorization without knowing what one is categorizing that is incoherent. — Dfpolis

What is categorized are the manifold of sense intuitions.

The bottom line is that I did not discuss Kant in my article, so this discussion does not relate to the topic. — Dfpolis

So, your questionable claims about Kant do not relate to the topic of your paper. So we can move on.

My article made no claim about immortality. So, are you concluding that our capacity to be aware of contents makes us immortal? — Dfpolis

You are starting to face the problem. Based on your claim that our power of awareness is agent intellect, and that according Aristotle the agent intellect is deathless and everlasting, then it can only be ours as long as we are living beings. It is then separable from us.

So, what of value did Kant add? — Dfpolis

The claim that the categories are the a priori conditions for knowing and that knowledge is not of how things are in themselves but how they are for us.

meaning nothing more than neural signal processing — Dfpolis

You made the distinction between neural signal processing and a recognition of meaning. A variation of your claim that we can't get there from here, that we will never understand consciousness by studying neural signal processing, that conscious is not the result of neural activity.

I am not arguing that my view is Aristotle's view, I am only crediting Aristotle with inspiring my view. — Dfpolis

You are doing more than that. You are using his terminology but have neglected to indicate that you are using in in ways that differ from his.

mind cannot categorize without first knowing — Dfpolis

That is an opinion stated as a matter of fact. According to Kant there cannot be knowing without the mind's categories. There is nothing incoherent in the idea that there are innate categories of mind. It is no more or less incoherent than Aristotle's claim that the agent intellect is deathless and everlasting, the activity of the unmoved mover and God according to Metaphysics, Book XII, ch.7-10 or possibly but not definitively human according to De Anima. Or your claim that the active intellect is consciousness and thereby the consciousness of human beings is deathless and everlasting.

That is hardly a cogent argument for Kantianism. — Dfpolis

It's not. It is an attempt to clear up your misunderstanding and misrepresentation of Kant.

So, do you think his theory contributes to understanding reality? — Dfpolis

To the extent seeing and knowing are not independent of the seer and knower, yes.

I did not say signal processing was simple. That is twisting my words. — Dfpolis

Here is what you said in context:

Kant would argue that in order for there to be recognized content the mind must organize and make sense of what is given to it, that is, sensory intuitions.
— Fooloso4

But it cannot do so at the sensory level, which is simply neural signal processing — Dfpolis

But, that is not the question I am addressing in my article. — Dfpolis

First of all, whether seeing and knowing are receptive or conceptive, passive or constructive has direct bearing on what you are addressing. It relates to the question of the activity of the active intellect.

Second, this discussion has not been limited to the article. If you make claims about Kant or Spinoza or anyone else then those claims become part of the discussion.

Sensation cannot impose abstract categories. — Dfpolis

It doesn't, the mind does.

To categorize we must judge ... — Dfpolis

According to Kant the categories of the understanding are a priori.

Are you now abandoning naturalism? — Dfpolis

You are confusing the attempt to understand Kant and my stance on naturalism.

But it cannot do so at the sensory level, which is simply neural signal processing — Dfpolis

There are two issues here. The first is your mischaracterization of Kant, leading to your declaring it prima facie impossible and incoherent. The second is I doubt that neuroscientists studying neural signal processing regard it as "simple".

I disagree because it is incoherent. — Dfpolis

It appears incoherent to you because what you are criticising is your own misrepresentation.

The question of whether seeing and knowing are receptive or conceptive, passive or constructive.
— Fooloso4
This is not a complete sentence, and I cannot complete it in a sensible way. — Dfpolis

It should be: The question is whether ...

Sensing and knowing — Dfpolis

I did not say sensing and knowing, I said seeing and knowing.

I have Windows 10 and can open all my files. Message me with your email address, let me know what you want, and I will send it in a format you can open (docx? pdf?). — Dfpolis

I think it would be more useful to copy and paste or at least summarize the article so that it could be part of this discussion.

As Kant has no facts to be categorized, there is no basis for categorization, — Dfpolis

,
The basis for categorizing sensory intuitions, not facts, is the a priori categorical structure of the human mind.

...as the mind categorizes based on recognized content. — Dfpolis

This assertion is not a refutation. Kant would argue that in order for there to be recognized content the mind must organize and make sense of what is given to it, that is, sensory intuitions. You may not agree but that does not mean the theory is incoherent. It coheres quite nicely. The question [is - correction made] whether seeing and knowing are receptive or conceptive, passive or constructive.

A follow up. You skipped right over the point:

According to Kant, it is not that the mind organizes or categories facts ... — Fooloso4

I get a message stating that I cannot open files from Microsoft 95 or earlier

Not "according to the categories," as I understand him, but by imposing the categories. — Dfpolis

The categories are the architecture of mind. They are not imposed in the sense that one can either impose them or not. They are the way the mind makes sense of sense data.

I would ask you to reflect on your claim, "this organizing, categorizing and synthesizing activity of the mind is the condition of possibility for empirical knowledge." It is prima facie impossible. Why? Because the mind could not possibly organize, or categorize facts it does not know. — Dfpolis

According to Kant, it is not that the mind organizes or categories facts, it organizes and categorizes the manifold of sensory intuitions according to the categories of the understanding.

... pre-given capacities or attributes. — Joshs

Aristotle begins with living beings that have certain capacities, including consciousness. If one starts here there is no answer to a question that is not asked, no solution to a problem that is not raised. No hard problem, or so it seems Dfpolis would have us think.

I suspect that if Aristotle were around today he would not be an Aristotelian. For one, in line with contemporary science, his concept of matter or material (hule) would have undergone a radical transformation. He would retain his focus on intelligible wholes and living beings, but he would no longer regard matter itself as something unformed. Matter or material is self-forming. Matter too is "being at work", energeia. A living organism is not simply a whole but a whole of wholes, a system of systems, self-organizing structuring structures.

I am not writing a commentary on De Anima. I am discussing the Hard Problem. — Dfpolis

'Active or agent intellect' is a term of art for Aristotle. An adequate discussion of it does not require a commentary on De Anima, but if you claiming that consciousness is the operation of the agent intellect, then it requires a discussion of what Aristotle actually said about it rather than skip over an essential point. If what you mean by agent intellect is what Aristotle said about it then your claim that consciousness is the operation of the agent intellect is the claim that consciousness is deathless and everlasting. Seems like an important point to skip over.

I said it was controversial and offered my argument to resolve the controversy. — Dfpolis

You didn't offer an argument. You simply chose one side.

If we abstract away physical reality, anything can happen — Dfpolis

When talking about physical reality it makes no sense to abstract away physical reality. To abstract away from physical reality and claim that it is logically possible for rocks to become hummingbirds is sophistry.

I am never using Aristotle as an authority. I am crediting him as a source. — Dfpolis

You are doing more than that. You do not simply cite him as a source, your argument is based on his. You refer to him 36 times in the article.

You say in the discussion:

I am an Aristotelian. — Dfpolis

and response to someone

this is not the Aristotelian view. — Dfpolis

By definition, an abstraction focuses on some aspects of experience while prescinding from others. As it is based on experience, it is necessarily a posteriori. — Dfpolis

When you "abstract away physical reality" you are not focusing on some aspect of experience. It is an escape to never never land. There can be no experience of such a world where everything that is not a logical contradiction can and does happen. The claim is not a posteriori.