Selected bibliography on Aristotle's Concept of Metaphysics

Agamben, Giorgio. 2024. First Philosophy Last Philosophy: Western Knowledge Between Metaphysics and the Sciences. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Aiken, Wyatt D. 1991. "Essence and existence, transcendentalism and phenomenalism: Aristotle's answers to the questions of ontology." The Review of Metaphysics no. 45:29–55.

"The first exhaustively scientific, speculative inquiry into the notion and nature of essence in the Western philosophical tradition is found in Aristotle's Metaphysics. In contrast to the earlier Greek philosophers and Plato, after considering the problem of being and change Aristotle reached the conclusion that the essential identity of material phenomena, or ousia, is an immanent and inseparable quality that forms the identity of each particular phenomenon. In Aristotle's concept, however, which constitutes the original form of phenomenal realism, ousia is not "it"-self some-thing or some it. For though its presence may certainly be speculatively implied, "it" is not. Following Aristotle, though, and for reasons extraneous to the theme of this present article, the speculative inquiry into the nature of essence and phenomenality deviated from the orientation that Aristotle initially imputed to that study, evolving in a philosophical milieu whose theoretical propensity was predominantly transcendental. This article, then, focuses on the problematic of essential identity in the Western transcendental tradition, and, more particularly, seeks to contrast and compare the essence of the transcendental philosophers against the ousia of Aristotle's metaphysic." (p. 29)

Aubenque, Pierre. 1962. "Aristotle and the Problem of Metaphysics." Philosophy Today no. 6:75–84.

"The. followmg article was first given as a lecture before the Kant Society at the Technical University of Berlin on June 5. 1959. Since then Professor Aubenque has developed the themes presented and published them in a book. Le problème de l'être chez Aristote. Essai sur la problematique aristotélicienne. [Paris: Presses Univeraitaires de France. 1962]"

"It is therefore not the purpose of this exposition to add another commentary to the many in existence, nor to propose something new about Aristotle, but rather to forget what is new about Aristotle, what is systematic, finished, satisfactory and to try to hear the silent word of Aristotle himself in the confused original.

"Aporia

In a famous and often repeated expression, at the beginning of book VII of the Metaphysics, Aristotle says that the chief question of metaphysics is "one which was raised of old and is raised now and always, and is always the subject of perplexity, namely, what being is."

Plato, in the Sophist 244a, had used the same word (aporein) to express the ever-recurring perplexity of man, as he seeks the meaning of being. "We believed for some time Plato says, "to hear known what we really mean when we used the expression ... but now we have run into difficulties.''

What therefore is aporia? Aristotle is the first philosopher who theorized on his own perplexity and left us an instruction on the subject. Aporia suggests poros, a ford, way, passage. We are in aporia when no way is open to us, or when we hesitate before several ways.

But how should one understand this not-being-on-the-way? It can have a twofold significance:

1. We do not know the correct way;

2. There is in reality no way.

In the first case our quandary is an accident whose fault lies in the ineptitude of our understanding. In more abstract terms: the answer to our question lies somewhere in a world of essences, an idea-heaven as, for instance, the solution to a mathematical problem; but the way to the answer, the nature of the proof, we have not yet discovered. This kind of aporia arises, for instance, in the Platonic myth of the cave when the captive reaches the light and is blinded by the clarity of the ideas.(2) The ideas are there before his eyes, and the way to them is clear in itself, but he cannot follow it on account of a passing weakness in his soul.

But this is not the meaning of the Aristotelian aporia. Aristotle does not apply the term aporia in the strict sense to a question such as the unresolved mathematical problem of the squaring of the circle. With him aporia is not a consequence of our ignorance, but lies in the thing itself. "The difficulty of our thinking points to a 'knot' in the object." (II, 1, 995a 30). When our difficulty is a genuine aporia, it corresponds to a difficulty in the thing itself.

In Book II Aristotle says: "Perhaps, too, as difficulties are of two kinds, the cause of the present difficulty is not in the facts but in us." (II 1, 993b 8). In another place he says that the first are pros hymas or kath' hymas, the second kath'auto. It is with the latter that metaphysics begins." (p. 75)

———. 2017. "Science Regained." In Contemporary Encounters with Ancient Metaphysics, edited by Greenstine, Abraham Jacob and Johnson, Ryan J., 119–137. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

"Pierre Aubenque's "Science Regained" (1962; translated by Clayton Shoppa) was originally published as the concluding chapter of Le Probleme de l'Etre chez Aristote, one of the most important and original books on Aristotle's Metaphysics. In this essay, Aubenque contends that the impasses which beset the project of first philosophy paradoxically become its greatest accomplishments.

Although science stabilizes motion and thereby introduces necessity into human cognition, human thought always occurs amidst an inescapable movement of change and contingency. Aristotle's ontology, as a discourse that strives to achieve being in its unity, succeeds by means of the failure of the structure of its own approach: the search of philosophy - dialectic - becomes the philosophy of the search. Aubenque traces this same structure of scission, mediation, and recovery across Aristotelian discussions of theology, motion, time, imitation, and human activity." (p. 7)

Bäck, Allan. 2004. "What is Being qua Being?" In Idealization XI: Historical Studies on Abstraction and Idealization., edited by Coniglione, Francesco, Poli, Roberto and Rollinger, Robin, 37–58. Amsterdam: Rodopi.

Poznan Studies in the Philosophy of the Sciences and the Humanities - Vol. 82.

Abstract: "I offer truth conditions for propositions about being qua being in Aristotle's philosophy. I show that in general Aristotle views expressions of the form "qua S" in "S qua S is P" (or "S is P qua S") as making a claim not about the subject "S", but about the predication of "P" of "S". I develop necessary and sufficient truth conditions for propositions of the form "S qua S is P". Finally, I show how this analysis satisfactorily covers what Aristotle says about being qua being in the Metaphysics ."

Baracchi, Claudia. 2008. Aristotle’s Ethics as First Philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Beach, John D. 1957. "Separate Entity as the Subject of Aristotle’s Metaphysics." The Thomist no. 20:75–95.

Bell, Ian. 2004. Metaphysics as an Aristotelian Science. Sankt Augustin: Academia Verlag.

Benardete, Seth. 1978. "On Wisdom and Philosophy: The First Two Chapters of Aristotle's Metaphysics A." The Review of Metaphysics no. 32:205–215.

Bolton, Robert. 1994. "Aristotle's Conception of Metaphysics as a Science." In Unity, Identity, and Explanation in Aristotle's Metaphysics, edited by Scaltsas, Theodore, Charles, David and Gill, Mary Louise, 321–354. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Brentano, Franz. 1975. On the Several Senses of Being in Aristotle. Berkeley: University of California Press.

English translation of Von der mannigfachen Bedeutung des Seienden nach Aristoteles (1862).

Bressan, Lisa. 2013. "Aristotle's Metaphysics Book K in Paul Natorp's neokantian perspective." Lexicon Philosophicum: International Journal for the History of Texts and Ideas no. 1:153–178.

Abstract: "In the modern age, the particular fact that qualifies book K of Aristotle’s Metaphysics as the only text in which the object of the science of being qua being is identified with the object of theology made the scholars to doubt its authenticity. The most important stance in this regard is that of P. Natorp, who, in the famous essay of 1888 “Über Aristoteles’ Metaphysik 1-8 K, 1065 a 26”, recovering and studying in the light of the Neokantian philosophical perspective some observations of the leading scholars of Aristotle, such as V. Rose, L. Spengel, F. Überweg and W. Christ, tried to demonstrate its inauthenticity. For Natorp, since the ὅν ἁπλόος or ή ὅν and the ὅν τι και λεγος τι are opposite entities, and since the one excludes the other, a science dealing with being in general is superior to all those sciences treating a particular field of being and cannot be identified with any of them, not even with the most important one. As a matter of fact, Aristotle genuine conception about the structure and meaning of metaphysics is that the πρώτη φιλοσοφία must also deal with the unmovable and immaterial being, but not only with it. On the contrary, this reading should be considered as the result of the interpolations made in the text by one of the compilers of the Metaphysics. Natorp observes that the most significant among these interpolations concerns the whole book K, which, according to the scholar, should lead to expunge the work of Aristotle (cf. P. Natorp, “Thema und Disposition der aristotelischen Metaphysik”, Philosophical Monatshefte, 24, 1888, p. 37-65, 540-574)."

Broadier, Sarah. 2012. "A Science of First Principles {Metaphysics A2)." In Aristotle's Metaphysics Alpha: Symposium Aristotelicum, edited by Steel, Carlos, 41–67. New York: Oxford University Press.

Brumbaugh, Robert S. 1954. "Aristotle's Outline of the Problems of First Philosophy." The Review of Metaphysics no. 7:511–521.

Cheng, Chung-Hwan. 1976. Sophia: The Science Aristotle Sought. Hildesheim: Georg Olms.

Chroust, Anton-Hermann. 1961. "The Origin of "Metaphysics"." The Review of Metaphysics no. 14:601–616.

Code, Alan. 1996. "Owen on the development of Aristotle's metaphysics." In Aristotle's Philosophical Development: Problems and Prospects, edited by Wians, William, 303–325. London: Rowman & Littlefield.

———. 1997. "Aristotle's Metaphysics as a Science of Principles." Revue Internationale de Philosophie no. 51:357–378.

Costanzo, Jason. 2021. "Aristotle and the Classical Paradigm of Wisdom." Philosophy International Journal no. 4:1–10.

Abstract: "The essay examines the ancient Greek origin of philosophy relative to the concept of wisdom. The nature of the sage is first considered. The sage is one who is deemed wise in his or her performances. But what is ‘wise’ about such performances? The Socratic denial of sage status is considered in reference to this. Socrates concludes that he is not wise as the gods are wise, but that he is wise insofar as he knows that he is not wise. The apparent contradiction is resolved through the distinction between human (finite) and divine (infinite) wisdom. The latter notion is further examined in the works of Aristotle who articulates the “classical paradigm” of philosophy in pursuit of infinite wisdom. The attributes of infinite wisdom are identified, and the essay concludes with a discussion of the sagely performance of infinite wisdom, Aristotle himself serving as the representative example."

Dorter, Kenneth. 1972. "First Philosophy: Metaphysics or Epistemology?" Dialogue no. 11:1–22.

Duarte, Shane. 2007. "Aristotle's Theology and its Relation to the Science of Being qua Being." Apeiron no. 40:267–318.

Ferejohn, Michael T. 1980. "Aristotle on focal meaning and the unity of science." Phronesis.A Journal for Ancient Philosophy no. 25:117–128.

In chapter Two of book IV of the "Metaphysics", Aristotle alludes to an argument that the Platonic vision of constructing a science of being "qua" being is made possible by the fact that the verb "to be", while categorially ambiguous, also exhibits a special sort of ambiguity to which he gives the name "focal meaning." This paper contains a reconstruction of the focal meaning analysis of "to be", from which are extracted principles which are shown to form the structure of Aristotle's argument for the science of being "qua" being.

Fraser, Kyle A. 2002. "Aristoteles ex Aristotele: A response to the analytic reconstruction of Aristotelian ontology." Dyonisius no. 20:51–69.

———. 2002. "Demonstrative science and the science of Being qua Being." Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy no. 22:43–82.

Abstract: "This paper defends the view that Aristotle’s ontological enquiry into being qua being, inaugurated in Metaphysics Γ (Gamma), falls under the rubric of demonstrative science, as defined in the Posterior Analytics. Ontology aims—in principle—to derive necessary truths about beings in general, just as Aristotelian zoology, for instance, aims to derive necessary truths about animal being. This proposal runs contrary to the verdict defended, inter alias, by G. E. L. Owen and more recently T. Irwin, who hold that ontology is chiefly a development of the procedures of Aristotelian dialectic, as laid out in the Topics. On their view, ontology does not satisfy the condition of homogeneity, which is central to the Posterior Analytics’ conception of a science: viz. the condition that every demonstrative science must be defined in its scope by a single genus of entities, as zoology is defined by the genus of animals, or botany by the genus of plants. The heterogeneity of the categories of being—the fact that they cannot be subsumed under a common genus—is presumed to indicate a dialectical mode of enquiry, on the grounds that dialectic is conceived by Aristotle as the method appropriate for universal investigations, i.e. investigations that are not restricted to a special genus. Thus the structure of being as being is not to be established demonstratively, according to a closed axiomatic system, but is, in Aubenque’s words, ‘toujours à ⟨rechercher⟩’. The structure and methods of demonstrative science find no application in ontology: ‘aucune démarche du discours scientifique, tel qu’Aristote le décrit dans la première partie de son Organon, ne trouve d’application dans le cas de l'être’."[*]

Pierre Aubenque, Le problème de l'être chez Aristote, Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 1962 p. 249.

Frede, Michael. 1987. "The Unity of General and Special Metaphysics: Aristotle's Conception of Metaphysics." In Essays in Ancient Philosophy, 81–95. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

———. 2008. "Aristotle’s Account of the Origins of Philosophy." In The Oxford Handbook of Presocratic Philosophy, edited by Curd, Patricia and Graham, Daniel W., 501–529. New York: Oxford University Press.

Gill, Mary Louise. 2005. "Aristotle’s Metaphysics Reconsidered." Journal of the History of Philosophy no. 43:223–241.

———. 2006. "First philosophy in Aristotle." In A Companion to Ancient Philosophy, edited by Gill, Mary Louise and Pellegrin, Pierre, 347–373. Malden: Blackwell.

Gómez-Lobo, Alfonso. 1978. "Aristotle's First Philosophy and the Principles of Particular Disciplines. An Interpretation of "Metaph." E, 1, 1025 b 10-18." Zeitschrift für philosophische Forschung no. 32:183–194.

Hahn, Robert. 1979. "Aristotle as ontologist or theologian? Or, aristotelian form in the context of the conflicting doctrines of being in the Metaphysics." Southwestern Journal of Philosophy no. 10:79–88.

"Scholars have believed that there are two apparently conflicting doctrines of being in the "metaphysics" -- one which treats being qua being as the concept of the most general object, comprehending both sensible and supersensible being alike, traditionally identified as the "ens commune"; the other which treats being qua being as the concept of the separate and divine entities, traditionally identified as the "ens perfectissimum". Following Owen, the conflicting positions of the tradition of Greek commentators are contrasted with those Aristotelianizing christians of the middle ages; scholarship, in the last century, on this problem of the conflicting doctrines of being in the "Metaphysics" is considered. Next, it is argued that primary being for Aristotle is understood as formal cause, the meaning of which is considered in terms of the separate and divine entities, the "ens perfectissimum". Finally, an attempt is made to explain the inclusion of the supposedly conflicting doctrine of the "ens commune", as a means of clarifying the nature of primary being as formal cause."

Halper, Edward C. 1987. ""Being qua Being" in Metaphysics Γ." Elenchos no. 8:43–62.

———. 2009. "Aristotle’s Generic Being." The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter no. 368:1–8.

Harré, Rom. 1997. "Forward to Aristotle: the case for a hybrid ontology." Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour no. 27:173–191.

Abstract: "It behooves a science to pay careful attention to its ontological assumptions, especially in cases where they are likely to be complex. Psychology seems to require both material states of humans as organisms, and symbolic productions. But we must be careful not to think that the grammars of the latter are some sort of superscience. The duality shows up strongly in the difference between skilled perfomances and their material enabling conditions. I argue that the dual ontology appears in a science of psychology as a hybrid grammar. If we try to colonize one or the other side of the hybrid by terms from the other, the transplanted terms make no sense in their new surroundings. We find ourselves with a double or hybrid grammar and three main patterns of action to explain, causal, habitual and monitored. By assimilating the latter two under the symbolic ontology apparent problems dissolve. This is illustrated with a sketch of the sources and character of the sense of personal uniqueness."

Husain, Martha. 1981. "The multiplicity in unity of being 'qua' being in Aristotle's 'pros hen' equivocity." The New Scholasticism no. 55:208–218.

"Pros hen equivocity unquestionably plays a central role in Aristotle's philosophy, both as a linguistic and as an ontological structure. This paper attempts to answer both G.E.L. Owen's charge that the secondary senses of being are reducible to the primary and D. W. Hamlyn's charge that the dependence of secondary on primary being cannot be understood concretely. It shows that Aristotle carries out the program of "Metaphysics" vii, 1 in the "Physics" where the dependence of secondary on primary being can be understood concretely in terms of characteristic ranges within which all processes of quantitative and qualitative change occur. Thus he is able to preserve both the irreducible multiplicity of the categorial senses of being and their unity, and so pros hen equivocity."

Ibrulj, Nijaz. 2023. "Aristotle's First Philosophy as Analytical Epistemology." The Logical Foresight-Journal for Logic and Science no. 3:35–48.

Abstract: "We analyze metaphysical foundations of the logical and epistemological construction of knowledge in Aristotle's First Philosophy. The possibility to define this construction as analytical epistemology is deduced from the fact that Aristotle used the term substance (οὐσία) in many equivalent expressions and different semantic roles, but with the same meaning. The basis for that is a semantic convertibility (άιτιστρέφειν) of the concept of substance (or "what is", or the "essence" of being) in each of the fields of knowledge. Here we have listed the four most general aspects of the meaning of the term substance ( and expanded them to ten aspects in their specific use in the physical, logical, linguistic and ontological domains. Because of all of the above, we define Aristotle's First Philosophy (προτὴ φιλοσοφία) as analytical epistemology, as a system of knowledge and cognition based on a system of many senses of the term substance or conceptual conversions of the term. In doing so, we observed these models of conversion of the meaning of the term substance through four predicative forms: synonymous, homonymous, paraonymous and analogical, which are based on four aspects of the concept of identity as logical sameness: that which is the same / identical (το όμοιον) because it belongs to the same genus (γένος), or belongs to the same / identical (το ίσον) species (εἶδος), or has the same /identical (το ἴσον) number (ἀριθμός) or same/identical semantical relations (το αναλογών). It can be seen that conceptual analogy (αναλογία) is the basis of all semantic transformations through which the concept of substance (οὐσία) goes in analytical epistemology."

Irwin, Terence. 1977. "Aristotle's Discovery of Metaphysics." The Review of Metaphysics no. 31:210–229.

———. 1987. "Ways to First Principles: Aristotle's Methods of Discovery." Philosophical Topics no. 2:109–134.

———. 1988. Aristotle's First Principles. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Jaeger, Werner. 1934. Aristotle: Fundamentals of the History of his Development. Oxford: Clarendon Pres.

English translation by R. Robinson, of Aristoteles: Grundlegung einer Geschichte seiner Entwicklung (1923).

Jaroszyński, Piotr. 2013. "From Ta Metá Ta Physiká to Metaphysics." Espiritu no. 62:9–33.

———. 2018. Metaphysics or Ontology? Leiden: Brill.

Judson, Lindsay. 2018. "First Philosophy In Metaphysics Λ." Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy no. 14:227–277.

———. 2023. "What Is Aristotle’s Metaphysics About?" Phronesis.A Journal for Ancient Philosophy no. 68:269–292.

Abstract: "This paper argues that the discussion in which Aristotle engages in Metaphysics ΖΗ has the same starting-point as natural science: the principles of changing substances.

These inquiries are nonetheless distinct because natural science uses these principles in its detailed investigations into natural substances, whereas ΖΗ reflect on the principles themselves. ΖΗ are an integral part of Aristotle’s inquiry into the principles of all substances, changing and unchanging: they are not merely preliminary to an inquiry into the latter kind. They are also an integral part of Aristotle’s ‘first philosophy’, alongside theology’s study of the nature and activity of unchanging substances."

Kahn, Charles H. 1985. "On the Intended Interpretation of Aristotle's Metaphysics." In Aristoteles: Werk und Wirküng: Erster Band: Aristoteles dund seine Schule, edited by Wiesner, Jürgen, 311–338. Berlin: de Gruyter.

Kirby, Jeremy. 2018. The Gamma Paradoxes: An Analysis of the Fourth Book of Aristotle’s Metaphysics. Lanham: Lexington Books.

Lang, Helen. 1993. "The Structure and Subject of Metaphysics Λ." Phronesis.A Journal for Ancient Philosophy no. 38:257–280.

Leszl, Walter. 1970. Logic and Metaphysics in Aristotle. Padova: Antenore.

———. 1975. Aristotle's Conception of Ontology. Padova: Antenore.

———. 2008. "On the science of being qua being and its platonic background in Aristote." In Aristote. Gamma. Édition, Traduction, Études, edited by Stevens, Annick, 217–265. Louvain-la-Neuve: Peeters.

Ludwig, Walter D. 1989. "Aristotle's Conception of the Science of Being." The New Scholasticism no. 63:379–404.

Madison, Ryan Douglas. 2008. First Philosophy: Aristotle's Concept of Metaphysics.

Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation available at ProQuest Dissertations Express ref. n. 3313153.

Makin, Stephen. 1988. "Aristotle on Unity and Being." Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society no. 34:770–103.

Malcolm, John. 1993. "On the Endangered Species of the Metaphysics." Ancient Philosophy no. 13:79–93.

Marx, Werner. 1954. The Meaning of Aristotle's 'Ontology'. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff.

"This study forms part of a wider investigation which will inquire into the relationship of Ontology and Anthropology. Since the meaning of the term 'ontology' is far from clear, the immediate task is to ask the 'father of ontology' what he might have understood it to mean.

The introductory chapter emphasizes the fact that Aristotle himself never used the term 'ontology.' It should be stressed at once that, even had be used it, he could not very well have employed it to denote the discipline of ontology. For it was only during the era of the schoolmen that the vast and rich body of the prose philosophia carne to be disciplined into classifications; these classifications reflected the Christian, - not the pagan Greek view of all-that-is. The metaphysica specialis dealing with God (theology), his creatures (psychology), and the created universe (cosmology), was differentiated from the metaphysica generalis, dealing with being-in-general (ens commune). This latter discipline amounted to the 'discipline of ontology' (1).

We are not concerned with the meaning of the metaphysica generalis. We wish to approach our problem with an open mind and want to hear directly from Aristotle - on the basis of the text of the prole philosophia alone - which body of thought he might have called his 'ontology' and what its meaning might have been.

Yet however carefully we may attempt to 'bracket' all preconceived notions, it stili remains true that it is an audacious undertaking to pose a definite question to Aristotle. More than two millenia of changing human thought cannot be eliminated, and we know very well that our question, as such, shapes and compels the answer in a definite direction which might easily be adjudged too 'modem'. Moreover, in concentrating on just one motif out of the many variegated and rich themes of the corpus aristotelicum, we are certain to overstress this one motif at the expense of others." (from the Preface, P. VII)

(1) cf. M. Heidegger, Kant und das Problem der Metaphysik, p. 18.

———. 1977. Introduction to Aristotle's Theory of Being as Being. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff.

English translation by Robert S. Schine of: Einführung in Aristoteles' Theorie vom Seienden, Freiburg: Rombach, 1972.

Meister, Samuel. 2023. "Aristotle’s Metaphysics Z as First Philosophy." Phronesis.A Journal for Ancient Philosophy no. 68:78–116.

Abstract: "Discussions of Aristotle’s Metaphysics Z tend to treat it either as an independent treatise on substance and essence or as preliminary to the main conclusions of the Metaphysics. I argue instead that Z is central to Aristotle’s project of first philosophy in the Metaphysics: the first philosopher seeks the first causes of being qua being, especially substances, and in Z Aristotle establishes that essences or forms are the first causes of being of perceptible substances. I also argue that the centrality of Z to first philosophy is compatible with its status as theology."

Menn, Stephen. 1995. "The Editors of the Metaphysics." Phronesis.A Journal for Ancient Philosophy no. 40:202–208.

———. 2010. "Zeller and the Debates about Aristotle’s Metaphysics." In Eduard Zeller. Philosophie- und Wissenschaftsgeschichte im 19. Jahrhundert, edited by Hartung, Gerald, 93–121. Berlin: de Gruyter.

———. 2021. "Aristotle on the Many Senses of Being." Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy no. 59:187–263.

Merlan, Philip. 1960. "Metaphysica generalis in Aristotle? ." In From Platonism to Neoplatonism, 160–220. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff.

Second revised edition (First edition 1953).

———. 1968. "On the terms 'Metaphysics' and 'Being qua Being'." The Monist no. 52:174–194.

Reprinted in: Philip Merlan, Kleine Philosophische Schriften, Herausgegeben von Franciszka Merlan mit einem begeitwort von Hans Wagner, Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1976 pp. 238-258.

Modrak, Deborah. 1995. "Theories of meaning and ontology in Aristotle's Metaphysics." In The Crossroads of Norm and Nature: Essays on Aristotle's Ethics and Metaphysics, edited by Sim, May, 221–234. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.

Mondal, Sudhangshu. 2023. "The concept of Metaphysics: Aristotle." IOSR Journal Of Humanities And Social Science (IOSR-JHSS) no. 28:53–55.

Abstract: "Deduction from prior knowledge is the method of metaphysical investigation. It tries to give a coherent account of the structure of the world, capable of explaining our everyday and scientific perception of the world, and free of contradictions, like foundational mathematics, which is sometimes considered a special case of metaphysics applied to the existence of numbers. Numbers can be defined in a variety of ways in mathematics; In a similar vein, there are a lot of different ways to define goals, properties, and objects in metaphysics, as well as concepts of nature and other entities that are said to make up the world. Although fundamental science's postulated entities, such as atoms and superstrings, may be studied as a special case in metaphysics, its primary focus is on the categories of object, property, and causality that these scientific theories assume. For instance: promoting the scientific theory that "electrons have charge" The task of metaphysics is to investigate what it means for electrons to be "objects," for charge to be a "property," and for both to exist in a topological entity known as "space."There are two broad stances regarding what metaphysics studies as "the world." Metaphysical anti-realism, on the other hand, assumes that the objects studied by metaphysics exist inside the mind of an observer, making the subject a form of introspection and conceptual analysis. This position is of more recent origin. The question of which stance to take belongs instead to epistemology, a different branch of philosophy. Metaphysics itself typically assumes that some stance has been taken on these questions and that it may proceed independently of the choice. In this paper I shall try to explain the notion of metaphysics."

Morrison, Donald. 1993. "The Place of Unity in Aristotle's Metaphysical Project." Proceedings of the Boston Area Colloquium in Ancient Philosophy no. 9:131–166.

Owen, Gwilym Ellis Lane. 1960. "Logic and Metaphysics in Some Earlier Works of Aristotle." In Aristotle and Plato in the Mid-Fourth Century: Papers of the Symposium Aristotelicum held at Oxford in August, 1957, edited by Düring, Ingemar and Owen, Gwilym Ellis Lane, 163–190. Göteborg: Studia Graeca et Latina Gothoburgensia.

Reprinted in: G. E. L. Owen, Logic, Science and Dialectic. Collected Papers in Ancient Greek philosophy, Ithaca: Cornell University Press 1986 pp. 180-199.

Reprinted in: Jonathan Barnes et al. (eds.), Articles on Aristotle. Vol. 3: Metaphysics, London: Duckworth, 1979 pp. 13-32.

———. 1965. "Aristotle on the Snares of Ontology." In New Essays on Plato and Aristotle, edited by Bambrough, Renford, 69–95. New York: Humanities Press.

Reprinted in: G. E. L. Owen, Logic, Science and Dialectic. Collected Papers in Ancient Greek Philosophy, Ithaca: Cornell University Press 1986 pp. 259-278.

Owens, Joseph. 1978. The Doctrine of Being in the Aristotelian Metaphysics: A Study of the Greek Background of Mediaeval Thought. Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies.

Third revised edition (first edition 1951).

———. 1982. "The Doctrine of Being in the Aristotelian Metaphysics - Revisited." In Philosophies of Existence: Ancient and Medieval, edited by Morewedge, Parviz, 33–59. New York: Fordham University Press.

———. 1986. "Is there Any Ontology in Aristotle?" Dialogue. Canadian Philosophical Review no. 25:697–707.

———. 2007. Aristotle's Gradations of Being in Metaphysics E-Z. South Bend: St. Augustine's Press.

Edited with a preface by Lloyd P. Gerson.

Patzig, Günther. 1979. "Theology and Ontology in Aristotle's Metaphysics." In Articles on Aristotle: Vol. 3: Metaphysics, edited by Barnes, Jonathan, Schofield, Martin and Sorabji, Richard, 33–49. London: Duckworth.

Originally published in German as: "Theologie und Ontologie in der "Metaphysik" des Aristoteles", Kant-Studien, 52, 1960/61 pp. 185-205.

Politis, Vasilis, and Steinkrüger, Philipp. 2017. "Aristotle’s second problem about the possibility of a science of being qua being: a reconsideration of Metaphysics Γ 2." Ancient Philosophy:59–89.

Abstract: "It is commonly assumed that Aristotle thinks that his claim that being exhibits a category-based pros hen structure, which he introduces to obviate the problem of categorial heterogeneity, is sufficient to defend the possibility of a science of being qua being. We, on the contrary, argue that Aristotle thinks that the pros hen structure is necessary only, but not sufficient, for this task. The central thesis of our paper is that Aristotle, in what follows 1003b19, raises a second problem for the possibility of the science of being qua being; and that he does not think that the resolution of the first, the category-based problem, is either necessary or sufficient for resolving this problem. This is the problem: how can a plurality of apparently primary kinds and their opposites (they include to hen, to on, to auto, to homoion, to heteron and to anhomoion) be the subject-matter the science of being qua being? It has been argued that these kinds are per se attributes of ousia and that, therefore, this problem is not different from the first problem. This, we argue, is mistaken; for nowhere in Gamma 2 does Aristotle claim that unity is a per se attribute of ousia. Rather, he says that identity, similarity, etc. are per se attributes of being qua being and unity qua unity. Aristotle’s resolution of the second problem, we argue, is that most of these kinds are reducible to a single compound principle: being-and-unity. Being and unity, moreover, are themselves related to each other as primary ousia and consequent ousia; but, we argue, Aristotle leaves it open, in Gamma 2, which of the two is primary, and which is consequent ousia."

Rangos, Spyridion. 2014. "First Philosophy, Truth, and the History of Being in Aristotle's Metaphysics." In The Bloomsbury Companion to Aristotle, edited by Baracchi, Claudia, 173–188. New York: Bloomsbury.

Reale, Giovanni. 1980. The Concept of Philosophy and the Unity of Metaphysics of Aristotle. Albany: State University of New York Press

Edited and translated by John R. Catan.

Authorized Translation from the Third Edition.

Salis, Rita. 2018. "The Unity of Aristotle’s Metaphysics Book Ε according to the Interpretation of the Ancient Commentators." Journal of Ancient Philosophy no. 12:89–132.

Abstract: "This paper discusses the three ancient commentaries on Book E of Aristotle’s Metaphysics, that have been handed down to us. It aims to demonstrate the fundamental part played by their particular interpretation of Aristotle’s doctrines in the birth of the traditional interpretation of his Metaphysics, according to which all the books comprising the work were written as a function of Book Λ, containing the well-known doctrine of the unmoved mover. Among the main elements supporting this assumption there is Aristotle’s distinction between three types of science - the theoretical, the practical and the productive - and his claiming the primacy of metaphysics as a theological science.

According to the ancient commentators, the remainder of Book E would belong to the unitary project of the Metaphysics, since it would indicate what is not encompassed in the object of metaphysics.

This would mean that Aristotle’s treatment of accidental being, being as truth and not-being as falsity, and being potentially and actually would take on a negative function. The theological interpretation of Aristotle’s Metaphysics thus retains its ultimate foundations in premises contained in the Aristotelian text itself."

Seddon Jr., Frederick A. 1981. "The principle of contradiction in Metaphysics, Gamma." The New Scholasticism no. 55:191–207.

Abstract: "The purpose of this dissertation is to provide a defence of Aristotle's principle of contradiction against the critique made on it by Jan Lukasiewicz in an article he wrote in 1910 which was translated and published in the March 1971 number of The Review of Metaphysics. Lukasiewicz maintains in general that the law of contradiction has no logical worth. Specifically, he charges Aristotle with having several laws of contradiction instead of one as Aristotle claims; with attempting to prove the law despite his claim that this is impossible and finally with failing in the very attempt to prove the law, or at least one of its formulations. In 20 chapters, each dealing with a respective section of Lukasiewicz's article, I attempt to show that all of Lukasiewicz's allegations are unfounded. My methodology is simply to follow Lukasiewicz through his 20 sections and compare what he says with what Aristotle actually wrote. If successful, this dissertation will show, in basic agreement with Professor Joseph Owens, that the best way to read Aristotle is on his own terms and not, as in the case of Lukasiewicz, via the latest developments in symbolic logic. I reiterate, with Aristotle, that the law of contradiction is the basic principle of being qua being and has logical worth precisely because of that fact."

Sefrin-Weis, Henk. 1992. "Pros hen and the foundations of Aristotelian Metaphysics." Proceedings of the Boston Area Colloquium in Ancient Philosophy no. 8:261–300.

Abstract:"Pros hen—usually translated as ‘focal meaning’—is the device by which Aristotle shows that a universal science of being qua being is possible: his metaphysics project. This essay argues for an interpretation of ‘pros hen’ that differs significantly from the currently dominant one. Specifically, it will take issue with Owen’s claim that ‘pros hen’ amounts to reductive translation, assimilating the notion to synonymy, and it will emphasize the aspect of content-neutral referentiality that is operative in Aristotle’s notion, but not adequately represented in Owen’s reconstruction. A close reading of Aristotle’s characterization of pros hen in Metaphysics Γ 2 will be offered, and some implications of pros hen in this re-interpretation for Aristotle’s metaphysics project will be sketched. The main emphasis of the paper will be on the clarification of what Aristotle means by pros hen."

Shields, Christopher. 2012. "Being qua Being." In The Oxford Handbook of Aristotle, edited by Shields, Christopher, 343–371. New York: Oxford University Press.

Abstract: "According to Aristotle, there is a science (epistêmê) that studies being qua being, and the attributes belonging to it in its own right. This claim, which opens Metaphysics IV 1, is both surprising and unsettling—surprising because Aristotle seems elsewhere to deny the existence of any such science, and unsettling because his denial seems very plausibly grounded. He claims that each science studies a unified genus, but denies that there is a single genus for all beings; claims which evidently conspire against the science. Aristotle announces: “[I]f there is no genus of being and every science requires its own genus, then there is no science of being.” This seems, moreover, to be precisely the conclusion he draws in his Eudemian Ethics, where Aristotle maintains that we should no more look for a general science of being than we should look for a general science of goodness. This article looks at three problems about the science of being qua being: The Possibility Problem, the Extension Problem, and the Intension Problem."

———. 2014. "First Philosophy First: Aristotle and the Practice of Metaphysics." In The Routledge Companion to Ancient Philosophy, edited by Warren, James and Frisbee, Sheffield, 332–346. New York: Routledge.

Skousgaard, Stephen. 1976. "Wisdom and Being in Aristotle's First Philosophy." The Thomist no. 40:444–474.

Sokolowski, Robert. 2012. "The Science of Being as Being in Aristotle, Aquinas, and Wippel." In The Science of Being as Being: Metaphysical Investigations, edited by Doolan, Gregory T., 9–35. Washington: Catholic University of America Press.

———. 2012. "How Aristotle and Husserl Differ on First Philosophy." In Life, Subjectivity & Art: Essay in Honour of Rudolf Bernet, edited by Breer, Roland and Melle, Ullrich, 1–28. Dordrecht: Springer.

Stevenson, J.G. 1975. "Being "qua" Being." Apeiron no. 9:42–50.

"It is shown that in the opening chapter of the Fourth Book of the "Metaphysics" (Book Gamma), Aristotle conceives of metaphysics as a very general study, encompassing all being. This is shown by means of a close study of the meaning of the phrase "being "qua" being" which Aristotle uses here. This result is important because it contradicts the claims of Joseph Owens and Philip Merlan, who have argued that there is nothing in Aristotle's "metaphysics" to contradict a conception of metaphysics as theology."

Tahko, Tuomas E. 2013. "Metaphysics as the First Philosophy." In Aristotle on Method and Metaphysics, edited by Feser, Edward, 49–67. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Upton, Thomas. 1988. "Aristotle on existence: escaping the snares of ontology?" The New Scholasticism no. 62:373–399.

Vigo, Alejandro G. 2014. "First Philosophy." In The Bloomsbury Companion to Aristotle, edited by Baracchi, Claudia, 147–172. New York: Bloomsbury.

Wedin, Michael. 2009. "The science and axioms of Being." In A Companion to Aristotle, edited by Anagnostopoulos, Georgios, 125–143. Malden: Wiley-Blackwell.

"Aristotle's first editor, Andronicus of Rhodes, placed the fourteen books now known as the Metaphysics after the Physics, whence comes the word "metaphysics," which literally means "after the physics." Some have used this fact to buttress the claim that the work as a whole has no focused subject, but rather is a collection of loosely linked essays. There is some warrant for this skeptical assessment. The first chapter of the first Book, Book A, (1) announces that "we" are seeking a certain kind of theoretical knowledge, something Aristotle calls "wisdom" (sophia). Because wisdom is knowledge of first causes and principles, the task is to investigate what sorts of causes and principles are suited to play this role. The reader might expect Aristotle to then proceed on just such a course of inquiry. After A, however, the term "wisdom" effectively disappears from the treatise.(2) In B's set of puzzles we get instead the "science of substance," in G we are introduced to the "science of being qua being," and in Book E preference appears to be given to "first philosophy" and "theology." Are these the same or different enterprises and, if different, are they independent or related, and, if related, how? These questions can be addressed by seeing how Aristotle's treatment of wisdom follows a coherent, if complicated, path through much of the Metaphysics, beginning with the science of being qua being." (p. 125)

(1) It is customary to indicate books of the Metaphysics by uppercase Greek letters, with the exception of the diminutive second book, which is denoted by lower case Alpha (a).

(2) The term occurs in B.2 but only by way of referring back to A.2's marks of wisdom. It also reappears in K. But K is just a precis of Books B, G, and E (with, in its second half, material from the Physics); plus, some doubt that K was even written by Aristotle.

Wians, William. 2024. "Aristotle’s Discovery of First Philosophy." proceedings of the Boston Area Colloquium in Ancient Philosophy no. 38:145–166.

Abstract: "Among the three kinds of theoretical knowledge, Aristotle distinguishes between physics and metaphysics—what he calls Second and First Philosophy. Aristotle’s physics studies changing things, things that change in any of several ways according to an inner principle that governs their alterations and their underlying stability—fundamentally, things that come into being and pass away. What Aristotle calls First Philosophy studies substances that are immovable and unchanging, eternal objects including primarily but not exclusively Aristotle’s god. Aristotle’s distinction between Second and First Philosophy constitutes a decisive difference between Aristotle and earlier philosophers.

My main claim will be that Aristotle “discovered” First Philosophy through critical reflection on the universalizing or totalizing assumption of his predecessors.

By “universalizing assumption” I mean that according to Aristotle, his predecessors assumed either explicitly or implicitly that they were enquiring into τὸ πᾶν, the all, the totality of everything that exists. Aristotle claims that they were wrong in this assumption.

All sciences seek knowledge of principles and causes (archai and aitia). But an investigation of beings that come into existence and pass away is essentially different from the philosophical investigation of immovable, unchanging being. To understand why, one must nevertheless begin by studying changing beings—in large part to come to recognize the insufficiency of Second Philosophy to investigate being as such.

Aristotle’s discovery was that the original project of Greek philosophy—the study of the whole—requires both Second and First Philosophy."

Yu, Jiyuan. 2003. The Structure of Being in Aristotle's Metaphysics. Dordrecht: Kluwer.