Book III, Chapter 16

Chapter 16. He refutes the fifth opinion, that of the Megarians, who deny all potency toward the future.

There is also a fifth opinion, which not only denies that anything is future but denies all potency toward any future thing whatever. For it says that nothing active can produce anything except while it is actually producing. This is the view of certain men who, as is reported in Metaphysics 9, 5 1, are called Megarians. As Averroes says there, this discourse, that is, this opinion, is supposed to come from certain of those who speak. Albert sets out three arguments of theirs there. D1 The first is: a cause is called active with respect to its effect, and cause and effect are simultaneous; therefore a cause is not active before it actually acts. The second is: if some mover can move, and is in potency to moving before it moves, and nothing comes from potency to act except through a motion and a mover distinct from itself, then it needs another, prior mover in order to move. By the same reasoning that other mover in turn needs yet another, prior mover, and so on to infinity, which is impossible. The third is: no nature is deprived of its proper operation. Therefore an active form or potency always has actual operation, and so never precedes it, nor can it precede it. Albert resolves these arguments, as indeed they are easily resolved by anyone. Aristotle and Averroes also sufficiently rebut and refute this opinion there.