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. For how can a principle of change or the nature of the good
exist for unchangeable things, since everything that in itself and
by its own nature is good is an end, and a cause in the sense that for
its sake the other things both come to be and are, and since an end or
purpose is the end of some action, and all actions imply change? So in
the case of unchangeable things this principle could not exist, nor
could there be a good itself. This is why in mathematics nothing is
proved by means of this kind of cause, nor is there any
demonstration of this kind-'because it is better, or worse'; indeed no
one even mentions anything of the kind. And so for this reason some of
the Sophists, e.g. Aristippus, used to ridicule mathematics; for in
the arts (he maintained), even in the industrial arts, e.g. in
carpentry and cobbling, the reason always given is 'because it is
better, or worse,' but the mathematical sciences take no account of
goods and evils.
But if there are several sciences of the causes, and a different
science for each different principle, which of these sciences should
be said to be that which we seek, or which of the people who possess
them has the most scientific knowledge of the object in question?
The same thing may have all the kinds of causes, e.g. the moving cause
of a house is the art or the builder, the final cause is the
function it fulfils, the matter is earth and stones, and the form is
the definition
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