Old post #2

This is my second old post.  It was from our early Aristotle discussions.

Aristotle's view of nature seems to be that all natural things have their own purpose, as well as their own motion or ability to change on their own accord.

My main problem with Aristotle's view of nature is that it seems more like he is describing life.  By his logic, mountains, the ocean and the sky are not natural.  But isn't that the most basic form of nature?  It is believed that when the earth was first formed, there was no life on the planet.  At that point in time, was the entire earth unnatural?  It is also thought that the first cells came from complex organic molecules, that at one point, were not reproductive.  So would that mean that the natural (living organisms) came from the unnatural (nonliving things)?  I think it is safe to say that we all consider nature to include the nonliving parts of our dear planet Earth.  I would even go as far as to say that these most basic parts of our planet are the most natural parts, and since everything came from it, stems off from it.

If this is true, then Aristotle's view of nature is not congruent with modern thought.  When thinking about the earth itself, it does move and change, but not to reach its goal.  It does not have a goal, and does not do what it does deliberately.  But as far as we know, the change isn't being caused by someone else either.  The earth is chaotic.  It seems to move at random, and in doing so, it caused biological life, which Aristotle calls nature.