Energeia and Entelecheia: ACT in Aristotle
Twenty-five years ago, George Blair proposed that "actuality" was the wrong word to use in translating either of Aristotle's two words for "act," and sparked a controversy that has continued to the present day. Here he presents his evidence in detail, as well as offering a critical examination of the
scholarship on the subject. His view remains that the only interpretation consistent with the texts is that energeia, coined very early by Aristotle to mean "internal activity", never lost that meaning. Somewhat later, Aristotle coined another term entelecheia, which meant "having one's end within." Then Aristotle realized that, while discussing motion, if a being has its end within itself, it is internally active, and therefore every entelecheia is in fact an energeia; from then on he used the term energeia exclusively. merely extending its application beyond living things.
Also included is a complete analytic register of the occurrences of both terms.
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