Origin of Fundamental Conflicts Concerning the Final Cause

The supreme place of the issue of the final cause is no secret to the people of thought. This topic is so important that some great figures, such as Ibn Sina and Mulla Sadra, have considered it as the most important component of wisdom. At the same time, there are some salient differences in this regard among its advocates and opponents. In Islamic philosophy, the problem of final cause has been mainly tackled by responding to the advanced criticisms while, in contemporary Western philosophy, the discussion of this topic is considered to be unimportant and superfluous. Rarely ever have either Islamic or Aristotelian philosophers dealt with the fundamental reasons and roots of the confirmation or rejection of the final cause; however, no consensus will be arrived at regarding superstructures without first analyzing the basic ideas. Here, through an analytic study of the conceptual and assertoric bases of the final cause, the authors have tried to investigate and evaluate the main roots of the conflicts over this problem in order to facilitate the judgment of superstructures. In doing so, they have focused on such concepts as the relationship between efficient and final causes, origin of motion, potency and predisposition, and essentialism and archetype.