Philosophy students and Professors alike gathered Wednesday evening to discuss the thorny, age-old Scholastic debate of the Unicity of the Substantial Form. Fr. Bonaventure led the discussion following the line of interpretation in Dr. Gorman's new book, A Contemporary Introduction to Thomistic Metaphysics.
The bulk of the discussion revolved around what Dr. Gorman takes Thomas's thesis of the unicity of substantial form to mean. Thomas maintains that any hylomorphic substance is informed by one, and only one, substantial form, and thus there cannot be a plurality of subordinate substantial forms within a single substance. Take, for example, a living body. According to the Aristotelian dictum, the soul is the form of the body. Though a living body has a multiplicity of parts and takes into itself the matter of other substances for its nourishment, once these things are incorporated into the body, they lose their substantial form and are rather subsumed under the substantial form of the whole. While the ex-substances may retain their powers as parts of the whole (carbon chains still act like carbon chains), they no longer are substances in their own right.
Fr. Bonaventure, as a good interlocutor, conducted an extensive survey of Dr. Gorman's position, identifying its strengths, pointing out its peculiarities, and revealing hidden ambiguities. Dr. Gorman, after responding valiantly to a horde of questions and critiques, admitted that he was "full of lead" from the many "bullets he had to bite." Dr. Gorman concluded his interrogation by explaining that while his position has difficulties, just as any philosophical position does, he will maintain it for as long as it protects survivalism (the position that the person, and not just the soul of the person, survives death). As the soul goes, so goes the man!