Meaning of metaphysics (what is it, concept and definition)

What is Metaphysics:

Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy that studies the central problems of philosophical thought: being as such, the absolute, God, the world, the soul. In this line, it tries to describe the properties, foundations, conditions and primary causes of reality, as well as its meaning and purpose.

Its object of study is the immaterial, hence its conflict with the positivists, who consider that its foundations escape empirical objectivity.

Etymologically, the word comes from the late Greek μετὰφυσικά (metaphysics), which means 'beyond physics'.

The origin of this word is attributed to Andronicus of Rhodes (1st century), who, when ordering Aristotle's books, failed to classify those that make up Metaphysics within logic, morals or physics, so he decided to put them later of those who dealt with physics.

However, metaphysics as such predates Aristotle, and already appears in pre-Socratic philosophers or in Plato himself.

For Aristotle, metaphysics is the first philosophy, the one that deals with the first causes, of being as such, from which the aspect that it will give in ontology follows.

On the other hand, it also addresses the divine, God and the absolute, deriving in the theological and cosmological line, which has taken advantage of the Christian religion from the Middle Ages with the scholastic and Saint Thomas Aquinas at the head.

For his part, Immanuel Kant in his book Foundations of the metaphysics of customs (1785), from his critical perspective, developed an important treatise on morality from the reflection of metaphysics as a discipline of thought that claims to be on top of the experience.

For Kant, metaphysics is the terrain where the endless battles of reason are engaged. Along the same critical line, it was the German philosopher MartinHeidegger who reacted against metaphysics when considering it a doctrine of forgetting of being, paradoxically its main object of reflection since Aristotle and Plato.

See also

• Teleology.Teleological.Abstraction.

Currently, metaphysics has led to reinterpretations of a mystical-esoteric nature, which seek to provide answers to our spiritual concerns, and which are closer to the field of self-help and occultism, than to that of philosophy. Conny Méndez is one of its most notable authors.

Metaphysics can also mean excessively deep approach or reasoning on some subject or topic: "You are doing a metaphysics of coffee preparation".

When the word metaphysics appears as an adjective, it indicates that something belongs or is relative to metaphysics, for example: "What this author says is a metaphysical truth". At the same time, it can be used to designate that something is very dark, difficult to understand: "The soul is a metaphysical subject."

Even, its use can also have a pejorative load when we want to describe something as very confusing or speculative, without scientific basis: "I don't want to do metaphysics about this, but I'm going to tell you about it."

Finally, a metaphysician or a metaphysicist is also a person who professes or is a supporter of metaphysics: "I am sick of positivism: I declare myself a metaphysician."