The main difficulty on Plato’s philosophy is not his forms as such, rather it’s that he has two first causes: soul and the forms. At times (as in Laws Book X or in Phaedrus) Plato reduces all to soul as to a first cause, and other times, like in Phaedo, he reduces all to form as ultimate explanation. What is the relation? The answer is of ultimate importance. Is the ultimate cause personal and living, or simply an exemplar (like a “museum of forms” as Borges described it)? If forms do not have soul, how are they sufficient causes, and if they do have soul, how are they not existing by participation?
Aristotle solves the problem by seeing being as primarily act, and the highest act as operation. This is why when he concludes to the existence of some “pure act” as a first cause of being, it is absolutely necessary that it be living and intelligent simply because of its primacy in act. It is stupid to think, as many have, that Aristotle does not prove the existence of a God who is a personal creator, but “only” a pure act or an unmoved mover. Aristotle’s very notion of act requires that the highest act be a person, intelligent, eternally blessed and all loving (for love is the perfection of will).
