Il desiderio come motore: dal De anima alla Metafisica sulle tracce di un concetto complesso

The subject of this paper is Desire meant as an engine, as a ‘power’ able to move. In the Aristotelian thought this specific meaning is so important that crosses through the Ethics to explain human acting, but it can be also found both in De anima to explain the living beings’ local movement and in Metaphysics to justify cosmological movement. My analysis develops in the following main points: a presentation of locomotory and appetitive skill inside the fundamental tripartition of soul as it is proposed by Aristotle in De anima; a reconstruction of Aristotle’s way of thinking through which he connects the dynamis of the local movement mainly (but not only) to the appetitive skill; a wide view to metaphysical plane to show which role Desire plays compared to the movement, on this level too.