Avicenna on Infinite Temporal Series

Avicenna was well-aware that the same reasoning through which he infers that a series of simultaneous causes must terminate in an uncaused cause can also be used to infer that a series of temporally ordered causes must terminate in a first, pre-etemal cause preceded by no further causes. As already noted, the former series would consist of what Avicenna considers to be metaphysicaT causes, whereas the latter would consist of what he terms physical causes. So in the Physics of the Shi/d he confutes several arguments adduced against the doctrine of a beginningless series of temporally ordered occurrences, a discussion pertinent to the question of when a series constitutes a whole. 

In his response to the first objection, Avicenna makes clear that unlike a series of coexistent things, a series of temporally ordered items, in which 

Yet the status of each one is not that of the whole kulliyya) of the past [...] The fact is that all the finite number of things that have been or will be realised, and are such that the second follows upon the first s ceasing to exist, do not constitute a whole (Jumla). For what is understood by whole is the aggregation ijtimd ). These are, however, simply not collected together in reality, even if each one of them exists individual at some moment during which the other does not exist 

Successive past occurrences exist together only in the mind. Being transitory, they do not constitute an aggregate and have no real totality, and hence no quantity, in the external world. So the coming-to-be of further occurrences does not result in an infinite coexisting quantity. 

In response to a further objection, Avicenna contends that since a temporal series such as the one described does not constitute a whole, the series lacks any real attributes. The objection is that if every motion comes to be in time, the whole kuU) and totafity Jumla) of motions come to be in time . In other words, since all the individuals share the attribute of being temporally originated, the whole too must have the same attribute. This claim unmistakably 

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