On φύσις. What did the Greeks un-derstand by φυσικός?

Resumo

The uses of φυσικός from its former occurrences until the III BC. are examined. After an analysis of the first instances of the term, its uses may be classified into two large groups. In the former, φυσικός can be understood as "natural" or "innate" and various sections can be identified: a) applied to objects or beings, as opposed to artificial’, b) to refer to "natural structures", c) to qualify properties in the inherent’sense, d) to attribute to productions and effects of natural activity, in the sense that nature is an active and conscious principle, e) to define capacities, abilities or instincts as op-posites to learned’, f ) to distinguish activities, behaviours and relationships which they are the result of the customs, g) to apply to laws and justice, as opposed to conventional’, h) with the idea of appropriate’, characteristic’and (i) opposed to psychic’. The second group includes the uses in which φυσικός is understood as referring to nature as object of study’