In philosophy, potentiality and actuality are a pair of closely connected principles which Aristotle used to analyze motion, causality, ethics, and physiology in his Physics, Metaphysics, Nicomachean Ethics, and De Anima.
A marble block in Carrara. Could there be a particular sculpture already existing in it as a potentiality? Aristotle wrote approvingly of such ways of talking, and felt it reflected a type of causation in nature which is often ignored in scientific discussion.