 James holds that the inchoate form present in matter is the same as the full-fledged, actualized form, differing from it only modally (Quodl. II, q. 5, p. 70, 386–388). To the objection that if this were true nothing “new” would result from the process of change, he responded by pointing out that the assumption that natural change results in the emergence of new things is rejected by no less an authority than Averroes himself, who denies that natural agents “induce something extrinsic in matter” (Quodl. II, q. 5, p. 77, 621). What newness does result from natural change is accounted for by the modal difference between the potential and the actualized form.