Aristotle - Delphi Complete Works of Aristotle

The Complete Works of

ARISTOTLE

(384 BC322 BC)

Please note: the corresponding Bekker numbers, the standard form of reference to works in the Corpus Aristotelicum, are provided with each title.

Contents

Delphi Classics 2013

Version 1

The Complete Works of

ARISTOTLE

By Delphi Classics, 2013

Complete Works of Aristotle

First published in the United Kingdom in 2013 by Delphi Classics.

Delphi Classics, 2013.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form other than that in which it is published.

Delphi Classics

is an imprint of

Delphi Publishing Ltd

Hastings, East Sussex

United Kingdom

Contact: sales@delphiclassics.com

www.delphiclassics.com

Stageira on the Chalkidiki peninsula Aristotles birthplace

The depiction of Aristotle in the 1493 Nuremberg Chronicle. Aristotle is credited with the earliest study of formal logic and his conception was the dominant form of Western logic until 19th century advances in mathematical logic.

Translated by E. M. Edghill

The purpose of this treatise is to enumerate all the possible kinds of things that can be the subject or the predicate of a proposition, covering some of the most discussed arguments of Aristotelian notions. Divided into fifteen chapters, the places every object of human apprehension under one of ten categories (known to medieval writers as the Latin term praedicamenta). Aristotle intended them to enumerate everything that can be expressed without composition or structure, thus anything that can be either the subject or the predicate of a proposition.

An understanding of Aristotles notion of logic is recommended before reading this work:

The fundamental assumption behind the theory of logic is that propositions are composed of two terms a two-term theory and that the reasoning process is in turn built from propositions:

• The term is a part of speech representing something, but which is not true or false in its own right, such as man or mortal.
• The proposition consists of two terms, in which one term (the predicate) is affirmed or denied of the other (the subject), and which is capable of truth or falsity.
• The syllogism is an inference in which one proposition (the conclusion) follows of necessity from two others (the premises).

A proposition may be universal or particular, and it may be affirmative or negative. Traditionally, the four kinds of propositions are:

• A-type: Universal and affirmative (Every philosopher is mortal)
• I-type: Particular and affirmative (Some philosopher is mortal)
• E-type: Universal and negative (Every philosopher is immortal)
• O-type: Particular and negative (Some philosopher is immortal)

This was called the fourfold scheme of propositions.

The treatise Categories opens with an explication of what is meant by synonymous, or univocal words, what is meant by homonymous, or equivocal words, and what is meant by paronymous, or denominative (sometimes translated derivative) words.

A Roman marble bust of Aristotle, after a Greek bronze original by Lysippus c. 330 BC.

Things are said to be named equivocally when, though they have a common name, the definition corresponding with the name differs for each. Thus, a real man and a figure in a picture can both lay claim to the name animal; yet these are equivocally so named, for, though they have a common name, the definition corresponding with the name differs for each. For should any one define in what sense each is an animal, his definition in the one case will be appropriate to that case only.

On the other hand, things are said to be named univocally which have both the name and the definition answering to the name in common. A man and an ox are both animal, and these are univocally so named, inasmuch as not only the name, but also the definition, is the same in both cases: for if a man should state in what sense each is an animal, the statement in the one case would be identical with that in the other.

Things are said to be named derivatively, which derive their name from some other name, but differ from it in termination. Thus the grammarian derives his name from the word grammar, and the courageous man from the word courage.

Forms of speech are either simple or composite. Examples of the latter are such expressions as the man runs, the man wins; of the former man, ox, runs, wins.

Of things themselves some are predicable of a subject, and are never present in a subject. Thus man is predicable of the individual man, and is never present in a subject.

By being present in a subject I do not mean present as parts are present in a whole, but being incapable of existence apart from the said subject.

Some things, again, are present in a subject, but are never predicable of a subject. For instance, a certain point of grammatical knowledge is present in the mind, but is not predicable of any subject; or again, a certain whiteness may be present in the body (for colour requires a material basis), yet it is never predicable of anything.

Other things, again, are both predicable of a subject and present in a subject. Thus while knowledge is present in the human mind, it is predicable of grammar.

There is, lastly, a class of things which are neither present in a subject nor predicable of a subject, such as the individual man or the individual horse. But, to speak more generally, that which is individual and has the character of a unit is never predicable of a subject. Yet in some cases there is nothing to prevent such being present in a subject. Thus a certain point of grammatical knowledge is present in a subject.

When one thing is predicated of another, all that which is predicable of the predicate will be predicable also of the subject. Thus, man is predicated of the individual man; but animal is predicated of man; it will, therefore, be predicable of the individual man also: for the individual man is both man and animal.

If genera are different and co-ordinate, their differentiae are themselves different in kind. Take as an instance the genus animal and the genus knowledge. With feet, two-footed, winged, aquatic, are differentiae of animal; the species of knowledge are not distinguished by the same differentiae. One species of knowledge does not differ from another in being two-footed.