This is for Tom Carroll and anyone else interested in the topic.
At 998b22 of his Metaphysics, Aristotle argues that Being cannot be a highest genus. (If it were a genus, it would have to be the highest genus since Being is maximally inclusive in that absolutely everything is; but Being cannot be the highest or any subordinate genus because it is not a genus at all.) I will formulate Aristotle’s thesis in my own way, and then give some reasons for accepting it. I won’t examine his reasoning in this installment. But first some terminological regimentation.
I will use ‘Being’ and ‘Existence’ interchangeably. To be = to exist. Being = Existence. Being/Existence is crucially different from beings/existents. (The forward slash in my writing indicates inclusive as opposed to exclusive disjunction. This is a Logic 101 distinction that I will happily explain if necessary.)
What is important here is the ontological difference between Being/Existence and beings/existents. I say that with Heidegger in mind, but without endorsing all or even most of what Heidegger means by the phrase, especially not what he says in his later phase, post-Kehre (after the famous ‘Turn.’) As I use ‘ontological difference,’ said difference is already in Aquinas as the distinction between esse and ens, the distinction between the To Be (esse) of beings and the beings (entia) that participate in To Be/Being. My ontological use of ‘participate,’ despite its Platonic provenance, is eminently apropos inasmuch as ens is the present participle of the infinitive esse. (Exactly how much philosophical juice can be squeezed out of this grammatical fact is a matter of controversy.)
The majuscule-miniscule distinction must be constantly observed. I mean the distinction between big ‘B’ being and little ‘b’ being. This typographical distinction records the ontological difference of Being and beings; in Latin that between esse and ens; in German, that between das Sein and das Seiende. Both of the latter terms are nominalizations or, if you prefer, substantivizations, the first of the infinitive sein, the second of the present participle seiend. ‘Das Sein’ is a proper noun that refers to Being in its difference from beings, while ‘das Seiende’ is a common noun that refers to beings either collectively or distributively depending on whether it is taken to refer to beings as a whole or to beings taken one-by-one.
So we need to distinguish collective from distributive uses of ‘being.’ And we must never use ‘being’ to refer to the Being of beings, that in virtue of which beings are. Some will dismiss ‘in virtue of which’ as a weasel phrase, a phrase with no definite meaning. We can discuss this if Tom wants to, but for now I dismiss the dismissal. Others will be inclined to say that there is no Being different from beings: there are beings, all right, but no Being. They might go on to say that talk of Being in its difference from beings involves illicit hypostatization.
This all needs careful discussion, but for now I will simply point out that the many numerically different beings have something in common, namely, that they are, and are not nothing. Each of the many beings is, and each is not nothing, and so each has in common with every other one the fact of its not being nothing. So the Being of beings is not the same as the beings that are. Being is one to their many. Being is what makes them be. The many beings form a totality of some sort since they all have in common that they are. But we may not assume that totality of beings is a mathematical set, a mereological sum, or any other familiar sort of totality. I am inclined to say that it is sui generis. It would also be hasty to assume that we know what the commonality of Being amounts to. Is it the commonality of a multiply instantiable concept? The commonality of a common cause? Both suggestions lead to trouble.
Another question concerns the ‘of’ in ‘Being of beings.’ Is this a subjective genitive, an objective genitive, both, or neither? In ‘city of Boston,’ the ‘of’ is neither. What I call the ‘of’ of apposition is not a genitive. So this is another topic that Tom might want to discuss. Timor domini initium sapientiae. “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” The fear of the Lord is not the Lord’s fear, but ours. The genitive is objective. The beginning of wisdom, however, is wisdom’s beginning. Subjective genitive. So both types of genitive are operative in one and the same Latin sentence and its English translation. The revelation of God, however, is both God’s revelation of himself and a revelation about God to us. So in this example the genitive has both functions. What about the Being of beings? Is Being merely that which makes possible the manifestation of beings to us, or is it that which makes beings be whether or not they are manifest to us? Or both?
Now what struck Parmenides at the beginning of our tradition and filled him with wonder was that beings are, that things exist, that they are (non-locatively) there, that they are not nothing. This was a concrete metaphysical experience he had, an intuition or direct (conceptually unmediated) awareness of the Being of beings. The first ‘of’ in the preceding sentence I take to express the objective genitive and the second the subjective genitive.
This leads naturally to the question, What is Being? Aristotle concludes at 998b22 of his Metaphysics that Being cannot be a genus. And he is right if he means that what makes beings be cannot be their falling under a genus. To put his conclusion in my own way, existing things are not a kind of thing. Particular trees, cats, moons, and so on are instances of natural kinds. So we can say that feline things are a kind of thing. But no particular feline, Max, for example, can instantiate the kind unless it, Max in this case, exists. No individual x can instantiate any kind K unless x exists. From this I conclude that existing things are not a kind of thing. Being is not a genus.
From this we can conclude that Being and a being is trans-generic: it transcends and cuts across all the various genera. A being qua being (ens qua ens) is not confined to any genus, and the Being (esse) of this being (ens) is not the being’s instantiation of any genus. Accordingly, being (ens) is a trans-generic and thus transcendental determination in the pre-modern sense.
More later. We are just scratching the surface.
This is another fascinating post, Bill. My thanks for taking the time and trouble to write it. And once again, I have a few questions.
But first, let me say that I believe I am tracking with most of what you wrote. I have some familiarity with these ideas already (the Heidegger references aside), but I do appreciate your precision and clarity. Your post sharpened a lot for me, as always.
For example, your use of grammar to make some of your points was not easy to assimilate at first, but in the end I found it quite helpful — definitely worth the effort to read (and re-read) slowly. Thank you laying things out that way.
First question.
You said, “[t]he forward slash in my writing indicates inclusive…disjunction.” I have not seen that before. I would have expected the “v”. Why did you choose the “/”? Is this a difference in Continental vs Anglo-American notation?
Preamble to my second question.
I believe I follow the distinction between esse and ens (or entia), i.e., the difference between Being and beings.
After introducing the distinction, you talked about, “…the Being of beings, that in virtue of which beings *are*.” Again, I think I understand your point.
With that as background, here my second question.
I believe I understood your explanation about why Being cannot be a genus. After thinking about it a while, it occurred to me that this might tie back to your discussion a few posts ago about the various senses of ‘prior’ — maybe ontological priority?
That is, I wonder if it would be fair to say the following:
For any genus to *be* a genus, that genus must *already* exist. Hence the ‘genus’ of Being would already presuppose Being, just as would any other existing thing presuppose Being. IOW, Being would seem *ontologically prior* — your previous post — to everything else, including any possible genus.
Is this observation relevant? If so, could it be related to your previous use of *ontological priority*, as I suspect it might? Could one see the ‘Being’ (esse) in this post as your ‘onto-theological Source’ in the earlier post? After all, the tradition from which this post flows, I believe, is a tradition that describes God as ‘Being Itself’.
Third and final question.
I used ‘act of existence’ a few posts back. I said something about God’s conjoining my essence with an act of existence. How is the phrase ‘act of existence’ related to the sense of your ‘esse’ in this post?
I’m pretty sure the two are not out-and-out synonymous. However, could one say that God’s conjoining an essence with an *act of existence* means (roughly) the same as His ‘bestowing’ Being on a particular being; ‘giving’ esse to a particular ens; ‘infusing’ an ens with esse; ‘allowing’ or ‘causing’ the participation in Being of a particular being?
Is what I wrote above plausible? Coherent? Admittedly, this question is more about getting clear on ‘act of existence’ than is strictly about your use of ‘esse’.
Time only for a brief response. The point about Being not being a genus is the point that the relation of Being to beings is not the relation of a genus to what falls under it.
Question for you: do you think of divine creation as God’s actuation (bestowal of existence) on pre-given essences?
Happy Saturday, Bill.
You said, “The point about Being not being a genus is the point that the relation of Being to beings is not the relation of a genus to what falls under it.”
Yes, that’s what I understood you as having said. I probably could have articulated my understanding more concisely.
You next said, “Question for you: do you think of divine creation as God’s actuation (bestowal of existence) on pre-given essences?”
No. I do *not* think of “creation as God’s actuation (bestowal of existence) on pre-given essences”, at least not in the sense of ‘pre-given’ I believe you mean here.
I believe ‘pre-given’ could mean one of two things, at least in this context.
First, a ‘pre-given’ essence could mean an idea in the mind of God. I don’t imagine either of us would want to deny ‘pre-given’ in this sense, however it might be interpreted.
Second, a ‘pre-given’ essence could mean something like a ‘pre-existent essence’. That is, it could mean an essence that (in some hard-to-imagine way) is *already there*, already ‘existing’ in a sort of ‘quasi-potency’, waiting to receive a bestowal of existence from God. But, I don’t think this second sense is coherent.
Whatever else one might make of a ‘pre-existent essence’, it seems to me that it would have to be some sort of ‘Being-essence conjunction’ already, yet with the Being still to be added. And I don’t see how that makes sense.
Anyway, those are the thoughts that occurred to me last night, after reading your question.
Then earlier today, I started thinking about how this might actually work. I recalled a book I read a few years ago, Gavin Kerr’s “Aquinas’s Way to God”. I remembered it helped me a lot with this esse-essence business, so I picked it up again and read through *Chapter 4: The Causal Principle*.
If I understand Kerr correctly, the thought is that God’s bestowing of esse upon (what Kerr calls) an ‘esse-essence composite’ is utterly unique.
Kerr says, “In bringing the potentially existing essence into existence, esse is not received in some distinct pre-existing essence bringing about a change therein, but actuates the essence whole and complete… [W]hen God creates, He brings into existence the essence-esse composite all at once.”
If I am following this, the idea is that the only potency involved is the *active potency* in God alone, with no passive potency adhering in any a pre-existing (target) object.
Those are excellent comments, Tom. You are right to point out the ambiguity or at least the lack of clarity of my use of ‘pre-given essence.’ It could be taken to mean “an idea in the mind of God.” That’s not what I mean.
The question I am posing is whether God creates out of nothing or creates out of merely possible items such as the individual essence of Socrates, the individual essence of Plato, and so on. In short, does God create out of nothing or does God create out of mere possibles? (Everything actual is possible, but not everything possible is actual; the merely possible is that which is possible but not actual. A mere possible, then, is an item that is merely possible.)
To say that God creates out of nothing (ex nihilo) is not to say that there is some thing or stuff out which he creates; it is to to say that it is not the case that there is anything out of which he creates. (If I tell my wife that I met nobody on the trail this morning, it would be a bad joke were she to reply, “How is Nobody doing this morning?” ‘Nothing’ and ‘Nobody’ are not names but quantifiers, as a logician would put it.) I am sure you agree with this, Tom.
Should we conclude that God creates ex Deo, out of God? Presumably not, on classical theism. So we might say this: there is a vast realm of merely possible individual essences, one for each individual existent that God either does or could create, and what God does when he creates is to bestow actual existence on the members of some compossible proper subset of these mere possibles, i.e., these merely possible individual essences. On this scheme, the mere possibles, which do not exist, are not nothing. So we can say that they have Being, but not Existence. There are philosophers who make this distinction, the early Russell, e.g., circa 1903. In sum:
1) Existence = actuality; 2) mere possibles do not exist; 3) mere possibles are not nothing; 4) Mere possibles ARE, i.e. have Being; and, what’s more, 5) mere possibles are REAL, i.e., independent of finite mind, which is to say that they do not have a merely conceptual status in minds like ours, ectypal intellects as opposed to the intellectus archetypus, God.
So, Tom, what I was asking you is whether you think of divine creation along the above lines. Does God create ex nihilo or ex possibilitate?
My best answer is, “I don’t know.” But that would be defeatist, and nobody likes a quitter.
So here goes.
First, when you say ex Deo is off the table for classical theism, I presume you are using ‘ex Deo’ to mean pantheism, or NeoPlatonic emanation, or (given one of the themes of this series) Brahman of Advaita Vedanta. I think this a qualification worth noting, since we will both agree that *everything* comes ‘from God’ in *some* important sense. But given that, then yes — I see why ex Deo is not an option for classical theism.
Second, because you are setting ex Deo aside due to its incompatibility with classical theism, I take it we are looking for an account of creatio ex possibilitate that *is* compatible with classical theism.
Third, in your list above — I presume from Russell — you said:
1) Existence = actuality. I see that.
Then you said,
2) Mere possibilities do not exist, [but] mere possibilities are not nothing. Mere possibilities ARE, i.e., have BEING, and … are REAL, independent of finite mind.
Now, I know Russell was not a theist, much less a classical theist, much less a Thomist. But just to make sure I understand correctly:
The above account seems to entail the rejection of the first of the “Twenty-Four Thomistic Theses”. That is, Russell’s account looks like it rejects the thesis that act and potency divide Being ‘with no remainder’ (my words), i.e., the thesis that all Being is either act-and-potency or pure act. Am I correct?
I think this is important, because Russell’s account *does* say mere possibilities have BEING. So, am I right to conclude that his account entails there *is* a ‘remainder’ after (the Thomist version) of the act/potency discussion does it work? Am right to understand that (on this account) BEING is divided between act-and-potency, *and* Pure Act (God, Being Itself), *and* possibilities?
And just to be crystal clear, I am assuming you and I are taking classical theism as a ‘baseline’ given, at least here. I realize Russell himself is not obligated to take act/potency into consideration.
With that as background, here is my answer:
a) IF we agree to limit ourselves to answers compatible with classical theism; and
b) IF we admit the BEING of possibilities must depend *ultimately* on God in *some* way (to preserve classical theism), even if that dependence is not along lines of the production of an essence-esse composite; and
c) IF I am right about the First Thomistic Thesis being incompatible with creatio ex possibilitate; and
d) Since I can think of no reason why some (non-Thomistic) version of classical theism *couldn’t* be compatible with creatio ex possibilitate, assuming the (b) qualification about ultimate dependence above; then
e) Yes, I believe we could add creatio ex possibilitate to our basketful of respectable options. Creatio ex possibilitate seems plausible to me.
Good comments as usual, Tom. Thanks!
Ad (1) Yes, by creatio ex Deo I mean schemes like neo-Platonic emanationism. That is ‘off the table’ for classical theism since it implies that God creates of necessity, and not freely.
Ad (2) No, I am saying that God does not create ex possibilitate, but ex nihilo. On classical theism, as I understand it, God is not the actualizer of mere possibles that are ‘already there.’ That’s what I meant by pre-given earlier.
Ad (3) I mentioned Russell for Only One purpose, to give an example of a philosopher who (at one time) distinguished Being from Existence. So let’s leave Russell out of this.
What I was asking you was whether you hold that divine creation is the actualization by God of merely possible items that ARE independently of finite mind and also ARE independently of divine mind. God’s job would then be to actualize (= bestow existence on) merely possible items which, qua merely possible, are not creatures and need no creating. Why do they need no creating to BE? Because they are necessary beings. Qua mere possibles what they lack is actuality (existence). An actualized possible — which is by definition not a mere possible — needs an actualizer. Consider the individual essence Schmocrates. This essence, as merely possible, lacks existence. This guy is one of many merely possible brothers of Socrates, who is, speaking tenselessly, both possible and actual, but not necessary. Schmocrates does not exist, i.e., he is not actual. But as merely possible he might have been actual. Had he become actual, he would have been contingently actual. So, had Schmocrates become actual, he would have needed God to actualize him.
I was unclear earlier about the status of the mere possibles — mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. Given what I mean by them, creatio ex nihilo is incompatible with creatio ex possibilitate. Give what YOU mean by them they might be compatible.
As for the first of the 24 Thomistic Theses — Potency and Act divide being in such a way that whatever is, is either pure act, or of necessity it is composed of potency and act as primary and intrinsic principles — questions arise as to the relation of potency to metaphysical possibility. The merely possible is possibly actual. No doubt. But is the merely possible potentially actual? Doesn’t potency pertain only to changeful material things? Didn’t potency come into philosophy when Aristotle and the boys tried to make sense of growth, gestation, generation and corruption, the diachronic change of material things?
Consider a purely spiritual and thus immaterial actual existent, an angel for example. No angel is actus purus. Only God is pure act. An angel is no doubt an essence-existence composite. But what sense does it make to say that an angel is of necessity composed of potency and act? Just asking.
You said, “Didn’t potency come into philosophy when Aristotle and the boys tried to make sense of growth, gestation, generation and corruption, the diachronic change of material things? … [W]hat sense does it make to say that an angel is of necessity composed of potency and act?”
But don’t we *know* that potency (understood as the principle of change) functions beyond the “diachronic change of material things?”
Angels aside, it seems plausible to say the mind is (in fundamental aspects) immaterial, for the all reasons you and many others have given. At the very least, please allow me to *assume* the mind is immaterial for the sake of argument.
But the (immaterial) content of my mind changes all the time. Yesterday, I potentially knew it was 1 July. This morning I actually knew it was 1 July. My immaterial mind changed. Moments ago I imagined a red sailboat. Now that imagined sailboat is blue. Immaterial things change constantly, rapidly, ceaselessly. So there *must* be a principle of change operating at the immaterial level. Potency — understood as the principle of change — must apply beyond the matter/form of the mundane world.
Doesn’t that seem right?
Tom,
What Kerr appears to be saying, as per your report, is that God does not create ex possibilitate, but ex nihilo. That is, God does not actuate (bestow existence upon) an individual essence that ‘already’ (logically speaking) IS; ‘in one blow’ so to speak he causes to exist, from nothing, an essence-existence composite. This is the classical doctrine as I understand it.
The question, however, is whether we can make rational sense of it, or must simply accept it as rationally incomprehensible, a mystery.
To see the problem, bear in mind that God needn’t have created anything on the classical view. So any world he creates — where a world is a maximal totality of compossible creatures — is contingent (posssibly existent and possibly nonexistent, i.e., neither impossible nor necessary). What’s more, there are many possible worlds. God is, after all, a libertarianly free agent. Therefore, since God does not create ex Deo, the only way to make discursive sense of divine creation is by understanding ir as creatio ex possibilitate.