Aristotle – Page 3 – Maverick Philosopher

More on One Person-Two Natures: Response to Timothy Pawl

A recent argument of mine questioning the coherent conceivability of the one person-two natures doctrine of Chalcedonian Christology begins with the premise

1. If N is a nature of substance s, then s cannot exist without having N. Natures are essential to the things that have them. In possible worlds jargon: If N is a nature of s, then in every possible world in which s exists, s has N. (The modality in play here is broadly logical or metaphysical.)

I pointed out that the argument's conclusion can be best resisted by denying (1). Professor Tim Pawl agrees. He comments:

I think the Aristotelian who wants to maintain Chalcedonian Christology could deny 1 and affirm a nearby proposition:

1’. For any one-natured substance s, if N is a nature of s, then s cannot exist without having N.

Adding the antecedent I’ve added to your 1 here allows for us to say that 1’ remains true in the case of Christ, since the antecedent is false. 1’ does all the work that the Aristotelian would want 1 to do, since every case we think of in mundane (non-christological) situations is a case where the thing in question is single-natured. I wouldn’t think the Aristotelian has any evidence for 1 that would not count as evidence for the revised 1’ as well.

The purpose of this entry is to evaluate Tim's response. But first some preliminaries.

Assumptions. Preliminaries, and Ontological Background

I am not questioning, let alone denying, the fact of the Incarnation. (To insert an autobiographical remark: I am inclined to believe it.) Thus I am not maintaining that there is no sense in which, in a sentence from the Angelus, 'the Word became flesh and dwelt among us." My question is whether the Incarnation is coherently conceivable within a broadly Aristotelian ontological framework. A negative answer, should one be forthcoming, does not foreclose on the question whether the Incarnation is coherently conceivable within some other ontological framework.

By 'coherently conceivable' I mean 'thinkable without broadly-logical contradiction.' Coherent conceivability is a notion weaker than that of (real as opposed to epistemic) possibility. I am not asking whether the Incarnation is possible, but whether it is coherently conceivable (within a broadly Aristotelian framework). Conceivability is tied to our powers of conception; possibility is not.

Whatever is actual is possible. So if the Incarnation is actual, then it is possible whether or not we can coherently conceive how it is possible, whether or not we can render it intelligible to ourselves, whether or not it satisfies the exigencies of the discursive intellect. So if it should turn out that the Incarnation is not coherently conceivable, the defender of the Incarnation has a mysterian move available to him. He can say, look, "It's the case; so its possibly the case; it's just that our cognitive limitations make it impossible for us (in this life) to understand how it could be the case." The present topic, however, is not mysterianism.

My precise question is this: is it coherently conceivable that one person, the Second Person of the Trinity, the Word of God, the Logos, have both an individual divine nature and an individual human nature? I will assume that a person, as per Boethius, is an individual substance of a rational nature. I will also assume the doctrine of the Trinity.

'Substance' is elliptical for 'primary substance' or 'individual substance' or 'first substance' (prote ousia). If abstract entities are entities that are non-spatiotemporal and causally inert, then individual or individualized natures are not abstract entities. Some of them are spatiotemporal, and all of them are causally efficacious. Thus the individual nature of Socrates is in space and time. (The individual nature of the Logos is not in space and time but it is causally efficacious.) What ties an individual substance to its individual nature is not the external asymmetrical nexus of exemplification: substances don't exemplify their natures; a substance is (identical to) its individual(ized) nature. (See Aristotle, Metaphysics, Z.6) Socrates is not a bare particular, and his nature is not a (conjunctive) property that he exemplifies. Of course, there is a sense in which Socrates and Plato are of the same nature in that both are human. This common humanity, however, has no extramental reality: it is not a platonic object exemplified by the two philosophers.

The nature or essence of an individual substance is the what-it-is of the thing or as Aristotle puts it, to ti ên einai, literally “the what it was to be” of a thing, essentia, quod quid erat esse. (Compare Hegel: Wesen ist was gewesen ist.) It follows that the nature or essence of Socrates is not accidental to him. The idea that the nature of an individual thing could be accidental to it is wholly un-Aristotelian, although it would make sense in an ontological scheme according to which Socrates is a bare particular and his nature is a conjunctive property the conjuncts of which are his non-relational properties. (We find such a scheme in D. Armstrong and R. Grossmann, et al.)

It also seems obvious to me that there is an important difference between the event or fact of the Incarnation and any theological doctrine about it. Theology, I take it, is a type of applied philosophy: it is philosophy applied to the data of revelation. The Incarnation is one such datum since it is God's self-revelation in Jesus Christ. So it seems obvious to me that we ought to distinguish the datum from its doctrinal formulation. To repeat myself, I am concerned with the latter.

Evaluation of Tim Pawl's Response

Tim makes a time-honored move in alleviation of the contradiction that issues from my reductio ad absurdum argument: he makes a distinction. One can always avoid or remove a contradiction by making a distinction. He distinguishes between one-natured substances and substances that have more than one nature. He then restricts my (1) to one-natured substances. The result of the restriction is (1'). Accordingly, it is only one-natured substances that are under the requirement that their natures be had by them essentially. Now if we plug (1') into my argument in lieu of (1), no contradiction results. Although a one-natured substance has its one nature essentially (in every world in which the substance exists), a multi-natured substance may have a nature that it has accidentally (in only some of the worlds in which the substance exists).

Unfortunately, this trades one problem for another. For now the problem is to understand how an Aristotelian substance that has two natures can have one of them accidentally. The Logos exists necessarily. In the patois of possible worlds, it exists in every possible world. And it is divine (has the divine nature) essentially, i.e., in every world in which it exists. Since it exists in every world, it has the divine nature in every world. But it has the human nature only in some worlds. So the Logos has the human nature accidentally.

The problem is: How can any substance have a nature accidentally? Don't forget: we are operating within an Aristotelan framework and our precise question is whether the one person-two natures doctrine is coherently conceivable within that framework. As I said above, the nature or essence of an individual substance cannot be accidental to it. (The connection between a substance and its nature cannot be assayed as the external asymmetrical nexus of exemplification.) The idea that the nature of an individual thing could be accidental to it is wholly un-Aristotelian.

To sum up. Professor Pawl makes a distinction between single-natured substances which stand under the requirement that their natures be had essentially by them and multi-natured substances that are not subject to this requirement. This distinction blocks the contradiction my reductio issued in. But Pawl's distinction does not succeed in rendering the Chalcedonian formulation coherently conceivable within the Aristotelian framework because it requires a notion that makes no sense within that ontological framework, namely, the notion that a substance can have a nature accidentally.

To modify the Aristotelian framework in that way is not to extend it or enrich it in the light of new data, but to destroy it. What the Christologist ought to do is reject the framework. He needn't abandon the Incarnation. There are other approaches to it. I hope to sketch one in a separate post.

Is it Coherently Conceivable that One Person Have Two Natures?

For Shaun Deegan, who 'inspired' a sloppy prototype of the following argument hashed out over Sunday breakfast at a Mesa, Arizona hash house.

…………….

The Question

More precisely: is it coherently conceivable that one person, the Second Person of the Trinity, the Word of God, the Logos, have both an individual divine nature and an individual human nature? (A person, as per Boethius, is an individual substance of a rational nature.)

This is not the same as the question: Is the Incarnation coherently conceivable? For my concern is whether the Incarnation is coherently conceivable within a broadly Aristotelian ontological framework. My answer: I don't think so. My answer leaves open the question whether the Incarnation is coherently conceivable within some other ontological framework.

The Argument

1. If N is a nature of substance s, then s cannot exist without having N. Natures are essential to the things that have them. In possible worlds jargon: If N is a nature of s, then in every possible world in which s exists, s has N. (The modality in play here is broadly logical or metaphysical.)

2. The Logos L is a necessary being: L exists in every possible world.

3. The Logos has the individual divine nature DN.

4. The Logos has the individual divine nature in every possible world. (from 1, 2, 3)

5. The Logos has the individual human nature HN.

6. The Logos has the individual human nature HN in every possible world. (from 1, 2, 5)

7. The individual human nature HN exists in every possible world. (from 6)

8. No individual human nature exists in every possible world.

9. (7) and (8) are logical contradictories.

Therefore, by reductio ad absurdum,

10. One of the premises is false.

But which one? Let's examine the premises. No classical Trinitarian theist could reject (2) or (3). And no believer in the Incarnation could reject (5). No classical theist could reject (8) given that God might have refrained from creating a natural universe with human beings. So it seems that someone who adheres to each of these theological commitments must reject (1), which is a plank in the Aristotelian platform.

Or, if you adhere to Aristotelian principles, it seems you must abandon the orthodox Chalcedonian line on the Incarnation.

Bare Particulars versus Aristotelian Substances

In this entry I will attempt to explain the difference between a bare particular and an Aristotelian primary substance. A subsequent post will consider whether this difference is theologically relevant, in particular, whether it is relevant to the theology of the Incarnation.

What is a Particular?

Particulars in the sense relevant to understanding 'bare particular' may be understood in terms of impredicability. Some things can be predicated of other things. Thus being black can be predicated of my cat, and being a property can be predicated of being black; but my cat cannot be predicated of anything. My cat is in this sense 'impredicable.' Particulars are subjects of predication but cannot themselves be predicated. Particulars, then, are ultimate subjects of predication. Thus my cat is an ultimate subject of predication unlike being black which is a subject of predication, but not an ultimate subject of predication. Particulars have properties but are not themselves properties. Properties may be characterized as predicable entities.

Three Senses of 'Bare Particular'

1. The first sense I mention only to set aside. It is a complete misunderstanding to suppose that philosophers who speak of bare or thin particulars, philosophers as otherwise different in their views as Gustav Bergmann, David Armstrong, and J. P. Moreland, mean to suggest that there are particulars that have no properties and stand in no relations. There is no such montrosity as a bare particular in this sense.

In order to explain the two legitimate senses of 'bare particular' I will first provide a general characterization that covers them both. A bare particular is a particular that lacks a nature or (real) essence. It is therefore quite unlike an Aristotelian primary substance. Every such substance has or rather is an individual nature. But while lacking a nature, a bare particular has properties. This 'having' is understood in terms of the asymmetrical external nexus of exemplification. A bare particular is thus tied to its properties by the external nexus of exemplification. To say that the nexus that ties a to F-ness is external is to say that there is nothing in the nature of a, and nothing in the nature of F-ness to require that a exemplify F-ness. After all, a, as bare, lacks a nature, and F-ness, while it has a nature, is not such that there is anything in it to necessitate its being exemplified by a. In this sense a bare particular and its properties are external to each other.

This mutual externality of property to bearer entails what I call promiscuous combinability: any bare particular can exemplify any property, and any property can be exemplified by any bare particular. (A restriction has to be placed on 'property' but we needn't worry about this in the present entry.)

David Armstrong holds that (i) there are conjunctive properties and that (ii) for each bare or thin particular there is the conjunctive property that is the conjunction of all of the particular's non-relational properties. He calls this the particular's nature. But I will avoid this broad use of 'nature.' What I mean by 'nature' is essence. Bare particulars lack essences, but not properties. Therefore, no property or conjunction of properties on a bare-particularist scheme is an essence. Note that it is given or at least not controversial that particulars have properties; it is neither given nor uncontroversial that particulars have essences.

I should also point out that talk of Aristotelian natures or essences would seem to make sense only within a constituent ontology such as Aristotle's.

From the foregoing it should be clear that to speak of a particular as bare is not to deny that it has properties but to speak of the manner in which it has properties. It is to say that it exemplifies them, where exemplification is an asymmetrical external tie. To speak of a particular as an Aristotelian substance is also to speak of the manner in which it has properties.

Consider the dog Fido. Could Fido have been a jellyfish? If Fido is a bare particular, then this is broadly logically possible. Why not, given promiscuous combinability? Any particular can 'hook up' with any property. But if Fido is an Aristotelian substance this is not broadly logically possible. For if Fido is a substance, then he is essentially canine. In 'possible worlds' jargon, Fido, if a substance, is canine in every possible world in which he exists. What's more, his accidental properties are not such as to be exemplified by Fido — where exemplification is an external tie — but are rather "rooted in" and "caused" by the substance which is Fido. (See J. P. Moreland who quotes Richard Connell in Moreland's Universals, McGill-Queen's UP, 2001, p. 93) The idea is that if Fido is an Aristotelian substance, then he has ingredient in his nature various potentialities which, when realized, are manifestations of that nature. The dog's accidental properties are "expressions" of his "inner nature." They flow from that nature. Thus being angry, an accident of Fido as substance, flows from his irascibility which is a capacity ingredient in his nature. If Fido is a bare particular, however, he would be externally tied to the property of being angry. And he would also be externally tied to the property of being a dog.

It follows that if particulars are bare, then all of their properties are had accidentally, and none essentially.

We now come to the two legitimate senses of 'bare particular.'

2. The second sense of 'bare particular' and the first legitimate sense is the constituent-ontological sense. We find this in Bergmann and Armstrong. Accordingly, a bare particular is not an ordinary particular such as a cat or the tail of a cat or a hair or hairball of cat, but is an ontological factor, ingredient, or constituent of an ordinary particular. Let A and B be round red spots that share all qualitative features. For Bergmann there must be something in the spots that grounds their numerical difference. They are two, not one, but nothing qualitative distinguishes them. This ground of numerical difference is the bare particular in each, a in A, and b in B. Thus the numerical difference of A and B is grounded in the numerical (bare) difference of a and b. In one passage, Bergmann states that the sole job of a bare particular is to individuate, i.e., to serve as the ontological ground of numerical difference.

Particulars, unlike universals, are unrepeatable. If F-ness is a universal, F-ness is repeated in each F. But if a is F, a is unrepeatable: it is the very particular it is and no other. One of the jobs of a Bergmannian bare particular is to serve as the ontological ground of an ordinary particular's particularity or thisness. A Bergmannian bare particular is that ontological constituent in an ordinary particular that accounts for its particularity. But note the ambiguity of 'particularity.' We are not now talking about the categorial feature common to all particulars as particulars. We are talking about the 'incommunicable' thisness of any given particular.

3. The third sense of 'bare particular' and the second legitimate sense is the nonconstituent-ontological sense. Summing up the above general characterization, we can say that

A bare particular is a particular that (i) lacks a nature (in the narrow sense lately explained); (ii) has all of its properties by exemplification where exemplification is an asymmetrical external nexus; and as a consequence (iii) has all of its properties accidentally, where P is an accidental property of x iff x exemplifies P but can exist without exemplifying P.

Note that this characterization is neutral as between constituent and nonconstituent ontology. If one is a C-ontologist, then bare particulars are constituents of ordinary particulars. If one is an NC ontologist who rejects the very notion of an ontological constituent, then bare particulars are ordinary particulars.

Conclusion

I have explained the difference between a bare particular and an Aristotelian substance. In a subsequent post I will address the question of how this deep ontological difference bears upon the possibility of a coherent formulation of the Incarnation doctrine.

Substance, Supposit, Incarnation, Trinity, and the Heresy of Nestorius

I need to answer three questions. This post addresses only the first.

1. What is the difference between an Aristotelian primary substance and a supposit (hypostasis, suppositum)?

2. Is there any non-theological basis for this distinction?

3. If the answer to (2) is negative, is the addition of suppposita to one's Aristotelian ontology a case of legitimate metaphysical revision or a case of an ad hoc theoretical patch job? According to Marilyn McCord Adams, "Metaphysical revision differs from ad hoc theoretical patching insofar as it attempts to make the new data systematically unsurprising in a wider theoretical context." ("Substance and Supposits," p. 40)

The First Question

By 'substance' I mean an Aristotelian primary substance, an individual or singular complete concrete entity. Among the characteristics of substances are the following: substances, unlike universal properties, cannot be exemplified or instantiated; substances, unlike accidents, cannot inhere in anything; substances, unlike heaps and aggregates, are per se unities. Thus Socrates and his donkey are each a substance, but the classical mereological sum of the two is not a substance.

Now what is a supposit? Experts in medieval philosophy — and I am not one of them, nota bene — sometimes write as if there is no distinction between a substance and a supposit. Thus Richard Cross: "Basically a supposit is a complete being that is neither instantiated or exemplified, nor inherent in another." ("Relations, Universals, and the Abuse of Tropes," PAS 79, 2005, p. 53.) And Marilyn McCord Adams speaks of Socrates and Plato as "substance individuals" and then puts "hypostases or supposits" in apposition to the first phrase. (PAS 79, 2005, p. 15)

My first question, then, is: Is there any more-than-verbal difference between a substance and a supposit, and if so, what is it?

One answer that suggests itself is that, while every substance has a supposit, some substances have alien supposits. That is, some substances are their own supposits, while others are not their own supposits, but have alien supposits. (I take the phrase 'alien supposit' from Adams, p. 31 et passim.) A substance has an alien supposit if and only if it is not its own supposit. I understand Aristotle to maintain or at least be committed to the proposition that every (primary) substance is essentially its own supposit. (I rather doubt that the Stagirite ever raised the question of alien supposition.) If so, then no substance is possibly such as to have an alien supposit. If alien supposition is metaphysically or broadly logically possible, however, then we have a ground for a more-than-terminological distinction between substances and supposits. Whether the converse of this conditional holds is a further question. For it may be that there is a ground for the distinction even if alien supposition is not possible.

Incarnation, Trinity, and the separated soul's survival between death and resurrection are theological examples of alien supposition. Whether there are non-theological examples is a further, and very important question, one the answer to which has consequences for questions (2) and (3) above.

The Incarnation is an example of alien supposition as I will now try to explain.

The orthodox view is that God the Son, the second person of the Trinity, the Word, becomes man in Jesus of Nazareth. Although the Word becomes flesh and dwells among us as we read in the NT, the Word does not merely assume a human body, nor does it acquire a universal property, humanity; the Word assumes a particularized human nature, body and soul. The eternal Word assumes or 'takes on' a man, an individual man, with an intellectual soul and and animal body. But now a problem looms, one that can be articulated in terms of the following aporetic tetrad:

a. A person is a (primary) substance of a rational nature. (Boethian definition)

b. There is only one person in Christ, the Word, the Second Person of the Trinity. (Rejection of the heresy of Nestorius, according to which in Christ there are two persons in two natures rather than one person in two natures.)

c. The individual(ized) human nature of Christ is a primary substance of a rational nature.

d. Every (primary) substance is its own supposit, which implies that every substance of a rational nature has its own personhood.

The tetrad is logically inconsistent: any three limbs taken in conjunction entail the negation of the remaining one. Thus the conjunction (a) & (c) & (d) entails the negation of (b). For if there are two primary substances of a rational nature, the Word and Christ, then there are two persons each with his own individualized nature, contra Chalcedonian orthodoxy, according to whch there is exactly one person in two natures. The solution to the tetrad is to deny (d), the very natural Aristotelian assumption that every substance is its own supposit. One does this by maintaining that, while the individualized human nature of Christ is a substance, it is not a substance that supports itself: it has an alien supposit, namely, the Second Person of the Trinity.

If the Incarnation as Chalcedonian orthodoxy understands it is actual, then it is possible. If so, alien supposition is possible, which straightaway entails a distinction between substance and supposit: while every substance has or is a supposit, not every substance has or is its own supposit. The individualized human nature of Christ is a supposited substance but is not itself a supposit.

Let me now say a bit about the Trinity. Here too a problem looms that can be cast in the mold of an aporetic tetrad.

a. A person is a (primary) substance of a rational nature. (Boethian definition)

e. There are exactly three divine persons, Father, Son, Holy Ghost . (Rejection of 'Quaternity')

f. The individualized nature of God is a primary substance of a rational nature.

d. Every (primary) substance is its own supposit, which implies that every substance of a rational nature has its own personhood.

Again, the tetrad is inconsistent, and again the solution is to reject (d) by saying that, while the individualized divine nature is a primary substance, it is not one that supposits itself: it has three alien supposits, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

The Son is thus the alien supposit of both God's divine nature and Christ's human nature.

My first question concerned the difference between a substance and supposit. My tentative answer is that while only substances can be supposits, there are substances that are not their own supposits nor are they supposits for anything else, an example being the individualized human nature of Christ.

Is there a non-theological basis for the distinction? if not, then the suspicion arises that the distinction is purely ad hoc, crafted to save tenets of orthodox Christian theology. But this is a question for another occasion.

What's wrong with ad-hocery?

After MacIntyre: Is and Ought

This follows up on yesterday's discussion. Thanks to Hodges for getting me started on this, to Milos for reminding me of MacIntyre, and to Peter for agreeing with me so far.

Are there any valid arguments that satisfy the following conditions: (i) The premises are all factual in the sense of purporting to state only what is the case; (ii) the conclusion is normative/evaluative? Alasdair MacIntyre gives the following example (After Virtue, U. of Notre Dame Press, 1981, p. 55):

1. This watch is inaccurate.

Therefore

2. This is a bad watch.

MacIntyre claims that the premise is factual, the conclusion evaluative, and the argument valid. The validity is supposed to hinge on the functional character of the concept watch. A watch is an artifact created by an artificer for a specific purpose: to tell time accurately. It therefore has a proper function, one assigned by the artificer. (Serving as a paperweight being an example of an improper function.) A good watch does its job, serves its purpose, fulfills its proper function. MacIntyre tells us that "the concept of a watch cannot be defined independently of the concept of a good watch . . ." and that "the criterion of something's being a watch and something's being a good watch . . . are not independent of each other." (Ibid.) MacIntyre goes on to say that both sets of criteria are factual and that for this reason arguments like the one above validly move from a factual premise to an evaluative conclusion.

Speaking as someone who has been more influenced by the moderns than by the ancients, I don't see it. It is not the case that both sets of criteria are factual in the sense defined above. The criteria of something's being a good watch already contains evaluative criteria. For if a good watch is one that tells time accurately, then that criterion of chronometric goodness involves a standard of evaluation. If I say of a watch that it is inaccurate, I am not merely describing it, but also evaluating it. MacIntyre is playing the following game, to put it somewhat uncharitably.

He smuggles the evaluative attribute good into his definition of 'watch,' forgets that he has done so thereby generating the illusion that his definition is purely factual, and then pulls the evaluative rabbit out of the hat in his conclusion. It is an illusion since the rabbit was already there in the premise. In other words, both (1) and (2) are evaluative. So, while the argument is valid, it is not a valid argument from a purely factual premise to an evaluative conclusion.

So if the precise question is whether one can validly move from a purely factual or descriptive premise to an evaluative conclusion, then MacIntyre's example fails to show that this is possible.

But I am being tendentious on purpose for didactic reasons. I grant that it is not perfectly evident that values and facts are mutually exclusive. I think what MacIntyre needs is the idea that some statements are both factual and evaluative. If (1) is both, the MacIntyre gets what he wants.

Is Man a Functional Concept?

But suppose one would be wrong to reject the (1)-(2) counterexample and that, with respect to functional concepts, the move from fact to value is logically kosher. Then this discussion is relevant to ethics, the normative study of human action, only if man is a functional concept. Aristotle maintains as much: man qua man has a proper function, a proper role, a proper 'work' (ergon). This is a proper function he has essentially, by his very nature, regardless of whatever contingent roles a particular human may instantiate, wife, father, sea captain. Thus, " 'man' stands to 'good man' as 'watch' stands to 'good watch' . . . ." (56) Now if man qua man has a proper and essential function, then to say of a particular man that he is good or bad is to imply that he has a proper and essential function. But then to call a man good is also to make a factual statement. (57)

The idea is that being human is a role that includes certain norms, a role that each of us necessarily instantiates whether like it or not. There is a sort of coalescence of factual individual and norm in the case of each human being just as, in Aristotle's ontoloogy, there is a sort of coalescence of individual and nature in each primary substance.

But does man qua man have a proper role or function? The moderns fight shy of this notion. They tend to think of all roles, jobs, and functions as freely adopted and contingent. Modern man likes to think of himself as a free and autonomous individual who exists prior to and apart from all roles. This is what Sartre means when he says that existence precedes essence: Man qua man has no pre-assigned nature or essence or proper function: man as existing individual makes himself what ever he becomes. Man is not God's artifact, hence has no function other than one he freely adopts.

Although Aristotle did not believe in a creator God, it is an important question whether an Aristotle-style healing of the fact-value rift requires classical theism as underpinning. MacIntyre seems to think so. (Cf. p. 57)

Interim Conclusion

If the precise question is whether one can validly move from a purely factual or descriptive premise to an evaluative conclusion, I have yet to see a clear example of this. But one ought to question the strict bifurcation of fact and value. The failure of entailment is perhaps no surprise given the bifurcation. The Aristotelian view, despite its murkiness, remains a contender.

Defending the Distinctio Realis Against Anthony Kenny

This post defends the real distinction between essence and existence. For some background, see Geach on the Real Distinction I.

In Aquinas on Being (Oxford 2002, p. 45), Anthony Kenny writes, "Peter's continuing to exist is the very same thing as Peter's continuing to possess his essence; if he ceases to exist, he ceases to be a human being and vice versa."

What Kenny is doing in this passage and the surrounding text is rejecting the real distinction between essence and (individual) existence. Thus in a cat, a dog, or a man, there is no distinction in reality between its essence or nature and its existence. In general, for items of kind K, to exist is to be a K. Thus for Socrates to exist is for Socrates to be a man; for Socrates to continue to exist is for Socrates to continue to be a man; and for Socrates to cease to exist is for Socrates to cease being a man.

The claim that for items of kind K, to exist is to be a K, is to be understood, not as a logical or metaphysical equivalence, but as an identity that sanctions a reduction: the existence of Ks just is (identically) their K-ness. Individual (as opposed to what Kenny calls specific) existence reduces to nature. But that is just to say that there is no real distinction in a thing between its individual existence and its nature. For example, there is no non-notional or real distinction in Socrates between him and his existence.

I have three objections to this broadly Aristotelian theory of existence according to which individual existence reduces to nature.

An Argument from Contingency

Socrates might never have existed. If so, and if, for Socrates,
who is a man, to exist = to be a man, then Socrates might never have been a man. This
implies that a certain man, Socrates, might never have been a man, which
is absurd. Therefore, it is not the case that, for Socrates, to exist =
to be a man.

The first premise ought to be uncontroversial. Speaking tenselessly,
Socrates exists and Socrates is a man. But there is no logical or
metaphysical necessity that the man Socrates exist. So, Socrates, though he exists, is
possibly such that he does not exist. (This is equivalent to saying that
he is a contingent being.) So, given that to exist = to be a man,
the man Socrates is possibly such that he is not a man. But this
contradicts the fact that Socrates is essentially a man. For if he is essentially a man, then he is necessarily such that he is a man. Therefore, it
is not the case that, for Socrates, to exist = to be a man.

Convinced? Here is another way of looking at it. I point to Socrates and say, 'This might not have existed.' I say something true. But if I point to him and say, 'This might not have been a man,' I say something false. Therefore, for Socrates, to exist is not to be a man. Of course, he cannot exist without being a man, and he cannot BE a man without BEING. But that is not the question. The question is whether Socrates' being or existence is reducible to his being a man. I have just shown that it is not. Therefore, there is a real distinction between essence and existence in Socrates.

What holds for Socrates holds for every man. No man's very existence is reducible to his being a man. And in general, no individual K's individual existence is reducible to its being a K.

An Argument from Reference

If for Socrates to exist is for Socrates to be a man, then, when he ceases to exist, he ceases to be a man. But then the proper name 'Socrates' used after the philosopher's death does not refer to a man. But it does refer. For I can make true statements about Socrates, e.g., 'Socrates taught Plato.' And the name refers to a man. When Socrates ceased to exist, 'Socrates' did not commence referring to some other thing, a jelly fish say, or a valve-lifter in a '57 Chevy, or more plausibly, a corpse. A man taught Plato, not a corpse, or a pile of ashes. Therefore, it is not the case that for Socrates to exist is for Socrates to be a man.

To understand this argument, please note that it is not being denied that, necessarily, at every time at which Socrates is alive, Socrates exists if and only if he is a man. Socrates cannot exist without being a man, and he cannot be a man without existing. What is being denied, or rather questioned, is the identification of Socrates' existing with his being a man. As I have pointed out many times before, logical equivalences do not sanction reductions.

A Third Argument

We cannot say that to exist = to be a cat, for then only cats could exist. We, or rather the Aristotelian, has to say that, for cats, to exist = to be a cat. In general, for K-items, to exist = to be a K. But why stop here? Can we stop here? There are no cats in general. There are only particular cats, any two of which are numerically distinct, and each of which has its own existence. Consider Max and Manny, two cats of my acquaintance. Each has his own existence, but they share the nature, cat. So if each exists in virtue of being a cat, then each exists in virtue of being the very cat that it is, which is to say: for Max to exist is for Max to be Max, and for Manny to exist is for Manny to be Manny. But then, generalizing, to exist = to be self-identical. The theory we began with collapses into the existence = self-identity theory.

But while each thing is self-identical — this is just the Law of Identity — no contingent thing is identical to its own existence. For if Max were identical to his own existence, then Max would necessarily exist. If God exists, then God is identical to his own existence. But Max is not God. Therefore, existence cannot be reduced to self-identity in the case of contingent beings.

Of course, given that contingent things exist, they must be self-identical, and they cannot BE self-identical unless they ARE or exist. But there might not have been any contingent things at all. So the existence of a thing cannot be reduced to the self-identity it could have only if it exists. Get it? If yes, then you understand the real distinction.

Is A Primary Substance Minus its Accidents a Primary Substance?

I return to a question I was discussing back in August with John the Commenter and more recently with Lukas Novak. The question concerns how to define 'primary substance.' I suggested the following: ". . . an individual or singular complete concrete entity together with its accidents. " But why include the accidents? I gave the following argument:

1. Every primary substance is ontologically basic, where ontologically basic entities are those that exist
per se or independently unlike secondary substances and accidents.

2. Every ontologically basic entity is complete.

Definition: x is complete =_df for every predicate F, either x is F or x is not F. (This is rough since some restrictions will have to be placed on the range of the predicate F. But it is good enough for a blog post.) Thus either Socrates is seated at t or he is not. If he is neither seated nor not seated at t, then he is an incomplete object at t. But if he is an incomplete object at t, then he cannot exist at t. Now every ontologically basic entity is possibly such that it exists. Therefore, every ontologically basic entity is complete. Every ontologically basic entity satisfies the predicate version of the Law of Excluded Middle. (I don't think the converse is true, but then I am not affirming the converse.)

Therefore

3. Every primary substance is complete. (from 1, 2)

4. No primary substance minus its accidents is complete.

5. No primary substance minus its accidents is a primary substance. (from 3, 4)

Lukas Novak responds:

. . . although I concede that necessarily, Socrates has this or that accident, I deny that it follows from it that Socrates considered in abstraction from these accidents is an incomplete object. When Socrates runs, the whole of Socrates is there. When Socrates does not run, again, the whole of Socrates is there. But for any x, y, if the whole of x is there even if y is not there then y is not required for the completeness of x. So Socrates considered precisely qua Socrates, without running or not-running, is complete, and a substance – – the fact that a necessary condition of his existence is that he is connected either with the accident of running or the accident of not-running notwithstanding.

I suspect that Novak has committed an ignoratio elenchi against me. I grant that when Socrates runs, the whole of Socrates is present, and that when he is not running, the whole of him is present. (For when he is not running, he is walking, or skipping, or jumping, or standing still, or crouching . . . .) And so I grant that it is not necessary for the completeness of Socrates that he be running, and that it is not necessary for the completeness of Socrates that he be not running. But — and here is my point — it is necessary for the completeness of Socrates that either he be running or not-running. If he is neither, then he is incomplete, hence not a primary substance. The same holds for all contingent accidents.

Therefore, a primary substance minus its accident is not a primary substance.

My argument above is valid. If Novak thinks it unsound, he must tell me which premise he rejects.

Aristotle on Method and Metaphysics

This is a really good collection of state-of-the-art essays that comes at the right time in my philosophical development. I thank Ed Feser, editor and contributor, for sending me a complimentary copy. (I didn't ask for one, and you shouldn't either.)

Here is Dr. Feser's summary of the contents.

And while you are at Feser's site, take a gander at his series on Alexander Rosenberg.

Is Socrates a Substance or a Cross-Categorical Hybrid?

0. I wanted to explore supposita in their difference from primary substances, but John the Commenter sidetracked me into the aporetics of primary substance. But it is a sidetrack worth exploring even if it doesn't loop back to the mainline. For it provides me more grist for my aporetic mill.

1. Metaphysics is a quest for the ultimately real, the fundamentally real, the ontologically basic. Aristotle, unlike his master Plato, held that such things as this man and that horse are ontologically basic. What is ontologically basic (o-basic) is tode ti, hoc aliquid, this something, e.g., this concrete individual man, Socrates, and that concrete individual donkey. Such individuals are being, ousia, in the primary sense. And so Socrates and his donkey can be called primary beings, or primary substances. Asinity there may be, but it can't be ontologically basic.

This is clearly the drift of Aristotle's thinking despite the numerous complications and embarrassments that arise when one enters into the details.

(If you think that there is 'substance' abuse in Aristotelian and scholastic precincts, I sympathize with you. You have to realize that 'substance' is used in different senses, and that these senses are technical and thus divergent from the senses of 'substance' in ordinary language.)

2. But of course every this something is a this-such: it has features, attributes, properties. This is a datum, not a theory. Socrates is a man and is excited by the turn the dialectic has taken, and this while seated on his donkey. Man is a substance-kind, while being excited and being seated are accidents. (Let us not worry about relations, a particularly vexing topic when approached within an Aristotelian-scholastic purview.) Setting aside also the difficult question of how a secondary substance such as the substance-kind man is related to Socrates, it is safe to say that for Aristotle such properties as being excited and being seated are theoretically viewed as accidents. So conceptualized, properties are not primary beings as they would be if they were conceptualized as mind-independent universals capable of existing unexemplified. Accidents by definition are not o-basic: If A is an accident of S, then A exists only 'in' S and not in itself. A depends on S for its existence, a mode of existence we can call inherence, while S does not depend for its existence on A.

3. So much for background. Now to the problem. Which is ontologically basic: Socrates together with his accidents, or Socrates taken in abstraction from his accidents?

What I want to argue is that a dilemma arises if we assume, as John the Commenter does, that Socrates taken together with his accidents is an accidental unity or accidental compound. A simple example of an accidental compound is seated-Socrates. Now I won't go into the reasons for positing these objects; I will just go along with John in assuming that they are there to be referred to.

Seated-socrates is a hylomorphic compound having Socrates as its matter and being seated as its form. But of course the matter of the accidental compound is itself a compound of prime matter and substantial form, while the form of the accidental compound is not a substantial form but a mere accident. The accidental compound is accidental because seated-Socrates does not exist at all the same times and all the same worlds as Socrates. So we make a tripartite distinction: there is a compound of prime matter and substantial form; there is an accident; and there is the inhering of the accident in the substance, e.g., Socrates' being seated, or seated-Socrates.

As Frank A. Lewis points out, accidental compounds are "cross-categorical hybrids." Thus seated-Socrates belongs neither to the category of substance nor to any non-substance category. One of its constituents is a substance and the other is an accident, but it itself is neither, which is why it is a cross-categorical hybrid entity.

The Dilemma

The dilemma arises on the assumption that Socrates together with his accidents is an accidental compound or accidental unity, and the dilemma dissolves if this assumption is false.

a. Either (i) Socrates together with his accidents is a primary substance or (ii) Socrates taken in abstraction from his accidents is a primary substance.

b. If (i), then Socrates is an accidental compound and thus a "cross-categorical hybrid" (F. A. Lewis) belonging neither to the category of substance nor to any non-substance category. Therefore, if (i), then Socrates is not a primary substance.

c. If (ii), then Socrates is not a concretum, but an abstractum, i.e., a product of abstraction inasmuch as one considers him in abstraction from his accidents. Therefore, if (ii), then Socrates is not a primary substance. For a primary substance must be both concrete and completely determinate. (These, I take it. are equivalent properties.) Primary substances enjoy full ontological status in Aristotle's metaphysics. They alone count as ontologically basic. They are his answer to the question, What is most fundamentally real? Clearly, Socrates taken in abstraction from his accidents is incompletely determinate and thus not fully real.

Therefore

d. On either horn, Socrates is not primary substance.

What say you, John?

On Primary Substances and Accidental Unities

I asked genuinely, not rhetorically : What is the difference between an Aristotelian primary substance and a supposit (hypostasis, suppositum)? The latter figures prominently in the philosophy of the School, as some call it, and I need to get clear about what supposits are, how they differ from primary substances, and whether there are any non-theological reasons for making the distinction. In pursuit of the first question I thought it advisable to state what I understand a primary substance to be. So I wrote:

By 'substance' I mean an Aristotelian primary substance, an individual or singular complete concrete entity together with its accidents. Among the characteristics of substances are the following: substances, unlike universal properties, cannot be exemplified or instantiated; substances, unlike accidents, cannot inhere in anything; substances, unlike heaps and aggregates, are per se unities. Thus Socrates and his donkey are each a substance, but the mereological sum of the two is not a substance.

I thought that was tolerably clear, but as so often happens, a commenter, ignoring my question, took issue with my set-up. That is, he questioned my characterization of primary substance. Nothing wrong with that, of course.

In his last comment, John the Astute Commenter wrote,

. . . I *am* saying that Socrates taken together with his accidents is not strictly identical to Socrates taken in abstraction from his accidents. But that point is obvious. What I am adding is this: Socrates taken together with his accidents is not a substance, but an accidental unity of a substance and some accidents. So I deny your claim that "it is only Socrates together with his accidents that is a complete concrete individual primary substance." Socrates together with his accidents may well be the only complete concrete individual, but he is not a primary substance. Nor is he prime matter; as you say, he is a compound of prime matter and substantial form, although in conjunction with his accidents he plays the *role* of matter in the accidental unity between him and his accidents. This would seem to be a debate about Aristotelian exegesis, so I'll leave it there and not continue to hijack your discussion. As I said, I thought the discussion in Z.4-Z.6 would prove relevant to that discussion, but it would seem that I was mistaken on that score, for which I apologize.

I will now continue in the second person.

No need to apologize, John. You have raised an interesting challenge which I ought to be able to meet. But I want to avoid the labyrinth of Aristotle exegesis to the extent that that is possible, for, lacking as we do the latter-day equivalent of Ariadne's thread, once we enter we are unlikely ever to find our way out again.

The disagreement seems to be as follows. I claim that, from a broadly Aristotelian perspective, which is the perspective of Aquinas, Scotus, Ockham and other medievals who speak of substances and supposita, Socrates is a concrete, complete, individual, primary substance at a time t only when taken together with his accidents at t. I don't deny that a primary substance can be considered in abstraction from its accidents. What I am claiming is that in concrete, mind-independent reality Socrates must have some set of accidents or other, and that, only when he is taken together with his accidents is he a primary substance.

Your claim is that Socrates together with his accidents (at a time, presumably, if I may interpret you a bit) is not a primary substance but an accidental unity, a hylomorphic compound the 'matter' of which is Socrates as primary substance and the form of which is something like the conjunction of his accidents. To put the disagreement as sharply as possible, I am claiming that Socrates counts as a primary substance only when taken together with his accidents, whereas you are claiming that Socrates so counts only when he is not taken together with his accidents, but taken in abstraction from his accidents. For one your view, Socrates taken together with his accidents is an accidental unity, not a primary substance. To get beyond a stand-off we need to consider some arguments.

Argument for My View

1. Every primary substance is ontologically basic, where ontologically basic entities are those that exist per se or independently unlike secondary substances and accidents.

2. Every ontologically basic entity is complete.

Definition: x is complete =_df for every predicate F, either x is F or x is not F. (This is rough since some restrictions will have to be placed on the range of the predicate F. But it is good enough for a blog post.) Thus either Socrates is either seated at t or he is not. If he is neither seated nor not seated at t, then he is an incomplete object. But if he is an incomplete object, then he cannot exist. Now every ontologically basic entity is possibly such that it exists. Therefore, every ontologically basic entity is complete. Every ontologically basic entity satisfies the predicate version of the Law of Excluded Middle. (I don't think the converse is true, but then I am not affirming the converse.)

Therefore

3. Every primary substance is complete. (from 1, 2)

4. No primary substance minus its accidents is complete.

5. No primary substance minus its accidents is a primary substance. (from 3,4)

Argument for John's View

A. The complete individual Socrates is a hylomorphic compound of matter and form (Premise).
B. The [primary] substance Socrates is the matter of the complete individual Socrates (Premise).
C. For all x and for all y, if x is a hylomorphic compound and y is the matter of x, then x is not strictly identical to y.
Therefore,
D. The complete individual Socrates is not strictly identical to the [primary] substance Socrates.

Read charitably, John's argument is an enthymeme the suppressed or tacit premise of which is:

S. The complete individual Socrates is an accidental unity of Socrates + his accidents.

Without suppressed premises (S), (B) is obviously false and the argument is unsound. But with (S), John's argument begs the question.

Here is another wrinkle. Some accidents are said to be 'proper.' These are accidents that are entailed by the nature (essence) of the thing that has the nature, but they are, for all that, accidents. A proper accident of a substance is one the substance cannot exist without. To put it paradoxically, a proper accident of a substance is an accident that is 'essential' and therefore not 'accidental' to the substance whose accident it is. But a better way to put it would be to say that a proper accident, though no part of the essence, is de re necessary to the substance having the essence.

To adapt an example from John J. Haldane, if my cat Max is lounging by the fire, he becomes warm. His warmth is an accident but not a proper accident or proprium. Max is warm both temporarily and contingently in virtue of his proximity to the fire. But the warmth that flows from his metabolic processes is a proper accident without which Max could not exist.

Now let's suppose that this distinction is not a mere scholastic Spitzfindigkeit but 'holds water.' Then, clearly, and pace John, Socrates together with his proper accidents cannot be an accidental unity. So Socrates as primary substance must include at least his proper accidents.

What is the Difference Between a Substance and a Supposit?

I need to answer three questions. This post addresses the first.

1. What is the difference between an Aristotelian primary substance and a supposit (hypostasis, suppositum)?

2. Is there any non-theological basis for this distinction?

3. If the answer to (2) is negative, is the addition of suppposita to one's Aristotelian ontology a case of legitimate metaphysical revision or a case of an ad hoc theoretical patch job? According to Marilyn McCord Adams, "Metaphysical revision differs from ad hoc theoretical patching insofar as it attempts to make the new data systematically unsurprising in a wider theoretical context." ("Substance and Supposits," p. 40)

The First Question

By 'substance' I mean an Aristotelian primary substance, an individual or singular complete concrete entity together with its accidents. Among the characteristics of substances are the following: substances, unlike universal properties, cannot be exemplified or instantiated; substances, unlike accidents, cannot inhere in anything; substances, unlike heaps and aggregates, are per se unities. Thus Socrates and his donkey are each a substance, but the mereological sum of the two is not a substance.

Now what is a supposit? Experts in medieval philosophy — and I am not one of them, nota bene — sometimes write as if there is no distinction between a substance and a supposit. Thus Richard Cross: "Basically a supposit is a complete being that is neither instantiated or exemplified, nor inherent in another." ("Relations, Universals, and the Absue of Tropes," PAS 79, 2005, p. 53.) And Marilyn McCord Adams speaks of Socrates and Plato as "substance individuals" and then puts "hypostases or supposits" in apposition to the first phrase. (PAS 79, 2005, p. 15)

My first question, then is: Is there any more-than-verbal difference between a substance and a supposit, and if so, what is it?

One answer that suggests itself is that, while every substance has a supposit, some substances have alien supposits. (I take this phrase from Adams, p. 31 et passim.) A substance has an alien supposit iff it is not its own supposit. I understand Aristotle to maintain or at least be committed to the proposition that every (primary) substance is essentially its own supposit. If so, then no substance is possibly such as to have an alien supposit. If alien supposition is metaphysically or broadly logically possible, however, then we have a ground for a more-than-terminological distinction between substances and supposits. Whether the converse of this conditional holds is a further question. For it may be that there is a ground for the distinction even if alien supposition is not possible.

The Incarnation is an example of alien supposition as I will now try to explain.

a. A person is a (primary) substance of a rational nature. (Boethian definition)

b. There is only one person in Christ, the Word, the Second Person of the Trinity. (Rejection of the heresy of Nestorius, according to which in Christ there are two persons in two natures rather than one person in two natures.)

c. The individual(ized) human nature of Christ is a primary substance of a rational nature.

d. Every (primary) substance is its own supposit, which implies that every substance of a rational nature has its own personhood.

The tetrad is logically inconsistent: any three limbs taken in conjunction entail the negation of the remaining one. Thus the conjunction (a) & (c) & (d) entails the negation of (b). The solution to the tetrad is to deny (d). One does this by maintaining that, while the individualized human nature of Christ is a substance, it is not a substance that supports itself: it has an alien supposit, namely, the Second Person of the Trinity.

Let me now say a bit about the Trinity. Here too a problem looms that can be cast in the mold of an aporetic tetrad.

a. A person is a (primary) substance of a rational nature. (Boethian definition)

e. There are exactly three divine persons, Father, Son, Holy Ghost . (Rejection of 'Quaternity')

f. The individualized nature of God is a primary substance of a rational nature.

d. Every (primary) substance is its own supposit, which implies that every substance of a rational nature has its own personhood.

The Son is thus the alien supposit of both God's divine nature and Christ's human nature.

Accidents of a Substance: Simple or Complex?

Dr. Novak is invited to tell me which of the following propositions he accepts, which he rejects, and why:

0. I have reservations about an ontology in terms of substances and accidents, but anyone who adopts such an ontology needs to provide a detailed theory of accidents. This post sketches a theory. It has roots in Aristotle, Brentano, Chisholm, Frank A. Lewis, and others who have written about accidental compounds or accidental unities.

1. Accidents are particulars, not universals, where particulars, unlike universals, are defined in terms of unrepeatability or uninstantiability.

2. The accidents of a substance are properties of that substance. Tom's redness, for example, is a property of him. That there are properties is a datanic claim; that some of them are accidents is a theoretical claim. Accidental properties are those a thing need not have to exist. I am using 'property' in a fairly noncommittal way. Roughly, a property is a predicable entity.

3. It follows from (1) and (2) that some properties are particulars.

4. A substance S and its accident A are both particulars. S is a concrete particular while A is an abstract particular. For example, Tom is a concrete particular; his redness is an abstract particular. It is abstract because there is more to Tom than his being red.

5. Accidents are identity- and existence-dependent upon the substances of which they are the accidents. An accident cannot be the accident it is, nor can it exist, except 'in' the very substance of which it is an accident. Accidents are not merely dependent on substances; they are dependent on the very substances of which they are the accidents. 'In' is not to be taken spatially but as expressing ontological dependence. If the being of substances is esse, the being of accidents is inesse. These are two different modes of being.

6. It follows from (5) that accidents are non-transferrable both over time and across possible worlds. For example, Peter's fear cannot migrate to Paul: it cannot somehow leave Peter and take up residence in Paul. Suppose Peter and Paul are both cold to the same degree. If coldness is an accident, then each has his own coldness. The coldnesses are numerically distinct. They cannot be exchanged in the way jackets can be exchanged. Suppose Peter and Paul both own exactly similar jackets. The two men can exchange jackets. What they cannot do is exchange accidents such as the accident, being jacketed. Each man has his own jacketedness.

Now for a modal point. There is no possible world in which Peter's coldness exists but Peter does not. Peter's coldness does not necessarily exist, but it is necessarily such that, if it does exist, then Peter exists. And of course the accident cannot exist except by existing 'in' Peter. So we can say that Peter's coldness is tied necessarily to Peter and to Peter alone: in every possible world in which Peter's coldness exists, Peter exists; and in no possible world does Peter's coldness inhere in anything distinct from Peter. The same goes for Peter's jacketedness. Peter's jacket, however, is not necessarily tied to Peter: it can exst without him just as he can exist without it. Both are substances; both are logically capable of independent existence.

The modal point underins the temporal point. Accidents cannot migrate over time because they are necessarily tied to the substances of which they are the accidents.

7. It follows that the superficial linguistic similarity of 'Peter's jacket' and 'Peter's weight' masks a deep ontological difference: the first expression makes reference to two substances while the second makes reference to a substance and its accident.

8 If A is an accident of S, then A is not related to S by any external relation on pain of Bradley's regress.

9 If A is an accident of S, then A is not identical to S. For if A were identical to S, then A would be an accident of itself. This cannot be since 'x is an accident of y' is irreflexive.

10. If A is an accident of S, then A cannot be an improper or proper part of S. Not an improper part for then A would be identical to S. Not a proper part of S because accidents depend on substances for their identity and existence. No proper part of a whole, however, depends for its existence and identity on the whole: it is the other way around: wholes depend for their identity and existence on their parts.

11. How then are we to understand the tie or connection between S and A? This is the connection expressed when we say, for example, that Socrates is white. It is an intimate connection but not as intimate as identity. We need a tie that is is less intimate than identity but more intimate than a relation.

We saw in #10 that an accident cannot be a part (ontological consituent) of its substance. But what is to stop us from theorizing that an accident is a whole one of the proper parts of which is the substance? This is not as crazy as it sounds.

12. Let our example be the accidental predication, 'Socrates is seated.' Start by giving this a reistic translation: 'Socrates is a seated thing.' Take the referent of 'Socrates' to be the substance, Socrates. Take the referent of 'a seated thing' to be the accidental compound Socrates + seatedness. This compound entity has two primary constituents, Socrates, and the property of being seated. It has as a secondary constituent the tie designated by '+.' Now read 'Socrates is a seated thing' as expressing, not the strict identity, but the accidental sameness of the two particulars Socrates and Socrates + seatedness. Thus the 'is' in our original sentence is construed, not as expressing instantiation, or identity, but as expressing accidental sameness. Accidental sameness ties the concrete particular Socrates to the abstract particular Socrates + seatedness.

13. The accidental compound is an extralinguistic particular having four constituents: a concrete particular, a nexus of exemplification, a universal, and a temporal index. Thus we can think of it as the thin fact of Socrates' being seated. 'Thin' because not all of Socrates' properties are included in this fact.

14. My suggestion, then, is that accidents are thin facts. To test this theory we need to see if thin facts have all the features of accidents. Well, we have seen (#1) that accidents are particulars. Thin facts are as well. This is a case of what Armstrong calls the Victory of Particularity: a particular's exemplification of a universal is a particular.

Accidents are properties and so are thin facts: both are ways a substance is. Both are predicable entities. 'Socrates is seated' predicates something of something. On the present theory it predicates an abstract particular of a concrete particular where the predicative tie is not the tie of instantiation (exemplification) but the tie of accidental sameness.

Accidents are abstract particulars, and so are thin facts. They are abstract because they do not capture the whole reality or quiddity of the substance.

Accidents depend on substances for their identity and existence. The same is true of thin facts. A fact is a whole of parts and depends for its identity and existence on its parts, including the substance.

Accidents are non-transferrable. The same holds for thin facts.

Accidents are necessarily tied to the substances of which they are accidents. The same goes for thin facts: the identity of a thin fact depends on its substance constituent.

An accident is not identical to its host substance. The same is true of thin facts. Socrates' being seated is not identical to Socrates.

An accident is not externally related to its substance. The same is obviously truth of thin facts.

Accidents are not parts of substances. The same holds for thin facts.

Finally, no accident has two beginnings of existence. If Elliot is sober, then drunk, then sober again, his first sobriety is numerically distinct from his second: the first sobriety does not come into existence again when our man sobers up. The same is true of thin facts. Elliot's beng sober at t is distinct from Elliot's being sober at t*.

15. On the above theory, an accident is a complex. It follows that an accident is not a trope, pace Dr. Novak. Tropes are very strange animals. A whiteness trope is an abstract particular that is also a property and is also ontologically simple. An example is the particular redness of Tom the tomato. I can pick out this trope using 'the redness of Tom and Tom alone' where the 'of' is a subjective genitive. But note that the 'of Tom and Tom alone' has no ontological correlate. The trope, in itself, i.e., apart from our way of referring to it, is simple, not complex. And yet it is necessarily tied to Tom. This, to my mind, makes no sense, as I explained in earlier posts. So I reject tropes, and with them the identification of accidents with tropes.

My conclusion, then, is that IF — a big 'if' — talk of substances and accidents is ultimately tenable and philosophically fruitful, THEN accidents must be ontologically complex entities. Anyone who endorses accidents is therefore a constituent ontologist.

Bare Particulars and Lukáš Novák’s Argument Against Them

In his contribution to the book I am reviewing, Metaphysics: Aristotelian, Scholastic, Analytic (Ontos Verlag, 2012), Lukáš Novák mounts an Aristotelian argument against bare particulars. In this entry I will try to understand his argument. I will hereafter refer to Professor Novák as 'LN' to avoid the trouble of having to paste in the diacriticals that his Czech name requires.

As I see it, the overall structure of LN's argument is an instance of modus tollens:

1. If some particulars are bare, then all particulars are bare.
2. It is not the case that all particulars are bare.
Therefore
3. No particulars are bare.

On the Very Idea of a Bare Particular

'Bare particular' is a technical term in philosophy the provenance of which is the work of Gustav Bergmann. (D. M. Armstrong flies a similar idea under the flag 'thin particular.') Being a terminus technicus, the term does not wear its meaning on its sleeve. It does not refer to particulars that lack properties; there are none. It refers to particulars that lack natures or nontrivial essential properties. (Being self-identical is an example of a trivial essential property; being human of a nontrivial essential property.) Bare particulars differ among themselves solo numero: they are not intrinsically or essentially different, but only numerically different. Or you could say that they are barely different. Leibniz with his identitas indiscernibilium would not have approved.

The notion of a bare particular makes sense only in the context of a constituent ontology according to which ordinary particulars, 'thick particulars' in the jargon of Armstrong, have ontological constituents or metaphysical parts. Consider two qualitatively indiscernible round red spots. There are two of them and thay share all their features. What is the ontological ground of the sameness of features? The sameness of the universals 'in' each spot. What grounds the numerical difference? What makes them two and not one? Each has a different bare particular among its ontological constituents. BPs, accordingly, are individuators/differentiators. On this sort of ontological analysis an ordinary particular is a whole of ontological parts including universals and a bare particular. But of course the particulars exemplify the universals, so a tertium quid is needed, a nexus of exemplification to tie the bare particular to the universals.

The main point, however, is that there is nothing in the nature of a bare particular to dictate which universals it exemplifies: BPs don't have natures. Thus any BP is 'promiscuously combinable' with any first-order universal. On this Bergmannian ontological scheme it is not ruled out that Socrates might have been an octopus or a valve-lifter in a '57 Chevy. The other side of the coin is that there is no DE RE metaphysical necessity that Socrates be human. Of course, there is the DE DICTO metaphysical impossibility, grounded in the respective properties, that an octopus be human. But it is natural to want to say more, namely that it is DE RE metaphysically impossible that Socrates be an octopus. But then the problem is: how can a particular qua particular 'contradict' any property? Being an octopus 'contradicts' (is metaphysically inconsistent with) being a man. But how can a particular be such as to disallow its exemplification of some properties? (116)

Thus I agree with LN that if there are bare particulars, then there are no DE RE metaphysical necessities pertaining to ordinary particulars, and vice versa. This is why LN, an Aristotelian, needs to be able to refute the very notion of a bare particular.

LN's Argument for premise (2) in the Master Argument Above

LN draws our attention to the phenomenon of accidental change. A rock goes from being cold to being hot. Peter goes from being ignorant of the theorem of Pythagoras to being knowledgeable about it. These are accidental changes: one and the same particular has different properties at different times. Now a necessary condition of accidental change is that one and the same subject have different properties at different times. But is it a sufficent condition? Suppose Peter is F at time t and not F at time t* (t* later than t). Suppose that F-ness is a universal. It follows that Peter goes from exemplifying the universal F-ness at t to not exemplifying it at t*. That is: he stands in the exemplification relation to F-ness at t, but ceases so to stand to t*. But there has to be more to the change than this. For, as LN points out, the change is in Peter. It is intrinsic to him and cannot consist merely in a change in a relation to a universal. Thus it seems to LN that, even if there are universals and particulars, we need another category of entity to account for accidental change, a category that that I will call that of property-exemplifications. Thus Peter's being cold at t is a property-exemplification and so is Peter's not being cold at t*. Peter's change in respect of temperature involves Peter as the diachronically persisting substratum of the change, the universal coldness, and two property-exemplifications, Peter's being cold at t and Peter's being not cold at t*.

These property-exemplifications, however, are particulars, not universals even though each has a universal as a constituent. This is a special case of what Armstrong calls the Victory of Particularity: the result of a particular exemplifying a universal is a particular. Moreover, these items have natures or essences: it is essential to Peter's being cold that it have coldness as a constituent. (This is analogous to mereological essentialism.) Hence property- exemplifications are particulars, but not bare particulars. Therefore, (2) is true: It is not the case that all particulars are bare.

I find LN's argument for (2) persuasive. The argument in outline:

4. There are property-exemplifications
5. Property-exemplifications are particulars
6. Property-exemplifications have natures
7. Whatever has a nature is not bare
Therefore
2. It is not the case that all particulars are bare.

Premise (1) in the Master Argument

LN has shown that not all particulars are bare. But why should we think that (1) is true, that if some particulars are bare, then all are? It could be that simple particulars are bare while complex particulars, such as property-exemplifications, are not bare. If that is so, then showing that no complex particular is bare would not amount to showing that no particular is bare.

The Master Argument, then, though valid, is not sound, or at at least it is not obviously sound: we have been given no good reason to accept (1).

Property-exemplifications, Tropes, and Accidents

But in all fairness to LN I should point out that he speaks of tropes and accidents, not of property-exemplifications. I used the latter expression because 'trope' strikes me as out of place. Tropes are simples. Peter's being ignorant of the theorem of Pythagoras at t, however, is a complex, and LN says as much on p. 117 top. So the entity designated by the italicized phrase is not a trope, strictly speaking. 'Trope' is a terminus technicus whose meaning in this ontological context was first given to it by Donald C. Williams.

Well, is the designatum of the italicized phrase an accident? Can an accident of a substance have that very subtance as one of its ontological constituents? I should think not. But Peter's being ignorant of the theorem of Pythagoras at t has Peter as one of its constituents. So I should think that it is not an accident of Peter.

I conclude that either I am failing to understand LN's argument or that he has been insufficiently clear in expounding it.

A Final Quibble

LN suggests that the intuitions behind the theory of bare particulars are rooted in Frege's mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive distinction between concepts and objects. "Once this distinction has been made, it is very hard to see how there might be a genuine case of logical de re necessity." (115) The sentence quoted is true, but as I said above, the notion of a bare particular makes no sense except in the context of a constituent ontology. Frege's, however, is not a constituent ontology like Bergmann's but what Bergmann calls a function ontology. (See G. Bergmann, Realism, p. 7. Wolterstorff's constituent versus relation ontology distinction is already in Bergmann as the distinct between complex and function ontologies.) So I deny that part of the motivation for the positing of bare particulars is an antecedent acceptance of Frege's concept-object distinction. I agree that if one accepts that distinction, then logical or rather metaphyscal de re necessity goes by the boards. But the Fregean distinction is not part of the motivation or argumentation for bare particulars.

Just what considerations motivate the positing of bare particulars would be a good topic for a separate post.

Transitivity of Predication?

I dedicate this post to London Ed, who likes sophisms and scholastic arcana.

Consider these two syllogistic arguments:

A1. Man is an animal; Socrates is a man; ergo, Socrates is an animal.
A2. Man is a species; Socrates is a man; ergo, Socrates is a species.

The first argument is valid. On one way of accounting for its validity, we make two assumptions. First, we assume that each of the argument's constituent sentences is a predication. Second, we assume the principle of the Transitivity of Predication: if x is predicable of y, and y is predicable of z, then x is predicable of z. This principle has an Aristotelian pedigree. At Categories 3b5, we read, "For all that is predicated of the predicate will be predicated also of the subject." So if animal is predicable of man, and man of Socrates, then animal of Socrates.

Something goes wrong, however, in the second argument. The question is: what exactly? Let's first of all see if we can diagnose the fallacy while adhering to our two assumptions. Thus we assume that each occurrence of 'is' in (A2) is an 'is' of predication, and that predication is transitive. One suggestion — and I take this to be the line of some Thomists — is that (A2) equivocates on 'man.' In the major, 'man' means 'man-in-the-mind,' 'man as existing with esse intentionale.' In the minor, 'man' means 'man-in-reality,' 'man as existing with esse naturale.' We thus diagnose the invalidity of (A2) by saying that it falls afoul of quaternio terminorum, the four-term fallacy. On this diagnosis, Transitivity of Predication is upheld: it is just that in this case the principle does not apply since there are four terms.

But of course there is also the modern Fregean way on which we abandon both of our assumptions and locate the equivocation in (A2) elsewhere. On a Fregean diagnosis, there is an equivocation on 'is' in (A2) as between the 'is' of inclusion and the 'is' of predication. In the major premise, 'is' expresses, not predication, but inclusion: the thought is that the concept man includes within its conceptual content the subconcept species. In the minor and in the conclusion, however, the 'is' expresses predication: the thought is that Socrates falls under the concepts man and species. Accordingly, (A2) is invalid because of an equivocation on 'is,' not because of an equivocation on 'man.'

The Fregean point is that the concept man falls WITHIN but not UNDER the concept animal, while the object Socrates falls UNDER but not WITHIN the concepts man and animal. Man does not fall under animal because no concept is an animal. Animal is a mark (Merkmal) not a property (Eigenschaft) of man. In general, the marks of a concept are not its properties. But concepts do have properties. The property of being instantiated, for example, is a property of the concept man. But it is not a mark of it. If it were a mark, then man by its very nature would be instantiated and it would be a conceptual truth that there are human beings, which is false.

Since on the Fregean scheme the properties of concepts needn't be properties of the items that fall under the concepts, Transitivity of Predication fails. Thus, the property of being instantiated is predicable of the concept philosopher, and the concept philosopher is predicable of Socrates; but the property of being instantiated is not predicable of Socrates.

Via Platonica Versus Via Aristotelis

I have spoken more than once of the fruitful tension between Athens (philosophy) and Jerusalem (Biblical revelation). But there is also a tension, and it is also a fruitful one, within Athens. It is depicted, if such a thing can be depicted at all, in Raphael's School of Athens. Take a gander at the close-up below. Plato points up, Aristotle, the younger man, points down. The Forms are, in a manner of speaking, up yonder in a topos ouranos, in a heavenly place; his star pupil would, again in a manner of speaking, bring them down to earth. In a terminology I do not wholly endorse, Plato is an extreme, while Aristotle is a moderate, realist.

The vitality of the West is due, in part, to the fruitful tension between Athens and Jerusalem. And much of the vitality of philosophy derives from the fruitful tension between the Platonic and Aristotelian ways of thinking, not just as regards the problem of universals, but on a wide range of issues.