Aristotle: The Complete Works - Aristotle

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always seek to set out the terms a single word: for we shall often have complexes of words to which a single name is not given. Hence it is difficult to reduce syllogisms with such terms. Sometimes too fallacies will result from such a search, e.g. the belief that syllogism can establish that which has no mean. Let A stand for two right angles, B for triangle, C for isosceles triangle. A then belongs to C because of B: but A belongs to B without the mediation of another term: for the triangle in virtue of its own nature contains two right angles, consequently there will be no middle term for the proposition AB, although it is demonstrable. For it is clear that the middle must not always be assumed to be an individual thing, but sometimes a complex of words, as happens in the case mentioned.

      That the first term belongs to the middle, and the middle to the extreme, must not be understood in the sense that they can always be predicated of one another or that the first term will be predicated of the middle in the same way as the middle is predicated of the last term. The same holds if the premisses are negative. But we must suppose the verb ‘to belong’ to have as many meanings as the senses in which the verb ‘to be’ is used, and in which the assertion that a thing ‘is’ may be said to be true. Take for example the statement that there is a single science of contraries. Let A stand for ‘there being a single science’, and B for things which are contrary to one another. Then A belongs to B, not in the sense that contraries are the fact of there being a single science of them, but in the sense that it is true to say of the contraries that there is a single science of them.

      It happens sometimes that the first term is stated of the middle, but the middle is not stated of the third term, e.g. if wisdom is knowledge, and wisdom is of the good, the conclusion is that there is knowledge of the good. The good then is not knowledge, though wisdom is knowledge. Sometimes the middle term is stated of the third, but the first is not stated of the middle, e.g. if there is a science of everything that has a quality, or is a contrary, and the good both is a contrary and has a quality, the conclusion is that there is a science of the good, but the good is not science, nor is that which has a quality or is a contrary, though the good is both of these. Sometimes neither the first term is stated of the middle, nor the middle of the third, while the first is sometimes stated of the third, and sometimes not: e.g. if there is a genus of that of which there is a science, and if there is a science of the good, we conclude that there is a genus of the good. But nothing is predicated of anything. And if that of which there is a science is a genus, and if there is a science of the good, we conclude that the good is a genus. The first term then is predicated of the extreme, but in the premisses one thing is not stated of another.

      The same holds good where the relation is negative. For ‘that does not belong to this’ does not always mean that ‘this is not that’, but sometimes that ‘this is not of that’ or ‘for that’, e.g. ‘there is not a motion of a motion or a becoming of a becoming, but there is a becoming of pleasure: so pleasure is not a becoming.’ Or again it may be said that there is a sign of laughter, but there is not a sign of a sign, consequently laughter is not a sign. This holds in the other cases too, in which the thesis is refuted because the genus is asserted in a particular way, in relation to the terms of the thesis. Again take the inference ‘opportunity is not the right time: for opportunity belongs to God, but the right time does not, since nothing is useful to God’. We must take as terms opportunity-right time-God: but the premiss must be understood according to the case of the noun. For we state this universally without qualification, that the terms ought always to be stated in the nominative, e.g. man, good, contraries, not in oblique cases, e.g. of man, of a good, of contraries, but the premisses ought to be understood with reference to the cases of each term-either the dative, e.g. ‘equal to this’, or the genitive, e.g. ‘double of this’, or the accusative, e.g. ‘that which strikes or sees this’, or the nominative, e.g. ‘man is an animal’, or in whatever other way the word falls in the premiss.

      The expressions ‘this belongs to that’ and ‘this holds true of that’ must be understood in as many ways as there are different categories, and these categories must be taken either with or without qualification, and further as simple or compound: the same holds good of the corresponding negative expressions. We must consider these points and define them better.

      A term which is repeated in the premisses ought to be joined to the first extreme, not to the middle. I mean for example that if a syllogism should be made proving that there is knowledge of justice, that it is good, the expression ‘that it is good’ (or ‘qua good’) should be joined to the first term. Let A stand for ‘knowledge that it is good’, B for good, C for justice. It is true to predicate A of B. For of the good there is knowledge that it is good. Also it is true to predicate B of C. For justice is identical with a good. In this way an analysis of the argument can be made. But if the expression ‘that it is good’ were added to B, the conclusion will not follow: for A will be true of B, but B will not be true of C. For to predicate of justice the term ‘good that it is good’ is false and not intelligible. Similarly if it should be proved that the healthy is an object of knowledge qua good, of goat-stag an object of knowledge qua not existing, or man perishable qua an object of sense: in every case in which an addition is made to the predicate, the addition must be joined to the extreme.

      The position of the terms is not the same when something is established without qualification and when it is qualified by some attribute or condition, e.g. when the good is proved to be an object of knowledge and when it is proved to be an object of knowledge that it is good. If it has been proved to be an object of knowledge without qualification, we must put as middle term ‘that which is’, but if we add the qualification ‘that it is good’, the middle term must be ‘that which is something’. Let A stand for ‘knowledge that it is something’, B stand for ‘something’, and C stand for ‘good’. It is true to predicate A of B: for ex hypothesi there is a science of that which is something, that it is something. B too is true of C: for that which C represents is something. Consequently A is true of C: there will then be knowledge of the good, that it is good: for ex hypothesi the term ‘something’ indicates the thing’s special nature. But if ‘being’ were taken as middle and ‘being’ simply were joined to the extreme, not ‘being something’, we should not have had a syllogism proving that there is knowledge of the good, that it is good, but that it is; e.g. let A stand for knowledge that it is, B for being, C for good. Clearly then in syllogisms which are thus limited we must take the terms in the way stated.

      We ought also to exchange terms which have the same value, word for word, and phrase for phrase, and word and phrase, and always take a word in preference to a phrase: for thus the setting out of the terms will be easier. For example if it makes no difference whether we say that the supposable is not the genus of the opinable or that the opinable is not identical with a particular kind of supposable (for what is meant is the same in both statements), it is better to take as the terms the supposable and the opinable in preference to the phrase suggested.

      Since the expressions ‘pleasure is good’ and ‘pleasure is the good’ are not identical, we must not set out the terms in the same way; but if the syllogism is to prove that pleasure is the good, the term must be ‘the good’, but if the object is to prove that pleasure is good, the term will be ‘good’. Similarly in all other cases.

      It is not the same, either in fact or in speech, that A belongs to all of that to which B belongs, and that A belongs to all of that to all of which B belongs: for nothing prevents B from belonging to C, though not to all C: e.g. let B stand for beautiful, and C for white. If beauty belongs to something white, it is true to say that beauty belongs to that which is white; but not perhaps to everything that is white. If then A belongs to B, but not to everything of which B is predicated, then whether B belongs to all C or merely belongs to C,

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