Parts and Properties in Aristotle\u27s Categories

Call a property recurrent if it can be found in more than one subject, and nonrecurrent otherwise. The question whether Aristotle holds that there are nonrecurrent properties has spawned a lively debate among recent commentators. An assumption held in common by both sides of the debate is that a property is nonrecurrent if it is inseparable from an individual subject. In this paper, I’ll argue that this assumption is false. There are a variety of kinds of separation in Aristotle. When we focus attention on what notion of separation is relevant, we will see that the inseparability possessed by individual properties is neutral on the question whether such properties are recurrent or nonrecurrent. In particular. I’ll ; argue that Aristotle is only claiming that inherent properties, unlike parts, cannot; be severed from their subjects

Aristotle on Consciousness

Aristotle sometimes draws analogies between perceiving and thinking. One analogy, for example, concerns the relation holding between faculties and their objects. If thinking is like perceiving, then as the faculty of perception is to the object perceived, so too the faculty of thought is to the intelligible object. Of course, there are also disanalogies between perception and thought. For example, where perception requires external stimulation by sensible substances, thought does not generally require external stimulation. How far then might we push the analogy? In this essay, I’ll argue that the role of the agent intellect in thought is analogous to the role of perceiving that we see and hear in perception

Aristotle on Mathematical Existence

Do mathematical objects exist in some realm inaccessible to our senses? It may be tempting to deny this. For one thing, how we could come to know mathematical truths, if such knowledge must arise from causal interaction with non-empirical objects? However, denying that mathematical objects exist altogether has unsettling consequences. If you deny the existence of mathematical objects, then you must reject all claims that commit you to such objects, which means rejecting much of mathematics as it is standardly understood. For, as David Papineau (1990) vividly puts it, it is doublethink to deny that mathematical objects exist but to continue to believe, for example, that there are two prime numbers between ten and fifteen. Two current responses to this problem are literalism and fictionalism. Both literalists and fictionalists deny the existence of a world of mathematical objects distinct from the empirical world. But they differ markedly in this denial. Literalists argue that mathematical objects simply exist in the empirical world; on this account, mathematical assertions assert true beliefs about perceivable objects. Fictionalists, on the other hand, hold that, strictly speaking, mathematical objects do not exist at all, and so exist in neither the empirical world nor in some realm distinct from the empirical world. They argue that mathematical objects are not actual objects but rather harmless fictions; on this account, mathematical assertions do not assert true beliefs about the world but merely fictional attitudes. Although these two positions are apparently quite opposed to one another, they nonetheless have been both ascribed to Aristotle. Indeed, as I’ll argue, Aristotle’s philosophy of mathematics exhibits some of the features characteristic of literalism and some of the features characteristic of fictionalism. However, Aristotle’s position also exhibits features interestingly different from both literalism and fictionalism. The paper comes in three parts. In the first part, I’ll quickly survey the variety of descriptions which Aristotle uses to characterize the relation between mathematical objects and the perceivable world. This will help to explain how apparently opposed positions have been ascribed to Aristotle. In the second part, I’ll discuss literalism in contemporary philosophy of mathematics, the ascription of literalism to Aristotle and the points of agreement and disagreement between Aristotle and literalists. In the third and final part of the paper, I’ll discuss fictionalism in contemporary philosophy of mathematics, the ascription of fictionalism to Aristotle and the points of agreement and disagreement between Aristotle and fictionalists

Ontological Independence in Aristotle\u27s Categories

Aristotle holds that substances (such as you and me) are ontologically independent from nonsubstances (such as our qualities and quantities) but nonsubstances are ontologically dependent on substances. There is then an asymmetry between substances and nonsubstances with respect to ontological dependence. Such asymmetry is widely and rightly thought to be a lynchpin of Aristotelian metaphysics. What is really real for Aristotle are such ordinary objects as you and me. Our properties - my paleness, your generosity - inhabit Aristotle\u27s ontology only in so far as they are ours. This much we can all agree on; and I\u27ll only briefly rehearse one of the reasons for ascribing this picture to Aristotle below. For I agree with the orthodoxy that substances enjoy a certain kind of ontological dependence from nonsubstances - an independence which nonsubstances lack with respect to substances. But I disagree with the orthodoxy as to what kind of ontological independence substances have and nonsubstances lack. Under the orthodox interpretation, the ontological independence ascribed to substances and denied of nonsubstances is a capacity for separate existence. But, I\u27ll argue, there\u27s a tension between substances and nonsubstances with respect to ontological independence

Is 'Cause' Ambiguous?

Causal pluralists hold that that there is not just one determinate kind of causation. Some causal pluralists hold that ‘cause’ is ambiguous among these different kinds. For example, Hall (2004) argues that ‘cause’ is ambiguous between two causal relations, which he labels dependence and production. The view that ‘cause’ is ambiguous, however, wrongly predicts zeugmatic conjunction reduction, and wrongly predicts the behaviour of ellipsis in causal discourse. So ‘cause’ is not ambiguous. If we are to disentangle causal pluralism from the ambiguity claim, we need to consider what other linguistic approaches are available to the causal pluralist. I consider and reject proposals that ‘cause’ is a general term, that the term is an indexical, and that the term conveys different kinds of causation through implicature or presupposition. Finally, I argue that causal pluralism is better handled by treating ‘cause’ as a univocal term within a dynamic interpretation framework

Salience and metaphysical explanation

Metaphysical explanations, unlike many other kinds of explanation, are standardly thought to be insensitive to our epistemic situation and so are not evaluable by cognitive values such as salience. I consider a case study that challenges this view. Some properties are distributed over an extension. For example, the property of being polka-dotted red on white, when instantiated, is distributed over a surface. Similar properties have been put to work in a variety of explanatory tasks in recent metaphysics, including: providing an analysis of change, giving to presentists truthmakers for past claims; giving to priority monists an account of basic heterogeneous entities; and giving to friends of extended simples an explanation of how an extended simple can enjoy qualitative variation. I argue that such explanations exhibit salience failure. How ought we represent the semantics of salience? Differences in linguistic stress induce semantic differences similar to the semantic differences induced in explanations by differences in salience, and I will draw an analogy with linguistic theories of focus sensitivity to sketch how one might model the role of salience in these kinds of explanations. I end with a few tentative conclusions about the role of cognitive values in metaphysical explanations. Some theorists view the citation of a ground as a sufficient explanation. If certain explanations appealing to distributed properties exhibit attenuated salience, then arguably the mere citation of a ground does not always provide an adequate explanation

Aristotle on Predication

A predicate logic typically has a heterogeneous semantic theory. Subjects and predicates have distinct semantic roles: subjects refer; predicates characterize. A sentence expresses a truth if the object to which the subject refers is correctly characterized by the predicate. Traditional term logic, by contrast, has a homogeneous theory: both subjects and predicates refer; and a sentence is true if the subject and predicate name one and the same thing. In this paper, I will examine evidence for ascribing to Aristotle the view that subjects and predicates refer. If this is correct, then it seems that Aristotle, like the traditional term logician, problematically conflates predication and identity claims. I will argue that we can ascribe to Aristotle the view that both subjects and predicates refer, while holding that he would deny that a sentence is true just in case the subject and predicate name one and the same thing. In particular, I will argue that Aristotle's core semantic notion is not identity but the weaker relation of constitution. For example, the predication ‘All men are mortal’ expresses a true thought, in Aristotle's view, just in case the mereological sum of humans is a part of the mereological sum of mortal