Handbook of the History of Logic: - Fordham University Faculty

Peter Abelard and His Contemporaries 107
we may be led to the conclusion that there is a thing named by the proposition as a
whole — its dictum — just as there is a thing named by the individual name. But
this conclusion makes exactly the wrong mistake about the dictum. The dictum
is signified by a proposition, but is not actually a thing that is named by it. The
signifying that a proposition does is different from naming. A proposition does
not name what it says.
This requirement proves troublesome when it comes to the correct interpretation
of certain kinds of impersonal construction. Subject and predicate terms
have so-called “personal” signification when there is something specifiable that
they name. 47 Aristotle’s defining characterization of the proposition as “a statement
of something about something” [Aristotle, 1963, p. 47 (17a25); Abelard,
1927, p. 389 (32–33); Abelard, 2006, 06.2] seems to require that both subject and
predicate terms have personal signification. But in many propositions this prerequisite
seems not to be met. “It is raining” appears to have a subject term (“it”)
without personal signification — and hence it is called an “impersonal construction.”
One of Abelard’s examples is ventum est ecclesiam [Abelard, 1927, p. 390
(15); Abelard, 2006, 06.5], meaning “It was come to church,” or in slightly better
English, “There was an arrival at church.” This proposition needs to be differently
expressed to fit under the definition just given: “There was an arrival at church by
some people” or “by them” [Abelard, 1927, 390 (19-20); Abelard, 2006 06.6]. This
re-formulation suggests that the proposition does have an implicit subject term
(“people,” “them” — i.e., “they”) with personal signification; it also suggests that
the explicit, original form of the proposition is misleading. There really are, in
effect, denotative subject and predicate terms.
The question is whether this sort of solution will work in all cases. Deeper
problems arise for propositions involving sentential operators such as “It is possible
that.” If we say, “It is possible that Socrates runs” we appear to be predicating
possibility of what is said by “Socrates runs.” In other words, we are treating
“Socrates runs” as a subject term, with the accompanying suggestion that it names
something. But, as noted, propositions do not name. If they did name, it would be
their dicta that they named, and Abelard will not accept this result. The dictum
is not a thing, and cannot coherently be treated as if it were personally signified. 48
This result applies to a wide range of impersonal forms: “It is possible that
...”, “It is true that ...”, “It is good that ...”, and so on, where the omitted
portion is seen as being filled by some verbal formula expressing a dictum. These
impersonal forms need to be clarified, just as “There was an arrival at church”
needs to be clarified, so as to reveal a personally signifying subject term. This is
done to “It is possible that Socrates runs” by rendering it as “Socrates possibly
runs” — that is, by re-stating it as a predication about Socrates, a personal subject.
47 For some of the historical background to this semantic use of the word “personal” (personalis),
see [Mews, 1992, pp. 14-16]. This word in these contexts must always be understood with
reference to its opposite: “impersonal.”
48 On the other hand, Abelard does refer to dicta by the entirely enigmatic phrase quasi res
(literally, “quasi-things”) [Abelard, 1927, p. 367 (12); Abelard, 2006, 04.26]. [Guilfoy, 2004b, p.
42, note 25] discusses the proper translation of this phrase.