Handbook of the History of Logic: - Fordham University Faculty

Logic and Theories of Meaning . . . 369
but something in between univocal and equivocal: being was said to belong to
accidents secundum prius et posterius. 117 The discussion was further complicated
by a passage in Aristotle’s Physics where he says that “equivocations are hidden
in genera”. 118
The result is that we find a threefold division of analogy in the late 13 th century
Elenchi commentaries. 119 In all three types speaking according to priority and
posteriority is involved:
1. The first type of analogy occurs in the relation of a genus to its species. For
example, ‘animal’ is an analogical term that can be predicated of rational and
non-rational animals alike. The two species participate equally in the ratio
of genus (i.e. ‘animal’ means the same in both cases), but since one species
is more noble than the other (rationality is a habit and non-rationality the
absence of a habit), one species is said to fall under the genus primarily (per
prius) and the other secondarily (per posterius). This type of analogy is
called univocation, because both analogates participate equally in the same
characteristic.
2. The second type of analogy occurs when the analogates participate in the
same characteristic (ratio), but not equally. This is the case with being (ens)
in relation to substance and accident. Substances participate directly and
primarily (per prius) in being, whereas accidents do so only immediately and
secondarily (per posterius), i.e. by means of substances, since accidents do
not exist separately from the substance in which they inhere. This type of
analogy is neither strictly univocal, nor strictly equivocal, but something in
between, because they share more than just a name.
3. The third type of analogy is identical to deliberate equivocation. It occurs
when the analogates share only a name, as is the case with ‘healthy’ said of
an animal, urine, a diet and a medicine. ‘Healthy’ signifies primarily (primo
et simpliciter) a healthy animal and it signifies the other things secondarily
through attribution (per attributionem) to the first thing.
This threefold division of analogy and the language in which it is put suggests that
the authors were interested in an ontologically based division. In their view, the
hierarchy of analogical terms is related to types of participation. Also Aquinas held
that analogical predication depends on natures being shared in prior and posterior
ways. 120 Duns Scotus criticizes this view in his commentaries on the Categories
and the Sophistici Elenchi. Scotus argued that analogy is possible in the order
of things, but that words signify according to their imposition. The process of
imposition is voluntary and does not allow for an ordering among significations
117 See e.g. Algazel’s logic, as cited in Ashworth [1992, p. 108].
118 Aristotle, Physics 7 (249a22-5).
119 The division presented here comes from Incerti auctores, qu. 823, [ed. Ebbesen, pp. 314–
317]. The examples are mine. See also: Ashworth [1992, pp. 119–120].
120 Ashworth [1992, p. 127].