Body and Soul in Ancient Philosophy

The priority of soul in Aristotle’s De anima: Mistaking categories? 275
t]kor (!qwµ c±q t¹ox6meja, toO t]kour d³ 6meja B c]mesir), t]kor d’ B1m]qceia,
ja· to}tou w\qim B d}malir kalb\metai. (Metaph. 1050a5 – 10)
The crucial – and initially curious – notion in this passage is that in generation
what comes to be proceeds to a source (an archÞ), which is to say to
an end for the sake of which generation takes place. 15
So far, then, Aristotle’s argument in De anima 412b4 –9 appears
heavily indebted to difficult doctrines of Metaphysics VII-IX. It is not
the place here to defend those doctrines, though, of course, the ultimate
cogency of Aristotle’s soul-body hylomorphism rests upon their defensibility.
Rather, the task at hand is simply to reconstruct the argument of
De anima in light of those doctrines. For this task, however, one further
piece is required. This piece returns us to the notion of there being a
controlling sense in a case of homonymy. The controlling sense of a
case of core-dependent homonymy is that source, or archÞ in terms of
which all non-core instances must be explicated. Thus, for instance, Aristotle
insists that in a range of homonyms, the non-core instance depend
upon the archÞ as a that which legitimates the application of a
term to a derived instance (Metaph. 1003b6, 1013a14 – 15). 16 Thus, to
use one of Aristotle’s favourite illustrations, just as a healthy complexion
is healthy only because it tends to indicate health in the person whose
complexion it is, so in the comparatively abstract case of unity, noncore
instances of unity qualify as unities only because they stand in
some appropriate relation to the core case, the archÞ which is the controlling
sense. In the case of unity, says Aristotle, the core is entelecheia.
Taking all that together, we may reconstruct Aristotle’s argument in
de An. 412b4 –9, in line with the responsive interpretation, as follows:
P 1 : In cases of core-dependent homonymy, the non-core instances qualify
as instances of the kind by being suitably related to the core, or
controlling instance of the kind in question.
C 1 : Hence, in the case of unities, non-core instances of unity qualify as
unities by being suitably related to the core or controlling instance
of unity.
P 2 : Entelecheia is the core or controlling instance of unity.
C 2 : Hence, in the case of unities, non-core instances are unities by being
suitably related to the entelecheia.
15 We will have occasion to revisit this passage below in § IV.
16 On the sense in which the controlling sense of a core-dependent homonym is
an archÞ, see Shields 1999, 122 –127.