Aristotle, Metaphysics Book Zeta (VII) Commentary ... - CATpages

Aristotle, Metaphysics, Zeta
concavity or of snubness, but in virtue of its
nature; nor do they attach to it as whiteness does
to Callias, or to man (because Callias, who
happens to be a man, is white), but as 'male'
attaches to animal and 'equal' to quantity, and as
all so-called 'attributes propter se' attach to their
subjects. And such attributes are those in which
is involved either the formula or the name of the
subject of the particular attribute, and which
cannot be explained without this; e.g. white can
be explained apart from man, but not female
apart from animal. Therefore there is either no
essence and definition of any of these things, or
if there is, it is in another sense, as we have said.
But there is also a second difficulty about
them. For if snub nose and concave nose are the
same thing, snub and concave will be the thing;
but if snub and concave are not the same
(because it is impossible to speak of snubness
apart from the thing of which it is an attribute
propter se, for snubness is concavity-in-a-nose),
either it is impossible to say 'snub nose' or the
same thing will have been said twice,
concave-nose nose; for snub nose will be
concave-nose nose. And so it is absurd that such
things should have an essence; if they have, there
will be an infinite regress; for in snub-nose nose
yet another 'nose' will be involved.
Clearly, then, only substance is definable. For
if the other categories also are definable, it must
be by addition of a determinant, e.g. the
qualitative is defined thus, and so is the odd, for
it cannot be defined apart from number; nor can
female be defined apart from animal. (When I
say 'by addition' I mean the expressions in which
it turns out that we are saying the same thing
twice, as in these instances.) And if this is true,
coupled terms also, like 'odd number', will not be
definable (but this escapes our notice because
our formulae are not accurate.). But if these also
are definable, either it is in some other way or, as
we said, definition and essence must be said to
have more than one sense. Therefore in one sense
nothing will have a definition and nothing will
have an essence, except substances, but in
however, appears in the formula or definition of the
pro per ty itself. T hus s nub bne ss is 'con cav ity of the nose',
where the nose is the proper subject of snubbness (that is,
nothing else is snub but noses). There is no such
relationship between accidents and their subjects. Thus
anything, so long as it is material, can be white. The
question here is whether the combination of properties and
their subjects admits of noncircular definition. Aristotle
has previously admitted that accidents combined with
subjects admit of a derivative definition, but this does not
seem possible with properties. Since 'snubbness' is
'con cav ity of the nose', 'sn ub n ose ' wou ld b e de fined as 'a
nose with concavity of the nose' (or Aristotle's abbreviated
'concave-nose nose') which repeats the word defined, and
thus is not a proper definition. Aristotle's conclusion here
is again that only substance has an essence, and thus is in
an unqualified sense definable, whereas combined terms
including subject and property do not denote any separate
essence, and are either not definable, or definable in some
other way. [Cf. Topics I, 5, for more on prop erties]
Stepping back from the details for a moment, what
Aristotle has established in the last two chapters is the
ontological claim that the categories do indeed enumerate
the types of existents that we must recognize in the world.
Substance has essence in a primary sense, accidents in a
secondary sense, and with respect to those things we refer
to b y combi ned term s, such as 'white huma n' or 'snub nose',
either their referents have no essence of their o wn, or their
essence is red ucible to the referents of the term s combined.
Thus we need not be concerned that all states of substances
have separate essences, which means that the scientist does
not have an impossible task.
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