Aristotle's Theory Unity of Science

7 IntroductionAristotle was also concerned about the epistemological etiolation thatattends increasing universalization. The more one grasps at what is com·man, the less one retains of the particular kinds. And yet what a thing isspe"cifically is as much a part of its Being as what it is at a high level ofgeneralization. For being biped is as much, if not more, part of the Beingof a man as being a substantial unity, the actuality of a potentiality. This isnot to say that Aristotle rejected general understanding altogether, but hedid not think that we know something solely in virtue of its membershipin a genus. Nor did he believe that the genus always provides the causeand explanation for a thing. He preferred instead the constitutive elementand the various kinds of cause as explanatory principles, and in his theoryof science the genus comes to denote the extension of the explanation,rather than the explanation itself.Aristotle also took issue with the Academic doctrine that all knowledgeforms a single science. He made the observation - hardly originalconSidering Socrates' frequent appeal to it - that there were experts whounderstood their own field but not others. It was clearly not necessaryto know everything in order to have expertise in a single field.' Nor wasit necessary to know the most general science. Plato, for his part, hadbeen scandalized that the mathematicians simply accepted the principles oftheir science without investigating its foundations. He supposed that theirhypothetical principles could be perfected by an unhypothetical science,philosophical dialectic, which would remedy the deficiency of mathematicsand indeed all hypothetical sciences. Only the philosopher, then, couldlegitimately lay claim to true knowledge of the special sciences. Aristotle,though he recognized a first philosophy that examined the first principlesof the special sciences, thought it right and proper that the special sciencesshould merely presuppose and not examine their own first principles.Accordingly, Aristotle sought to redress the imbalance apparent in theAcademic prejudice towards the universal. He attended more equally toboth the specific and the general levels of inquiry and studied the causes ofthings in addition to their similarities and differences. These new concernsfound logical expression in his theory of scientific understanding, whosefoundation is the demonstrative syllogism. A syllogism is composed of atleast three terms, a major (e.g., having wings), a middle (e.g., fliers), anda minor (e.g., birds), arranged in at least two premisses and a conclusion;for example,2 See PA I.l, where Aristotle draws the distinction between the specialized expert andthe generaUy educated layman. Also Balme 1972, 70, on the connection with Plato andSpeusippus.