{51}
§ 2
DIFFICULT CHARACTERISTIC OF THIS SEARCH
Where is the difficulty, the aporía, Aristotle mentions?
This difficulty was clearly presented by Plato in the Sophist, “If some [he is thinking about Empedocles] say that all of reality is hot, that all of it is cold, then what do we understand when we say that one of these two elements, the cold and the hot, that each one of them and the fusion of both are (eînai)? What do we mean when we say that this “is”? Is it perhaps a third thing together with the first two, the heat and the cold? We do not know”1. This is the great aporía. Plato himself will tell us further on, “Actually, until now, we thought we knew in one way or the other, more or less problematically, what things are. However, we now realize that when we wish to be accurate about what does it mean to say that things are, we find ourselves involved in a difficulty (eporékmen). It is clear that since ancient times (pálai, here appears the term we saw in Aristotle) we thought we knew all these things, but now apparently, we are submerged in difficulty, in aporía”. This aporía is precisely what gives Plato the energy to say, with respect to all previous philosophy, that everything it did seems like an enormous gigantomachy (gigantomachía perì tês ousías) because of the controversies between philosophers. What is this gigantomachy about? About what he has just {52} mentioned. What is the ón, the eînai, that eînai, which is present in all affirmations when we say that things are hot, that things are cold and however, it seems to be something that escapes us. The imperceptibility of the diaphanous; the diaphaneity of being, to be, of the eînai, of “is”, has become a great problem for Plato.
Then, we have to ask how does Aristotle approach this grand problem?
{53}
§ 3
THE ARISTOTELIAN SEARCH
Philosophy in Aristotle, as in all previous Greek philosophy, is absolutely a philosophy of concretion. Therefore, let us ask Aristotle, what is he searching for? And, in second place, in what does the moment of encounter with what is searched for consist, i.e., the moment of truth?
I. The Aristotelian idea of ón, the ón and the horizon of motion
In the first place, what is Aristotle searching for?
Certainly, Plato has just told us and even Aristotle repeats it, tí tò ón, what is “that which is”. This is usually translated as “entity”, a translation that will have to be corrected immediately. Let us point out that instead of saying entity, it might be more convenient what in a neutral and absolutely common way a Greek might say, just as we do, that things “are”. And for Aristotle tò ón means, in the first place, simply that “which is”. Then Aristotle, who begins the search for this “which is”, carries out his investigation (zétesis) in four successive steps.
The first step is to try to say exactly what it is we are searching for when we say that something is. Aristotle, with a titanic intellectual effort, has told us that “which is” is said and understood in various different ways (pollachôs légetai tò ón). His immediate disciples —for example Theophrastus, his {54} most intimate and immediate disciple— was able to make an affirmation that seems truly astounding to us, that it is “manifest and evident” (phanerón) that to be (Sp. ser) is said in multiple ways. Of course, after Aristotle invested a titanic effort on it.
But then, how many senses does the expression “which is” has for Aristotle?
In the first place (let us begin the list from the last), we say of something that it is in the sense that it is true; later we shall see what Aristotle understands by truth. The issue of that it is as true comes to Aristotle from Plato, from Parmenides, and above all from sophists like Protágoras; to be, in the sense of “telling the truth”, in other words, the way of truth.
Against this, the error (pseudós) functions as non-being, it is that which is-not. Let us not assume that here Aristotle is thinking primarily about the “is” and the “is-not” as copula of a phrase. The Poem of Parmenides is full of negations, “being” does not move, being has no differences, etc. Here, it is not the case of an affirmation or negation as formula of a copula, but of the inherent truth of that affirmation and that negation. That is what the case is. And we say that the “it is” is true in the sense of an affirmation, that this wall is white, and that it is true it is not red. Here we have the first sense or meaning of the “that it is”, the “is” as truth2.
But this sense of truth remits to some internal moment of the thing, by virtue of which we can talk about truth. Which moment is that?
{55} Now we take a look at the second sense of the expression “that it is” for Aristotle, a sense that comes to him from the most remote origins of Greek philosophy. Things are —we were saying— perfectly delimited (péras). Hence, Aristotle thinks that if things begin to be produced and to be made, the fact that a thing may be made, and therefore be delimited, means it is finished, that it has its end (télos), its completeness, in itself. Because of that, he makes it more precise and stamps the concept of péras into a new concept, the concept of “act” (entelécheia), to have the télos in itself (en-télos-èchein). In this sense and in this measure, things are precisely act (entelécheia). Against this, of course, we have the non-being. We say about something that “it is not” in the sense that it does not have that actuality yet. Of an acorn, for example, we say it is not an oak tree yet; we do not say that the acorn is nothing —that thought never crossed the mind of Aristotle—, but that the acorn, whatever it is, is destined to be an oak tree. The acorn is precisely what has in itself its finished act (entelécheia), the delimited plenitude of its reality; the acorn has it in a certain way since it can be distinguished from the other seeds we can have on Earth, but in itself, qua seed, is what Aristotle would say, the capacity, power or potency (dýnamis) of producing the oak tree3.
The second fundamental sense of the expression that it is means saying about something that it actually is (entelécheia). But this is not enough for Aristotle, since he is never fully satisfied.
In a third sense Aristotle receives the legacy of Plato. We have mentioned the ideas, the eîdos. When Plato {56} spoke about the eîdos in general, for example, of the eîdos of justice or courage, what he understands by eîdos is something that properly belongs to that of which it is predicated4. However, one of the great difficulties Aristotle presented to his master is, and what happens to the properties that are accidental in a reality?
If a man who is a slave were given his freedom, Plato would say that while he was a slave he participated in the idea of slavery, while now he participates in the idea of freedom. But, what is that liberation? Plato never resolved this difficulty satisfactorily because he understood that when it is said of something that it is, it is understood it is something that properly belongs to it “from itself”, insofar as it is. For example, that white is nothing but white and is not gray; whiteness as such is what belongs to the eîdos.
Aristotle will tell us that the third sense of something, when we say “that it is”, is precisely what it may be when we enunciate that which is essential to it. For example, we say that Socrates is a musician, but he might not have been, and in this sense, that does not properly belong to the being. However, when we say he is rational, this is something that properly belongs to him on his own, precisely because of his own essence.
This is the third sense of “that it is”, to be of his own, kath’autó. Aristotle gathers here all the enormous mass of the Platonic inheritance. But —as he used to say— friend of ideas, but even friendlier of truth.
Now the fourth sense appears.
Aristotle understands that we say of something “that it is” when {57} it is fully based on itself, in such fashion that it cannot be an attribute of anything else nor can it be predicated of anything else; however, all the others can be predicated of it. Then, Aristotle will say that the thing in that plenitude has the totality of the resources that constitute its independence5 and this is more or less what a Greek would understand by the term ousía. I leave the term without translation; do take the explanation I have just given because every attempt at translation lowers the unitary richness of the concept of ousía. Even today in Modern Greek the wealth or the fortune inherited from the parents is called periousía; the fortune or the assets is that which constitutes the resources for the independence of a reality.
And so, “that it is”, in the sense of being true, presupposes the actuality of reality as enteléchia. The actuality of reality as enteléchia is understood that it is something in order to be that which by itself (kath’autó) constitutes it. And this reality involves all the resources by virtue of which it is independent, it is choristón, separated and independent from all the others. On this fourth sense of being Aristotle is going to center all his reflection, after telling us what entity is (tí tò ón), that it is the choristón, the ousía.
Second step. And now, what does Aristotle understand by this ousía, in what does the ón consist, the entity6?
{58} At the beginning of book G of his Metaphysics Aristotle gives us the example of health. It is said that a man is “healthy“, that he has health. The medicine is called “healthy” because it restores health. Taking a stroll is said to be healthy because it tends to preserve health. Color is said to be healthy because it expresses health, etc. Aristotle says that even those things that constitute the fundamental characteristics of an ousía, that which gives it independence, can be understood in many ways. Certainly all the senses we have just enumerated and others that Aristotle mentions can be reduced to a fundamental one. It is from the health of man that all those things receive the qualification of healthy: the medicine, the stroll, the color, etc. Therefore, Aristotle says, with respect to ousía all these things are called beings simply by analogy (kath’analogían). And let us remember that Aristotle never used the expression “analogy of being” (Sp. analogía del ser) (analogía toû óntos); however, he does say that the unity of all modes of being with ousía is a unity through analogy.
Analogy here does not mean similarity, but has the sense of what we say with respect to the good color of a man as referred to something else, like the health of a healthy man. Consequently, when we enunciate about something and we say “that it is”, Aristotle will say that in the very fact of saying “that it is” in this ultimate and radical sense of ousía, all these differences we have just mentioned are manifested. If the color is healthy it is because it manifests health, etc.
However, “to manifest” is rendered in Greek by the term kategoreín. What Aristotle means is that in the simplest logos, in a diaphanous way and without being aware of it, we are {59} manifesting the different ways of being, the categories or the ways of being. If we say that something is white, what we naturally say is that it is white, not that it is red; but in the very fact of saying it is white, we announce the way in which the real is white, i.e., as “qualification” of a subject. If we say it is large because it has twenty meters, we say it has twenty meters, but in a subjacent and presupposed manner is manifested the way in which the large is real with respect to that, which is large, i.e., quantification; etc. Then, Aristotle establishes his list of ten categories of which nine, which are the ways of being with respect to a subject, are reduced and founded in the very way of being of the subject, of the ousía.
With this, Aristotle has made philosophy take a giant step. Basically, what he has done is to conceptivize in a grand manner the issues that were making the rounds in philosophy from Anaximander to the time of the Platonic Academy. First the senses of being. Second, being as ousía. What do we understand by ousía? Here begins what is specific to Aristotle.
Third step. Aristotle remembers that Parmenides had said that entity is something that is there (keîtai), that lies without motion. By two ways that we will immediately indicate —the way of the logos and the way of motion (kínesis)—, Aristotle is going to say that entity does not lie there (keímenon), but is “subjacent” (hypokeímenon), that it is a sub-jectum or a sub-stance. The idea of ousía as substance is specifically Aristotelian.
That reality may be ousía is something that Plato had mentioned in a more or less vague manner. That this ousía might be related to a way of being had been mentioned often and had been searched for since ancient times (pálai). But to say that ousía is subjectum (hypokeímenon), is something specifically Aristotelian.
{60} Aristotle accomplishes this third step in two ways, the two ways through which the whole Greek thought has taken place, a very concrete philosophy. On the one hand, Greek thought is turned towards things, which are born, perish and last from their birth to their death. On the other hand, it is a thought elaborated from the logos, in which man says what the things are: the kínesis and the lógos. Aristotle reaches the idea that substance is a subject (hypokeímenon) in two ways, by way of the logos and by way of motion.
If I say of something that it is white, the subject of that predication is a subjectum, a subject of the qualities we predicate of it precisely in the predicate; but the subject itself, is not predicated of anything at all. This is the vision of substance as subject from the point of view of the logos. Aristotle himself in book Z of the Metaphysics says he is going to proceed logikôs, but he never does.
The other was the way of motion; that things are born, perish and die. At this point, he encounters the great difficulty of Parmenides. And Aristotle now considers: what Parmenides says is true, but under that motion there is a subjacent subject of motion. Substance, which is not just subject of predication and of the logos, is the subject subjacent to the variations of motion.
However, Aristotle just makes both ways identical and that is one of the most difficult problems. Is this a legitimate move? When we say that everything is in motion, does it mean that what is in motion is under the motion? Does it mean that what is subjacent is exactly the subjacent that represents the subject of predication? This is far from being true, anything can be turned into a subject of predication, even being itself, and we can say that this is a being or that that is a being. But being a subject of predication does not mean that in reality it may have a {61} subjectual structure, and much less that this subjectual reality may be what is subjacent to motion. One case is that motion may affect the totality of the thing in motion, and quite another that the thing in motion may be a kind of subject upon which what we call motion is occurring. Nevertheless, Aristotle centers on the subject, but here again he finds himself facing a serious difficulty, what is that subject?
Aristotle, eternally unsatisfied, again encounters all the difficulties of the preceding philosophy.
In the first place, subject is understood as that matter from which all things are made, because something cannot appear from nothing. That matter, Aristotle said, is sub-jectum (hypokeímenon), but strictly speaking is not substance since it lacks any determinations. At this point the perspective of Anaximander reappears. We could say those determinations are impressed on matter and are the ones that constitute the essence (ousía), as something kath’autó. This is true, but man, every one of the mortals, is born and dies. Is the form, i.e., the essence of each one of those men the subject, the true substance? Not quite, Aristotle would say, because actually each man is born and dies, but he understands that being born and dying means separating the prime matter from some of its essential determinations. The line of generation is indefinite; therefore, even though it is true that every man dies and every living being dies, yet, prime matter and its essential determination —its substantial form (morphé), in his terminology— are immortal. What we understand by subject is the complicated interweaving (sumploké) of matter and form.
However, we can ask Aristotle, is this not diluting the concept of substance?7. When I talk about Socrates, {62} am I talking about Socrates being a man or am I talking of the concrete humanity of this Socrates I have here in front of me, which after all is what really matters? As a typical Greek Aristotle shows he cannot handle the problem if it is true that reality is moving8, being born and perishing in the way Aristotle has just described. He posits the question, what is it that provokes this motion?
Prime matter on its own would be indifferent to have this or that form; pure form would be the Platonic eidos. Who is the one, then, that is going to make that these forms may be impressed on matter? For this, Aristotle has a solution we might call astute, which consists in saying that the world has not been made by any god (theós), that God does not move the world, but “provokes” the motion of the world without this God being affected at all. The theós of Aristotle is the only substance, not generated and incorruptible, that does not have as a function to produce the other substances of the world, not even to put them in motion, but only to provoke motion in them. How is it provoked? That is the favorite example of Aristotle, as the object of love and desire it moves without moving. Provokes the desire, but to him, the beloved, nothing has to happen. Something would happen to him, if at the same time he were in love with the other, but by himself he moves without being moved. The function of the God of Aristotle is not to make the world, not even to put it in motion, but to provoke the internal motion. That is why Aristotle called this God a separated substance, because it is the only one that fully realizes {63} the idea of separation (choristón), of the substance that only needs itself.
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1 Soph 243 d-e.
2 Zubiri note on the margin: “Obscure. We have to say: pseudós is not the same as negation, alethés is not the same as affirmation, but rather that pseudós is not true of the affirmation or the negation, and alethés is true of the affirmation and the negation.”
3 Zubiri note on the margin: “It is not the case that dýnamis may not be ón; Aristotle expressly says the contrary (Met D 1017 b 1-9). But in its full meaning ón is entelécheia ón.
4 Zubiri note on the margin: “Kath’autó: What always and necessarily (or as ídion, or rather I would say, as constitutive of something, what belongs to the tì éstin): Met L 1073 a 3-4”. “Met D 1022 a 25-36. Synonym of katá phýsin and kath’ousían.”
5 Zubiri note on the margin: “(Brentano, ch. I). Independent Met Z 1028 a 34. Not every ón kath’autón falls directly on a category (Brentano, § 11). But, careful: Aristotle seems to identify ón kath’autón and ón as species (?) or category”. [The reading of this manuscript note by Zubiri offers several doubts, and therefore, we give the most probable. It has not been possible to identify the reference to Brentano, if that is really the reference, as it seems].
6 Zubiri note on the margin: “The ón has four senses: 1) To be true. 2) To have actuality. 3) To be itself. 4) To be independent (ousía). Each sense is founded on the following one.
7 Note of Zubiri on the margin: “Here we must clarify the sumploké and the first and second ousía. Two senses of hypokeímenon, as tode tí (first substance), and tí estí (second substance).”
8 Zubiri note on the margin: “Here second substance is viewed from the horizon of motion”.