SEEAAP, Zagreb, Institut za Filozofiju 17th of May 2014
Aristotle. Physics.
Alpha, ch. 5:
The
opposed are principles, or all originates from the couples
Dimka Gocheva, Sofia University St. Kliment
Ohridsky
Main idea:
to find a middle way between Scylla and Harybdis
1. Rough
working translation:
All (the
thinkers), who say that the Whole is one and not moved, make the opposed principles. Indeed,
Parmenides makes the hot and the cold principles and pronounces them as the
principles fire and earth, and others make dense and rare, and Democritus - the
full and the empty, from them the one as the existing, the other – as the not
existing. Also, according to him (important) are: position, scheme, order.
They are the genera of the
opposed: species (of the genus of)
position are above and below, in front of and behind;
species of scheme are the angled and the-one-without-angles, the rectilinear
and the circular.
It is clear,
that all the thinkers in a way make the opposed principles. With a good reason:
the principles must be neither from one another, nor from some other
principles, and everything is out of them. To the primordial opposed are
peculiar these: because they are the first ones, they must not be originated
from some other different (principles), and because they are opposed, they are
not from one another.
But it is
necessary to examine this reasonably. To begin with, it must be taken as
granted that in the realm of everything existing, it is not natural neither to act nor to be acted upon in a
contingent manner; nor whatever is engendered by whatever. What happens by
chance must be considered an exception. How is that the white colour to be
begotten by the educated, if not only by coincidence? “The educated/the
trained” may happen to be (a quality of a bearer), who (in respect of other
opposites) is not white or is black.
But the white
appears from what is-not-white, and moreover not from absolutely everything,
but only from the black or the intermediary. The educated is not from the
educated,(and not from whatever illiterate person), but from the not-educated (in some particular
skill), or from some other intermediate state between literacy and illiteracy,
if there is such.
The disappearance of these does not happen in the first instance,
which prompts, as for example, the white coloured does not degrade in the
educated, with some exceptions, when there is coincidence. The white degrades
in the not-white, and not in some contingent, but in the black or something
intermediate. In the same manner the experienced-in-music degrades in the
not-experienced, and not in a random person, lacking whatever kind of training,
but in an uneducated or intermediate type of person, if such one exists.
The same applies likewise to the rest, including all existing things
– not only the simple, but also the composite ones, according to the same
reason. There is not appropriate verbal designation for the correlated
dispositions, and that’s why some people omit to notice (or some people forget)
what happens.
It is necessary that all well-tuned appears from the not-tuned and
the not-tuned from the well-tuned, and the well-tuned degrades into
not-tunedness, and moreover not in a random one, but precisely the antithetical
one. It makes no difference whether we are talking about harmony, or order, or
composite objects – clearly, this is the same reason.
Moreover, the house and the statue
and whatever else appears in the same manner: the house is built from
materials, which previously are not arranged, but scattered around, and the
statue or something which is sculptured is made out of something formless. And
each of these, some are orderings, others are syntheses.
If this is true, whenever something new would engender and whenever
something degrading would degrade, this happens either from the opposites or
into the opposites, and what is in between. These intermediaries in between are
from the opposites, as the colours are from the white and black. So it would
turn out, that all naturally born are either opposites or they are from the
opposites.
As we have said in the beginning,
up to this point the majority of the other (thinkers) agreed and followed: they
all say, that the elements and the principles, which are labeled with their
names, are opposites, although without a proof – as if they are forced to say
this by the truth itself. There are
differences among them in respect of their bias: some prefer the more primordial
ones, others – what is derived from them, and some are more comprehensible to
the reason, others – by the senses. (Some prefer to pose as a cause of the
generation hot and cold, others – wet and dry, third group – the even and the
odd, or Hatred and Love, which differ from the rest in the mentioned way.) So,
it turns that somehow they are saying the same, despite the differences among
them. To many it may seem that these opinions differ, but in fact they are
alike by analogy. They take the principles to be from the same column of
coupled opposites: some of them embrace, others are embraced by the opposites.
2. Commentary
a) The translations, which have been consulted, especially with regard to
the rendering of the conceptual cluster: ™nant…on, ™nant…wsij, ™nantiÒthj:
The best ones for me of the Physics:
William Charlton’s.
Opposites
– opposition;
Aristotle. Metaphysics,
Loeb Classical Library, vol. XVII, XVIII, 1989 (1933), ed. by G. P. Goold.
Translated by Hugh Tredennick.
Contraries
– contrariety;
Philip H. Wicksteed and F. M. Cornford in the Loeb edition, LCL. Reprinted 1980.
Contrasted
couple(s) – antithesis;
Aristote. Physique. I-IV.
Texte établi et trduit par Henry Carteron. Septième triage. Paris. Les belles letters. 1990. prem. édition
1926.
Le
contraire – la contrariété.
Aristote. La Métaphysique.
Traduction de Jules Barthélemy-Saint-Hilaire, revue et annotée par Paul
Mathias. Introduction et dossier de Jean-Louis Poirier. Presses Pocket. 1991.
Le
contraire – la contrariété.
Hans Günther Zekl Aristoteles. Die
Physik. Hamburg, 1995.
Gegensätze.
Gegensätzlichkeit. Zusammengesetzung. Entgegensetzung – “Dasein”!
The Russian translation. Аристотель. Сочинения в четырех томах. Том 3. М., “Мысль”, 1981. АН СССР. Пер.
В. П. Карпова. (Аристотель. Физика.
М., 1936)
Противоположность; пара противоположностей –
противоположное;
The Bulgarian translation. Аристотел. Съчинения. Том ІІ, част І. Физика. Превод Цочо Бояджиев. Изд.
“Захарий Стоянов”, С., 2012. Ред. Иван Христов. In book A only противоположност.
In book E – Противоположно –
противоположност.
b)When working on the first Bulgarian translation
of the “Metaphysics” with Nikolai Gochev, who translated eight of the
books, we had to solve the following problem in book Iota: there are
several words in it with the same root, which are as if synonyms. We had to
decide: are these redundant precisions or they are absolutely necessary
distinctions? Repeatedly through the centuries Aristotle has been accused by
people, who feel aversion towards his thought, that sometimes he enjoys the
playing with speculative distinctions for the sake of their own. Precisely
these, by the way, make book Iota so boring for some readers. The
decision, which we have chosen for the translation of the terms in the “Metaphysics” later on has been applied
again in the first Bulgarian translation of the “De caelo”, done by me and the editor Vladimir Marinov.
We have been convinced that these seeming
synonyms are conceptual differentiations – and moreover important ones for his
first philosophy, for his second philosophy and for his cosmology. The
translation of these terms in the “Metaphysics”,
for the books I-III and X-XIV, and in the “De
caelo” as well is: as “противоположно” (in English
approximately “the opposite”) is translated ™nant…on, аnd ™nant…wsij (in English approximately
“oppositioning”) is rendered as “противополагане”. The Bulgarian “противоположеност”
stands for
™nantiÒthj
(in English opposedness), аnd “противолежащо”
is the rendering of ¢ntike…menon .
3. The methodological invitation: rely on
the first philosophy in the Physics
*The powerful beginning of the ontological
thinking of the difference-and-differentiation-in-the-identity in ancient
Greece in the Pythagoreans. From Philolaus on they conceive of ten primordial couples or pairs, but they
do not label them opposites. They are called “principles by correlation’, or sustoice…a, co-elements,
principles-in-unity, original couples, attributes in partnership, because the one is impossible
without the other. The male and the female, which are of outmost importance for
the living nature ¥rrhn kaˆ
qÁlu are, of course, among them, on the
fifth place of the principles in couples[i].
**Plato: the “Timaeus” (90 e
ff and further till the end). The poetic ontology of love between man and woman
in the “Symposium” and the organic
description of the difference between them as natural beings at the end of the
“Timaeus”: this happens for the
propagation of the genus.
*
The conceptual cluster
™nant…on, ™nant…wsij,
™nantiÒthj
What does this mean for ¹
qeologik» or the first
philosophy and for the philosophy of nature?
The core part of the Aristotelian lectures on ¹
qeologik»,
which we nowadays read as the fourteen books of the “Metaphysics”, is in the so-called “treatise in three books on oÙs…a, the
books ZHΘ”. The concepts genus, edoj -species, substance, differentia specifica are thought over in these books.
Centuries
later Porphyry comments on them in his “Isagoge”,
and Boethius translates and comments on them in Latin. So they became part of
the medieval universities’ curricula and fundamentals of logic. After these
three books on oÙs…a -
substance (or the substantial being), the precise clarifications are
even deepened in book Iota, but many readers skip it as a boring inquiry
into meticulous superfluities. For the proper understanding of some puzzles of
the first two methodological books of the Physics
book Iota is indispensable.
In book Iota the analysis begins
with the problem of what is one-unique-unified and logically the other problem
emerges from here: what are the separately existing real entities, which are to
be included into groups of species (forms, e‡dh), similar to theirs, and from here in larger
and more voluminous genera, which comprise the similar species. We can ask a
paradigmatic question like that: why the opposite of the white colour is the
black colour, and why the opposite of the basso voice is the tenor? Why the
soprano is not the opposite of the red colour or why the cold air is not the
opposite of the rough, or to the unbearable pressure on the bottom of the
ocean? Book Iota is important because it gives answers to questions
similar to these ones.
Loeb Classical Library, vol.
XVII, XVIII, 1989 (1933), ed. by G. P. Goold. Translated by Hugh Tredennick.
1.
The
whole of chapter 4, but particularly 1055 a 3-10 :
"Since
things which differ can differ from one another in a greater or less degree, there is a certain maximum
difference, and this I call contrariety. That it is the maximum difference is shown by induction. For whereas things which differ in genus have no means of passing into each other, and are more widely distant, and are not
comparable, in the case of things that differ
in species, the contraries are the
extremes from which generation takes place;
and the greatest distance is that which is between the extremes, and
therefore also between the contraries. [ii]
2.
And
again book Iota, chapters 7 and 8, from 1057 b 35 till 1058 a 29 for the
precisions of the concepts genus and eidos-species, differentia specifica, ™nant…on, ™nant…wsij, ™nantiÒthj :
"That which is “other in species” than something else is “other” in respect of something; and that something must apply to both. E.g., if
an animal is other
in species than something else, they must both be animals. Hence, things which are other in species must be in the same genus. The sort of thing I
mean by “genus” is that in virtue of which two things are both called the same one
thing; and which is not accidentally differentiated, whether
regarded as
matter or otherwise. .. Therefore this difference must be “otherness of genus”. ( I say “otherness of genus” because by “difference of
genus” I mean an “otherness” which makes the genus itself other); this, then, will be a form of contrariety. This is
obvious by induction. For all differentiation
is by opposites, and we have shown that contraries are in the same genus, because contrariety was shown to
be complete difference. But difference in species is always difference from something in respect of something; therefore this is the same thing, i.e.
the genus, for both. (Hence too all contraries which differ in species, but not in genus are in the same line of
predication, and are other
than each other
in the highest degree; for their
difference is complete, and they cannot come into existence simultaneously.)[iii]
Hence, the
difference is a form of contrariety.
"To be “other in species”, then, means this: to be in the same genus and involve contrariety, while being indivisible.
"To be “other in species”, then, means this: to be in the same genus and involve contrariety, while being indivisible.
3.
Especially
in respect of the heterosexuality and the explanation of the sex difference
between male and female in the living creatures, not only in man, but also in
all the animals and the whole nature in general, conceptually very important is
almost all of the chapter 9, 1058 a 30 – 1058 b 24.
"The
question might be raised as to why woman does not differ from man in species, seeing that female is contrary to male, and their difference is a contrariety; and why a
female and a male animal are not other in species, although the difference belongs to “animal” per se, and not
as whiteness or blackness
does; “male” and “female” belong to it qua animal. This problem is practically the same as “ why does one kind of contrariety (e.g. “footed” and
“winged”) make things other in species, while another (whiteness and
blackness) does not?” The
answer may be that in the one case the attributes are peculiar to the genus,
and in the other they are less so’; and since one element is formula and the
other matter, contrarieties in the formula produce difference in species, but contrarieties in the
concrete whole do not.
Hence the whiteness or
blackness of a man does not produce this, nor is there any specific difference
between a white man and a black man; not even if one term is assigned to each. For we are now regarding “man” as matter, and matter does not produce difference; and for this reason, too, individual men are not species of “man”, although the flesh and bones of which this man and that man consist are different. The concrete whole is “other”, but not “other in species”, because
there is no contrariety in the formula, and that is the ultimate indivisible species. But Callias is definition and matter. Then so too is “white
man”, because
it is the individual,
Callias, who is white.
Hence “man”, then, is only white accidentally. Again, a bronze circle
and a wooden one do not differ in species; and a bronze triangle and a wooden
circle differ in species not because of their matter, but because there is
contrariety in their formulae.
But does not matter, when it is “other” in a particular way, make things “other in species”? ... Surely it is because
there is contrariety in the definition, for so there also is in “white man” and
“black horse”; and it is a contrariety in species, but not because one is white
and the other black; for even if they had both been white, they would still be
“other in species”.
“Male” and “female” are
attributes peculiar to the animal, but not in virtue of its substance; they are
material or physical. Hence the same semen may, as the result of some
modification, become either female or male.
The Greek for the last two sentences: tÕ d ¥rren kaˆ
qÁlu toà zóou o„ke‹a mn p£qh, ¢ll' oÙ kat¦ t¾n oÙs…an ¢ll' ™n tÍ ÛlV kaˆ tù
sèmati, diÕ tÕ aÙtÕ spšrma qÁlu À ¥rren g…gnetai paqÒn ti
p£qoj.
Minimalistic commentary: as Plato clarifies in the “Phaedo” (103
a, b and ff., b 4 aÙtÕ tÕ ™nant…on ˜autù ™nant…on oÙk ¥n pote gšnoito) to all real entities, which really
exist as substancies (or substantial beings) nothing is opposed. To the man a
real contrary being would be the anti-man or the not-man, to the woman a real
contrary being would be the anti-woman or not woman. The examples here are
mine, and we remember that in the “Phaedo” this is made in order to
prove the immortality of soul, because the anti-soul or the not-soul does not
exist. To being there is not not-being as its opposite and this is the deepest
root of the monism, which dominates the whole philosophical tradition after
Plato and Aristotle in the millennia after that. It is not by chance, that for
both of them not-being is not an ontological, but epistemological category.
Then how to explain the difference, for
example, between male and female? What Aristotle offers in chapter 9 of book Iota is a virtuous passing through
Scylla and Charybdis, i.e. the extinction of the differentiation between them,
on the one hand, and the exaggerated removal of the one from the other, which
would send them in different e‡dh. From empirical point of view Aristotle touches this question (among
many others) in the “On the generation of animals”, but it is much more
important that he finds a solution of it in his first philosophy. He succeeds
in this by polishing the exquisiteness of the difference between ™nant…wsij, which is translated by us
in Bulgarian as “противополагане” (approximately “opposing” in
English) and “противоположеност” - ™nantiÒthj (approximately “opposedness”
in English) . There is dynamics, movement and modality in the first one, this is a concept
through which the mutual attraction and approaching of two remote from one
another opposite things is conceived, whereas in the second one there is static
and rest, there is the result and the product of a process or becoming, which
is already fulfilled.
The difference between
the male and the female is conceived through it and its optics, mingling with
the concept of the peculiar p£qoj. It is not by
chance that this precision is used in his logic rarely, only twice in the “Topics” (112 b 28 and 113 a 2, 9),
whereas the usages of these distinctions in two other spheres of his thinking
are many and important, and they will contribute to the abstractedness of the
first philosophy.
The distinctions between
™nant…on, ™nant…wsij,
™nantiÒthj
in Aristotle’s cosmology and his philosophy of nature
The analysis of the movements in the cosmos
begins with these precisions in the “De
caelo”, book Alpha, ch. 4, 270b 30 – 271 a 35. There are two main genera of
the movement of the fundamental elements – circular movement and rectilinear
movement, both of them being primordial. The circular movement, or more
precisely said, the spherical movement of the outmost sphere of the cosmos in
itself around the axis of the cosmos and the Earth, which coincide, is used by
Plato in the “Timaeus” and by
Aristotle in the “De caelo” in order
to explain the uniqueness, the spatial limitedness and the eternity of the
cosmos. Aristotle thinks that two different movements, happening in a circle,
are contrary ones, only if they occur on a line – whatever chord, connecting
two points in the circle, or as it is in the example in ch. 4 – the diameter.
By the circular movement, when a body with a limited volume is moving on the
edge of a circle, its direction doesn’t matter for Aristotle. Regardless of the
fact that there are clockwise movements or counter-clockwise movements, he
does not consider them to be contrary
in the absolute meaning of the word. They have opposite directions
physically, but they are not contrary in the ontological aspect of his concept[iv].
In the “Physics” we see again the
same conceptual puzzles, accompaning ™nantiÒthj - ™nant…on – in 187 a 20, I, 4 and ™nant…wsij in 190 b 27, ch. 7.
1.
Especially telling is the reasoning in 217 a 23, IV,
9: cold and hot are “opposings”, they are not given and petrified in a static
state once and forever, but changing and changeable characteristics, because
the hot may cool down and the cold may get warmer. This is a reasoning made in
the context of the refutation of the hypothesis for the existence of the
vacuum. And moreover the dynamic character of the opposings is explained
through the modal categories. Another example – dry and wet, the sand on the
beach.
2. In 226 a 26, V, 2, it is added that ™nant…wsij is relevant concerning the quality,
the quantity and the place, but it is not applicable for the substance, the relation, acting and being acted
upon.
3.
Another
place with enormous relevance is in Book V, ch. 5, where again, another
clarification is given. Practically the whole of the chapter is a fantastic,
dialectical, untranslatable in any language properly analysis with this
important triad ™nant…on, ™nant…wsij, ™nantiÒthj: in order to conceive the nature of movement as
change in the largest possible ontological scope, and not only as spatial
locomotion. An example is
given about the origin of the names of the processes, which appear in Greek
accordingly not from their source, but in conformity to their direction: the
transition from health to illness and vice versa, movement from and to.
The opposed qualities in On
coming-to-be and passing-away
Book Beta, chapter 2 and 3 329 b 7 – 331 a 6
Possible
conclusion(s): the pairs of the opposed (qualities, quantities and/ or
attributites) are several groups: the Pythagorean ten couples, the ones of
Plato and his followers, the Aristotelian ones. There is a hierarchy in them; according
to Aristotle the most important ones among them are the ones, which undergo
endless and reversible changes, whereas the ones, which are subjected to
irreversible changes, are not so necessary for the proving of the eternal
existence of the world.
[i]
Aristotle. Metaphysics,
А/І, ch.
5, 986 а 22-986 b
9. See Aristotle. Metaphysics,
Loeb Classical Library, vol. XVII, XVIII, 1989 (1933), ed. by G. P. Goold.
Translated by Hugh Tredennick.
[ii]
In the handout I
am quoting the translation of Hugh Tredennick from the Loeb edition, mentioned
in the previous endnote. See also the similar rendering of these passages in
the translation of W. D. Ross, published on the Internet Classics Archive of
the MIT, accessible on the 7th of October 2013.
[iv] De caelo, book
Alpha, ch. 4, 270b 30 – 271 a 35. For the Greek original see Aristotelis, De caelo, recognovit brevique
adnotatione critica instruxit D. J. Allan, Oxonii, 1961, (1936). SCBO.
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