Where does Aristotle go wrong?

[Betterave]

Why can’t we just say that the object’s essence is simply what an existent object is, as opposed to the “way” in which an object exists?

I’ll just quickly point out here that ‘essence’ is the etymological cognate of the Greek ousia, from which is derived the Latin *essentia *- the literal etymological translation of both is beingness. The question then: why should we reduce the particular ‘beingness’ of a being to a question only of its ‘what,’ and *not *of its ‘how’?

The vast difference between me and the* table *does not consist in our having vastly different sorts of being–the Heideggerian Dasein, or “that it is”–but consists rather in our having vastly different sorts of nature–Wesen, was sein, or “what it is.” So existence is what both the table and I have in common, and with respect to existence, we **do not **differ at all–we differ only in our natures, not in our existing. If different objects had different “ways of existing” then the table and I would be differing with respect to existence itself. But this is plainly false because that we both exist is true for the both of us, while the kinds of things that we are is where we differ. So “that we exist” should be univocal, while “distinguishedly human, or distinguishedly artifactual” should be the only characteristics that make us different in kind.

Das Wesen der Wahrheit ist die Wahrheit vom Wesen. - The essence of truth is the truth of essence.
-Heidegger (Mysterious, huh? )

 

[Betterave]

Basic first-order logic says this is outright false. Only propositions can be truth bearers. Concepts, objects, or properties standing alone cannot be truth bearers. We need a subject and a predicate in order to make a truth-valuable sentence.

Sure, I assumed you would riposte with something like this: the proper locus of truth is in predicative judgments. However, first-order logic deals only with second-order truth. The truths broached by first-order logic are meaningless without alethic truth, without the uncovering of the atomic elements of its propositions. (I’m sure you agree… at least, I’ll have some questions if you don’t!)

 

[Betterave]

I disagree. We are saying something about the world: namely, Obama is part of it. This is a truth-valuable statement. It is true! Contrast: “Blobama exists.” (False, I presume.) Note also the contrast between “Hamlet exists” and “Blamlet exists.”

I forgot to add here that this also implies that we are saying something about Obama: namely that we can look at the world/reality in order to find out more about him. We are not free to invent statements about him and regard these statements as ‘non-truth-functional.’ The same applies to Hamlet.

 

[Syntax]

Kant distinguished blosser Position einer Gegenstand (the ‘mere’ positing of an object) from its absoluter Position (positing it ‘absolutely’). In Kantian terms, then, the question before us regards our disagreement about the sufficient conditions for counting something as having been posited ‘absolutely.’

I am not sure what this means or where this is found. You will have to explain. Kant distinguishes two types of positing. The predicative sense of positing as in “Obama is president” and the non-predicative as in “Obama is.” And neither “is” is a predicate at all. The first is positing a subject in relation to the predicate–so the “is” here is the copula of predication, not the predicate itself. The absolute “is” in the latter sense, is not a predicate either because it has no role in truth-functional statements. So Kant reduced the copula “is” to the predicative sense, the identity sense, and the subsumption sene of “is.” But he never thought “is” was a predicate itself. And this is crucial for understanding the rest of his philosophy. “Being is obviously not a real predicate.” (A598/B626) He didn’t say sometimes it is and sometimes it isn’t. See below for textual proof.

-]You misquote Kant, as almost everyone seems to do./-] You wrote: “I am proposing, like Kant, to stop treating the term “to exist” as if it were a predicate at all.” But Kant only denied that ‘exists’ was a ‘real’ predicate [wrong, he denied all of], that is, a predicate that contributed to specifying the ‘what’ of a thing. He did not claim that it was not a-] truth-functional predicate at all/-] **[Yes he did. He denied existence is a predicate at all. He didn’t say “existence is SOMETIMES NOT a predicate.” What would be so novel about Kant’s claim if he did NOT deny “existence” was a predicate at all? He would then have to believe that existence WAS informative since there would be different species of “existence.” Also, don’t confuse Predicates with truth-functions. Truth functions are the “is” of identity, the “is” of predication, and the “is” of subsumption. Likewise, the “and, or, not, if–then” are truth-functions.] **

So you are miquoting Kant. Here is that direct quote:

Being is obviously not a real predicate, i.e., a concept of something that could add to the concept of a thing. It is merely the positing of a thing or of certain determinations in themselves. **(1)] **In the logical use it is merely the copula of a judgment. The proposition “God is omnipotent” contains two concepts that have their objects: God and omnipotence; the little word “is” is not a predicate in it, but only that which posits the predicate **in relation to **the subject. **(2)] **Now if I take the subject (God) together with all his predicates (among which omnipotence belongs), and say “God is,” or “there is a God,” then I add **no new predicate **to the concept of God, but only posit the subject in itself with all its predicates, and indeed posit the object in relation to my concept. (A598/B626)

So both in the “absolute” and “relative” sense of “to exist,” neither copula is predicate at all. And if you pay attention to the crux of Kant’s theory of judgment, he says that ALL judgment involve the subject and predicate logical form. And because existence is not a predicate, therefore, NO judgments can be made about a subject’s “existence”. Here’s the reason why:

I ask you: is the proposition, “This or that thing exists”–is this proposition, I say, an analytic or synthetic proposition? **(1)] **If it is the former, then with existence you add nothing to your thought of the thing; but then either the thought that is in you must be the thing itself, or else you have presupposed an existence as belonging to possibility, and then inferred that existence on this pretext from its inner possibility, which is nothing but a miserable tautology. The word **“reality,” **which sounds idfferent from **“existence,” **in the concpet of the predicate, does not settle it. For if you call all positing (leaving indeterminate what you posit) “reality,” then you have **already posited **the thing with all itse predicates in the concept of the subject and assumed it to be actual, and you only repeat that in the predicate. (2)] If you concede, on the contrary, as in all fairness you must, that every existential proposition is synthetic, then how would you assert that the predicate of existence may not be cancelled without contradiction?–since this privilege pertains only in the analytic propositions, as resting on its very character. (A598/B626)

So, if something like “Obama exists” were analytic, then the statement would be **trivially **true. On the other hand, if statement like “Obama does not exist” is synthetic, then to deny it is to commit a **contradiction **in terms since Obama is already assumed to exist in the judgment. This is the exact same thing Frege, Russell, and others said too. So no one is misquoting Kant.

 

[Syntax]

Sure, I assumed you would riposte with something like this: the proper locus of truth is in predicative judgments. [yes, this is foundation of 1st-order logic] However, first-order logic deals only with second-order truth. **?] **The truths broached by first-order logic are meaningless without alethic truth ?], without the uncovering of the atomic elements of its propositions [atomic elements are constitutive of propositions, yes. And the truth values of sentences using "and, or, not, if-then, iff) are a function of the truth-value of its sentence parts. On the other hand, the truth of categorical statements and statements made about relations (including identity) is a function of what 1st-order logic calls “satisfaction.” ]. (I’m sure you agree… at least, I’ll have some questions if you don’t!)

I am not sure what you are trying to say here.

Truth is a property of propositions. When second-order or third-order propositions are made *about *concept, properties, or other propositions, truth is still a property of propositions. Truth is never a property of objects, concepts, and other properties alone.

 

[Syntax]

I’ll just quickly point out here that ‘essence’ is the etymological cognate of the Greek ousia, from which is derived the Latin *essentia *- the literal etymological translation of both is beingness. The question then: why should we reduce the particular ‘beingness’ of a being to a question only of its ‘what,’ and *not *of its ‘how’?

It’s “beingness” is reduced to neither, otherwise, we have infinite conceptions of “being,” which is silly. Why are you proposing reduction? You can make perfect sense of the “what” and the “how” without introducing different species of “existence” into it.
I just construe “essence” to mean the mode of possession of a property that that one object has **de re **necessarily–that is, that the object has in all worlds in which that object exists. But different modes of “having a property,” that is contingently or necessarily, is not synomous with “that the object exists.” Why would you want to make such a conceptual mess?

Das Wesen der Wahrheit ist die Wahrheit vom Wesen. - The essence of truth is the truth of essence.
-Heidegger (Mysterious, huh? )

Cute. That’s what I’m talking about

 

[Syntax]

Look, let’s just suppose for the sake of argument that Hamlet does exist. Hamlet is just not a flesh-and-blood-kind of entity. This still is not going to change the univocal meaning of “to exist.” OUR disagreement will merely come down to WHAT it is that exists, not HOW it exists. What if I told you that we share the exact same meaning of “to exist”? Though I doubt would agree, I’m convinced that we DO share the same notion after all. Truly.

It seems you fall quite effortless in thinking “existence” means different things for infinite amount of objects, and there’s nothing I can do to convince you otherwise than offer illustrative examples about how nonsensical this notion really is. I hope you took the time to read my latest post to Areo- about this. I’m sure I made a convincing case of WHY the notion of different species of existence is nonsensical. Please read it if you haven’t already.

how would I quantify the statement “Obama exists”??? I can’t. In fact, if the name “Obama” denotes an actually existent object, then we are saying something redundant when we utter the sentence “Obama exists.” We are saying “The existent entity denoted by the name ‘Obama’ exists,” so “an existent entity exists.” But this isn’t saying anything about Obama that is unique or peculiar or informative at all–so it is not even truth-valuable! In fact, we are not saying anything about Obama! We are merely denoting an object, if that object exists, whenever we utter the name “Obama.” So we need to predicate something to him such as “president of the usa” in order to say, mean, or assert anything informative at all about Obama.

I disagree. We are saying something about the world: namely, Obama is part of it. This is a truth-valuable statement. It is true! **[It is trivially true, but fails to be informative at all] **Contrast: “Blobama exists.” -](False, I presume.)/-] ****** Note also the contrast between “Hamlet exists” and “Blamlet exists.”

How is this an objection to what I already said about the differences between meaning, reference, and truth in my other posts? I haven’t left anything out here. You assume that you are pointing to objects that exist by your use of these notions (which is totally fine with me). But the meaning that your intentionality associates with the object you presuppose to exist is not the same thing as THAT the objects exists. Do you see the difference?
Betterave;6341642:

I forgot to add here that this [Obama exists]

also implies that we are saying something about Obama **[no it doesn’t; like Kant before me, it is trivially true because it is analytic] **: namely that we can look at the world/reality in order to find out more about him **[that’s not implied in the statement at all any more than that “Hamlet exists” implies that we can go around looking in the world to find out more about Hamlet]. **We are not free to invent statements about him **[of course not] **and regard these statements as ‘non-truth-functional’ [these statements are NON-truth-functional, especially if you’re a Kantian about these matters] The same applies to **[the concept of] **Hamlet.

Suppose we do treat existence like a predicate. Kant (and myself too) would simply say that “Obama exists” is trivially true because you are predicating existence to an object you are already presupposing to exist. So the statement is completely non-informative about Obama. So it is arguable whether it is asserting or denying anything about Obama at all. In other words, presupposing “Obama” designates an object, uttering “Obama exists” is logically equivalent to uttering with the **exact same **meaning and intentionality:

“Obama”

So you haven’t **said **anything at all. You’ve just uttered a word, presupposing that thing exists by your utterance of the word. The same is true for “Blobama.” This is precisely the source of the triviality of the statement for which you are trying to give additional sense to, as if “Obama exists” meant anything more than that he exists. But it doesn’t mean anything more. The same is true for “Bloma exists.” If you really believed this statement has something to say, it is not saying anything more than the former statement about Obama.

I can see that you continue to confuse meaning with existence as if meaning was intimately tied up with presupposition an entity’s existence.

I am dead serious about this: If you haven’t already, please read Frege’s Sense and Nominatum where addresses all the difficulties you seem to be having with intentionality, reference, and meaning. He captures it all with one **univocal ** meaning of “existence.” Philosophers were not dense to the accusations you are firing their way.

 

[Syntax]

Originally Posted by Betterave
I disagree. We are saying something about the world: namely, Obama is part of it. This is a truth-valuable statement. It is true! Contrast: “Blobama exists.” (False, I presume.) *** *Note also the contrast between “Hamlet exists” and “Blamlet exists.”

Point of clarification"

“Obama exists” is trivially true; it is analytic.

“Obama is part of the world” is synthetically true because it says that Obama has such and such a relationship to everything around him.**

 

[Betterave]

I am dead serious about this: If you haven’t already, please read Frege’s Sense and Nominatum where addresses all the difficulties you seem to be having with intentionality, reference, and meaning. He captures it all with one **univocal ** meaning of “existence.” Philosophers were not dense to the accusations you are firing their way.

I just re-read an undergrad paper I wrote six years ago defending some of Frege’s distinctions against criticisms from Russell and Davidson. That’s the last time I read “On *Sinn *and Bedeutung” (that’s what you’re referring to, right?) - but I have read it!

 

[Betterave]

It’s “beingness” is reduced to neither, otherwise, we have infinite conceptions of “being,” which is silly. Why are you proposing reduction? You can make perfect sense of the “what” and the “how” without introducing different species of “existence” into it.

Uh… I thought *you *were proposing reduction?

“Why can’t we just say that the object’s essence is simply what an existent object is, as opposed to the “way” in which an object exists?”

I just construe “essence” to mean the mode of possession of a property that that one object has **de re **necessarily–that is, that the object has in all worlds in which that object exists. But different modes of “having a property,” that is contingently or necessarily, is not synomous with “that the object exists.” Why would you want to make such a conceptual mess?

Did *I *make that mess? I don’t think I said what you’re suggesting (whatever that is), did I? Essence as a mode of possession of a property… hmm… very strange. Don’t you mean that ‘essence’ means the properties themselves, not the mode in which those properties are possessed?

 

[Betterave]

I am not sure what you are trying to say here.

Truth is a property of propositions. When second-order or third-order propositions are made *about *concept, properties, or other propositions, truth is still a property of propositions. Truth is never a property of objects, concepts, and other properties alone.

 

[Betterave]

I am not sure what you are trying to say here.

Truth is a property of propositions. When second-order or third-order propositions are made *about *concept, properties, or other propositions, truth is still a property of propositions. Truth is never a property of objects, concepts, and other properties alone.

I’m talking about the truth expressed by ‘the thought’ or by ‘meaning’ - alethic truth is the emergence of meaning or significance and it makes possible propositional truth.

 

[DanteAlighieri]

A few people (e.g. Touchstone, R Daneel) have accused Aristotle of pulling metaphysical bunnies out of too small a hat. I’m wondering where exactly he goes wrong. How far does he get it right … and at what distinction does he perform some kind of philosophical prestidigitation?

I know that’s kind of a broad question, so broad answers are welcome.

Sorry – no philosopher, I. The only mistake I remember is that he failed to conclude that the Prime Mover could will anything or know anything beyond itself. Afraid I don’t know of any flaws in his methodology, etc.

I mainly just wanted to comment that Metaphysical Bunnies should TOTALLY be the name of a band!

Peace,
Dante

 

[Syntax]

Uh… I thought *you *were proposing reduction?

“Why can’t we just say that the object’s essence is simply what an existent object is, as opposed to the “way” in which an object exists?”

No. You are putting “existence,” and the “what” and “how” of existence together. I am separating those notions. Reduction means that you are translating, for instance, “existing humanly” to mean “existing-humanly.” The hyphen makes all the difference. The former notion is univocal interpretation of “existence.” The latter notion is not a univocal interpretation of existence.

Please excuse this poor analogy, but it seems that your view would be very similar to reducing the notion of the Form of Justice to all of its instances of something being just. So justice is no longer one thing, but is reduced to its myriad of instances.

Did *I *make that mess? I don’t think I said what you’re suggesting (whatever that is), did I? Essence as a mode of possession of a property… hmm… very strange.

My apologies if I spoke to soon.

Don’t you mean that ‘essence’ means the properties themselves, not the mode in which those properties are possessed?

Yes, but you are you going to have to have some way of articulating between the essential and accidental properties which an object possesses. One set of properties it has essentially, or necessarily, that is, in all worlds that object exists. An object has a property accidentally, or contingently, if that object has that property in some, but not all, worlds in which it exists.

Necessarily
Contingently

are different modes of property possession when we speak of an object’s property, not modes of existence itself, simply because the object itself doesn’t necessarily exist, does it? So “having a property essentially” is a mode in which that object possesses that property.

 

[Betterave]

I am not sure what this means or where this is found. You will have to explain. Kant distinguishes two types of positing. The predicative sense of positing as in “Obama is president” and the non-predicative as in “Obama is.” And neither “is” is a predicate at all. The first is positing a subject in relation to the predicate–so the “is” here is the copula of predication, not the predicate itself. The absolute “is” in the latter sense, is not a predicate either because it has no role in truth-functional statements. So Kant reduced the copula “is” to the predicative sense, the identity sense, and the subsumption sene of “is.” But he never thought “is” was a predicate itself. And this is crucial for understanding the rest of his philosophy. “Being is obviously not a real predicate.” (A598/B626) He didn’t say sometimes it is and sometimes it isn’t. See below for textual proof.

So you are miquoting Kant. Here is that direct quote:

So both in the “absolute” and “relative” sense of “to exist,” neither copula is predicate at all. And if you pay attention to the crux of Kant’s theory of judgment, he says that ALL judgment involve the subject and predicate logical form. And because existence is not a predicate, therefore, NO judgments can be made about a subject’s “existence”. Here’s the reason why:

Being is obviously not a real predicate, i.e., a concept of something that could add to the concept of a thing. It is merely the positing of a thing or of certain determinations in themselves. (1)] In the logical use it is merely the copula of a judgment. The proposition “God is omnipotent” contains two concepts that have their objects: God and omnipotence; the little word “is” is not a predicate in it, but only that which posits the predicate in relation to the subject. (2)] Now if I take the subject (God) together with all his predicates (among which omnipotence belongs), and say “God is,” or “there is a God,” then I add no new predicate to the concept of God, but only posit the subject in itself with all its predicates, and indeed posit the object in relation to my concept. (A598/B626)

You seem to suppose that the modifier ‘real’ is a meaningless and inconsequential word for Kant. I don’t think it is. Can you find where Kant says “Being is not a predicate”, rather than “Being is not a real predicate”? Read carefully what you’ve quoted here: ‘is’ is the predicate that posits the thing in itself, with all its (real) predicates.

So, if something like “Obama exists” were analytic, then the statement would be **trivially **true. On the other hand, if statement like “Obama does not exist” is synthetic, then to deny it is to commit a **contradiction **in terms since Obama is already assumed to exist in the judgment. This is the exact same thing Frege, Russell, and others said too. So no one is misquoting Kant

1. Obama exists is synthetic, not analytic. (post 123 - ??)
2. Saying so does not settle the meaning of the concept ‘Obama.’

 

[Syntax]

Being is obviously not a real predicate, i.e., a concept of something that could add to the concept of a thing. It is merely the positing of a thing or of certain determinations in themselves. (1)] In the logical use it is merely the copula of a judgment. The proposition “God is omnipotent” contains two concepts that have their objects: God and omnipotence; the little word “is” is not a predicate in it, but only that which posits the predicate in relation to the subject. (2)] Now if I take the subject (God) together with all his predicates (among which omnipotence belongs), and say “God is,” or “there is a God,” then I add no new predicate to the concept of God, but only posit the subject in itself with all its predicates, and indeed posit the object in relation to my concept. (A598/B626)

You seem to suppose that the modifier ‘real’ is a meaningless and inconsequential word for Kant. I don’t think it is. Can you find where Kant says “Being is not a predicate”, rather than “Being is not a real predicate”? Read carefully what you’ve quoted here: ‘is’ is **[not] **the predicate [itself] but **then I **posit the subject, namely, God] that -]posits the thing in itself/-], with [respect to] all -]its/-] **[of God’s] ** -](real) /-]predicates…

Sorry Betterave, but you need to read the passage better. I edited your crucial misrepresentation of the passage above. You left out the “no” and misconstrued what, exactly, is doing the positing. ***I ***am doing the positing, not the predicate, because “existence” is not a predicate. period.

Kant explicitly says “is” is not a predicate in “God exists.” What*** I ***posit is the object which is already presupposed to exist in any judgment made about God, such as “God is omnipotent.” So the “is” is still acting as a copula, not a predicate. So you are still misconstruing the passage.

Your intepretation simply does not make sense for Kan’ts Theory of Judgment, and I still don’t see how this is an objection to what I’ve been saying.

You’re going to have to do more work here

 

[Betterave]

Look, let’s just suppose for the sake of argument that Hamlet does exist. Hamlet is just not a flesh-and-blood-kind of entity. This still is not going to change the univocal meaning of “to exist.” OUR disagreement will merely come down to WHAT it is that exists, not HOW it exists. What if I told you that we share the exact same meaning of “to exist”? Though I doubt would agree, I’m convinced that we DO share the same notion after all. Truly.

So what do you think is *the basis *of our disagreement about what exists?

How is this an objection to what I already said about the differences between meaning, reference, and truth in my other posts? I haven’t left anything out here. You assume that you are pointing to objects that exist by your use of these notions (which is totally fine with me). But the meaning that your intentionality associates with the object you presuppose to exist is not the same thing as THAT the objects exists. Do you see the difference?

Absolutely.

Suppose we do treat existence like a predicate. Kant (and myself too) would simply say that “Obama exists” is trivially true because you are predicating existence to an object you are already presupposing to exist. So the statement is completely non-informative about Obama. So it is arguable whether it is asserting or denying anything about Obama at all. In other words, presupposing “Obama” designates an object, uttering “Obama exists” is logically equivalent to uttering with the **exact same **meaning and intentionality:

“Obama”

So you haven’t **said **anything at all. You’ve just uttered a word, presupposing that thing exists by your utterance of the word. The same is true for “Blobama.” This is precisely the source of the triviality of the statement for which you are trying to give additional sense to, as if “Obama exists” meant anything more than that he exists. But it doesn’t mean anything more. The same is true for “Bloma exists.” If you really believed this statement has something to say, it is not saying anything more than the former statement about Obama.

So, presupposing “Hamlet” does *not *designate an object, uttering “Hamlet does not exist” is logically equivalent to uttering with the exact same meaning and intentionality:

“Hamlet”

(Is this what you really want to say?)

 

[Betterave]

Sorry Betterave, but you need to read the passage better. I edited your crucial misrepresentation of the passage above. You left out the “no” and misconstrued what, exactly, is doing the positing. ***I ***am doing the positing, not the predicate, because “existence” is not a predicate. period.

*How *are you doing the positing? By your use of the predicate ‘is’!

Do you have some reason for claiming that ‘positing’ and ‘predicating’ are independent notions? I’ll dig up some references for you on the different Kantian modes of *Position *when I get a chance.

 

[Syntax]

1. Obama exists is synthetic, not analytic. (post 123 - ??)
2. Saying so does not settle the meaning of the concept ‘Obama.’

It’s because “existence” is not predicate. All that you’re saying in “Obama exists” is that there is some existent entity x which exists. But this is trivially true.

And (2) is exactly right. That’s why “Obama exists” is analytic. You aren’t saying anything about Obama. It is trivially true and uniniformative.

?? Why is this not clear? Kant agrees. He just said it in the passage I quoted days ago.

 

[Syntax]

*How *are you doing the positing? By your use of the predicate ‘is’!

-]No! /-] Yes!

“Is” is peforming the role of predicating a property of an object. But*** I ***am doing the positing of the existence of that object by predicating a property to it. This is precisely why the judgment “Obama exists” would be trivially true for Kant.

Do you have some reason for claiming that ‘positing’ and ‘predicating’ are independent notions? I’ll dig up some references for you on the different Kantian modes of *Position *when I get a chance.

Absolutely. They are different notions. But I wouldn’t be predicating without also positing that that object exists about which I pass a judgment. This is exactly the whole point of my entire discussion!

Therefore, “existence” is implicitly univocal every time I make a judgment whether about Hamlet or Obama. So there is nothing informative about “existence” at all.