LESSON 10

The Procedure Against Those Who Say that Contradictories Are True at the Same Time

Chapter 5: 1009a 16-1009a 38

             353. But the same method of discussion is not applicable in all of these cases, because some men need persuasion and others force. For the ignorance of those who have formed their opinions as a result of difficulties is easily cured, because refutation is directed not against their words but against their thought. But the cure for all of those who argue for the sake of argument consists in refuting what they express in speech and in words.

             354. Those who have experienced difficulties have formed this opinion because of things observed in the sensible world, i.e., the opinion that contradictories and contraries can both be true at the same time, inasmuch as they see that contraries are generated from the same thing. Therefore, if it is impossible for non-being to come into being, the thing must have existed before as both contraries equally. This is Anaxagoras' view, for he says that everything is mixed in everything else. And Democritus is of the same opinion, for he holds that the void and the full are equally present in any part, and yet one of these is non-being and the other being.

             355. Concerning those who base their opinions on these grounds, then, we say that in one sense they speak the truth, and that in another they do not know what they are saying. For being has two meanings, so that in one sense a thing can come to be from non-being and in another sense it cannot. Hence the same thing can both be and not be at the same time, but not in the same respect; for while the same thing can be potentially two contraries at the same time, it cannot in complete actuality.

             356. Further, we shall expect them to believe that among beings there is also another kind of substance to which neither motion nor generation nor corruption belongs in any way.

COMMENTARY

             663. Having raised arguments against those who deny the first principle, and having settled the issue, here the Philosopher indicates how one must proceed differently against various men who adopted different versions of the above-mentioned error. This is divided into two parts.

             In the first (353:C 663) he shows that one must proceed differently against different men. In the second (354:C 665) he begins to proceed in a different way than he did above ("Those who").

             He accordingly says, first (353), that the same method "of discussion," i.e., of popular address (or "of good grammatical construction," according to another translation, or of well ordered argument "or intercession," as is said in the Greek, i.e., of persuasion) is not applicable to all of the foregoing positions; that is, to the position that contradictories can be true, and to the position that truth consists in appearances. For some thinkers adopt the foregoing positions for two reasons. Some do so because of some difficulty; for since certain sophistical arguments occur to them, from which the foregoing positions seem to follow, and they do not know how to solve them, they accept the conclusion. Hence their ignorance is easily cured. For one must not oppose them or attack the arguments which they give, but must appeal to their thought, clearing up the mental difficulties which have led them to form such opinions; and then they will give up these positions.

             664. Others adopt the foregoing positions, not because of any difficulty which leads them to such positions, but only because they want to argue "for the sake of argument," i.e., because of a certain insolence, inasmuch as they want to maintain impossible theories of this kind for their own sake since the contrary of these cannot be demonstrated. The cure for these men is the refutation or rejection "of what they express in speech and in words," i.e., on the grounds that the word in a statement has some meaning. Now the meaning of a statement depends on the meaning of the words, so that it is necessary to return to the principle that words signify something. This is the principle which the Philosopher used above (332:C 611).

             665. Those who (354).

             Since the Philosopher met the difficulties above on this point by considering the meaning of words, he begins here to meet those who are in difficulties by solving their problems.

             First (354), he deals with those who held that contradictories are true at the same time; and second (357:C 669), he deals with those who held that everything which appears so is true ("And similarly").

             In regard to the first he does two things. First, he sets forth the difficulty which led some men to admit that contradictories are true at the same time. Second (355:C 667), he clears up this difficulty ("Concerning those").

             He says, then, that the opinion on this point, that the parts of a contradiction may be true at the same time, was formed by some men as a result of a difficulty which arose with regard to sensible things, in which generation and corruption and motion are apparent. For it seemed that contraries were generated from the same thing; for example, air, which is warm, and earth, which is cold, both come from water. But everything which is generated comes from something that existed before; for non-being cannot come into being, since nothing comes from nothing. A thing therefore had to have in itself contradictories simultaneously, because if both the hot and the cold are generated from one and the same thing, then it turns out to be hot and not-hot itself.

             666. It was because of such reasoning that Anaxagoras claimed that everything is mixed in everything else. For from the fact that anything at all seemed to come from anything else he thought that one thing could come from another only if it already existed in it. Democritus also seems to have agreed with this theory, for he claimed that the void and the full are combined in any part of a body. And these are like being and non-being, because the full has the character of being and the void the character of non-being.

             667. Concerning those (355).

             Here he solves the foregoing difficulty in two ways. First, he says that the opinion of those who have adopted the foregoing absurd views because of some difficulty must be met by appealing to their thought, as has been stated (353:C 663). Therefore "concerning those who base their opinions," i.e., those who think that contradictories are true at the same time, "on these grounds," i.e., on the reasoning mentioned above, we say that in one sense they speak the truth and in another they do not know what they are saying since their statements are absurd. For being has two meanings: actual being and potential being; and therefore when they say that being does not come from non-being, in one sense they are right and in another they are not. For being does not come from actual being but from potential being. Hence in one sense the same thing can be at the same time both being and non-being, and in another sense it cannot; for the same thing can be contraries potentially, but it cannot be both "in complete actuality," i.e., actually. For if something warm is potentially both hot and cold, it still cannot be actually both.

             668. Further, we shall (356).

             Then he gives the second solution. He says that we deem it fitting that they should accept or think that there is some kind of substance to which neither motion nor generation nor corruption belongs, as is proved in Book VIII of the Physics. Now one could not conclude to the existence of this kind of substance by reason of what has been said above, namely, that contraries belong to it, because nothing is generated from them. This solution seems to be like the one reached by the Platonists, who, because of the changeable character of sensible things, were compelled to posit unchangeable separate Forms (i.e., those of which definitions are given, and demonstrations made, and certain knowledge is had) on the grounds that there could be no certain knowledge of sensible things because of their changeableness and the mixture of contrariety which they contain. But the first solution is a better one.