Analyses of Aristotle (Jaakko Hintikka Selected Papers)

251 Pages·2004·1.8 MB·English

by  J. Hintikka

ANALYSES OF ARISTOTLE
JAAKKO HINTIKKA SELECTED PAPERS

VOLUME 6

1. Ludwig Wittgenstein. Half-Truths and One-and-a-Half-Truths.
1996 ISBN 0-7923-4091-4
2. Lingua Universalis vs. Calculus Ratiocinator. An Ultimate
Presupposition of Twentieth-Century Philosophy. 1996
ISBN 0-7923-4246-1

3. Language, Truth and Logic in Mathematics. 1997

ISBN 0-7923-4766-8

4. Paradigms for Language Theory and Other Essays. 1997

ISBN 0-7923-4780-3

5. Inquiry as Inquiry. A Logic of Scientific Discovery. 1999

ISBN 0-7923-5477-X

6. Analyses of Aristotle. 2004
ISBN 1-4020-2040-6
JAAKKO HINTIKKA
Boston University, U.S.A.
ANALYSES OF ARISTOTLE

KLUWER ACADEMIC PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK, BOSTON, DORDRECHT, LONDON, MOSCOW
eBook ISBN: 1-4020-2041-4
Print ISBN: 1-4020-2040-6
©2004 Kluwer Academic Publishers
New York, Boston, Dordrecht, London, Moscow
Print ©2004 Kluwer Academic Publishers
Dordrecht
All rights reserved
No part of this eBook may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, recording, or otherwise, without written consent from the Publisher
Created in the United States of America
Visit Kluwer Online at: http://kluweronline.com
and Kluwer's eBookstore at: http://ebooks.kluweronline.com
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Origin of the essays vii

Introduction ix

1. On Aristotle’s notion of existence 1

2. Semantical games, the alleged ambiguity of ‘is’, and Aristotelian

categories 23

3. Aristotle’s theory of thinking and its consequences for his

methodology 45

4. On the role of modality in Aristotle’s metaphysics 77

5. On the ingredients of an Aristotelian science 87

6. Aristotelian axiomatics and geometrical axiomatics 101

7. Aristotelian induction 111

8. (with Ilpo Halonen) Aristotelian explanations 127

9. Aristotle’s incontinent logician 139

10. On the development of Aristotle’s ideas of scientific method and

the structure of science 153

11. What was Aristotle doing in his early logic, anyway?: A reply to

Woods and Hansen 175

12. Concepts of scientific method from Aristotle to Newton 183

13. The fallacy of fallacies 193

14. Socratic questioning, logic, and rhetoric 219

v
This page intentionally left blank
ORIGIN OF THE ESSAYS
All permissions granted for the previously published essays by their respective
copyright holders are most gratefully acknowledged. Thanks are also due to
the editors of the volumes in which these articles appeared previously and to
the co-author of one of the articles.
1. ‘‘On Aristotle’s notion of existence’’, T he Review of Metaphysics vol. 52
(June, 1999), pp. 779–805. Reprinted with permission.
2. ‘‘Semantical games, the alleged ambiguity of ‘is’ and Aristotelian cate-
gories’’, Synthese vol. 54 (1983), pp. 443–468 (D. Reidel Publishing Co.,
Dordrecht).
3. ‘‘Aristotle’s theory of thinking and its consequences for his methodology’’,
previously unpublished.
4. ‘‘On the role of modality in Aristotle’s metaphysics’’, in Of Scholars,
Savants and T heir T exts, ed. by Ruth Link-Salinger, Peter Lang
Publishing, New York (1989), pp. 123–134. Reprinted with permission.
5. ‘‘On the ingredients of an Aristotelian science’’, Nouˆs vol. 6 (1972),
pp. 55–69. Reprinted with permission from Blackwell Publishing, Oxford.
6. ‘‘Aristotelian axiomatics and geometrical axiomatics’’, in T heory Change,
Ancient Axiomatics and Galilean Methodology, ed. by Jaakko Hintikka
et al., D. Reidel Publishing, Dordrecht (1980), pp. 133–144.
7. ‘‘Aristotelian induction’’, Revue lnternationale de Philosophie vol. 34 (1980),
pp. 422–439. Reprinted with permission.
8. (with Ilpo Halonen) ‘‘Aristotelian explanations’’, Studies in the History of
the Philosophy of Science vol. 31, no. 1 (2000), pp. 125–136. Reprinted
with permission from Elsevier.
9. ‘‘Aristotle’s incontinent logician’’, Ajatus vol. 37 (1978), pp. 48–63.
Reprinted with permission.
10. ‘‘On the development of Aristotle’s ideas of scientific method and the
structure of science’’, Aristotle’s Philosophical Development: Problems and
Prospects, ed. by William Wians, Lanham, Maryland, Rowman &
Littlefield (1996), pp. 83–104. Reprinted with permission.
vii
viii ORIGIN OF THE ESSAYS
11. ‘‘What was Aristotle doing in his early logic, anyway?: A reply to Woods
and Hanson’’, Synthese vol. 113 (1997), pp. 241–249 (Kluwer Academic
Publishers, Dordrecht).
12. ‘‘Concepts of scientific method from Aristotle to Newton’’, in Knowledge
and the Sciences in Medieval Philosophy, Vol. I, ed. by Monica Asztalos,
John E. Murdoch and Ilkka Niiniluoto, Helsinki, Acta Philosophica
Fennica, vol. 48 (1990), pp. 72–84. Reprinted with permission.
13. ‘‘The fallacy of fallacies’’, Argumentation vol. 1 (1987), pp. 211–238
(D. Reidel Publishing Co., Dordrecht).
14. ‘‘Socratic questioning, logic, and rhetoric’’, Revue Internationale de
Philosophie vol. 47, no. 184 (1993), pp. 5–30. Reprinted with permission.
INTRODUCTION
The purpose of the introduction to a book should be the same as that of the
label on a medicine bottle. It should tell the reader how to use the text of the
book. The present volume needs such instructions more than most books,
including the earlier volumes of my selected papers. The main warning that
the label on this product should proclaim is not to read the papers printed or
reprinted here in the same way as fully polished contributions to scholarly
journals on ancient philosophy. I have been, and I continue to be, fascinated
by Aristotle’s philosophical ideas. I have thought about them, and I have come
up with a number of interpretations of them. The essays published or repub-
lished here are presentations of these interpretations. Alas, they are all sketches
rather than fully argued and documented papers. The reason is obvious. My
main lines of work in philosophy run elsewhere and have the first claim to my
working time and energy. I fully admit this orientation of my philosophical
interests does not excuse the sketchiness of my papers. Since I was aware of
the situation for a long time, I hoped to rewrite some of the papers published
here and replace some others by new ones in such a way that the interpretational
argumentation and scholarly documentation would be on the same level as in
specialized publications on ancient philosophy. Reluctantly, I have reached the
conclusion that I will never have a chance of doing so. Hence my only chance
of bringing my interpretational ideas to the attention of a wider philosophical
audience is to reprint the original papers as they are, with an explanation of
their status.
My main reason for doing so is a strong belief in the potential importance
of the interpretations I outline in these papers. The first and foremost aspect
of this importance is the giving of new general perspectives on Aristotle’s
philosophy. It might seem overoptimistic, not to say pretentious, to think that
after more than two millennia there could be unused clues to Aristotle’s
thinking. The fact nevertheless is, I believe, that in some cases the progress of
systematic conceptual analysis (and synthesis) puts what Aristotle is doing –
or, rather, thinking – in a new light. Even the most central concept of all,
ontology, the concept of being, bears witness to these opportunities. For a
century and a half, the consensus of philosophers is that this concept is
irreducibly ambiguous between being in the sense of identity, predication,
existence and subsumption. This assumption may be called the Frege-Russell
ambiguity thesis. But is the thesis true? Everybody admits that there are
different uses of words for being, but the Frege-Russell thesis tries to explain
ix