The Categories by Aristotle (good ebook reader TXT) 📖

Part 10

The proposed categories have, then, been adequately dealt with.

We must next explain the various senses in which the term

‘opposite’ is used. Things are said to be opposed in four senses:

(i) as correlatives to one another, (ii) as contraries to one

another, (iii) as privatives to positives, (iv) as affirmatives

to negatives.

 

Let me sketch my meaning in outline. An instance of the use of

the word ‘opposite’ with reference to correlatives is afforded by

the expressions ‘double’ and ‘half’; with reference to contraries

by ‘bad’ and ‘good’. Opposites in the sense of ‘privatives’ and

‘positives’ are’ blindness’ and ‘sight’; in the sense of

affirmatives and negatives, the propositions ‘he sits’, ‘he does

not sit’.

 

(i) Pairs of opposites which fall under the category of relation

are explained by a reference of the one to the other, the

reference being indicated by the preposition ‘of’ or by some

other preposition. Thus, double is a relative term, for that

which is double is explained as the double of something.

Knowledge, again, is the opposite of the thing known, in the same

sense; and the thing known also is explained by its relation to

its opposite, knowledge. For the thing known is explained as that

which is known by something, that is, by knowledge. Such things,

then, as are opposite the one to the other in the sense of being

correlatives are explained by a reference of the one to the

other.

 

(ii) Pairs of opposites which are contraries are not in any way

interdependent, but are contrary the one to the other. The good

is not spoken of as the good of the bad, but as the contrary of

the bad, nor is white spoken of as the white of the black, but as

the contrary of the black. These two types of opposition are

therefore distinct. Those contraries which are such that the

subjects in which they are naturally present, or of which they

are predicated, must necessarily contain either the one or the

other of them, have no intermediate, but those in the case of

which no such necessity obtains, always have an intermediate.

Thus disease and health are naturally present in the body of an

animal, and it is necessary that either the one or the other

should be present in the body of an animal. Odd and even, again,

are predicated of number, and it is necessary that the one or the

other should be present in numbers. Now there is no intermediate

between the terms of either of these two pairs. On the other

hand, in those contraries with regard to which no such necessity

obtains, we find an intermediate. Blackness and whiteness are

naturally present in the body, but it is not necessary that

either the one or the other should be present in the body,

inasmuch as it is not true to say that everybody must be white or

black. Badness and goodness, again, are predicated of man, and of

many other things, but it is not necessary that either the one

quality or the other should be present in that of which they are

predicated: it is not true to say that everything that may be

good or bad must be either good or bad. These pairs of contraries

have intermediates: the intermediates between white and black are

grey, sallow, and all the other colours that come between; the

intermediate between good and bad is that which is neither the

one nor the other.

 

Some intermediate qualities have names, such as grey and sallow

and all the other colours that come between white and black; in

other cases, however, it is not easy to name the intermediate,

but we must define it as that which is not either extreme, as in

the case of that which is neither good nor bad, neither just nor

unjust.

 

(iii) ‘privatives’ and ‘Positives’ have reference to the same

subject. Thus, sight and blindness have reference to the eye. It

is a universal rule that each of a pair of opposites of this type

has reference to that to which the particular ‘positive’ is

natural. We say that that is capable of some particular faculty

or possession has suffered privation when the faculty or

possession in question is in no way present in that in which, and

at the time at which, it should naturally be present. We do not

call that toothless which has not teeth, or that blind which has

not sight, but rather that which has not teeth or sight at the

time when by nature it should. For there are some creatures which

from birth are without sight, or without teeth, but these are not

called toothless or blind.

 

To be without some faculty or to possess it is not the same as

the corresponding ‘privative’ or ‘positive’. ‘Sight’ is a

‘positive’, ‘blindness’ a ‘privative’, but ‘to possess sight’ is

not equivalent to ‘sight’, ‘to be blind’ is not equivalent to

‘blindness’. Blindness is a ‘privative’, to be blind is to be in

a state of privation, but is not a ‘privative’. Moreover, if

‘blindness’ were equivalent to ‘being blind’, both would be

predicated of the same subject; but though a man is said to be

blind, he is by no means said to be blindness.

 

To be in a state of ‘possession’ is, it appears, the opposite of

being in a state of ‘privation’, just as ‘positives’ and

‘privatives’ themselves are opposite. There is the same type of

antithesis in both cases; for just as blindness is opposed to

sight, so is being blind opposed to having sight.

 

That which is affirmed or denied is not itself affirmation or

denial. By ‘affirmation’ we mean an affirmative proposition, by

‘denial’ a negative. Now, those facts which form the matter of

the affirmation or denial are not propositions; yet these two are

said to be opposed in the same sense as the affirmation and

denial, for in this case also the type of antithesis is the same.

For as the affirmation is opposed to the denial, as in the two

propositions ‘he sits’, ‘he does not sit’, so also the fact which

constitutes the matter of the proposition in one case is opposed

to that in the other, his sitting, that is to say, to his not

sitting.

 

It is evident that ‘positives’ and ‘privatives’ are not opposed

each to each in the same sense as relatives. The one is not

explained by reference to the other; sight is not sight of

blindness, nor is any other preposition used to indicate the

relation. Similarly blindness is not said to be blindness of

sight, but rather, privation of sight. Relatives, moreover,

reciprocate; if blindness, therefore, were a relative, there

would be a reciprocity of relation between it and that with which

it was correlative. But this is not the case. Sight is not called

the sight of blindness.

 

That those terms which fall under the heads of ‘positives’ and

‘privatives’ are not opposed each to each as contraries, either,

is plain from the following facts: Of a pair of contraries such

that they have no intermediate, one or the other must needs be

present in the subject in which they naturally subsist, or of

which they are predicated; for it is those, as we proved,’ in the

case of which this necessity obtains, that have no intermediate.

Moreover, we cited health and disease, odd and even, as

instances. But those contraries which have an intermediate are

not subject to any such necessity. It is not necessary that every

substance, receptive of such qualities, should be either black or

white, cold or hot, for something intermediate between these

contraries may very well be present in the subject. We proved,

moreover, that those contraries have an intermediate in the case

of which the said necessity does not obtain. Yet when one of the

two contraries is a constitutive property of the subject, as it

is a constitutive property of fire to be hot, of snow to be

white, it is necessary determinately that one of the two

contraries, not one or the other, should be present in the

subject; for fire cannot be cold, or snow black. Thus, it is not

the case here that one of the two must needs be present in every

subject receptive of these qualities, but only in that subject of

which the one forms a constitutive property. Moreover, in such

cases it is one member of the pair determinately, and not either

the one or the other, which must be present.

 

In the case of ‘positives’ and ‘privatives’, on the other hand,

neither of the aforesaid statements holds good. For it is not

necessary that a subject receptive of the qualities should always

have either the one or the other; that which has not yet advanced

to the state when sight is natural is not said either to be blind

or to see. Thus ‘positives’ and ‘privatives’ do not belong to

that class of contraries which consists of those which have no

intermediate. On the other hand, they do not belong either to

that class which consists of contraries which have an

intermediate. For under certain conditions it is necessary that

either the one or the other should form part of the constitution

of every appropriate subject. For when a thing has reached the

stage when it is by nature capable of sight, it will be said

either to see or to be blind, and that in an indeterminate sense,

signifying that the capacity may be either present or absent; for

it is not necessary either that it should see or that it should

be blind, but that it should be either in the one state or in the

other. Yet in the case of those contraries which have an

intermediate we found that it was never necessary that either the

one or the other should be present in every appropriate subject,

but only that in certain subjects one of the pair should be

present, and that in a determinate sense. It is, therefore, plain

that ‘positives’ and ‘privatives’ are not opposed each to each in

either of the senses in which contraries are opposed.