On Ideas: Aristotle's Criticism of Plato's Theory of Forms

417 Pages·1995·23.48 MB·English

by  Gail Fine

ON IDEAS

ON IDEAS
Aristotle's Criticism of Plato's
Theory of Forms
GAIL FINE
CLARENDON PRESS OXFORD
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ISBN 0-19-823549-6
To My Parents
and
to Terry

PREFACE
THE Peri ideon (On Ideas) is a short essay by Aristotle, which survives
only in fragments preserved by the Greek commentator Alexander, in his
commentary on Aristotle's Metaphysics. In this essay, Aristotle presents
and criticizes arguments for the existence of Platonic forms, and sketches
his alternative. It is an especially rich source for anyone who wants to
understand Plato's theory of forms. For it characterizes forms, and sets
out arguments for their existence, more systematically than Plato does or
than Aristotle does elsewhere. Asking whether Plato is committed to
these arguments and characterizations affords new insights into the
dialogues. Attention to the Peri ideon also illuminates Aristotle's under-
standing of and alternative to Plato. Nor is the work of purely historical
interest. It is one of the first contributions to the continuing debate about
the nature of universals, and it raises still-current questions about, for
example, the range of universals and whether they can exist uninstan-
tiated. Anyone interested in this debate should be interested in its origins.
I first became interested in the Peri ideon when, as a graduate student
at Harvard in the early 19705, I took a seminar on it with Professor
G. E. L. Owen. My interest in it deepened when I gave my own courses
on it at Cornell. Initially I worked on the Peri ideon piecemeal, analysing
a given argument and tracing its Platonic roots. But I gradually became
convinced that the first book of the Peri ideon (which is my focus here) is
an integrated whole, and so it seemed worth while to provide a connected
discussion. This also seemed worth while because there was no systematic
book length treatment of the Peri ideon available in English.
Though the Peri ideon is short, the present work is rather long. This
is partly because the Peri ideon's arguments are cryptic, abstract, and
indeterminate. To explain the various ways in which they can be read,
and to trace the implications of these readings, takes some time. This
is not to say that Aristotle must have had any particular determinate
reading in mind; perhaps he deliberately phrased the arguments in-
determinately in order to highlight a corresponding indeterminacy in
Plato's texts. But even if this is so, we need to see precisely how the
arguments Aristotle records are indeterminate, and we need to see what
this shows us about Plato and about Aristotle's understanding of him.
Another reason for the relative length of my discussion is that the Peri
ideon cannot be properly evaluated or understood in isolation. For
example, in order to see whether the arguments Aristotle records can
fairly be ascribed to Plato, we need to look at the Platonic texts. In order
to understand the point of Aristotle's criticisms, we need to look at other
Aristotelian passages where they are developed more fully. Or again,
viii Preface
short though the Peri ideon is, it often considers the same few Platonic
passages from different points of view, so I often need to follow suit. (In
a letter to Mersenne Descartes says that '[repetitions may be offensive in
some places, but they are elegant in others' (AT III 36i/CSM III 180). I
do not claim elegance, but the nature of the Peri ideon makes some
repetition necessary.)
Despite the length of my discussion, there are many omissions. For
example, I do not provide a new text or edition of the Peri ideon, nor do
I discuss the second book of the Peri ideon. I do not discuss in detail
Platonists other than Plato, in order to see whether Aristotle might have
them in mind, nor do I say much about Plato's late dialogues or so-called
unwritten doctrines. There are many relevant aspects of Plato's and
Aristotle's thought that I touch on but do not discuss in detail. Although I
perhaps cannot justify all these omissions, I can explain my reasons for
them.
Since Dieter Harlfinger has recently produced a new, and good, text of
most of the Peri ideon, based on a fresh examination of the manuscripts,
it was unnecessary for me to produce yet another one. Nor was my aim to
produce a critical edition of the Peri ideon; what follows is more of a
philosophical than a philological exploration (although I do not think
there are firm boundaries here).
Although I do not discuss the second book of the Peri ideon, the part I
focus on (book i) is self-contained. For example, as I explain in Ch. 2.7,
its structure is neatly dilemmatic.
I shall argue that one central aim of Peri ideon i is to illuminate Plato's
theory of forms as it is described in the middle dialogues. (Peri ideon 2,
by contrast, claims to discuss Eudoxus' theory of forms; it also discusses
some arguments about principles which, while they are relevant to Plato,
are not so clearly concerned with the middle dialogues in particular.) This
is not to say that other sources, such as the late dialogues or other
Platonists, are irrelevant; and at some stages I consider some relevant
passages in the late dialogues as well as other possible sources. But since
the middle dialogues seem to be a chief target, and since exploring that
target is already quite a large project, it seemed reasonable to limit
myself primarily to it. Others might like to carry my project further by
asking what light the Peri ideon sheds on other sources.
To explore the arguments and assess their cogency, I need to take
stands on a variety of topics in Plato and Aristotle. To defend all my
views in detail would have made an already long and complicated book
even longer and more complicated. But in Ch. 4 I indicate my views on
some of the central issues. Although this account is not as detailed or as
thoroughly defended as it perhaps should be, I hope that it at least
provides a framework for what follows.
For my own part, it was only after much labour that the point of the
Preface ix
Peri ideon and its sources in the dialogues became clear to me. But the
effort revealed to me a richness and depth in the dialogues and in the Peri
ideon that I had not initially suspected. I hope that the light the Peri
ideon casts on Aristotle and on various Platonic passages proves as
illuminating for others as it did for me.
An earlier version of Ch. 8 appeared as The One over Many',
Philosophical Review, 89 (1980), 197-240; an earlier version of parts of
Ch. ii appeared as 'Owen's Progress: A Review of Logic, Science, and
Dialectic', Philosophical Review, 97 (1988), 373-99. The present versions
appear here by permission of Cornell University. An earlier version
of Ch. 9 appeared as 'The Object of Thought Argument: Forms and
Thought', in Apeiron: A Journal for Ancient Philosophy and Science,
21 (1988), 105-46; the present version appears here by permission of
Academic Printing and Publishing. An earlier version of Ch. 13 appeared
as 'Aristotle's Criticisms of Plato', J. Klagge and N. Smith (eds.),
in Methods of Interpreting Plato and his Dialogues, Oxford Studies in
Ancient Philosophy, Supplementary Volume (1992), 13-41. An earlier
version of part of Ch. 14 appeared as 'Aristotle and the More Accurate
Arguments', in M. Nussbaum and M. Schofield (eds.), Language and
Logos (Cambridge University Press, 1982), 155-77. I gratefully acknowl-
edge permission to use portions of these earlier articles. I am also grateful
to the Casa Editrice Leo S. Olschki for permission to reprint Harlfinger's
text of the Peri ideon.
In writing this book, I have acquired a number of debts that I am pleased
to record. I have been greatly influenced by G. E. L. Owen, both by his
classes and by his published writings (now collected in Logic, Science, and
Dialectic), and also by his unpublished manuscript on the Peri ideon (on
deposit in the Classics Library in Cambridge University). I thank Mrs
Sally Owen for giving me permission to consult Owen's manuscript before
it was available to the public.
Since 1975, I have had the great privilege of being a member of
the Sage School of Philosophy at Cornell University. The friendliness,
support, and stimulation that I have received from many colleagues and
students has been remarkable. I should especially like to thank Sydney
Shoemaker and Nicholas Sturgeon, both of whom provided encourage-
ment as well as insightful comments, both written and oral, on various
versions of various chapters; and Norman Kretzmann, who also provided
encouragement, and who read and commented helpfully on most of a
penultimate version.
In 1982-3, while on a National Endowment for the Humanities fellow-
ship, I was a Visiting Fellow at Brasenose College, Oxford; and in 1987 I
was a Visiting Fellow at Wolf son College, Oxford. I should like to thank