亚里士多德解释编—-命题的性质与类型

There  is no  unity  about an  affirmation or  denial  which,  either  positively or

negatively,  predicates  one  thing  of  many  subjects,  or  many  things  of  the

same  subject, unless that which is indicated  by the  many is really some  one

thing.  do not apply this word  ’one’ to those things which, though they have a

single recognized name, yet do not  combine  to form a unity. Thus, man may

be  an  animal,  and  biped,  and  domesticated,  but  these  three  predicates

combine to form a unity. On the other hand, the predicates ’white’, ’man’, and

’walking’  do  not  thus  combine.  Neither,  therefore,  if  these  three  form  the

subject of an affirmation, nor if they form its predicate, is there any unity about

that affirmation. In both cases the unity is linguistic, but not real.

If therefore the dialectical question is a request for an ans wer, i.e. either for

the  admission  of  a  premiss   or   for   the   admission   of  one   of   two

contradictories-and the premiss is  itself always one of two contradictories-the

answer  to  such  a  question  as  contains  the  above  predicates  cannot  be  a

single  propos ition.  For as  I  have  explained  in  the  Topics,  ques tion  is  not  a

single one, even if the ans wer asked for is  true.

At  the  same  time  it is plain  that  a  question  of the form  ’what is  it?’  is not a

dialectical  question,  for  a  dialectical  questioner  must  by  the  form  of  his

ques tion give his opponent the chance of announcing one of two alternatives,

whichever he wishes. He must therefore put the question into a more definite

form,  and  inquire, e.g..  whether  man  has  such  and s uch a  characteristic or

not.

Some  c ombinations  of  predicates  are  such  that  the  separate  predicates

unite to form a single predicate. Let us consider under what conditions this is

and  is  not  possible.  We  may  either  state  in  two  separate  propositions  that

man  is an  animal and that man is  a  biped, or we may  combine  the two,  and

state that  man  is  an  animal  with  two  feet. Similarly  we  may  use  ’man’  and

’white’  as  separate  predicates,  or  unite  them  into  one.  Yet  if  a  man  is  a

shoemak er  and  is  also  good,  we  cannot  construct  a  composite  proposition

and  s ay  that  he  is  a  good  shoemaker.  For  if,  whenever  two  separate

predicates truly belong to a subject, it follows that the predicate resulting from

their  combination  also  truly  belongs  to  the  subject,  many  absurd  results

ensue.  For instance,  a man  is  man  and  white.  Therefore,  if  predicates may

always  be  combined,  he  is  a  white  man.  Again,  if  the  predicate  ’white’

belongs  to  him,  then  the  combination  of  that  predicate  with  the  former

composite predicate will be permissible. Thus it will be right to say that he is a

white  man  so  on  indefinitely.  Or,  again,  we  may  combine  the  predicates

’musical’,  ’white’,  and  ’walking’,  and  these  may  be  combined  many  times.

Similarly we may say that Socrates is Socrates and a man, and that therefore

he  is  the  man  Socrates,  or  that  Socrates  is  a  man  and  a  biped,  and  that

therefore  he  is  a  two-footed  man.  Thus  it  is  manifest  that  if  man  states

unconditionally  that  predicates  can  always  be  combined,  many  absurd

consequences ensue.