The Equivocity of "Logos": From John's Gospel to Thomas's Division of Logic

Orientation #

He does not refer to a previous class. At the end: “we’ll begin next time by recalling” Thomas’s saying in the exposition of the Metaphysics that logic proceeds by way of predication while natural philosophy proceeds by way of motion. The next class carries on the threefold division of logic and moves into Porphyry’s Isagoge.

The class, in order #

1. Three meanings of logos (“the Greek word logos is a word equivocal”) #

Point: logos is equivocal, with three main meanings ordered as we come to know them: word, thought, reason.

• (1) Word. John’s Gospel: “in the beginning was the word, the word was toward God, and the word was God.” Problem in English: “word” tends to stop at the first meaning, though we sense something behind it.
• (2) Thought, the mental word: the thought the word signifies. Two really distinct meanings, but connected because the word signifies the thought (“I signify my thoughts to you using words”).
• (3) Reason. Connection: not by chance; it is the reason that has thoughts, the reason that thinks.
• Why this order: Thomas on imposition of names (impositio nominis, “placing upon” — a label put on a thing, parents put a name on you). In the fifth book of the “wisdom” [ed.: Metaphysics V] Thomas says we name things as we know them, so the order of imposition follows the order of our knowing. The word is sensible (heard, or seen if written); a thought cannot be seen, heard, smelled, tasted or touched, nor can reason; but the thought is closer to the word, since the word signifies it.
• Which meaning in John? The thought of God. Argument, as he gives it:
  1. When reason knows itself, a thought of itself proceeds from it.
  2. So when God knows himself, there proceeds from him a thought of himself.
  3. It is the thought because (a) it is the thought of the best thing there is, God; (b) it is the only perfect thought of God, the only thought expressing God perfectly; (c) more than that, it is the only thought that is a person, a thought that is God himself.
  4. As my thoughts remain in my mind, so the Son is in the Father.
• Asides: Monsignor Dionne held Greek better than Latin for poetry and philosophy; he and Father Boulet, native French speakers, held English better than French for both. Story that Dionne first met Shakespeare through a French translation and was given an English one (De Koninck’s note in his Shakespeare gave “some truth in that story”). Dionne on San Francisco: “I’ve never been there twice.”

2. Logic named from reason; Thomas’s two proemia (“Thomas goes back and he says that logic”) #

Point: logic (“rational philosophy” in Latin) is named from the third meaning, reason; Thomas defines it by going back to Aristotle’s De Anima.

• Thomas’s two proemia to logic: the “short” one at the beginning of the exposition of the Peri Hermeneias; the “major” one at the beginning of the exposition of the Posterior Analytics. He wrote on the Posterior Analytics perhaps because it is the greatest book of logic; on the Peri Hermeneias because a student asked him, and he did not finish it, so Cajetan’s continuation was put in.
• Thomas goes back to De Anima III: the powers or abilities of the soul are known through their acts (the ability to see through seeing; sight distinguished from hearing by seeing from hearing), and the acts are distinguished by their objects.
• Definition of reason recalled (Hugo’s or Duane’s — “somebody’s definition”): the ability to understand, to reason, and to direct itself and others.
• Logic is the art that directs the act of reason itself; therefore “in a way, the art of arts.” Reason for “of arts”: the other arts arise from reason figuring out how to use the hands (or feet), directing some other part of man; logic directs the act of reason itself, from which the others in some way proceed.
• “Art of arts” is like “King of Kings”: almost a figure of speech, antonomasia — the thing that stands out. So Christ is “the Word,” the Bible “the Book” or “book of books,” God “the King” or “King of Kings.” Saying logic is the art of arts is like saying it is the art; it shows its importance.
• This should make the student benevolent. Thomas’s proemium to the three books on the soul divides (into three, of course) and says Aristotle first renders the student benevolent by showing the desirability of the knowledge, in itself and as useful: all knowledge is good, but some is better because about better things or because more certain, and in both ways this knowledge is most good; and it is most useful — Thomas elaborates, e.g. in ethics, where the human virtues are studied, some in this power of the soul, some in that. Thomas goes back to it for logic because Aristotle there talks about the acts of reason.

3. The three acts of reason and the three parts of logic (“the first act of reason is understanding”) #

Point: reason has three acts as far as knowing goes; since logic directs the acts of reason, logic has three parts.

• First act: understanding what a thing is; also called simple grasping; Latin intelligere, English “understanding.” Examples: you understand what a square, circle, triangle, odd number, even number is (perhaps not what a soul is); what a dog or cat is, but less well (“I can kind of tell which is which”). The proper object of our mind is the what-it-is of a thing sensed or imagined.
• Second act: understanding the true or the false. Understanding what a square is and what a circle is, it may dawn on me that a square is not a circle (true); understanding square and quadrilateral, that a square is a quadrilateral (true). “A square is not a quadrilateral” is false; “a square is a circle” false while its negative is true. Aristotle sometimes calls this composition and division: putting together or separating what was understood by the first act. Both acts are kinds of understanding, and the second presupposes the first.
• Third act: reasoning — putting together two or more statements and getting another statement from them by some kind of argument. Aristotle does not talk much of it in De Anima; more in logic.
• Conclusion: three acts of reason, so three parts of logic. “See how important that is. Light dawns.” (Aside: a former student was “kind of a fanatic” about this; “I don’t think he’s completely all wet.”)
• In the proemium to the Posterior Analytics Thomas distinguishes and orders the three acts and divides logic accordingly: the Categories pertains to the first act; the Peri Hermeneias (De Interpretatione in Latin) to the second; all the others — Prior and Posterior Analytics, the Book on Places [ed.: Topics], Sophistical Refutations, to some extent Rhetoric, and Thomas says even fiction [ed.: Poetics] — to the third, as kinds of reasoning.

4. Albert the Great’s division into two; the rule of two or three (“my other teacher in logic is Albert the Great”) #

Point: Albert divides logic into two parts, the art of defining and the art of reasoning, and both his division and Thomas’s make sense.

• Albert’s basis is discourse. Shakespeare defined reason as the ability for “large discourse.” Loosely, discourse is going from one thing to another; the discourse that really defines reason is coming to know what you don’t know through what you do know.
• Simple unknown (what is reason? what is a square?) vs. complex unknown (a statement): the simple unknown is answered by a definition, the complex by an argument, reasoning. Oesterle’s Logic (he studied under De Koninck; a college textbook, “kind of a bestseller”) follows this: the art of defining and reasoning. Albert puts together into “reasoning” what Thomas separates into second and third acts.
• Rule: sometimes a division into two, or three, or both, makes sense. Favourite example: Aristotle praises Homer for seeing that a plot should have beginning, middle and end (three), but elsewhere in the book on the Poetic Art says the plot consists of tying knots and untying them (two). Likewise the Our Father: petitions about the good and the bad (two), or end, means and impediments (three).
• Aside: class runs till four thirty — “I can continue to torture you till [then].”

5. The basic distinction of two: name and speech (“distinction between the name and”) #

Point: besides the fundamental three, logic needs a fundamental distinction of two: name vs. speech.

• “Speech” is his rendering of what is usually called oratio (heard as “ratio” in the recording) — cf. “parts of speech” in grammar.
• Common definition: both name and speech are vocal sound (says how the sound is produced) signifying, and signifying by custom, agreement or institution, not by nature. Boundary: a baby’s cry is vocal sound signifying a need, but by nature — you don’t have to teach a baby to cry. Scientists agree to call a new particle “berkelium” after Berkeley: signifying by agreement.
• Difference: name = having no part that signifies by itself; speech = having parts that signify by themselves (at least two parts; not every part need signify).
• Examples: “Duane” means him, but “Du” and “ane” do not mean his head and his body. “Bergquist” (father dropped the g): berg is mountain, quist branch in Swedish, but used as a name it does not mean “mountain branch”; the parts don’t signify separately when it functions as a name. The little girl Johnson was not the son of John. As Thomas says, the etymology of a word is not its meaning: “philosopher” does mean lover of wisdom, but Aristotle does not use “philosophy” to name the love of wisdom but the knowledge a lover of wisdom pursues, and usually calls it a methodos (“knowledge over a road”). People confuse etymology and meaning. “White man” or “black man” is speech: each part means something.
• “This is a very fundamental distinction for logic.”

6. The speech that perfects each act (“the speech that is necessary to perfect each”) #

Point: each act of reason is perfected by a kind of speech, and all speech is ultimately made of names.

• First act, definition: if you don’t know what something is you need a definition. Shakespeare’s sonnets are in iambic pentameter: an iamb is two syllables with the accent on the second (“That time of year thou mayst in me behold”); pentameter, five such feet. A perfect number: a number equal to the sum of everything that measures it (evenly). 2, 3, 5 measured only by 1; 4 by 1 and 2, adding to 3; 6 by 1, 2, 3, which add to 6 — the first perfect number; 28 the second (mnemonic: Thomas on the perfection of God in ch. 28 of the Summa Contra Gentiles, “maybe by chance”); he forgot the third. Augustine and Thomas on the significance of six in God’s making the universe; its measures 1, 2, 3 are perfectly ordered. So definition is the speech that perfects understanding what a thing is, distinctly.
• Second act, statement: sometimes called proposition, but originally a proposition was a statement placed before (proponi) for reasoning. A statement is true or false, affirmative or negative; if the affirmative is true the opposed negative is false, and conversely.
• Third act, argument, chiefly syllogism. Aristotle distinguishes at least four kinds of argument, not treated here.
• Every speech is eventually made of names: the definition of the name called genus and the name called difference; the statement (Peri Hermeneias) of noun and verb; the syllogism of statements. So the proportion definition : first act :: statement : second :: argument : third, but you go back to names.
• Prior Analytics: what the syllogism is, when you have one and when you don’t — “the key argument”; later, demonstrative vs. dialectical vs. sophistical syllogism. Joke: the sophistical is the one “Berkowitz” uses — deceiving the class even about the axioms.

7. For next time: predication vs. motion (“logic proceeds by way of predication”) #

Point: Thomas, in his exposition of the Metaphysics, contrasts logic, which proceeds by way of predication, with natural philosophy, which proceeds by way of motion.

• Nature is defined as the beginning and cause of motion and rest in that in which it is, as such and not by accident; we know natures by what things do; Aristotle (Thomas will point out) knows matter through motion; “things in motion sooner catch the eye than what not stirs” is the starting point.
• Albert’s first two books of logic are De Praedicabilibus and De Praedicamentis, both from the word for predication, being said of; and the syllogism in the strict sense rests on “said of all” and “said of none” — that is what predication means. Thomas uses one word to say how each science proceeds: “you know how wise the guy is.”

His words #

• logos: equivocal; three meanings, word, thought, reason.
• impositio nominis: placing a name upon a thing; order of imposition follows order of our knowing.
• rational philosophy: Latin name for logic, from “reason.”
• art of arts: logic, as directing the act of reason itself; an antonomasia like “King of Kings.”
• benevolent: what a proemium should make the student.
• abilities of the soul [ed.: powers, potencies]: known through acts; acts through objects.
• understanding what a thing is / simple grasping (intelligere) [ed.: simple apprehension]: the first act.
• understanding the true or the false / composition and division: the second act.
• reasoning: getting a statement from two or more statements: the third act.
• the Book on Places [ed.: Topics]; fiction [ed.: Poetics]; the book on the Poetic Art.
• discourse: coming to know what you don’t know through what you do know; “large discourse” (Shakespeare).
• simple unknown vs. complex unknown: answered by definition vs. argument.
• name vs. speech [ed.: nomen vs. oratio]: vocal sound signifying by custom, with no part / with parts signifying by themselves.
• methodos: Aristotle’s usual word for philosophy, “knowledge over a road.”
• perfect number: equal to the sum of everything that measures it evenly.
• statement (proposition: originally a statement placed before, proponi, for reasoning).
• syllogism / argument: the speech perfecting reasoning.
• predication / being said of: how logic proceeds; “said of all,” “said of none” [ed.: dici de omni, de nullo].

Texts #

Read in class (recalled or quoted from memory)

• John 1:1 (the Word, translated and discussed).
• Thomas Aquinas, proemium to the exposition of the Posterior Analytics (three acts of reason, division of logic).
• Thomas Aquinas, proemium to the exposition of the De Anima (rendering the student benevolent; knowledge good and useful).
• Thomas Aquinas, exposition of the Metaphysics (logic by predication, natural philosophy by motion).
• Shakespeare, “That time of year thou mayst in me behold” (iambic pentameter example); “things in motion sooner catch the eye than what not stirs.”

Mentioned

• Thomas Aquinas, proemium to the exposition of the Peri Hermeneias; Cajetan’s completion.
• Thomas Aquinas, exposition of Metaphysics V (“fifth book of wisdom”): we name things as we know them.
• Aristotle, De Anima III (powers, acts, objects; two kinds of understanding).
• Aristotle, Categories; Peri Hermeneias (noun and verb); Prior Analytics (what a syllogism is; demonstrative, dialectical, sophistical); Posterior Analytics; Topics; Sophistical Refutations; Rhetoric; Poetics (plot).
• Albert the Great, logic: art of defining and art of reasoning; De Praedicabilibus, De Praedicamentis.
• Oesterle, Logic.
• Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles ch. 28 (perfection of God).
• Augustine and Thomas on the number six.
• The Our Father (two divisions of its petitions).

His questions #

• What are the three main meanings of logos? Word, thought, reason.
• In John’s Gospel, what meaning of logos is there? The thought of God — the thought proceeding from God knowing himself, which is a person, God himself.
• Logic is taken from which sense of the three? Reason (“rational philosophy”).
• “Art of arts” is almost like what figure of speech? Antonomasia.
• What are the two kinds of understanding? Understanding what a thing is, and understanding the true or the false.
• If logic directs the acts of reason, how many parts of logic? Three, after the three acts.
• What distinction of two is very basic for logic? Name and speech (a student first offered subject and predicate).
• Does “Bergquist,” used as a name, mean mountain branch? No; when it functions as a name only the whole signifies.
• What speech perfects each act of reason? Definition, statement, argument (syllogism).
• Do you know what a perfect number is? A number equal to the sum of everything that measures it; 6 the first, 28 the second; the third he forgot.