Logic (2016)
51. The Fallacy of the Accident Continued: Porphyry's Predicables, De Fallaciis, and What Is First Simply
Class of 2017-05-11
https://berquistcourse.com/course/philosophy/2-logic-2016/051-the-fallacy-of-the-accident-continued-porphyrys-predicables/

[0:00] In the fallacy of the accident, I'm just on page two here now. In the fallacy of the accident, the middle term is not connected with one of the extremes in the same way, or in so far as it is connected with the other extremes. For example, Socrates is a man, and man is a species. Therefore, Socrates is a species, huh? Well, Socrates is not a man in so far as man is something universal and reason, huh?

[0:32] Socrates is a man by reason of what man signifies, an animal with what reason. Now, to be a species happens to man, in so far as man is said of Socrates, right?

[0:51] But nevertheless, it belongs to what man as such to be a species, right? It's a very hard thing. Avoid that, right? But is man said of Socrates because Socrates is a universal as man is, or is man said of Socrates because Socrates is a species as man is,

[1:31] or is Socrates a man? Man said Socrates because it signifies the nature. So you got to see the distinction there, right? So someone says, "Is man said of Socrates as such? " Be very careful there, right? Said of Socrates because he's an animal of

[2:04] reason. Yeah. Nature, not because of its universality. This man is, or because it's a definition. Michael is a what rational animal? Rational animal is a definition. Therefore, you're a definition, right? You belong in the science of logic, right? Yeah, you belong in. You belong in the logic, right? So logic,

[2:38] we find out that that Michael's really a definition. Yeah. Is a speech signifying what something is. That's what he is, right? No one else.

[2:56] So we say we admit that Michael is a man, right? And we admit that man is a what? That man is a animal having reason, and we admit that that is a what definition. Therefore, Michael is a definition.

[3:18] You don't put on the natural science. You put on the logic. It's a very hard thing to be able to express the right when you first first meet it. huh

[3:46] Do you have to admire? you know I read it. Admire Aristotle and Porphyry right now. They both do the same thing. You know, Porphyry was asked by a guy named I guess Chrysaorius something like that in the Greek. Chrysaorius is trying to understand the book called the Categories of Aristotle. He's went across these words: genus, difference, species, property, accident. Right? What the hell do these words mean?

[4:14] Right? And so he asks him to explain. Right? And what's his name? Porphyry says, "Oh, Chrysaorius it says, "to know what genus is, what difference is, what species is, what property and accident is, is not only necessary for understanding categories, like you wanted, and that's where you you came to me, but for understanding definition, for understanding division. Because definition is what of a species by genus and differences, right?

[4:47] And one of the most important kinds of division is the division of a genus into species by differences, right? So again, understand those five things, right? To understand definition, division, right? And demonstration. because in demonstration, you prove a property of a species through an understanding of its nature, right? Because, you know, you're asking something that's so important for not just understanding the categories of Aristotle. It was very important for that, but for understanding definition, division, demonstration.

[5:18] I mean, wow. But then I'm struck by the fact that Porphyry, right? He gives those five. He gives them in this order: genus, difference, species, property, accident. But when he gets into each of the five, right? He takes up genus first, and then what does he take up second. Species. Yeah.

[5:53] See? He must have lost his notes. And then comes difference, and then property and accident, right? So there's one change in the order, right? Is that just is that just a closeness of this part, right? He puts difference in the proemium, right? He puts difference before what? Yeah. But in the tractatus, the drawing out, the thing, he puts what? Yeah. Does he know what he's doing? And then is he looking before and after?

[6:37] I mean, which comes before? In the proemium you've got the difference before the species. In the tractatus you've got the species before the difference. Which comes first? Difference or species? What do you say? Which comes before? It depends on which sends it before. Oh, What's what's this now?

[7:07] Yeah, yeah. What sense of before does difference come before a species? The order of knowing? The order of reason. No. The order of being. isn't it? Okay. It's a second sense. See. Okay. In what sense, though, does species come before difference? Is that maybe the third sense? Yeah. The order of knowing, yeah, yeah. That's interesting, huh? Because genus and species are like father and son, right? They're kind of correlatives, right?

[7:58] So genus is a name said with one meaning of many things, right? Other than species, right? Signifying what it is. So it kind of defines genus in comparison to species, right? And then species is what is placed directly under the genus, and what's a genus is an answer to the question of what is it, right? Just turn them around, right? Okay. Okay. So in the order of knowing, species comes right next to genus, right?

[8:26] And then when he proceeds to difference, right? He gives you know a couple notions of difference. One is a difference is what a species has in addition to a genus. Now he's defining difference by what? Genus and species, right? Okay. Or he gives another notion of difference. A difference is what separates species under the same genus. So you're making known what difference is through genus and species, right?

[9:04] Plus the fact that genus and species are kind of relative to each other, right? Does he? Okay. But in what way is difference prior to species, right? Well, take the definition of what square, right? It's a equilateral and right-angled quadrilateral. Well, there can't be a what square without a quadrilateral, but there can be a quadrilateral without a square. Can there be equilateral without a square? Yeah, you have what's called the rhombus.

[9:40] I'm just like a jerk, but my mnemonic device is rhombus. you know, it's got an S at the end, right? So it's like a square, right? It's it's equilateral, right? So equilateral, even in the genus of quadrilateral, can be without square. See, but can square be without equilateral? No. See. And then the other one is what right angle, right? And can there be a square without right angles?

[10:08] All right angles? No. But can there be right angles without a square? Yeah, in the oblong, right? You know, people call rectangles oblong, but the oblong. Um. So in the order of being, you might say, right? Genus is before what? Equilateral, because it can be without equilateral. And equilateral is before what? Can be without square, but not vice versa. So he's giving them in the order of being there, right?

[10:46] And then he's what? Giving them in the order of knowing them. Just one one thing is turned around, right? Well, Aristotle does the same thing in the categories, right? Because when he first enumerates the categories in the *Antepredicaments*, right, he gives substance first, then how much or quantity, and then how or quality, and then what. Yeah, but in the order he takes up what? He takes up towards something or for how Quality, yeah, because of the what

[11:28] of knowing these things, right? The fact that things that are really relations, I mean, really basically qualities, are said to be over towards something, right? And because Plato's not defined it fully, so you have to take up relations in some way and distinguish, right, between something whose whole nature is to be towards something, right, and something who is basically something other than relation but has some relation following upon it, right?

[11:58] So it's kind of interesting, right? There's one thing where it's you know, just how subtle these guys and how carefully Porphyry is writing Aristotle. I really admire them, you know, they're really looking for an actor and seeing in different senses, magnificent minds. I find it care in the modern philosophers we just sloppy, very sloppy. We're talking last night about the you know we're talking about a little about the distinction between the image and the thought, right?

[12:34] Of course, in the English philosophers like Locke and so on, you know, use the word idea, you know, but sometimes they mean an image, sometimes they mean a thought, right? And they don't even distinguish it themselves. Yeah,

[12:52] some people often use the word "imagine" when they mean thinking. Yeah, yeah, imagine that stuff. Yeah, yeah, the Latin song, yeah, imagine. Well, I we had a priest here many years ago. I asked him to translate something from Spanish. Yeah. I had to rephrase it because I didn't read Spanish. So now I never knew Spanish, but I read when he translated the English, he used the word "imagine" something.

[13:18] I said, I think what you mean there is to conceive, like a thought. And he says, no, no, I think it was imagine. So I said, what's the Spanish saying? He brought it out, and whatever was concevere in Spanish. Oh, yeah, conceive, imagine, you know, it's all the same. I said, I don't think it's the same. Well, there's an interesting likeness between the imagination and reason, right?

[13:43] Because when you imagine something, you form an image, right? When you think about something, you form a what thought, right? It's a little bit different from the exterior senses, right now. And so, you know, when Thomas comes to talk about the Trinity, right now, you know, I don't think it takes it to be a demonstration, right? But it seems that when you think about something, right, there's a thought that proceeds from you, right?

[14:14] So it's not quite as as mystifying, right now, that there should be a thought in God, right now. That's interesting. There's a likeness between the two, you know.

[14:41] So to be a species happens to man in so far as man is said of Socrates, right? Well, even that's kind of hard to see, you know, because you might say it doesn't happen that man is a species, right? See, and a species, by definition, you know, is going to be able to be said of the singulars, right?

[15:04] What belongs to man in so far as man is in reason, where it is universal and more precisely a species, happens to man in so far as man is said of Socrates, not by reason of its being in the mind. Since man signifies in general what Socrates is, an animal with reason, it is said of Socrates by reason of what Socrates is, for it signifies this in what in general.

[15:30] It is not said of Socrates by reason of what happens to it in reason. So, can we excuse you from being a definition? Because to be an animal that has reason in your mind or our mind is a definition, right? That's not why we say your animal has reason. That's your definition, right? That happens to you in the mind. Hard thing.

[16:10] Okay, now this work that I've mentioned before, the De Fallaciis ad quosdam nobiles Artistis. If you look at the short philosophical works of Thomas, this is one of them, right? It's in the Mariette edition, right now. There's some dispute as to whether it's written by Thomas, you know, but a lot of them think that it was written after his he was kidnapped or something, you know. It's very exciting for his his his friends there.

[16:32] I'm probably interested in these things, right? It should be said, therefore, first about the fallacy of the accident, Where it should be known that the accident here is taken in so far as it's distinguished against what per se to itself, huh?

[16:52] Per se is said to be in something, something inside something. Is in it according to the ratio of its own what definition? Okay, so it could be something that pertains intrinsically to the definition of the thing, right? Or something that follows upon the nature of the thing, right, expressed in the definition.

[17:22] Now a little difficulty going into this thing now. But aside from this, whatever is in something is said to be in it per accidens, huh? For in order that something be inside something per se per accidens, tripliciter dicitur aliquid esse in aliquo. One of these things, huh? For some things are in every way the same, according to the what? And these are words like vestis and indumentum, which I guess are kind of what. Synonyms, right?

[17:58] Okay. And in these there is only the per se, and in no way the per accidens, right? Some things there are which one is altogether extraneous from the ratio of the other, right? As white and man, right?

[18:22] And in these is only what per accidens, and no way per se, right? So is a white man and a black man different kind, different kind of man?

[18:36] Kind of accidental to being man, right? In order to be a different kind of man, you have to have a different kind of reason. Maybe a man or woman, I don't know

[18:48] Okay But some things there are of which one pertains in some way, right, to the ratio of the other, right? Although they are not altogether the same in definition, as has the superior being the more universal, right, and the inferior, right?

[19:15] For the superior is placed in the definition of the inferior, right? Nevertheless, it is not altogether the same the definition of the inferior and the superior. Amen. Since the definition inferior adds over the definition of the superior, right? Okay.

[19:36] So my mother said, "What? I don't know it didn't sound right to me to say that man's an animal. Well, he's not just an animal, right?

[19:52] And similar, he says, not only about the more universal and the less universal, right, the genus and the species or the species and the individual, but similar about the property and the species, right? For the species is placed in the definition of property, but nevertheless, the species and the property are not altogether the same in definition. And in these, he says, there is in some way the per se, and in some way the per accidens insofar as they partly agree according to definition and they differ partly.

[20:29] And those things there which are said in the first way is necessary that whatever is true about one should be true about the what other, right? And that such things are entirely the same thing secundum rem, right? And they differ secundum nomen solum, right? Whence in these it does not happen, the fallacy, of the accident.

[21:02] But in all others, it is not necessary that whatever is true of one should also be true of the other. It sounds very strange, huh? People just got to study the syllogism, right?

[21:16] And there, therefore, if from this that something is what true of one is concluded to be true of the other, there is possible the fallacy of the accident.

[21:32] It happens sometimes that what is true about one is concluded to be true about the other. To wit, when something's attributed to one according as it's the same as the other, then what is in one and the other will be in the other one, right? So he talked about that in the categories, right? Didn't he? You know, he's talking about the the uh Predicamental order there, right?

[21:57] So that if animal, you know, substance is said of what animal it's said, and animal is said of dog, then substance will be said of what dog.

[22:15] But if genus is said of animal, right? An animal is said of dog. Maybe dog is not a genus. Maybe that's not the best example.

[22:29] Maybe that's a lower genus, right? But if you say if you say man is the lowest species, right? Well, then man is an animal, right? Animal is substance and man is a substance, right? But man is an animal. Animal is a genus. Therefore, man is a genus. It Seems to be identical though in speech, doesn't it? Man is an animal. Animal is a genus. Therefore, man is a genus.

[23:00] Man is an animal. Animal is a substance. Therefore, man is a substance. Right. It's very slippery Yeah. Look so I like don't think of the words huh Yeah.

[23:23] But substance is still signifying what man is, right? While genus is saying something about animal, right? That belongs to animal, not in so far as it's said of man, right? now Even that's kind of hard to maintain sometimes. That's what genus says it's said you know, it's the name itself, one meaning of many You know, you hear it very easily. So it's this Albert the Great says this is most of all able to

[23:57] to deceive, that's what he's going to do, even wise, yeah. Because if there was something like that, you know, he gets into those troubles about the intellect, right?

[24:28] So you do geometry, you understand what you imagine, right? Yeah that's it I never thought of that He's trying to tie up you know man's imagination with superior reason, right? So he just sees even the wise. even Thomas often quotes these guys with approval as well sometimes.

[25:25] So he gives this example here later on of the four-footed, right? You can see how it's kind of a fallacy of the middle term, huh? Yeah, I think so Yeah maybe, so.

[26:33] So at the end of that passage here, he says, "As the philosopher says in the first book of the *Sophistic Refutations, the fallacy accident comes about because someone is not able to judge the same and the diverse, one and the many, right? Okay.

[26:57] We must be careful when saying something is per accidens. The same could be said of simpliciter Is first philosophy wisdom simpliciter compared to natural philosophy or political philosophy, or compared to the wisdom of God?

[27:19] This is going to be the second kind of fallacy outside of speech. There, the fallacy of simpliciter secundum quid. What is pleasant is good, would you say?

[27:37] Adultery is pleasant, right? Therefore, adultery is good, huh? Would you say adultery, though is? good In some way, then. Yeah, but you say simply, you know, without qualification, it's good.

[28:10] You know, I can't suspect. You know, this one of the biggest mistakes in thinking. You know, it takes up people. You talk to the materialist, right?

[28:23] What's he saying? He says matter is the source of everything, right? And everything comes from matter in some way, right? Is that true, simply?

[28:38] You see, Aristotle in the Ninth Book of Wisdom, right? My favorite book, by the way, of the fourteen books. He says, you know, that the thing that goes from ability to act, right? It's an ability before it's an act, right? So the wood, you could say, right, is able to be a chair or a table or a bookcase before it's actually one, right? So ability comes before act, right?

[29:12] Then Aristotle says, but simpliciter haplos in Greek huh? Act is before ability. Passability. Why? Because something goes from ability to act, because there's something already in act, right? So he's saying that act comes before simply, right? But the man who thinks of matter as being absolutely first is thinking of what potency, right? He's thinking of what is before in some, you know, diminished sense, right? Is before simply, right?

[29:52] You know, it's kind of puzzling that we get into the to the four kinds of causes, right? Huh? Because what does Aristotle do when he takes up the four kinds of causes?

[30:13] Do you know what the order that is? Can you say it again? Question. Aristotle distinguishes the word "cause" is equivocal by reason, right? And the basic distinction of the senses of cause is matter, form, mover, and end, right? But in what order does Aristotle distinguish them?

[30:46] He gives matter first, then form, right? Then mover. And then end, right? Okay. Now, that's why I got into habit there when I was explaining. what kind of causes they would take Uh, the blackboard. thing. I'd say now, you come into the classroom and the word cat is on the board, right?

[31:16] What does that word cat on the board depend upon for its existence? C A and T, right? Is now its most obvious dependence? I say now, if someone says it doesn't depend upon C A and T to be right, well, let's take away the C, and take away the A, take away the T.

[31:50] Where's the bird? How can you deny it depends upon C A and T, right? That's the most obvious, right? Okay. But then I can force you to admit it has another dependence besides upon the letters, right? I think the word act, right? I say now exactly the same letters as that, right? So the word cat, if it depends only upon those letters, this is the word cat, isn't it?

[32:26] Right. Now you're forced to say there's another dependence that you didn't realize, right? What was that? Order. The order, yeah. That's the same second kind of clause, form the order, right? Okay.

[32:44] What does a wooden table depend upon? Wood. Yeah. If you take all the wood out of a wooden table, what do you got left? Nothing. nothing, Nothing, right? An idea. Yeah. Isn't that what's most known, right? You know.

[32:59] Okay. But then if you say yeah, yeah, but if that's all the wooden table depends upon, wood, then That's a table this is a table too, right? So you're forced to say that the wooden table depends upon not only wood in one way, but also upon its shape or its parts, the order. Yeah. Okay.

[33:27] So now you got two kinds of causes, huh? You got matter, which is most known, right? Just do a little thinking around it, add some word or something, right? Something's going to force your mind to realize. So there's what we call form kind of cause, right?

[33:50] In fact, what is this here? This is the word cat here? No, what makes it to be what it is over here? The word cat? It's the form, right? Forms in terms of what the thing is, right? Matters that from which something comes to be, isn't it, right? But the form is what makes it be what it is, okay? Now,

[34:17] what's the next kind of cause? huh? The move or maker. Yeah. But now, how, how do you get from that to this, right? You say, well, do the letters just automatically arrange themselves in this order? You put them. Yeah. So you got the the mover. In this case, it would be the what the writer, right? Okay. So

[34:48] the writer put the C before the A here, and after here he put it after the A, right? huh? Okay. Remember talking to guys in TAC, Thomas Aquinas College, I'd say we get the same letters again, right? And they're referred to their college as TAC, right?

[35:09] Did you see the the what do you call it the register there? They had an article there about the who the commencement speakers are at the Catholic, so-called Catholic colleges, and some had very good people, you know. With TAC, Thomas Aquinas College, out in California, there, they had uh, Mother Superior, the Sisters of Life, do you know? The one that started, yeah, started,

[35:36] and she's quite a woman there, I guess. Who's the speaker? So they're one of the the good Catholic colleges, right? And then they had some other ones that you know, you know, they had some funny, who's not pro-life, or some some other terrible thing, right?

[35:55] So, okay. But now going back to our starting point here, if the writer can put them in this order and that order, why did he put them this order? Because he likes cats. Yeah, he wants to talk about the cat, right? So that's the end of their purpose, right? Okay. And so if I want to talk about my favorite animal,

[36:24] I had a black cat there in my morning there, you know? bad luck, to have a black cat. I cross your word, but... okay. If I wanted to teach, you know, acting ability in the ninth book of wisdom, I would put them in this order, right? Okay. So it depends if I was not talking about my favorite animal or my favorite book of wisdom, right? You know.

[36:48] So you're kind of forced, you know, in this order to recognize these four kinds of causes, right? But simply which is first, matter, and form, or mover? among those three.

[37:09] Simply would be the mover, right? Yeah, because I made the letters C, A, and T, and put them in order, right? So I made that matter of those three letters, either matter of the word cat than one of these other ones, right? And I'm the one who gave them that form or order, right? Okay. Well, why did I do all that stuff, right? This is the causa, causarum, right?

[37:39] The cause of all the causes. But you might think, you know, that that since matter is what most known, right, that therefore simply speaking it's what first. Yeah, but it's only what. Before, in some way, right now. Okay.

[38:02] You can have the letters C A and T without the word cat, but not vice versa, right? See it that way. Now, did we? Was it Timon of Athens, right? Mm hmm Timon of Athens, after he he gets disgusted with human nature, right? He's mentioned in Plutarch, you know, Timon of Athens. And he's he's the example of the great misanthrope, Misanthrope, right? But why does he turn against all men?

[38:43] Do you know why? Well, in the game to play, he's a very generous man, right? He's always inviting people over, come out and have dinner at my house and so on. And then he and not only gives you a free dinner, right, but he gives you some little present or something, you know, and so on. Well, his his servants, of course, you know, who are preparing the meals and so on, they're kind of concerned about his his his finances, you might say, right?

[39:16] And uh finally runs into a little bit of you know temporary distress, right now. Well, that's no problem. He's got all kinds of friends in Athens, right? So he sends to Michael, he sends to Mars and they all have some excuse why they can't lend him any money, right? So what does he do? That's he turns against all mankind, right now. So one of the later scenes, he's digging in the ground, right, to find roots you know to eat, right.

[39:45] And what does he he addresses the earth, right? Like the early poets did, right? He says, "Common mother, thou, whose womb immeasurable, and infinite breast, right, teems and feeds all, right. "

[40:08] So he's seeing Mother Earth, right, as being what? The beginning of all things. Yeah, yeah. And as being infinite, Thomas points out, you know, that they thought the beginning of things was infinite, but they didn't understand the kind of infinity that it had because they were thinking of it in terms of what mattered, right? But also the idea that they say the word matter, materia, let's say, might come from the word mater, mother, right?

[40:37] So it's more known that you came from your what mother than from your what father. I always tell that story, a real life story. My son Paul was very little. I told you that story. other day. And did I come from Mama? He said, out of the blue, he said, you're just kind of sitting, you know, sitting in the living room someplace. And he said, did I come from Mama?

[41:00] He said, little boy, you know. I said, I said, yes, you did come from Mama. And he said, well, did Maria come? That's his sister. And I said, yeah, Maria came from Mama. And he said, did Marcus come? That's his older brother. And I said, yeah, Marcus came from Mama. And finally, he said, out of the blue, you know, I didn't. He said, did you come from Mama?

[41:24] And I said, no. He said, well, then you don't really belong here, but but you can stay. he says. That's how it. took place, you know. and I know he just he he put in his head why he and and Maria and Marcus why do they all live in this house with Mama, right? Well, because they all came from Mama, right? That makes makes sense, right? Yeah, yeah.

[41:45] But what the hell am I doing? But I can stay. This deadbeat comes up. Where did he come from? This deadbeat from Minnesota. He doesn't know the difference between a refrigerator and an icebox.

[42:05] So it's more known that you came from your mother than from your father, right? It's more known that you came from your father than that you came from God, huh? You know. And Aristotle realized that the soul came immediately from God, right? The human soul, not these souls of the dog or cat or the tree that could come immediately from your parents, right? From God through your parents, right?

[42:31] But that the immortal soul came from God, not through your parents, but immediately from God, right? But that's obviously much more hidden to us, right? But it's also less known that the matter, I mean, that the father that you came from your father than from your mother, right?

[42:54] So yet they say the father is is maybe more the source of the form, right? Because the father determines whether you be a male or female. It's not in the genes of the womb, right? But in the man, right? It's kind of interesting, right?

[43:17] So he's more in some sense a mover maker, right? He determines more that you could be a man or a woman, right? But God, most of all makes you. But yeah, I know it's crazy. The world has crazy out there. Yeah. They got you know I picked up the morning paper there and the Holy Cross and Holy Cross the Jesuit college there you know they they got some English professor there's got a you know database you know all about transgender or something or one of these things and.

[43:51] And just collecting all this, you know, information about them, you know, so we can study this great. uh advance in human consciousness Yeah Yeah wow. I I mentioned that you know didn't I mention the cardinal was it Sapieha who was the one was the one who sent John Paul II to Rome at the end of the war there, and he wanted him to go to the angelic rather than to the Gregorian because that was a little more safe, right?

[44:21] And he didn't want him to stay in the in the Polish house because most of these guys are going to the Gregorian He wanted him to stay at the the Belgian house and so on. So yeah, a little bit of prudence there, you know. But holy crap, I don't know. Not that stuff is pretty either. but Take the holy out Yeah The crap Yeah. With regard to this sort of transgender stuff and all the myriad new genders that they've dreamed up, is there any sign that this this sheer foolishness of it is going to cause it to fizzle out, or is it really just kind of rolling downhill and gathering?

[45:02] Well, no, we're keeping getting more and more, you know, outside of nature. eh? What was it Chesterton said, "The more a man worships nature, the more unnatural he becomes." Which is true. So yeah, it's just...

[45:20] So anyway, you know, you might say that simply what comes first is the maker, or or maybe the end, right? really comes first, the causa causare, we call it. you know? Um. That's even more hidden than the maker. right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. But if you think that matter comes simply first, right, and you'd be a materialist, you know, dialectical materialism is what they're, most of modern science is kind of, you know, evolutionary because they're they're thinking of matter as being simply what comes before, right?

[45:56] But that's this next kind of fallacy, right? Called restoring the first one you know we're still on the first one, right? But you see the power of that that one, right? That the evolutionists and so on and the materialists are making the second kind of mistake, right? But the first one's even more difficult, right? Stop here, I guess, huh?