Ousia a Prolegomenon to Metaphysics Z and H

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Ousia: A Prolegomenon to Metaphysics Z and HAuthor(s): Michael LouxReviewed work(s):Source: History of Philosophy Quarterly, Vol. 1, No. 3 (Jul., 1984), pp. 241-265Published by: University of Illinois Press on behalf of North American Philosophical PublicationsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/27743685 .

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History of Philosophy QuarterlyVolume 1,Number 3, July 1984

OUSIA: A PROLEGOMENON TOMETAPHYSICS Z AND HMichael Loux

ITT 7HATEVER novelty he may have claimed forhis own answer to theV Vquestion "Which things are ousiai?", Aristotle viewed his attempt toformulate a response to that question as continuous with the inquiriesof earlier thinkers; and this suggests that the sense he attached to theterm ousia is such that philosophers as different as Plato, Democritus,and Aristotle himself can all be said to be attempting an identificationof ousiai. That Aristotle construed the term as neutral between opposingontologies is clear from the early chapters o?Metaphysics Z;1 and unlesswe make this assumption, many of the ensuing chapters of Z and H arelikely to remain a mystery. Recent tendencies to translate ousia as itoccurs in the middle books of theMetaphysics in terms of the expression"reality" rather than in themore traditional ways as "substance" reflecta sensitivity to this point. But while the picture of a subject of or a thingstanding under other things plays a more central role in the Categoriesthan in themiddle books, it is,nonetheless, misleading to read this pictureinto our translation of ousia as it occurs in the earlier work; for eventhere the term has a sense that is independent of the famous formula of2a 11-12 ("neither said ofa subject nor present in a subject"). That formuladoes not represent the attempt to stipulate a sense for a technical termwhich Aristotle wants idiosyncratically to introduce; it is rather theattempt to provide a criterion for identifying the things he takes to bethe best candidates foran antecedently understood title. Thus, at 2a 33-2b6 we find Aristotle effectively arguing that the things picked out by theformula actually deserve the title ousia, a procedure pretty clearly inappropriate in the case of a stipulated definition of a technical term. Butwhat sense did he attach to the title? In part, he must have taken itsderivation from the verb einai as explicative of its sense. In part too, hemust have viewed its occasional use in Plato to express the idea of anontologically privileged entity as precedent forhis own use. Finally, thereis the argument of 2a 33-2b 6, where Aristotle suggests that a minimalcondition on any attempt to identify things worthy of the title prote ousiais that the items so identified constitute the smallest set such that wecan truly say of the members of that set, "If none of these things existed,nothing else would either."

241


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242 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY QUARTERLYNow, Aristotle is confident that the items picked out by the formulaof 2a 11-12 meet this minimal condition. The formula as originally presented involves a double negative; but Aristotle understands the criterionin positive terms as well. Negatively, his candidates for the title ousiaare things whose existence does not turn on their "being of other things(either themere predicates of others or themere attributes of others);2positively, they are the things which objects suffering from either of thesetwo forms of of-dependence are, in the final analysis, of-dependent on;3and, forAristotle, the two points, positive and negative, are sufficient toshow that, taken together, the items picked out by his formula meet thecondition that is central in the idea ofbeing an ousia.As examples of things so picked out Aristotle points to a "certain man"and "a certain horse";4 and he takes the use of sortais here seriously. Hewants to deny that the predicates holding true of an ousia all stand ona par: those that serve as answers to the "What is it?" question play a

privileged role in the identification and characterization of an ousia. Inthe Categories he makes the point by telling us that the predicates whichfunction as correct answers to the question "What is it?" "reveal" or"make known" the primary ousia ofwhich they are said;5 and while heconcedes that genus-terms play this role, he repeatedly insists thatspecies-terms "reveal" the primary realities par excellence?

The idea that an appeal to the framework of substance-sortals is aprerequisite for the identification and characterization of ousiai comesout in Aristotle's favorite epithet for ousia, the expression tode ti.1Thisepithet is typically construed as an expression predicable of everythingthat is an ousia; but I think we catch the full force of the epithet ifwetake it to be a kind of schema, with ti as a variable whose proper substituends are substance-species-terms, such that for any ousia some substitution-instance of that schema holds true. But what guarantees thepossibility of specifying for each ousia some substance-species? Categories3 suggests an answer; for there Aristotle wants to say that what insuresthe legitimacy of predicating a genus of individuals is the fact that thespecies subordinated to that genus are said of those individuals.8 If something is an animal, say, it is an animal precisely because it is a man, adog, a horse, or some other determinate kind of animal. The idea, I takeit, is that there is no such thing as just being an animal; foran individualto be an animal is for it to be a thing of one of these lowest level kinds.But ousia is itself a genus, the summum genus for all ousiai; and in thelight of the remark of chapter 3, that means that an object's being anousia just consists in its belonging to some lowest-level species withinthe category of ousia .

The minimal essentialism inherent in the idea that every ousia is somedeterminate kind of thing or other is innocent enough on the surface. Itmay be that any attempt to defend the thesis will require an appeal toless innocent forms of essentialism; but I want to set those complicationsaside and focus on a complication that arises from the interface of the


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OUSIA INMETAPHYSICS ZAND H 243minimal essentialism just outlined and the criterion forousia-hood statedat 2a 11-12. According to the minimal essentialist perspective, everyousia is a thing of some determinate kind, where the kind is provided bya specification of the ousia's infima species; whereas, the criterion forousia-hood tells us that those things are ousiai which, while being subjectto neither of the two forms of of-dependence paramount inCategories 5,are the kinds of things objects suffering from either form of of-dependenceare, in the final analysis, of-dependent on. Taken together, these twothemes commit us to the idea that whatever kind of thing an ousia is,its being that kind of thing cannot rest on either of the two forms ofof-dependence Aristotle delineates.

For suppose that we have a candidate for the title ousia and that it isa K (where K expresses some substance-species): then, were that thing'sbeing a K to rest on some prior instance of one thing's being said of or amere attribute of another, something other than our original K (vis., thesubject of the relevant instance ofbeing said of or an attribute of)wouldturn up with a better claim to the title ousia. But these two forms ofof-dependence represent the only "relations" in terms ofwhich the Aristotle of the Categories is willing to reduce one fact to other more basicfacts, so that given the minimal essentialism of the Categories and itscriterion for ousia-hood, a primary ousia's being the kind of thing it ismust be an irreducible and unanalyzable fact; and since the preferredframework forkind-specification is constituted by the infimae species towhich ousiai belong, the fact that a primary ousia belongs to the infimaspecies it does must be a primitive and basic fact, one not susceptible offurther ontological analysis.9

Of course the Aristotle of the Categories never expresses the consequence of these two themes in precisely the way I have; but there areclear signs that he wants to defend just such an account. We have alreadynoted Aristotle's insistence that the legitimacy ofpredicating a genus ofthis or that individual derives from the legitimacy of predicating one ofits species of the same individual. But that insistence precludes anyanalysis of an individual ousia's belonging to its infima species whichwould construe it as a fact resting on some prior instance of one thing'sbeing said of another.Against the possibility of analyzing substance-species predications interms of the notion of presence in,we have Aristotle's firm denial that

substance-kinds and substance-differentiae are present in anything.10This denial serves to underwrite Aristotle's account of the distinctionbetween the case where we predicate of an ousia a substance-sortal ordifferentia and the case where what gets predicated of an ousia is a termfrom one of the dependent categories. In the latter case, we typicallyconfront the phenomenon of paronymy, where the term applied to anousia is an expression like "courageous" which, while not a name of anitem from a dependent category, is constructed out of some such name;and the effect of predicating the relevant paronymous term is to assert


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244 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY QUARTERLYthat the relevant dependent item is present in some ousia.11 Sometimes,however, language seems to run roughshod over the distinction operativein the case of "courage" and "courageous." A single term does double-dutyas a name of a non-substantial item and a predicate of individual ousiai.Color-words (in both Greek and English) provide a notorious example.Both the color and an object having it are called white; but Aristotlewants to say that they are so called homonymously: while the name iscommon, there is a different account ofwhat being white amounts to inthe two cases.12When the accounts are actually spelled out, what we findis that, as predicates of ousiai, terms like "white" display precisely thesemantics of paronymous forms like "courageous"; to say that some ousiais white is to say that the relevant color is present in it.

But while insisting that claims about how a given ousia is qualified,quantified, or the like require the use of explicitly paronymous predicatesor expressions whose homonymy disguises the semantics of paronymy,Aristotle denies that the predication of substance-kinds or substance-differentiae involves the relevant paronymy or homonymy.13 He wouldn't,of course, deny that in the case of substance-terms we can construct whatlook like name/paronym pairs (as in "human'V'humanity"); the point israther that the semantics of substance-predications makes such a distinction gratuitous. Nor would he deny that substance terms can take onsenses other than their familiar senses; he says as much in chapter l.14What he would deny (presumably, against Plato) is that a systematichomonymy infects ous ia-words such that in one sense they pick out anabstract entity and in another, concrete particulars standing in somespecial relation to that abstract entity.When we turn to texts written after the Categories, we find Aristotleexpressing the view Ihave outlined in farmore explicit terms. InPosteriorAnalytics 1.23 (83a 24), he tells us that when we predicate a substancespecies of one of itsmembers, the predicate "signifies that the subject is

identical with the predicate." The uncharitable interpreter might read abizarre view into this remark, the view that Socrates, say, is identicalwith the species man; but what Aristotle doubtless means comes out afew lines further on, where he contrasts substance-predications with thecase where we predicate of an ousia some term outside the category ofousia. The latter kind of predication, he insists, is always to be analyzedin terms of some "relation" or tie between distinct objects, the ousia inquestion and the attribute signified by the relevant predicate.15 Talk ofidentity of subject and predicate, then, is meant as a bold (and, hence,slightly misleading) pronouncement that relational theories are out ofplace in the case where we predicate of an ousia its proper species. I takeit that the point being made here is continuous with that made at 73a5-9, where Aristotle contrasts the case inwhich we predicate of an ousialike Socrates a term like 'white' and the case where we predicate of himhis proper species.16What he tells us is that if the former predication istrue at all, it is true kata sumbebekos; whereas ifSocrates is a man, he


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OUSIA INMETAPHYSICS Z AND H 245is a man kath hauto. The idea presumably is that if it is true that Socratesiswhite, it is true in virtue of a "coming together" of two distinct things;but in the case of "Socrates is a man," all that we have is Socrates. He'sa man all right; but he's not a man because he or some other underlyingsubject stands in some relationship to something else. He's a man all byhimself or in his own right.17

These texts are interesting; more interesting are a number of textswhere Aristotle defends the irreducible or unanalyzable nature of substance-predications by way of arguments of just the sort I outlined a fewpages back. In Physics A.3 (186b 30-34), he tells us that we construe thegenus animal and the difference biped as attributes of something elseonly at the risk ofmaking man itself an attribute of that other thing,with that thing, presumably, rather than this or that individual man,emerging as the likely candidate for the title ousia. The same point ismade inMetaphysics N.l (1087a 31-35), where, referring to the procedureof identifying ousiai and first principles, Aristotle tells us that were weto identify as ousia and principle something such that it is an attributeof something else, the "something else" would turn out to have a betterclaim to the pair ofprivileged titles. And inPosterior Analytics II.3 (90b35-37), where his concern iswith the demonstrability ofdefinition, Aristotle warns against the temptation to construe the logical form ofdefinition as one ofpredication, with the differentia being said of the genus orvice versa. The mistake of so interpreting a definition is not explicitlyrelated to the issues we have been discussing; but it is difficult to readthe passage otherwise than as an injunction against an analysis of substance-species which would take an ouisa's belonging to its infima speciesto consist in some prior instance of one thing's being said of another.

These texts provide evidence for the view that Aristotle did in factsubscribe to the idea that ousiai are irreducibly or primitively the kindsof things they are and that he subscribed to it for just the reasons I havesuggested. But itwould be wrong to conclude that Aristotle did not seeproblems in the view. Pretty clearly, he did. As early as the Categories,the definability of owsia-species gives him pause. He is, however, contentto note that neither the genera nor the differentiae of ousiai are presentin anything and tomake the recalcitrant differentiae look as much likesecondary ousiai as he can; and even the fact that he finds himself compelled to call kinds ousiai is a source of embarrassment tohim, an embarrassment that shows through his use of the qualifying term deuterai andhis insistence that universals require instances for their existence. Again,inDe Interpretations 11 (20b 15-20) and Posterior Analytics II.6 (92a28-33), Aristotle notes that the definition ofman suggests that men arehybrids of at least a couple ofnotions; and while he never fully explainshow the appearances ofplurality are to be reconciled with the presumedunanalyzable unity of the thing defined, he wants to insist that they arejust that?mere appearances.


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246 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY QUARTERLYII

Despite these difficulties, then, the view that an ousia is unanalyzablyor primitively the kind of thing it is is not one Aristotle iswilling to giveup. When we turn to the middle books of theMetaphysics ,we run upagainst the view straightaway. There the thesis is formulated in termsof the notion of the ti ein einai orwhat-it-was-to-be; and inZ. 4-5 Aristotleattempts to vindicate the doctrine ofminimal essentialism by arguingthat in a strict sense only ousiai have a ti ein einai . In Z.4, Aristotlesupports the thesis by appeal to the pros hen nature of einai arguing thatsince it is constructed out ofthat verb, the expression ti ein einai inheritsthe semantical properties ofeinai, inparticular, the verb's restriction, inits core sense, to the domain of ousiai.18 Then inZ.5, doubtless to answerthe charge that any attempt to argue for the centrality o? ousia by appealto the view that einai has focal meaning (with its core applicationrestricted to the domain of ousiai) is hopelessly circular, Aristotle setsout a different line of argument against the claims of things outside thecategory of ousia to have a ti ein einai.The argument is difficult; but the contention seems to be that anyattempt to identify the ti ein einai of a non-substantial item fails either

by providing too little or toomuch.19 The example is the familiar snub;and what Aristotle argues is that were one to leave out ofone's definitionof snub any reference to the attribute's proper subject, viz. nose, whatwould result is a definition of a notion other than snub, i.e., the notionconcave. On the other hand, were one to include a reference to the propersubject, defining snub as concave nose, then the definition would give ustoomuch; itwould make reference towhat Aristotle insists is "an addeddeterminate" and, hence, would not succeed in isolating precisely whatbeing snub consists in. But why suppose that any reference to noseinvolves going beyond what counts as being snub? Because expressionslike "snub nose" are non-redundant, and they wouldn't be were nose not"an added determinate." Now, Aristotle tells us that snub highlights thelogical features of all items outside the category ofousia; and he concludesthat since such things are not subject to any determinate definition, thereis nothing determinate which, in the strict sense, counts as their ti eineinai .

Then, in Z.6, Aristotle provides us with a flurry of arguments for thethesis that each ousia is the same as its ti ein einai. The reference tosameness here is reminiscent ofPosterior Analytics 1.23; and the force ofthe claim is pretty clearly continuous with the claim outlined there, viz.,that in the case of an ousia, its being what it ismust be a primitive andunanalyzable fact. The arguments employed in Z.6 represent a blend ofepistemological and ontological considerations; but forour purposes, moreinteresting than the arguments Aristotle actually uses in defense of thefamiliar thesis ofunanalyzability is the status he accords that thesis inZ.6. In that text, the thesis is not presented, as itwas in earlier writings,


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OUSIA INMETAPHYSICS ZAND H 247as a consequence of Aristotle's own attempt at identifying ousiai, but asa general constraint on any attempt at fixing the extension ofthat term.20

Z.3 is helpful in explaining this new status. The unanalyzability thesishad its original roots in two assumptions: first, that what I have calledminimal essentialism is true and, second, that the slogan of 2a 11-12("neither said ofnor present in") provides us with a satisfactory criterionfor identifying ousiai. The surprising upshot ofZ.3, however,is that thesetwo claims ultimately come into conflict: a thorough-going application ofthe relevant criterion is possible only at the expense of rejecting minimalessentialism.

Aristotle's concern here is with the contention that the notion of asubject (hupokeimenon, i.e., something such that "other things are saidof it,but it is itself said of nothing else") provides us with a satisfactoryprinciple for identifying ousiai. This formula differs only verbally fromwhat we find at 2a 11-12; for, as we have already noted, Aristotle wantsto understand the slogan of 2a 11-12 in both positive and negative terms;and, furthermore, the examples of things said of something else providedin Z.3 make it clear that the use of the "said of..." locution in that textcorresponds to that of De Interpretatione 3 (16a 10-11) where we areexplicitly told that the locution spans the pair of notions (being said ofand being present in) as these are understood in the Categories. Theconcern, then, iswith the familiar criterion of the Categories (henceforth,we can call it the hupokeimenon criterion); and what Aristotle argues isthat its consistent application commits us to the view that it ismatterunderstood as that which "is of itself neither a particular thing nor of aparticular quantity, nor otherwise positively characterized" (1029a 24)that has the best claim to the title ousia. We can postpone the questionof just why Aristotle thinks this and focus instead on his insistence thatany such assignment of the term severs the tie between ousia and thetode ti schema. To suppose that anything meeting the barren characterization of 1029a 24might be an ousia is eo ipso to deny that for each ousiathere must be a determinate kind such that the ousia is a particularinstance of that kind.21 One has to choose between the hupokeimenoncriterion and the doctrine ofminimal essentialism. Not surprisingly, Aristotle opts for the latter. But if the unanalyzability thesis is to be maintained, a new defense is required; and the one Aristotle develops involvesthe strategy of Z.6, where the thesis is taken as a requirement on anyattempt at identifying ousiai.

When he formulates the general requirement, Aristotle tells us thatit applies in the case of all things that are "primary and kath hauto ,"22The language is reminiscent of earlier writings, especially Categories 5(where we spoke ofprotai ousiai) and Posterior Analytics 1.5 (with itsdistinction between predications true kath hauto and those truemerelykata sumbebekos); but however reminiscent of earlier texts the jargon ofZ.6 might be, subsequent passages in the middle books make it clear thatthe things Aristotle has inmind when he uses the familiar labels are


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248 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY QUARTERLYnot the protai ousiai of the Categories, things like "a certain man" and"a certain horse." In a variety of places, he tells us that it is not theordinary objects of the Categories that are primary ousiai or beings intheir own right; it is, on the contrary, the forms of such objects thatdeserve these titles.23

It should be clear that this shift has its roots inAristotle's account ofordinary objects as hylomorphic structures; but we can be more specifichere: it is the matter/form dichotomy as it is expressed in the theory ofsubstance-predications at work in Z and H that underlies Aristotle's contention that form rather than ordinary objects is prote ousia. In theCategories, Aristotle insisted that substance-terms are predicatedsynonymously; but in the middle books, he tells us that general termsfrom the category of ousia are systematically homonymous. As he putsit in Z.10, a substance-word can "signify either the composite or theform/actuality" (1035a 7-8). Talk of the composite here is, of course, areference to the ordinary objects of the Categories, construed now ascomplexes ofmatter and form; and when he speaks of substance-termssignifying such complexes, Aristotle has inmind the characteristic useof terms like "man" and "horse" as substance-sortals. Functioning in thisway, substance-terms are predicated of ordinary objects; and the effectof so predicating them is to identify the kind towhich one ormore composite objects belong.24 Apart from the talk ofmatter-form composition,all of this is old hat to the reader of the Categories; but when he insistson the homonymous nature of substance-terms, Aristotle means to denythat the account presented in that early work is exhaustive of the useswe make of general terms from the category of ousia. In addition to theirnormal sortal roles, terms like "man," and "horse" can be used to signifyor express form. Used in this sense, substance-terms are characteristicallypredicated not of ordinary objects but of the matter making up suchobjects; and the force of so predicating them is to identify the formassociated with thatmatter and, hence, to identify just what the relevantmatter is constitutive of.25

Thus, signifying the composite, the term 'man' figures in sentences likethe familiar(1) Socrates is a man,

where it is predicated of thewhole matter-form composite that is Socratesand enables us to classify that composite in terms of the species towhichit belongs. But signifying the actuality or form, the term appears insentences like(2) That parcel of flesh and bones is a man,

where it is predicated not of Socrates, but of his matter. So predicated,it provides us with a sentence whose normal use would not serve toclassify thatmatter by telling us what kind of stuff it is; that classificationis already present in the subject-term of (2). The point of the sentence is


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OUSIA INMETAPHYSICS ZAND H 249rather to identify the eidos informing the relevant parcel ofmatter and,thereby, to specify just what that matter constitutes ormakes up.26

Now, Aristotle wants to insist that this homonymy is an instance ofhis favorite logical tool, the pros hen. As he tells us inH.2, the distinctsenses of any given substance-term are systematically connected: one isbasic and the other, to be explained in terms of it;27 nd what he tells usin Z.8 is that the core meaning of a substance-term is that inwhich itsignifies the form.28The idea presumably is that the sortal use of a substance-term is derived from or to be explained in terms of itsuse to signifythe form; and in Z and H this idea gets expressed in a variety ofways;but we can summarize the insight underlying all these formulations bysaying that, forAristotle, the truth of a sentence like (1) always rests onthe truth of a sentence of the general form of our (2). Given a sentencelike (1), one can always ask, "But why is that composite thing the kindof thing it is?" and, according toAristotle, the answer will always takethe form of a sentence like (2), where we pick out the matter making upthe composite and predicate of it the relevant form. Socrates, then, is aman precisely because his matter (his flesh and bones) is informed bythe eidos, man.This account of substance-predications stands in stark opposition to

the theory operative in the Categories and other logical writings. In thosetexts, predications like (1) are taken to be primitively or unanalyzablytrue; but now Aristotle is claiming that given the hylomorphic structureof ordinary objects, the truth of a substance-species predication rests onthe prior truth of a substance-form predication like (2); and, of course,sentences like (2) are one and all relational in the broad sense that theyexpress a tie between two distinct things, a certain parcel ofmatter anda form.29But, then, given the controlling idea that a formal constrainton any attempt at specifying ousia is the condition that the specifiedobjects must be things such thatwhatever they are, their being that kindof thing is a primitive or unanalyzable fact, the ordinary objects of theCategories no longer have a claim to the title primary ousia.But if ordinary objects are not to be counted primary ousiai, the onlyremaining candidates are the matter and formmaking up such objects;and as we have seen, Aristotle wants to deny that matter provides uswith a serious candidate here. The underlying assumption of the argument inZ.3 is that the familiar matter making up ordinary objects cannotbe construed as ousia since it fails to pass the unanalyzability test.30When pressed, we can, after all, explain why this flesh and these bonesare the kinds of materials they are. As he tells inH.4, they are what

they are because some more elementary matter (phlegm or bile or...) isinformed in some way;31 and, Aristotle wants to insist, the analysis won'tstop with matter like phlegm and bile. The same type of analysis can bereiterated until we reach the matter of Z.3 which "is of itself neither aparticular thing nor of a particular quantity, nor otherwise positivelycharacterized"; and that matter isn't any kind of stuffat all. As Russell


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250 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY QUARTERLYDancy puts it, "there's no saying what it is,"32 so that, reverting to thelanguage of Z.6, there is no ti ein einai with which it could be the same.But ifneither thematter nor the composite meet the formal condition ofunanalyzability, then form represents the last possibility in our searchafter ousia; and Aristotle wants to insist that in its case we have somethingwhich meets the formal condition. A form's being what it isneither restson nor consists in any prior fact. Any proposition, then, specifying theconceptual content of a form will be primitively or unanalyzably true, iftrue at all; and that, I suspect, is one of the things Aristotle has inmindwhen he tells us that form is actuality.33 Form is the only thing that iswhat it is kath hauto, so it alone deserves the title prote ousia .

IllIn outline, then, the development ofAristotle's thinking on ousia is asfollows: in the Categories, he invokes the hupokeimenon criterion andconstrues it as yielding the result that ordinary objects (e.g. "a certainman" and "a certain horse") are protai ousiai. He endorses as well thedoctrine ofminimal essentialism, and so he is committed towhat I havecalled the unanalyzability thesis as regards his candidates forousia-hood.That thesis takes on increasing significance in his own thinking; andwhen, given developments in the physical writings that have the consequence that the ousiai of the Categories are composites of matter andform,Aristotle sees an inescapable tension between the two theses whichoriginally gave rise to the unanalyzability thesis, he maintains the thesisnonetheless, construing itnow not as a consequence of his own inventoryof ousiai but as a formal condition on any such inventory. But adherenceto that thesis, in the face of the doctrine ofZ and H that ordinary objectsare what they are because their matter is informed in a certain way,forces him to reject the Categories view that ordinary objects are ousiai;and we get the familiar theme of Z and H that form is primary ousia.But this summary tells us only half the story. To see this, we shouldthink back to the Categories. My account suggests that in that textAristotle begins with an antecendently understood notion of ousia and acriterion for identifying ousiai which just happens to yield the consequence that particular plants, animals, and persons turn out to be ousiai.But this ismisleading. Aristotle is just as well thought of as beginningwith the insight that the familiar particulars of common sense are "mostreal," and of subsequently attempting to come up with a general formulawhich captures this insight; and, of course, within the context of the

Categories (where the matter/form dichotomy is not yet operative), thecriterion succeeds in this; but it succeeds precisely because itwas formulated to do so.So underlying all the formal machinery of the Categories is an insightabout the reality of commonsense objects; and given the minimal essentialism of the Categories, a critical component in this insight is the idea


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OUSIA INMETAPHYSICS ZAND H 251that ordinary objects have the reality they do because they are the kindsof things they are. Recall here the implication of lb 10-15 that ordinaryobjects fall under the category of ousia precisely because they fall underthe infimae species that stand at the bottom of that categorial tree. Tobe, for them, just is to be a thing like "a certain man" and "a certainhorse." But, then, leaving aside the formal machinery involved in thestatement and defense ofwhat I have called the unanalyzability thesisas it operates in the logical writings, there is a special status reservedfor infimae species, a status guaranteed by the general insightsmotivating the account of ousia defended in the Categories. The idea isthat the framework of sortal terms expressing substance-species enablesus to identify themost real things by highlighting just what it is aboutthem that ismost real; that framework, then, is ontologically privilegedand the expressions constituting it are assimilated to or reduced to someother class of linguistic expressions only at the expense of generating aradically mistaken picture of the world.

None of this is meant to minimize the significance of the formalmachinery at work in the Categories; the point is rather to indicate thatthemachinery goes hand-in-hand with insights (however loosely formulated) about the ontological priority of ordinary particulars and theprivileged status of their infimae species; and the notorious fact is thatthose insights are ones that the Aristotle of Z and H is reluctant to giveup. Throughout Z and H, we find Aristotle insisting that although formis primary ousia, ordinary objects are real, deserve to be counted ousiai;34that in spite of their hylomorphic structure, ordinary objects are fullblooded unities and not mere heaps;35 that while the definition of substance-species requires the identification of both a genus (and, hence,matter) and a differentia (and, hence, form), definition is "the formulaof some one thing."36 So there are twoAristotles inZ and H: theAristotle,who follows out the implications of the hylomorphic theory and theunanalyzability thesis to conclude that form is kath hauto and prote ousiaand the Aristotle who wants to defend the primacy of ordinary objectsand the integrity of the framework of their substance-species. The existence of these twoAristotles is, of course, what makes Z and H so difficult;but it is their existence, I want to suggest, that provides the key to themiddle books; for these books are best understood as the attempt on thepart of these two Aristotles to come to some sort of reconciliation. Thatis, Z and H represent the attempt to accommodate both the insight thatform isprote ousia and the intuition that ordinary objects falling undersubstance-species are full-fledged realities and irreducible unities.

But how does all of this translate into what my title seems to promise,a series ofdirections forreading Z and H? Well, ifwe construe the tensionI have indentified as Aristotle's central philosophical concern, we mustview Z and H as an integral whole focusing on a general problematicthat is, inAristotle's mind, finally resolved onlywhen we reach H.6. Thatrequires us to relinquish the standard picture which construes Z.17 as


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252 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY QUARTERLYthe grand climax ofAristotle's argument and the six chapters ofH as amere appendix to the important business transacted in Z. The standardpicture is initially plausible. The introductory chapters of Z give prideof place to the question "What is ousia?" and Z.17 appears to provide adefinitive answer to the question when it tells us that form isprote ousia.But the picture loses its force on closer scrutiny; for while the openinglines of Z.3 suggest the procedure of examining, in turn, four likely candidates for ousia-hood,31 the actual course of the argument just doesn'tfollow the suggested procedure.38 Indeed, the claim that form is ousiahardly comes as news to the reader of Z.17. He knows that already bythe end of Z.3 and finds the claim rehearsed and developed a number oftimes in intervening chapters.39 In any case, even a quick reading of Z.17indicates that the supposed conclusion of Z that form is ousia is not thecentral concern of that chapter. The problem of Z.17 is rather one ofidentifying a way of formulating that thesis which will not compromisethe unity of ordinary objects; and that problem appears inZ.17 forneitherthe first nor the last time.40

So even ifZ.17 were Aristotle's last word, the last word wouldn't bethe thesis that form is ousia; the last word would, on the contrary, bethat the thesis is compatible with the view that each ordinary object isa "whole and one not like a heap but like a syllable;"41 but the fact isthat Z.17's talk about "principles" as opposed tomere "elements" doesnot represent Aristotle's lastword; the concern ofZ.17 persists throughoutH, until we come to H.6, where after reformulating one last time theproblem of unities and heaps, Aristotle gives us what he takes to be thelast word on the issue.So my first suggestion is to take Z and H as a unified line of argumentinwhich the issue of the substantiality of form functions not as a conclusion but as a source, together with the intuitions of the Categories aboutthe irreducible unity and reality of commonsense particulars, ofa general

puzzlement Aristotle wants to unravel. This puzzlement operates at twolevels: itmanifests itself, first, at the level of the particular or individual,where we have the conflicting intuitions that ordinary objects are realunities and that they are composites, one component of which is real inthe primary sense. Particulars, however, fall under general kinds, so thepuzzlement expresses itself at the level of the general as well, where theconcern is to show that the complexity of a d?finition in terms of genusand differentia is consistent with the irreducible unity of the thingdefined. As we have seen, Aristotle was aware of this difficulty alreadyin the Categories and other logical writings; but whereas he was therecontent to respond to the concern by appealing to a thesis about thedependence ofgenera on their lowest level species, the hylomorphic theoryin general and the specific expression of it in the idea that natural substances can be defined only by reference to both their matter and formgive a new urgency to problems about the unity of definition.42So what Iwant to claim is that the dominating concern of Z and H is


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OUSIA INMETAPHYSICS ZAND H 253this puzzlement about the unity and reality of ordinary objects, wherethe puzzlement operates at both the level of talk about particulars andthe level of talk about the general kinds towhich they belong; and I shallconclude by showing how this approach provides a framework for achapter-by-chapter interpretation of Z and H. Ifwe agree that Z.l andZ.2 serve to introduce the topic of our concern, ousia, Z.l by linking itup with the themes ofT.l and I\2 about a "master science" and the proshen character of einai and Z.2 by connecting Aristotle's concern with thetopic with the investigations of earlier thinkers, then we should see Z.3as the initial substantive chapter in the middle books. As I have argued,the concern there is to call into question the formal apparatus at workin the Categories by arguing that in the light of the hylomorphic theoryand the relevant facts about predicating form ofmatter, the hupokeimenoncriterion of the Categories commits us to an identification of ousia thatis incompatible with minimal essentialism. Minimal essentialists mustreject that criterion and insist that the composite and the form are ousiai;but already in Z.3, Aristotle is convinced that of these two, it is form thatis ousia in the primary sense and that the composite's claims to statusas ousia are posterior to or derivative from that ofform.43 o the conclusionwhich presumably we must await Z.17 to meet is operative already inZ.3, where our discussion of ousia has barely begun. But this is notsurprising. The idea that form's being predicated ofmatter is prior to thecomposite's being the kind ofthing it is represents the source ofAristotle'scontention that form rather than the composite isprote ousia. That ideafunctions as a premise inAristotle's case in Z.3 against the criterion; forit is only by appealing to that priority that Aristotle succeeds in establishing that the relentless application of the hupokeimenon criterion forcesus to delve beneath a composite's being whatever it is to the idea of anunderlying subject of predication which "is of itself neither a particularthing nor of a particular quantity, nor otherwise positively characterized."44

Now, the success of Z.3 hinges on our willingness to endorse certainassumptions forwhich Z.3 provides no justification. First, Z.3 assumesthat given any conflict between minimal essentialism and thehupokeimenon criterion, it is the doctrine ofminimal essentialism thatis to be preserved. Second, the pronouncement that form is, in someprivileged way, ousia rests on an appeal to the unanalyzability thesis,which, in the light of the central argument of Z.3, stands in need of anew justification. Finally, the contention that, in spite ofform's privilegedstatus as ousia, ordinary objects deserve that title assumes that theirhylomorphic structure does not compromise the reality ofordinary objects.In Z.4-5, Aristotle focuses on the first assumption, arguing for thedoctrine ofminimal essentialism. Significantly, that doctrine gets reformulated inZ.4-5; forwhereas in earlier writings the doctrine isformulatedwith an eye toAristotle's own selection of ordinary particulars as protaiousiai and, hence, makes reference to the case where we predicate of an


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254 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY QUARTERLYordinary object its infima species, Z.4-5 has to confront the fact that suchobjects will not turn out to be protai ousiai and that talk about what anousia ismight not turn out to be formulable in terms ofthe sortal languageof species-predication. Hence, Aristotle's appeal to more general talkabout the ti ein einai of an ousia.

The second assumption is addressed in Z.6 where Aristotle tries tovindicate the unanalyzability thesis by arguing that it is a generalrequirement on any attempt at identifying ousiai. But his formulationof the familiar thesis in Z.6 is geared to the tension that will dominatethe remainder of Z and H, viz., the tension between the intuitions thatwhile form is ousia, ordinary objects have as well some sort of claim tothat title. Consequently, Aristotle does not say that the unanalyzabilitythesis presents us with a test that must be passed by anything we mightwant to call ousia under any legitimate assignment of that term; theclaim is rather that none of the things classified as ousiai under theprimary or privileged assignment of the term can fail to pass the test.In Z.7-9 Aristotle takes up the final assumption ofZ.3, addressing thetension just outlined. A parameter of the discussion there is the thesisthat form isprote ousia,45 and the aim is tomake a start towards showinghow this thesis is consistent with the unity and reality ofordinary particu

lars construed as composites of form and matter. The argument moveson a variety of fronts; but the centerpiece of Z.7-9 is the tode/toionde(this/such) contrast of 1033b 20-24, the force of which is to disabuse usof the idea that the composition of ordinary objects can be reresented inadditive terms,where matter and formare construed as a pair of completeentities (this-es) entering into some sort ofnexus or "relation." The contemporary reader cannot resist the temptation to construe the contrasthere in Fregean terms; and while talk of the saturated or complete andthe unsaturated or incomplete is anachronistic in this connection, ithasits point; forwhat Aristotle is trying to tell us is that his notion of form,unlike Plato's, is not that of one more full-fledged object which in combination with some parcel ofmatter constitutes an ordinary object. Form,he wants to say, is something which enters discourse as the referent ofa predicate-term rather than as the referent of a logical subject. It is notan object (in the Fregean sense), but rather how something that is a kindof object (a parcel ofmatter) is; or, to express the point in even morethorough-going Fregean terms, form is a kind of function which takes asits arguments bundles of stuff and has as its values particular objects ofdeterminate substance-species.

In Z. 12-16, Aristotle focuses on the role of genera and differentiae indefinition, approaching the issue of the unity of ordinary objects fromthe perspective of their falling under general kinds; but he provides uswith a natural transition to this discussion in Z. 10-11. These chaptersare as difficult as any in Z and H; and while I claim no definitive interpretation of them, Iwould tentatively suggest that we understand Z. 10-11as the dialectical exploration of the hypothesis that the definition of


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OUSIA INMETAPHYSICS Z AND H 255natural kinds need involve only a reference to form, that matter needplay no role in such definitions. What would be gained were thehypothesisto prove acceptable is clear: our puzzlement about the irreducible unityof ordinary objects would be relieved at the level of the general; for theupshot of the proposed hypothesis would be that, despite its linguisticcomplexity, definition really is "the formula of some one thing."46 Thereis, of course, a precedent for this sort of strategy; the locus ismathematics,where concepts whose only instantiations are material can be definedindependently of the perceptible matter inwhich they are realized;47 andin Z.l0 and the opening lines ofZ.l 1,Aristotle focuses on the attempt toread the model ofgeometrical definition into the definition of substancekinds. The upshot of his explorations, however, is that any attempt tomathematicize the definition of natural kinds fails; for as Aristotle seesit, the rationale for eliminating the material component from the definition of a natural kind, when pressed consistently, commits us to a radicalreductionism which construes as one in kind things that are obviouslydifferent; and so, he concludes, we cannot avoid the fact that "some thingssurely are a particular form in a particular matter"48 and that theirdefinition must reflect this.

So the upshot ofZ. 10-11 is that there is a real problem about the unityofdefinition; and in Z.12-16, Aristotle confronts the problem, focusing onthe problem from the perspective of talk about genera and differentiae.The idea that Z.12-16 constitute a single unit of the text is bound to becontroversial. Standard readings of the middle books see a sharp breakbetween Z.12 and Z.13. Aristotle is construed as embarking on a newproject in Z.13, an examination of the claims of the universal to statusas ousia .49 hat I want to suggest, however, is that the focus on thestatus of the universal in Z. 13-16 hooks up directly with the concerns ofZ.12, where Aristotle seeks to develop an alternative to the acceptedmodel of definition which construes a definition as an expression of some"relation" (such as the "blending" of the Sophist) between logically separate and conceptually complete notions. Aristotle's alternative is an elaboration of the themes of Categories 3; it denies that genera representdeterminate ways of being and construes them as mere determinableswhich get determinate conceptual content only invirtue of the differentiaethat mark out their species.50 The point at issue, I take it, is continuouswith that of 1.8 (1058a 1-4) where Aristotle explicitly denies that thepredication of a genus across its various species should tempt us intothinking that there is some one thing present in all of them. Being ananimal, he tells us, is a different thing for a man and a horse.Then, inZ. 13-16, Aristotle considers the competing picture ofdefinition,where the genus is a complete and fully determinate way of being towhich is added another fully determinate notion, the differentia. Theidea gets expressed in the slogan that the universal is ousia, and laterin the chapter Aristotle glosses the slogan with the claim that the genus"exists apart from the species." We have already met this claim in Z.12,


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256 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY QUARTERLYwhere it is used to express the foil forAristotle's own account of generaas determinables; and in both contexts, the force of the claim is thatgenera have determinate conceptual content, that there is somethingsuch that being an animal, for instance, just consists in that and thatwhatever this is, it can be identified independently of any reference tothe particular kinds of animal that there are. This reading of the sloganof Z.13 is confirmed by other texts. In K.l, for example, we meet withthe idea (presumably, Platonic) that it is universals rather than infimaespecies that ought to be construed as principles (1059b 24-27); the obviousimplication is that in conjunction with issues relating to the identificationofprinciples and ousia, talk about universals is talk about genera. Again,in B.3, where the same cluster of issues is being discussed, genera arecontrasted with lowest-level species and are lumped together under theterm "universal" (998b 14-16). B.4 is even more telling on this score; forthere the concern is with the candidacy ofwhat, forPlato at least, arethe summa genera, being and unity, for status as ousiai; and the viewthat they have such status is expressed as the view that there is somedeterminate conceptual content, specifiable independently of any reference to particular kinds ofbeings or things that are one, attaching to theterm "being" or the term "unity" (1001a 5-8, 19-25, and 1001b 1-2).

Still, some would insist that in Z.13 "universal" has themore generalsense it has inDe Interpretatione 7 (19a 38-40), where the universal is"of such a nature as to be predicated ofmany"; and they would appealto Z.3 (1028b 34), where Aristotle contrasts the notions of genus anduniversal, to counter the idea that the focus of Z.13 is the status ofgenera.Such a line, however, overlooks the fact thatwhatever Aristotle is arguingin Z.13, it is clear from 1038b 16-33 that genera are at least covered bythe slogan in that chapter. Furthermore, it overlooks the fact that when,in contexts other than Z.3, he deals with the more general claim thatwhat is predicable ofmany cannot be ousia, Aristotle is unwilling toassent unequivocally to the claim. Finally, themore general reading ofthe slogan of Z.13 has difficulty in explaining why, in a chapter presumably concerned to show that nothing predicable ofmany can be ousia,Aristotle should use language that suggests he iswilling to countenancethe idea that some things (like man and horse at 1038b 17-21) which arepredicable ofmany are ousiai.The more natural reading of Z.13 takes the reference of "universal" tobe constant throughout the chapter. From 1038b 16 onwards Aristotle istalking about genera, and there is no reason to suppose that he haschanged the subject at 1038b 16. He is talking about the same thingsthat concerned him at 1038b 11-15, and merely considering a new accountofhow those things (genera) might function as the ousia of their subordi

nate species.The motivation for attacking the view that genera are ousiai in therelevant sense comes out clearly at 1039a 2-14, where Aristotle pointsout that on an additive conception ofdefinition, the lowest level natural


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OUSIA INMETAPHYSICS ZAND H 257kinds into whose definition genera enter will never turn out to provideconcepts of genuine unities. But obviously this cannot be the basis forAristotle's argument against the additive picture since the proponent ofthat picture will (in virtue of his allegiance to genera as ousiai) cheerfullyagree that lowest level species lack the unity Aristotle wants to read intothem. Hence, the argument against the additive picture proceeds bypointing out that anyone who construes genera as determinates musthold either that a genus exhausts the conceptual content of its subordinatespecies (referred to by hechastou and hechosto of 1838b 10), inwhich casehe is committed to the bizarre view that being a man and being a donkey,say, are the same thing or that the genus constitutes only a part of theousiai and ti ein einai of the relevant species. But ifhe takes the lattercourse, then since he construes genera as complete and determinate waysthings are, he will have to deny that it is at the level of the subordinatespecies that we confront the emergence of determinate ways ofbeing andhold that for all the species under a genus there is a single determinateway ofbeing, which, Aristotle points out, is just to endorse the first view,viz., that a genus exhausts the conceptual content of its species.51

In Z. 14-17, the general attack on the additive conception of definitionand the associated picture of genera as complete modes of being givesway to an attack on themost influential form such a picture takes, Plato's.This attack moves on a variety of fronts, but one component of the argument carries on the argument of Z.13; for the obvious rejoinder to thedialectic of Z.13 is that one can agree that genera have complete, determinate conceptual content across their species and hold that the speciesunder a genus differ by being aggregates, so to speak, of the single genusand its various differentiae, where these are construed as attributes modifying the common genus. Aristotle counters the rejoinder by pointingout that the Platonist who (with his talk of "blending" or "mixing")advances this line cannot, while maintaining the view he wishes todefend?that the genus is a single ousia across the species?interpret theconstitution of the relevant species according to this substance-accidentmodel; for since the differentiae of a genus are contraries, they cannotsimultaneously be exhibited by a single ousia (1039b 2-16).

In Z.17 Aristotle takes up again the project of Z.7-9, that of showingthe consistency ofmaintaining both that form is ousia and that what itinforms is an irreducibly real unity. The way Iwould suggest carving upthe text here is to take Z.17 as the initial chapter in a segment thatcarries us to 1043b 23 ofH.3, where Aristotle moves on to a new issue.Z.17 attempts to provide content for the view that form is ousia, for sofar Aristotle's justification for the view has largely been a matter ofpointing out that form alone satisfies the formal conditions functioningas parameters on any attempt at coming up with an inventory o? ousiai.Form meets the condition imposed byminimal essentialism: every formis a ti esti; but, given any form, its satisfying that condition is not a factwhich is susceptible of analysis in terms of any prior facts: each form is


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258 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY QUARTERLYprimitively or irreducibly whatever it is. The difficulty is that there ismore to the concept of ousia than is provided by any appeal to the doctrineofminimal essentialism or the unanalyzability thesis. The concept ofousia is the concept of something that plays a certain explanatary role:anything that isprote ousia has to be something such that by appealingto itwe can explain why things other than protai ousiai have being orexist. In Z.17, Aristotle tries to show how form, just in virtue of itssatisfying the formal conditions associated with the concept of ousia, issuited to play such an explanatory role.

The argument developed in Z.17 focuses on the case of ordinary objects(a house (1041b 4), a man (1041b 5)); and what Aristotle argues is thatform functions as the cause of the being of these objects. The actualargument relies on a theme developed in Z.16, the idea that there is nosuch thing as just being a being or just being one thing.52What Z.17 addsis the positive point that our notions of being and being one are to befleshed out, in the final analysis, in terms of sortal predications. But,then, to ask for the cause of the being of this or that ordinary object isto ask for that in virtue ofwhich the relevant ordinary object is the kindof thing it is, and the answer to any such question ultimately turns onthe fact that the relevant object ismade out of a certain kind ofmatterinformed by a certain eidos. But the appeal here to form and matter arenot on the same footing; for the appeal tomatter of a certain kind ingiving an account ofwhy this or that ordinary object is the kind of thingit is represents the appeal to something such that there is an account (interms ofprior facts) of its being the kind of stuff it is. Like the ordinaryobject with which our inquiry began, the relevant matter fails tomeetthe unanalyzability criterion and so gives rise to the very kind ofquestionwe wanted to answer. Form, on the other hand, iswhatever it isunanalyzably or primitively, so that by appealing to itwe can provide a finalanswer to questions about the being of things; and the upshot of thispoint is just that form does play the kind of explanatory role associatedwith the concept o?prote ousia as early as the Categories; forms are suchthat ifnone of them existed, nothing else would either.

But, of course, this point only highlights the central tension of Z andH; for ifform isprote ousia in this sense, how can ordinary objects maintaintheir status as realities and unities? Z.17 attempts to relieve the tensionby suggesting amodel (on a par with that developed inZ.8) which accommodates at once the causal role of form and the integral unity of ordinaryobjects. The model takes the form of a contrast between stoicheia (elements) and archai (principles),53 which Aristotle sees as critical in anyattempt at giving a recipe for the constitution of ordinary objects. Heappears to be saying that while ordinary objects have their materialcomponents or elements, an identification of these falls short ofa completeaccount of an object. We need something more; but the additional "something" is not one more ingredient. It is rather what is expressed by a setof directions specifying just how the relevant ingredients, components,


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OUSIA INMETAPHYSICS Z AND H 259or elements are put together; "and this", we are told "is the ousia of thething.54

Form's being an ousia, then, does not involve its being a full-fledgedobject in its own right; so that inH.l Aristotle can reiterate the intuitionof the Categories that, in spite of the ousia-hood of form, ordinary composites deserve the title of ousia. It is again only an additive conception oftheir composition that suggests the contrary; and inH.2 and H.3, Aristotlepresses the insight underlying the todeltoionde and stoicheionlarche contrasts of Z.8 and Z.17. In H.2 the insight is formulated once again interms of the role that form plays in giving an account of the being ofordinary objects. What Aristotle tells us is that for each substance-kindthere is a distinct sense of the verb einai; and he argues that what givesus that sense, ultimately, is the form-predication appropriate to the kind.55So a form-predication provides us with a recipe for the being ofan ordinaryobject; and in that recipe, the matter appears as the referent ofa singularterm (a Fregean name), the logical subject of the predication, and theform gets expressed not by a complete expression (a name or logicalsubject) but by an incomplete expression (a predicate); and, then, inH.3,Aristotle reiterates the injunction of Z.17 against construing form as onemore ingredient or component on a par with the matter by reminding usthat juxtaposition isnot one more thing among those that are juxtaposed.56

At 1043b 23, we reach the beginning of the last segment of Z and H.It may strike one as bizarre that I would divide H.3 into two parts,especially bizarre in the light of the opening word of 1043b 23 hoste; butthe fact is that from this point onward Aristotle's concern is to take thetwo sources of puzzlement of Z and H, composition at the level of theparticular and composition at the level of the general, and to try to showthat they represent a single problem, which is resolved in one and thesame way. We have, of course, been prepared for this assimilationiststrategy; forwe already know that for a particular to be is for it to bean individual instance of its infima species; and Aristotle has told us thatthe form-predication underlying this or that particular's being amemberof its infima species is subject to a generalization thatmimics a definitionof the species itself.57 ut, further, inhis treatment ofdefinition, Aristotlehas dropped repeated hints that the proper interpretation of genus asdeterminable and differentia as that which specifies the relevant determinate bears a striking resemblance to our understanding ofmatter andform,58so that we are not surprised to find Aristotle, after a number ofpreparatory moves, identifying the formal notions underlying therelevant assimilation in terms of the energeialdunamis distinction.Now, many commentators have taken the appeal to the act/potencydistinction to be Aristotle's last word on the problems of Z and H. Theidea presumably is that having assimilated the issue ofgenus/differentiacomplexity indefinition tomatter/form composition, Aristotle is satisfiedthat he has sufficiently accommodated the unity ofordinary objects fallingunder substance-sortals with the reflection thatmatter just ispotentially


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260 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY QUARTERLYwhatever itbecomes; it is potentially what it actually will be. But thereare problems with this sort of interpretation ofH.6. For one thing, it isjust not clear what the assimilation Aristotle has inmind amounts to.The idea that the form and differentia are one is familiar enough. Butwhat of the relation between genus and matter? Is Aristotle saying thatthe genus and the matter are identical? or is itrather that the genus-termmerely expresses or signifies the matter? or is the relation here evenlooser so that what we have is a kind of analogy hinging on themodalstatus of both genus and matter, where the determinadility o? a genus isto be understood on analogy with the potentiality of matter? Aristotledoesn't answer these questions; but surely one would have thought thatwere the assimilation in question to represent his final resolution of theproblem ofunity, Aristotle would have done more to tell us just what thecash value of the assimilationist strategy is.

But there is a more pressing difficulty with this interpretation ofH.6.The interpretation puts the full weight of the account ofunity Aristotlewants to provide on the unity involved in the act/potency distinction; but,as Richard Rorty points out, this unity just doesn't provide us with thediscriminations Aristotle needs ifhe is to give a successful account of theirreducibly real unity of individual members of substance-species.59 Thefact is that the relevant distinction can be applied to cases where Aristotlewants to deny we have the relevant unity. Reflection on Aristotle'sfavorite example of a general term not expressing a substance-species,the term "cloak" (himation) as defined in Z.4, brings out the point. Aristotle's concern in introducing this term is to point out that the unity ofan ousia is not the kind ofunity hinging on themerely conventional factthat we have a single common noun true of that object and others. Werewe to introduce the term "cloak" as an abbreviation for the complexexpression "white man," we would not thereby succeed in specifying a tiein einai; nor would the "entrenchment" of this Goodman-noun make theslightest difference here. We wouldn't have a ti ein einai simply becausebeing a cloak is not just what some one thing is.60But of course, ifwetake any white man, the account ofH.6 in terms ofactuality and potencyseems to apply; for surely prior to his becoming white, theman is potentially what he will actually be?white.

So ifwe take the act/potency distinction to carry the fullweight of theargument inH.6, we'd have Aristotle delineating a kind ofunity far toobroad forhis own purposes, which are to isolate the special unity of thingslike "a certain man" and "a certain horse." Of course, it is possible thatthe interpretation is right and that Aristotle's account just fails; but I'minclined to think that this is not so. It is significant that as soon as hehas pointed to the act/potency dichotomy, Aristotle invokes the term"cloak" (himation);61 and while he gives the term a new definition (roundbronze), the connections with the use ofthat term inZ.4 can hardly haveescaped him; and although the bronze sphere does frequently function ashis model for the constitution of substantial unities, the unity of bronze


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spheres is no closer to the unity he wants to read into substance-species,on the one hand, and their instances, on the other, than is the unityoperative in the case of white man.But, then, what are we tomake of the appeal to act/potency inH.6?Well, Iwould suggest that we construe itnot as Aristotle's last word onthe unity of ousia, but as one more model, on a par with the todeltoiondecontrast of Z.8 and the stoicheionlarche contrast of Z.17, for overcomingan additive conception of ordinary objects and the definition of their

substance-species.But ifthe appeal to act/potency isn't Aristotle's last word on the problems ofZ and H, what is? It is significant here that just before he concludesH.6 (10456 18-20) Aristotle has his critic still pressing the problem ofunity. It is as though when confronted with all the dialectic of Z and Hincluding the various models Aristotle has presented, the persistent criticremains dissatisfied. He says, presumably, "I see how the todeltoionde,stoicheionl arche, and energeialdunamis distinctions all point to differences in the ontological status ofmatter and form, genus and difference.But, look, you still have a matter and a form, a genus and a differentia,an element and a principle, a this and a such, something potentially soand so and something actually so and so. So don't we still end up withtwo things? And how can we escape the conclusions that what the twothings make up is 'one like a heap' and the general kinds under whichthey fall just kinds ofheaps?"Aristotle's reaction is at once fascinating and puzzling:Therefore it is like asking what in general is the cause of unity and of athing's being one; for each thing is a unity and the potential and the actualare somehow one (1045b 18-20).

Initially this sounds defeatist, as though a frustrated Aristotle wereadmitting that he can do no more towards dispelling the concerns ofhisinsensitive critic and just stomping his foot, "But they are one." I aminclined to think, however, that construing these remarks in this lightinvolves amisunderstanding ofwhat Aristotle is about here. The passage,I think, should be read in the light of a similar remark from De AnimaB.l where Aristotle says that "we can wholly dismiss as unnecessary thequestion whether the soul and body are one"; such a question "ismeaningless," since "unity has many senses (asmany as 'is' has), but themostproper and fundamental sense of both is the relation of an actuality tothat ofwhich it is the actuality."What does all this come to?Well, I take it thatwe have here an appealto the pros hen doctrine as regards einai and hen. Aristotle is remindingus that in the core application of the terms, the things that are and areone just are the familiar objects of the Categories: "That's just what wemean by 'an existent' and 'one thing'. Each is a paradigmatic instanceof a thing that there is and a thing that is one. So to ask whether they


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really are or really are one is senseless." Although in both passages thereis a reference to act and potency, the reference isn't the operative point.It isn't, I think, that Aristotle wants to say that things are called realitiesand unities because they involve the act/potency dichotomy. The point israther that things which are, infact, describable in terms ofthat dichotomyare theparadigmatic instances of things that are and things that are one,so that we can press the critic's questions only at the risk ofmisusingthe language we use in talking about the world.So I want to suggest a picture ofH.6 and, by extension, of all ofZ andH. The picture is one ofa sustained dialectical treatment ofa puzzlement

occasioned by his own views about matter/form composition and the ousia-hood of form, on the one hand, and intuitions about the irreducibly realunity ofordinary objects, on the other. The strategy is to provide a varietyof tools and models for removing the puzzlement, and, then, to insist, inthe face of persistent attacks on his use ofmodels and his dialecticalmeandering, that, in the end, we can press doubts about the unity andreality of ordinary objects falling under substance-kinds only ifwe failto realize that the very language we must use to formulate those doubtsis one inwhich the doubts make no sense; for that language has builtinto its semantics the centrality of the reality and unity of ordinaryobjects.University ofNotre Dame Received August 15,1983

NOTES1. See, e.g, 1028b 2-7 of Z.l and all of Z.2.2. I am summarizing the complicated recipes involving things said of and present in

another in terms of talk about predicates and attributes. Presumably, what I have to sayhere is sufficiently general as to remain neutral on the Owen-Ackrill debate on inherence;nor should one take my use of "predicate" to represent an assimilation of Aristotle's useof legin and katagorein.3. 2b 15-17.4. 2a 13. I use the Oxford translations throughout.5. 2b 30-37.6. 2b 8-10; 2b 33-34.7. The title takes on increasing significance in later writings; but it is prominent alreadyin the Categories. See, e.g., 3a 10-13.8. lb 10-15.9. This idea (I call it the unanalyzability thesis) has been discussed at length by Russell

Dancy. See his "On Some of Aristotle's First Thoughts About Substances," ThePhilosophical Review, vol. 84 (1975), Sense and Contradiction (Dordrecht: Reidel, 1977),and "On Some ofAristotle's Second Thoughts about Substances: Matter," The PhilosophicalReview, vol. 87 (1978). My debt to Dancy is, I suspect, obvious. I know that it is deep.


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OUSIA INMETAPHYSICS Z AND H 26310. 3a 6-28.11. See, e.g., 10a 26-10b 11.12. 2a 27-33.13. 2a 19-26; 3a 32-3b 9.14. la 3-5.15. 83a 25-32.16. The contrast here is not the contrast normally marked by the terms kath hauto andkata sumbebekos; that contrast is elaborated at 73a 34-73b 4.17. Dancy makes this point nicely in "On Some ofAristotle's Second Thoughts," pp. 381-82.18. 1030a 18-1030b 5.19. The operative argument, I take it, is found in the difficult 1030b 28-37 with 1031a1-7, the gloss that helps us see the point of the central argument.20. Actually the force of the claim in Z.6 may be even stronger than talk ofunanalyzability

might suggest. Since it is form that turns out to be ousia in the sense dictated by thisthesis, the idea that we have strict identity here is not (provided that we take form to bea universal) totally out of the question and might be the best way to understand howousia in the middle books (as opposed to the logical writings) is what it is unanalyzablyor primitively. Problems, of course, will arise when we focus on Z.13; but I am unconvincedthat the arguments presented there are meant to exclude the possibility that universalforms (understood as Aristotle understands them, i.e., as "such-es" and not "this-es") areousiai. The use ofPlatonic materials in Z.6 together with the remark at 1031b 14-15 thatthe point made apropos of a Platonic ontology is general shows that Aristotle took thearguments ofZ.6 to be transcendental in the sense that they hold for any ontology seekingto identify ousiai.21. 1029a 28.22. 1032a 5.23. See, e.g., 1037a 33-1037b 6 and 1043b 1-4.24. 1035b 28-30.25. See, e.g., 1043a 6 and 1049a 34-36. For more on this contrast, see my "Form, Species,and Predication," Mind, vol. 88 (1979).26. Contemporary theorists might agree that there is a homonymy in (1) and (2) butlocate it in the copula (distinguishing, say, between the "is" of sortal predication and the"is" ofmaterial constitution). Aristotle presumably takes the "is" to be synonymous andlocates the homonymy in "man."27. 1043a 29-37.28. 1033b 17-18.29. And that relationship Aristotle takes to be kata sumbebekos .See 1029a 22-26.30. Otherwise Aristotle's analysis would not have proceeded to the matter so starklydescribed in Z.3, but would have stopped short with familiar matter of some determinatestuff-kind.31. 1044a 15-1044b 2.32. See "On Some of Aristotle's Second Thoughts," p. 390.33. But obviously only one of the things.34. See, e.g., 1029a 29-30, 1035a 1, 1039b 20-26, and 1042a 25-32.35. See, e.g., 1041b 12-13 and 1043a 8-10.


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264 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY QUARTERLY36. See, e.g., 1037b 25-28.37. 1028b 33-35.38. This is not to say that Aristotle doesn't investigate the claims of the four candidates;the point is rather that any scheme that attempts to interpret Z exclusively in terms of1028b 33-35 will be forced to leave large sections of the text (perhaps, the majority of thechapters of Z) unexplained.39. See, e.g., 1032b 1, 1034a 30, 1035a 4, 1038a 26, and 1039b 20-26.40. This is the force of Z.8 as well as H.1-H.3.41. 1041b 12.42. See, e.g., Physics B.2 (194a 12-18) and Metaphysics E.l (1025b 29-1026a 6).43. 1029a 31-32.44. 1029a 31-32.45. See Z.7 (1032b 1), where the role this thesis takes in the argument of Z.7-9 ismadeexplicit.46. 1037b 27.47. See, e.g., 193b 31-35, 1026a 7-10, 1077b 11-33.48. 1036b 23. Some might argue that the hypothesis to be explored in Z.10-11 is thatwhat we define is the form rather than the species with which it is associated and thatthe force of the argument is that while the hypothesis is correct, to define the form, one

must refer to the kind ofmatter it informs. Proponents of this interpretation fail to seethe impact of the redundancy argument in Z.5; one consequencee ofthat argument, I takeit, is that were form to be the object of definition rather than the species, then anyreference to the matter in the definition would give rise to the snub problems discussedearlier and we'd have the consequence that no form has a ti ein einai, an incredible result!This is not to say that form cannot be defined; Aristotle says it can; the point is ratherthat the hypothesis in Z.10-11 has to focus on the definition of species and that 1036b 23tells us that in defining species, we must refer to the matter.49. Recent literature (all of it exemplifying the standard reading) attaches critical importance toZ.13, giving itmore attention than any other chapter in Z-H. This is not surprisingsince the contention that no universal is ousia appears to be inconsistent with two othercharacteristic claims of Z-H, that form is ousia and that form is predicable ofmany and,hence, universal. As I see it, once one reads Z.13-16 in the light of Z.12, Aristotle'sdiscussion of the universal tends to be a far less mysterious component of the text, onedemanding considerably less of the commentator.50. 1038a 5-8.51. See, e.g., 999b 20-23 and 1086b 20-1087a 10. All of this is an extremely complicatedbusiness; and this general survey at most summarizes the conclusions which, tomy mind,a thorough-going study of Z.13 and related texts like B.4 and M.10 would result in. As Isee it, the force of Z.13 hinges on the idea that no genus (understood in Platonic termsas a complete and determinate way things are, identifiable independently of the specificforms it happens to take) can be the ousia or part of the ousia of those species. As regardsthe more general question, "can what is common tomany be ousia?" Aristotle does not,I think, give a definitive answer in Z.13; nor is the answer he would give unequivocally"yes" or "no". If a universal is viewed as a "one over a many," the answer is "no"; butAristotle is unwilling, as I read him, to construe form as numerically "one" or "many."It is a "such" and not a "this," so that while things of a species are correctly said to be


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OUSIA INMETAPHYSICS ZAND H 265one in form, it does not, on Aristotle's view, make clear sense to ask "Just how many(numerically different) substantial forms are there across a given species?" See M.10 fora detailed treatment of the issue.52. That is the sense I would give to 1040b 16-27, especially in the light of 1001a 2 if.53. 1041b 12-33.54. 1041b 27.55. 1042b 24-1043a 11.56. 1043b 5-14.57. See, e.g., 1033b 24-26.58. See, e.g., 1038a 5-7 and 1043b 28-32.59. See Rorty's "Genus as Matter: A Reading o?Metaphysics Z-H" inExegesis and Argument, ed. by Lee, Mourelatos and Rorty (New York: Humanities Press, 1973).60. 1029b 28-1030a 6.61. 1045a 26-27.62. 4126 6-9.

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Ousia a Prolegomenon to Metaphysics Z and H