Physicality [Being] of Protagoras vs Abstraction [Non Being] of Anaxagoras

Some philosophers assert that it is possible for the same thing to exist and not to exist.

Writers on physical nature [physicists] use this language.

But it is impossible for anything to exist physically and not to exist [i.e. exist abstractly] at the same time.

The uneducated even demand that this be demonstrated.*

This is because the uneducated do not to know which things one should seek proof and which things one should not

• It would be impossible for everything to be proven.

But it is possible to prove by refutation that it is impossible to prove everything, as long as the disputer says something.

• But if he says nothing, then it is ridiculous discuss with someone who says nothing just like talking to a plant.

Proving by refutation is different from proving by demonstration.

This is because one who demonstrates something inexplicable is like begging the initial principle.*

But proving by refutation refutes the inexplicable cause.

Aristotle’s System: Definitions

The starting point for all such discussions is not the demand to say that something exists or does not exist, since this wuld be begging the initial principle.

Instead, we demand that the word must signify something understandable to both himself and the disputer.

If there is such a word then there can be a demonstration since something will be defined.

Assume that “man” means one thing, as “two-footed animal”.

One thing means that “man” in our discussion will refer only to a 2-footed animal even if “man” can mean other things.

• Here, the disputer submits to my definition.

It is possible to assign a separate proper name to each definition.

For example:

• “man” is “two-footed animal”
• [“man-essence” is “humanity”]
• [“civlized-man” is “the most advanced thinking animal”]

But if names were not assigned, and “man” could mean many things then there would be no discussion.

Assume that in a discussion, one word means one thing.

Therefore, it is surely not possible for a physical man to mean the same as an abstact man.

Physical man means the same as abstact man only if man were a homonymy.

But if “physical man” and “abstract man” are the same, then to be a physical man is also the same as to be an abstract man, since “man” is one.

This is what to be one philosophically signifies, just as cloak and garment are the same philosophically.

But “physical man” and “abstract man” were demonstrated to signify something different.

I defined man as a physical man, a two-footed animal.

And so man cannot be an abstract man.

In this case, we cannot say that:

• physical man is abstract man
• abstract man is physical man

A name has one meaning.

Therefore, ‘physical man’ cannot mean ‘abstract man’ if ‘man’ means two-footed animal.

It is not possible to be physical and abstract, except in virtue of an ambiguity.

Physical man and abstract man mean something different just as to be physically white is different from to be a physical man.

Physical man is more different from abstract man than physical white is different from physical man.

Assume that physical man and abstract man are the same in 10,000 ways. If the disputer asks if both definitions are the same, then you can agree as long as he adds all the other 10,000 attributes that are accidental to both definitions.

Some say that this would destroy the substance or essence of the definition because this makes the definition accept accidental nuances.

My definition of physical man is precise. It cannot be abstract man, which negates it since the substance was its physicality.

Anaxagoras’ System: Substance

Substance means that it is existence that is true only for itself and not other things.

But if physical man is precisely abstract man or non-physical man, then its existence will be something else.

Consequently, they would say that:

• no such definition exists for anything
• everything is predicated accidentally

It would mean that physical whiteness is accidental to physical man because he is white, but white is not his essence.

If every attribute is accidental, then every definition is an attribute.

This means that attributes are attributes of attributes. This goes to infinity which is impossible.

This is because not more than two are usually combined as attributes to subjects.

The accident is not an accident of an accident, unless it is because both are accidental to the same thing.

For example, this music is audibly white, but that thing is also visually white.

Both whites are accidental to the man.

But visually-white Socrates is not audibly-white. And so such whitness is an accidental attribute of something else, not of Socrates.

This means that the connection of white to Socrates cannot be infinite moving upward (in the series of predication).

For example, there is something else remotely connected and accidental to the white Socrates [to make him audibly-white too] for no one thing is generated from all of them.*

Music is not an accident of white, nor of Socrates.

The refuters of this doctrine of substance say that:

• an accident is not accidental to an accident
• not everything is accidental

This still allows substance.

But still I have shown that it is impossible for contradictions [of physicality and abstraction] to be predicated simultaneously [instead they should be defined and separated].

Protagoras’ System: Physicality

If all contradictions are true for the same subject, then all things will be one.

• A trireme, wall, and man are all one as physicality. [i.e. they are all connected by the one idea of physicality]

In this case, it would be possible to affirm or deny anything of everything.

• This is the argument of Protagoras.
• It means that a physical man is not a physical trireme, yet is the same as the trireme in physicality.

And so, the result is that of Anaxagoras: all things are together (commingled)

• Nothing truly belongs to anything.

Therefore, they are speaking of the indeterminate. So while speaking of physicality, they speak about abstraction.

• The indefinite abstract is the thing that is physically potential but not physically actual.

But they must assert the affirmation or the denial of every attribute about every subject.

For example, if the physical man is not an abstract man, then he is also physical like the trireme or not physical.

If the physical man is affirmed to be not abstact man then the negation must also be allowed.

But if physical man is abstract man then the abstraction will be the attribute itself [of the physical man].

Thus, the followers of Protogoras believes that it is not necessary to affirm or to deny.

If physical man and abstract man are the same, then non-physical man and physicalized abstract man are the same.

• These are 2 denials of the 2 propositions.

If this does not hold for all, then they would be one would be true and the other would be false.

Anaxagoras vs Protogoras

But if this holds for all things, then everything is both:

• physically white and abstractly white
• physical and abstract

This means that there is something fixedly abstact.

This is a firm opinion [of the supporters of Anaxagoras] that the abstract is something firm and knowable.

It means that the opposite affirmation of physicality would be more knowable.

But if we allow denials then we should speak by distinguishing [to clear things up].

For example, that a thing is physically white and abstractly white or not abstractly white.

Without this clarification [of physical or abstract], then nothing exists physically and all things would be one abstraction.

• The same abstract thing will be a man and a god and a trireme and their contradictions

The supporters of Anaxagoras say that this is their point from the start.

They say that:

• a person who supposes that a thing is either only physical or abstract is mistaken
• a person who supposes that a thing is both physical and abstrct is speaking truly

They say that such is the nature of existing things.

I ask what do they mean?*