This text is part of:
Search the Perseus Catalog for:
[1051b]
[1]
but also (in the
strictest sense1) to
denote truth and falsity. This depends, in the case of the objects,
upon their being united or divided; so that he who thinks that what is
divided is divided, or that what is united is united, is right; while
he whose thought is contrary to the real condition of the objects is
in error. Then when do what we call truth and falsity
exist or not exist? We must consider what we mean by these
terms.It is not because we are right in thinking
that you are white that you are white; it is because you are white
that we are right in saying so. Now if whereas some things are always
united and cannot be divided, and others are always divided and cannot
be united, others again admit of both contrary states, then "to be" is
to be united, i.e. a unity; and "not to be" is to be not united, but a
plurality.Therefore
as regards the class of things which admit of both contrary states,
the same opinion or the same statement comes to be false and true, and
it is possible at one time to be right and at another wrong; but as
regards things which cannot be otherwise the same opinion is not
sometimes true and sometimes false, but the same opinions are always
true or always false.But with regard to incomposite
things, what is being or not-being, and truths or falsity? Such a
thing is not composite, so as to be when it is united and not to be
when it is divided,
[20]
like the
proposition that "the wood is white," or "the diagonal is
incommensurable"; nor will truth and falsity apply in the same way to
these cases as to the previous ones.In point of fact, just as truth is not the
same in these cases, so neither is being. Truth and falsity are as
follows: contact2 and assertion are truth (for
assertion is not the same as affirmation), and ignorance is
non-contact. I say ignorance, because it is impossible to be deceived
with respect to what a thing is, except accidentally3;and the same applies to incomposite
substances, for it is impossible to be deceived about them. And they
all exist actually, not potentially; otherwise they would be generated
and destroyed; but as it is, Being itself is not generated (nor
destroyed); if it were, it would be generated out of something. With
respect, then, to all things which are essences and actual, there is
no question of being mistaken, but only of thinking or not thinking
them.Inquiry as to
what they are takes the form of inquiring whether
they are of such-and-such a nature or not.As for being in the sense of truth, and not-being
in the sense of falsity, a unity is true if the terms are combined,
and if they are not combined it is false. Again, if the unity exists,
it exists in a particular way, and if it does not exist in that way,
it does not exist at all.
1 This appears to contradict Aristot. Met. 6.4.3. But it is just possible to interpret κυριώτατα(with Jaeger) as "in the commonest sense."
2 i.e. direct and accurate apprehension.
3 i.e. we cannot be mistaken with regard to a simple term X. We either apprehend it or not. Mistake arises when we either predicate something wrongly of X, or analyze X wrongly.
Aristotle. Aristotle in 23 Volumes, Vols.17, 18, translated by Hugh Tredennick. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1933, 1989.
The Annenberg CPB/Project provided support for entering this text.
Purchase a copy of this text (not necessarily the same edition) from Amazon.com
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.