miÉ. plato's sophist on negation and not being

7/30/2019 MI. Plato's sophist on negation and not being

1/10

361

Platos Sophiston Negationand Not-BeingFabin Mi

SummaryThis brief paper develops an interpretation of Platos theory of

negation understood as an answer to Parmenides paradoxes concerningnot-being. First, I consider some aspects that result from an analysis ofSophist257b259d, formulating some general theses which I then go onto unfold in more detail in the following section. Finally, I show whatexactly Platos so-called overcoming of the Eleatic problem related tonegation and falsehood is; and I outline some of the main semantic andmetaphysical consequences that are entailed by this overcoming.

1. Platos relocation of not as a solution toParmenides problem

At the end of the passage in Platos Sophistthat is dedicatedto the analysis of the combination between the greatest kindsemerges the thesis according to which the not-being must befirmly established as something that is not and, like every idea, assomething which has its own nature. This may be the main resultof the investigation that was meant to examine the problems ofthe Parmenidean dictum, expressed in the only possible way thatfragment 2 of the Poem declares viable, the one in which beingis and not-being is not (fr. 2.3). This same wayParmenides

Way of Truth in the Poemhad also been clearly judged in thedialogue at 241d7 as paradoxically not viable, since Parmenidestheory did not allow us to explain one of our most elementary


2/10

362

Fabin Mi

comprehensive abilities, the one that permits us to work with thenegation and to admit the possibility of the falsehood. Platos

idea is that if not-being were not accepted, falsehood would notbe possible (237a34; 241a9b3).

The postulation of the idea of not-being as a necessarycondition to justify some of our basic linguistic practices as

well as the use of negative predicates and the meaning of falsestatements constitutes, therefore, a first relevant topic of theSophist. A second one, on which I will also focus in this paper,is an ontological one. It lies namely in the formulation of some

metaphysical central tools which introduce clearly anti-Eleaticfeatures in our ontology. The main metaphysical tool of PlatosSophistconsists in accepting not-being in its only admissible sense,that is to say, as dierence(255b34, c810, d1), and rejectingthe ontological monism that Plato considers directly associated

with an erroneous semantic that, in the end, does not accountfor predication and in which there only exist namesthat wouldapparently name the only reality of its correlate.

2. Naming and negating

Let us now characterize in a loose way some of the main thesesthat emerge from the aforementioned passage (Sophist257d259d).

(i) Parmenides thesis arises from a basic misconceptionof the primary function of language, which he reducesto naming something. In this way, the sophistic thesis

about the impossibility of falsehood, which Plato dis-cusses in the Sophist, must be understood as a conse-quence of Parmenidean exclusion of the not from itsoriginal place in language, namely in the predicativestatement, and of the erroneous Eleatic assimilationof the function of the negative particle to a negationof the subject-name. Such assimilation, in turn, givesrise to expressions like not-being, in which being

appears as the name of an object. The Eleatic rejec-tion of the not is, at the same time, a consequence ofcomprehending the statements wrongly as if its func-tion were the mere nominal identifcation of a single or


3/10

363

Platos Sophiston Negation and Not-Being

atomic object. Therefore, the Parmenidean rejectionof not as a meaningful function of language is based

on and, at the same time implies, a theory of names,which involves the supposition that names are doinghis complete linguistic work in language without anylogical relation to other linguistic functions.

(ii) Taking loosely Tugendhats1 reconstruction of theargument that Plato would attribute to Parmenides,

we obtain the following:

(1) sthinks/says that x is not

equals Parmenides in

(2) sthinks/says (the) nothing;

(2) implies that the negation operates as negation ofthe object. Besides, according to the perceptual model,applied to the epistemic operations of thinking/saying,Parmenides would clarify (2) in terms of

(3) s does notthink/say,

from which we can infer that (2) is impossible orunacceptable. Parmenides takes the function of notin (1) according to the objectual or nominal sense ofthe negation of something, of a being. And he doesthis in the following way: whoever thinks/says thatsomething is not, thinks/says the not-being, since tothink/saywhat is notequals to think/say that some-thing is nothing(fragment 8, 10; fr. 6.2), which in theend is at the same time absurd, because of (3). In this

way, not-being is introduced as the absurd specter towhich we should commit ourselves if we acceptedthe negation in our linguistic uses mentioned in (1).

Thereafter, the prohibited Way of not-being commitsthe following absurdity:

(4) sthinks/says the not-being,

1 Tugendhat, Das Sein, pp. 3666, 48f.


4/10

364

Fabin Mi

where the completive grammatical form of the sentencethrough which not in the predicative part of the state-

ment would be introduced in (1) has disappeared, beingreplaced in (4) by the nominalized use of the negation.

If we accepted (1), we should admit (4) to explain thesupposition of (2). (4) clarifies that the nothing of(2) means not-being. The not would lead us, then,to negate the act of thinking/saying, as in (3). And(3) would be taken by Parmenides as a thought (act)

without thought (content), that is, as a meaninglessthought containing a senseless expressionthe nega-tive particlewhich does not refer to some being inthe world. Parmenides develops such analysis undertheperceptualmodel through which he would under-stand thinking and saying. Under the powerful inf lu-ence of this model, thinking or saying somethingnegatively qualified would equal seeing without see-

ing anything, which implies the elimination of thevisual act and the corresponding act of thought as aconsequence of having accepted the negation of thecontent by not having excluded, at the beginning, theuse of not as a deceptive resource of human language.

If the previous reconstruction of the Parmenideanrejection of negation is right, we can claim to

have a plausible explanation of Platos criticism ofParmenides odd and strict philosophical thesis aboutbeing, according to which whatever we think of, nec-essarily is. The monistic thesis, along with whichbeing is the only possible thing, was read by Plato asa consequence of the only form that is accepted byParmenides as a possible correlate of thinking/saying,that is, a simple and absolute unified object, without

any logical relation to any other thing. Parmenidesmetaphysics was for Plato a coherent but paradoxicalresult of the prohibition of the not as a non-senseand deceptive expression.


5/10

365


(iii) To Parmenides, admitting not-being would imply non-sensical terms with the semantic form of the not-real.

He arrives at this thesis as a consequence of incorrectlyplacing the not, conceiving it as if this particle wouldmake a backward movement that would cancel the onemade through the mere denomination of something.

(iv) Plato correctly transfers the not to the predicativeexpression. The Platonic negation now does not makesuch expressions as the not-real, but operates on theassertive place of a statement, that is to say, on thepredicate, allowing to make sentences in which whatis said about something is not the case and avoiding,thanks to the change of the position of not, that

which is being negated would equal zero.

(v) In addition, through the negation we can discoverwhat it is as long as the propositional function ofnot articulates the subject in its own how, and this

requires, consequently, a new theory of language,which the Sophistdevelops by appealing to the com-bination of being and not-being and clarifying thatwhat it is is expressed through the propositionalform . . . is . . . or . . . is not. . ., wherein is isused in an incomplete sense.2

3. The parts of otherness

The form of otherness and its parts, a controversial doc-trine that the Sophistintroduces in 258d5259d7, is postulatedto explain that everything that is is. . . and is not. . . Let usexamine it briefly:

(i) 258e6259a2: The Parmenidean theory of an absoluteor nominal not-being(238c912), understood as contrary(258b3) to the absolute being, has been discarded sometime ago in the dialogue (237b), because it entails acomplete non-sense (259a1). Instead, the theory of the

2 Frede, Prdikation; Brown, Being,pp. 4970.


6/10

366

Fabin Mi

combination of the greatest kinds allows the Strangerfrom Elea to establish the realityof not-being (259a2),

understood as what supports the predication of some-thing different from what the subject really is.

(ii) 259a4b1: The contribution of the theory of the great-est kinds to the Platonic explanation of the negationis stated there in the following way:

(a) Being and difference go through all the kinds andthey interrelate with each other (259a46), in so far as

everything that is delimits their identity differentiat-ing themselves from a multiplicity of other things in

which this thing does not participate. Besides, whatis not delimits everything that is different from theproperties which constitute the identity of something.Consequently, what is not draws up the boundariesof the group of properties, which are equally realamong themselves, but different from those in which

a specific object participates.(b) Insofar as the not-being participates of being, it is; but,

since its own nature consists in delimiting everythingthat is different from what constitutes the specificidentity of a thing, the not-being is not the sameas

what a thing really is, but precisely different from it.Te reality o not-being consistsin that it is not(259a6b1). To make this possible, not-being does not have tobe understood in an absolute way, but as something

whichparticipates o being(258e67).

(iii) 259b16: The apparently paradoxical identity of not-being is solved if we take into account that being isnot, too, since what it is is not, for Plato, somethingundifferentiated. The bare factthat something is, doesnot entail that what is lacks relationships with different

properties. In other words, the apparent paradoxicalidentityof the Platonic being, which bears the dier-ence, is explained because being, just as not-being,is not for Plato the sign of an object. The nominal


7/10

367


grammatical form, the being, does not seem to havedeceived Plato, tempting him to postulate an object as

the reality apart rom the real objects. Being andnot-being do not have a nominal sense; the sentencesin which they appear mean the identity and the dif-ference, respectively. That is why, everything that isis. . .and is not. . . Being and not-being meanneither specific classes, like man or horse, norits contraries, but they constitute the ormal structurethrough which every specific determination is possible.3

Being and not-being are signs of the combinationamong ideas that constitute the reality o each object. Forthis reason, the being of something includes explicitlyor tacitly its difference with regard to other things

whose definitional properties are different from theones that constitute the own identity of the object(259b25).

(iv) 255c1213: The things which areare identicalor dierent,that is to say, what it is is always articulatedwhetherin an aff irmative way with the properties that consti-tute its identity, or in a negative way with those otherproperties from which it differentiates. Here, identityand difference are theormal structuresthatgo throughevery relationship among ideas making them possible,that is to say, making possible the determination ofeach entity via its participation in ideas. Somethingparticipates of the identity in so far as it takes partof those forms that determine its sameness. But theidentity, the same as the difference, is not one moreform of the same type of which an object participatesin the definition of its sameness. Identity and differenceare not specific kinds, but ideas thatormallystructurethe determination of any object. Negation is explained,then, through this structural form by which Socratessameness,in fact, delimits a scope of the incompatible

3 Gill, Method, section 5.2.


8/10

368

Fabin Mi

properties and different predicates that are notsaid ofit with truth.4

(v) Plato claims that the nature of otherness is divided inparts (257c5258c5, 258d5e3),5 which is coherent

with theormalityof this idea, since the parts of thedifference are delimited as those which are notthe sameas those that a certain thing participates in. Each partof not-being has, in this way, a positive reality, since

what is not. . . means only what is not F, G, H, solong as these properties do not constitute the samenessofx. However, as what is not is merely a property thatis found in an antitheticalrelationship (258b14), that isto say, it is incompatiblewith the ones that are the samein relation to x, the properties that are otherin relationto the ones that are said to be ofxwith truth are not,themselves, less real (258a9, b2, c3, e23). In fact,the negative predicates do not introduce not-objects,somethingcontrary to a Parmenidean absolute-being(258b3), but the parts of not-being are the correlatesof the negation applied to the assertive function of astatement that predicates certain things ofx.6

4. The negation explained in the metaphysical terms ofidentity and difference

Furthermore, the Platonic solution to the Parmenidean prob-lems of not-being and falsehood through a clarification of the use ofnot is sufficiently general so as to give space not only to contradic-tory predicates but also to contrary predicates. The contradictoryones are those which can be characterized as members of twostatements which, being mutually inconsistent, do not leave roomfor a third statement that includes a predicate inconsistent withboth previous statements. This is the case of the logically exhaus-tive antithesis, but scarcely informative, between big and notbig. On the other hand, contrary predicates are those that belong

4 For further details on this interpretation, see my book, Dialctica, pp. 47100.5 Owen, Not-Being, pp. 223267, 232ff.; Lee, Negation, 267303.6 Szaif, Wahrheit, pp. 436ff., 446453.


9/10

369


to sentences which can give room to a third statement including athird predicate that is inconsistent with the two initially opposite

predicates. This is the case of the antithesis between white andblack. There is a mutual relationship of opposition in antitheticalterms between what is and what is not (258b1).

Plato thinks that the restricted interweaving of the greatestkinds assures the participation between specific forms, and heassumes that this doctrine also allows us to justify the primarypredicative function of the language (259e46), saving it fromits annihilation. The diagnosis that motivates Platos therapy of

not, manifests that if we do exclude the combination amongforms, which is useful for giving account of our operation withthe negation, we will be deprived of the language (260a89).

This, in turn, supposes a frontal rejection to reduce the linguis-tic functions to naming, as well as to vindicate naming as theprimary linguistic function.

Finally, the Sophistmaintains that identification comes spe-cifically through a method of division, which aims to fix the

complex definition of a thing by means of genus and differentiae.Such a theory of definition implies a claim according to whichidentification entails the articulation of the multiplicity that iscomprised within the inner structure of each entity. In this way,the form of the difference plays, in the end, the role of a necessarypresupposition, to explain not onlypredication but also identifcation.

Translated by Marcela Leiva


10/10

370

Bibliography

Brown, Lesley. Being in the Sophist: A Syntactical Inquiry. In OxordStudies in Ancient Philosophy4 (1986): 4970.

Diels, Hermann, and Walther Kranz. Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker,3 Volumes. Berlin: Weidmann, 1903. 6th edition with final editingand revisions by W. Kranz, 1952. Editions after the 6th are mainlyreprints with little or no change. References are to the 199218 Edition.

Duke, E. A., W. F. Hicken, W. S. M. Nicoll, D. B. Robinson, J. C. G.Strachan, eds., PlatonisOpera. Tomus I. Tetralogias III continens.Recognoverunt brevique adnotatione critica instruxerunt. OxfordClassical Texts. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995.

Frede, Michael. Prdikation und Existenzaussage. Platons Gebrauch von . . .ist . . . und . . . ist nicht . . . im Sophistes. Gttingen: Vandenhoeck& Ruprecht, 1967.

Gill, Mary Louise. Method and Metaphysics in Platos SophistandStatesman. In Edward N. Zalta, ed., Te Stanford Encyclopedia ofPhilosophy(Fall 2008 Edition). Available online: http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/plato-sophstate/.

Heidegger, Martin. Platon: Sophistes. Gesamtausgabe II. Abteilung, Bd.19. Edited by I. Schssler. Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann, 1992.

Lee, E. N. Plato on Negation and Not-Being in the Sophist. In TePhilosophical Review 81 (1972): 267303.

Mi, Fabin. Dialctica, Predicacin y Metasica en Platn. Investigacionessobre elSofista y los Dilogos ardos. Crdoba: El Copista, 2004.

Owen, G. E. L. Plato on Not-Being. In Gregory Vlastos, ed., Plato I.Metaphysics and Epistemology. A Collection o Critical Essays(pp. 223267).Garden City: Doubleday & Anchor, 1971.

Ryle, Gilbert. Letters and Syllables in Plato. In TePhilosophical Review69 (1960): 431452.

Szaif, Jan. Platons Begri der Wahrheit. Freiburg im Breisgau/Mnchen:Alber, 19983.

Tugendhat, Ernst. Das Sein und das Nichts. In Philosophische Austze(pp. 3666). Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1992.

miÉ. plato's sophist on negation and not being

Documents