No Universal is a Substance

⊕ "universal" (καθ' ὅλου or καθόλου) means "on the whole, in general" as opposed to "particular" (καθ' ἕκαστον).

The word first becomes frequent in Aristotle.

"I call universal what is by its nature predicated of a number of things, and particular what is not; man, for instance, is a universal, Callias a particular" (On Interpretation 17a).

"One in number and particular are the same..., [and] universal over them" (Metaphysics III.999b). From the Categories to the Metaphysics, Aristotle changes his mind about the existence of general objects. In the Categories, they exist. In the Metaphysics, they do not.

We can begin to think about this by thinking about universal truths. ⊕
"Socrates... sought in ethical matters the universal and was the first to set thought on definitions. Plato followed him and assumed that the problem of definition is concerned not with any sensible thing but with beings of another kind; for the reason that there can be no common definition among the sensible things, as they are always changing. These beings he called ideas" (Metaphysics I.6.987b).

"But whereas Socrates regarded neither universals nor definitions as separate, they separated them and called these beings ideas. Hence on their view it followed by virtually the same argument that there are ideas of all terms which are predicated universally" (Metaphysics XIII.4.1078b).

"Plato and his followers considered the particulars among the sensibles to be in a state of flux, and that none of them persists, but that the universal exists besides them and is something other than them" (Metaphysics XIII.1086b).

When, for example, we say something is true of every man, we say something about men in general. For what we say to be true, it seems that there must be a fact of the matter about what a man is. Otherwise, it seems that what we say would be neither true nor false.

From the Categories to the Metaphysics

⊕

In the Categories, there is a fact of the matter. The general object man is a secondary substance, and something is a man just in case it is an atomic part of this general object.

"Every substance seems to signify a this. As regards the primary substances, it is indisputably true that each signifies a this; for the thing revealed is individual and one in number. But for the secondary substances, although it appears from the name--when one speaks of man or animal--that each likewise signifies a this, it is not true" (Categories 5.3b).

⊕
"It seems that separate (χωριστὸν) and a this (τόδε τι) belong most of all to substance" (Metaphysics VII.1029a).

"It is evident that nothing belonging as a universal is a substance because nothing predicated in common signifies a this [and a substance is a this]" (Metaphysics VII.1038b). In the Metaphysics, because he thinks he had been wrong about what the primary substances are, Aristotle proceeds must more cautiously. This is an improvement over the dogmatism with which he seems to proceed in the Categories. In the Metaphysics, Aristotle sets out what he takes to be initially plausible conditions soomething must meet to be a substance. He is aware that nothing obviously meets these conditions, and he restarts his inquiry with the possibility that there might be a way of thinking about forms so that they are substances.

This frees Aristotle to give up the existence of general objects altogether if his investigation gives him a different way to explain why there is a fact of the matter about what man is, and this in fact seems to be what happens in the Metaphysics. Once Aristotle no longer thinks he needs man for his explanation of the fact of the matter, the general objects he had recognized as secondary substances in the Categories fall out his ontology in the Metaphysics. Man is not a this and an individual. Nor is it a quality. Qualities are how something is, not what it is.

The Reality of the Natural Kinds

How, in the Metaphysics, does Aristotle explain the fact of the matter about what man is?

⊕   "We usually posit some one form in connection with each set of many things to which we apply the same name. Or don’t you understand?
  I do.
  Then in the present case, too, let’s take any set of many things you like. For example, there are, if you like, many couches and tables.
  Of course.
  But the forms connected to these manufactured items are surely just two, one of a couch and one of a table.
  Yes" (Republic X.596a). He appeals to numerically distinct forms that are the same in account. He thinks the form of a natural body is the organization of the material so that it is a member of a natural kind. These organizations are all the same in account. Human beings are all organizations in the form of a rational animal, and this makes it true to say every man is a rational animal.

This means that for there to be natural kinds, we do not need there to be general objects.

"Those who speak of the forms speak correctly that they are separate if they are substances, but incorrectly that the form is the one over many (Metaphysics VII.16.1040b).

Separate from Matter in Account

⊕ "Substance without matter is the what it is to be" (Metaphysics VII.1032b).

"If the line when divided perishes into its halves, or the man into flesh and bones and sinews, it does not follow that they are constituted out of these as parts of their substance, but rather that they are constituted out of them as their matter; and these are parts of the composite, but not of the form and of which the account is; and therefore neither are they included in the accounts" (Metaphysics VII.11.1035a).

"For things that are seen to be induced in specifically different materials, as a circle is in bronze and stone and wood, it seems clear that neither the bronze nor the stone belong at all to the substance of the circle, because it is separate from them. As for things which are not seen separated, there is no reason why the same should not apply to them; if all the circles that had ever been seen were bronze; for the bronze would none the less be no part of the form" (Metaphysics VII.11.1036a31).

"[W]e have shown that the material parts of a thing cannot be present in the account of the substance since they are not parts of that substance" (Metaphysics VII.11.1037a). This helps us begin to see how Aristotle replies to an argument for separate forms of the sort we saw in the Phaedo and that Aristotle himself knew from his time in the Academy.

       1.  Human beings change, but what it is to be human does not.
       2.  If (1) is true, then forms exist apart from the sensible objects.
     ----
       3.  Forms exist apart from the sensible objects.

Aristotle does not think we need a general object to explain why what it is to be human does not change. It is enough that the forms of human beings are separate in account from the matter they organize. Human beings are material beings who have the potential to change, but separateness from matter in account means that the forms of human beings do not change.

This, it seems, is Aristotle's view, but it is confusing to think about.

We need to see why the form of a human being is not subject to change even though it cannot exist apart from the matter it organizes. Aristotle tries to show us how to work through the puzzles that block our progress, but these discussions in the Metaphysics are hard to follow.

Perseus Digital Library

Aristotle, Metaphysics

Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, A Greek-English Lexicon

⊕ καθόλου (from κατά + ὅλου), katholou, adverb, "on the whole, in general"

κατά ὅλου elides to καθ' ὅλου. Authors before Aristotle use κατά ὅλου and καθ' ὅλου.

"[L]ike men who are unable to express themselves I won't try to deal with the matter as a whole (κατὰ ὅλον) but will take up a part and use it as an example to try to show you my meaning" (Plato, Republic III.392d).

τι, ti, indefinite prounoun, (τόδε τι = "a this," "some this," "a something")
τόδε, tode, demonstrative pronoun, "this"
χωριστός, chōristos, adjective, "separable"

"[In Metaphysics Z 13, Aristotle] argues at length that no universal can be a substance. But since he also wants forms to be substances, he has to deny that forms are universal. And, in fact, we do find him claiming that the form of a particular object is peculiar to that object, just as its matter is; Socrates' form, i.e., his soul, is different from Plato's form, i.e., Plato's soul (Met. Δ 1, 1071a 24-29). ⊕ We even find Aristotle claiming that the form is a particular this (a tode ti [a τόδε τι]; 8, 1017b 25; Η I, 1042a 29; Δ 7, 1049a 28-29; De gen. et corr. 318b 32). And, of course, he has to claim that a form is a particular this, if he wants forms to be substances, since he assumes that a substance has to be a particular this. It was for this reason that Aristotle rejected the claim of matter to be substance; matter is only potentially a particular this" (Michael Frede, "Substance in Aristotle's Metaphysics," 77. Essays in Ancient Philosophy, 72-80).

"It is a basic nontrivial fact about the world [according to Aristotle] that things come with forms that are exactly alike, and not just sufficiently similar to class them together in one kind. The reality of kinds amounts to no more than this: that the specification of the form of particular objects turns out to be exactly the same for a variety of objects. But for this to be true, there is no need for a universal form or a universal kind, either a species or a genus. And, in fact, the import of [Metaphysics] Z 13 seems to be that there are no substantial genera or species in the ontology of the Metaphysics" (Michael Frede, "Substance in Aristotle's Metaphysics," 78. Essays in Ancient Philosophy, 72-80).