Being As a Kind in Plato's Sophist

Being as a Kind in Plato’s Sophist

Roberto Granieri

A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor in Philosophy Department of Philosophy University of Toronto

Being as a Kind in Plato’s Sophist

Roberto Granieri

Doctor in Philosophy Department of Philosophy University of Toronto 2021

Abstract

What is being for Plato? While in several dialogues ‘being’ (to on, ousia) typically designates the intelligible domain in general, in the Sophist Plato was led, through his engagement with the paradox of falsehood and the problem of not-being, to single out being as just one among the kinds

(or forms) – notably, one of the so-called ‘greatest kinds’. Surprisingly little effort has been devoted by scholars to working out the motivations and implications of this move. I shall argue that the kind being, just like any other kind (or form), is first and foremost conceived of by Plato as a robust causal principle. It is not a most generic genus encompassing all other genera, but the entity metaphysically responsible for the property named after it, viz. being (simpliciter). Against the current orthodoxy, I therefore think that the famous slogan ‘to be is to be something’, often taken to capture a fundamental truth of Plato’s conception of being, does not fit the Sophist.

Further, this also means that, unlike many modern philosophers, Plato conceives of being as a real property. What property? Although the Sophist is not fully explicit on this point, Plato probably suggests that it is the property of having ‘the power to act or to be acted upon’, which can be interpreted as the power to take part in a causal relation. Finally, I argue that the isolation of a kind being is a necessary condition for Plato’s account of not-being. Were there no kind being, Plato could not bring his ambitious project about not-being to completion.

G.G.

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Acknowledgments

I would like to thank my committee members for their guidance and support over the years. Lloyd

Gerson has from first to last been a source of inspiration, wise counsel, insightful suggestions and benevolent criticisms. His dedication and constant encouragement to raise the bar have been greatly beneficial all along. I am indebted to Rachel Barney for many rewarding conversations, helpful comments on my written work and precious advice of various kind at crucial junctures.

George Boys-Stones contributed decisively to shaping my dissertation project and his generous and expert assistance has been essential to bring it to completion. James Allen’s constructive criticisms and suggestions saved me from many errors and pushed me both to better discipline my thoughts and to express them more clearly.

The Department of Philosophy and the Collaborative Program in Ancient and Medieval

Philosophy of the University of Toronto have provided a very friendly and intellectually stimulating environment. John Magee has been an inspiring and committed mentor and a unique model of scholar. Martin Pickavé first welcomed me in Toronto and gave me useful suggestions at important moments. A special debt is owed to my friends and fellow students Taylor Barinka, Doug Campbell,

Anthony Fredette, Mark Gatten, Francesco Pica, Matt Watton and Simon Whedbee.

I also wish to express my gratitude to some Italian scholars, on whose encouragement and feedback I have been able to count even after leaving Italy: Francesco Ademollo, Francesco

Caruso, Riccardo Chiaradonna, Giulia De Cesaris, Paolo Fait, Franco Ferrari, Francesco

Fronterotta and Federico Petrucci. Professor Anna Maria Ioppolo’s mentorship, perspective and unstinting support have proved invaluable to me throughout the years. The news of her sudden death reaches me as I am about to submit this thesis and causes me deep sorrow.

I have spent the last year and a half of my doctorate as a visiting student at the École Normale

Supérieure, rue d’Ulm. I would like to thank the Philosophy Department there, and especially

Dimitri El Murr for his gracious hospitality. In Paris I have had the good fortune to discuss aspects of my work with Professors Jonathan Barnes, Luc Brisson, Tiziano Dorandi and Pierre-Marie

Morel. To all my heartfelt thanks.

My mother and Stefano have unfailingly given me strength through times good and bad.

Chiara has borne up with my period of gestation and her big eyes see where I cannot, dans l’empire des lumières.

Paris, January 2021

Table of Contents

Preliminary note ...... iii

Introduction ...... 1

Chapter 1 The Question of Being in the Sophist ...... 15

1.1 What is Being? ...... 15

1.2 The Kind Being and the Definiendum of the Question ‘What is Being?’ ...... 29

Chapter 2 Being and Participation ...... 48

2.1. Forms, Participation and Causality ...... 48

2.2. The Kind Being as a Cause and Being as a Property...... 59

2.3. Being and Participation in Parmenides’ D2 ...... 75

2.4. Coda: Is the Kind Being itself a Being? Yes ...... 78

Chapter 3 All-Pervasiveness and Combination ...... 83

3.1. Vowel Analogy ...... 84

3.2. All-Pervasiveness: Fictions, Porphyrian Trees and the Philosopher’s Object ...... 95

3.3. Combination ...... 115

Chapter 4 Remarks on the Verb ‘To Be’ ...... 137

4.1. Traditional and Revisionist Interpretations ...... 137

4.2. The Semantic-Continuity Thesis ...... 147

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Chapter 5 Quantification, Modality and Power ...... 158

5.1. Existence and Quantification ...... 161

5.2. Existence and Modality ...... 168

5.3. The Dunamis Proposal ...... 170

Chapter 6 Being and Not-Being ...... 194

6.1. The ‘Parity Assumption’: Its Formulation and Background ...... 198

6.2. The Outcome: Not-Beings and the Form of Not-Being ...... 200

Conclusion ...... 228

Appendix Not-Being, Contradiction and Difference: Simplicius vs Alexander of Aphrodisias 233

Bibliography ...... 242

Preliminary note

The Greek text of Plato’s dialogues is cited in the standard editions of Duke et alii 1995 (first two tetralogies) and Burnet 1900-1907 (other dialogues). I have availed myself of the translations of

Rowe 2015 (Sophist) and Cooper 1997 (other dialogues), both with modifications. Editions and translations of all other ancient and medieval texts I quote are mentioned in the first sub-section of the Bibliography.

The following abbreviations are used:

DK Diels, Hermann-Kranz, Walter (1951-26) (eds.), Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker,

3 vols. Dublin-Zürich.

IP2 Isnardi Parente, Margherita (2012) (introd., ed., Ital. transl. and comm.), Senocrate

e Ermodoro: testimonianze e frammenti, ed. by T. Dorandi. Pisa.

LSJ Liddell, Henry George-Scott, Robert (19409), A Greek–English Lexicon, rev. by

H.R. Jones. Oxford.

SVF von Arnim, Hans (1903-24) (ed.), Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta, 4 vols. Leipzig.

Names and writings of ancient Greek and Latin authors are abbreviated as in LSJ and P.G.W.

Glare, Oxford Latin Dictionary (Oxford, 20122). Works of secondary literature are standardly referred to by the author’s last name and the publication date of the consulted edition of the work.

Where it seems appropriate, I specify the first edition of the cited work, by adding a further date in square brackets next to the publication date (e.g. Lafrance 2015 [1981]). Journal abbreviations in the Bibliography follow those given in L’Année Philologique.

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Introduction

The scope of the present enquiry. The following is an examination of Plato’s treatment of being in the Sophist. This dialogue contains Plato’s most extended discussion of the topic of being, a characteristic that is also reflected in its ancient subtitle, ‘On Being’ (περὶ τοῦ ὄντος), later translated into Latin by Marsilio Ficino as ‘de ente’1. My project arises from the following issue: in several dialogues, especially the Republic, ‘being’ (τὸ ὄν, οὐσία) refers to the intelligible domain in general2, typically contrasted by Plato with the inconstant flux and variety of perceptible things, collectively oft-termed ‘becoming’ (γένεσις); yet, in the Sophist Plato also singles out being as just one among the kinds (or forms)3. Notably, he gave it pride of place as one of the so-called ‘greatest

1 Cf. D.L. 3.58.644 and Ficino, in Sph. 219.1 On the ancient double titles of Plato’s dialogues, cf. Mansfeld 1994:

71-4. Notomi 1999: 10-19 provides a useful overview of the ancient debate on the subject (σκοπός) of the Sophist. 2 Cf. e.g. R. 486a9; 508d5; 521d4; 523a3; 525b5; 525c6; 526e6; 534a3; Ti. 52d3. In some cases, a qualification is added through an adverb or adjective, cf. e.g. Phdr. 249c4, Phlb. 59d4: τὸ ὂν ὄντως; Phdr. 247c7: οὐσία ὄντως οὖσα; R. 477a3: τὸ παντελῶς ὂν; 477a7, 478d7: τοῦ εἰλικρινῶς ὄντος; 490b5: τῷ ὄντι ὄντως; Sph. 246b8: τὴν ἀληθινὴν οὐσίαν; 248a11: τὴν ὄντως οὐσίαν; Ti. 27d6: τὸ ὂν ἀεί; 37e5: τὴν ἀίδιον οὐσίαν; 52c5-6: τῷ δὲ ὄντως ὄντι. These passages also show that Plato does not refrain from using ‘ὄν’ and ‘οὐσία’ interchangeably, cf. Peipers 1883: 3, 67 and passim. 3 Plato often uses ‘γένος’ and ‘εἶδος’ synonymously, especially in the ‘later’ dialogues, to refer to the intelligible

Forms. Compare e.g. Prm. 129a1 (εἶδος) with 129c2 (τὰ γένη τε καὶ εἴδη); Prm. 135a8 (γένος) with b7 (εἶδος); and Sph. 254c3-4 (τῶν εἰδῶν τῶν µεγίστων λεγοµένων ἄττα) with 254d4-5 (µέγιστα µὴν τῶν γενῶν). See below p. 35-6 nn.1-3 for further details. I shall hereafter capitalize the terms ‘form’ and ‘kind’ to refer to the proprietary Platonic concepts. Note also that ‘ὄν’ and ‘οὐσία’ are used interchangeably even in relation to the Kind Being, cf. Sph. 250c2, 256a1 (τὸ ὄν) and Sph. 250b9, 251e11, 252a2 (οὐσία). Finally, note that the two meanings of ‘ὄν’ and ‘οὐσία’ just

Kinds’. My main purpose here is to investigate the philosophical motivations and implications of

Plato’s isolation of a Kind Being in the Sophist4. Thus, this dissertation may be seen as an attempt to make progress in the understanding of Plato’s distinctive contribution to the study of being – labelled ‘ontology’ by early modern philosophers5 – and in the elaboration of an adequate answer to the question: what is being for Plato?

Justifications for this study. The ancient Platonists often proved judiciously sensitive to the above distinction between referents of ‘being’ in Plato’s works. Thus, at the beginning of De Principiis

Book II, Damascius makes the following preliminary remark:

mentioned (intelligible world in general, and one of the Forms) by no means exhaust semantic ranges of these terms, which of course include non-technical senses too, cf. again Peipers 1883 for a full survey; and des Places 1981 [1961] for a more concise overview. Notably, in several dialogues, e.g. Euthyphro (11a-b), Meno (72a-b) or Phaedo (76d), Plato employs ‘οὐσία’ for the ‘what it is’ sought in Socratic inquiry. Arguably, this is the foundation for the aforementioned use of the same term for the intelligible domain in general: in other words, ‘οὐσία’ is used for any or all essences sought through Socratic ‘what is F?’ inquiries. 4 A Form of Being might cursorily be mentioned even at Prm. 136b6, where τὸ εἶναι is listed, with ὁµοιότης,

κίνησις, στάσις and others, among ‘those things that one might above all grasp by means of reason and might think to be Forms’ (135e2-4: ἃ µάλιστά τις ἂν λόγῳ λάβοι καὶ εἴδη ἂν ἡγήσαιτο εἶναι). But even if one granted that τὸ εἶναι should be identified with the Sophist’s Kind Being (see n.6 below), the Parmenides offers no significant insights on how to account for this notion, let alone a metaphysical analysis of it comparable in scope and depth to that of the Sophist. Furthermore, at Tht. 185c9-10 οὐσία is listed among those ‘common things’ (κοινά) deployed by the soul independently of its use of sense-organs. But the ontological status of these ‘common things’ is highly controversial. Notably, it is far from clear whether they should sic et simpliciter be identified with the familiar Platonic Forms (cf. Ferrari 2008 for some cautious remarks). Thus, all things considered, it seems safe, for an adequate investigation of the concept of Being as Kind, to limit the field of exploration to the Sophist, which undoubtedly contains the most informative and ample discussion of that concept. Nota bene: I do not mean to suggest a developmental story according to which Plato changed his mind regarding the appropriate referent of ‘τὸ ὄν’ and ‘οὐσία’ (Forms collectively in the ‘middle’ dialogues; the Kind Being in the ‘later’ ones). The two referents reflect two complementary metaphysical views that Plato developed by dealing with different problems. I shall return to this point in the conclusions. 5 Cf. Devaux-Lamanna 2009.

Before all, one must distinguish what the terms signify. For being is also said to be one

of the genera of being, which is opposed to not-being, and is contradistinguished with

respect to the other genera. This being has the character of form; but it is among the

five simple forms, together with the other four genera. And in the Parmenides, before

the hypotheses, [Plato] assimilated this form to the generic forms. In another sense,

Being is also said to be the entire pleroma of kinds, since we properly call it substance,

as Plotinus does6.

Damascius speaks for himself, but traces his view back to Plato (and Plotinus). A similar observation is made by his pupil Simplicius, in response to a criticism by Alexander of Aphrodisias against Plato’s alleged posit of absolute not-being as a Kind7:

It is necessary to comprehend that the being assumed by Plato [scil. in the Sophist] is

what is studied in accordance with the bare peculiarity of being itself, which is set in

the division against both the other genera and not-being. For he says that this too is a

genus, but not perfect being which contains all the genera in itself. To that, perfect not-

6 Pr. II 56.9-16: Πρὸ δὴ πάντων τὰ σηµαινόµενα διαιρετέον τῶν ὀνοµάτων. Λέγεται γὰρ ὂν καὶ ἕν τι τῶν γενῶν

τοῦ ὄντος, ἀντικείµενον τῷ µὴ ὄντι, καὶ ἀντιδιῃρηµένον τοῖς ἄλλοις γένεσιν· εἰδητικόν γε ὂν τοῦτο ὄν, ἀλλ’εἰδῶν τῶν ἁπλῶν µετὰ τῶν ἄλλων τεσσάρων γενῶν. Καὶ ἐν <Παρµενίδῃ> πρὸ τῶν ὑποθέσεων συγκατείληχε καὶ τοῦτο τοῖς γενικοῖς εἴδεσιν. Ἕτερον δὲ λέγεται ὂν τὸ ὁλοφυὲς πλήρωµα τῶν γενῶν, ὅπερ οὐσίαν ἰδίως καλοῦµεν, ὡς ὁ Πλωτῖνος (I slightly modify Ahbel-Rappe’s translation). Damascius identifies τὸ εἶναι at Prm. 136b6 (‘ἐν <Παρµενίδῃ> πρὸ τῶν

ὑποθέσεων’) with the Sophist’s Kind Being. For the meaning of ‘πλήρωµα’ in this passage, compare Procl. in Ti. III 8.18; in Prm. 763.18; 800.10. The Plotinian reference is in all likelihood to II 6.1.1-5. 7 For this criticism cf. Simp. in Ph. 136.10-11. I examine the polemics between Simplicius and Alexander in the Appendix.

being would be opposed, if it is possible to speak of opposing with regard to it. This

kind of being would not be a genus, if genera are opposed to one another in a division8.

Modern commentators have not shown a comparable interest in this distinction between being qua intelligible realm and being qua single Kind, and its ontological implications9. Notably, surprisingly little effort has been devoted to working out the reasons and significance of the isolation of a Kind Being in the Sophist10. Undoubtedly, throughout the last two centuries this dialogue has steadily attracted considerable interest and generated vigorous debates, notably in

English-language scholarship subsequent to the appearance of Cornford’s epoch-making

8 in Ph. 136.21-27: Ἐννοῆσαι δὲ χρὴ ὅτι τὸ ὑπὸ τοῦ Πλάτωνος εἰληµµένον ὄν ἐστι τὸ κατ’ αὐτὴν τοῦ εἶναι τὴν

ἰδιότητα ψιλὴν θεωρούµενον, ὃ καὶ ἀντιδιῄρηται πρός τε τὰ ἄλλα γένη καὶ πρὸς τὸ µὴ ὄν· καὶ γὰρ τοῦτο γένος εἶναί φησιν, ἀλλ’ οὐχὶ τὸ παντελῶς ὂν τὸ καὶ τὰ γένη πάντα ἐν ἑαυτῷ συνῃρηκός· ᾧ τὸ παντελῶς µὴ ὂν ἀντικέοιτο, εἰ καὶ τὸ ἀντικεῖσθαι δυνατὸν ἐπ’ αὐτοῦ λέγειν. τὸ δὲ τοιοῦτον ὂν οὐκ ἂν εἴη γένος, εἴπερ τὰ γένη ἐναντία διαιρέσει ἐστὶ τῇ πρὸς ἄλληλα (I slightly modify Huby’s translation). I take ‘τὸ παντελῶς µὴ ὂν’ to be equivalent to Plato’s ‘τὸ µηδαµῶς ὄν’ (cf. e.g., Sph. 237b7-8) or ‘τὸ µηδαµῇ ὄν’ (cf. e.g., R. 477a6). 9 This holds true even of Peipers 1883, who only touches upon the problem (cf. esp. pp. 332-3). Peipers’ book remains the only (if generally neglected) comprehensive treatment of Plato’s ontology, albeit limited in a number of ways. Notably, Peipers – just like Berger 1961 – mostly aimed at a diligent collection of all the Platonic passages in which the vocabulary of being is at work, rather than at a critical exploration of the philosophical problems Plato was concerned with when he discussed the topic of being (cf. already Shorey 1982 [1884]: 1 n.1, 29 n.30 for a similar complaint). In fact, a fresh and systematic philosophical study of Plato’s conception of being, spanning the whole corpus and comparable in scope to those of Owens 1978 [1951] and Aubenque 1962 on Aristotle, is, to the best of my knowledge, still a desideratum of Platonic scholarship. 10 Campbell 1867: LXXVII glances at the problem and (what I regard as) its correct solution, but then spoils his insight (LXXXV-VI) by ending up conflating what he had previously distinguished (i.e., in his words: ‘Being’ as the sum of true positive determinations and ‘Being’ as one of several Kinds). Cornford 1935: 292-3 and, more recently,

Centrone 2008: LVII and Hestir 2016: 135-6 see the ambiguity too, but do not dwell on it in any serious detail. Gill 2012 might be another partial exception. Although she does not in fact problematizes the distinction between being qua whole eidetic domain and being qua individual Kind, she devotes several pages to the metaphysical analysis of the Form of Being. Notably she identifies it with the philosopher’s object, i.e. the subject matter of philosophy. I will critically assess this construal in §3.2.

commentary in 1935. In particular, Platonic studies abound in sophisticated and enlightening treatments of the topics of being and not-being in the Sophist11. Nevertheless, especially after

Kahn’s pioneering works on the verb ‘to be’ in ancient Greek12, most of these studies have been characterized by a pronounced tendency to adopt a purely language-focused approach, which has led their authors to concentrate in large part on the notorious question of the distinction of the senses or uses of ‘εἶναι’ in this dialogue13. With that, the very fact that the Sophist singles out a Kind Being

– which is first and foremost a metaphysical fact, not a linguistic one – has remained, I believe, without a satisfactory explanation and has instead generally been taken for granted as an unproblematic datum. In my view – a view for which the present study as a whole constitutes a defence – this aspect of Plato’s metaphysics is instead worth puzzling over and carries considerable implications. The first justification of this dissertation is therefore found in the present lack of any satisfactory systematic examination of the subject, and in the intrinsic importance of that subject for an adequate interpretation both of Plato’s project in the Sophist and of his metaphysics more generally.

11 Cf. e.g. Ackrill 1957; Moravcsik 1962; Frede 1967; Malcolm 1967; Owen 1971; Graeser 1982; Heinamann

1983; Bostock 1984; Roberts 1986; Dixsaut 1991b; Brown 1999 [1986]; Frede 1992; Brown 1994; O’Brien 1995; Fronterotta 1995; Szaif 1998; Burnyeat 2003; Leigh 2008; Fronterotta 2011; Crivelli 2012; Gill 2012. I will not attempt here to give an overview of scholarly debate on the Sophist. I will confine myself to identifying the main lines of research relevant to my topic. 12 Cf. Kahn 2003 [1973] and the papers collected in Kahn 2009. 13 Prominent examples of this tendency include the studies of Ackrill, Frede, Malcolm, Owen, Bostock, Brown ad Burnyeat cited above at n.11. Owen’s introductory words to his celebrated essay are paradigmatic in this regard: ‘The Sophist will turn out to be primarily an essay in problems of reference and predication and in the incomplete uses of the verb associated with these’ (Owen 1971: 225). On this exegetical approach to the Sophist see the salutary remarks by Neal in Bluck 1975 [1963]: 9-12. More general observations on the interest of analytic philosophers in the

Sophist can be read in White 1993: VII-IX, XIX-XXI.

The isolation of a Kind Being had far-reaching consequences on the subsequent history of philosophy. In the seventh aporia of Metaphysics B Aristotle levelled a momentous, if quite brief, criticism against the notion of being as a genos14. According to Aristotle, being cannot be a genos because, on his theory of predication (cf. esp. Top. Δ 4), a genos is not predicated of its own differentiae (‘animal’ is not predicated of ‘rational’, but of ‘human being’); but being is predicated of everything, including its own differentiae (for each differentia is); therefore, being is not a genos. This famous argument provides the ultimate rationale for Aristotle’s claim that ‘being is said in many ways’, and so for no less than his doctrine of the categories. Plato is not overtly mentioned in this passage, but it is widely acknowledged that he is the target of criticism. Thus, one of the most influential and persistent theories in the entire history of philosophy ultimately stemmed from a critical assessment of the Platonic concept of a Kind Being. Accordingly, a second justification for the present work lies in the significance of Plato’s isolation of a Kind Being for the subsequent developments of the history of philosophy.

There is also a third justification. Over the last seventy years, Platonic studies have seen the emergence and strengthening of a consensus regarding Plato’s conception of being. This consensus is aptly summarized by the famous slogan, authoritatively introduced by G.E.L. Owen, that for

Plato ‘to be is to be something’15. We shall see in due course that the statement of the slogan might

14 Cf. Metaph. B 3.998b22-7; and, for analyses, Berti 1979, 2009; Shields 1999: 247-59; Barnes 2003: 329-36

(who is also worth consulting, with De Haas 1997: 237-50, for remarks on the late antique reception of this argument). This is the only passage where the argument that being is not a γένος is properly spelled out by Aristotle. In those other passages in which this claim appears, the argument is simply assumed, cf. e.g. Top. Δ 6.127a26-39; APo. B 7.97b14; Metaph. H 6.1045a36-b7. For the logical foundations of the argument, cf. Top. Δ 2.122b18-24. 15 The slogan was first stated in Owen 1965: 71 as ‘to be is to be something or other’. Then Owen 1971: 265 n.178 expressly shortened it as ‘to be is to be something’, which he presumed more perspicuous. The slogan sounds to my ears as a companion of the Quinean adages ‘to be is to be the value of a bound variable’ and ‘no entity without

be open to different readings16. But one common way of making sense of this slogan is the following: Plato does not conceive of existence as an independent notion, but thinks that to exist always means to exemplify or instantiate a determinate property (different from sheer being)17.

Thus, to say that ‘X is’ is not to ascribe some putative independent property of existence to X, but is a way of suggesting that X has a certain nature or is variously characterized18. More generally, those scholars who endorse this Owenian slogan typically go so far as to say, with Kahn, that

‘existence does not emerge as a distinct concept in ancient philosophy’19. It is worth noting that

identity’, as well as of the Kantian maxim ‘existence is not a real predicate’. I will return to all these sayings in ch.5. Among the few dissenting voices that have spoken out against Owen’s slogan see Heinaman 1983; Rosen 1983: 229- 44; O’Brien 2013a, 2013b and 2020; Fronterotta 2011. My debt to these interpreters will be evident. Note, however, that none of them substantiates their critique with a detailed metaphysical analysis of Being as a Kind. 16 See below especially ch.5. 17 Cf. the helpful concise overview provided by Galluzzo 2011: 37-8. 18 This intentionally vague summary of the consensus view will be spelled out in ch.5. 19 Cf. Kahn 1976. Notice that this is more than a linguistic or lexicographical point. What Kahn wanted to stress is not just that ancient Greek did not possess separate words – as English and other modern languages do – for ‘to exist’ and ‘to be’; it is not even that ‘exsistentia’ or ‘existentia’ is a word of late appearance (which is in any case true, cf. Carraud 2003: part. 7-8 and n.19). Kahn’s point is rather the more ambitious one that ‘the topic of existence is not thematized in Greek discussions of Being’ (Kahn 2009: 4) and that ‘existence in the modern sense becomes a central concept in philosophy only in the period when Greek ontology is radically revised in the light of a metaphysics of creation’ (Kahn 1976: 323). A similar thesis has been recently defended in what promises to be the most extensive and detailed reconstruction of the history of the concept of existence (of which only the first volume has so far appeared), namely Bardout 2013: 19-84, who maintains that the reflection on being prior to the age of Marius Victorinus constitutes ‘un paysage ontologique privé d’existence’ (p.50) – though he also lets slip, surprisingly enough, that ‘si le mot [scil. ‘existentia’] s’est fait attendre, le besoin d’exhiber un sens pour ainsi dire non essentiel de l’étant (on) ou de l’essence s’était déjà manifesté’ (p.64). Already Carraud 2003 (whose influence on Bardout is palpable and acknowledged) argued the notion of existence was a novelty of Victorinus’ Christological thought and was ‘un philosophème neuf, qui est d’abord un théologoumène – entendons un concept forgé en métaphysique pour penser une thèse de théologie trinitaire, et non pas avancé pour des fins métaphysiques. Autrement dit, exsistentia est

this communis opinio on Plato’s conception of being is not unique to (though perhaps more widespread among) scholars working in Owen’s footsteps, or to analytically trained historians more generally. In fact, Gilson had already indpendently come to a similar conclusion. In Being and Some Philosophers he stated, with customary boldness, that ‘to the question: in what sense can it be said that a Platonic Idea is, there is but one answer: it is in the sense that it is wholly and exclusively that which it is […] the Platonic notion of being is not only entirely foreign to existence, but inconsistent with it’20. This interpretation of Plato’s conception of being is therefore orthogonal to the notorious analytic-continental divide (assuming that there actually is such a beast) and defences of it have come from many quarters.

In my view, a proper metaphysical analysis of Plato’ concept of a Kind Being enables us to question the core of this entrenched orthodoxy. I want to show that when being is metaphysically analyzed by Plato in terms of participation in the Kind Being (X is, because it partakes in the Kind

Being), as is so often the case in the Sophist, ‘to be’ does not stand for ‘to be something’, or ‘to be itself’, or ‘to be variously characterized’ (or similar) but should be understood in terms of existence

– though, nota bene, neither according to the quantified notion of existence that the Frege-Russell tradition has made us familiar with, nor according to the modal notion of existence that has had a long course in the history of philosophy, especially after Avicenna. Hence, the third main justification of the present work is that it aims to challenge the current consensus on a crucial aspect of Plato’s metaphysics and of the history of metaphysics more generally.

la solution métaphysique précise et technique à un problème théologique’ (2003: 24). See also Courtine 2004: 402-4. Interestingly enough, none of these authors dwells on (or even mentions) the Sophist.

20 Gilson 1952: 15, 33 (emphasis in the text). See also the works of Bardout and Carraud cited in the previous note, where a similar point is implicit.

Limits and methodology. It is also apposite to say something on what this thesis is not meant to be and which methodological principles will guide it.

First, this is not a complete and systematic account of Plato’s conception of being. While I will not refrain from turning, whenever appropriate, to passages from other dialogues (of any period of Plato’s philosophical career), the focus of my study, as its title suggests, will be confined to the Sophist. This is not because I subscribe to an ‘atomistic’ exegetical approach to Plato’s

œuvre that treats each dialogue as an isolated unit. To be sure, each dialogue has its own literary unity, argumentative and doctrinal specificities and should first be investigated within the framework of its own dramatic setting, aims and strategies. But I have little confidence that this should imply the denial en bloc of the possibility of interpreting the dialogues conjointly, let alone that there is no consistent doctrinal content that can be extrapolated from them. As the late Mario

Vegetti has perceptively written, ‘the dialogues contain theoretical nuclei, doctrinal segments that are explicitly referred to, summarized, discussed and reworked in a plurality of other texts. These recurrent nuclei are therefore at least partially sheltered from dialogic contextualization and present a transversal constancy’21. Instead, the reason why I chose to concentrate on the Sophist is that the account of being developed in this dialogue is sufficiently complex and wide, and has such distinctive specificities (notably, the isolation of a Kind Being) to deserve a treatment in its own right, at least for the purposes of a doctoral dissertation.

Second, this is not a commentary (not even a selective one) on the Sophist. As I shall clear up in the next sub-section of this Introduction, I have found it expedient, for the sake of exposition, to follow for the most part the internal order of the Sophist’s text in my discussion and I will not abstain from dwelling (sometimes at considerable length) on certain chunks of text to explain them

21 Vegetti 2003: 80 (English translation is mine).

in detail. Nevertheless, my aim is not to provide a thorough explanation of the text of the dialogue for its own sake, but to address a precise philosophical problem thematized in it and explore how

Plato dealt with this problem. Thus, significant portions of the Sophist that are not directly relevant to the issue in hand will either be discussed selectively, or left out of consideration altogether.

This leads me to my third remark: the present work is primarily a philosophical study, not a philological one. This does not mean that I have not employed all the philological tools of textual analysis that are in my capacities. It only means that, although I shall discuss some matters of textual criticism, their place in my discussion will be marginal, and I will predominantly be interested in discussing philosophical problems, doctrines and arguments and therefore in gaining a philosophical understanding of Plato’s notion of Being as a Kind. In doing so, however, I will endeavor to minimize as much as possible the impact of a contemporary (and therefore potentially anachronistic) standpoint on the examination of texts. Although it will sometimes prove fruitful to put Plato in dialogue with some contemporary (as well as medieval and early modern) conceptions of being, and although I will in some cases avail myself of notions introduced in recent philosophy for interpretative purposes, I will nevertheless strive to take as my starting point the philosophical questions that, in my view, Plato himself was concerned with, as opposed to those that a contemporary philosopher would deem significant22. Notably – as I mentioned before – unlike other scholars who have dealt with Plato’s views on being in recent decades, I will not prioritize the notorious problem of the distinction of the senses or uses of to verb ‘to be’, a problem that has preoccupied most analytically oriented metaphysicians, logicians and philosophers of language of the last century. Instead, I will regard as my governing investigandum Plato’s isolation of a Kind

22 This differentiates my approach from that of other interpreters, e.g. Crivelli 2012: 11.

Being, to explore its motivations and implications, and discuss the problem of Plato’s uses of

‘εἶναι’ specifically in relation to it.

Fourth, some portions of the following chapters will be devoted to the discussion and critical assessment of interpretations that differ from mine, with the consequent drawback of a temporary interruption of the direct analysis of Plato’s texts. I deemed, however, that especially in consideration of the Pantagruelian abundance of the secondary literature on Plato’s Sophist (which

I endeavored to scrutinize the most thoroughly I could) this was a price worth paying, persuaded as I am of Cherniss’ wise warning that ‘there can be no approach to common agreement on more general issues until scholars stop passing by in silence the discordant interpretations of specific passages on which any sound decision of those larger issues must depend’23.

The structure of this study. To make progress with my question about how Plato conceived of a

Kind Being, the best strategy, I think, will be to work through this difficult text by following its internal order. Thus, the present work divides into six chapters (plus an appendix), taking as its starting point, in chapter 1, the issue of how Plato came to isolate a Kind Being. I set out to answer this question by discussing the distinctive type of inquiry into being Plato pursues in the Sophist and the relationship between this inquiry and the Kind Being. I argue that Plato is led, through his engagement with the problem of false predication and not-being, to undertake a definitional search for being, reminiscent of salient aspects of definitional quests staged in earlier dialogues, but also with a difference: for the first time the definiendum is not a being (e.g. beauty, courage), but being itself. The Kind Being, as I will show, captures the definiendum of the question ‘What is being?’.

Thus, the isolation of a Kind Being is a salient aspect of Plato’s strategy to dispose of the paradox

23 Cherniss 1944: XXII.

of falsehood and the puzzle of not-being (a conclusion that I will develop more in the subsequent chapters of the thesis).

I proceed in chapter 2 by beginning a metaphysical analysis of the Kind Being. I argue that the Kind Being, just like any other Platonic Kind, is first and foremost conceived of by Plato as a robust causal principle, metaphysically responsible for property its name names, i.e. being. This, I maintain, is neither the property of being something or other, nor the property of being identical to itself, but just of being (simpliciter), which I propose to understand, against the received view, in terms of existence. I will corroborate my interpretation by drawing not only from the Sophist but also from the second deduction of the second part of the Parmenides.

The Sophist does not just describe Being as a Kind. It also assigns to it a distinctive function in the mechanics of the combination of Kinds analogous to that of vowels in the combination of letters. I chapter 3, I argue that from this analogical characterization we learn two main things.

First, that the Kind Being is all-pervasive: everything partakes in it (perhaps this is also part of what is suggested by the inclusion of the Kind Being among the so-called ‘greatest Kinds’). This claim, however, might elicit two considerations: first, that Plato is condemned to an extremely expansive ontology, on which every possible subject of predication (including e.g. fictional entities) exists; second, that the Kind Being is a most generic genus encompassing all genera. Both considerations are in my view misconceived and I will dwell on criticizing them – along with the recently defended thesis that the Kind Being should be identified with the philosopher’s object, i.e., te subject matter of philosophy. The second thing we learn from the vowel-analogy is that participation in the Kind Being is a necessary condition for the combination with other Kinds. I will show that Being has a twofold role in the mechanics of combination. On the one hand, it grounds the existence of the combining Kinds. On the other hand, it works as a relational property

connecting those Kinds. The latter function, I argue, is reflected by the use of the verb ‘εἶναι’ as a copula (that I take to have existential import, see below).

Chapter 4 focuses on semantic issues concerning Plato’s philosophical uses of the verb ‘εἶναι’.

I want to show that the reading famously championed by Owen, Malcolm and Frede, on which Plato is unaware of purely existential uses of ‘εἶναι’, is unpersuasive. In addition, I also provide a critical assessment of the so-called ‘semantic continuity thesis’, defended by Brown. I aim to show that, while Brown’s thesis may correctly capture a phenomenon of the Greek language, namely, that an existential use of the verb ‘εἶναι’ can easily lead to use of the same verb as a copula, and, conversely, that the copula has existential import, I contend that it does not effectively illuminate the metaphysical view Plato spells out in the Sophist. In other words, the ‘semantic-continuity thesis’ may bear upon our understanding of aspects of the verb ‘εἶναι’ (as, after all, it is presented), but throws limited light on how the Kind Being works in the Sophist’s metaphysical theory.

Among the reasons that have led scholars to deny the presence of any notion of existence in

Plato’s thought is the one that we cannot find in the dialogues (or, for that matter, in ancient philosophical texts more generally) anything like the quantified conception of existence defended by

Frege, Russell and Quine; or any version of the modal conception of existence operative in discussions about creation among medieval (both Islamic and Latin) and early modern philosophers.

Thus, one might suspect that my talk of existence entails that I intend to find in the Sophist at least some version of either of these two conceptions of existence. But this is by no means my goal. Thus, in chapter 5, I want to show that, while I think Plato does operate with a notion of existential being, corresponding to the property obtained via participation in the Kind Being, nothing in the text suggests that this notion is to be accounted for either in quantificational or modal terms. So how should we understand Plato’s notion of existence? While the Sophist is not fully explicit on this point and seems not to overtly endorse any ‘official’ solution to what it means for something to be

(simpliciter), I will argue that Plato might be hinting at the right answer to this question at 247d8-e4, with the so-called ‘dunamis proposal’, though he leaves to the reader to work out part of the details for herself. The ‘dunamis proposal’ is the claim that ‘to be is to have the power to act and be acted upon’, which can be interpreted as the power to be part of a causal relation.

In chapter 6 I complete my metaphysical analysis of the Kind Being, by investigating the role of this notion in Plato’s account of not-being. I shall argue that the isolation of a Kind Being is a necessary condition for that account. In particular, Plato’s solution to the puzzle of not-being

(stated at 258d5-e3) hinges on the demonstration of the existence of a Form or Kind of Not-Being

(258c4, d6: εἶδος; 260b7: γένος), which is set against the Kind Being, but also partakes in it – and, therefore, is. Thus, were there no Kind Being, Plato could not bring his ambitious project about not-being to completion. I will develop my argument by focussing on Plato’s prospect of joint illumination of being and not-being stated at 250e5-251a3, and argue that this forward-looking prediction is not due – as per the current orthodoxy – to facts about the uses of the verb ‘to be’, but to the recognition of the status of being and not-being as genuine Kinds.

A conclusion will wrap up the main results of this inquiry, and dwell more on the importance of the isolation of a Kind Being for the treatment of the paradox of falsehood and the puzzle of not-being. The conclusion will be followed by an appendix, in which I explore an instructive debate between Simplicius and Alexander of Aphrodisias on Plato’s conception of not-being.

Chapter 1

The Question of Being in the Sophist

How does Plato come to isolate a Kind Being? In this chapter, I set out to answer this question by discussing what distinctive type of inquiry into being Plato pursues in the Sophist and the relationship between this inquiry and the Kind Being. I first argue that Plato is led, through his engagement with the problem of false predication and not-being, to undertake a definitional search for being, reminiscent of salient aspects of definitional quests staged in the early dialogues, but also with a difference: for the first time the definiendum is not a being (e.g. beauty, courage), but being itself. In the second section I show that the Kind Being captures the definiendum of the question ‘What is being?’.

1.1 What is Being?

The aim(s) of the dialogue. The Sophist presents itself as the first part of an ambitious three- pronged project, aimed at defining and so distinguishing three apparently similar figures: the sophist, the statesman and the philosopher1. The dialogue’s avowed purpose is thus to provide an

1 Cf. 216d3-217a9. As is well known, Plato devoted two eponymous dialogues to the first two figures, namely

Sophist and Statesman, but notoriously never wrote a Philosopher. Gill 2012 is a recent extensive attempt to solve this exegetical puzzle (with references to the main literature at p.1 n.3).

15 16 account of what a sophist is (218b7-c1). But this task soon turns out to involve a range of further philosophical problems that give the dialogue a Chinese-box structure2.

Let me explain this in more detail. After six attempts to define the sophist by the method of division3, the Eleatic Stranger (hereafter ES), who is the main character of the dialogue with the young Theaetetus, initiates another one that is however nipped in the bud by the emergence of the dialogue’s governing impasse. He sets out to portray the sophist as an expert of appearances

(φαντάσµατα), who deceives his hearers by instilling in them false beliefs passed off as true4. But the ES is aware that the sophist will resist such a definitional capture by summoning Parmenides’ dictum and so triggering the notorious paradox of falsehood5. In outline, the sophist’s counter- argument is this: speech is considered false if it says that things that are, are not, and that things that are not, are6; but this violates Parmenides’ notorious decrees that not-being is unthinkable and

2 This also explains why since the antiquity the identification of the main theme (σκοπός) of the dialogue has proved so tricky, cf. again Notomi 1999: 10-19. Starting from Schleiermacher 1824 [1807]: 131-2 it has become customary among commentators to describe the internal architecture of the Sophist by distinguishing a ‘shell’ or ‘frame’ (216 a1-236d4, 264b11-268d5) and a ‘core’ (236d5-264b10) (cf. e.g. Bonitz 1886 [1858-60]: 176-7, Campbell

1867: XLVII; Gomperz 1925 [1902]: 441, Diès 1925: 267, Notomi 1999: 27-30, Brown 2008: 437, Crivelli 2012: 1). The former is devoted to the definition of the sophist by the method of division; the latter to the determination of the metaphysical and logical conditions of possibility of this definition. While I will not dispute this account, I should like to suggest that it may fruitfully be integrated by noting that the Sophist, like other dialogues (Barney 2010 makes a persuasive case for the Republic), is structured by ring-composition, and follows an ABCDCBA pattern. I must leave the development of this point for a future occasion. 3 It is unclear what precise role the first six definitions are supposed to play, cf. Cornford 1935: 172-3 and Wolff

1991: 29-44 for discussions. 4 Cf. 240d2-241a2. The definition will be taken up and expanded at 264b11-268d5, cf. Dixsaut 1992. 5 Eristic arguments based on similar uses of Parmenides’ thesis were common, cf. e.g. Hp., de arte 2 with Vegetti

1963-4. For more details about the paradox of falsehood and the various interpretations thereof, cf. Crivelli 2012: 51-70. 6 Cf. 240e10-241a1: τά τε ὄντα λέγων µὴ εἶναι καὶ τὰ µὴ ὄντα εἶναι. In the main text, I speak generically about

‘speech’ for the sake of brevity, but the ES’ argument is more complex and offers parallel discussions of δόξα and λόγος.

17 inexpressible and that there can be absolutely no weaving between being and not-being7; therefore, falsehood is impossible and the hunt for the sophist is again unsuccessful. There are various ways of interpreting this fiendish argument. On one possible construal, the paradox is based on the sophistical assumption that negative predication entails non-existance, so that if it is false that X is

F, then X is not F; but if X is not F, it follows that X is not, viz. does not exist. But since what does not exist cannot even be referred to, then it cannot even be thought or said; whence, the impossibility of falsehood.

Defining the sophist therefore requires the preliminary disarming of the paradox of falsehood, which in turn demands a prior assessment of Parmenides’ ban of not-being. But since not-being has turned out to be untreatable (because it is unthinkable and inexpressible), the ES proposes to confront

Parmenides by first focusing on being. He suggests that the problem lies perhaps there and that the concept of being has been hastily taken for granted as something straightforward, while in fact it might be as obscure as that of not-being8. The Chinese-box structure should now be clear: we started from the sophist, then moved to falsehood, then to not-being and eventually to being. Plato’s proposed strategy is therefore to take a fresh start from being and proceed backwards9.

Inquiry into being. Having situated the inquiry into being within the overall project of the Sophist,

I now want to examine what specific type of inquiry it is. There are obviously very different ways

7 Cf. fr. 28B2 DK: οὔτε γὰρ ἂν γνοίης τό γε µὲ ἔὸν (οὐ γὰρ ἄνυστόν) οὒτε φράσαις; and B7 DK: οὐ γὰρ µήποτε

τοῦτο δαµῆι εἶναι µὴ ἐόντα. Notice the occurrence of the term ‘συµπλοκή’ at 240c2-3, picked up later at 259e6. 8 Cf. 242b10-c2. I shall return to the statement of the equal obscurity of being and not-being in ch.6. 9 Whence the Sophist’s ancient subtitle (cf. above p.1 n.1). For the record, ancient sources also attribute the title

‘περὶ τοῦ ὄντος’ to a work of Protagoras (80B2 DK), one of Simon the cobbler (D.L. 2.123.27), one of Xenocrates (D.L. 4.12.94), one of Strato of Lampsacus (Procl. in Ti. 3.16.3), and one (possibly spurious) of Archytas (Stob. 2.2.4).

18 of undertaking a study of being and it may prove helpful to sketchily distinguish some of them at the outset as a framework for analysis.

a) One may investigate being by looking at the famous Heideggerian Grundfrage der

Metaphysik: ‘Why is there something rather than nothing?’10. This question is concerned

with the ultimate explanation of existence as opposed to nothingness. The discussion of this

question has been often intertwined with that about the principle of sufficient reason.

b) Alternatively, one may decide to focus on a question of the Quinean type: ‘What is there?’.

What primarily is at issue here is the extensional determination of our ‘ontological

commitment’, that is the range of entities or kinds of entities we are committed to

countenancing in compiling an ontological catalogue of the world (e.g. properties, relations,

numbers, fictional objects etc.).

c) Yet another option is to concentrate on the question ‘What is being?’, which introduces an

investigation on the nature of being. A variant of this option, common in contemporary analytic

metaontology11, consists in adopting a semantic-based approach centered on the question

‘what do we mean by “being”?’, which focuses on the meaning or intension of the term ‘being’.

Although throughout 236d5-242b5 the ES discusses at length the tricky notions of ‘what in no way is’ (237b7-8: τὸ µηδαµῶς ὄν) and ‘not-being in itself’ (238c9: τὸ µὴ ὂν αὐτὸ καθ’ αὑτό) as opposed

10 On a widespread opinion, this question originated with §7 of Leibniz’s Principes de la nature et de la grace fondés en raison (1714). But this is incorrect: it is at least as old as Siger of Brabant’s Quaestiones in Metaphysicam, 170: si vero quaeratur de tota universitate entium quare magis est in eis aliquid quam nihil. As is well known, this question has been taken up by many others beside Leibniz and Heidegger, including Schelling, Schopenhauer, Bergson, Wittgenstein and, more recently, Rescher, Parfit, Nozick, Van Inwagen and Lowe. 11 For the concept of ‘metaontology’ cf. Van Inwagen 1998. Another historical amendment is in order here. It is often thought that the term ‘metaontology’ has been coined by Van Inwagen (cf. e.g. Berto-Blebani 2015: 2). This is perhaps true limited to the history of analytic philosophy. But Heidegger already spoke at length of ‘Metontologie’ in his 1928 Marburg course on Leibniz, cf. Heidegger 1978 [1928]: 199-202.

19 to those of ‘being’ (τὸ ὄν) and ‘something’ (τι), he does not seem interested in tackling a problem of the a) type12.

Instead, he has been taken to be concerned with an inquiry based on a version of the Quinean question. At 242c5-6 he kicks off his investigation by complaining about the slapdash way

(εὐκόλως) of speaking of ‘anyone that ever rushed to judgement in the matter of distinguishing how many beings there are, and what they are like’13. This statement has suggested to some interpreters that the agenda of the ontological section of the Sophist is set by the questions ‘How many beings are there?’ and ‘What are beings like?’ – which may be reasonably considered as versions of the ‘What is there?’ question For example, McCabe writes: ‘the project [of the discussion of being] is to investigate the early thinkers to discover “how many and of what sort are the things that are” […] we need to be able to count the things that are […] and to say what they are like’14.

However, a closer inspection of the text suggests a different construal. I want to show that the question the ES focuses on is instead one of the c) type. He is therefore first and foremost

12 According to Aubenque 1962: 13 n.1 this question is foreign to Greek thought as a whole. 13 πᾶς ὅστις πώποτε ἐπὶ κρίσιν ὥρµησε τοῦ τὰ ὄντα διορίσασθαι πόσα τε καὶ ποῖά ἐστιν. For a similar remonstrance about the earlier thinkers’ contempt for their audience, cf. Arist. Metaph. B 4.1000a10-11. 14 McCabe 1994: 199-200. See also Fronterotta 2007: 76-8, 338 n.155. Crivelli 2012: 72 seems to follow a similar line of reasoning, though his view is admittedly more nuanced. On the one hand, he appears to suggest that the ES is mainly concerned with the issue of determining what being is and what is signified by the word ‘being’ (and he rightly stresses that this question surfaces here of the first time in the history of Greek philosophy). On the other hand, he points out that while ‘counting beings requires getting clear about what being is […] establishing what beings are like is obviously a reasonable starting point in the search for what being is’. The idea seems to be that the determination of ‘what being is’ is prior in the order of enquiry to answering the question ‘how many beings are there?’; but also that the answer to the question ‘what are beings like?’ can be reasonably taken to pave the way for the determination of ‘what being is’. However, as Sabrier 2016: 53 observes, this sits uneasily with Plato’s customary prioritizing the ti esti question over the poion ti question in the order of enquiry (cf. e.g. Men. 71a3-b8; La. 190b7-c2; Grg. 448e6-7).

20 concerned with determining ‘what being is’15. So the problem with the thinkers he addresses is not that they felt short of a rigorous study of how many beings there are and what they are like, but that in developing their accounts of how many beings there are and what they are like they did not preliminarily clarify what they meant by ‘being’ or provided inaequate accounts of what being is.

I will then argue that the Sophist’s inquiry into being interestingly compares to and differs from typical definitional searches pursued in Plato’s early dialogues.

To begin with, consider the reasons of the ES’ complaint at 242c5-6, as they are spelled out in the ensuing lines (242c8-243b10). The ES protests that the earlier thinkers who made pronouncements on how many beings there are and what they are like did not care about elucidating the meaning of the terms they employed16. Each of them seems just ‘to be telling us a

15 I share this view with Frede 1996a: 181-9, Centrone 2015: 62-7 and Sabrier 2016: 2-6. With Frede and Sabrier, however, I disagree about the answer Plato gives to this question. Frede 1996a: 197-9 believes the answer to this question is found in the distinction between καθ᾽αὑτά and πρὸς ἄλλα which Plato draws at 255c12-3 (see ch. 3); Sabrier 2016: passim thinks it is provided by the whole theory of the five greatest kinds. I believe the dialogue does not conclusively endorse any definition of being and is therefore, on the surface, aporetic on this point (see the end of this chapter). Still, Plato might be hinting at the right answer at 247d8-e4, with the so-called ‘dunamis proposal’ (see §5.3), though he leaves to the reader to work out the details for herself – my reading has some resemblances with that of Cordero 2000. Notice also that Frede 1996a: 198 affirms that by considering a question of the c) type, in effect Plato also provides the grounds to answer a question of the a) type. In other words, Frede suggests that by explaining what being itself is, Plato has the resources also to answer the question of why there is something rather than nothing (see below p.70 n.65). 16 On this note, it is worth observing that not only does the dialogue open with the question whether three names

(ὀνόµατα) refer to three distinct kinds, or two, or one (cf. 217a), but especially starting from the exposition of the puzzles about not-being (236d5-242b5), the emphasis on language correctness becomes increasingly conspicuous. In this stretch of text the occurrences of ὀρθός and cognates with verbs and names of saying are numerous (e.g. 237c11; 238b4, c5, c8; 239a8, b9). And it is remarkable that the term ‘ὀρθολογία’ is coined by Plato and appears only here (239b4) in the whole Platonic corpus. Indeed, according to the TLG the earliest post-Platonic occurrence of this term dates about half a millennium later and is found in the grammarian Aelius Herodianus (Hdn. Gr. III 2.513.6). For the record, there is another Platonic hapax occurring in these pages: it is ‘ἐναντιολογία’ at 236e5 (we have also ‘ἐναντιολογεῖν’ at 268b4). There are no other occurrences of this word in the other dialogues either. But the term

21 story (µυθόν) as if we were children’, by using an evocative language and without troubling to provide a suitable conceptual clarification of the notions with which they operated. So their uncritical lack of accuracy makes their views underdetermined and ultimately incomprehensible:

‘each pursues his own project without caring at all whether we’re following what they say or being left behind’.

Notably, the ES and Theaetetus emphasize that those thinkers neglected to clarify what exactly they indicated (δηλοῦν) by ‘being’ (243d1-5). It is the very meaning of ‘being’ that remains in the dark in their accounts, i.e. the thing the name ‘being’ correctly applies to and discloses. And this is explicitly regarded as ‘the most important, the chief and first’ (τοῦ µεγίστου τε καὶ ἀρχηγοῦ

πρώτου) thing to investigate about being (τὸ ὄν). We are therefore led to suppose, by such a wealth of solemn adjectives, that this is the main investigandum of the inquiry into being the two interlocutors intend to pursue. What should first and foremost be determined is what being is, i.e. what is meant by ‘being’.

The ensuing pages of the dialogue lend further support to this construal. Since the rival thinkers did not trouble to clear up what they meant by ‘being’, Theaetetus proposes to probe them

(in a series of imaginary dialogues run in absentia of the actual interlocutors, and with Theaetetus as their spokesman17), to see whether an answer to our question of being can be extrapolated from what they said. Four groups of thinkers are considered: the pluralists; the monists; and the two confronting parties of the notorious ‘gigantomachy’, namely the so-called ‘sons of the earth’ and

occurs again already in Arist. GC 323b17. My hunch is that these two hapaxes are not without connection, but I should leave the investigation of this point for a future occasion. 17 Cf. Brown 1998: 182-3 and above all McCabe 2000: 60-92 on this new dialogical approach.

‘friends of the forms’, oft-referred to by the rough labels of ‘materialists’ and ‘idealists’18. I shall say more about these imaginary dialectical encounters later. For the moment, I want to focus on three main passages which I think confirm that the question ‘What is being?’ or ‘What is meant by “being”?’ is the main concern of the ES’ inquiry into being.

• At 243e2, amid the criticisms of the dualists, i.e. those pluralists who claim that ‘all things are

hot and cold or some other such pair of things’, the ES asks them: ‘what exactly are you saying

about them both [scil. hot and cold or some other such pair of things], that is, when you say

both and each of them are? What are we to take this ‘being’ of yours to be (τί τὸ εἶναι τοῦτο

ὑπολάβωµεν ὑµῶν)?’. The question is taken up a few lines below: the dualists should say

‘what exactly [they] intend to indicate when [they] utter the word “is” (244a5-6: τί ποτε

βούλεσθε σηµαίνειν ὁπόταν “ὂν” φθέγγησθε)19. What the ES is interested in is thus not

whether the number or the qualitative characterizations of beings are adequate, but what

meaning the dualists assign to ‘being’ (τὸ εἶναι, ὂν) when they say that both and each of the

two beings they posit are. To be sure, the ES will also contend that, once the dualists

rigorously confront the question ‘What is being?’ and its implications, they will no longer be

in a position to coherently stick to their account of the number of beings. But the chief problem

the ES and Theaetetus are concerned with is the determination of what being is.

• At 244b7 the ES presses the same point against the monists, i.e. those thinkers who claim that

‘all things are one’. He invites them to clarify ‘what exactly they say being is (τί ποτε λέγουσι

18 I argue in §1.2 that the ES makes a distinction between the first two groups (monists and pluralists) and the two factions of the gigantomachy. Notably, the complaint about lack of conceptual and linguistic accuracy applies just to the former, even though all four groups of thinkers will be refuted. 19 Heidegger 1992 [1924/5]: 447 goes so far as to say that the whole dialogue revolves around this question (that he also famously quoted in the first page of Sein und Zeit), but this may be an overstatement.

τὸ ὄν)’. Working out an answer to this question will generate serious problem for monism.

Notably, they will no longer consistently state that ‘all things are one’. But the governing

question submitted to them is again focused on what being is.

• Finally, at 246a1-2, the ES prefaces the gigantomachy by remarking that the assessment of

materialists and idealists will usefully integrate those assessments of pluralists and monists in

order to realize ‘from all sides that being is no less problematical than not-being when it comes

to saying what exactly it is’ (ὅτι τὸ ὂν τοῦ µὴ ὄντος οὐδὲν εὐπορώτερον εἰπεῖν ὅτι ποτ᾽ἔστιν).

So the criticisms of all four groups of thinkers share a common approach: they raise the

question of what each thinker who has discussed being means by ‘being’.

These passages prove that the entire so-called ‘doxographical’20 section of the Sophist, i.e. the section in which the ES and Theaetetus address those thinkers that have so far said something about being(s), is governed and unified by one problem: the determination of what being is. It can therefore be concluded that this problem is the main concern of the Sophist’s inquiry into being.

An unprecedented definitional search. Having argued that the inquiry into being the ES pursues centers around the question ‘What is being?’, I next want to show that it is a typical definitional question, reminiscent of those habitually raised by Socrates in Plato’s earlier dialogues, but with a difference which renders the Sophist’s investigation both unprecedented and historically momentous.

An established scholarly consensus regards the search for definitions as a distinctive feature shared by many of Plato’s so-called ‘early’ dialogues, e.g. Laches, Charmides, Euthyphro, Hippias

Major or Meno. These works portray Socrates addressing his interlocutors – typically, reputed

20 For the use of this label I rely on Mansfeld 1986.

24 experts on the subject considered – by asking them to provide a definition of a given abstract concept, e.g. courage, temperance, piety, beauty or virtue, about which he declares himself ignorant. Socrates’ requests characteristically take the form ‘What is F?’ (τί ἐστι) or ‘What do you call F?’ (τί λέγεις, τί φῂς, τί καλεῖς, τί ὀνοµάζεις)21, where F is substituted for the name of the abstract concept sought22. What he seeks is an account capturing the essential feature of F, such that it correctly applies to all the instances of F.

These searches for definitions normally end with a negative outcome (aporia), due to the inability of Socrates’ interlocutors to provide answers that effectively meet the formal requirements of Socrates’ questions23 and therefore resist his painstaking cross-examination

(elenchus). Notably, the definiens they offer frequently falls short of the universality of the definiendum included in Socrates’ question: Socrates’ interlocutors fail to say what F is in general, and rather restrict themselves merely to submitting cases of F (e.g. Meno). In other situations, the definiens does have the extension required, but captures an inessential characterization of the definiendum (e.g. Euthyphro).

We find the same pattern in the Sophist’s doxographical section, or so I argue. The dialogical role of Socrates is played by the ES, and the various thinkers addressed by him compare to

Socrates’ victims in the early dialogues24. Like the ‘barren’ Socrates, who is ignorant of the objects

21 Cf. Giannantoni 2005: 320-1 and nn.10-11 on these various formulae. 22 Cf. Robinson 1941: 51-62, Fronterotta 2001: 3-39, Giannantoni 2005: 313-48 and Politis 2015: 17-93 for discussions of the ti esti question. 23 Politis 2015: 45 concisely lists these requirements. 24 The ES is called θεὸς ἐλεγκτικός at 216b6. Zaks 2018 convincingly shows the central role of Socratic elenchus in the Sophist, especially in its doxographical section. See in addition Szlezák 2004: 145-9 for resemblances between the ES and the Socrates of the early dialogues, but also Rosen 1983: 21-4 for some differences.

25 of his investigation, the ES focuses on a problem whose solution turns out to elude him25. He therefore decides, in concert with Theaetetus, and again like Socrates, to turn to those who are purportedly in the know about it – including those who made pronouncements about how many beings there are, and what they are like, despite their blameworthy expressive sloppiness.

He addresses them by asking a question that has unmistakable formal resemblances to the requests for definition in the early dialogues. It is a typical ‘What is F?’ (or ‘What do you call F?’) question26, aimed at obtaining an account that captures the shared trait of all beings qua beings.

And since none of the thinkers probed by the ES were able to provide a satisfactory account of what being is, the upshot of these exchanges is aporetic: it emerges that we are as much in difficulty about being as we are about not-being (250e5-7)27.

But note a crucial difference. For the first time in Plato’s dialogues and in the history of philosophy more generally, the definiendum is not a being, but being itself (τὸ ὄν, τὸ εἶναι). It is no longer a question of knowing what this or that single being is (e.g. beauty, courage), but what being itself is, with no further qualifications. The aim is to know what is that in virtue of which we say about an object or many objects that they ‘are’, not that ‘are beautiful’, ‘courageous’ and so on. A project of this type is not documented in any text preceding the Sophist. The French philosopher Paul Ricoeur has aptly emphasized this distinctive feature of our dialogue, by speaking of a ‘redoublement de la question ontologique’: we transition from a question about ‘What is this

25 Cf. 242b10-c2, 243c2-5. 26 Cf. again 243d3-5: δεῖν διερευνήσασθαι τί ποθ’ οἱ λέγοντες αὐτὸ [scil. τὸ ὄν] δηλοῦν ἡγοῦνται; 243e2: τί τὸ

εἶναι τοῦτο ὑπολάβωµεν ὑµῶν; 244a5-6: τί ποτε βούλεσθε σηµαίνειν ὁπόταν “ὂν” φθέγγησθε; 244b7: τί ποτε λέγουσι τὸ ὄν; 246a1-2: τὸ ὂν […] εἰπεῖν ὅτι ποτ᾽ἔστιν. 27 As earlier forward-looking statements had already heralded, cf. 242b10-243c5, 244a7-8 and 245e8-246a2. Cf. ch. 6 on this point.

26 or that?’ into one about ‘What is the being ascribed to this or that?’28. It seems therefore doubtful to assert, as Aubenque does, that the problem of being – viz. the problem posed by the question

‘What is being?’ – had never been addressed in pre-Aristotelian philosophy29.

The introduction of a definitional inquiry into being marks therefore a genuine novelty30. Plato is aware that he is calling into question a notion that seems at first blush unproblematic, but that promptly becomes baffling – just like that of not-being – as soon as one dwells on trying to clarify it31. Plato’s project begins then from pausing to explore the exact meaning of ‘being’ and the ontological conditions of its correct application. One can therefore conclude that the question of being, that is the traditional object of ontology, is first raised not by Aristotle, as a common opinion would have it, but in the Sophist32.

Intermezzo (1): the science of being qua being and the question of being. The foregoing might elicit two critical remarks, which I shall briefly consider before turning to examining how the answers provided by the ES’ rival thinkers fall short of his question.

1) Granted that the question of being, that is the traditional object of ontology, is first raised not

by Aristotle but in the Sophist, does this not also imply the dubious claim that the baptism of

a science of being qua being, generally ascribed to Metaph. Γ 1, is not in fact originally

28 Cf. Ricoeur 2011 [1953-1954]: 108 (but see below ch.3 n.31). 29 Cf. Aubenque 1962: 13-4 and the next sub-section for further remarks. 30 Cf. Campbell 1867: LXIII: ‘the mind is called away to the consideration of a new problem, which may thus be stated generally: “What is being? Or What is the form of Being?”. The change of mental attitude expressed in these few words – from asserting “Being is” to asking “What is Being?” is of the highest importance’. 31 Cf. 242b10-c2, 243c2-5. 32 Cf. Frede 1996a: 181. See also Centrone 2015: 62-4, who finds in the Sophist ‘la prima formulazione consapevole del problema dell’essere [which is] un’acquisizione originale di Platone’

Aristotelian? It does not. Plato inaugurates the question ‘What is being?’; but he does not

single out a separate branch of knowledge expressly devoted to studying being qua being and

its attributes. The question is Platonic, the disciplinary delimitation is not. And this makes a

substantive difference for the subsequent history of philosophy33. My caveat has obviously

nothing to do with the labeling of such a discipline. It is well known that the words

‘µεταφυσική’ and ‘ὀντολογία’ (or their cognates) are neither Platonic nor Aristotelian34.

Instead, as we will see more in detail in due course (ch. 3), the point is that for Plato the inquiry

stemming from the question ‘What is being?’ is no more than a part of a broader (in fact

universal) science, namely dialectic, and does not circumscribe an independent area of

knowledge35. The patent for this demarcation is Aristotelian36.

2) The second critical observation too takes the steps from Aristotle. In a notorious passage at

the end of Metaph. Z 1, Aristotle writes (1028b2-7):

the question which, both now and of old, has always been raised, and always been

the subject of doubt, viz. what being is, is just the question, what is substance? For

it is this that some assert to be one, others more than one, and that some assert to

33 Cf. Aubenque 1962: 21-3. 34 Cf. Brisson 1999 and again Devaux-Lamanna 2009. In fact, the TLG lists no occurrence at all of ‘ὀντολογία’

(or, for that matter, of any of its cognates). 35 This does not exclude of course that Plato’s dialectic may have played some role in the shaping of Aristotle’s project of a science of being qua being, cf. de Strycker 1979 and Leszl 2008. 36 I therefore basically agree on this point with Trabattoni 2005 in denying that there exists strictly speaking an ontology (i.e. a metaphysica generalis) in Plato. But this of course does not exclude that Plato has extensively dealt with issues later included in the disciplinary boundaries of ontology.

be limited in number, others unlimited. And so we also must consider chiefly and

primarily and almost exclusively what that is which is in this sense37.

Aristotle seems to suggest that the question ‘What is being?’ (τί τὸ ὄν) is a traditional one

(πάλαι). The progress he claims for himself concerns rather the reconfiguration of this

question as one about substance (οὐσία). The examples he mentions echo some of the views

tackled in the doxographical section of the Sophist (monism, pluralism)38. One can therefore

surmise that Aristotle takes the question ‘What is being?’ to be as old as the proponents of

those views, at least some of whom certainly date before Plato. The Sophist would not then

mark a real novelty, as I argued it does.

But it is doubtful that the ‘τί τὸ ὄν’ question Aristotle raises here should be understood in

the same sense of the Sophist’s question of being. As Brunschwig has shown, the context

suggests that Aristotle refers here to an extensional investigation into the fundamental beings,

rather than a question about the meaning or intension of ‘being’39. In other words, ‘τὸ ὄν’ here

ultimately stands for ‘ἀρχή’ and the question ‘What is being?’ boils down to ‘What is there

37 καὶ δὴ καὶ τὸ πάλαι τε καὶ νῦν καὶ ἀεὶ ζητούµενον καὶ ἀεὶ ἀπορούµενον, τί τὸ ὄν, τοῦτό ἐστι τίς ἡ οὐσία (τοῦτο

γὰρ οἱ µὲν ἓν εἶναί φασιν οἱ δὲ πλείω ἢ ἕν, καὶ οἱ µὲν πεπερασµένα οἱ δὲ ἄπειρα), διὸ καὶ ἡµῖν καὶ µάλιστα καὶ πρῶτον καὶ µόνον ὡς εἰπεῖν περὶ τοῦ οὕτως ὄντος θεωρητέον τί ἐστιν (my emphasis). This passage has been endlessly discussed. My remarks are obsviously very selective and uniquely focused on the problem of the originality of the ES’ question ‘What is being?’. 38 Barney 2012: 168 emphasizes the kinship between the sketchy list at 1028b4-6 and the survey of ἀρχαί theories in Metaph. A 3. She makes a compelling case that both are shaped by the Sophist’s doxographical section, as well as by pre-Platonic doxographical accounts that Mansfeld 1986 has shown were current in Sophistical milieux and probably originated with Hippias’ ‘anthology of related ideas’ (86B6 DK) and Gorgias’ Περὶ τοῦ µὴ ὄντος (MXG 979a13–18). 39 Cf. Brunschwig 1964: 191-5 (who also disputes the standard translation of ‘τί τὸ ὄν’). See also Menn unpublished: IIα2c-d. Frede 1996a: 188-9 goes in a similar direction.

that might be a being in the eminent sense, i.e. a principle?”40. So understood, this was indeed

the dominant issue of a good deal of pre-Aristotelian thought, at least as far as we know from

the extant sources. And Aristotle makes therefore a perfectly correct point in remarking that

τὸ ὄν is to be understood in the sense of οὐσία, i.e. what exists in a primary way. But it is not

on this ground that the ES confronts his rival thinkers.

1.2 The Kind Being and the definiendum of the question ‘What is

Being?’

In the previous section I have argued that in the Sophist Plato was led, through his engagement with the problem of the definition of the sophist, and therefore with the paradox of falsehood and the puzzle of not-being, to concern himself with an unprecedented definitional question about being. It is now time to examine how he sets out to answer it.

Critical assessment of other views on being: overview. As I mentioned above, the ES starts off by sifting through the views of some other thinkers who made pronouncements about being41. This critical assessment divides into two clearly sign-posted stages.

40 Cf. again Menn unpublished: IIα2c, but also the brief remarks by Centrone 2015: 66. 41 Note that this cross-examination of rival theorists of being is not meant to be exhaustive (245e6-8). It is also worth observing that such an ‘endoxastic’ approach to philosophical inquiry was anything but obvious. It certainly does not go without saying that a philosophical discussion should begin with a critical survey of the opinions expressed by other thinkers on the same subject. Plato’s choice to do, on the one hand, bears perhaps witness to the emergence of the historical consciousness of a philosophical tradition in the making, probably under the influence of sophistic proto-doxographical accounts (see above n.39). On the other hand, it implements a type of argumentative strategy, ultimately rooted in Socratic dialogical practice, which will have visible effects on Aristotle’s dialectic. On these matters, see Mansfeld 1986, Cambiano 1986 and Barney 2012.

• A first group of philosophers is initially considered (242c8-245e5), including the dualists and

the monists, who made reputedly authoritative statements about the number (πόσα) and

qualitative features (ποῖα) of beings (242c6). We have already seen the ES protesting about

their disdainful conceptual carelessness: these theorists did not even pause to explain what

they meant by ‘being’. And when they are expressly asked to do so, their main tenets, as we

shall see, turn out to crumble.

• The second stage concerns a famous antagonism, mythologically represented as a ‘battle of

gods and giants’ (γιγαντοµαχία)42, between the so-called ‘sons of the earth’ and the ‘friends

of the forms’, i.e. materialists and idealists. It will emerge shortly that these thinkers did

attempt an account of what being is. But their views, upon inspection, will nonetheless prove

inadequate43.

42 Some scholars take Hes. Theog. 675-715 to be the literary source for this mythical reference (cf. e.g. Diès

1925: 352 n.1; Fronterotta 2007: 361 n.183). The quotation is technically incorrect as that Hesiodic passage tells the titanomachy, not the gigantomachy (cf. Brown 1998: 181 and Delcomminette 2014: 537). Plato’s language may suggest that he had that story in mind too (cf. Boys-Stones 2010: 41-2), but it is unlikely that he conflated the two stories, cf. Symp. 190b-e and also Plt. 291a for the centauromachy. More plausible loci paralleli are Od. XI 305-20 and Il. V 385-91. In fact, it is perhaps pointless to look for a precise literary source, as the gigantomachy (just like the centauromachy and the titanomachy) was integral part of the Athenian religious tradition, formed a central moment of the Great Panathenaea and continued to be very popular in painting, sculpture and poetry, as documented by Overbeck 1871: 339-98, Vian 1952 and more recently Massa-Pairault-Pouzadoux 2017. 43 Some commentators parse this textual section differently (cf. e.g. Bonitz 1886 [1858-60]: 162-3; Diès 1909:

17 n.62; Moravcsick 1962: 29; Seligman 1974: 30; Frede 1996a: 186; Brown 1998: 185-6; Fronterotta 2007: 78-81; 360-1 n. 182; Crivelli 2012: 71-93). They believe that the ‘πόσα τε καὶ ποῖά’ questions at 242c6 set the agenda for the whole doxographical section: the pluralists and the monists provide an account of how many beings there are (πόσα); whereas materialists and idealists concern themselves with what beings are like (ποῖα). A passage at 245e6-246a2 seems to bolster this reading. The ES here introduces the gigantomachy by remarking that so far they have considered some of ‘those who make precise claims (διακριβολογουµένους) about being and not-being’; now they will look at ‘those who speak in another way’ (τοὺς δὲ ἄλλως λέγοντας). The former group refers to pluralists and monists. Since the term διακριβολογέοµαι probably means to speak with numerical exactness (cf. Men. 83e11, Phlb. 53a6, c8, d1 with Cambiano 1986: 73-5 for a similar use of ἀκρίβεια and its cognates), those scholars surmise that pluralists and

The professed purpose of all these encounters is ‘to see from all sides that being is no less problematical than not-being when it comes to saying what exactly it is’ (245e8-246a2). But in pursuing this ‘negative’ goal, the ES will tacitly broach positive doctrinal elements as well.

I will consider the cross-examination of each group in turn. My goal, however, in not to offer a detailed treatment of this whole complicated textual section44. Instead, I will selectively focus on those elements relevant for my main argument. I want to show that throughout the doxographical section a conception of being as a separate Platonic Kind finds its own way through the dialogue and that this Kind ultimately captures the definiendum of the question ‘What is being?’.

Dualists [243d8-244a2]. The ES first targets the pluralists. Among them he focuses on those ‘who claim that all things are hot and cold or some other such pair of things’ (243d8-9)45. These thinkers are therefore dualists46. Earlier their view was worded as ‘there are two [beings]’47. Presumably

monists only account for the number of beings; and that, by contrast, ‘those who speak in another way’, namely materialists and idealists, are the thinkers who account for qualitative features of being. Yet, in line with other commentators (e.g. Campbell 1867: 116 n.15; Natorp 1903: 287; Bluck 1975 [1963]: 89; Mansfeld 1986: 24-5; Karfik 2011: 121-2), I am doubtful about this reading for two reasons. (i) To be sure, the quantitative aspect receives more emphasis in the discussion of the first group of thinkers – which explains the (perhaps ironic) use of διακριβολογουµένους. But they clearly have also views about what things are like (e.g. hot, cold, dry, wet, cf. 242d3- 4). (ii) Further, materialists and idealists are not listed at 242c8-243a5 among the thinkers who ‘ever rushed to judgement in the matter of distinguishing how many beings there are, and what they are like’ and whom the ES blames for expressive sloppiness. Nor does that description fit them. Instead we shall see that they did attempt an account of what being is. Compare also Arist. Metaph. A 3.983b19. 44 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 71-101 for a valuable comprehensive exegesis. 45 ὁπόσοι θερµὸν καὶ ψυχρὸν ἤ τινε δύο τοιούτω τὰ πάντ’ εἶναί φατε. The identity of these thinkers is not specified in the dialogue. 46 But the ES’ critical remarks are meant to hold equally for ‘anyone else who says that everything is more than one thing’ (244b2-4), including e.g. those who posit ‘three beings’ (τρία τὰ ὄντα) mentioned at 242c9-d3. 47 242d3: δύο [τὰ ὄντα]. I supply τὰ ὄντα from 242c9. I take it that the two phrases δύο τὰ πάντα and δύο [τὰ

ὄντα] are intended as equivalent.

32 this is not the implausible contention that any other object except hot and cold is a blank nothing, i.e. that the furniture of the world counts only two items. Instead they probably mean that hot and cold (or similar pairs of things) are basic constituents of all things48, perhaps on the assumption that, unlike everything else, they alone are immune from generation and corruption. So that the qualification of ‘beings’ (in the sense of ‘real beings’) applies to them alone49.

The ES asks what they mean when they say that both and each of hot and cold are, i.e. what is this being that they attribute to hot and cold. Three alternatives are envisaged:

(1) being is a third thing in addition to the hot and the cold (τρίτον παρὰ τὰ δύο ἐκεῖνα);

(2) being is either the hot or the cold (τοῖν γε δυοῖν καλοῦντες θάτερον ὂν);

(3) being is both the hot and the cold (ἄµφω […] ὄν).

The ES’ strategy is to show that whichever of these three alternatives is upheld, dualism turns out to be impossible. On option (1) ‘being’ refers to something different from the hot and the cold.

Therefore, since both the hot and the cold are, being must count as a further basic constituent on top of them and, accordingly, an adequate account of reality must include not two beings, but three

(one of which is being itself). On option (2), ‘being’ refers to either the hot or the cold. But if being is identical to either of them and is said in the same way (ὁµοίως) of these two terms (since both the hot and the cold equally are), then these two terms turn out to be identical to each other. On

48 Either as basic material stuffs (Frede 1996a: 186-7) or as fundamental properties (Cornford 1935: 218; Crombie

1962: 390; Rosen 1983: 207; Crivelli 2012: 74-5). Perhaps these targeted thinkers were insensitive to this distinction. 49 The notion of a ‘being’ compares therefore to that of a ‘principle’, cf. e.g. Barney 2012: 178-183, Mansfeld

2019: 5. That is why, at Ph. A 2 Aristotle can make such a smooth transition from his own division of the ἀρχαί (184b15-22) to the enumeration provided by ‘those who inquire into the number of the things that are’ (184b22-5: τὰ ὄντα…πόσα), cf. Mansfeld 1986: 7-11. And, as we have seen, at Metaph. Z 1.1028b2-7 Aristotle speaks not of ἀρχή but of ὄν, but ‘au sens fort du mot être’ (Brunschwig 1964: 194).

33 option (3), ‘being’ refers to the single pair hot-cold. Thus, on both (2) and (3), dualism collapses into monism.

The pluralists are therefore unable to answer the question ‘What is being?’ without also relinquishing their main tenet. The result is the notorious state of aporia (244e4, 8: ἠπορήκαµεν), typical of Socratic cross-examinations in the early dialogues50. But although the question of being remains unanswered, the assessment of the dualists is also fertile. The governing implicit assumption of the anti-dualist argument is that ‘being’ must refer to some real thing, something that counts itself as a being51. That assumption, I take it, is in turn based on a robust realist theory of meaning52. Since by the dualists’ own admission (243e1-2) both the hot and the cold are, there must be something in the world explaining the meaningful attribution of ‘being’. In effect, the ES’ reply is ultimately that being must feature in any list of ultimate properties, because all these properties are said to be and this requires in turn a precise metaphysical explanation53. This point should be kept in mind to see the trajectory of the argument, as I think it should be reconstructed.

Monists [244b6-245d11]. None the three options faced by the dualists proved acceptable to them.

They are either bound to countenance a higher number of beings, one of which should be being itself; or they must subscribe to monism. We shall see the ES endorsing a version of the former

50 Cf. e.g. Men. 79e7-80d4. 51 Cf. Bluck 1975 [1963]: 70, Rosen 1983: 208 and Crivelli 2012: 76. As Crivelli observes, if being did not count itself as a being, the dualists could still stick to their view that there are only two beings, while acknowledging that being is distinct from hot and cold. 52 Cf. Gerson 2020: 136. 53 Cf. Crombie 1962: 390; Bluck 1975 [1963]: 82.

34 view at a later stage of the dialogue (250b8-c3). But first he turns to neutralizing monism, by showing that it is not a coherent alternative.

He addresses those who claim that ‘all things are one’ (ἓν τὸ πᾶν)54. These monists were earlier identified with the members of the Eleatic race (242d5)55 and their view was worded as ‘what people call ‘all things’ are actually one’56. How should we understand this thesis? One would expect that since the dualists’ two beings are more plausibly interpreted as basic constituents of the world, rather than as the only two items included in a catalogue of the world, then the same will hold for the one being of the monists. And yet, we will see that it proves hard to make sense of some ES’ arguments against the monists unless we take their view to be the extreme claim that there is just one single object ever57. Perhaps this shift should not provoke too much astonishment.

For, first, when Plato criticizes Eleatic monism, he seems to have primarily a Mellissan-type ontology in sight58, and Melissus was indeed a defender of that extreme monistic claim59. Second,

54 Cf. also Prm. 128a8-9 (ἓν φῂς εῖναι τὸ πᾶν) and Tht. 180e3 (ἕν τε πάντα ἐστὶ). 55 Cf. Cordero 1991 on the expression ‘Ἐλεατικὸν ἔθνος’ (242d4). 56 242d6: ἑνός ὄντος τῶν πάντων καλουµένων. 57 In contemporary idiom (cf. Schaffer 2018 [2007]), these monists are therefore ‘existence monists’ – as opposed to ‘priority monists’ or ‘substance monist’. Thus, while the dualists’ theory is in effect a cosmology explaining the world by appealing to two basic principles, the monistic dictum leaves no room at all for any cosmology, because it implies the rejection of any plurality, cf. Palmer 2009: 208-16 and Mansfeld 2019: 1-2, 5-6. That is ultimately why at Ph. A 2.184b25-185a20 Aristotle warns that the critical assessment of Eleatic monism falls outside the scope of physics. 58 Cf. Cordero 1991 and Fronterotta 2000. Melissus is named at Tht. 180e2 (before Parmenides) and 183e3

(alone). He was arguably the chief representative of Eleaticism in Plato’s time, cf. Reale 1970: 31-3, 256-68 and Palmer 2009: 218-22. 59 Cf. especially 30B5, 8 DK with Reale 1970: 105-23, 234-42 and Palmer 2009: 214-6. By contrast, unity appears to have a much more marginal role in Parmenides’ poem (and this regardless of the correct lectio of 28B8.5- 6 DK, whether the one transmitted by Simp. in Ph. 78.15, 145.6 (ἕν, συνεχές) or the one transmitted by Ascl. in Metaph. 42.30-1 (οὐλοφυές)), cf. Barnes 1979, Cordero 1991: 109-13, Fronterotta 2000 and Palmer 2009: 205-16. It

35 in developing his arguments against this radical monism, Plato might also offer suitable resources to neutralize other more generous types of monism60.

The ES raises two arguments against the monists: one centered on the concept of name

(244b9-d13), and the other on the concept of wholeness (244d14-245d11). I shall only discuss the former and leave the latter aside61. The argument about names is this. The monists say that ‘only one is’ (ἓν µόνον εἶναι)62. But they also grant that this ‘being’ they attribute to the one refers to something (b12: ὂν καλεῖτε τι;—Ναί). To what? To stick to their extremely restrictive ontological commitment, they must say that it is the same unique thing named by ‘one’ too. But it is ridiculous

(καταγέλαστον) to say there are two names if there is only one thing. If there are two names, there should be two things named. But in the monistic universe there is only one thing that can be named and nothing else (µηδὲν πλὴν ἓν), therefore there can only be one name and nothing else can be attributed to the one63.

will be objected that in the Sophist Plato names Parmenides many times (216a3; 217c5; 237a4; 241d5; 242c4; 244e2; 258c6) and quotes him verbatim at 244e3-5 and elsewhere (cf. Frère 1991), so it seems unlikely that he has Melissus in sight rather than Parmenides himself. But consider this. The sources suggest that Melissus engaged in a defense of the master’s views, pursued through a systematization, in straight and dry prose, of the content of the often sibylline Parmenidean poem (cf. Mansfeld 2016). Such an agile arrangement of Parmenides’ thought, written in a style sympathetic to Ionian physicists, probably proved more accessible than the poem itself, ending up mediating its comprehension, and making Melissus’ account representative of his predecessor’s view. The name and words of father Parmenides continued to be mentioned by authority, but Melissus’ treatise was, as a matter of fact, Parmenides’ historical voice and Plato himself probably reads here Parmenides ‘avec des lunettes mélissiennes’ (Cordero 1991: 112). Notice that Parmenides and Melissus are systematically associated in other non-Platonic texts: cf. Isoc. Antid. 268; Arist. Ph. A 2.184b16, 185a9, 185b17-18; A 3.186a6-7, Γ 6.207a15; Metaph. A 5.986b18-19, 27; Cael. Γ 1.298b17. 60 Cf. below n.63. 61 For the argument about wholeness compare Dixsaut 2000: 198-210, Harte 2002: 100-16 and Crivelli 2012:

79-85. My account of the argument about naming is indebted to Dixsaut 2000: 189-98 and McCabe 2000: 63-70. 62 Compare Melissus’ 30 B 8.1 DK: ἓν µόνον ἔστιν. 63 Suppose a more generous monist replied that ‘all things are one’ in that there is only one basic constituent

(‘substance monism’, cf. above n.57), as opposed to there being one single object ever. The ES could still reply that

Actually, even a single name turns out to be too much. For a name is other than the thing it names; so, in order for there to be naming, there should be at least two things, a name and its named64. If name and named were identical – as the monist is in fact committed to say to be consistent – either the name would be empty or it would name itself: in both cases, it would not do naming at all. The monist is therefore reduced to silence: since her view makes naming impossible, she cannot even start answering either the question about the name(s) of the one, nor any other question (244c4-5). She cannot escape a pragmatic self-refutation65.

The monists too are therefore unable to account for what being is without also relinquishing their main tenet. Our question remains therefore unanswered. But the driving implicit assumption of the argument against the dualists is again at work: ‘being’ must refer to something (244b12-13).

It is cleared up, however, that certainly this cannot be the one of the monists. Pluralists and monists ultimately commit the same mistake of Meno and Hippias: when asked for a definition, they simply enumerate cases (the hot and the cold; the one)66. The question of being cannot be answered by

in calling this basic constituent not only ‘one’ but also ‘being’, one would attribute to it a distinct constitutive property (cf. Rosen 1983: 208-9 and Gerson 2020: 137-8). We would therefore have two and not one basic constituents: the monist is still condemned to dualism. More generally, the monist is forbidden to attributing any constitutive property to the principle she posits. 64 The argument works on the assumption that a name counts as a being. Note also that the ES’ objection makes sense only if its target is ‘existence monism’. For a ‘substance monist’ could obviously still reply that she does not deny that there exists a plurality of entities (including names); instead, she claims that everything depends on one fundamental being. The argument can escape triviality and sophistry only if it is meant to undermine a view that establishes an extremely restrictive ontological commitment. 65 Cf. Castagnoli 2010: 218-22. 66 Cf. Men. 71e1-72b7; Hp. Ma. 287e4, 289e3. Following Politis’ useful list of the requirements of an adequate answer to a ti esti question (cf. Politis 2015: 45), we can say that pluralists and monists fail to meet the ‘generality requirement’.

37 purveying a list of beings, let alone by restricting this list to one single basic entity that rules out any plurality67.

My goal was to show that throughout the doxographical section of the Sophist a conception of being as a separate Platonic Kind finds its own way through the dialogue and that this Kind ultimately captures the definiendum of the question ‘What is being?’. Although Forms are not yet explicitly in question at this stage68, the assessments of pluralists and monists pave the way for that conclusion: they point out that ‘being’ is a referring-expression that signifies something real in the world; and that this thing cannot be a single basic thing exhausting all there is.

Gigantomachy [245e6-250d4]. The second part of the examination of theories of being is the confrontation with the materialists and the idealists. Unlike pluralists and monists, they do pause to explain what they mean by ‘being’. Still, their views will nonetheless succumb to the ES’ scrutiny.

The materialists define being as identical to body69. More radically, they acknowledge existence to all and only tangible bodies70. To be is for them to be bodily. The materialists are

67 Cf. Frede 1996a: 187. 68 Pace Cornford 1935: 218, 220. In a sense, Forms are in view from the start, implicitly, since this is a ti esti inquiry. Still, they do not take the spotlight before the gigantomachy and, after all, it seems unlikely that the hot and the cold of the dualists or the Eleatic one are meant to be Forms. 69 Cf. 246b1: ταὐτὸν σῶµα καὶ οὐσίαν ὀριζόµενοι. 70 Cf. 246a10-b1: διισχυρίζονται τοῦτο εἶναι µόνον ὃ παρέχει προσβολὴν καὶ ἐπαφήν τινα. The identity of the materialists is a vexed issue and a vast range of names has been proposed (cf. Diès 1925: 291 n.1 and Cornford 1935: 231 n.2). The tangibility criterion rules out the ancient Atomists, for Leucippus and Democritus regarded atoms as imperceptible (cf. 68A37 DK and Brown 1998: 188; pace Guthrie 1978: 138 n.2). Plato may also allude to a general and widespread materialist view, like the one discussed in Lg. X and Tht. 155e3-156a2 (cf. e.g. Diès 1925: 291 and Fronterotta 2007: 363 n.184).

38 depicted as brutal people, unwilling (and unable) to engage in rational discussion71, so the ES proposes to take as his actual addressees not them, but an ideal, ‘reformed’ version of them, viz. materialists improved ‘through discourse’ (βελτίους […] λόγῳ) and ‘by hypothesis’

(ὑποτιθέµενοι) – a fictional dialogue within a fictional dialogue. In a dense exchange (246c9-

248a3), the reformed materialists72 are led to acknowledge the existence of non-bodily existents.

They agree that there are mortal living beings, i.e. ensouled bodies73. Since soul is the principle of life, they are committed to the existence of souls. Although they do not refrain from saying that souls too are bodily (247b8-9), they grant that souls differ by the possession (ἕξις) or presence

(παρουσία) of non-bodily ethical properties (virtues and vices such as justice, injustice, wisdom etc.). They are therefore committed to the existence of these non-bodily properties. Hence, they must give up both tangibility and corporeality as criteria of existence74. The materialists’ account of being is thus too narrow: their definiens does not have the extent required by the definiendum75.

What ‘being’ refers to cannot then be just the property of corporeality.

71 Cf. Fronterotta 2007: 365 n. 186 for the ethical implications of this remark, in relation to Lg. X 889b-890a

(radical materialism leads to atheism, which Plato seems to consider the source of immorality and disrespect for the law). This ethical dimension of materialism is also apparent at Phd. 81b4-6, 83d3-4, cf. Lefebvre 2018: 314 and n.3 See also McCabe 2000: 90 for the claim that the acknowledgement of other minds – which the unreformed materialists deny – is a necessary requirement for genuine and civil disagreement. It might therefore be no accident that the materialists are refuted through an appeal to the ontological foundations of virtues and vices. 72 From now on, when I speak of ‘materialists’ I mean reformed materialists. 73 Aristotle will criticize this definition of ‘living being’ (ζῷον) at Top. Δ 5.126a26-9, but will also endorses it at de An. 434b11-12. 74 Fuller exegesis in Brunschwig 1994 [1988]: 119-22, who has also thoroughly demonstrated how the position of the Sophist’s materialists was relaunched by the Stoics. 75 To refer again to Politis’ list of the requirements of an adequate answer to a ti esti question (cf. above n.72), the materialists fail to meet the ‘co-extensivity condition’.

Perhaps we can make progress by asking what common nature (συµφυὲς γεγονός)76 corporeal and incorporeal things share when we say that they both are. Quite suddenly and with a certain peremptory tone, the ES answers this question by broaching a ‘ὅρος’77 of being:

I say, then, that a thing genuinely is if it has some power, of whatever sort, either to act

on another thing, of whatever nature, or to be acted upon, even to the slightest degree

and by the most trivial of things, and even if it is just the once. That is, the definition that

defines the things that are as being, I propose, is nothing other than power’78.

This is the so-called ‘dunamis proposal’79. For lack of a better account, the materialists accept it

(247e5-6). One might think an answer to the question ‘What is being?’ has finally been reached.

And yet the ES warns that this definition is merely tentative (247e7-248a2). Before singing victory, the idealists should give their assent too. And they will stubbornly make opposition.

The idealists think that only immaterial intelligible forms are true being and that bodies are instead mere becoming80. Thus, they posit a radical ontological separation between being and

76 Cf. Campbell 1867: 123 for this expression. 77 I leave ‘ὅρος’ untranslated here because it is notoriously controversial whether it indicates a mere ‘mark’ or a ‘definition’. I return to this issue in §5.3 (where I defend the latter option). 78 247d8-e4: λέγω δὴ τὸ καὶ ὁποιανοῦν τινα κεκτηµένον δύναµιν εἴτ᾽ εἰς τὸ ποιεῖν ἕτερον ὁτιοῦν πεφυκὸς εἴτ᾽ εἰς

τὸ παθεῖν καὶ σµικρότατον ὑπὸ τοῦ φαυλοτάτου, κἂν εἰ µόνον εἰς ἅπαξ, πᾶν τοῦτο ὄντως εἶναι: τίθεµαι γὰρ ὅρον ὁρίζειν τὰ ὄντα ὡς ἔστιν οὐκ ἄλλο τι πλὴν δύναµις. Cf. below ch.5 n.36 for textual issues. The formula is repeated at 248c4-5, slightly differently phrased: ἡ τοῦ πάσχειν ἣ δρᾶν […] δύναµις. 79 The label is due to Brown 1998. 80 Cf. 246b7-c2: νοητὰ ἄττα καὶ ἀσώµατα εἴδη βιαζόµενοι τὴν ἀληθινὴν οὐσίαν εἶναι […] σώµατα […] γένεσιν

ἀντ᾽ οὐσίας. The identity of the idealists has been much debated, at least since the time of Proclus, cf. in Prm. I 729.24- 6. Diès 1925: 292 n.1 surveys the main proposals. My considered view is that the idealists’ view undeniably resembles, already in the terminology used, Plato’s own metaphysics in dialogues such as Republic or Phaedo. But I doubt that the refutation of the idealists is a self-criticism on Plato’s part (pace, among many, Kamlah 1963 and Sayre 223-4). Instead, following a suggestion first proposed (perhaps independently) by Natorp 1903: 292-3 and Shorey 1903: 184

40 becoming81. The former is perfectly stable and immutable; the latter is subject to change82. They also aver that knowing subjects communicate (κοινωνεῖν) with real being through reasoning (διὰ

λογισµοῦ), and with becoming through bodily perception (σώµατι […] δι᾽ αἰσθήσεως). But what exactly is this this relation of communication? The ES asks whether to know is a case of acting on something; and to be known a case of being acted upon by something. If so, the idealists could well accept the dunamis proposal. But they reply in the negative: since to be acted upon means to be set in motion (κινεῖσθαι), and forms must be immobile (τὸ ἠρεµοῦν), they contend that the dunamis proposal cannot apply to true being, but only to becoming. This, however, elicits a paradox: by the idealists’ own admission, forms are both motionless and knowable; yet, it appears that they also move by being known. Both motion and motionlessness are therefore required for the knowledge of the Forms to be possible83. Where do things go wrong?

The text does not offer a straightforward answer. The ES simply follows up with a notorious rhetorical outburst: ‘But – Zeus! – what is this? Are we in any case going to be so easily persuaded that motion and life and soul and wisdom are truly absent from what perfectly is, and that it does not live, or think, but sits there in august holiness, devoid of intelligence, fixed and immovable?’84.

The question is rhetorical in that it calls for a negative answer. And Theaetetus agrees that a

n. 433, though from interpretative standpoints different from mine, I think the idealists’ account represents too rigid an interpretation of Plato’s theory of Forms, namely one which is unable to account for the Forms’ causal nature and for their mutual participatory relations. For similar readings see also Cornford 1935: 242-4 and Cherniss 1944: 439- 40 n.376. 81 Cf. 248a7: γένεσιν, τὴν δὲ οὐσίαν χωρίς. 82 Cf. 248a12-13: ἀεὶ κατὰ ταὐτὰ ὡσαύτως ἔχειν […] ἄλλοτε ἄλλως. 83 Cf. Keyt 1969: 2 for a more detailed account of the paradox. 84 Sph. 248e7-249a2: τί δὲ πρὸς Διός; ὡς ἀληθῶς κίνησιν καὶ ζωὴν καὶ ψυχὴν καὶ φρόνησιν ἦ ῥᾳδίως

πεισθησόµεθα τῷ παντελῶς ὄντι µὴ παρεῖναι, µηδὲ ζῆν αὐτὸ µηδὲ φρονεῖν, ἀλλὰ σεµνὸν καὶ ἅγιον, νοῦν οὐκ ἔχον, ἀκίνητον ἑστὸς εἶναι; Hadot 1960 documents the enormous impact of these lines on the Platonic tradition.

41 positive one would indeed be terrible (δεινὸν). The point is probably that the idealists’ persistence to deprive true being of any sort of motion requires too high a price to pay, namely the impossibility of intelligence and knowledge, which a philosopher venerates above all else (250c10-11). It must therefore be conceded that being is in some sense subject to motion, because intelligence implies a form of motion85. Perhaps the solution to the paradox is that two types of motion are here in play: one physical (from which forms are immune); and one non-physical (to which forms are subject)86.

Be that as it may, at 249a2-b1the ES feels entitled to infer that being must have intelligence, life,

85 This passage is among the most intricate and debated of Plato’s dialogues. A detailed analysis would lead me too far afield (but see §5.3). Still, I will not refrain from expressing doubts about those (widespread) readings interpreting the ES’ rhetorical question as urging some enlargement of the idealists’ ontological commitment (cf. e.g., Brochard 1912: 141; Heidegger 1992 [1924/5]: 482; Diès 1925: 288-9 n.1; Cornford 1935: 241-7; Ross 1951: 110-1; Cordero 1993: 44-46; Menn 1995: 23, 71 n.5; Brown 1998: 201-2; Miller 2004: 357-8; Politis 2006 (part. 168); Brisson 2008; Karfik 2011: 139). What the ES stresses is not that motion, life, soul and intelligence should be included in the domain of what exists (or even really exists); but that, in virtue of their presence (παρεῖναι) in perfect being, the latter can live, think and therefore move (cf. Zeller 1889 [1859]: 689 n.1 and de Vogel 1986: 196). So the argument is not meant to criticize the idealists on what they do or do not countenance as being (or real being), but on the structural features of perfect being. Equally unconvincing are those readings identifying the motion ascribed to perfect being with so-called ‘mere Cambridge change’ (Reeve 1985: 61; McPherran 1986: 244-50; Silverman 2002: 158, 260; Gill 2012: 237-8). To which it can be objected (i) that appeal to ‘mere Cambridge change’ could at best account for the presence of motion, but it leaves the notions of life, soul and intelligence entirely unexplained. Further, (ii) reference to time is pivotal for the notion of ‘Cambridge change’. For x undergoes ‘Cambridge change’ if F is true of x at t1, but no longer at t2. Unless t1 and t2 are different, there can be no ‘Cambridge change’. But Forms are not subject to time. (For further criticisms of the ‘mere Cambridge change’ proposal, cf. Brown 1998: 190-2; Leigh 2012a: 244-9; and Wiitala 2018: 174-7). The correct interpretation is instead, I think, that Plato assigns to the Forms a non-physical type of motion, consisting in the time-immune and rational causal interconnection binding forms together and making the eidetic domain an integrated and dynamic organism (cf. Ti. 30c5-31b3). I consider this consistent with the cornerstones of Plato’s metaphysics and I believe it does not mark a turning point in his thought. Versions (sometimes considerably different) of this constural have been defended by Zeller 1889 [1859]: 686-98; Apelt 1891; Gomperz 1925 [1902]: 444-5 and n. 2; Rodier 1957 [1905]: 63-5; Stefanini 1949: 205; de Vogel 1953; Pester 1971; Gerson 2006; Fronterotta 2007: 81-97; Ferrari 2012; Perl 2014; Fronterotta 2020. 86 This is a point shared also by commentators who read the argument differently than I do, e.g. Cornford 1935:

246 and Cherniss 1944: 352, 439.

42 soul and therefore also motion. Through the mouth of Theaetetus, still acting as their spokesman87, it appears that the idealists eventually give up.

The idealists’ conception of being, just like that of the materialists, is therefore too narrow.

By unreservedly excluding motion from true being, the idealists deprive it of every power of

κοινωνία, including that with knowing subjects. Thus, they end up making true being unintelligible, contrary to their own premise. Their account fails to explain a basic feature of true being, namely its intelligibility88.

The final aporia [249d9-250d4]. One would expect at this point the ES returning to the dunamis proposal89. Since true being has been shown to be in some sense subject to motion, the main obstacle for the idealists’ acceptance of the ‘dunamis proposal’ has been removed and they could now endorse it. But it turns out that the sequence is not concluded by a reaffirmation of the

‘dunamis proposal’, but by the statement of the notorious so-called ‘children’s prayer’ (249d3-4):

‘being and the all are such things as are both immovable and movable’90. Thus, the ‘dunamis proposal’ seemingly disappears from the dialogue91 and the ‘children’s prayer’ becomes the focus

87 Cf. Sph. 248a5: σὺ δ᾽ἡµῖν καὶ τὰ παρὰ τούτων ἀφερµήνευε. 88 Taking again Politis’ list of the requirements of an adequate answer to a ti esti question (cf. above n.23), the idealists fail to meet the ‘explanatoriness requirement’. 89 See below §5.3. 90 ὅσα ἀκίνητα καὶ κεκινηµένα, τὸ ὄν τε καὶ τὸ πᾶν συναµφότερα λέγειν. For the construal of this line cf. Owen

1966: 339 n.16; Perl 2014: 152-3; Gerson 2020: 140 n.69. In my view, the point is not that being includes two different classes of things (those in motion and those immovable) – as maintained by many interpreters, but that beings are in one sense in motion, and in another sense at rest. Keyt 1969: 6 acknowledges that this translation is grammatically possible, but judges it unnecessary and unfeasible. But his objections are all directed against Owen’s own reading, and cut no ice against mine (cf. above n. 85). 91 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 90.

43 of the two interlocutors as the new account of being (τῷ λόγῳ τὸ ὄν). One may therefore surmise that the former has replaced the latter and that the dunamis proposal was only meant to serve to advance the argument92. There is good reason, I think, to suppose that Plato is here inviting the reader to work out part of the argument for herself, 93. But in any case, the account of being stated by the ‘children’s prayer’ now takes the spotlight.

Theaetetus deludes himself that with that logos a satisfactory result has been achieved. But the Stranger immediately disenchants him by raising a further aporia about being, the final one.

He contends that the logos of the ‘children’s prayer’ is in fact open to the same objection earlier addressed to the dualists (243d6-244b5). Just as being could not be the hot and the cold, so too it cannot be motion and rest94. These last are most contrary to one another, yet both exist. And when we say that both and each of them ‘are’ we mean something different from ‘move’ or ‘rest’. Being encompasses motion and rest (περιεχοµένην) – because they both are through their combination with being (πρὸς τὴν τῆς οὐσίας κοινωνίαν) – and should therefore count as a third thing alongside and different from them (τρίτον τι […] ἕτερον δή τι), which by its own nature (κατὰ τὴν αὑτοῦ

φύσιν) neither moves nor rests and is outside motion and rest.

92 The main proponent of this reading has been Diès 1909. 93 The notion of dunamis is abrubtly taken up again by the ES in the ensuing pages of the dialogue (cf. e.g.

251e8-9; 252d2; 253e1-2; 254c4-5) to describe the participatory relation linking Forms with one another. The lack of any explicit rationale for the renewed employment of this notion makes the supposition arise that Plato is inviting the reader to bridge the gap between the two sections and to complete the argument autonomously. See §5.3. 94 Problem: the ‘children’s prayer’ did not assert that being is motion and rest, but that ‘being and the all are such things as are both immovable and movable’. On the face of it, the ES’ reformulation of the latter statement through the former seems illegitimate. Solution: as Bluck 1975 [1963]: 104 perceptively remarks, the ES here simply draws an inference without spelling it out. The ‘children’s prayer’ made the extensional claim the totality of what is includes things that are both in motion and at rest; the ES infers the intensional claim that the concept of being should therefore be identified with motion and rest. The inference is probably based on previous remarks at 249b2-3 and 249b12-c1.

The logos of the ‘children’s prayer’ does not therefore provide a satisfactory answer to the definitional question of being. It too fails to meet the ‘generality requirement’ that any correct answer to a ti esti question must fulfill95. In response to the definitional question of being, it simply enumerates cases, namely the two fundamental beings of motion and rest. The ES concludes that just as they found themselves confused about not-being, so too are they now in a state of equal (if not higher) puzzlement (ἀπορία) about being (250e5-7)96.

The status of the definiendum. Our definitional question about being is still unanswered. And it will remain so until the end of the dialogue97. We have found the assessed theorists of being making mistakes typical of Socrates’ victims in the early dialogues: they either confine themselves to enumerating cases of (fundamental) beings, or provide too narrow answers that do not account for certain types of being or for some essential features of being. Not even the final characterization of being stated by the ‘children’s prayer’ has withstood close inspection.

Yet the refutation of this last characterization of being also broaches salient positive doctrinal elements about the status of the definendum of our question, elements that shed light on the argumentative trajectory of the dialogue’s series of aporiai about being. The ES now overtly states

95 Cf. Bluck 1975 [1963]: 103. 96 The ES however immediately adds (250a7-251a3) that precisely because being and not being are equally puzzling, they might turn out to be also jointly illuminated: so far as one is clarified, the other will be too. Owen famously baptized this announcement ‘the Parity Assumption’ (cf. Owen 1971: 230). I shall examine it in Ch. 6. 97 In saying so, I want to qualify Frede’s suggestion that ‘the Sophist, in a way, is the most dogmatic of all of

Plato’s dialogues’ (Frede 1996b: 135). Frede argues elsewhere that the question of being is indeed answered in the Sophist, through the distinction between καθ᾽αὑτά and πρὸς ἄλλα at 255c12-3 (cf. Frede 1996a: 181-9). I criticize this reading in ch. 3. More generally, while I think the Sophist obviously does voice positive answers to some philosophical problems (e.g. what falsehood is), I believe it does not overtly endorse any definition of being and is therefore, at least prima facie, aporetic on this point. Still, I shall also suggest that Plato might be hinting at the right answer at 247d8- e4, with the so-called ‘dunamis proposal’ (see §5.3), though he leaves to the reader to work out the details for herself.

45 what was already hinted at in the refutation of the pluralists and monists: not only is ‘being’ a genuine referring-expression; it also refers to an entity in its own right, which cannot exhaust all there is, and is separate from all others things that are said to be. Further, being should hold not only of bodies but also of incorporeal entities, as the anti-materialist argument had urged. And it must also be an entity open to relations of communication with other beings, as the anti-idealist argument had urged.

What sort of entity is it? Textual signposts unmistakably suggest that it is a bona fide Platonic

Kind or Form98.

• The verb ‘embrace’ (περιέχω), used at 250b9, will promptly resurface at soon as 253d8, amid

the notorious account of the dialectician’s task, to specify one of the types of relationships

holding among Forms.

• The vocabulary of κοινωνία (250b10-11) will be obviously ubiquitous in the ensuing pages of

the dialogue. Notably, the analysis of ‘to be’ (εἶναι) in terms of combination with being (πρὸς

τὴν τῆς οὐσίας κοινωνίαν), here mentioned for the first time, will be repeatedly stressed, on

the assumption that being is a Kind99.

• The attribution to being of a nature of its own also suggests that its ontological status is that

of a bona fide Kind. For ‘φύσις’ (especially with genitive) will be frequently employed in the

subsequent pages roughly as a synonym of ‘εἶδος’, ‘γένος’ and ‘ἰδέα’100.

98 In the opening of the next chapter, I will argue that Plato speaks of Form (εἶδος, ἰδέα) and Kind (γένος) interchangeably. This is not meant to be a novel claim, cf. esp. Cornford 1935: 257 n.1 and Cherniss 1947: 126-33. 99 Cf. 254d10, 256a1, 256d9, 256e2-3. 100 Cf. 255d9, e5; 256c2-3, e1; 257a9, c7, d4, d31; 258a8, a11. For this meaning of ‘φύσις’ cf. Mannsperger

1969: 190. See also Crat. 389b8-11 (with Ademollo 2011: 129).

• We find an explicit confirmation of this construal as soon as at 254d4-5. Here the ES

retrospectively refers to being, motion and rest as the ‘greatest of the kinds (τῶν γενῶν) we

have just been talking about’. And at 254c3, these Kinds are also called Forms (τῶν εἰδῶν).

Being should therefore be regarded as a separate Kind or Form. And in this way it will continue to be considered throughout the rest of the dialogue101. The implications of this characterization of being as a Kind or Form will be investigated in the remainder of this thesis. For purposes of this chapter, however, we can observe that the long series of refutations that have so far kept the two interlocutors busy aimed, among other things, at identifying being as a single Kind. This characterization of being is therefore a positive result cashed out by the two interlocutors, that will be held firm in the continuation of their inquiry. While the ES and Theaetetus did not manage to achieve a definition of being, it is now clear that the definiendum of the question they have been busy with all along, is the Kind Being.

This conclusion chimes with Plato’s remarks about the metaphysical background of ti esti questions. In several dialogues the search for the definition of F aims to know the feature which remains identical in all the instances of F (e.g. the beauty making all beautiful things beautiful).

This feature is often metaphysically characterized as a Form. Thus, the Form F specifies the definiendum of the question ‘What is F?’. Here are just two examples:

• In the Hippias major, Socrates asks Hippias at 286d1-2 ‘what is the beautiful?’ (τί ἐστι τὸ

καλόν). More precisely, he is interested in knowing what the beautiful itself is (286d8, 289c3,

d2: αὐτὸ τὸ καλὸν). Later he will make clear that the definiendum he is seeking for is the form

(289d4: τὸ εῖδος) of the beautiful in virtue of which all beautiful things are beautiful (289d2-

5, 292c8-d4, 294b6-c2).

101 Cf. 254e3; 255e1; 257a4-9; 259a4-5, b1-2. The same holds of Motion and Rest.

• Similarly, in the Meno, Socrates is interested in knowing what virtue is (71d5: τί φῂς ἀρετὴν

εἶναι), and specifies that the object of his inquiry is the form of virtue (72c7, d8, e5: εἶδος),

i.e. that single thing which remains identical (ταὐτόν) in all virtues and because of which (δι᾽ὃ)

all virtues are virtues.

In this chapter I have argued that a similar pattern is found in the Sophist. The ES and Theaetetus engage with an (unprecedented) definitional question ‘What is being?’ and the definiendum of this question is captured by the Kind Being (or Form of Being), that will have a prominent role in the argument of the dialogue.

Chapter 2

Being and Participation

The last attempted definition of the sophist triggered the paradox of falsehood and the puzzle of

not-being. The latter in turn prompted a definitional search for being. The definiendum of this

search was then identified with the Kind Being. By exploring this sequence of thoughts in the

previous chapter, I proposed an explanation of how Plato came to isolate a Kind Being. It is now

time to begin a metaphysical analysis of this notion, which will span the rest of this thesis. I shall

begin in this chapter by arguing that the Kind Being, just like any other Platonic Kind, is first and

foremost conceived of by Plato as a robust causal principle. It is the cause in virtue of which the

things partaking in it have the property named after it, i.e. the property of being (simpliciter). This

implies that there is a distinctive property of being (not being something or other) for which the

Kind Being is metaphysically responsible. I shall support this interpretation by drawing not only

from the Sophist, but also from the second part of the Parmenides. The long-range goal I have in

sight advocating this reading, and which will be further defended in the following chapters, is that

the famous slogan ‘to be is to be something’, almost unanimously taken to capture a fundamental

truth of Plato’s conception of being, does not in fact fit with the conception of being developed in

the Sophist. A coda to the chapter will enquire whether the Kind Being can itself be a being.

2.1. Forms, Participation and Causality

What does Plato mean when he speaks of Being as a Kind? Plato borrowed the term ‘γένος’ from

the ordinary Greek language and included it in the range of expressions deputed to designate

48 49 intelligible Forms1. The usage of this term becomes more frequent in the so-called later dialogues2, where it is often employed interchangeably with ‘εἶδος’3. Notably, in the Sophist Plato freely swings between calling Being a γένος and an εἶδος4. Thus, to ask what he means when he speaks of Being as a Kind is equivalent to asking what it means for him to conceive of Being as a Form.

In order to answer these questions, I shall focus on a salient aspect of Plato’s characterization of the Forms, namely their status as causes. Thus, the first segment of the argument I am going to develop in this chapter is aptly outlined as follows:

1. Forms are causes

2. Being is a Form (in the Sophist)

3. ∴ Being is a cause

1 Along with ‘εἶδος’, ‘ἰδέα’, or locutions such as ‘the ούσία of F’, ‘αὐτὸ τὸ F’ or ‘F αὐτὸ καθ᾿ αὑτό’ (for any substitution of ‘F’ capturing the name of a Form, e.g. ‘the beautiful itself’). Cf. D.L. 3.64.705-7: [Πλάτων] τὴν γοῦν ἰδέαν καὶ εἶδος ὀνοµάζει καὶ γένος καὶ παράδειγµα καὶ ἀρχὴν καὶ αἴτιον. The term ‘γένος’ is still used by Plato in its ordinary meanings of ‘race’ or ‘family’ e.g. at Phdr. 244d7; R. 363d3; Cra. 395c9; Tht. 174e5; Sph. 216a2-3; Lg. 693a2; or even ‘offspring’, e.g. at Symp. 191c5-6; R. 368a3. For the etymology of γένος, cf. Chantraine 1999 [1968]: 222. 2 References, statistics and analysis in Campbell 1894: 300-1 and Ritter 1910. 3 Compare e.g. Prm. 129a1 (εἶδος) with 129c2 (τὰ γένη τε καὶ εἴδη); Prm. 135a8 (γένος) with b7 (εἶδος); Sph.

254c3-4 (τῶν εἰδῶν τῶν µεγίστων λεγοµένων ἄττα) with 254d4-5 (µέγιστα µὴν τῶν γενῶν); Sph. 253d1 (τὸ κατὰ γένη διαιρεῖσθαι) with 253e2 (διακρίνειν κατὰ γένος), 264c1-2 (κατ᾽εἴδη διαιρέσεων) and 267d5-6 (τῆς τῶν γενῶν κατ᾽εἴδη διαιρέσεως); Plt. 285a4 (κατ᾽εἴδη διαιρουµένους) with b2 (ἐν εἴδεσι), b5 (γένους) and c1 (δύο γένη). Pellegrin 1991: 392 tentatively suggests that Plato designates by γένος what gets divided, and by εἶδος what results from division, but see contra Sph. 253d1, Plt. 289a8, b1, b5. The term ἰδέα is less frequent in this context and often accompanied by the numerical adjective µία (cf. e.g. Phdr. 265d3 ; R. 507b6 ; Prm. 132a2-3; Sph. 253d5, Phlb. 16d1, 60d5). It has proved tempting, at least since Seneca (Ep. 58.18-21), to draw a sharp technical distinction between ἰδέα and εἶδος, but these attempts do not withstand the evidence, cf. e.g. Euthphr. 6d10-e1; Phd. 104c7-e1; R. 596a6-597a2; Prm. 132a1-3, 135a8-c1. More importantly, Plato is not bound to a rigid technical terminology (cf. again Campbell 1894: 292; Shorey 1903: 4), and all these terms have a variety of applications. 4 See previous note.

This section discusses premise 1 and thereby provides for the appropriate background to argue, in §2.2, that the Kind Being, just like any other Platonic Kind, is first and foremost conceived of as a robust causal principle: the cause of being. Such a conclusion will imply that there is a distinctive property of being of which the Kind Being is the cause. This will be the starting point of the second segment of my argument.

Participation and causality. Plato was committed to the view that ordinary objects of experience possess a given attribute in virtue of standing in the appropriate relation to an abstract5 intelligible object, traditionally called Form or Idea6. This relation is designated in the dialogues by a non- systematic plurality of expressions – including (but not restricted to) ‘participation’ (µέθεξις),

‘presence’ (παρουσία), ‘imitation’ (µίµησις) and ‘combination’ (κοινωνία)7 – and is customarily characterized in causal terms. Thus, in what is often regarded as the locus classicus for the exposition of Theory of Forms, viz. Phaedo 99d4-102a68, Socrates affirms that ‘all beautiful things are beautiful because of the beautiful (100d6-7: τῷ καλῷ πάντα τὰ καλὰ καλά)’. ‘The beautiful’ is of course the Form of Beauty, which is acknowledged as the true cause (αἰτία) whose presence makes (ποιεῖ) beautiful anything beautiful. The ‘hypothesis’ of the Forms, as Plato calls it, is here invoked following Socrates’ previous dissatisfaction with naturalistic accounts of phenomena, including Anaxagoras’ (98d6-99d3). The causes advocated by such accounts are downgraded to

5 I.e. immaterial and outside space and time, cf. Symp. 211a7-8; Phdr. 247c2; Ti. 52b3-5. 6 But see above n.1. 7 Cf. Fujisawa 1974 and Brisson 2005 [2001]: 25 on these various expressions. Phd. 100d5-6 stresses the marginal importance of a technical and context-invariant vocabulary to express this relation. 8 But remember that at Phd. 100b1-3 Plato presents this doctrine as familiar and not as something new to the conversation staged in this dialogue (cf. also 76d7-8). This remark is often (and predictably) underestimated by those who, like Dancy 2004 (see p. 299-300), defend a developmental account of Plato’s metaphysics.

51 mere necessary conditions, or, as Socrates puts it, to ‘that without which the cause would not be able to act as a cause’ (99b3-4: ἐκεῖνο ἄνευ οὗ τὸ αἴτιον οὐκ ἄν ποτ’ εἴη αἴτιον). The real cause

(τὸ αἴτιον τῷ ὄντι) can instead be no other than the intelligible Form.

Similarly, the Hippias Major has Socrates remarking that ‘the beautiful itself’ (286d8, 289c3, d2: αὐτὸ τὸ καλὸν), i.e. the ‘form’ (289d4: τὸ εῖδος) of the beautiful which is identified with the definiendum of the question ‘what is the beautiful?’, is that ‘by which everything else is beautified and seen to be fine when that form is added to it’9. Thus – he adds later (300a9-b2) – the many beautiful things ‘have some thing that itself makes them beautiful (ἔχουσιν ἄρα τι τὸ αὐτὸ ὃ ποιεῖ

αὐτὰς καλὰς εἶναι), i.e. that common thing (τὸ κοινὸν τοῦτο) that belongs to both of them in common and to each privately (ὃ καὶ ἀµφοτέραις αὐταῖς ἔπεστι κοινῇ καὶ ἑκατέρᾳ ἰδίᾳ)’. And ‘the maker – Socrates declares at 296e8-9 – is nothing else but the cause’ (τὸ ποιοῦν δέ γ' ἐστὶν οὐκ

ἄλλο τι ἢ τὸ αἴτιον).

Essentially the same explanatory pattern recurs in other dialogues, where the absence of vocabulary of ‘αἰτία’ from the relevant passages is compensated by the steady presence of other standard causal locutions, such as the instrumental dative and the construction διά + accusative10.

Thus, in the Euthyphro, Socrates aims to account for ‘the pious which is identical in all actions

(5d1-2: ταὐτόν ἐστιν ἐν πάσῃ πράξει τὸ ὅσιον αὐτὸ αὑτῷ)’ and makes it clear that the metaphysical explanation for this is provided by ‘that form itself in virtue of which all pious actions are pious

(6d10-e1: ἐκεῖνο αὐτὸ τὸ εἶδος ᾧ πάντα τὰ ὅσια ὅσιά ἐστιν)’. Analogously, the Meno (72a6-c4) contrasts the ‘swarm of virtues’ purveyed by Meno’s answer to the definitional quest for virtue

9 289d2-4: ᾧ καὶ τἆλλα πάντα κοσµεῖται καὶ καλὰ φαίνεται, ἐπειδὰν προσγένηται ἐκεῖνο τὸ εἶδος (echoed by

Hippias at 289d7-8). 10 Cf. Sedley 1998: 115 on these locutions. On the causal meaning of ‘διά + accusative’ in Herodotus and Plato see Luraghi 1989.

(71d5) with the very thing in virtue of which the particular virtues are ‘all the same and differ in nothing from one another (ᾧ οὐδὲν διαφέρουσιν ἀλλὰ ταὐτόν εἰσιν ἅπασαι)’, namely, the one and the same form they have and in virtue of which they are virtuous, in spite of their differences

(72c6-8: κἂν εἰ πολλαὶ καὶ παντοδαπαί εἰσιν, ἕν γέ τι εἶδος ταὐτὸν ἅπασαι ἔχουσιν δι’ὃ εἰσὶν

ἀρεταί)11.

We are therefore led to suppose, by the persistence of such causal descriptions of participatory relations, that when the dialogues explain the possession of a property as a result of participation in the appropriate Form, the relation Plato has in mind is causal in nature. This seems to be the case, for example, in the Symposium, where Diotima asserts (210b1-3) that the beauty of each beautiful body is ‘brother’ (ἀδελφόν) to that of any other body in that the ‘the beauty of all bodies is one and the same (ἕν τε καὶ ταὐτὸν […] τὸ ἐπὶ πᾶσιν τοῖς σώµασι κάλλος)’; and the metaphysical explanation for this unity and sameness is the existence of a Form of Beauty in which all beautiful things partake (211b2-3: τὰ δὲ ἄλλα πάντα καλὰ ἐκείνου µετέχοντα). Likewise, in the Parmenides,

‘things that get a share of likeness come to be like in that way and to the extent that they get a share’12; and many large things can be said to be large and share the one and the same character

(µία τις […] ἰδέα ἡ αὐτὴ εἶναι ἐπὶ πάντα) of largeness because there is a unitary form of Largeness

(εἶδος […] ἓν τὸ µέγα) which grounds this share (132a1-3). In both passages the explanatory pattern is a consistent one: a plurality of objects share a certain attribute because there is an

11 It is disputed whether in dialogues such as Euthyphro or Meno Plato had already fully elaborated his account of the ontological status of the Forms. But however underdeveloped this account may have been at that stage, it seems to me that the reference to Forms and their causal role is unmistakable in these dialogues, as these passages show. Cf. Fronterotta 2001: 3-44. 12 129a4-5: τὰ µὲν τῆς ὁµοιότητος µεταλαµβάνοντα ὅµοια γίγνεσθαι ταύτῃ τε καὶ κατὰ τοσοῦτον ὅσον ἂν

µεταλαµβάνῃ.

53 intelligible Form, whose name names that attribute, in which they partake and which is therefore the ultimate true cause of that attribute13.

So far this reconstruction has focused exclusively on participation occurring between Forms and perceptible particulars. But Plato countenances also participatory relations in which the relata are both Forms. This is the case of states of affairs captured by true predicative statements such as

‘the horse is an animal’, whose truth is explained through reference to the Form of Horse’s participation in (or combination with) the Form of Animal. The Sophist lays down this aspect of

Plato’s theory more extensively than any other dialogue. But it should be clear that this can hardly be a later doctrinal development. Inter-eidetic participations are prefigured already at least in

Republic, Phaedo and probably Cratylus14; and, as a matter of fact, the very possibility of Platonic

13 The prominence of the notion of causality in the description of the Forms’ ontological status is consistently stressed by ancient sources. Xenocrates is reported by Proclus to have defined ἰδέα as ‘paradigmatic cause of whatever is at any time composed according to nature (in Prm. 888.14-5 = Xenocrates F 14 IP2: αἰτίαν παραδειγµατικὴν τῶν κατὰ φύσιν ἀεὶ συνεστώτων; cf. Taràn 1987: 246-50). At Metaph. A 9.990a34-b1 Aristotle most famously presents Plato and the Platonists as ‘οἱ δὲ τὰς ἰδέας αἰτίας τιθέµενοι’, and at 9.991b3–4 (= M 5.1080a2-3) the Phaedo’s causal account is directly referred to: ἐν δὲ τῷ Φαίδωνι οὕτω λέγεται, ὡς καὶ τοῦ εἶναι καὶ τοῦ γίγνεσθαι αἴτια τὰ εἴδη ἐστίν (echoed by GC B 9.335b7-16). Xenocrates’ formula can be paralleled in Alcinous (cf. Did. 163.23-24 [p. 21 Whittaker]: ὁρίζονται δὲ τὴν ἰδέαν παράδειγµα τῶν κατὰ φύσιν αἰώνιον, supplemented by 12.167.6-9 [p. 27 Whittaker]: τῆς ἰδέας οὔσης αἰτίας ⟨καὶ⟩ ἀρχῆς τοῦ εἶναι ἕκαστον τοιοῦτον, οἵα ἐστὶν αὐτή) and Diogenes Laertius (3.77: τὰς δὲ ἰδέας ὑφίσταται, καθὰ καὶ προείρηται, αἰτίας τινὰς καὶ ἀρχὰς τοῦ τοιαῦτ’ εἶναι τὰ φύσει συνεστῶτα οἷάπερ ἐστὶν αὐτά). Arius Dydimus and Aëtius have descriptions in very similar phraseology, which probably reflects a scholastic tradition (cf. Ar. Did. apud Eus. PE 11.3.5: αἰτίαν καὶ ἀρχὴν τοῦ ἕκαστον εἶναι τοιοῦτον, οἵα ἐστὶν αὐτή; Aët. 1.10.§1: ἰδέα ἐστὶν οὐσία σώµατος, αἰτία τῶν οἵα ἐστὶν αὐτὴ καὶ παράδειγµα τῆς τῶν κατὰ φύσιν ἐχόντων αἰσθητῶν ὑποστάσεως). Cf. also Sen. Ep. 65.7.1-2: his quintam [scil. causam] Plato adicit exemplar, quam ipse “idean” vocat). For a useful concise overview of the Neoplatonic developments of the notion of Forms as causes, one can consult Sorabji 2004: 160-3. 14 Cf. R. 476a4-7 (with Adam 1902: 362-4 and Ferrari 2000: 374-6); Phd. 102b9-103a2, 104b6-105a5 (with

Diès 1909: 95-7 and Robin 1926: LVI-LVII); Cra. 438e5-6 (to compare with Men. 81c9-d1). See also Fronterotta 2001: 55-6, 125-8, who also mentions Men. 76c6-d1, Prt. 329c2-331a1 and 349a8-d5. The retraction of Lafrance 2015 [1981]: 517 is instructive in this regard.

54 dialectic relies on the condition that Forms are interrelated15. Now, that inter-eidetic participatory connections cannot be sic et simpliciter identified with those between a perceptible particular and a Form is a platitude, if only because the former are time-immune and do not involve any relata which are subject to generation and corruption. But the consistent employment of the vocabulary of participation in the description of both relations can hardly be explained away through appeal to mere homonymy16, and it is only reasonable to suppose some common ground. Thus, from the consideration of a number of passages of the Sophist there emerges a certain definite tendency of

Plato’s method to analyze even inter-eidetic combination in causal terms17. Notably, the construction ‘διά + accusative’, which is indicative of a causal link, recurs consistently throughout the dialogue’s section on the ‘communion of kinds’. For example, at 256a1 the ES remarks that

Motion ‘is, because of its sharing in being’ (διὰ τὸ µετέχειν τοῦ ὄντος), rephrased a few lines below with the causal conjunction ‘ἐπείπερ’ replacing ‘διά + accusative’18; and at 256a7-8 Motion is said to be identical ‘because, again, everything has a share in identity’ (διὰ τὸ µετέχειν αὖ πᾶν

ταὐτοῦ)19. In addition, the verb ‘ποιεῖν’ is also used in relation to inter-eidetic participation. For

15 Cf. the resumé in Ross 1951: 116-7. 16 As Cornford 1935: 278-9 seems to do, followed (as frequently) by Cherniss 1944: 46 n.35. 17 Interpreters who have proposed a causal reading of inter-eidetic participation include: Fronterotta 2007: 214-

5 n. 25 and passim; Leigh 2010: 72-6; Ferrari 2012: 611; Wiitala 2018: 182-4. 18 Cf. 256d9: κίνησις […] ἐστι καὶ ὄν ἐπείπερ τοῦ ὄντος µετέχει. 19 Repeated at 256b1: ἀλλ' ὁπόταν µὲν ταὐτόν διὰ τὴν µέθεξιν ταὐτοῦ. Further examples of these causal formulations include: 255e5: διὰ τὸ µετέχειν τῆς ἰδέας τῆς θατέρου; b2-3: διὰ τὴν κοινωνίαν αὖ θατέρου; 259a7: µετασχὸν τοῦ ὄντος ἔστι διὰ ταύτην τὴν µέθεξιν. On the causal meaning of ‘διά + accusative’ see again Sedley 1998: 115 and Luraghi 1989. Ackrill 1957: 1 argued that ‘this διά does not introduce […] the cause why κίνησις ἔστιν: it does not refer to some event or state which resulted in the further state described by ‘κίνησις ἔστιν’. The words introduced by διά give an expansion or analysis of ἔστιν as this word is used in κίνησις ἔστιν, i.e. as used existentially’ (his italics). I agree that an existential sense is in play here – I will dwell on this point at length later in this and the following chapters. However, as we shall see in more detail in the next sub-section, to be a cause is not for Plato – as

55 example, at 256d12-32 the ES asserts that ‘with all of them [scil. the kinds], the nature of the different, by rendering (ἀπεργαζοµένη) each a different thing from being, makes (ποιεῖ) it a not- being’20.

To sum up: in Plato’s conception of the Forms their status as causes is prominent, and so is the causal analysis of participatory relations, both between Forms and particulars, and between

Forms with one another. Accordingly, when Plato uses ‘γένος’ and ‘εἶδος’ (interchangeably) to refer to intelligible Forms, by also stressing their involvement in participatory relations (oft- expressed by causal locutions), it seems reasonable to conclude that he has first and foremost in mind the notion of a causal principle, rather than, say, that of a taxonomical posit aimed to fulfil a classificatory function (as modern readers might be led to think by recent accounts of natural kinds).

The causality of Forms. It remains to be explained, however, what exactly it means for a Form to be a cause. A comprehensive examination of Plato’s notion on eidetic causality would require a separate treatment, but I should provide a brief outline of my view as a framework for analysis21.

opposed to most modern philosophers – to be an event or a state (cf. Sedley 1998 and Natali 2003), but to be the thing metaphysically responsible for the possession of a given property. Thus, to exclude that ‘διά’ introduces the cause why κίνησις ἔστιν because it does not refer to some event or state means anachronistically to saddle Plato with a modern conception of causality foreign to him and is therefore unpersuasive as an argument. 20 It is worth noting that at at Sph. 265b8-10 the ES explicitly connects production to causality: ‘We called productive […] any capacity that turns out to cause things to come into being that were not before (ποιητικήν, εἴπερ µεµνήµεθα τὰ κατ’ἀρχὰς λεχθέντα, πᾶσαν ἔφαµεν εἶναι δύναµιν ἥτις ἂν αἰτία γίγνηται τοῖς µὴ πρότερον οὖσιν ὕστερον γίγνεσθαι). Admittedly, as Francesco Ademollo warns me per litt., this statement does not generalize over every type of causality, but speaks more specifically of the causality involved in the coming into being of what was not before. The reference to time makes it arduous to lightheartedly apply this connection between production and causality to the communion of the Forms. And yet it seems to me that it a relevant connection which should at the very least ring a bell. 21 For which I am especially indebted to Zeller 1889 [1859]: 686-98; Sedley 1998; Fronterotta 2001: 195-222;

Natali 2003, 2013; Ferrari 2010. See also Hankinson 1998: 84-98.

First, it proves useful to begin with saying what Forms as causes are not. For many modern metaphysicians, causes are entities like events, states of affairs, facts, situations or tropes22. But

Platonic Forms are immaterial objects (ὄντα)23. Thus, as Sedley has convincingly shown, when

Plato nominates a Form as cause, he regards it as the thing responsible for the possession of a determinate property, ‘much as in a legal context a person, rather than an event involving that person, is ultimately nominated as responsible for, or guilty of (αἴτιος), the crime’24.

Second, for a Form to be a cause is not, as some have suggested, to be a logical reason, namely an explanatory account of a given phenomenon25. The frequent employment of the vocabulary of

‘production’ and ‘generation’ in Plato’s description of the Forms’ causality (especially in Phaedo and Hippias Major) discourages deflationary readings of this sort and suggests instead a conception of the Forms as productive factors responsible for their participants’ possession of a given property26. Forms are immaterial objects that are metaphysically responsible for determinate

22 Cf. Schaffer 2016: §1 for a survey. 23 See below pp. 58-60. 24 Cf. Sedley 1998: 120. See also Hankinson 1998: 85-6, 88. 25 Pace Vlastos 1969, Frede 1980: 126 and Fine 1987 (more nuanced). I of course do not mean that Plato never uses ‘αἰτία’ or ‘αἴτιον’ to indicate a propositional explanation (cf. e.g. Ion 532b8, 536d1; Ly. 209b8; Grg. 520e7; Phdr. 229d4-6; Symp. 184a5, 204b5; Phlb. 15a7-c2; Ti. 22c1-23b3) But I deny that this is the meaning in play when it comes to the causality of the Forms. As for Frede’s notorious claim that in the Phaedo ‘αἰτία’ is used for propositional items (causal account), whereas ‘αἴτιον’ is used for non-propositional items (cause or agent), cf. e.g. Phd. 98d7-el, 101c4-5 and the remarks by Mueller 1998: 83-5 and Ledbetter 1999: 256-8 – the latter’s positive interpretative proposal on Plato’s conception of αἰτία/αἴτιον is in turn correctly assessed by Wolfsdorf 2005. 26 Cf. e.g. Phd. 100d5 (ποιεῖ); Hp.Ma. 296c2-3 (ποιεῖν), e8-9 (ποιοῦν), 297a4-8 (ποιοῦν, ποιοῦντος, ποιεῖται), b9 (πατήρ), 300a9 (ποιεῖ), 303e11-2 (ποιοῦν), with Natali 2013: 45-50 and the other studies mentioned above at n.21. At Phd. 100d5-5 the agent of ‘production’ is actually the ‘presence of’ or ‘combination with’ the Form of Beauty, but this is just an equivalent periphrasis, as proved by the instrumental dative ‘τῷ καλῷ’ at d7 (cf. also Sedley 1998: 116). On the connection between causality and production in Plato see also Casertano 2002: 8-10. One might object that, by the time he wrote the Timaeus (and possibly the Philebus), Plato developed his views about causation in such a

57 features to those entities (either sensibles or intelligibles) that partake in them. To be sure, Forms also play a decisive epistemological role in providing the reason explaining why a certain attribute

F holds true of a certain entity x. But this is not because the Form itself is an explanatory reason

(in the logical sense). Instead, it shows that Plato has a realistic approach to explanation based on the idea that explanations have objective correlates and track real relations of dependence between entities27.

Third, what makes a Form a cause is first and foremost its being by its own nature (φύσις) the property its name names and its participants have28. This seems to me the gist of formulae such as

way that Forms are no longer causes, because their causal role is transferred to an intermediate agent, viz. the demiurge (cf. e.g. Lennox 1985: part. 212). My reply to this objection is threefold. First, it is a notorious matter of controversy whether the demiurge is an independent metaphysical agent, or simply a metaphorical image capturing an aspect of the Forms’ causal role, though not numerically distinct from them (cf. Ferrari 2003 for the latter option – which has of course a Neoplatonic pedigree – with references to other advocates of it; see also Gerson 2020: 96, 152). Second, even if the demiurge is to be kept distinct from the Forms, the fact that he is assigned the role of transferring to the sensibles the property paradigmatically exemplified by a Form, would not entail that Forms are deprived of every causal role, let alone that they are mere explanatory accounts. They would still be intelligible paradigms of the property named after them, which the demiurge should ‘look at’ (Ti. 28a6-7) to shape the world. See also Brisson-Pradeau 1998: 13-4 on this point. Third, the problem of the transfer of the causal function from the Forms to the demiurge would only concern the Forms-sensibles participatory relationship, not the Forms-Forms one. I thank Doug Campbell for pushing me to clarify this point. 27 For a recent defence of a similar realistic account of explanation see Kim 1994. One might ask where Platonic

Forms, insofar as they are causes (αἰτίαι), would fit into the Aristotelian fourfold causal scheme. This question is in a way as old as Aristotle himself, cf. Metaph. A 6.988a9-10, A 9. 991a8-11; Z 8.1033b 26-8; but see also Sen. Ep. 65 and Plut. De def. or. 435f-436e. It is doubtful, however, that it is a legitimate one. It is unclear, that is, whether Platonic Forms are meant to answer any of the questions motivating the introduction of Aristotle’s four causes (see especially Natali 1997 and 2003). Several late ancient Platonists argued that the causality of Platonic Forms is not accounted for by the Aristotelian fourfold scheme, but rather complements it, cf. e.g. Ascl. in Metaph. 87.34-88.18 (with Gerson 2005: 225-7); Procl. in Ti. 1.265.19-30; Simp. in Ph. 3.13-4, 10.32-5 (quoting Porphyry, cf. fr. 120 Smith); but already Sen. Ep. 65.7-8. For these authors, paradigmatic causality is different from formal causality, in that the latter is internal to the object. 28 Cf. Cherniss 1957: 258-262. On the logic of ‘being’ and ‘having’, cf. Code 1986: esp. 425-9.

‘τὸ ὃ ἐστι’ (e.g. Phd. 75d1) or ‘τὸ ὃ ἐστι ὂν ὄντως’ (e.g. Phdr. 247e2), oft-deployed by Plato to refer to Forms29. In addition, this also provides for the appropriate conceptual framework to understand uses of the term ‘φύσις’ with the genitive singular referred to a Form (‘the nature of

F’)30. It might be wondered why it matters for the Forms’ causality that Forms are by their own nature the property their name names. It matters because Plato was committed to a conception of causation (possibly inherited from previous thinkers) according to which things are F because of the presence of something which is essentially F by its own nature, in a way analogous to that in which fire, being essentially hot by its own nature, makes other things hot by being present in them. This conception has been dubbed by some scholars ‘Transmission Theory of Causation’ or

‘Synonymy Principle of Causation’31.

Fourth, thanks to such a causal role a Form also grounds the correct attribution of a single name32 and a unique definitional formula to all and only the bearers of the property the Form’s name names33. It is because, say, Alcibiades partakes in the Form of Beauty that he can correctly

29 On the formula ‘ὅ ἐστιν’, cf. Ademollo 2013: 56-65. 30 See above p. 44 with n.101. 31 Cf. Barnes 1982: 119-20; Sedley 1998: 117-27. The principle is defended by Makin 1990-1, mostly on

Aristotelian grounds. For an early modern resurgence of a version of this principle, cf. Suárez, Disputationes Metaphysicae, 26, 1, 2; Descartes, Meditationes, AT, VII, 40-1, 165. See Lloyd 1976 for discussion. For ease of exposition I refer to the labels ‘Transmission Theory of Causation’ or ‘Synonymy Principle of Causation’ as if they were interchangeable, but note that the latter makes a relevant reference to language (‘synonymy’) which is absent from the former. Apart from that, it might be wondered whether, on this reading, a Forms is a property, or the cause thereof. I think this is a false dilemma: on the account of causation I take Plato to be committed to, it is because Forms are by their own nature the properties named after them that they are also, for that very reason, metaphysically responsible for (i.e. the true causes of) that property in the things that partake in them. So the Form of Beauty is by its own nature beauty and, for that very reason, it is metaphysically responsible for (i.e. the true causes of) the beauty in Helen. 32 ‘Name’ is equivalent to predicate expression. For a thing to acquire its ‘name’ in virtue of its participation in a Form means that the predicate corresponding to the Form is truly predicated of that thing, cf. e.g. Phd. 102b1-3. 33 Cf. e.g. Phd. 78e2, 102b1-2, c10, 103b7-c1; Prm. 130e5-6.

be called ‘beautiful’ and described by the definitional formula of beauty. Forms play therefore a

special role in regulating the correct use of language to describe the world34. It is unclear whether

Plato is also committed to the converse claim that for every common name borne by a plurality of

different bearers there is a Form of which these bearers partake and which grounds the correct

attribution of that common name, with its corresponding definitional formula35. In any event, it

can safely be granted that whenever we have Plato countenancing a certain Form F, there is also

one and the same property F, enjoyed by all and only the objects partaking in F, and in virtue of

which they are called by the same name and defined by the same definition qua F thing.

2.2. The Kind Being as a Cause and Being as a Property.

The first premise of my governing argument (p. 48), i.e. that Forms are causes, has been discussed.

Let me move to the second premise: in the Sophist, Being is a Form or a Kind. On the face of it,

this seems just obvious. A perusal of the central section of the dialogue show that Being is

repeatedly referred to as a γένος and an εἶδος36. But what needs to be ascertained, in order for the

conclusion (the Kind Being is a cause) to be safely inferred, is that this denomination corresponds

to a conception of the status of Forms in line with the one emerged in the foregoing examination.

34 Cf. Cra. 435e6-440e1, with Cambiano 1991 [1970]: 181-5 and Barney 2001: 138-55. Stimulating insights

will also be read in Ricoeur 2011 [1954]: 29-37. 35 Some passages seem to support an interpretation along these lines, e.g. R. 596a6-7, 507b2-7, Phd. 65d11-e1,

75c10-d3, 78d10-e2; Prm. 130b7-131a3. But see contra Plt. 263a2-b11 (to contrast in turn with S.E. M XI 15-7), with Dixsaut 2001: 235-8. Crivelli 2008: 218-22 concisely assesses this evidence. The underlying philosophical issue is that of the extent of the population of the eidetic realm, on which see the remarks of Ross 1951: 165-75, Baltes- Lakmann 2005 [1994]: 6 and Fronterotta 2001: 118-24. 36 Cf. e.g., Sph. 254d4 (to compare with c3-4), e3, 255e1, 257a4-9, 259a4-5, b1-2.

To start with, it proves convenient to set aside a thesis regarding Plato’s ‘later’ metaphysics that, though probably still quite widespread, seems to me not adequately borne out by the texts.

This thesis is characteristic of a so-called ‘developmentalist’ interpretation of Plato’s thought. By

‘developmentalist’ (itself a vague, if popular, label) I do not mean an interpretation on which

Plato’s philosophy grew and expanded over the years, like the branches of a tree – something which is simply natural for any thinker whose activity spans for several decades and which virtually every interpreter of Plato, including inflexible champions of ‘unitarianism’, are ready to accept37. Instead, I mean an interpretation which sees a radical break in Plato’s philosophical career, an intellectual shift motivated by a drastic change of mind on certain fundamental issues, and resulting in the dismissal of previous convictions. This interpretative line might be orthogonal to the notorious analytic-continental divide, though it has arguably been defended with greater conviction by analytically trained historians, especially those working (consciously or not) in the footsteps of Gilbert Ryle38.

The ‘developmentalist’ thesis I intend to assess is this: in the ‘later’ dialogues (viz., roughly, dialogues posterior to the Republic), Plato abandoned his ‘middle-period’ Forms, in the light of the notorious criticisms stated in the first part of the Parmenides. According to this construal, Plato

37 Cf. Shorey 1903: 3-4. See already the unequivocal remark made in Shorey 1888: 276 (which should be a warning to all those who dismiss his unitarism too quickly): ‘Without wishing to be held to say that Plato had no period of growth and never changed his mind, I think the dialogues do show that he belongs to the thinkers whose thought is first revealed to us in its maturity and remains essentially the same through life, rather than to the Hegels and Schellings who go through periods and have a first, second, and third manner’ (emphasis mine). 38 Cf. the critical surveys in Lafrance 1979 and Lafrance 2015 [1981]: 307-14, 342-49. Wise considerations on the old gigantomachy between ‘developmentalists’ and ‘unitarians’ can be read in Sedley 2004: 13-15. In what follows I shall leave out of consideration the reading defended by Peck 1952, on which the Kind Being, like all the so-called ‘greatest Kinds’ of the Sophist, is not a genuine Form but merely an empty name sophistically introduced by Plato only for the sake of argument. See contra Lacey 1959 and Lafrance 2015 [1981]: 322-5.

61 regarded those objections as sufficiently disruptive to provoke the dismissal of the metaphysical theory presented most fully in dialogues such as Phaedo, Symposium, Phaedrus and Republic. The

Parmenides would consequently be a point of no return in Plato’s philosophical career39. This general thesis is quite often supplemented by the more specific claim that in the later dialogues

Plato reduced Forms to mental entities of some sort, be they concepts or logical types40.

However, neither the general thesis nor the specific claim withstand the evidence of Plato’s text. The latter clashes with of Plato’s explicit rejection of conceptualism at Prm. 132b3-c1141; and both are contradicted by a number of passages from dialogues chronologically later than the

Parmenides, where the cornerstones of the theory of Forms, in its traditional version, are reasserted as resolutely as ever: e.g. Phlb. 15a1-7, 59a7-c6, 61d10-e4; Plt. 269d5-7; Ti. 27d5-28a4, 51d3-

52a442; probably also Lg. 963c5-965e543. Nor is the Sophist an exception: the εἴδη and γένη

39 Of course, not all the interpreters who deem that the objections raised in the first part of the Parmenides are regarded by Plato as serious and troublesome go so far as to say that they also led him to dismiss Forms altogether. For example, Brisson 2005 [2001]: 28-31, Fronterotta 2001: part. 183ff. and Gerson 2020: 128-30 consider those objections grave and alarming for Plato, but do not for a moment disavow the presence of full-blooded Forms in dialogues such as Philebus and Timaeus. 40 Versions (sometimes considerably different) of this thesis have been defended by: Lutosławsky 1897: part.

426; Natorp 1903; Ritter 1923; Ryle 1939; Ackrill 1955. Stenzel 1940 [1931]: 57-8 and passim had a more nuanced view, but see Cherniss 1944: 215-6 n. 128 and Lafrance 2015 [1981]: 344-6 for criticisms. In the antiquity, the rhetorician Alcimus (apud D.L. 3.13.144-6) claimed that Platonic Forms are νοήµατα. See also Arist. de An. Γ 3.429a27-8 referring to someone who described the soul as ‘the place of forms’ (οἱ λέγοντες τὴν ψυχὴν εἶναι τόπον εἰδῶν). It is unclear whether Aristotle refers to Plato himself or some member of the Academy (cf. Ross 1961: 292). Be that as it may, the passage might be taken to suggest that already at the time of Aristotle the thesis that the locus of Forms is the soul, and that therefore Forms are mental entities of some sort, had been advanced. 41 As pointed out by several interpreters: see e.g. Shorey 1903: 29-30, Cherniss 1944: 215-6 n. 128; and Gerson

2020: 81-2. The Parmenides passage is thoroughly examined by O’Brien 2013b. 42 I assume the Timaeus to be late, cf. Cherniss 1957 and Gill 1979 against Owen 1953. 43 I discuss these passages in Granieri (forthcoming-a).

62 mentioned throughout the core section of the dialogue exhibit credentials of standard ‘middle- period’ Forms: notably, they are involved in relations of participation or combination (described, as we shall see, by familiar causal locutions), and collectively constitute the distinctive object of dialectic (253b-254a), just as they were in the Republic. Moreover, in the Parmenides itself Plato stresses that the renounciation of Forms would carry the very detrimental consequence of destroying ‘the power of dialectic’ altogether (135c2: τοῦ διαλέγεσθαι δύναµιν παντάπασι

διαφθερεῖ)44. And the primacy of ‘the power of dialectic’ – with the companion claim that dialectic is the truest knowledge, concerned (again) with ‘being and with what is really and forever in every way eternally self-same’ – is unmistakably reaffirmed at Phlb. 57e6-58a645. In short, Forms are by no means rejected in the later dialogues; and they were and remain real beings (ὄντα)46.

44 For the expression ‘τοῦ διαλέγεσθαι δύναµιν’, cf. R. 511b4, 532d8, 533a8, 537d5 and Phlb. 57e7. 45 ἡ τοῦ διαλέγεσθαι δύναµις […] τὴν γὰρ περὶ τὸ ὂν καὶ τὸ ὄντως καὶ τὸ κατὰ ταὐτὸν ἀεὶ πεφυκὸς πάντως ἔγωγε

οἶµαι ἡγεῖσθαι σύµπαντας ὅσοις νοῦ καὶ σµικρὸν προσήρτηται µακρῷ ἀληθεστάτην εἶναι γνῶσιν. σὺ δὲ τί; πῶς τοῦτο, ὦ Πρώταρχε, διακρίνοις ἄν. 46 In cauda, I shall address two variants of the reading I have just assessed. (1) McCabe 1994: 226-7 suggests to understand Being, Motion and Rest ‘in a minimal way, as features of speech (predicates) as corresponding to features of the world (kinds)’ and not as full-fledged Platonic Forms. But the εἴδη-γένη of the Sophist are not ‘features of the world’, but entities in virtue of which the objects partaking in them possess the property named by the Kind’s name (cf. e.g. 254d10; d14-5 with 255b3; 256a1; a7-8; b1-3). And this, as we have seen, is typical of Platonic Forms. (2) Gill 2012: 9-10 n.26, 202-3 n.1 and passim adoptes a peculiar reading. She claims [a] that in the late dialogues Plato rejects his dualism between the sensible and the intelligible. On her reading, after the Parmenides Forms become stable natures immanent to sensible things (explicitly compared by her to Aristotelian forms). But Gill also rejects the Owenian revision of the dating of the Timaeus (cf. above n.40), a dialogue in which, as is well-known and Gill herself does not fail to recognize, ‘traditional’ separate Forms are clearly present. To explains this discrepancy, she affirms [b] that in the Timaeus Forms are reintroduced ‘for a special reason: the Demiurge looks to these objects in fashioning the world’ (p. 10 n. 26). Against Gill’s interpretation, one may note [a] that the Philebus (15a1-7, 59a7-c6, 61d10-e4) and the Statesman (269d5-7) restate the dualistic thesis just like the Timaeus; and, after all, there is a sense in which Forms have always been immanent, cf. e.g. Phd. 100d5: παρουσία and the discussion in Perl 1999. Furthermore – in reply to Gill’s point [b] – one wonders why in the Timaeus the Demiurge needs to look precisely at separate Forms to shape the world. If it is because they are paradigms (as it should be cf. Ti. 28a7, 28c6-29a6) then it is unclear how this

The introduction of the Kind Being. Let us now inspect whether the causal conception of participation is still operative in the Sophist and applies to the Kind Being as well. In the last sub- section of §1.2 we have seen the ES cross-examining the characterization of being offered by the

‘children’s prayer’. There he developed an argument aimed at singling out Being from Motion and

Rest (250a8-c5). Let me recall the essentials of that argument. The ES contends that both and each of Motion and Rest, though most opposed to one another (ἐναντιώτατα), equally are (εἶναί γε

ὁµοίως φῂς ἀµφότερα αὐτὰ καὶ ἑκάτερον). He then proceeds to establish that for both and each of

Motion and Rest to be is neither to change nor to rest: it is to combine with Being (τὴν τῆς οὐσίας

κοινωνίαν). Therefore, Being is a third thing alongside motion and rest (τρίτον ἄρα τι παρὰ ταῦτα

τὸ ὄν), different from them (ἕτερον τι τούτων), and which by its own nature (κατὰ τὴν αὑτοῦ

φύσιν) is neither motion nor rest, but just being47. The intentionally underdetermined phrase ‘third thing’, as we have seen, prefigures the claim, explicitly made a few pages later, that Being is an independent Kind.

The argument implements two familiar and interconnected explanatory strategies. On the one hand, Plato accounts for the possession of a determinate property (in this case, being) by appealing to the combination with an entity which is that property by its own nature: Motion and Rest are

could be reconciled with Plato’s purported earlier rejection (between the Parmenides and the Timaeus) of the sensible- intelligible opposition. More generally, I confess that the ascription to Plato of these multiple doctrinal fluctuations seems not very persuasive to me. 47 From this conclusion, the further inference is drawn that Being is outside (ἐκτός) Motion and Rest. The inference is perhaps invalid and its interpretation controversial, see Crivelli 2012: 95-101, 127-8 for discussion. Karfik 2011: 144 claims that ‘other genera or forms “are” due to their participation in being which is something different from them [but] only the genus of being “is” due to its identity with itself’ (his italics). But Being obtains the property of being identical to itself by partaking in the Kind Identity. In fact, Being is due to its own nature, not due to its identity with itself.

64 because they combine with (or partake in)48 Being. Just as the beauty of a plurality of particulars was explained in Phaedo, Hippias Major and Symposium through their participation in the Form of Beauty, so too here the being of Motion and Rest is explained through their participation in the

Form of Being.

On the other hand, the refutation of the ‘children’s prayer’ adopts a typical ‘One-Over-Many’ argument49: it postulates the existence of a Form as the adequate metaphysical principle grounding the possession by a plurality of objects other than that Form, and partaking in that Form, of the property that Form’s name names. The property bearers are here Motion and Rest. As both and each of them equally are, they enjoy the same property, namely, being, which holds of Motion in the same way as it holds of Rest. But, crucially, neither to be in motion nor to be at rest is what it is to be. The intension of the predicative expression ‘is’ (simpliciter) is different from that of the predicative expressions ‘is in motion’ and ‘is at rest’. Thus, presumably on the implicit assumption that intensions of predicative expressions are parasitic on the properties they denote, the ES infers that the property being is irreducible to those of being in motion and being at rest. Neither of the properties the respective names of Motion and Rest name can be identified with the property being.

Such a property requires therefore a distinctive causal principle explaining the possession of that property by a plurality of numerically different objects. This principle is the ‘third thing’, the Kind

Being, which is being by its own nature. Notice that the inference from the identification of the property being to the postulation of a Kind Being is silently based on the additional (and admittedly unargued) premise that the property being is a natural (or real) one. Plato simply assumes that being

48 On the vocabulary of ‘κοινωνία’ and ‘µέθεξις’, see below p.49 and also Ross 1951: 111-2 n.6. 49 On this argument cf. Alex. Aphr. in Metaph. 80.8-81.22 and Fine 1993: 103-19.

65 is a ‘joint-carving’ property, and not merely a common name such as ‘barbarian’, to which no Form corresponds, because it does not capture a natural property, but simply stands for ‘non-Greek’50.

From the consideration of this crucial passage there emerges that the Kind Being is therefore introduced in the Sophist as a metaphysical principle causally responsible for the possession by a plurality of objects partaking in it of the property its name names, viz. the property of being.

A recurrent pattern. A number of other passages in the dialogue display the same explanatory pattern, by consistently portraying the Kind Being as the ‘active pole’ of a participatory relation which results in the participant’s possession of the property of being. Let me mention at least the following four passages:

• At 254d10 Motion and Rest are said to be because the Kind Being blends (µεικτὸν) with

them51. The adjective ‘µεικτόν’ derives from the verb ‘µείγνυµι’. Especially in the form

‘συµµίγνυµι’, this verb is used in the dialogue interchangeably with other verbs or locutions

indicating participation, such as ‘µετέχειν’, ‘µεταλαµβάνειν’, ‘κοινωνεῖν’, ‘ἐπικοινωνεῖν’ or

‘ἔχειν κοινωνίας’52. Thus, Motion and Rest enjoy the property being in virtue of their sharing

in the Kind Being, which causes their possession of that property.

• At 256a1 the ES avers that Motion ‘is because of its sharing in being (ἔστι δέ γε διὰ τὸ µετέχειν

τοῦ ὄντος)’. The locution διά + accusative is, as we have seen, among Plato’s standard

50 Cf. Plt. 263a2-b11 and above n.35. 51 τὸ δέ γε ὂν µεικτὸν ἀµφοῖν· ἐστὸν γὰρ ἄµφω που. I interpret the γὰρ as having an elucidatory and confirmatory function, not as causal, cf. Kühner-Gerth 1904: 331-2. The second sentence does not of course express an explanation of the first – it is rather the opposite (compare: ‘the sun has risen; for there is light’). 52 Cf. e.g. 252e2 (to compare with 252d2-3 and 251e9); 254e4 (to compare with 255b3); 256b10 (to compare with 256b6).

formulae to express his notion of causality. The genitive ‘τοῦ ὄντος’ picks up the Kind Being,

namely, one of the five greatest kinds singled out in the previous pages of the dialogue. Again,

Motion (here taken as a specimen of any participant in the Kind Being) possesses the property

being in virtue of its sharing in the Kind Being, which is therefore the cause of it enjoying that

property.

• The claim is reiterated at 256d9, in a slightly different phraseology. The ES has just pointed

out that Motion shares in the Kind Difference in relation to Being (d5-6). By foreshadowing

the forthcoming semantic analysis of negation as expressing difference and not only

contrariety (257b3-c3)53, he infers that Motion ‘really is a not-being’ (ὄντως οὐκ ὄν ἐστι). On

top of this, the ES adds that, despite its being a not-being, Motion ‘is a being’ (ἐστι καὶ ὄν),

because it partakes in Being (ἐπείπερ τοῦ ὄντος µετέχει)54.

• Finally, at 259a6-7, the same point, already generalized at 256e3-4, is cashed out in relation

to the Kind Difference: ‘Difference, with its share in what is, is, because of that sharing

(259a6-7: τὸ µὲν ἕτερον µετασχὸν τοῦ ὄντος ἔστι µὲν διὰ ταύτην τὴν µέθεξιν). As we shall

see in due course (chapter 6), the remark is momentous, because one of the parts of the Kind

Difference is ‘Not-Being’55.

These passages corroborate the reading that in the Sophist the Kind Being is a metaphysical principle responsible for the property its name names, i.e. the property of being. Just as the property of beauty is obtained by partaking in the Kind Beauty (Helen is beautiful because of the Beautiful), so too the property of being is obtained by partaking in the Kind Being (Motion is because of

53 See ch.6. 54 Both ‘οὐκ ὄν’ and ‘ὄν’ are governed by one and the same copula (ἐστι). 55 Cf. again O’Brien 1995: 59-63. I will return to this remark in ch.4.

Being). Admittedly the terms ‘αἰτία’ and ‘αἴτιον’ do not figure in these passages. And yet, the locutions ‘διά’ + accusative and the vocabulary of participation/combination/blending are strongly reminiscent of the causal relation thematized in the Phaedo and elsewhere. The argument schematized above at p.48 can then be considered proved.

‘To be is to be something’: a first case against. Entailed by the foregoing analysis is the claim that there is a distinctive property of being for whose possession the Kind Being is metaphysically responsible, in that it is obtained through combination with it. It is worth dwelling further on this claim in order to assess an entrenched scholarly consensus regarding a salient aspect Plato’s ontology. I mentioned at the beginning of §2.1 that the Owenian slogan ‘to be is to be something’ is now almost unanimously taken to capture a basic truth of Plato’s conception of being and that one common way of making sense of it is this: to exist means to exemplify or instantiate a determinate property (different from sheer being). Seligman, following Frede and Owen on this point56, states the core of this reading perspicuously: when Plato – he writes – ‘says “motion is” or “motion and rest are” he does not use the verb “to be” in our “existential” sense. Motion is as moving, and only as moving, it is as a “what” a “nature”’57. Hence, the property acquired by participation in the Kind Being is not just existence, but the property captured by the determinate nature of the participant.

To begin the assessment of this interpretation – to which I will return time and again throughout the following chapters – it is worth looking once more at the refutation of the

‘children’s prayer’. For this argument provides us with a first substantive piece of evidence to

56 Whose views I will discuss in more detail in ch. 3. 57 Seligman 1974: 69. See also Lee 1972: 276-7.

68 contend that this reading does not fit well with Plato’s conception of being in the Sophist. The ES avers at 250a11-b7 that:

• ‘To be’ (εἶναι) is said in the same way (ὁµοίως) of both and each (ἀµφότερα ἀυτὰ καὶ

ἑκάτερον) of Motion and Rest;

• For both and each of Motion and Rest ‘to be’ does not mean either ‘to be in motion’

(κινεῖσθαι) not ‘to be at rest’ (ἑστάναι).

Plato’s reiterated emphasis on the pair ‘ἀµφότερα καὶ ἑκάτερον’ (250a11-12, b2)58 suggests a reformulation of these two claims in a slightly different, if perfectly equivalent, phraseology: (i) for Motion, to be is neither to be in motion, nor to be at rest; (ii) for Rest, to be is neither to be at rest, nor to be in motion. Instead, for both and each of Motion and Rest ‘to be’ means the same thing: it means just to be, viz. to combine with the Kind Being (b10-11: τὴν τῆς οὐσίας κοινωνίαν).

The present passage is consequently a first stumbling block for any interpretation of the sort defended by Seligman and the scholars he is inspired by, to the extent that it contradicts explicitly that ‘to be’ is to exemplify or instantiate a given property (different from sheer being), or even to have a determinate nature. Analyses of ‘Motion is’ as ‘Motion moves’, or ‘Motion is motion’, or

‘Motion has the nature of what moves’ Plato overtly rejects in these lines. To be, when it is metaphysically explained in terms of participation in the Kind Being, is not therefore to be something: it is just to be (simpliciter), i.e. to possess the property of being obtained through the combination with the Kind Being. In contrast with the ample majority of commentators, I think this property should be understood in terms of existence – though, as I shall clarify especially in chapter 5, neither according to a quantified nor a modal notion of existence.

58 At 250b5 only ‘ἀµφότερα’ figures, but the symmetry with the claim made two lines above about ‘being in motion’ is strongly indicative of the fact that it is a mere shortcut.

Let me explain this in more detail. Both in the refutation of the ‘children’s prayer’ and in all the other passages listed in the previous sub-section, the verb ‘to be’ (εἶναι), when employed to denote the property obtained by participation in the Kind Being, is not supplied with any complement. This grammatical datum might be interpreted in two ways: either the verb is a predicate complete in itself, i.e., it needs no complement to constitute a meaningful grammatical unit59; or it is an incomplete predicate used elliptically, i.e., as a copula, with a silent complement to be supplied from the context60. I will deal extensively with problems concerning the semantics of ‘εἶναι’ in chapter 4, but let me first state my own view from the outset. It seems to me that the former interpretation is the most natural and the correct one. I take the verb ‘to be’ to be used as a complete predicate and its meaning to be genuinely existential61. This is not because I have an uncompromising commitment to the claim that in Greek, and in Plato’s Greek in particular, the verb ‘εἶναι’ cannot be used elliptically as an incomplete predicate62. My view stems primarily from considerations in ontology, not in grammar. The predicates expressed by various forms of εἶναι’

59 Cf. Shorey 1933: 298; Cornford 1935: 296; Ackrill 1957; Crombie 1962: 498-9; Moravcsik 1962: 51;

Heinamann 1983; Brown 1999 [1986]: 472-3 (but Brown’s account of completeness differs from that of all other scholars mentioned in this note, see below §4.2); O’Brien 1995, 2013a, 2020; Fronterotta 2007, 2011. 60 Cf. e.g. Frede 1967, 1992; Malcolm 1967; Owen 1971. 61 Nota bene: in advocating that the meaning of 1-place εἶναι is existential, I am not for a moment making a case about translation. My point is not that whenever the verb εἶναι is used in the Sophist as a complete predicate we should translate it with the English verb ‘to exist’ (or with corresponding verbs in other modern languages), as in many passages did both Cornford 1935 and Cordero 1993. Indeed, I am fully in agreement with the detailed treatment of O’Brien 2020 (who specifically assesses Cornford’s translation choice) in believing that such a translation would rather spoil Plato’s argument in many respects. Notably, it would have nefarious consequences when applied to Plato’s explanation of not-being (e.g. at 256d8). My point rather concerns our philosophical understanding of the nature of the property obtained via participation in the Kind Being. 62 But I share Matthen’s doubts that ‘one could justify a rule of grammar that permits predicate-deletion except in such cases of repetition [scil. ‘Is Tom well-dressed? Yes, he is.’], and so I suspect that the theory of the incomplete copula is grammatically ad hoc’ (Matthen 1983: 131 n.2).

70 in the quoted passages denote the possession of a feature of which the Kind Being is the cause. As we have seen earlier in this chapter, a Kind is the cause of the presence in its participants of the property its name names. Accordingly, the Kind Being will be the cause of the presence of the property being in its participants. It would be unnatural, I believe, to interpret the sentence ‘X is because it partakes in the Kind Being’ as in fact meaning ‘X is F because it partakes in Being’, for

‘X is F’ is metaphysically explained either by X’s being F by its own nature or by X’s participation in the Kind F, not in the Kind Being.

Likewise, it would be unnatural, I think, to read the occurrences of the verb ‘to be’ in the quoted passages as elliptical uses of the copula meant implicitly to indicate self-identity63. This exegesis sits uneasily with Plato’s argument for the non-identity of the Kind Identity and the Kind

Being (255d8-c8)64. The property of ‘being the same as itself’ is due to sharing in the former, not in the latter (256b1-2). In modern philosophical idiom: the truthmakers of ‘F is’ and ‘F is identical to itself’ are two distinct states of affairs, i.e., two distinct participatory relations, the former in the

Kind Being, the latter in the Kind Identity.

If the complete use of the verb ‘to be’ should not be construed as an elliptical use of the ‘is’ of identity, still less plausibly will it be interpreted as an elliptical use of the copula meant implicitly to indicate the possession of any other property (except being itself), including essential properties, i.e., properties explaining what something is. Take the sentence ‘the apple is’. While it is trivially true that ‘the apple is a fruit’, the property ‘being a fruit’ is due to sharing in the Kind

Fruit and cannot be somewhat extrapolated from participation in the Kind Being. The Kind Being, taken on its own, is metaphysically responsible only for the property ‘being’ (simpliciter).

63 See e.g. Malcolm 1967 and Owen 1971 (echoed by many, e.g. Harte 2002: 154). 64 Analysis of the argument in Crivelli 2012: 136-40. See also below §3.2.

Intermezzo (2): a criticism by Aristotle. The present reconstruction has the additional advantage of better framing Plato’s isolation of Being as an independent Kind within its historical context.

In particular, it puts us in a better position to see why, in the eleventh aporia of Metaphysics B

(4.1001a4-b1), Aristotle feels entitled to ascribe to Plato (and the ‘Pythagoreans’) the view that being (τὸ ὄν, later referred to as αὐτό ὄν65) is nothing else but its nature (ἀλλὰ τοῦτο αὐτῶν τὴν

φύσιν εἶναι), something whose substance is just being (οὐσίαν […] εἶναι […] τὸ ὄν)66. We have seen in §2.1 that what makes a Form or Kind a cause is first and foremost its being by its own nature (φύσις) the property its name names and its participants have and that this is coalescent with

Plato’s commitment to what has been dubbed ‘Transmission Theory of Causation’ or ‘Synonymy

Principle of Causation’67. The Kind Being is not an exception, as indicated by the fact that at 250c6 the ES unmistakably attributes to it a distinctive nature (κατὰ τὴν αὑτοῦ [scil. ὄντος] φύσιν). Thus,

65 Berti 1979, which is still the most perceptive examination of the eleventh aporia, makes the captivating remark that ‘αὐτό ὄν’ becomes, in Latin translation, ‘esse ipsum’. One might wonder whether ‘ipsum ens’ would be a better fit (cf. e.g. Thomas Aquinas, In III Metaph. 10.3.464), as ‘esse ipsum’ seems a closer rendering of ‘αὐτό εἶναι’. But Berti’s point is of course not just a linguistic one. For his main purpose is to show that this view, here ascribed by Aristotle to Plato, indirectly became the fountainhead of ontotheological conceptions developed throughout the history of philosophy, starting from Philo of Alexandria, to Porphyry, Augustine, Avicenna and Aquinas, who conceived of God as esse ipsum subsistens (though these authors also neglected, according to Berti, that Aristotle in fact rejected this view). A discussion of such a far-reaching and interesting narrative is obviously beyond the scope of the present work. But it is worth noting that the Sophist’s Kind Being is never described as a first principle of all (unlike, for example, the God of Avicenna and Aquinas) – as also Frede 1996a: 197-8 seems to suggest. It is a Kind among others, to be sure with a special role, but a Kind all the same. So, if Plato is to be given pride of place at the beginning of the history of ontotheology, this can hardly be due to the Sophist. Perhaps R. 509b-c will be a better place to look at, as Heidegger did not fail to see. Cf. also below nn. 71, 73. 66 Aristotle’s argument concerns both Being itself (αὐτό ὄν) and One itself (αὐτό ἕν), but I shall restrict my focus on the former concept in the main text. Notice that for Aristotle being (ὄν) and one (ἕν) are convertible (cf. e.g. Metaph. 1040b16: τὸ ἓν λέγεται ὥσπερ καὶ τὸ ὄν; 1054a13: ταὐτὸ σηµαίνει πως τὸ ἓν καὶ τὸ ὄν; esp. 1061a15-8). Not so for Plato, cf. Prm. 142b5-c7 and below §2.3. 67 See above p.52-3 and n.25.

72 by observing that Plato countenances a ‘being itself’, which is being by its own nature and whose substance is nothing else but being, Aristotle is presumably targeting the Platonic notion of a Kind

Being, which was already critically assessed in the fourth aporia of B. It is no accident then, that the fourth and the eleventh aporiai are often discussed conjointly in the literature68.

Aristotle deemed this view profoundly wrong. The main objection he raised against the postulation of a being-itself is that it carries with it the unwelcome consequence that nothing can exist besides it. For, Aristotle contends, ‘what is different from being does not exist, so that it necessarily follows, according to the argument of Parmenides, that all things that are are one and this is being’69. The argument adopts a familiar strategy, also operative at Metaph. N 2.10891-6

(raising the famous charge of ἀπορῆσαι ἀρχαϊκῶς), whereby Aristotle assimilates Plato’s conception of being to Parmenides’, in that both are committed to the claim that being is univocal and the rejection of plurality70.

One might wonder whether this criticism is fair against Plato. Ross answered in the negative71.

On Parmenides’ view, presumably, anything other than ‘what is’ is not, i.e. does not exist. Plato, by contrast, conceived of being as an attribute (the ‘attribute of existence’ in Ross’ words) and it was this ‘abstraction’ that he made a substance, something which does not prevent from recognizing the existence of other substances. After all, Ross concludes, Plato was as alive as

Aristotle to the fallaciousness of the principle that ‘what is different from being is not’ (τὸ ἕτερον

68 Cf. e.g. Berti 1979 and 2009. 69 1001a31-1001b1: τὸ γὰρ ἕτερον τοῦ ὄντος οὐκ ἔστιν, ὥστε κατὰ τὸν Παρµενίδου συµβαίνειν ἀνάγκη λόγον

ἓν ἅπαντα εἶναι τὰ ὄντα καὶ τοῦτο εἶναι τὸ ὄν. Emphasis mine. 70 Cf. Berti 2001. 71 Cf. Ross 1924: 245.

τοῦ ὄντος οὐκ ἔστιν)72. It seems to me that Ross has a point here. To conceive of Being as a Kind, which is being by its own nature, may well be problematic for several reasons (see below §2.4), but it is doubtful that it implies the unwelcome consequence of making everything else non- existent and of consequently reducing all to (an Eleatic) one. For Plato, as we shall see in more detail in chapter 6, it is not the case that ‘what is different from being does not exist’, as Aristotle puts it. What is different from (the Kind) Being does exist, thanks to its participation in the Kind

Being; but it is not being in its own nature, as only the Kind Being is so. And the whole analysis of negative particles as expressing difference and not contrariety (Sph. 257b9-c3) was meant precisely to dispel the doubt that ‘µὴ ὄν’ stands for ‘what does not exist’ and, by the same token, to dispose of the sophistical rejoinder that ‘not being’ is not even thinkable or sayable.

Intermezzo (3): a comparison with Aristotle. I have argued that in the Sophist Plato is committed to a participatory conception of being, such that to be is to partake in the Kind Being. To fully appreciate the distinctive significance of this position, a further Aristotelian digression may prove instructive. In a forthcoming magisterial paper on ‘Aristotle on the Many Senses of Being’73, Menn persuasively argues that according to Aristotle the correct method to make existential sentences involving 1-place being (‘F is’) amenable to causal analysis, is to rewrite them by [i] turning them into sentences involving 2-place being, [ii] moving the subject-term (‘F’) to predicate position, and

[iii] introducing a subject (primarily the per se subject of F) of which the new predicate holds (‘S is

F’). Thus, to explain the fact that F exists we need not look for a cause that supplies existence to F,

72 To Ross’ defense of Plato, Berti 2001: 206-7 replies by quoting Metaph. N 2.10891-6, where Being itself is identified with the One, i.e., the first principle of all. But the Kind Being of the Sophist is not the first principle of all. 73 Cf. Menn forthcoming. The paper is mostly focused on APo B.2-10, Metaph. Δ7 and ZH. Menn, whom I thank for letting me read and cite the last version of this paper, is also fully aware of the gulf between Plato and Aristotle on this point.

74 but for something that supplies F-ness to some subject S (primarily the per se subject of F). The

‘cause of the being’ (αἴτιον τοῦ εἶναι) of F is, for Aristotle, the οὐσία of F. Thus, the second meaning of οὐσία listed at Metaph. Δ 8 (1017b14-16) is: ‘that which, being present in such things as are not predicated of a subject, is the cause of being (αἴτιον τοῦ εἶναι), as the soul is of the being of animals’.

The example of the soul makes it clear that Aristotle is thinking of the formal cause, as something’s internal cause of being (compare Metaph. B 2.996b13-14 and de An. B 4.415b10-4).

In the Sophist, I submit, precisely the alternative view is maintained. As I have been arguing throughout this chapter, Plato here avers that to explain the fact that F is (viz. exists) we need to look for a cause that supplies being to F. The ‘cause of the being’ of F is not the οὐσία of F, as

Aristotle would have it, but a metaphysical principle which, by its own nature, provides being to all the objects bearing the appropriate (participatory) relation with it. This cause, I submit, is the

Kind Being74.

74 The following difficulty arises. At R. 509b7-8 Socrates says that the being and essence (τὸ εἶναι τε καὶ τὴν

οὐσίαν) of the Forms is bestowed to them by the Idea of the Good (ὑπὸ τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ παρεῖναι), which is itself beyond essence in rank and power (ἐπέκεινα τῆς οὐσίας πρεσβείᾳ καὶ δυνάµει). One way to construe this famous claim is that the Idea of the Good is the cause of the being of the other Forms (at 516c2 the Good is said to be ‘in a certain sense cause of all things (τρόπον τινὰ πάντων αἴτιος)’). A serious philosophical and exegetical problem is how this squares with the claim in the Sophist that the property being is obtained via participation in the Kind Being. Cordero 2000 proposes a developmental reconstruction. I should recognize that I do not yet have a fully worked-out solution to this problem, and no other explanation available in the literature really satisfies me.

2.3. Being and Participation in Parmenides’ D2

I now interrupt my discussion of the Sophist to make a brief expedition into the Parmenides75. I want to show that the participatory conception of being I have ascribed to Plato is operative also outside the Sophist, notably in the second deduction of the second part of the Parmenides76.

Starting from 142b1 Plato has Parmenides and the young Socrates taking a fresh start from the hypothesis ‘if one is’ (ἓν εἰ ἔστιν), after the unfortunate consequences resulting from the first deduction77. Here is the ouverture of D2 (capital letters in square brackets are of course mine, for ease of reference):

Consider from the beginning: if one is, can it be, but not partake of being?”—“It

cannot.”—“So there would also be the being of the one, and that is not the same as the

one. For if it were, [A] it couldn’t be the being of the one, [B] nor could the one partake

of it. On the contrary, [C] saying that one is would be like saying that one is one. But

this time that is not the hypothesis, namely, what the consequences must be, if one is

one, but if one is. Isn’t that so?“—”Of course.”—“Is that because ‘is’ signifies

something other than ‘one’?”—“Necessarily.”—“So whenever someone, being brief,

says ‘one is,’ would this simply mean that the one partakes of being?”—“ Certainly.”78

75 There will be another one in ch.3. 76 Namely, the section of the dialogue starting from 135d and devoted to the notorious dialectical exercise

(gymnasia). The hermeneutical presuppositions with which I tackle Prm. II are inspired by Cornford 1939: 109-15. I shall not attempt to defend these presuppositions here. But see below n.81. 77 Cf. the words of despair at 142a6-8. I should also leave out of consideration whether D1 and D2 are governed by exactly the same hypothesis, which is not relevant to my purposes. 78 142b5-c7: { ΠΑΡΜ. } Ὅρα δὴ ἐξ ἀρχῆς. ἓ ν ε ἰ ἔ σ τ ι ν, ἆρα οἷόν τε αὐτὸ εἶναι µέν, οὐσίας δὲ µὴ µετέχειν;

{ ἈΡΙΣΤ. } Οὐχ οἷόν τε. { – } Οὐκοῦν καὶ ἡ οὐσία τοῦ ἑνὸς εἴη ἂν οὐ ταὐτὸν οὖσα τῷ ἑνί· οὐ γὰρ ἂν ἐκείνη ἦν ἐκείνου οὐσία, οὐδ' ἂν ἐκεῖνο, τὸ ἕν, ἐκείνης µετεῖχεν, ἀλλ' ὅµοιον ἂν ἦν λέγειν ἕν τε εἶναι καὶ ἓν ἕν. νῦν δὲ οὐχ αὕτη ἐστὶν ἡ

The argument developed in this excerpt has the logical form of a modus tollens. It is counterfactually argued that if one and its being were the same, three unwelcome consequences would follow:

[A] The being of the one would not be its being (but its oneness);

[B] the one would not partake in being (it would rather partake in itself);

[C] the statements ‘one is one’ and ‘one is’ would mean the same.

[C] is the only consequence explicitly falsified. Parmenides rejects it on account of the datum that the semantic contents of ‘ἔστι’ and ‘ἕν’ are different. Therefore, the statements ‘one is one’ and

‘one is’ cannot mean the same. This semantic point presumably goes hand in hand with an ontological one. It is because being and one are different beings that their linguistic correlates mean different things. This provides part of the ground to falsify [A] and [B] too, whose drawbacks are left implicit in the passage. If one and being were the same, then ([B]) the one’s participation in being would resolve into the one’s participation in oneness (it would ultimately not be being that is partaken in but oneness); and ([A]) the being of the one would not be its being, but its oneness. But being is not identical to one (as per the falsification of [C]), so the two states of affairs remain distinct and the being of the one is not its oneness79.

It is noteworthy, especially in consideration of the previous comparative remarks with

Aristotle’s view, that the gist of the present argument is that the being of the one is set apart from

ὑπόθεσις, ε ἰ ἓ ν ἕ ν, τί χρὴ συµβαίνειν, ἀλλ’ ε ἰ ἓ ν ἔ σ τ ι ν· οὐχ οὕτω; { – } Πάνυ µὲν οὖν. { – } Οὐκοῦν ὡς ἄλλο τι σηµαῖνον τὸ ἔ σ τ ι τοῦ ἕ ν; { – } Ἀνάγκη. { – } Ἆρα οὖν ἄλλο ἢ ὅτι οὐσίας µετέχει τὸ ἕν, τοῦτ' ἂν εἴη τὸ λεγόµενον, ἐπειδάν τις συλλήβδην εἴπῃ ὅτι ἓν ἔστιν; { – } Πάνυ γε. Italics are Gill-Ryan’s. 79 Note: the argument is not based on the principle that in any relation of participation, the participant and what is participated in are distinct. What is denied is not that one can partake in itself. The rejoinder is rather that, since being and one are different, in the statement ‘the one is’, it is not the one’s participation in itself that is at issue, but the one’s participation in being.

77 the one’s quiddity80. What is in question at D2 is expressly not the one’s oneness, but the one’s being. And Parmenides presupposes that the latter is not supplied from the former. Instead, twice in this passage the property denoted by the predicate ‘is’ (ἔστιν) – the one’s being – is metaphysically analyzed in participatory terms that should by now be familiar to us, i.e. as participation in being (οὐσίας µετέχειν). Admittedly, being here is not explicitly characterized as a Kind (γένος) or a Form (εἶδος). Still the vocabulary of participation seems to point in the direction of Plato’s sustained view that what are participated in are first and foremost Forms. In any case, the argument pattern is unmistakably a consistent one: to explain the fact that ἕν is we need to look for a cause that supplies being to it and the causal relation is one of participation81.

80 Gerson 2004: 311 takes these lines as ‘anything but an application of a general principle: if A is, then (i) A’s essence is distinct from it, and (ii) A partakes of that essence’ (my emphasis). Gerson’s main argument for it is that ‘that which is one is’ – as he translates ἓν εἰ ἔστιν – cannot simply mean ‘that which is one is real’ because the Good in R. 509b8-9 is real (cf. Baltes 1997) but is also beyond οὐσία. As I understand it, the point is that if ‘to partake in οὐσία’ (Parmenides’ analysis of the predicate ἔστιν) meant just ‘to be real’, then the Good would not be real because it does not partake in οὐσία (but is somehow beyond it); but the Good is real; therefore ‘to partake in οὐσία’ cannot simply mean ‘to be real’. Rather it means for something to partake in its own essence. It seems to me that this explanation faces two objections. First, for the one to partake in its own essence means, I take it, to partake in oneness. Thus, the statement ‘the one is’ would be analyzed as ‘the one is one’. But this is exactly what Parmenides warns (142c1-2) not to be the case in D2. Thus, whilst acknowledging that ‘‘that which is one is’ […] must obviously be contrasted with ‘that which is one is one’’, Gerson’s account forces him to conclude that the latter statement is in fact a good analysis of the former. Second, the joint treatment of R. 509b8-9 and Prm. D2 assumes a semantic invariance of οὐσία, which is far from obvious. Plato uses οὐσία in a variety of different ways (cf. Peipers 1883 and Berger 1961) and not only to designate ‘essence’ (quidditas), as e.g. at Euthphr. 11a7, Men. 72b1 and Phdr. 245e4. For example, a production is said bring something into οὐσία (Sph. 219b4-6, Symp. 205b8-c1 et Plt. 258e1-2); οὐσία is also the result of a generation (Sph. 245d4-6); but it also designates the eideic domain (R. 523a3, 525b5, c6, 526e6, 534a3) in opposition to γένεσις; and in Sph. 250b9, 251e11, 252a2, it is the property obtained via participation in one of the greatest Kinds, namely, the Kind Being. It seems to me that this last is the meaning relevant for D2, whereas there is reason to think that the meaning ‘essence’ might be relevant to R. 509b8-9. It is unsurprising, in this regard, that Gerson also sees no gulf between Plato’s and Aristotle’s view on this point. 81 A clarification is in order. While I think the γυµνασία does contain linguistic ambiguities and fallacious arguments (cf. above n. 65) – which are key for the exercise to be antinomically structured – in my view the problems

2.4. Coda: Is the Kind Being itself a Being? Yes

In an important paper of 1996 Frede has argued that the Sophist’s Form of Being is not itself a being82. Frede’s main point is that since the Form of Being is that in virtue of which all beings can be called beings, it cannot itself be a being among others. I shall devote the last section of this chapter to take issue with this claim. Frede supports his reading with three main arguments, which

I shall cross-examine one at a time in the following three sub-sections.

[1] Being, Form and the Good. The first argument proceeds via negativa, stemming from an obvious objection that, as Frede foresees, can promptly be moved to his main thesis. The objection is this. In the Sophist Being is regarded as a Form or Kind; but since a Form is standardly taken by

Plato to be a being, it follows that Being is itself a being. Frede’s reply to this objection invokes the Idea of the Good mentioned in Republic VI. He contends that the Good is a Form but not a being, because it is said to be ‘not an οὐσία, but beyond οὐσία in rank and power’ (R. 509b9-10:

in D2 pertain the mereological account developed from 146c7 onwards (as persuasively shown by Harte 2002: 78- 100), and not the participatory conception of being which comes to the fore at 142b5-c7 (which will be the exclusive focus of the remarks I provide), as Gill 2012: 62-4 thinks. The issue with the first antinomy (D1-D2) is not, as Gill puts it, ‘that being is a nature outside the nature of beings, including oneness’, but that the possession of parts does not pluralize the one, or, which is the same, that something can be one even if it has parts (notably, by being a ὅλον), as again successfully proved by Harte 2002. The obvious rejoinder will be that at Sph. 250d2 the fact that Being is outside (ἐκτὸς) Motion and Rest is said to be ‘the greatest of the impossibilities’ (πάντων µὲν οὖν ἀδυνατώτατον). This seems to support Gill’s line. Yet, notice that by ἐκτός the Stranger in all likelihood means that Being instantiates neither Motion nor Rest. This seems indeed false. But the claim that Being is different from Motion and Rest (250 c3- 4) remains untouched (cf. Crivelli 2012: 97-8 on this passage). And it seems to me that what Prm. 142b5-c7 need imply is only that one and being are different from one another (cf. Prm.142b7-8: οὐ ταὐτὸν; c4-5: ἄλλο τι), not that the former cannot instantiate the latter. Thus, Sph. 250d2 in fact lends no support to Gill’s line. Either Gill’s use of ‘outside’ is different from the Stranger’s use of ἐκτός at Sph. 250d2, in which case this passage is irrelevant for the interpretation of D2; or it is the same, in which case her reading does not fit well with D2. 82 Cf. Frede 1996a: 193-5.

ἐπέκεινα τῆς οὐσίας πρεσβείᾳ καὶ δυνάµει). Accordingly, Frede thinks it is legitimate to regard something as a Form without also being committed to the further implication that it is, pari passu, also a being.

Yet, upon inspection, the Republic passage Frede refers to not only does not bear his reading out, but rather undermines it. For it is certainly true that the Good is said to be ‘not an οὐσία, but beyond οὐσία in rank and power’. Still, as Baltes has thoroughly demonstrated83, this cannot mean that the Good is beyond being altogether84. In fact, the Good is said to be the ‘happiest of being’

(526e4–5: εὐδαιµονέστατον τοῦ ὄντος), the ‘brightest of being’ (518c9: τοῦ ὄντος τὸ φανότατον) and the ‘best among the beings’ (532C6-7: τὴν τοῦ ἀρίστου ἐν τοῖς οὖσι). The Idea of the Good is, therefore, a being and does not transcend being altogether. Whatever Plato has in mind in saying that the Good is ‘beyond οὐσία in rank and power’85 he cannot mean that the Good is not itself a being. Perhaps it is a being in a sense different from that in which what is caused by it is a being

(e.g. Forms and sensibles are by partaking in a given Form, while the Good is without partaking in anything), but this cannot entail that the Good is not itself a being altogether.

[2] Self-predication. Frede’s second argument is that when Plato speaks of the Idea of F, this Idea is not itself one of the Fs. Thus, even if Plato calls Being itself a being, this is not in the sense in which being is generally spoken of, i.e. in the sense that being in itself is a further being.

83 Cf. Baltes 1998. See also Gerson 2020: 125. 84 Notice that Plato never says that the Good is ‘ἐπέκεινα τοῦ ὄντος’. 85 Cf. Gerson 2020: 120-96 for a recent extensive discussion.

A thorough treatment of the vexed debate on self-predication and self-participation in Plato’s metaphysics of Forms clearly falls beyond the scope of the present inquiry86. But it seems to me that even assuming that Being is said to be in a sense other than the one in which any other thing that is is said to be (i.e. by its own nature and not by participation), this is not enough to deny outright that the Kind Being is itself a being. What can certainly be granted is that the Kind Being is a being in a distinctive way, namely, by its own nature. But this is far from implying that the

Kind Being is not a being at all.

Though unconvincing, this remark of Frede, however, touches upon an important problem that is well worth pondering on and to which, as we have seen, Aristotle was very sensitive87: what could it mean for a Kind to be being by its own nature? Could there be something that is in itself just pure being (what is more, without also being the first principle of all, as the proponents of the so-called metaphysics of Exodus want it)? Aristotle replied in the negative, although, as we have seen, his criticisms of Plato on this point might be less than fatal. But the problem remains and, in fact, a similar question could also be asked, for example, in relation to the Kind Identity: how exactly should one understand the notion of a Form that is unqualifiedly identity? So far as I can tell, Plato does not offer us any significant details on this point, which must remain, I think, an open question and perhaps an obscure point of the entire metaphysics of the Sophist.

[3] Being and Thing. The third main argument Frede devises is that when Plato speaks of Being in the Sophist, he says it is a ‘third thing’ (250b8, c1-2: τρίτον […] τι), not a ‘third being’. This argument can be objected too. There is evidence that Plato, unlike the Stoics or Meinong, is

86 See Brunschwig 1985 for an authoritative discussion and the useful overview of the main interpretative options by Fronterotta 2001: 235-69. 87 Cf. Metaph. B 4.1001a4-b1 discussed above in the Intermezzo (2) at §2.2.

81 committed to the view that every ‘something’ (τι) is also a ‘being’ (ὄν)88. Consider for example the first argument for the claim that it is impossible to say what is not at Sph. 237b7-e789. The ES argues against the possible suggestion that even if ‘not being’ cannot be applied to any being, it could nonetheless be applied to something. His strategy consists in stressing there is no

‘something’ (τι) which is not also a ‘being’ (ὄν): we always apply ‘something’ to a thing that is.

More precisely, he urges that whoever says ‘something’ (τόν τι λέγοντα) says ‘at least one thing’

(ἕν γέ τι λέγειν), because the indefinite pronoun ‘something’ (τι) is a sign of one (ἑνὸς […]

σηµεῖον) and the numerical attribute ‘one’ can only be applied to something that is90. And a similar point is also operative at 246e5-247a10, in the cross-examination of the materialists, where the legitimacy of the transition from ‘τι’ (‘a mortal creature is a something’) to ‘τι τῶν ὄντων’ (‘they therefore posit soul as one of the beings’) is simply taken for granted. Therefore, when Plato speaks of Being in the Sophist as a ‘third thing’ he ultimately means that Being is a ‘third being’.

One can therefore conclude that Frede’s contention that the Kind Being is not itself a being does not have the cogency it claims for itself.

Conclusion. In this chapter, I have taken a first step towards the metaphysical analysis of the Kind

Being. I have argued that the Kind Being, just like any other Platonic Kind, is first and foremost a robust causal principle, metaphysically responsible for the property its name names, i.e. being

(simpliciter). Thus, there is a distinctive property of being (not being something or other) of which the Kind Being is the cause. I sustained this reading by first focussing (more closely than I did in chapter 1), on the refutation of the account of being stated by the ‘children’s prayer’. The

88 Cf. especially Aubenque 1991a. I shall return to this point in ch.5. 89 For more extensive analysis cf. Crivelli 2012: 32-42. 90 This premise is not stated, but should likely be supplied, cf. again Crivelli 2012: 38.

82 explanatory pattern displayed by the argument against this account has been seen operative in a number of other passages of the Sophist. Next, after two brief Aristotelian incursions (the former to defend Plato from a criticism by Aristotle, the latter to compare their respective conceptions of the causes of being), I have shown that the participatory conception of being thematized in the

Sophist is also at work in the second deduction of the second part of the Parmenides. I concluded by disputing Frede’s claim that the Kind Being is not itself a being.

Chapter 3

All-Pervasiveness and Combination

What exactly do we learn from this analogical characterization? Two main things, as I shall argue in this chapter:

1. The Kind Being is all-pervasive: everything partakes in it. This is possibly also part of what

is suggested by the inclusion of the Kind Being among the so-called ‘greatest Kinds’. But the

claim that Being is all-pervasive might elicit two considerations: first, that Plato is condemned

to an extremely expansive ontology, on which every possible subject of predication (including

e.g. fictional entities) exists; second, that the Kind Being is a most generic genus

encompassing all genera. Both considerations are in my view misconceived and I will dwell

on criticizing them.

2. Participation in the Kind Being is a necessary condition for the combination with other Kinds.

In particular, I will show that the Kind Being has a twofold role in the mechanics of

combination. On the one hand, it is metaphysically responsible for the existence of the

combining Kinds. On the other hand, it works as a relational property connecting those Kinds.

The latter function, I shall argue, is reflected by the use of the verb ‘εἶναι’ as a copula.

The chapter is structured as follows. In §3.1 I outline the interpretation of the vowel analogy I support; in §3.2 I discuss Being’s all-pervasiveness; in §3.3 Being’s combinatory role.

83 84

3.1. Vowel Analogy

Two competing interpretations. In this section, I provide an interpretation of the vowel analogy.

Traditionally, this analogy has been interpreted as suggesting that the so-called ‘vowel-Kinds’ –

i.e. those Kinds having a function in the mechanics of the combination of Kinds analogous to that

of vowels in the combination of letters – are Being and Difference and that each of them is a

necessary and sufficient condition for combination and division respectively: the former is

individually responsible for combination, the latter for division1. Taking my cue from other

commentators2, I shall dispute this reading and defend one on which vowel-Kinds (a) include,

beside Being and Difference, at least also Identity; (b) are involved only in combination and not

also in division; and (c) conjointly contribute to making combination among Forms possible. Thus,

individually, each vowel kind is only a necessary, but not also sufficient condition for combination.

The context of the analogy. From 251e5 to 254b7, the ES and Theaetetus develop a complex

account of dialectic, in response to a puzzle about predication broached by some so-called ‘late-

learners’3. I shall not dwell on that puzzle here and focus only on the outcome of the account of

dialectic, as it is summed up at 254b8-c1 through the following three remarks:

1 Cf. Campbell 1867: 144; Ross 1951: 113; Bluck 1975 [1963]: 124; Frede 1967: 37-8; Gómez-Lobo 1977: 38,

45; Guthrie 1978: 151; Crivelli 2012: 116, 152; Gill 2012: 212-3. The reading of Cornford 1935: 261-2 is more nuanced. See below n.11. 2 Especially Dixsaut 2001: 172-5, Harte 2002: 151-5 and Zaks 2017: 66-70, though I shall depart from significant

aspects of their respective interpretations of the vowel analogy and especially of the role of the Kind Being as a ‘Vowel-Kind’, see below n. 23. 3 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 103-9 for an explanation of the puzzle and an overview of the main interpretations. Dixsaut

2001: 151-230 provides a comprehensive and insightful account of Plato’s conception of dialectic in the Sophist. The traditional association of the ‘late-learners’ with Antisthenes has been forcefully opposed by Brancacci 1999, who has proposed to identify them with Euthydemus and Dionisodorus.

i) ‘some kinds are ready to combine with each other, others not’;

ii) ‘some a little, others a lot’;

iii) ‘some, even, are perfectly capable of being in combination with all and through all’4.

How are these three claims proved? Conclusion i) was established at 251d5-252e8. In that passage the ES envisages three exclusive and jointly exhaustive options about the combination of Kinds: first, no Kinds blend; second, all Kinds blend; third, some Kinds blend and some do not. The first two options are rejected and the third retained5. Thus, it is pointed out that Kinds combine but not indiscriminately. It is the dialectician’s task to determinate which Kinds do and which do not combine (253e1-2).

It is unclear on what grounds conclusion ii) is inferred. The main issues at 251e5-254b7 concern, first, whether Kinds do or do not combine; and second, once it is agreed that they do but not indiscriminately, whether there are some Kinds capable of combining with all other Kinds.

But the interlocutors do not expressly discuss matters of degree, i.e., whether some Kinds combine more (ἐπὶ πολλά) or less than others (ἐπ’ὀλίγον)6. Presumably, conclusion ii) is considered proved a fortiori through the demonstration of iii). Since there are Kinds capable of combining with all other Kinds, then it is perhaps implied that Kinds combine more or less than others. It is unclear what this talk of degree ultimately boils down to. One possibility, which I offer for consideration, is that they pertain to the participatory (and predicative) extent of certain Kinds. To claim that a

4 Ὅτ’οὖν δὴ τὰ µὲν ἡµῖν τῶν γενῶν ὡµολόγηται κοινωνεῖν ἐθέλειν ἀλλήλοις, τὰ δὲ µή, καὶ τὰ µὲν ἐπ’ὀλίγον, τὰ

δ’ἐπὶ πολλά, τὰ δὲ καὶ διὰ πάντων οὐδὲν κωλύειν τοῖς πᾶσι κεκοινωνηκέναι. 5 More extensive exegesis in Crivelli 2012: 109-17. The exclusion of the first option is echoed at 259d9-e6. I shall return later to one salient aspect in the refutation of the first option. 6 But notice that at 253d5-e1 we have four occurrences of the adjective ‘πολύς’ at the plural.

Kind combines more than another means that the range of objects partaking in that Kind is wider than that of the objects partaking in another Kind.

Conclusion iii) is inferred by means of an analogy, introduced at 252e9-253b8. Since some

Kinds do and some do not combine, their status is interestingly akin to that of letters and musical notes. Not only do letters and notes too combine selectively. In addition, just as the combination of Kinds is studied by philosophy, i.e. dialectic7, so too there will be a specific expertise (literacy) concerned with determining how letters combine, and another expertise (musicality) concerned with how notes combine.

The analogy with letters is articulated more fully than the one with musical notes. The former also includes relevant remarks on the distinctive role of some letters, the vowels, in the mechanics of combination. Vowels, the ES points out, ‘differently from the other letters, run through them all

(διὰ πάντων) like a bond (οἷον δεσµὸς), so that without a vowel it’s impossible for any of the others to fit together either’8. The salient features of vowels, as they are described here, are two: first, they are all-pervasive; second, by binding together other letters (presumably consonants), they are necessary conditions (ἄνευ τινὸς…ἀδύνατον) for any two or more other letters to fit together9. The

7 Cf. 253c4-d3, e4-5. 8 253a4-6: Τὰ δέ γε φωνήεντα διαφερόντως τῶν ἄλλων οἷον δεσµὸς διὰ πάντων κεχώρηκεν, ὥστε ἄνευ τινὸς

αὐτῶν ἀδύνατον ἁρµόττειν καὶ τῶν ἄλλων ἕτερον ἑτέρῳ. Emphasis mine. 9 The phrase ‘to fit together’ (ἁρµόττειν) may be construed as indicating either the formation of a syllable (cf. e.g. Campbell 1867: LXXVII) or of a whole word (cf. e.g. Trevaskis 1966: 115). In the former case, the point would be that two consonants alone cannot form a syllable – a vowel must be supplied. By contrast, one or two vowels can form a syllable (e.g. ἀεί). In the latter case, the point would be that no well-formed word could be composed solely of consonants. By contrast, a well-formed word can be composed just of vowels (e.g. again ἀεί). A different reading is proposed by Ryle 1960: 434-5 (followed by Harte 2002: 153 and n. 63). According to Ryle the point is that consonants cannot be uttered by themselves and need a vowel to be pronounceable and audible. But this explanation is questionable, because what is at issue here is how more than one consonant can ‘fit together’, whereas Ryle’s remark concerns the possibility of pronouncing a single consonant regardless of its combination with other consonants.

ES does not expressly spell out the details of the parallel with Kinds. Still, at 253b9-c3 he makes some remarks about the distinctive competence of the expert in the combination of Kinds (who will soon be called ‘philosopher’ and ‘dialectician’10), which provide for the relevant resources to fill in the gaps. The different interpretations of the vowel analogy depends in part on how some of these remarks are construed. That expert – the ES says – will be able to show correctly11:

(1) ‘which sorts of kinds are in harmony (συµφωνεῖ) with which and which are not receptive to

each other’;

(2) ‘further, whether there are some that hold them together, running through them (διὰ πάντων

εἰ συνέχοντ’ ἄττ’ αὔτ’ ἐστιν ) in such a way as to make them capable of mixing (ὥστε

συµµείγνυσθαι δυνατὰ εἶναι)’;

(3) ‘and again, in cases where they divide off (ἐν ταῖς διαιρέσεσιν), whether there are others

(ἕτερα) running through wholes (δι’ὅλων) that cause the division (τῆς διαιρέσεως αἴτια)’.

The traditional interpretation of the vowel analogy. According to the traditional interpretation of the vowel analogy, both (2) and (3) are relevant to understanding the role of vowel-Kinds12. The traditional interpretation assumes that the phrases ‘διὰ πάντων’ and ‘δι’ὅλων’ are essentially

10 Cf. above n.7 of this chapter. 11 In the text these remarks are formulated as a question. But the question has a rhetorical sound and strongly suggests a positive answer, which in fact Theaetetus promptly gives (253c4-5). Thus, for ease of exposition, I report it as a series of statements. 12 See the authors mentioned above at n.1. The position of Cornford (1935: 261-2) is more nuanced, but not entirely perspicuous. Since he claims that those mentioned in (3) are ‘the disjoining Forms [which] are the meanings of the words ‘is not’ in true negative statements’, he seems to subscribe to the traditional interpretation. But then he also sees a distinction (correctly, in my view) between the expressions ‘διὰ πάντων’ and ‘δι’ὅλων’ and concludes that ‘the disjunctive Forms correspond to lines of division either passing between such complexes [scil. Forms considered as complexes divisible into parts] and separating them or passing through them and separating their parts’.

88 equivalent and interchangeable (both indicate all-pervasiveness), and are both meant to mirror the

‘διὰ πάντων’ at 253c5. And since (2) speaks of combination (συµµείγνυσθαι) and (3) of division

(διαιρέσεως), ‘Vowel-Kinds’ are accordingly claimed to be all-pervasive factors involved in any combination and division among Kinds. More precisely, as I anticipated at the beginning of this section, advocates of this reading incline to regard the Vowel-Kinds as necessary and sufficient conditions for combination or division and maintain that the candidates which fulfill this role are the Kinds Being and Difference. The former is individually responsible for combination, the latter for division13.

This is typically explained as follows. The combination of two Kinds F and G is linguistically expressed through the statement ‘F is G’. The connecting function of the copula in this statement is taken to have its ontological counterpart in the ‘vowel function’ of the Kind Being, which is consequently regarded as the unique and direct agent of composition. On the other hand, the division of two Kinds R and S is linguistically expressed through the statement ‘R is not S’.

Statements of this sort will be later analyzed as ‘R partakes in Difference relative to S’. The negation of the copula is taken to have its ontological counterpart in the ‘vowel function’ of the

Kind Difference, which is regarded as the unique and direct agent of division.

The case for the traditional interpretation. The traditional interpretation seems to have quite good textual support, from three main passages:

13 Ross 1951: 113 claims that the connecting Forms are Being, Sameness and Difference; whereas the most general separating Form is Difference. But the genera evoked in (3) are explicitly said to be ‘other’ (ἕτερα) than those referred to in (2). So, Difference can hardly be both a connecting and a separating Kind.

• First, at Sph. 259a5-6 the ES affirms: ‘being and difference pervade all [Kinds] and one

another (τό τε ὂν καὶ θάτερον διὰ πάντων καὶ δι’ ἀλλήλων διεληλυθότε)’. This is taken to

suggest that Being and Difference are the only two all-pervasive Kinds.

• Second, at 251e8-252a10, the ES assesses the claim that no Kinds blend. The first argument

he devises to reject this claim is a counterfactual conditional. If no Kind had the power to

combine with any other, then Motion and Rest would not even combine with Being. Yet,

without sharing in Being neither of them would be and every predicative attribution of

being14 would be impossible. One would expect the conclusion to be that this cannot be so

because it should at least be granted that Motion and Rest, just like any other Kind, is

(namely, exists). Perhaps this is part of the story, but the ES accomplishes his argument

rather differently. For the examples of predicative attribution of being he mentions are not

sentences such as ‘X is’. Rather, he evokes the views of the predecessors: ‘some [say] that

things really are in motion, the others [say] they really are at rest (οἱ µὲν ὄντως κινεῖσθαι

λέγοντες, οἱ δὲ ὄντως ἑστηκότ’εἶναι)’. In this phrase, Being is referred to by the adverb

‘ὄντως’, which can occur in any affirmative sentence. Hence, the Kind Being seems to be

regarded as an ingredient involved in every participation among Kinds15. One plausible way

14 The verb is ‘προσάπτουσιν’. Compare 238e8, 239a3, 241b2, 251d6. 15 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 112-3. It is tempting to speculate that this remark of Plato’s was also meant to carry some weight against views such as those mentioned (and criticized) by Aristotle at Ph. A 2.185b26-32. We are informed by Aristotle that some thinkers thought that from the fact that some things can be predicated of others (through the verb εἶναι used as a copula) the apparently absurd conclusion follows that the same thing is both one and many. To circumvent this difficulty – which is presumably a sophism based on a confusion between the ‘is’ of identity and the ‘is’ of predication – these thinkers proposed various ad hoc solutions. The sophist Lycophron simply took away the verb ἐστίν. Others changed the mode of expression, saying not that ‘the man is white but that he has whitened (ὁ ἄνθρωπος οὐ λευκός ἐστιν ἀλλὰ λελεύκωται)’. Plato’s point at Sph. 251e8-252a10 might implicitly be intended to point an accusing finger at the adequacy of such naïves ways out.

to make sense of this suggestion is to think that Plato is implicitly making a point similar to

one made by Aristotle in passages such as Int. 12.21b9-10, APr. 51b13-16 and Metaph.

1017a22–30. Here, Aristotle suggests that a non-copular sentence (e.g. ‘a man walks’) can

always be turned into an equivalent copular sentence in which the same verbal predicate is

turned into a copular predicate (e.g. ‘a man is walking’). But Plato goes even further. For,

unlike Aristotle, he seems to take this linguistic fact to reflect an ontological fact, namely,

that there is a Kind, the Kind Being that perform the function of a connector which mediates

any combination, and is linguistically mirrored by the verb ‘to be’ used as a copula16.

• A third passage has been invoked to support the traditional interpretation of the vowel

analogy. At Prm. 162a4, in the context of the fifth deduction, being17 is characterized as a

‘bond’ (δεσµός) linking the subject ‘the one’ (τὸ ἕν) and the predicate ‘not-being’ (οὐκ ὄν),

in the statement ‘the one is a not-being’. Once again, being is here a connecting element, and

performs the function of the copula18.

The case against the traditional interpretation. The traditional interpretation faces two problems19:

a) First, there seems to be no vowel responsible for the division of consonants. Vowels only

bind consonants (whether in syllables or entire words) and do not divide them. This

disanalogy speaks against taking statement (3)20 to be concerned with Vowel-Kinds.

16 One can interestingly contrast this view with Kant, Kritik der reinen Vernunft A598-9/B626-7. 17 I write ‘being’ with lowercase ‘b’ because ὄν is not openly described as a γένος or an εἶδος in D5. 18 On this passage cf. Granieri forthcoming-b and below §3.5. 19 See above n.2. 20 ‘And again, in cases where they divide off (ἐν ταῖς διαιρέσεσιν), whether there are others (ἕτερα) running through wholes (δι’ὅλων) that cause the division (τῆς διαιρέσεως αἴτια)’.

b) Second, according to the traditional reading there is ultimately just one Vowel-Kind

individually responsible for combination and another one individually responsible for

division. But the subject of both (2) and (3) is plural (253c1: ἄττ[α]; c3: ἕτερα).

These considerations discourage the attribution to Plato of the view that there are only two vowel-

Kinds, the Kind Being and the Kind Difference, the former being individually responsible for (i.e., the necessary and sufficient conditions for) combination; the latter being individually responsible for (i.e., the necessary and sufficient conditions for) division.

Basics of an alternative reading. It is advisable to explore alternative interpretations of the vowel analogy that are not affected by these difficulties. In the ensuing pages, I shall not attempt a full illustration and defence of such an alternative interpretation, a task which exceeds the scope of my inquiry. I will instead concentrate on some salient aspects that I think should be part of this alternative view, and prove relevant for the metaphysical analysis of the Kind Being I am pursuing in this thesis.

To begin with, consider once more criticism a) against the traditional interpretation. If that objection is on the right track, then only claim (2) is relevant to the understanding of the vowel analogy. Accordingly, vowels and vowel-Kinds are claimed to be all-pervasive factors involved in combination alone (and not also in division). Further, it seems plausible to take the locution ‘διὰ

πάντων’ alone, and not also ‘δι’ὅλων’, to mirror the ‘διὰ πάντων’ at 253c5. The concepts of ‘ὅλον’ and ‘πᾶν’ can hardly be regarded as simply interchangeable for Plato21. Notably, they had been carefully distinguished earlier in the dialogue, in the context of the criticism of Eleatic monism

21 As proved especially by Harte 2002.

244b6-245e222. It would be quite strange if Plato now employed the two terms synonymously – and nothing in this passage compels us to take him to do so.

These remarks suggest the alternative construal that vowel-Kinds conjointly contribute to making combination among Forms possible. One way to develop this intuition is that vowel-Kinds conjointly contribute to the constitution of any Form qua Form. And since at 257a9 the ES says that ‘it is the nature of Kinds to combine with one another’ (ἔχει κοινωνίαν ἀλλήλοις ἡ τῶν γενῶν

φύσις), I offer for consideration the proposal that in contributing to the constitution of any Form qua Form, by the same token vowel-Kinds make combination among Forms possible.

Which are these vowel-Kinds? Being and Difference are surely among them. For at 259a5-6 the ES unequivocally states that ‘Being and Difference pervade all [Kinds] and one another’. This was already suggested by the traditional interpretation. But the way I construe this claim differs in two respects from the traditional interpretation: first, I take both Being and Difference to contribute to combination alone (division is not in question); second, I doubt that Being and Difference are the only vowel-Kinds, and I think that at least Identity, whose all-pervasiveness is stated at 256a7-

8 (διὰ τὸ µετέχειν αὖ πάν ταὐτοῦ), should be included in the list as well23.

Let me explain this in more detail. I have been arguing that vowel-Kinds are necessary conditions for combination. How does combination work for there to be such conditions? As I argued in chapter 2, I interpret inter-eidetic participation as a time-immune and invariable causal interaction among Kinds, such that, given two Kinds A and B, for A to combine with (or partakes in) B means that B is causally responsible for A’s possession of the property B’s name names –

22 Cf. Harte 2002: 100-116. 23 The all-pervasiveness of the Kind Identity has been defended, among others, by Ross 1951: 113; O’Brien

1995: 65-6; Harte 2002: 154 and n.67; Zaks 2017: 67-8 and n.17 (contra, cf. Dixsaut 1991b: 207-13).

93 e.g. Motion is (viz. has the property of being) because it partakes in the Kind Being (256a1). So, minimally, eidetic combination requires that:

[α] the existence of the Kinds involved in combination;

[β] that each of these Kinds is identical to itself;

[γ] that they are numerically and essentially different from one another;

[δ] that there is a participatory medium which links the two Kinds24.

My considered view, which I will spell out and elaborate on in the next chapter, is that, on the one hand, the Kind Being accounts for the monadic property of the bare existence of a Form. This meets requirement [α]25. On the other hand, the Kind Being also performs the additional function of a relational property as a connecting element between two relata, which is linguistically expressed by the verb ‘to be’ as a copula, as proved by passages such as Sph. 251e8-252a10 and

24 I say ‘minimally’ because other conditions might be involved. For example, the combining Kinds must presumably also be immutable, or else the interweaving would not be time-immune and invariable. One can make a case that this is caused by the Kind Rest, whose all-pervasiveness might be inferred from 249b12-c1 (to compare with Phd. 78c6, d2, d6, d8, 79e4-5; R. V 479a2-3; Crat. 439e3-4; Plt. 269d5-7; Phlb. 59c2-3, 60 e1-2; Ti. 29a1-2). Admittedly, this claim is more controversial and there is no need to push it here. 25 Harte 2002: 154 explains: ‘if the kind Change is to combine with other kinds, it must both be and be distinct; that is, it must be the same as itself and different from the rest’ (my emphasis). Harte follows here a widespread trend in English-language studies, one ultimately depending on Malcolm 1967 and Owen 1971: 255-8, which analyzes being in terms of self-identity (‘being’ > ‘being the same as itself’). This reading sits uneasily with Plato’s careful distinction between the Kind Identity and the Kind Being (255d8-c8) and I shall criticize it later in this chapter, as well as in ch.4. For the time being, suffice it to say that the property of ‘being the same as itself’ is due to sharing in the Kind Identity, not in the Kind Being (256b1-2; cf. also Movia 1991: 340). Dixsaut 2001: 172-4 is closer to the truth, as for the role of the Kind Being in combination. But both Harte and Dixsaut underplay the connecting role of being as described in passages such as Sph. 251e8-252a10 and Prm. 162a4. On the other hand, Zaks 2017: 68 put all the emphasis on the role of Being as a linking operator and underplays (perhaps denies) its role as a monadic property.

Prm. 162a4 mentioned above26. This meets requirement [δ]. Notice that this additional function of the Kind Being does not make it an individually sufficient condition of combination. For without the contribution of further constitutive features of the relata linked by Being, e.g. their difference from each other and identity with themselves, combination could not come about – a link alone does not accomplish any combination. The Kinds Identity and Difference provide such constitutive features and, consequently, meet requirement [β] and [γ]. Notice that, by stressing that the Kind

Being meets both requirements [α] and [γ], my reading, I contend, is able to account, as others are not27, for the evidence of Sph. 251e8-252a10 and Prm. 162a4 where Being is described as a connective factor linguistically mirrored by the copula.

Intermezzo (4): a predicament for Plato’s account. I have been arguing that vowel-Kinds, including the Kind Being, are universally participated in and have a constitutive role in the mechanics of combination among Kinds. More precisely they are necessary conditions for the participation among Kinds. Still, they are themselves Kinds and, consequently, they too are involved in relations of participation. This, I submit, puts Plato in a predicament, which I shall outline in this sub-section.

The predicament is the following: it is unclear how those factors which enable combination are themselves involved in combinatory relations. Consider, for example, the participation of

Motion in Being. The former is, because of its participation in the latter. Yet, it is unclear how

Motion could partake in anything if it were not itself a being in the first place. Or consider the

26 That Being is both a monadic and relational property is also maintained by Gill 2012: 57-61, 163-6, 173-6,

240. But my reading of Being as a monadic property differs substantively from hers, as it will emerge later in this chapter. 27 I take Dam. Pr. II 75 to defend a reading similar to the one proposed presently.

combination between the Being and Difference. The former is different from something else

(including the Difference) because of its participation in the latter. Yet again, it is unclear how the

Being could partake in anything if it were not itself different from other things (including

Difference) in the first place. More generally: let F be a Platonic Kind; for F to partake in any

other Kind (including other vowel-Kinds), F must already have all the properties which

participation in other vowel-Kinds procures. So since participation in other vowel-Kinds is a

necessary condition for any given Kind’s participation in another Kind, Plato seems to fall in a

circle between condition and conditioned.

One way to rescue Plato from such a circle might be to suggest that two participatory relations

are implicitly operative in his account of combination. First, there is a primitive participatory

relation, call it Participation1, involving any vowel-Kind as at least one of the two relata. This

first type of participation is constitutive and does not require that the participants be already

endowed with the properties caused by the vowel-Kinds. Second, there is an ‘ordinary’

participatory relation, call it Participation2, which does not involve vowel-Kinds. For any given

Kind F, Participation2 is possible if and only if F already partakes1 in all vowel-Kinds. The

problem with such a two-tiered construal is that it has scarcely any textual support. Thus, as far as

I can tell, Plato’s account of combination remains tangled up in this predicament.

3.2. All-Pervasiveness: Fictions, Porphyrian Trees and the Philosopher’s

Object

In the previous section, I have outlined the interpretation of the vowel analogy I support. In the

remainder of this chapter, I will focus on the two chief features of Being as a vowel-Kind, namely,

its all-pervasiveness and combinatory role. The present section is devoted to Being’s all-

96 pervasiveness. The claim that everything partakes in Being might elicit two considerations: first, that Plato is condemned to an extremely expansive ontology, on which every possible subject of predication (including e.g. fictional entities) exists; second, that the Kind Being is a most generic genus encompassing all genera. Both considerations are in my view misconceived and I will dwell on criticizing them respectively in the first and third of the following sub-sections (the second will be an intermezzo on the label ‘greatest Kinds’). Before moving to Being’s combinatory role, I will also briefly assess, in the last sub-section, Gill’s thesis that the Kind Being should be identified with with the ‘philosopher’s object’, i.e., the subject matter of philosophy.

Everything partakes in Being. Twice the ES stresses that the Kind Being is all-pervasive. We have already seen him stating at 259a5-6 that: ‘being and difference pervade all [Kinds] and one another

(τό τε ὂν καὶ θάτερον διὰ πάντων [scil. γενῶν]28 καὶ δι’ ἀλλήλων διεληλυθότε)’. But Being’s all- pervasiveness emerged already at 256d12-e3: all Kinds (κατὰ πάντα [scil. γένη] 29) – the ES asserts in that passage – are ‘not-beings’ because Difference makes them so, by rendering each a different thing from being; still, ‘since they share in being, [we’ll be correct] in saying that they are, and talking of them as beings’30.

In both passages the ES speaks specifically about Kinds. Thus, one might suppose that the claim of all-pervasiveness is confined to Kinds, and does not extend to perceptible particulars or souls. One possible way of developing this reading is to regard the property being as a second- order property belonging to Forms alone, and perceptible particulars as existing only to the extent

28 ‘γενῶν’ is supplied from ‘τὰ γένη’ at 259a5. 29 ‘γένη’ is supplied from the previous sentence at 256d11-12. 30 κατὰ πάντα γὰρ ἡ θατέρου φύσις ἕτερον ἀπεργαζοµένη τοῦ ὄντος ἕκαστον οὐκ ὂν ποιεῖ, καὶ σύµπαντα δὴ

κατὰ ταὐτὰ οὕτως οὐκ ὄντα ὀρθῶς ἐροῦµεν, καὶ πάλιν, ὅτι µετέχει τοῦ ὄντος, εἶναί τε καὶ ὄντα.

97 that they partake in Forms (other than Being), which in turn partake in Being31. For example,

Socrates does not himself partake in Being, but only in the Form of Human Being, which in turn partakes in Being.

However, there are reasons to be doubtful of this construal. Consider the two famous examples of true and false statement at 263a: ‘Theaetetus sits’ and ‘Theaetetus flies’. Both statements are about Theaetetus (263a5, 11: περὶ ἐµοῦ; b4-5, c1: περὶ σοῦ). Now, a few lines before, the ES had claimed that every logos must necessarily be ‘of something’ (τινὸς)32. The same point is reasserted, with a slightly different phraseology, at 263c9-1133. Hence, Theaetetus is a something (τι). But

Plato, unlike the Stoics or Meinong, is also committed to the view that every something (τι) is also a being (ὄν)34. This further aspect of Plato’s account, severely judged by Aubenque as ‘une occasion manquée’35, is proved by passages both within and outside the Sophist. Thus, one of the governing premises (left unquestioned by Plato) of the paradox of falsehood is that to say

31 See Frede 1996a: 197-8, who believes that in the Sophist, Plato thematises a threefold ‘hierarchisierte

Ontologie’, with the Kind Being itself at the top, other Forms participating in it at a second level and, finally, sensible particulars partaking in Being only through the intermediary of Forms. Similarly, already Ricoeur 2011 [1953-4]: 14, 107-8 went so far as to say that we have here ‘une ontologie de deuxième degré’ which stems from the question of what it means for a Form (and only for a Form) to be (see also Seligman 1974: 68 who speaks of Being as a ‘meta- form’; and Movia 1991: 292-3, 354 and passim, ‘metaidee’). As I argued in ch.1 (esp. p.24), I agree with Ricoeur that in the Sophist we find a ‘redoublement de la question ontologique’, to the extent that we transition from a question about ‘What is this or that?’ into one about ‘What is the being ascribed to this or that?’. Yet, I doubt that the second of these two questions can be asked only about Forms. 32 Cf. Sph. 262e6-7: Λόγον ἀναγκαῖον, ὅτανπερ ᾖ, τινὸς εἶναι λόγον, µὴ δὲ τινὸς ἀδύνατον. This is called by

Thomas 2008 ‘tinos requirement’. 33 Μηδενὸς <δέ> γε ὢν οὐδ' ἂν λόγος εἴη τὸ παράπαν· ἀπεφήναµεν γὰρ ὅτι τῶν ἀδυνάτων ἦν λόγον ὄντα µηδενὸς

εἶναι λόγον. Perhaps ‘ἀπεφήναµεν’ does not refer just to 262e6-7, but also to 237b10-239a12. 34 See above §2.4. Thus, the ‘tinos requirement’ is also an ‘ontos requirement’, as Thomas 2008 also claims. Cf. also Granieri forthcoming-b. On the epistemological implications of these principles, cf. Fronterotta 2001: 66-79. 35 Cf. Aubenque 1991a and above §2.4.

98 something is to say something that is (237d1-4), a point repeated at 246e5-9 in the refutation of the materialists, where the legitimacy of the transition from ‘τι’ (‘a mortal creature is a something’) to ‘τι τῶν ὄντων’ (‘they therefore posit soul as one of the beings’) is simply taken for granted. But see also Tht. 189a6-8, where Socrates and Theetetus agree that she who opines something opines something that is (ὁ δ᾽ ἕν τι δοξάζων οὐκ ὄν τι; –– συγχωρῶ.).

The foregoing suggests the (perhaps obvious) conclusion that Theaetetus is not only a something

(τι), but also a being (ὄν). But we have seen the ES systematically explaining something’s being a being by evoking its participation in the Kind Being. We are therefore invited to infer that

Theaetetus, who is a perceptible particular, partakes in Being too and, accordingly, that Being’s all-pervasiveness is not confined to Kinds: everything (including sensibles) partakes in Being.

Now, modern readers have been accustomed, especially as a result of the work of Russell and

Quine, to link the claim that everything exists with the problem of empty names and fictional entities. Consequently, one might suspect that Being’s all-pervasiveness commits Plato to an extremely expansive ontology, in which every possible subject of predication (including e.g. fictional entities) exists.

In reply to this worry, one might begin by remarking that Plato was much less concerned with the problem of fictions and empty names than contemporary analytic philosophers are36. In any case, there are reasons to doubt that he was committed to any such excessively wide ontology.

Again, this is not because Plato, like the Stoics or Meinong, countenances objects that are

‘something’ but do not exist, a claim that we have just seen he adamantly rejects37. Instead, while

36 Cf. Kripke 2013 [1973]: 4: ‘No problem has seemed to represent a more perplexing philosophical conundrum than that of the use of names which have no reference’. I doubt that such a perplexity was felt by Plato. For Plato’s attitude towards other types of non-existent entities, e.g. objects that existed in the past, cf. Heinaman 1983: 12-3. 37 I shall return to the difference between Plato’s and the Stoic-Meinongian ontology in ch.5.

99 he does not claim deny that fictional discourse is meaningful, he claims that fictional entities, such as the Chimaera, Scylla, or Cerberus, are not real unities but a matter of mental fabrication38, because they do not track reality, but are ‘synthetically’ constructed by combining material from various sources39. As Crivelli observes, for Plato a sentence that is not about something existent

(a real unity), such as a sentence involving fictional entities, ‘is not really a sentence (or at least is not a sentence that may be evaluated as true or false)’40. But then it is not obvious how exactly

Plato would treat such sentences. Probably O’Brien41 has a point suggesting that the theory of the

Sophist, in which the existence of the subject of predication is a preliminary condition for the articulation of a logos, would demand that when we assess a sentence such as ‘mermaids swim’, we should begin by analysing the subject of predication and therefore confronting the prior sentence ‘there are women with a fish tail’ and check first whether that is true or false. Similarly, when we assess the sentence ‘the present King of France is bald’, we should begin by confronting the prior sentence ‘France has a a King’ and check first whether that is true or false.

Intermezzo (5): greatest Kinds. Being is also famously included among the ‘so-called greatest forms’ (254c3-4: τῶν µεγίστων λεγοµένων ἄττα [scil. εἰδῶν]) or ‘greatest of the Kinds’ (254d4:

µέγιστα µὴν τῶν γενῶν). What do these labels mean?

A few words of context first. After agreeing that Kinds combine selectively and that the task of dialectic is to explore the relationships among Kinds, starting from 254c1, the ES and Theaetetus

38 Cf. Cherniss 1944: 254 and especially Thomas 2008: 659-66. 39 Cf. e.g. R. 488a4-7, 588b10-d9. 40 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 8. 41 Cf. O’Brien 1995: 76-7; 2005: 144.

100 turn to give a sample of how this project should be pursued. In order not to get confused through the maze of all Forms, they decide to restrict their inquiry to ‘some of those reckoned to be the greatest’ (254c3-4: τῶν µεγίστων λεγοµένων ἄττα [scil. εἰδῶν]). They set a two-pronged agenda for themselves: first, they will have to determine what these greatest Kinds are like; and second, how they combine. The first project is pursued in 254d4-255e7; the second in 255e8-259b7. The phrase ‘τῶν µεγίστων λεγοµένων ἄττα [scil. εἰδῶν]’ prompts at least three questions. (i) Which are these selected Forms? (ii) Why exactly are they called ‘greatest’ (µεγίστων)?

The answer to (i) is plain. By 255e7 five Forms will have been singled out: Being, Motion,

Rest, Identity and Difference. Is this the full list? It is certainly complete as far as the Sophist’s argument is concerned. No other greatest Kind is named in the rest of the work. But the indefinite pronoun ‘ἄττα’42 at 254c4 suggests that the greatest Kinds invoked in the dialogue might not be the only ones. A plausible candidate here left unmentioned is Oneness43. To integrate the list, some

42 Attic form of the indefinite τινά, to be distinguished from ἅττα nom./acc. plural of ὅστις. 43 Cf. R. 476a5-7. Plot. VI 2.9-12 is still the most sustained attempt to deny that ἕν is a Kind, though systematically overlooked by most of the commentators I know of. While a full assessment of Plotinus’ arguments obviously exceeds the scope of this chapter, I shall not refrain from making at last some remarks. In outline, Plotinus stresses that neither the primary One (the One of the first hypostasis, which Plotinus identifies with the Good of R. 509b9-10 and the subject of Prm. D1), nor the secondary One (the One-Being of the second hypostasis, which he identifies with the subject of Prm. D2) can be a γένος. The former is beyond being and therefore can neither be a predicate, nor have differentiae, nor be divisible (which are all taken to be structural features of a Kind). The latter too is not a predicate or a common Kind of what falls under it, because it is not ‘what something is’ (ὅπερ ὄν τι) and is not included in the definitional account of a Kind. Neither of these two cases is relevant for the present purposes. For the One which would count as a greatest Kind is neither the first principle of all (the Good which Plotinus identifies with the One, based on Aristotle’s testimony) nor the whole eidetic realm (Plotinus’ second hypostasis), but just one among the Kinds, namely, the Kind causally responsible for the oneness of anything that partakes in it. Plotinus, however, envisages this possibility as well (10.24-42). While he grants that oneness is present in many things as something common (τι κοινόν) he denies that this is enough to posit a genus of oneness. Why? Because, Plotinus argues, (i) it does not have differentiae, so it cannot produce species and be present in the definition of what falls under it (10.37-40); and (ii) if it produces the identical species of Being, then it is identical with Being and only the name is

101 interpreters refer to the so-called ‘κοινά’ of Theaetetus 185-6 and to the hypothesizable objects recommended at Parmenides 136b4-6 as potential subject-matters of the dialectical exercise44. I doubt that several of the items mentioned in these two passages could hope to count as greatest

Kinds – e.g. generation, corruption, odd and even. But the fact remains that nothing in the Sophist compels us to think that the list is complete, and one textual point invites us to think that it is not45.

What about (ii)? Why are they called ‘greatest᾽ (254c4: τῶν µεγίστων; d4: µέγιστα)? One might think this is due to their all-pervasiveness. This may certainly be true of Being, Identity and

Difference, which are explicitly said to be all-pervasive. But there is a problem with Motion and

different (10.40-42). Neither of these two arguments seems compelling to me. For (i) would not apply to any other greatest Kind. For example, the Kind Identity does not have differentiae and is not present in the definitional account of a Kind. Further if (ii) means that the Kinds Being and One (as greatest Kinds) would have the same extension, this would be true of any greatest Kind; and this is not an obstacle to their distinctness. If it means that to be one and to be are the same property, so that the species of the putative Kind One are identical to those of the Kind Being, then it seems to me that Plato would not subscribe to this view (cf. e.g. Prm. 142b5-c7), although he would probably be committed to the claim that if something is then it is also countable (cf. e.g. Tht. 188e3-189b3, Sph. 237c7-e3 and Thomas 2008). 44 Cf. e.g. Rosen 1983: 264 n.17. 45 The emphasis on the number of the Kinds (cf. e.g. 254e3-5, 255c6, c9, e8, 256d1) is no evidence for the exhaustiveness of the list. As 256d1-4 shows, this emphasis is meant to point out that the number of the greatest Kinds cannot be smaller (ἐλάττω), meaning that none of the five Kinds is reducible to another. Sasso 1995: 183-98 embarks in a lengthy discussion on whether the greatest Kinds are actually five or only four. The problem, according to Sasso, is that Being seems to be a more ontologically eminent factor than the other four, in that, presumably, it inglobes them and is not just on a par with them – Sasso 1995: 184 evokes on this point 243d1 where being is called ‘µεγίστου τε καὶ ἀρχηγοῦ’, a passage that he parallels with the ‘complete living being’ of Ti. 31a4, that encompasses all other intelligibles. It seems to me, however, that this is a pseudo-problem, for at least three reasons. First, the repeated emphasis on the exact number of the selected Kinds leaves no doubt that they are no less than five; and nothing in the text suggests that being is superordinate to all other Kinds. Second, at 243d1 being is called ‘µεγίστου τε καὶ ἀρχηγοῦ’, I believe, not due to its ontological eminence, but because, since not-being has turned out to be untreatable (in that it is unthinkable and inexpressible), being is the only possible, and therefore crucial, starting point, or as the ES puts it at 242b7-8, ‘the most necessary research path’ (τὴν ὁδὸν ἀναγκαιοτάτην). Third, and more generally, the puzzle seems motivated by a confusion between Being as the overall domain of Forms and Being as just one of the Forms (the twofold reference of ‘tὸ ὄν’ or ‘οὐσία’ from which this dissertation began), which should be kept distinct.

102

Rest. For they are repeatedly said not to partake in each other, as they are contraries (250a8-9:

ἐωαντιώτατα […] ἀλληλοις; 254d7-8: ἀµείκτω πρὸς ἀλλήλω). Therefore, they seem not to be all- pervasive46. Thus, some have proposed to read those superlatives as meaning ‘most important’, rather than ‘most-extended’47. A detailed discussion of this problem would take me too far afield.

Notably, it would demand a detailed analysis of a notorious passage at 256b6-c1048. I shall not adjudicate the issue, which does not make a great difference for my present purposes. Even if the

46 As forcefully claimed by O’Brien 1995: 103-110. 47 Cf. e.g. Cornford 1935: 273-4 n.2 and Crivelli 2012: 117 n.42. What types of superlatives are these: absolute

(‘the greatest’, ‘the most important’) or relative (‘greatest’, ‘very great’, ‘most important’, ‘very important’)? It is difficult to choose between these two options. But consider the following two points. (a) First, with respect to the claim that we are here dealing with a selection of these special Kinds (and that nothing rules out the possibility of further ones) it makes little difference which way you go. For whether the superlative is absolute or relative, the ES in any case supplies restrictive riders (i.e., the indefinite ‘ἄττα’ at 254c4 and ‘τῶν γενῶν ἃ νυνδὴ διῇµεν’ at d4). So if one takes the ES to be saying that he and Theaetetus will investigate just some among the Forms which are reckoned to be the greatest (254c4); and that Being, Rest and Motion are the greatest among the Kinds he and Theaetetus have just been talking about (d4) – then the possibility that there are further greatest kinds is left untouched. (b) Second, the presence or absence of the article is not decisive to adjudicate the issue (cf. also Künher-Gerth 1897: 21). For one thing, both ‘µεγίστων’ at 254c4 and ‘µέγιστα’ in d4 are predicate adjectives. So they would not get an article anyways. For another, one can certainly refer to passages in which the superlative is not preceded by an article, and yet it seems implausible to regard it as absolute. For example, at Lg. 907a2-3 the Athenian Stranger asks: ‘But aren’t all the gods the greatest of all the guardians and don’t they look after our interests? (Ἀλλ’οὐ πάντων φυλάκων εἰσὶ µέγιστοι καὶ περὶ τὰ µέγιστα ἡµῖν οἱ πάντες θεοί)’. Clearly, ‘very great’ will not do. And at Prm. 133b4, Parmenides stresses that while there are many reasons why separation is problematic, the greatest (µέγιστον, no article) concerns their (un)knowability. Moreover, two points seem to suggest that the superlatives are relative. First, as noted by Ross 1951: 113 n.6, Theaetetus’ answer at 254d6 (πολύ γε) discourages exegeses of ‘µέγιστα’ as an absolute superlative – ‘much the greatest’ or ‘much the most important’ are preferable to ‘much very great’ or ‘much very important’ as renderings of ‘πολύ γε [µέγιστα]’, and therefore ‘the greatest’ or ‘the most important’ are preferable to ‘very great’ or ‘very important’ as renderings of µέγιστα. Second, the relative superlative is generally accompanied by the genitive of the person or thing surpassed. The genitive plural immediately following τῶν γενῶν seems to me more naturally read as having this syntactical role, though admittedly this is not the only possible reading. 48 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 161-6 for a detailed exegesis.

103 two superlatives ‘µεγίστων’ and ‘µέγιστα’ mean ‘most important’, it seems plausible to suppose that at least part of the reason why Being is ‘most important’ is that it is an all-pervasive Kind.

The Kind Being is not a genus of all genera. One way of making sense of the universality of the

Kind Being might be to give it pride of place as a genus of all genera. This construal locates the

Kind Being atop of a universal Porphyrian tree. Such an overarching Kind would then branch out into all the various species and sub-species populating the world. The Kind Being is thus regarded as something like a summum genus of ‘whatness’, a most general Kind ‘essence’, which we encounter when we get to the summit of a hierarchical classificatory account of Kinds based on the extensional criterion of the generality of their intelligible content. As we work upwards from lowest species, by asking ‘what is it?’ at each step, the Kind Being will be the point of arrival of our ascent. In Aristotelian jargon, the Kind Being would be the all-inclusive genus, superordinate to all the ten categories, and that cannot itself fall under a higher genus49.

My hunch is that a good many readers tend to understand (consciously or not) the concept of a Platonic Kind Being along these lines. For this account seems to chime with the widespread slogan ‘to be is to be something’. If the Kind Being is a most generic genus of ‘whatness’, one can draw from this the implication that, by partaking in Being, something obtains its own determinate

49 At Top. A 9.103b27-37 Aristotle avers that someone who signifies the ‘what it is’ (τί ἐστι), signifies either a substance, or a quantity or a quality, or one of the other categories. Thus, essential predication (a predication answering the question ‘what is it?’) ranges over all the categories and is not restricted to substances alone. But this of course does not mean that, for Aristotle, there is an overarching ontological kind ‘τί ἐστι’ encompassing all the categories. The kind ‘what it is’ is one of the genera of predication (γένη τῶν κατηγοριῶν) not a genus of being (γένος τοῦ ὄντος). For a comprehensive interpretation of Top. A 9, cf. Frede 1981 and Granieri 2016. In this regard, it is also worth noting that the idea of a categorial tree governed by a topmost category of beings or entities has been explicitly advocated in recent times by an Aristotelian inspired metaphysicians such as Lowe 2006: 7-8, 38-9 and passim. According to Lowe such a maximally overarching category of entities first branches out into universals and particulars (see esp. Figure 1.1 at p.8 and Figure 3.1 at p.39), so that ‘anything whatever uncontentiously belongs [to it]’ (p.38).

104 nature50. In any event, the claim that the Kind Being is a genus of all genera has been explicitly voiced in the antiquity by Seneca and in modern times by Stenzel. In the rest of this sub-section, I shall cross-examine their readings, that I regard as paradigmatic instances of this line of interpretation.

But notice that this construal of the status of the Kind Being is in effect also implicit in Aristotle’s argument that being is not a genos in the seventh aporia of Metaph. B (3.998b22-7). So, although I cannot provide a detailed examination of this argument, which would lead me too far afield, I suggest that the arguments I shall develop in the remainder of this sub-section might be effective against

Aristotle’s criticism too.

[1] In Letter 58, Seneca embarks in a discussion on the poverty of Latin language for philosophical discourse, especially as regards Platonic vocabulary51. The proposed specimen to display these linguistic deficiencies are the Greek terms ‘οὐσία’ and ‘τὸ ὄν’. The choice was reportedly inspired by a meeting Seneca had the day before with a Platonist friend, who informed him that ‘τὸ ὄν’ (hesitantly rendered by Seneca as ‘quod est’) was used by Plato in six senses52.

He prefaces his elucidation of these senses with some remarks on the notions of genus and species.

The intended purpose of that longish prelude is to find ‘the primary genus on which all the remaining species depend, from which arises every division, and in which all things are

50 A reading along these lines is adopted for example by Lee 1972: 276-7, Seligman 1974: 43, perhaps even

Frede 1996a: 197-8 (see above n.31), but already Heidegger 1996-7 [1936-46]: 211 (who was probably indebted to Stenzel for this reading, see below n.49). Gill 2012: 229 correctly rejects this reading (though without sufficient argumentation), but it is unclear to me how this rejection is supposed to be reconciled with her thesis that the Kind Being is the philosopher’s object (see below). 51 Analyses of this letter in Brunschwig 1994 [1988] and Sedley 2005. My glosses will obviously be very selective. 52 A scholastic (Middle Platonist) systematization, cf. Mansfeld 1992: 84 n.23.

105 included’53. We will succeed if we take things one at a time and work upwards, looking for their common trait at each step. Thus, we pick up the species ‘human being’, ‘dog’ and ‘horse’; their shared essential feature, which encompasses them and has them subordinate to itself, is ‘animal’.

From ‘animal’ we move to ‘living beings’, then to ‘body’ and, finally, to the Platonist supreme genus of ‘being’ (12.3-4: genus primum et antiquissimum et, ut ita dicam, generale), which has nothing above it and contains the totality of what there is.

It is difficult to say whether Seneca is precisely thinking about the Sophist (though no other

Platonic dialogue contains a comparable account of Being as a Kind) and I shall not enter into the controversy regarding Seneca’s Platonist sources. Still, he claims to be reporting Plato’s views. My point is that this way of construing Plato’s conception of a Kind Being is disputable.

Seneca assumes the standard Aristotelian description of the genus-species relation in terms of class inclusion54. A genus includes its species and is predicated of them; a species is included in the genus which is predicated of it. The scala naturae Seneca sets out is a hierarchy of classes governed by an extensional criterion. The more comprehensive the class (i.e. the higher the number of its members), the higher up in the scala. The Kind Being is the summit of this universal ontological tree55. However, this sits uneasily with Plato’s own words. For, in the Sophist, the Kind Being does not stand with its participants in a genus-species relation, at least as this relation is spelled out by

Aristotle in Topics Δ (e.g. 1.121a10-4) and assumed by Seneca here. The genus-species relation is never symmetrical. A genus is predicated of the species which fall under it; but a species is never

53 8.9-12: nunc autem primum illud genus quaerimus ex quo ceterae species suspensae sunt, a quo nascitur omnis divisio, quo universa comprensa sunt. 54 Aristotle is also named at the very beginning of the account, 9.13-4: homo species est, ut Aristoteles ait; cf.

Mansfeld 1992: 85-90. 55 Cf. Mansfeld 1992: 96-99, including a joint discussion of Porph. Intr. 4.21-32.

106 predicated of its genus. Consider, by contrast, the relationship between the Being and Difference: each is predicated of the other. For Being partakes in, but is also partaken in by Difference (259a4- b7). Their relation is symmetrical. Therefore, they do not stand to each other as genera stand to their species (in the Aristotelian sense)56.

[2] Similarly to Seneca, Stenzel has suggested that the Kind Being is ‘a supreme genus holding together all the other γένη (cf. Sophist 253 b,c), and all things are only because they fall under this genus and are comprehended by it […]. Being is in this sense of a generic concept, including all the particular forms of being […] is the generic concept of a species’57. A Kind Being so conceived is an all-embracing Kind covering all essential features, which are hierarchically organized according to an extensional criterion. Stenzel posits that ‘to be’ for Plato means ‘to be an εἶδος’, and consequently to have a definite character ‘this’ or ‘that’. Thus, the Kind Being is for him the summit of the scala of these definite characters arranged according to a growing order of generality. The Kind Being is the most generic Kind of ‘whatness’.

The Kind Being, however, is not responsible for what something is, but for the fact that it is.

What Motion’s participation in Being explains is that Motion is, not the fact that it is Motion (or in motion or moving). Stenzel seems somewhat to glimpse at a similar objection, but his treatment

56 This argument is also effective as a reply to Aristotle’s criticism at Top. Δ 1.121a14-7. Crivelli 2012: aptly observes that the central concept of Plato’s method of division is that of subordination. And subordination is irreducible to extensional inclusion. See already Cornford 1935: 268-9, Dixsaut 2001: 157 and Centrone 2008: LVI. 57 Cf. Stenzel 1940 [1931]: 135-6 (similarly Seligman 1974: 43: ‘Being is […] a form of forms, as it were’).

Interestingly enough, Heidegger, who had a fairly large exchange of correspondence with Stenzel (cf. Heidegger- Günther 2000) and knew both editions of the Studien zur Entwicklung der Platonischen Dialektik (cf. Ibid.: 25, 30), defends a similar reading in his Nietzsche (cf. Heidegger 1997 [1961]: 211). Heidegger argued that, starting from Plato, οὐσία has been conceived of as the most universal, supreme genus of ‘beingness’ (‘Die Seiendheit nennt daher das Allgemeinste dieses Allgemeinsten: das Allerallgemeinste, τό κοινότατον, die oberste Gattung (genus), das »Generellste«’). See contra also Dixsaut 1991a: 487-8.

107 thereof is perplexing. Apparently, he takes this objection to boil down to the suggestion that it is the Kind Identity, not the Kind Being, which is responsible for a Kind’s essence. While this is not the content of my objection, Stenzel’s reply is still worth scrutinizing to bring out a telling aspect of his reconstruction. Stenzel is obviously aware of Plato’s distinction between the Kind Identity and the Kind Being (Sph. 255d8-c8). But he alleges that Plato understands ‘ταὐτόν’ as meaning

‘equal’ not ‘identical’, because the argument posits that if Being and Identity were not distinct

Kinds, ‘all things would be ‘the same’’. Hence – Stenzel concludes – Plato does not in fact dissociate Identity from Being.

Such an exegesis is open to objections. First, the standard Greek word for ‘equal’ is ‘ἴσος’, not ‘ταὐτός’. Nor is there any evidence that Plato might have conflated the two (cf. e.g. Phd. 74a- b). Perhaps Stenzel was in fact voicing a certain bewilderment often felt by readers of 255b8-c8.

For, at first blush, the argument in this passage seems fallacious58. Its logical form is that of a modus tollens: (a) let Being be identical to Identity; (b) Motion and Rest are; (c) therefore, Motion and Rest are identical; (d) but (c) is impossible; (e) therefore, (a) is false. The argument seems fallacious because (d) is true only on a collective reading of (c), namely, the reading whereby

Motion and Rest are identical to each other. But it has been argued that (c) can also, and perhaps more plausibly, be read according to a distributive reading, as saying that Motion is identical to itself and Rest is identical to itself. Admittedly, the argument is far from straightforward. Yet, for one thing, to this diagnosis it has been objected that there is a paucity of evidence in the text for a distributive reading of (c)59. For another, scholars have proposed valuable ways to rescue Plato

58 Cf. e.g. Bostock 1984: 91-2; Silverman 2002: 164. 59 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 139.

108 from a dubious argument60. In any case, it seems far-fetched to pretend that since the argument is questionable, Plato in fact did not think the Kind Identity and the Kind Being to be distinct or, correlatively, that the properties ‘being’ and ‘being identical to itself’ are not for him set apart61.

For, whatever the correct exegesis of the argument at 255d8-c8 may be, this would sit very uneasily with Plato’s emphasis on the number of the selected greatest Kinds (cf. e.g. 254e3-5, 255c6, c9, e8, 256d1), which is meant to stress that that number cannot be smaller than it was shown to be

(see esp. 256d1-4): none of the five Kinds is reducible to another. Therefore, Plato remains committed to the distinctness of Identity and Being.

The Kind Being is not the philosopher’s object. At 254a4-b1, concluding the description of the method of dialectic and the task of the dialectician, the ES states that while

the sophist runs off into the darkness of not-being, [and] is made difficult to spot by the

obscurity of the region […] With the philosopher, because he is always engaged through

reasonings with the idea of being, it is rather the brightness of the region that makes him

so very hard to discern; for the eyes of the soul, in the case of ordinary people, are unable

to endure looking towards the divine62.

60 Cf. again Crivelli 2012: 136-40. In a nutshell, Crivelli’s ingenious proposal can be summarized as follows.

Plato is here arguing that the Kind Being and the Kind Identity should be distinguished because while the collective sentence ‘Motion and Rest both are’ is logically equivalent to its distributive counterpart ‘each of Motion and Rest is’, and both hold true; the collective sentence ‘Motion and Rest are both identical’ (meaning: they are identical to one another) is not logically equivalent to its distributive counterpart ‘each of Motion and Rest is identical’ – the former is false, the latter is true. 61 The same doubtful conclusion is drawn by Owen 1971: 266 (Additional note). 62 Ὁ µὲν ἀποδιδράσκων εἰς τὴν τοῦ µὴ ὄντος σκοτεινότητα […] διὰ τὸ σκοτεινὸν τοῦ τόπου κατανοῆσαι

χαλεπός· […] Ὁ δέ γε φιλόσοφος, τῇ τοῦ ὄντος ἀεὶ διὰ λογισµῶν προσκείµενος ἰδέᾳ, διὰ τὸ λαµπρὸν αὖ τῆς χώρας οὐδαµῶς εὐπετὴς ὀφθῆναι· τὰ γὰρ τῆς τῶν πολλῶν ψυχῆς ὄµµατα καρτερεῖν πρὸς τὸ θεῖον ἀφορῶντα ἀδύνατα.

109

This passage seems to suggest that the philosopher’s object, i.e. the subject matter of philosophy, is the Form of Being, i.e. one of the greatest Kinds. The ES says that the philosopher is always engaged with the ἰδέα τοῦ ὄντος. Now since ‘ἰδέα’ is often used by Plato intercheangeably with

‘εἶδος’ and ‘γένος’, both within and outside the Sophist, it seems natural to identify the ‘ἰδέα τοῦ

ὄντος’ with the Kind Being or Form of Being thematized in the dialogue and to infer that the philosopher’s object is consequently the Form of Being.

Such a reading has been recently defended by M.L. Gill63. Gill takes the Kind Being to be ‘a form that structures all beings and together with some other content makes them what they are, thereby enabling them to act on some things and/or to be affected by others’. On Gill’s reading the

Form of Being is therefore a structuring factor (co-)responsible for making each being the determinate beings it is. Thus, it constitutively contributes to determining what something is, not just that it is. It is ‘inside the nature of every being as its structural core enabling it to fit together with other things outside its specific nature’. Thus the Form of Being ‘dictates a focus on the nature of things and gives the philosopher a distinctive perspective on any topic he studies’64.

Since the Form of Being constitutes (or at least contributes to constituting) the nature of every being by making it the distinctive being it is, then the philosopher, by grasping the Form of Being, has epistemic control on every being and can satisfy his desire ‘to understand the nature of things’65. On this reading, then, the Kind Being is not the cause of existence, as I argued that it is, but a structuring factor that makes every being the determinate being it is.

63 Cf. Gill 2012: esp. 6-8 and 229-240. 64 All the last three quotations are from Gill 2012: 240 (emphasis mine, except for ‘inside’). 65 Gill 2012: 242 (Gill’s emphasis). On top of the criticisms that I shall raise in the rest of this sub-section, there is one point of Gill’s reading that I would like to preliminarily dwell on. Gill 2012: 229 overtly (and correctly) states that the Kind Being should not be conceived of as a highest genus of all genera or as an indefinite indeterminable from which all categorial content has been stripped away. However, it seems to me that the way she explains the nature and

110

However, I think this reconstruction encounters at least three major difficulties:

1. If the subject matter of philosophy were restricted to the Kind Being, we would have to

surmise that Plato has radically modifed his view since the time he wrote the so-called middle

dialogues; and that he did so in a way that makes his new account hardly plausible. For in

previous dialogues, notably in the Republic, the philosopher is said to be concerned with the

whole realm of true being, i.e. with all Forms, not just one Form. The philosopher is assigned

the epistemic task of knowing all essences. Indeed, one can really call herself a philosopher if

she has the erotic desire for, and is able to attain this synoptic knowledge.

Notably, at R. 476a9-477b Plato famously contrasts ‘those who alone are called

philosophers’ with the so-called ‘sight-lovers (φιλοθεάµονες), craft-lovers (φιλοτέχνοι), and

practical people (πράκτικοι)᾽, also collectively referred to as ‘philodoxers’ (480a6, 12:

φιλοδόξους), i.e. lovers of opinions. Philosophers and philodoxers are distinguished

depending on their specific modes of cognition. The former possess knowledge (ἐπιστήµη,

γνῶσις); the latter mere opinion (δόξα). These two modes of cognition are in turn

distinguished according to the specific objects they apply to. Knowledge is said to be set over

‘what perfectly is’ (τὸ παντελῶς ὄν). ‘what purely is’ (τὸ εἰλικρινῶς ὄν), or simply ‘being’ (τὸ

ὄν). Opinion is said to be set over ‘what is such as to be and not to be, [i.e. what is] intermediate

role of the Kind Being in the excerpts just quoted is hard to reconcile with that rejection and, as a matter of fact, chimes with the claim that the Kind Being is a genus of all genera or an indefinite indeterminable. For I cannot help thinking that it is by being a maximally indeterminate determinable of any given nature or by being a highest genus encompassing every determinate nature that the Kind Being could constitute, by variously determining itself, the determinate nature of each entity. If the Kind Being is, in Gill’s words, ‘a core that runs through all beings’, by knowing which the philosopher can fulfil her interest in knowing ‘all beings’, then the Kind Being must somehow contain all beings in a way that clashes with her (correct) claim that Being is a structural and not a categorial, but a structural Kind. Accordingly, the demarcation line Gill draws between her view and the one on which Being is a genus of all genera is, upon inspection, quite blurred, perhaps to the point of disappearing.

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between what purely is and what in no way is’66. There is little doubt that the object of

knowledge should be identified with the Forms, among which the Form of Beauty is

mentioned in this passage as an instance. This is proved by 479e7-8, where those who know,

viz. the philosophers, are said to ‘study the things themselves that are always the same in every

respect’67. These can hardly be anyting but Forms (not just one Form).

Similarly, at R. 533b1-3 Socrates describes dialectic, i.e. the science proper to the

philosopher, as the only ‘inquiry that systematically attempts to grasp with respect to each

thing itself what the being of it is’68. So the philosopher’s object is obviously not restricted to

one single Form, but ranges over the whole realm of the Forms. Indeed, the greatest test of

who is naturally dialectical and who isn’t is that ‘anyone who can achieve a synoptic vision is

dialectical, and anyone who can’t isn’t’69.

Thus, if Plato really meant to restrict the philosopher’s object from the whole realm of

true being to one single (however important) Form, we would have to surmise that he has

radically modified his view since the time he wrote the Republic. But since there is no

compelling reason why the philosopher should concern herself only with one Form and not

with every Form (how, for example, could a philosopher possibly neglect the Form of

Justice?), Plato’s purported restriction would not only mark a turning point, but would also be

hardly plausible. The difficulty is exacerbated by the reappearance, in such ‘late’ dialogues

66 477a6-7: τι οὕτως ἔχει ὡς εἶναί τε καὶ µὴ εἶναι, οὐ µεταξὺ ἂν κέοιτο τοῦ εἰλικρινῶς ὄντος καὶ τοῦ αὖ µηδαµῇ ὄντος. 67 Τί δὲ αὖ τοὺς αὐτὰ ἕκαστα θεωµένους καὶ ἀεὶ κατὰ ταὐτὰ ὡσαύτως ὄντα; ἆρ' οὐ γιγνώσκειν ἀλλ' οὐ δοξάζειν;

– Ἀνάγκη καὶ ταῦτα. 68 Τόδε γοῦν, ἦν δ' ἐγώ, οὐδεὶς ἡµῖν ἀµφισβητήσει λέγουσιν, ὡς αὐτοῦ γε ἑκάστου πέρι ὃ ἔστιν ἕκαστον ἄλλη

τις ἐπιχειρεῖ µέθοδος ὁδῷ περὶ παντὸς λαµβάνειν. 69 537c6-8: Καὶ µεγίστη γε, ἦν δ' ἐγώ, πεῖρα διαλεκτικῆς φύσεως καὶ µή· ὁ µὲν γὰρ συνοπτικὸς διαλεκτικός, ὁ

δὲ µὴ οὔ.

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other than the Sophist as Philebus and Timaeus70, of the familiar claim that the philosopher

dialectician deals with Forms in general, and not just with one special Form. Thus, at Phlb.

57e6-58a6, the ‘power of dialectic’ (τοῦ διαλέγεσθαι δύναµις)71 is expressly said to be

concerned ‘with being and with what is really and forever in every way eternally self-same’

(περὶ τὸ ὂν καὶ τὸ ὄντως καὶ τὸ κατὰ ταὐτὸν ἀεὶ πεφυκὸς πάντως)72. And at Ti. 51d4-e6, we

are famously told that if understanding and true opinion are distinct, as they should be, then

there are intelligible Forms, which are the specific objects of understanding. And only the

gods and a small group of people (in all likelihood philosophers)73 have a share of

understanding. Thus, actually, from the claim that the philosopher concerns herself only with

the Form of Being, one would actually have to surmise not just that Plato has radically

modified his view since the time he wrote the Republic, but that only in the Sophist he makes

this restriction of the philosopher’s object – something which, in my view, makes that claim

even less plausible.

One could reply to my objection by contending that the Kind Being is superordinate to

all other Kinds, so that by knowing that Kind one would also know in a way all the others.

Just as by knowing the Kind Animal, one can grasp (the essential core) of all animal species

subordinate to that Kind (e.g. Horse, Dog etc.); so too by knowing the Kind Being I can also

grasp all the Kinds subordinate to it. So there might be a sense in which, by knowing the Kind

70 Certainly regarded as ‘late’ by Gill (cf. ch.2 n.46). 71 Cf. ch.2 n.44 for this phrase. 72 I take the ‘καὶ’ to be epexegetical and therefore ‘τὸ ὂν’ to be a collective name for the domain of Forms in general. Compare Phlb. 61d10-e4 (part. e2-3: κατὰ ταὐτὰ δὲ καὶ ὡσαύτως ὄντα ἀεί). For the formula ‘τὸ ὄντως καὶ τὸ κατὰ ταὐτὸν ἀεὶ πεφυκὸς πάντως’ (or similia), cf. Phd. 78c6, d2, d6, d8, 79e4-5; R. V 479a2-3; Cra. 439e3-4; Sph. 249b12-c1; Ti. 29a1-2. 73 Notice that at Ti. 47b1-4 ‘φιλοσοφία’ is said to be a gift from the gods to the mortal race.

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Being, the philosopher concerns herself with all Kinds. The consistency with the declarations

in the middle dialogues could therefore be preserved.

But this reply will not do. For to conceive of the Kind Being as superordinate to all other

Kinds, means to make it a genus of all genera. I argued in the previous sub-section that this

way of construing the Kind Being in not supported by the text.

2. The restriction of the philosopher’s object to the Form of Being also sits uneasily with the

specific way in which the ES characterizes the ἰδέα τοῦ ὄντος at 254a4-b1. First, at 254a9 the

ES calls the Idea of Being a ‘χώρα’: the philosopher’s object is a region or a field. It seems

unlikely that Plato would refer in this way to a single Form and it is instead more plausible

that he has in mind the whole region of true being, elsewhere famously designated as

‘intelligible place’ (R. VI 509d2; 517b5: νοητὸς τόπος) or ‘the place beyond heaven’ (Phdr.

247c3: ὑπερουρὰνιος τόπος). It is worth noticing, in this regard, that ‘χώρα’ (254a9) replaces

‘τόπος’ at 254a6, and is therefore presumably understood as a synonym thereof.

3. Further, look at the occurrence of the expression ‘the divine’ (τὸ θεῖον) at 254 b1. This

expression can be paralleled in the Platonic corpus, and its meaning is often associated with

the realm of Forms in general.

• At Phd. 80b1-5 Socrates contrasts soul and body by stating that the former is ‘most like

the divine, deathless, intelligible, uniform, indissoluble, always the same as itself’; the

latter is ‘most like that which is human, mortal, multiform, unintelligible, soluble and

never consistently the same’74. There is little doubt that the respective terms of

74 τῷ µὲν θείῳ καὶ ἀθανάτῳ καὶ νοητῷ καὶ µονοειδεῖ καὶ ἀδιαλύτῳ καὶ ἀεὶ ὡσαύτως κατὰ ταὐτὰ ἔχοντι ἑαυτῷ

ὁµοιότατον εἶναι ψυχή, τῷ δὲ ἀνθρωπίνῳ καὶ θνητῷ καὶ πολυειδεῖ καὶ ἀνοήτῳ καὶ διαλυτῷ καὶ µηδέποτε κατὰ ταὐτὰ ἔχοντι ἑαυτῷ ὁµοιότατον αὖ εἶναι σῶµα.

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comparison of soul and body match the ‘two types of beings’ mentioned at 79a675: the

soul is akin to the Forms; the body to the sensibles. So, ‘the divine’ (τῷ θείῳ) refers

broadly to the intelligible realm. With this precise meaning, the expression recurs several

times in the Phaedo (81a5, 83e2-3; 84a9).

• Similarly at R. 500b8-c9 the philosopher is said to ‘consort what is ordered and divine

(θείῳ)’, by having her thoughts ‘truly directed towards the things that are […] things that

are organized and always the same […] being all in a rational order’. These objects are of

course the Forms taken as a whole, not just one Form. This is further corroborated by

611e2-3, where Socrates avers that the soul, as it is revealed by its love for wisdom

(φιλοσοφίαν), ‘is akin to the divine and immortal and what always is (συγγενὴς οὖσα τῷ

τε θείῳ καὶ ἀθανάτῳ καὶ τῷ ἀεὶ ὄντι)’76. Once again, ‘θείῳ’ collectively stands for the

intelligible world as a whole.

For all these reasons I find it problematic to identify the philosopher’s object with the Form of

Being. But the fact remains – it will be rejoined – that 254a4-b1 Plato calls the philosopher’s object

‘ἰδέα τοῦ ὄντος’: in what other way could we ever interpret this phrase than as referring to the

Form of Being? To begin with, notice that, although the word ‘ἰδέα’ is often used in these pages of the Sophist to refer to a Form, it need not necessarily be understood according to this meaning.

Consider the parallel example of the Phaedrus: here ‘ἰδέα’ is employed to designate Forms (265e3,

273e2); but it is also employed, a few pages above, in relation to the soul (246a3). Should we therefore conclude that the soul is a Form? Obviously not. More generally, as Campbell wisely warned, even in philosophical contexts we have no obligation systematically to understand ‘ἰδέα’

75 δύο εἴδη τῶν ὄντων, τὸ µὲν ὁρατόν, τὸ δὲ ἀιδές Cf. also R. 509d4. 76 I take both καὶ in this sentence to be epexegetic. Cf. also Phdr. 246d7-8.

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in what has been taken to be its technical intension77. My considered view is that in this Sophist

passage Plato is intentionally exploiting the multifaceted semantics of this term to highlight the

distinction between the Kind Being and the domain of true being, which constitutes in its entirety

the philosopher’s object78. In this way he can emphasize one of the most conspicuous doctrinal

novelties of the dialogue, namely the introduction of a Kind Being, to be distinguished from the

whole realm of the Forms. As we shall see in more detail later, this distinction is necessary for the

resolution of the paradox of falsehood and ultimately for the capture of the sophist.

3.3. Combination

Participating in Being. Having scrutinized Being’s all-pervasiveness, I now move to inspect its

combinatory role. Previous analyses invite the consideration that participation in the Kind Being

is involved in two ontological situations.

[1] In chapter 2, we saw Plato explaining something’s possession of the property of being as

a result of participation in the Kind Being. Thus, at 254d10 Motion and Rest are because the Kind

Being blends with them (τὸ δέ γε ὂν µεικτὸν ἀµφοῖν· ἐστὸν γὰρ ἄµφω που). Motion and Rest

therefore enjoy the property of being in virtue of their sharing in the Kind Being, which is the

cause of that property. Similarly, at 256a1 the ES avers that Motion is because of its sharing in

being (ἔστι δέ γε διὰ τὸ µετέχειν τοῦ ὄντος). The same point is repeated at 256d9: ‘Motion is

something that is, given that it shares in being (ἡ κίνησις […] ὄν, ἐπείπερ τοῦ ὄντος µετέχει)’; and

generalized at 256e2-3: ‘we’ll be correct […], since they [scil. all Kinds] share in being, in saying

77 Cf. Campbell 1894: 302. 78 Cf. also Campbell 1867: LXXVII-VIII.

116 that they are, and talking of them as things that are (ὀρθῶς ἐροῦµεν […] ὅτι [scil. πάντα τὰ γένη]79

µετέχει τοῦ ὄντος, εἶναί τε καὶ ὄντα). So it will not come as a surprise that even ‘Difference, with its share in what is, is, because of that sharing (259a6-7: τὸ µὲν ἕτερον µετασχὸν τοῦ ὄντος ἔστι

µὲν διὰ ταύτην τὴν µέθεξιν)80. I have argued in §2.2 that the uncomplemented occurrences of

‘εἶναι’ denote existence.

[2] Participation in the Kind Being is involved also in a second situation. At 251e8-252a10, a passage we have encountered in §3.1, the ES assesses the claim that no Kind blends. He argues counterfactually, by urging that if that were true, then Motion and Rest would not even combine with Being: neither of them would be. One would expect the conclusion to be that this cannot be so because it should at least be granted that Motion and Rest, just as any other Kind, is (namely, exists). This might be at least part of the story. Still, the ES accomplishes his argument rather differently. For the examples of predicative attribution of being he mentions are not simple sentences of the sort ‘x is’. Rather, he evokes the views of the predecessors: ‘some [say] that things really are in motion, the others [say] they really are at rest (οἱ µὲν ὄντως κινεῖσθαι λέγοντες, οἱ δὲ

ὄντως ἑστηκότ’εἶναι)’. In this formulation, the role of Being is referred to by the adverb ‘ὄντως’, which can occur in any predicative sentence. Hence, the Kind Being seems to be regarded as an ingredient involved in every participation among Kinds, which performs the function of a connector mediating combination, and is linguistically mirrored by the verb ‘to be’ used as a copula. Prm. 162a4, a passage to which I shall return later, corroborates a construal along these lines. In the context of the fifth deduction, being is characterized as a ‘bond’ (δεσµός) linking the

79 Supplied from 256d12. 80 Italics in Rowe’s translation.

117 subject ‘the one’ (τὸ ἕν) and the predicate ‘not-being’ (οὐκ ὄν), in the statement ‘the one is a not- being’. Thus, its function is that of a connecting factor, and its linguistic counterpart is the copula.

Two ontological situations, then. For one thing, things partake in the Kind Being and so obtain the property of being (simpliciter), meaning existence, linguistically mirrored by the verb ‘to be’ used as a standalone predicate-term (1-place being). But participation in the Kind Being is also operative in every combination among Kinds, with being functioning as a participatory mediator or connecting factor, linguistically mirrored by the verb ‘to be’ in its copulative use (2-place being). In the next chapter, I will argue that these two uses of ‘εἶναι’ are not without relation, and that the copula has existential import81 (though this does not imply that I am an advocate of the so- called ‘semantic-continuity thesis’). But before turning to matters of semantics, though, I will first focus, in the next three sub-sections, on two passages that jointly throw light on this two-pronged role of the Kind Being and on its significance in Plato’s view: they are Sph. 255c-d and the fifth deduction of Prm. II (D5)82. Let me turn to the former now.

Analysis of Sophist 255c-d. At 254c4-6, the ES and Theaetetus set a twofold agenda for themselves: first, they will have to determine what the selected greatest kinds are like; and second, how they combine83. The first project is pursued in 254d4-255e7, and the second in 255e8-259b7.

81 Cf. also Crivelli 2012: 7-8, 202. Compare Moore 1936: 187 (‘It seems to me that “This exists” (in this usage) always forms part of what is asserted by “This is a book,” “This is red,” etc.). 82 On the number of the deductions in Prm. II, I follow Brisson-Décarie 1987. 83 Materials in this and the following two subsections draw from Granieri 2019 and Granieri forthcoming-b.

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In the last step of the first project the two interlocutors develop an argument to distinguish the

Kind Being from the Kind Difference. Here is the text84:

ES: What about difference? Should we say it’s a fifth form? Or should we think of this

and being simply as two names for one kind? – THT: Perhaps we should. – ES: But I

think you agree that of the things that are, some are spoken of in and by themselves,

while others are always spoken of in relation to others. – THT: Why would I not? –

ES: And that what is different is always said in relation to something different – right?

– THT: Just so. – ES: It would not be, if being and difference were not very much

distinct. If difference shared in both forms in the way that being does, then among the

differents, too, there would be a different that was not in relation to something else,

whereas as things are we find that whatever is different simply cannot fail to be what

it is, namely different, in relation to something else. – THT: Yes, as you say. – ES: The

nature of Difference, then, we’re to treat as being fifth among the forms we’re singling

out85.

84 In Burnet’s and Diès’ editions of the Sophist, this excerpt begins at l.12. In the new OCT at l.13. However, for a typographical error, l.14 is misprinted as l.15. I follow the new OCT, emending this typo. 85 {ΞΕΝ}: τί δέ; τὸ θάτερον ἆρα ἡµῖν λεκτέον πέµπτον; ἢ τοῦτο καὶ τὸ ὂν ὡς δύ᾽ ἄττα ὀνόµατα ἐφ᾽ ἑνὶ γένει

διανοεῖσθαι δεῖ; {ΘΕΑ}:τάχ᾽ ἄν. {ΞΕΝ}: ἀλλ᾽ οἶµαί σε συγχωρεῖν τῶν ὄντων τὰ µὲν αὐτὰ καθ᾽ αὑτά, τὰ δὲ πρὸς ἄλλα ἀεὶ λέγεσθαι. {ΘΕΑ}: τί δ᾽ οὔ; {ΞΕΝ}: [d1] τὸ δέ γ᾽ ἕτερον ἀεὶ πρὸς ἕτερον: ἦ γάρ; {ΘΕΑ}: οὕτως. {ΞΕΝ}: οὐκ ἄν, εἴ γε τὸ ὂν καὶ τὸ θάτερον µὴ πάµπολυ διεφερέτην: ἀλλ᾽ εἴπερ θάτερον ἀµφοῖν µετεῖχε τοῖν εἰδοῖν ὥσπερ τὸ ὄν, ἦν ἄν ποτέ τι καὶ τῶν ἑτέρων ἕτερον οὐ πρὸς ἕτερον: νῦν δὲ ἀτεχνῶς ἡµῖν ὅτιπερ ἂν ἕτερον ᾖ, συµβέβηκεν ἐξ ἀνάγκης ἑτέρου τοῦτο ὅπερ ἐστὶν εἶναι. {ΘΕΑ}: λέγεις καθάπερ ἔχει. {ΞΕΝ}: πέµπτον δὴ τὴν θατέρου φύσιν λεκτέον ἐν τοῖς εἴδεσιν οὖσαν, ἐν οἷς προαιρούµεθα. There is a textual difficulty at c14. The new OCT reads ‘πρὸς ἄλλα’. The lectio is based on MSS T and W, while MSS B and D (family β) read ‘πρὸς ἄλληλα’. Duncombe 2012: 80-1 makes both a paleographical and a philosophical case to read ‘πρὸς ἄλληλα’. In fact, he is not the first to prefer the β lectio. For while ‘πρὸς ἄλλα’ has been printed by Burnet, Diès and Robinson, ‘πρὸς ἄλληλα’ was favored by Bekker, Stallbaum, Campbell and Apelt. Since the β family is sometimes more reliable than T and W for the Sophist, the paleographical

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As I read the argument86, the ES begins with a first premise positing an ontological classification of two jointly exhaustive classes of beings (ὄντα)87, often dubbed by scholars

‘absolutes’ and ‘relatives’88. These two classes are distinguished on the criterion of the predicative behaviors characterizing their linguistic counterparts. Absolutes are spoken of in and by themselves (αὐτὸ καθ᾽αὑτό); relatives are always spoken of in relation to something else (πρὸς

ἄλλα)89. Unfortunately, what exactly it means for something to be spoken of by itself and in

case for πρὸς ἄλληλα deserves serious consideration (it is also unclear to me why starting from Burnet’s edition, ‘πρὸς ἄλλα’ has been preferred). Yet, the philosophical reasons given by Duncombe seem to me uncompelling (see n.84). 86 Cf. Crivelli 2012, 140-9 and Leigh 2012b for valuable overviews of the main interpretations of this passage. 87 This is often neglected by interpreters who see the gist of this argument in a distinction between senses or uses of the verb ‘εἶναι’ (see below). But the text says ‘τῶν ὄντων’ and therefore suggests that beings are here distinguished, not linguistic uses of a verb. That the classes are meant to be jointly exhaustive seems to me suggested by the ‘τὰ µὲν…τὰ δὲ’ construction, though I will not press this point. At any rate, I found no fatal objection to it (in the next subsection I consider one rejoinder and show that it is harmless). Are the two classes also disjointed? Since Being is said to partake in both (255d5), the answer is in the negative. Ademollo 2011: 287-8 makes a tantalizing suggestion that something like this bipartite division is alluded to at Cra. 424d1-5. I am suspicious about the pertinence of other passages oft-invoked as witnesses to this bipartite division in the dialogues, e.g. Chrm. 168b–169b; R. IV 438a-e; Prm. 133c–134a; Tht. 160b; Phlb. 51c, 53c (cf. e.g. Owen 1957: 173, n.3; Annas 1974: 266, n.1; Movia 1991: 336, n.11; Leigh 2012b: 12-4). For example, the first three of these passages seem to me to propose classifications of different types of relatives, rather than divisions of beings into ‘absolutes’ and ‘relatives’. Notice also that the bipartite division of beings announced in this excerpt had some currency in Plato’s Academy, cf. e.g. Xenocrates F 15 IP2 = Simp. in Cat. 63.22–5 (with Granieri 2019); Div. Arist. 67M/32 DL (with Granieri forthcoming-c); Arist. de bono fr. 2 = Alex. Aphrod. in Metaph. 56.13–21; Hermodorus F 5 IP2 = Simp. in Ph. 247.30–248.15; and the overview in Mansfeld 1992: 59-61. 88 Cf. among others Cornford 1935: 282-5, Ross 1951: 113-4, Owen 1957: 107 (who later changed his mind, cf. n. 152), Bluck 1975 [1963]: 148-50, Heinaman 1983: 15-8, Movia 1991: 335-6, Dancy 1999: 59-70, Fronterotta 2011: 61-9, Duncombe 2012. I cannot follow up on the differences between these studies here. For ease of exposition, in the rest of this subsection I will use the phrases ‘by itself’ and ‘in and by itself’ interchangeably. 89 Is this contrast meant to hit off the familiar ontological divide between perceptible particulars and Forms?

One might think it is, perhaps under the superficial seduction of the label ‘αὐτὰ καθ᾽αὑτά’, frequently applied by Plato to the Forms. This is how e.g. Zeller 1889 [1859]: 589-90 and Krämer 1959: 311-3 appear to read this passage. But the by itself-relative distinction is meant to apply to Kinds, or else the argument would be pointless, and perhaps

120 relation to something else Plato does not explicitly tell. But the train of thoughts in the passage suggests a reconstruction along these lines. First, Leigh has convincingly argued that this distinction does not concern the linguistic correlates of property bearers but of properties themselves as conceived of in the attribute mode, i.e., qua attributes of subjects90. Thus, I interpret the middle infinitive ‘λέγεσθαι’ at 255c14 to do duty as a passive not as a reflexive. With this proviso, I read the by itself-relative contrast as follows. To be spoken of by itself means to be denoted by a semantically or syntactically complete predicate. To be spoken of in relation to something else means to be denoted by a semantically or syntactically incomplete predicate. A syntactically incomplete predicate is a predicate which needs to be supplied with an additional linguistic expression, namely, a complement, in order to constitute a well-formed sentence, when it is predicated of a given subject (e.g., ‘Four is double….’). A syntactically complete one, by

unintelligible, as an attempt to set apart the Kind Being and the Kind Different. Correlatively, if the πρὸς ἄλλα class covered sensibles, then Plato would appear to think that Difference is a sensible, which is hardly credible. Cf. Campbell 1894: 305-6 and, more recently and extensively, Ademollo 2013: 47-51 and El Murr 2014 for discussions of non-technical uses in Plato’s dialogues of the expression αὐτὸ καθ᾿αὑτό, which conveys the general idea of ‘taking something in itself’, without any qualification or relation to something else. This idea does not apply to the Forms- sensibles contrast alone, cf. e.g. Phd. 64c4-8 (death is the separation of the body from the soul, on which the body comes to be separated itself by itself (αὐτὸ καθ’ αὑτό) apart from the soul, and the soul is separated itself by itself (αὐτὴν καθ αὑτήν) apart from the body), That Plato’s metaphysically loaded meaning of ‘αὐτὸ καθ᾽αὑτό’ in not at work in this passage was already clear to Shorey 1888: 286-9, Cornford 1935: 282 n.1 and Cherniss 1944: 280-3. 90 Cf. Leigh 2012b: 11-21. Thus, the Eleatic Stranger does not spell out the criteria which entitle a subject X (be it a Form or a sensible particular) to rank as a being or as something different. Rather he expounds that τὸ ὄν, qua attribute, is predicated both as a standalone term and in relation to something else; whereas τὸ θάτερον, qua attribute, is predicated only in relation to something else. (While I subscribe to this point of Leigh’s interpretation, I depart from some interpretative results she draws from it, see next note). Thus, I am also doubtful about the reading of Gill 2012: 165. After saying (rightly) that, in the statement ‘Motion is, because it partakes in Being’, what is said of Motion is spelled out by the phrase auto kath’ hauto, Gill analyzes the statement as: Motion is itself (changing) by itself (in virtue of change). The text, in my opinion, does not bear this out. For what is said auto kath’ hauto is not the subject ‘Motion’, but the predicate ‘is’, to the extent that it does need not be supplied with an additional linguistic expression; nor does its semantics suggest an implicit reference to another item.

121 contrast, does not need such a supplement (e.g., ‘The horse is an animal’). A semantically incomplete predicate is a predicate which need not be syntactically incomplete, but whose semantics suggests an implicit reference to another item (e.g., ‘Mathematics is a science’ which is syntactically complete, but suggests that there is something Mathematics is the science of – namely, numbers – as being a science is always said in relation to something, i.e., to the object of science)91. Semantically complete predicates do not suggest this (e.g., ‘Humans are biped’).

Theaetetus accepts this distinction. The ES then applies it to Being and Difference. Thus, he adds a second premise: ‘The different is always spoken of in relation to something different’. One might suspect that this clashes with my previous claim (indebted to Leigh) that the ES makes a distinction concerned with properties themselves as conceived of in the attribute mode and not with property bearers. For, presumably ‘τὸ δέ γ᾽ἕτερον’ designates the bearer of the property difference92. Yet, upon inspection, this confirms rather than undermining my claim. For the property bearer is not considered in itself, but precisely qua bearer of the property difference. In

91 The complete-incomplete distinction elaborates on insights by Owen 1957: 107. It has been objected to me: where does a predicate such as ‘large’ fit into this scheme? It is, I submit, semantically incomplete. But what exactly does this mean? A thing is ‘large’ only in some context? Yes: the point seems that the expression ‘καθ᾿αὑτό’ here conveys the idea of ‘taking something in itself’, without any qualification or relation to something else; the expression ‘πρὸς ἄλλα’ indicates the necessity of such a qualification. If I truly predicate ‘large’ of X, there is always an explicit or implicit reference to the context in which this is true, a view which after all is only reasonable. To be sure, I can use ‘large’ as a syntactically complete predicate, but given the semantic incompleteness of this predicate, a qualification or an implicit reference to another item is always in order. Moreover, notice that, unlike Leigh 2012b: 19-20, I do not think ‘by itself’ predication indicates the way of being a property consisting in being the nature of the subject of which the predicate expression corresponding to that property holds true. So, on my reading to say that F is predicated ‘by itself’ of X does not mean that F expresses the nature of X. Rather, it means that, in being predicated of X, F does not need not be supplied with an additional linguistic expression; nor does its semantics suggest an implicit reference to another item. Accordingly, I find it hard to link, as Leigh does, 255c-d with 244b-245d. 92 The objection seems corroborated by the fact that the point at 255d1 is picked up at 255d6-7 where we read

‘whatever is different’ (ὅτιπερ ἂν ἕτερον ᾖ).

122 other words, it is in virtue of bearing the property difference that whatever we call ‘different’ is spoken of in relation to something different. And what provides the appropriate explanation for this is that the property difference, which is obtained via participation in the Kind Difference, belongs to the πρὸς ἄλλα class (counterfactually urged at 255d4). The strategy deployed by the ES seems, accordingly, to be the following: to show that Difference falls under the πρὸς ἄλλα class, he points out that for every object of which the property difference obtains, that object, qua different, is always spoken of in relation to something else.

Theaetetus accepts this premise too. There is also a third premise, tacitly granted by both interlocutors, namely, that Being shares in both forms93, as it is spoken of both by itself and in relation to something else. At this point the ES proceeds with a counterfactual sub-argument. If

Difference and Being were not distinct, Difference too would be spoken of in and by itself, as well as in relation to other things. Yet, the second premise excludes this possibility. Therefore,

Difference and Being are distinct and Difference must be singled out as a fifth Kind.

The salient move for my present purposes is the third premise: Being is spoken of both by itself and in relation to something else. If my account of the by itself-relative distinction is correct, then the predicate expression denoting the Kind Being, i.e., the verb ‘εἶναι’, performs two predicative behaviors. First, it can be predicated as a standalone term and do duty as a complete

93 The phrase ‘µετεῖχε τοῖν εἰδοῖν’ at 255d5 is bewildering. It seems to suggest that there are two Forms of By

Itself and Relative in which other Kinds partake. I was unable to find any plausible way to make sense of these lines so interpreted, without saddling Plato with views for which there is no other evidence elsewhere. The bewilderment can perhaps be mitigated by taking this phrase, which remains arduous, to indicate not Forms, but a generic notion of ‘type’ or ‘class’ (cf. e.g. Frede 1967: 24).

123 predicate (1-place being). Second, it can be predicated in relation to something else and perform the function of a copula, to provided with a complement (2-place being)94.

In addition, it is worth noticing that while the by itself-relative distinction is articulated on linguistic grounds, it has also ontological implications. If this were not so, the ES would not be in a position to draw from it the ontological conclusion of the non-identity of Being and Difference

(which is a claim about Kinds, not verbs). Thus, ‘by itself’ predicates denote monadic properties; relative predicates denote relational properties. The property metaphysically explained by the Kind

Being is both a monadic and a relational property. It is a property in its own right which holds of its bearers as a standalone, independent feature. But it is also a property which connects its bearers to another property. We shall see in the next section which relationship obtains between these two functions and what consequences this carries for the semantics of the verb ‘to be’.

The two-pronged function of the Kind Being which came to the fore in the previous subsection should now be apparent. Before turning to the Parmenides, it behooves us to address alternative construals of Sph. 255c-d, which have enjoyed much currency in recent scholarship.

94 Could it not be the case that Plato has in mind a strategy comparable to the one I ascribed (following Menn forthcoming) to Aristotle in §2.2? We saw Aristotle claiming that the correct method to make existential sentences involving 1-place being (‘F is’) amenable to causal analysis, is to rewrite them by [i] turning them into sentences involving 2-place being, [ii] moving the subject-term (‘F’) to predicate position, and [iii] introducing a subject (primarily the per se subject of F) of which the new predicate holds (‘S is F’). Thus, within the framework of causal analysis, sentences involving 1-place being are turned into sentences involving 2-place being. If Plato subscribed to such a view, the argument at Sph. 255c-d would reach a conclusion the opposite to that which is stated and intended. For it is precisely the possibility of being predicated as a standalone predicate term which marks the fundamental distinction between the Kind Being and the Kind Difference. Any attempt to reduce ‘αὐτὸ καθ᾽αὑτό' Being to ‘πρὸς ἄλλο’ Being spoils the argument.

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Critical assessment of alternative readings. The traditional interpretation of Sph. 255c-d has been famously challenged by Frede and Owen95. The chief objection raised by both these commentators is the following. If the ‘by itself’-relative distinction is meant to be exhaustive, then the traditional interpretation is unable to account for reflexive relations. For the phrase ‘πρὸς ἄλλα’, unlike the more generic ‘πρός τι’, entails the numerical distinctness of the relata, as proved by its equivalence with ‘πρὸς ἕτερον’ at 255d1. The relata of a reflexive relation, though, are not numerically distinct.

But reflexive relations are crucial for Plato’s argument, because among the pivotal notions of the

Sophist there is that of ταὐτόν. Therefore, the traditional interpretation must be rejected.

On top of this, Owen (1971: 257) adds the following objection. The argument is introduced by the Eleatic Stranger with the words ‘but I think you agree that’ (ἀλλ᾽ οἶµαί σε συγχωρεῖν). Since the verb ‘συγχωρεῖν’ is in the present tense, Theaetetus is supposed to be familiar with the distinction the Stranger is about to draw. But nowhere in the dialogue is the distinction between absolutes and relatives advanced before this passage and there is no reason to suppose that

Theaetetus was otherwise familiar with it.

Frede and Owen in turn offered two alternative explanations of the passage. According to

Frede, Plato distinguishes two classes of beings on the basis of two uses of the verb ‘to be’96. In a

καθ᾽αὑτό predication, ‘to be’ expresses the nature or essence of a subject. In a πρὸς ἄλλο predication, ‘to be’ expresses a subject’s possession of a property (as a result of participation). The two classes of beings set apart through the distinction between καθ᾽αὑτό and πρὸς ἄλλο predications are Forms and sensible particulars. Forms are the only possible subjects of a καθ᾽αὑτό predication. For only Forms have natures in the strict sense: they alone can be what they are by

95 Cf. Frede 1967 and Owen 1971. Notice that Owen was one of the proponents of the traditional interpretation

(cf. Owen 1957: 107), which he dropped in his 1971 paper (cf. above n.88). 96 I take Crivelli 2012: 145-9 to defend a version of Frede’s interpretation.

125 themselves and not by bearing the appropriate relation to something else. The subjects of a πρὸς

ἄλλο predication can in principle be both sensible particulars and Forms. For both can have properties (as a result of participation). But since Plato characterizes the second class of beings as being always (ἀεὶ) predicated of something different, its extension is restricted to sensibles. Now, things can participate in Being both καθ᾽αὑτό and πρὸς ἄλλο, which means that there are two ways of being. By contrast, things can participate in Difference only with respect to something else.

Owen believes that Plato distinguishes two uses of the verb ‘to be’, both incomplete. In its

καθ᾽αὑτό use, ‘to be’ is used for statements of identity. In its πρὸς ἄλλο use, ‘to be’ is used for statements of predication. Thus, whatever is said ‘to be’ either is said to be identical to itself or something else can be predicated of it. By contrast, ‘different’ is always said ‘relative to something else’, and can never be employed for statements of identity.

I shall now reply to the objections raised by Frede and Owen, and contend that their own interpretations are uncompelling. As pointed out by other scholars, the first objection is not supported by the evidence97. At Phlb. 51c-d, Plato uses ‘πρός τι’ (51c6) and ‘πρὸς ἕτερον’ (51d7) interchangeably. Aristotle will do the same (cf. e.g., Cat. 7.6a36-7)98. The Academic Hermodorus

(F 5 IP2) even subordinates πρός τι to πρὸς ἕτερον. So, while I agree that ‘πρὸς ἄλλα’ is equivalent to ‘πρὸς ἕτερον’ at 255d1, nothing impedes (neither in general, nor in this passage) that they can be equivalent to, or implied by ‘πρός τι’. And since ‘πρός τι’ can include reflexive relations, the claim that ‘πρὸς ἄλλα’ entails the numerical distinctness of the relata, is not borne out by the text99.

97 Cf. Heinamann 1983: 15; Brown 1999 [1986]: 476; Crivelli 2012: 146. 98 Cf. other references in Crivelli 2012: 146 n.122. 99 Duncombe 2012 does not dwell on this reply to the traditional interpretation. Thus, he proposes the ingenious emendation of the text mentioned above at n. 140 to accommodate the notion of ‘ταυτόν’ (c14: ‘πρὸς ἄλληλα’ instead of ‘πρὸς ἄλλα’). As I said, I do not mean to dispute the paleographical plausibility of this lectio. Yet, I think it is unnecessary to accommodate ‘ταὐτόν’ and reflexive relations. Moreover, it has been objected to me that ‘πρὸς ἕτερον’

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The second objection has been taken more seriously100. Still, this too seems to me to overinterpret these lines. The sentence ‘ἀλλ᾽ οἶµαί σε συγχωρεῖν’ does not in itself inescapably require Theaetetus’ previous acquaintance with the object of agreement. It may simply be an interlocutory formula to introduce a fresh point in the argument, an innocuous façon de parler devoid of serious theoretical significance. After all, the phrases ‘αὐτό καθ᾿αὑτό’ (or just

‘καθ᾿αὑτό’) and ‘πρός τι’ are common expressions already in pre-platonic literature – nor are they consistently used in a technical fashion in Plato’s works themselves101. Further, even if Owen were right, one could well speculate that Theaetetus might have been acquainted with something like a distinction between absolutes and relatives for either of the following two reasons. First,

Theaetetus was a mathematician. A standard example of relative concerns arithmetical relations, namely, double-half. The ES might simply suppose that Theaetetus is intuitively familiar with the by itself-relatives distinction from his mathematical background102. Second, Tht. 160b9-10 (τινὶ

does not mean the same as ‘πρὸς ἄλλα’ (in Greek one might expect the former to mean ‘in relation to another of two’, the latter to mean ‘in relation to some other’). I do not deny that there are cases in which this can be so. But, for one thing, LSJ reports (s.v. ἄλλος) there are clauses such as ‘ἕτερον µέν…ἄλλον δέ…’ (Il.9.313), or ‘ἄλλο µέν…ἑτέρου δέ…’ (Hdt.1.32), or ‘θάτερον…τὸ δ᾽ ἄλλο’ (Esch. IT 962), where ‘ἄλλος’ and ‘ἕτερος’ mean exactly the same – within Plato’s dialogues, see Alc. I 116e (τότε µὲν ἕτερα…, τότε δὲ ἄλλα…) and Tht. 184e (διὰ δὲ τῶν ἄλλων ἑτέρων αὖ τινῶν). More importantly, my main claim does not demand that πρὸς ἄλλα and πρὸς ἕτερον mean the same (which is instead required by Frede’s reading), but that they do not imply numerical distinctness. 100 Cf. e.g. Crivelli 2012: 147-8. 101 Cf. again Ademollo 2013: 47-51 and El Murr 2014. 102 The possible rejoinder that, for Plato, to be a mathematician is (a necessary but) not a sufficient condition to be a philosopher (cf. Tht. 146 b3-4; 162 b6-8; R. 531 d9-e3) cuts no ice, because all my reading requires is Theaetetus’ intuitive familiarity with the by itself-relative distinction, not that he has a full grasp of the metaphysics behind it.

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εἶναι ἢ τινὸς ἢ πρός τι ῥητέον αὐτῷ, εἴτε γίγνεσθαι: αὐτὸ δὲ ἐφ᾽ αὑτοῦ τι κτλ.) might be a good background for Theaetetus to understand the Stranger’s distinction103.

Owen’s interpretation is in turn open to at least two objections. First, as pointed out by Crivelli

(2012: 147), Plato introduces his argument for the distinction between Difference and Being with a classification of ‘beings’ ὄντα (τῶν ὄντων τὰ µὲν… τὰ δὲ), not of uses of the verb ‘to be’. To be sure, the distinction of ὄντα is then applied to Being and this application can be further cashed out in terms of uses or senses of ‘to be’. But Owen’s interpretation does not account for the primary division of beings104. Second, if the ‘by itself’ use of ‘to be’ is the one used for statements of identity, it is unclear why Plato would also posit a Form of Identity. As I argued above, if X possesses the property of being identical with itself in virtue of participating in the Form of Being kath’hauto, participation in the Form of Identity becomes ontologically redundant105.

Frede’s reading is more sophisticated, but open to objections all the same. First, no reference whatsoever is made to the Forms-sensibles distinction throughout the passage (the genitive plural

τῶν ἑτέρων is no counter-evidence, since it may well refer to Forms alone). So it would be odd, to say the least, if Plato, in distinguishing between beings by themselves and relatives, were silently bringing sensibles into the picture.

103 Cf. Leigh 2012b: 13. Remember that the Sophist (cf. 216 a1-2) is explicitly presented as the sequel to the

Theaetetus. It might be reasonably replied that the relativity thematized at Tht. 160b9-10 concerns specifically the relationship between an object and the subject of perception and that the absolute-relative distinction is there introduced with the purpose to dispose of absolute properties. Still, nothing compels us to think that Theaetetus must be fully alive to the distinction the ES is about to draw. What the phrase ‘σε συγχωρεῖν’ requires, on my reading, is that, minimally, the by itself-relative contrast does not sound entirely new and baffling to Theaetetus. 104 The same objection is effective against Moravcsik 1962: 48, 54, Bostock 1894: 92-4 and Brown 1999 [1986], as Crivelli himself points out. 105 Cf. Movia 1991: 340.

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Second, notice that this move would saddle the preposition ‘πρός’ (in the expressions ‘πρὸς

ἄλλα’ and ‘πρὸς ἕτερον’) with a dubious ambiguity in the space of three lines. For at c14 it would indicate ontological dependence, as it obtains in any relation of participation (whether between perceptible particulars and Forms; or just among Forms). By contrast, at d1 ‘πρός’ indicates the relativity involved in incomplete predicate expressions such as ‘different…’.

Third, in distinguishing between beings by themselves and relative, Plato does not focus on the predicative relations between subjects and predicates, but on the semantical and syntactical behavior of predicates only106. Thus, in demonstrating the distinctness of Being and Difference, the Eleatic Stranger does not spell out the criteria which entitle a subject X (be it a Form or a sensible particular) to rank as a being or as something different. Rather he expounds that τὸ ὄν, qua attribute, is predicated both as a standalone term and in relation to something else; whereas

τὸ ἕτερον, qua attribute, is predicated only in relation to something else.

Being in Parmenides’ D5. I anticipated that Prm. D5 fruitfully complements Sph. 255c13-4 and that these two passages jointly provide the key to throwing light on Plato’s conception of the two-

106 See above n.73 and text thereto. It has been objected to me that ‘τὸ δέ γ᾽ ἕτερον’ at 255d1 seems to offer a better contrast with the beings (ὄντα) mentioned at 255c13 – and that this might be taken to support Frede’s case. But it is not obvious that this is so. The sentence is perfectly intelligible if we take ‘τὸ ἕτερον to’ designate any bearer of the property difference and to prelude to the claim, counterfactually stated at d4, that the Kind Difference falls under the ‘πρὸς ἄλλα’ class alone. The main contrast of the passage is not a purported one between τὸ δέ γ᾽ ἕτερον (d1) and τῶν ὄντων (c13); but the one between τὸ ὄν and τὸ θάτερον (d4-5). In fact, it seems to me that the passage would have provided better support for Frede’s reading if the genitive τῶν ὄντων at c13 were singular. In that case, the alleged contrast with τὸ δέ γ᾽ ἕτερον would have been more apparent.

129 pronged role of the Kind Being. I shall now turn to Prm. D5 to give substance to this claim. For the present, my chief focus will be 160e7-163b5107.

D5 is the first deduction of Prm. II which assumes as its starting point the negative hypothetical statement ‘if the one is not’ (εἰ δὲ δὴ µὴ ἔστι τὸ ἕν)108. The purpose of the deduction is to demonstrate that, if this premise is accepted, for a variety of different properties F, the one is both F and non-F. The first step of this argument (160b5-e7) establishes that, although the one is not (ex hypothesi), it is nonetheless something recognizable, different from other things and knowable. For, if this were not the case, it would not be possible to distinguish the sentence ‘the one is not’ from ‘the not-one is not’ or, say, ‘largeness is not’. But since this is in fact possible, then, to the extent that the one-that-is-not is a recognizable subject of predication, it will still be something (160e3-4) and ‘nothing prevents it from partaking of many things’ (160e7-8: µετέχειν

δὲ πολλῶν οὐδὲν κωλύει), even though it is not a being, given that it is not109. The verb ‘to partake’

(µετέχειν) denotes, here as elsewhere, the possession of a certain property. Thus, in D5, the possession of a variety of properties different from being, is not precluded by the not-being (µὴ

ἔστι) of the one-that-is-not, and is indeed required by the recognizability of the one-that-is-not as a distinct subject of predication.

107 The following is obviously not meant to be an exhaustive commentary 160c5-163b5. I will selectively explore only those points which are relevant for the present analysis. 108 With Cornford 1939: part. 230-231 and O’Brien 2005a: 235-6 I take it that the verb ‘to be’ is here used in its existential meaning. One may object that it is impossible to speak of what does not exist in the first place. This is exactly the position of D6. My view is that this is precisely part of what the D5-D6 antinomy is meant to exhibit. 109 This inference is here granted unproblematically. But again, we will see below in the next sub-section that it should not go unquestioned and that it hides something important which, in my view, the reader is tacitly invited to notice and rectify.

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Parmenides and the young Aristotle, the two interlocutors in this section of the dialogue, further develop this result up to the surprising statement at 161e3 that, among the things in which the one-that-is-not partake there is, in some way, also being (καὶ µὴν καὶ οὐσίας γε δεῖ αὐτὸ

µετέχειν πῃ). How do they get there? The gist of their argument is that, since the one is not, not- being must be truly predicated of the one (162b6-7). Let me spell this out. Parmenides stipulates the following formal definition of logical truth: ‘to say the things that are’ (162a1: ὄντα λέγειν).

This requires that a true predicative sentence, logically regimented according to such a definition, must first and foremost respect a formal requirement: of a given subject S the verb ‘to be’ must be predicated positively, either through its affirmative attribution (‘S is...’) or – we learn here – through double negation (‘S is not non...’)110. In order to fulfil this requirement, the governing statement of D5, ‘the one is not’ (µὴ ἔστι τὸ ἕν), must therefore be reformulated according to the logical form of a positive predication: the one is a not-being (162a1-2: ἔστιν [...] τὸ ἓν οὐκ ὄν).

From this result, the conclusion is drawn that the one-that-is-not ‘must also somehow partake in being’ (161e3).

This conclusion implicitly suggests that the (true) attribution of the verb ‘to be’ in the statement ‘the one is a not-being’ should be analyzed in participatory terms. If the predicate ‘is’ holds true of the subject ‘the one’, then the one(-that-is-not) partakes in being, at least to the extent that it is a not-being. At 162a4-5 Parmenides elaborates on this point by affirming that in this situation being performs the function of a ‘bond’ (δεσµός) linking ‘the one’ and ‘not-being’. It seems to me that Plato is here pointing to the distinctive role of ‘being’ as a connecting factor which operates in every combination and is linguistically mirrored by the verb ‘to be’ in its copulative use (2-place being). It is, in other words, the ‘in relation to something’ use of the verb

110 Cf. Kahn 1981: 90-93 on the ‘veridical sense of εἶναι in this passage.

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‘to be’ evoked at Sph. 255c-d. So this first strand of the argument suggests that being is a relational property whose combinatory role is reflected in the copulative use of the verb ‘to be’.

But there is more. After this first strand of the argument, one might wonder whether being is just a relational property and its only function of that of a connecting factor. In the ensuing lines, as I shall now try to show, Plato will point out that this cannot be the case. Being must also be a monadic property. Starting from 162a4-5, Parmenides and the young Aristotle articulate a convoluted sequence of combinations of the predicates ‘being’ and ‘not being’, based on the principle of assigning a positive result to an even (or null) number of negations and a negative result to an odd number of negations111, according to the following scheme [S1]112:

1. What is partakes in being in regard to being a being (‘what is is a being’).

2. What is partakes in not-being in regard to not being a not-being (‘what is is not a not-

being’).

3. What is not partakes in not-being in regard to not being a being (‘what is not is not a non

not-being’).

4. What is not partakes in being in regard to being a not-being (‘what is not is a not-being’).

Let me unpack some of its details. In D5 the dative of possession, referring to τὸ ἕν, indicates participation, and is therefore a substitute for µετέχειν. So the statement µὴ οὐσία τῷ ἑνί [scil.

ἔστιν] (162b6) indicates that the one partakes in not-being. In reformulating µὴ ἔστι τὸ ἕν as ἔστιν

τὸ ἓν οὐκ ὄν, Parmenides, on my reading, establishes (1) first, that predicative judgments in which a negation is applied to the predicate (‘the sun is not shining’) should be regimented by introducing

111 Cf. Ferrari 2004: 347 n. 197. 112 I borrow this scheme from Gill-Ryan 1996: 95-8 and Gill 2002: 123-6, though I disagree with the conclusion of their analyses. I also follow them in rejecting the emendations to this passage proposed by Shorey 1891 (already discarded by Diès, Moreschini, but followed by Burnet and others).

132 a copula and modifying the predicate, which becomes nominal (‘the sun is not-shining’). Second,

(2) Parmenides analyses judgements of the form ‘x is not-F’, by expanding them into ‘x partakes in being in relation to non-F’. This applies a fortiori to positive judgments (‘x is F’ à ‘x partakes in being in relation to F’).

Now, if the being were nothing but a ‘bond’, and therefore only a relational property, then two difficulties would arise. For (I) the statements in S1 would be exposed to a potential infinite regress. Let us take statement 1) as an example: ‘x is a being’. To connect x to the predicate ‘being’

(ὄν), Parmenides introduces the verb ‘to be’ in its copulative use, which mediates the participatory relation: ‘x is a being’. We have now three factors: (i) x; (ii) the copula ‘is’; (iii) the predicate

‘being’. The statement, in its regimented form, should then expand the relationship between (i) and (ii) as follows: ‘x partakes in being in regard to being a being’. This new configuration of the relationship between (i) and (ii), however, is itself a participatory relationship. Hence, it requires the further mediation of a new ‘bond’: ‘x is a being in regard to being a being’. And so on ad infinitum.

(II) Correlatively, the statement ‘x is a being’ could not be syntactically complete. The participle ‘being’ (ὄν), here in the function of a nominal predicate, must in fact be analyzed as

‘something that is’. If, however, being is only a relational property, it will be necessary to complete the phrase ‘something that is’ with a further participle ‘being’ as a nominal predicate (‘something that is an entity’). And so on ad infinitum.

Where do things go wrong? As I said, I believe that Plato is here pushing the reader to reflecting on these troublesome implications and rectifying the main assumptions on which they are based. He is signaling that it cannot be the case that being is only a relational property and a connecting factor: it must also be a monadic property. For if being is both a monadic and a relational predicate, and the verb ‘to be’ (εἶναι) consequently enjoys both complete and incomplete

133 uses, i.e. can be used in well-formed sentences both (a) as a 1-place predicate (... is) and (b) as a

2-place predicate (... is...), then there certainly is a way out of the impasse generated by S1. For, if being is also a monadic property, then difficulty (II) can be solved by rejecting its major premise, i.e. that being is nothing but a ‘bond’ or relational property. Further, the distinction between (a) and (b) enables one to solve (I) as well. For the state of affairs described by the statement ‘x is a being’ does not posit a multiple participation in being - that is, in being as a ‘bond’ (copula) and being as a property (predicate). The state of affairs is unique: ‘x is’ and ‘x is a being’ are two equivalent statements, with the same truthmaker, that is the existence of x. The addition of the participle ὄν to the predicate ἐστι does not convey a meaning other than the complete use of the predicate ἐστι113.

Levels of combination. In the two foregoing sub-sections I have argued that Sph. 255c13-4 and

Prm. D5 jointly throw light on Plato’s conception of the two-pronged role of the Kind Being. For one thing, participation in the Kind Being secures the property of being (simpliciter), meaning existence, linguistically mirrored by the verb ‘to be’ used as a standalone predicate-term (1-place being). But participation in the Kind Being is also operative in every combination among Kinds different from the Kind Being, as a participatory mediator or connecting factor, linguistically mirrored by the verb ‘to be’ in its copulative use (2-place being).

113 Compare Sph. 256a1-2: ἔστι [scil. κίνησις] δέ γε διὰ τὸ µετέχειν τοῦ ὄντος with 256d8-9: ἡ κίνησις […] ἐστι

καὶ ὄν, ἐπείπερ τοῦ ὄντος µετέχει. Cf. Leigh 2008: 117-8 and above all O’Brien 2020: §§6-8 on this point. One might object that the main purpose of this strand of D5 is not to induce the reader to reflecting on the function of being in participatory relations, but to reconsider the difference between property and relations. For example, Gill argues that the potential infinite regress to which the statements of S1 are exposed derives from the fact that Parmenides, just as in the second version of the so-called ‘third man’ argument (132c-133a), unduly treats relations as if they were properties (see Gill-Ryan 1996: 96-8 and Gill 2002: part. 126-7). I reply that the problem posed by the potential infinite regress to which the statements of S1 are exposed does not concern properties and relations in general, but specifically being, understood both as monadic property and as ‘bond’.

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Let us dwell on this second function. Consider the participation of the Kind Human in the Kind

Animal. Since Plato seems committed to the view that the Kind Being works as an ingredient of every situation in which something participates in a Kind other than Being114, we are led to suppose that the Kind Being is also operative as an ingredient of the participation of the Kind Human in the

Kind Animal. More precisely, we can draw from the analysis at Prm. 162a4-5 and say that the Kind

Being acts as a bond linking the Kind Human and the Kind Animal. So that the Kind Human partakes in the Kind Animal through the mediation of the Kind Being. So the sentence ‘the human being is an animal’ tells us that the Kind Human is the subject of two relations of participation: a first participation in the Kind Being; and a second in the Kind Animal. Thus, as Crivelli puts it, ‘Plato seems committed to distinguishing two levels of combination: immediate and mediated combination, which occurs thanks to the immediate combination of a further factor (the vowel-kind being)’115.

Here is one way to make sense of this two-tiered conception of combination. Let F be a property different from the property being, and let X be something F belongs to. The property F belongs to X, because X combines with the Kind F. Plato seems to think that X’s combination with

F must also entail X’s combination with Being. More precisely, X’s combination with Being mediates X’s combination with F. Thus, for X to have a property different from the property being, it must also have the property being: X must, in other words, exist.

This interpretation faces two possible objections. The first has been raised by Leigh116. She contends that if the state of affairs explaining statements containing the copula (e.g. ‘the human

114 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 112-3. 115 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 116 (emphasis mine). While I subscribe to these words of Crivelli’s, I argued in §3.1 that

I do not follow his account of vowel-Kinds. 116 Cf. Leigh 2008: 119-20. Leigh’s objection (reminiscent of remarks by Ackrill 1957) is framed in a broader criticism of Lesley Brown’s account of the verb ‘to be’ in the Sophist, which I will consider in the following section.

135 being is an animal’) included the Kind Being, we would expect the Kind Being to be explicitly invoked in the explanations of any statements expressing the possession of a property. Yet statements of this sort are standardly explained just in terms of participation in the corresponding

Form, with no involvement of the Kind Being. For example, the appropriate explanatory analysis of the statement ‘Motion in different from the Same’ (256a3) is that Motion participates in

Difference with respect to the Same (256a5, b2-4); and not that Motion participates in Being with respect to Difference with respect to the Same. Accordingly, the copula does not denote a separate

Kind involved in a relation of participation.

One possible reply to this objection is that, at 251e8-252a10 Plato does suggest that the state of affairs explaining statements containing the copula, such as ‘things really are changing’, involves participation in Being (esp. 251e10-a3). One might plausibly think that since in that passage Plato made once and for all the point that the Kind Being is an ingredient of any relation of participation, he is not compelled to always mention the Kind Being in spelling out the state of affairs explaining any relation of participation. The involvement of the Kind Being does not require explicit mention in the explanatory analysis of a relation of participation. This is not enough, however, to deny such an involvement117.

The second objection draws from Prm. D5. As I said above, the first step (160b5-e8) of the argument developed in this deduction establishes that, although the one is not (ex hypothesi),

‘nothing prevents it from partaking of many things’ (160e7-8). The verb ‘to partake’ (µετέχειν) denotes, here as elsewhere, the possession of a certain property. Thus, in D5, the possession of a variety of properties different from being, is not precluded from the not-being (µὴ ἔστι) of the one- that-is-not, and is indeed required (161a1: ἀλλὰ καὶ ἀνάγκη) by the recognizability of the one-that-

117 This reply follows considerations by Crivelli 2012: 203.

136 is-not as a distinct subject of predication. So, it looks as though X’s possession of a property different from being is not precluded from x’s not-being and, consequently, it does not entail X’s being.

This objection too can be answered. Prm. 160b5-e7 starts off by suggesting that any subject of predication can be ‘something’ (knowable, different from other things etc.) without being a

‘being’. The passage suggests a Stoic-Meinongian ontological scenario. But there is evidence, both inside and outside the Parmenides, that Plato would not have subscribed to such a view. At Prm.

132b3-c11, Parmenides criticizes Socrates’ conceptualist way out to the first so-called ‘third-man’ argument, by objecting that each thought (νόηµα) is necessarily of something (τινός), and further specifying that it must be something that is, i.e., a being (ὄντος)118. At Sph. 237b7-e7 the ES warns that the expression ‘something’ (τι) is a sign of the numerical attribute ‘one’ (ἑνὸς […] σηµεῖον); and since numerical attributes have existential import, it follows that we always apply ‘something’ to a thing that is: ‘something’ and ‘one’ can only refer to beings119. And further passages could be mentioned (e.g. R. V 478b6-c2; Tht. 189a6-8).

118 Note that the transition from τινος to ὄντος is essential for the criticism of conceptualism, because the aim of the argument is to show that all νοήµατα are always referred to something real. Cf. O’Brien 2013b. 119 It will be objected: if Plato rejects the claim that a subject of predication can be ‘something’ without also being a ‘being’, why does he appear to endorse it in D5? I provide a full answer to this question in Granieri forthcoming-b. Here I shall confine myself to suggesting that Plato dialectically entertains this possibility to stimulate us to reflecting on the ontological requirements of the extra-linguistic correlates of contentful thought and meaningful speech. In this regard, the antinomic contrast between D5 and D6 (163b7-164b4) is revealing.

Chapter 4

Remarks on the Verb ‘To Be’

This chapter focuses on semantic issues concerning Plato’s philosophical uses of the verb ‘εἶναι’. I

want to show that the reading famously championed by Owen, Malcolm and Frede, on which Plato

is unaware of purely existential uses of ‘εἶναι’, is unpersuasive. In addition, I shall also provide a

critical assessment of the so-called ‘semantic continuity thesis’, defended by Brown, and contend

that it too is open to objections. For, although this thesis may correctly capture a phenomenon of

the Greek language, namely, that an existential use of the verb ‘εἶναι’ can easily lead to use of the

same verb as a copula, and, conversely, that the copula has existential import, it does not effectively

illuminate the metaphysical view Plato spells out in the Sophist. In other words, the ‘semantic-

continuity thesis’ may bear upon our understanding of aspects of the verb ‘εἶναι’ (as, after all, it is

presented), but throws limited light on how the Kind Being works in the Sophist’s metaphysical

theory.

4.1. Traditional and Revisionist Interpretations

The debate on the senses of ‘εἶναι’ in the Sophist. The reconstruction carried out in the previous

chapter involves the vexed question of the senses of the verb ‘to be’ (εἶναι) in Plato’s Sophist,

which has been the cause of a lot of spilt ink over the last hundred years. Probably pushed by John

Stuart Mill’s famous stigmatization of the Greeks’ nefarious neglect of the logical distinction

137 138 between copulative and existential ‘is’1, English-speaking Plato scholars of the early 20th century engaged in a discussion on whether (and, if so, to what extent) Plato displayed awareness of that dichotomous distinction. In the beginning, this discussion took in effect the form of a defence of

Plato and it was only natural for commentators to look at the Sophist to this end. Thus, Shorey argued – with customary brevitas – that in this dialogue, and indirectly in the second part of the

Parmenides, Plato exhibits full awareness not only of the distinction between the existential and the copulative ‘is’, but also of the ambiguity of the copula, as a sign of both identity and predication2. Cornford reacted by contending that while Plato did use ‘εἶναι’ in its existential meaning, the purely predicative copula has no place in his account, in which the non-existential meaning of ‘εἶναι’ is confined to identity3. Cornford’s view was in turn criticized by Ackrill, whose celebrated Plato and the copula confirmed de facto Shorey’s intuition, though from the perspective of a strongly conceptualist interpretation of Plato’s ‘later’ Forms4. Ackrill’s reading was in broad

1 Cf. Stuart Mill 1974 [1843]: 79. As evidence that Mill was likely the fountainhead of this discussion, one may cite Shorey 1933: 298 (see already Shorey 1903: 54 n.391). 2 Cf. again Shorey 1903: 53-4 (rejecting also Grote 1865: 445 n. x, 449, who reproached Plato for conflating the

‘is’ of identity with the ‘is’ of predication), and above all Shorey 1933: 298. Similarly Taylor 1949 [1926]: 392. 3 Cf. Cornford 1935: 263-6, 278-9, 282-5, 296. By the time Cornford published his commentary, the linguistic turn had largely taken hold in English philosophy and there were other philosophical authorities, apart from John Stuart Mill, to deal with in relation to the problem of the various senses of ‘to be’. Notably, Russell stressed the ‘terrible ambiguity’ of the word ‘is’, as a sign for at least as many concepts as existence, identity and predication (cf. Russell 2010a [1903]: 64). Among the reasons why Cornford resolutely denied any role to the purely predicative copula in Plato’s account of being in the Sophist is that he endeavored to draw a sharp line between Platonic dialectic and modern formal logic as pursued by people like Russell (cf. Cornford 1935: 64). 4 Cf. Ackrill 1957. Unlike Cornford, Ackrill’s aim to find in Plato precisely the formal distinctions among senses of ‘is’ drawn by Frege and developed by Russell is easily detectable, cf. Ackrill 1957: 2: ‘With Plato’s procedure here one may compare a passage in Frege's paper Über Begriff und Gegenstand. […] In offering the analyses that he does it seems to me that Plato, no less clearly than Frege, is engaged in distinguishing and elucidating senses of ‘is’’.

139 outline endorsed by Moravcsik and Crombie5, and so became the prevailing view in English- language studies.

It is worth noting that until the late ‘60s the object of contention was essentially whether Plato was alive to the ambiguity of the copula, i.e., whether he consciously saw any distinction between

‘ἐστιν’ as a sign of identity and as a simple predicative connection. But nobody really questioned

Plato’s awareness of the existential sense of ‘εἶναι’.

Yet, it was especially this aspect of the then prevailing interpretation that came under fire with the ground-breaking works of Frede, Malcolm and Owen6. The main contention of these commentators was that the Sophist neither contains nor compels any isolation of the existential ‘is’ and that occurrences of 1-place being (which appeared to previous interpreters to be naturally read as indicating existence) can be accommodated as mere elliptical forms of 2-place being. Plato was thus taken to solve the paradox of falsehood just through the singling out of two incomplete sense or uses of the verb ‘to be’ (identifying and predicative senses for Owen and Malcolm; definitional and predicative uses for Frede). This bold thesis received significant additional support from the results of Kahn’s coeval large-scale investigations on the semantics of the verb ‘to be’ in ancient

Greek7. To cut a (very) long story short, we may summarize the core of Kahn’s conclusion by quoting the title of one of his most influential papers: ‘existence does not emerge as a distinct concept in ancient philosophy’8. Rather – Kahn maintains – the verb ‘εἶναι’ originally had a

5 Cf. Moravcsik 1962: 42, 51-6; Crombie 1963: 498-50. 6 Cf. Frede 1967, Malcolm 1967 and Owen 1971. There is little doubt that Vlastos’ work on the notion of ‘degrees of being’ in Plato’s metaphysics (cf. Vlastos 1965) and on the principles of predication in Plato’s later dialogues (cf. esp. Vlastos 1966) contributed to the raise of the revisionist interpretation defended by these authors. 7 Cf. Kahn 2003 [1973] and the papers collected in Kahn 2009. 8 Cf. Kahn 1976. Unlike Frede, Malcolm and Owen, Kahn has never focused on the Sophist to make his case

(and one might well wonder whether this is an accident), though he later came to endorse Brown’s exegesis of this

140 multitude of semantic values or uses, that the modern ‘copula–existence dichotomy’ is ill-suited to capture, and that ‘form a significantly unified conceptual system, a network of interdependent concepts clustering around the notion of predication’9.

By the early eighties the revisionist interpretation had become the new orthodoxy: the notion of existence – it was established – is foreign to Plato’s philosophy. Apart from a few dissenting voices10, this opinion has in the essential remained unquestioned up to the present day. It has significantly been refined by Brown and Burnyeat11, whose conclusions, however, are ultimately in harmony with the Owenian slogan ‘to be is to be something’, which continues to be cited as a fundamental truth of Plato’s conception of being12. And even when the revisionist interpretation is not explicitly referred to, one can clearly detect its influence. Let me mention just one among the many examples. In her instructive discussion of the ‘communion of Kinds’, Harte claims that if a

Kind ‘is to combine with other kinds, it must both be and be distinct; that is, it must be the same as itself and different from the rest’13. Thus, according to Harte, for a Kind to be means to be the same as itself, not just to exist – a typical Owenian move, as we have seen in chapters 2 and 3.

dialogue (cf. Kahn 2003 [1973]: IX-XII). It is interesting to note that Étienne Gilson, independently from the analytically trained historians just named, and from a methodological and hermeneutical perspective very distant from theirs, had already come to a similar conclusion. Cf. Gilson 1952: 15, 33 quoted above in the Introduction. 9 Cf. Kahn 2003 [1973]: VIII (emphasis mine). Fronterotta 2011: 54-62 provides a helpful critical overview of

Kahn’s main theses. Unlike Frede, Malcolm and Owen, Kahn has never focused on the Sophist to make his case. 10 Cf. e.g. Heinaman 1983; Rosen 1983: 229-44; O’Brien 2013a, 2013b and 2020; Fronterotta 2011. 11 Cf. Brown 1999 [1986], Brown 1994 and Burnyeat 2003. See also Szaif 1998. 12 Cf. below n.31. 13 Cf. Harte 2002: 154; my emphasis.

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If the revisionist thesis were true, what I said about being as a monadic property would be off the track. Yet, as I will try to show in the remainder of this chapter, there are reasons to think that the revisionist thesis lacks the textual support it requires from the Sophist. I will first criticize the version of this thesis defended by Frede, Malcolm and Owen14. Then, in the next section I will assess the so-called ‘semantic continuity thesis’ proposed by Brown and developed by Burnyeat.

The case against the revisionist view. In the previous chapter, I have already cast doubts on any interpretation accounting for Plato’s use of 1-place being as an ellipsis for 2-place being (either identifying or predicative), when the former is analyzed in terms of participation in the Kind Being.

In addition, I have shown that the revisionists’ reading of Sph. 255c-d, a passage which they charge with significant weight for their overall interpretation, is questionable. On top of this, their exegeses of other passages they relied upon can be proved equally uncompelling. I shall mention the following three as particularly salient:

(1) At 237b7-8 the ES speaks of ‘τὸ µηδαµῶς ὄν’. The revisionist interpretation takes this phrase

to mean not ‘what does not exist at all’, but ‘what is predicatively nothing’ (a subject which,

for every predicate F, is not F). However, if ‘τὸ µηδαµῶς ὄν’on indicates ‘what is

predicatively nothing’, it follows that ‘τὰ πάντως ὄντα᾽ and ᾽τὸ παντελῶς ὄν᾽ (cf. e.g. 240e5,

247a10, 248e8-249a1) are to be understood respectively as ‘the things which are predicatively

everything’ and ‘that which is predicatively everything’, that to which all the predicates can

be ascribed15. Not only is this something hard to make sense of in general, but certainly it is

not what Plato has in mind.

14 The interpretations of Frede, Malcolm and Owen are not identical, but there is significant common ground among them. It is on this common ground that I shall focus in the next sub-section. 15 Cf. Heinaman 1983: 4. See also Thomas 2008: 649 n.42 and Crivelli 2012: 46-8.

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(2) At 256e3-7 the ES notoriously seems to infer from the claim that all Kinds share in being (e3)

that in relation to each of the Forms being is manifold (e6: περὶ ἕκαστον ἄρα τῶν εἰδῶν πολὺ

µέν ἐστι τὸ ὄν). According to the revisionist interpretation, the latter statement means that

there are many predicates which may be truly affirmed of a Kind. Therefore ‘to share in being’

cannot be read existentially, or else we would saddle Plato with a fallacious inference from an

existential claim to a predicative claim.

The governing premise of this argument, as I understand it, is that the conclusion at 256e6

is uniquely inferred from the claim that all Kinds share in being (e3), and that the latter claim

explains the former16. It is precisely because each Kind shares in Being that it has many

attributes. Thus, an existential understanding of the former statement triggers the purported

fallacy from an existential claim to a predicative claim.

However, there are reasons to doubt the correctness of the governing premise. Consider

the broader context in which this ES’ remark is framed. Starting from 255e8, the ES gives a

(quite convoluted) sample of how Kinds combine with each other – the second project of the

twofold agenda set at 254c4-6. He singles out Motion as a specimen and explores its

combinatory relations with the other four of the selected greatest Kinds:

§ [a] Motion is not Rest, because it is different from Rest (256e11-15);

§ [b] but Motion is (simpliciter) because it partakes in Being (a1-2);

§ yet again, [c] Motion is not Identity, because it is different from Identity (a3-6);

§ [d] but Motion is identical, because it partakes in Identity (a7-8);

16 Interpreting the revisionist argument in explanatory terms, I am adopting a principle of charity. For suppose the revisionists contended that the claim that ‘if [not since] a Form exists then there are many attribues that belong to it’ is fallacious. They could be proved wrong on purely logical grounds, because the inference is in fact valid (cf. Heinaman 1983: 8).

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§ yet again, [e] Motion is not Difference, because it is different from Difference (c4-5);

§ but [f] Motion is different, namely from Identity, Difference and Rest (c7-11);

§ yet again [g] just as Motion is different from three of the five selected Kinds, soo too it

is different from Being, and is therefore a not-being (c11-d8);

§ but, remember, [h] Motion is (as per [b]) because it partakes in Being [d8-9].

The crucial step, for the dialogue’s overall project, is of course the one made through claims

[g] and [h]. Thus, it is just natural that at d11-e4 the ES stresses the conclusion reached through

[g] and [h] and generalizes it to all Kinds. But when at e6-7 the ES infers (ἄρα) that in relation to each of the Forms ‘being is manifold’ and ‘not-being is of an unlimited quantity’, nothing compels us to think that this conclusion is drawn exclusively from [g] and [h]. Indeed, it seems more naturally to follow from the whole chain of inferences started at 255e8 ([a]-[h]). Thus, the ‘manifold being’ does not (and certainly need not) indicate just the property obtained by participation in the Kind Being, but all the positive attributes belonging to a Kind. Thus, the

‘manifold being’ evoked at 256e6 includes existence, i.e. the property obtained via participation in the Kind Being, as well as other properties. The clause ‘πολὺ µέν ἐστι τὸ ὄν’, consequently, tolerates a paraphrase such as ‘there are many Kinds, including the Kind Being, in which each Kind partakes’.

This reconstruction is corroborated by two further textual signoposts. One is the grammar of the phrase ‘Motion is a being’ (256d8: κίνησις ἐστι ὄν). Notice the repetition of the verb

εἶναι in the participial form complementing the copula (ἐστι ὄν). As 256a1 proves, this reduntant formula gives a sense equivalent to the simple 1-place ἔστι. For both ‘ἔστι’ at 256a1 and ‘ἐστι ὄν’ at 256e7 are equally explained in terms of participation in Being (cf. 256a1: διὰ

τὸ µετέχειν τοῦ ὄντος; 256d9: ἐπείπερ τοῦ ὄντος µετέχει). The question therefore arises of why Plato does not straightforwardly say ‘ἔστι’ at 256d8 too. In my view, the reason is that

144 he intends to stress that being is a property on a par with others, obtained by participation in a

Kind17. Just as Motion’s possession of the properties of identity and of the property of difference was expressed by the locution copula + participle (256a7: ἦν ταὐτὸν; a10: ταὐτόν

τ’εἶναι; c4: ἐστιν ἕτερον), so too is Motion’s possession of the property of being (256d8: ἐστι

ὄν). Hence, since the property obtained by participation in the Kind Being is a property on a par with others, it seems very unnatural to regard the conclusion at 256e5-6 as suggesting that being is instead some sort of supererogatory property that comprises all the properties denoted by predicates that hold true of a Kind.

It might be objected that my criticism of the revisionists’ interpretation of the ‘manifold being’ evoked at 256e6 entails a cumbersome ambiguity in the meaning of ‘τὸ ὄν’: on the one hand ‘τὸ ὄν’ refers to the property obtained by partaking in the Kind Being; on the other hand,

(πολὺ) ‘τὸ ὄν’ stands for the ensemble of the positive attributes belonging to a Kind. I bite the bullet: there is an ambiguity indeed, but one that is clearly flagged by Plato and, far from being cumbersome, is instead pivotal for the accomplishment of the overall project of the dialogue.

Let us look at the second textual signpost, which occurs at 263b4-12. The ES has just mentioned the two famous examples of true and false statement: ‘Theaetetus sits’ and

‘Theaetetus flies’. The latter statement is false – the ES observes – because it ‘says things that are different from those that are […] in which case it says the things that are not as if they are’18. The things said by this false statement are not a blank nothing, as the proponent of the paradox of falsehood would rejoin. Instead, the ES expounds that they are [i] ‘things that are’

(ὄντων), but also [ii] things that are different from those that are about Theaetetus (ὄντα ἕτερα

17 Cf. Heinaman 1983: 9; Leigh 2008: 117-9; O’Brien 2020: §8. 18 Ὁ δὲ δὴ ψευδὴς ἕτερα τῶν ὄντων. – Ναί. – Τὰ µὴ ὄντ’ἄρα ὡς ὄντα λέγει. – Σχεδόν.

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περὶ σοῦ). That is to say: [i] flying is an existing attribute, in that it partakes in the Kind Being;

but [ii] it is different from all the attributes that belong to Theaetetus. It is at this stage that the

ES makes an explicit cross-reference to the point made at 256e6-7, which is now restated in a

slightly, if significant, different phraseology: ‘for we said, I think, that there are many things

that are about each and every thing, and many that are not’ (πολλὰ µὲν γὰρ ἔφαµεν ὄντα περὶ

ἕκαστον εἶναί που, πολλὰ δὲ οὐκ ὄντα). The ‘πολὐ ὄν’ of 256e6 has been rephrased as ‘πολλὰ

ὄντα’. This confirms, I submit, that the ‘manifold being’ referred to in the earlier passage was

not meant to indicate only the property obtained by participation in the Kind Being, but all the

positive attributes that belong to the item designated by the subject of predication.

Accordingly, the ambiguity in the meaning of ‘τὸ ὄν’ is key to disentangle the paradox of

falsehood. For it enables Plato to display the sophistical trick underlying that paradox, namely,

the confusion between ‘being’ as the sum of true determination and ‘being’ as existence19. By

showing that these two meanings of ‘τὸ ὄν’ are grounded in two distinct metaphysical states

of affairs, Plato is able to set apart what the sophist had muddled up.

(3) At 259a6-8, the ES, in summing up his argument for the being of not-being, makes the

following remark: ‘difference, with its share in being, is, because of that sharing, while at the

same time it is certainly not what it has that share in, but rather something different from it’

(τὸ µὲν ἕτερον µετασχὸν τοῦ ὄντος ἔστι µὲν διὰ ταύτην τὴν µέθεξιν, οὐ µὴν ἐκεῖνό γε οὗ

µετέσχεν ἀλλ’ ἕτερον). Although the first ἔστι (1-place) is emphatically twice explained in

terms of participation in Being, the revisionist interpretation casts doubts on the existential

interpretation of this verb. For since in the second clause the verb is missing, it must be

19 Cf. Campbell 1867: LXXXVI (see already LXXVIII).

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supplied from the first. But since in the second clause the implicit ‘is’ should be copulative,

so will it have to be understood in the first clause too20.

The revisionist objection can be answered. For one thing, the ἐστί21 in the second clause

might have been simply elided, rather than supplied from the first clause22. Or, even if it is

supplied from the first clause, nothing compels us to take it univocally: it might be used

existentially in the former clause; copulatively in the latter23. Nor is this shift logically

fallacious or grammatically anomalous.

I will take it therefore as proved that the revisionist opinion that 1-place being is in fact an ellipsis for 2-place being does not have the cogency claimed for it24. This is not yet to say, however, that Plato put forward a full positive theory of the distinction of different senses of ‘εἶναι’ – comparable to the one we find in Frege and Russell – nor that this distinction is itself the key to

20 Cf. Owen 1971: 253. 21 In writing ‘ἐστί’ I follow the modern standard convention known as ‘Hermann’s rule’, for which ἔστι

(orthotone accent) expresses the existential sense and but ἐστί (enclitic accent) the copulative sense. But see Kahn 1973: 420-34 for critical remarks on this convention (p. 420 n.1 gives the reference to the relevant work of Hermann, on which the label ‘Hermann’s rule’ is based). 22 Cf. Heinaman 1983: 10 and Leigh 2008: 115. 23 Cf. again Heinaman 1983: 10. Paolo Fait, per litt., suggests to me another construal. He observes that in this passage there might not even be any need to talk about ellipses, because the final ‘ἕτερον’ may well be the explicit predicative complement of the ἔστι (that should therefore be ‘ἐστί’), with the only proviso that it remains pending until the end of the sentence. So we would have something along the following lines: the different, participating in being is ... something different. The proposal is intriguing, but, in my view, it does not fit well with a recurrent explanatory pattern employed by the ES throughout the dialogue. For, on Fait’s construal, in this case for X to participate in Being means (not simply being, but) being X – in this case: the different, by participating in being is different. However, as I argued in ch.2, the Stranger normally explains things in a different way. He says that, because of participation in/combination with Being, a certain kind (e.g. Motion) simply is (not ‘is (in) motion’), cf. 250b10- 11, 254d10, 256a1, 256d9 and the subsection at pp. 67-70 above. 24 I shall deal with Owen’s argument from the so-called ‘Parity Assumption’ (cf. Owen 1971: 229-32) in ch.6.

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solving the paradox of falsehood or even the goal of the dialogue. Still, it seems reasonable to

claim at least that Plato displays some awareness of the ambiguity of that verb (at least to the extent

that this ambiguity was sophistically exploited by the paradox of falsehood) and that he built a

metaphysical theory that, starting from the things themselves – rather than from the rules of

grammar and syntax – enables one, among other things, partly to disentangle that ambiguity

between an existential and a copulative sense of the verb.

4.2. The Semantic-Continuity Thesis

Overview of the semantic-continuity thesis. More recent research on predication and existence in

the Greek language, carried out especially by Lesley Brown, has resulted in the elegant thesis that

the syntactical difference between the complete (1-place) and the incomplete (2-place) uses of the

verb ‘εἶναι’ does not also entail a sharp semantic difference25. Thus, the verb ‘εἶναι’, unlike its

counterpart in modern English, is not ambiguous between existential and predicative sense, when

it is used respectively as a 1-place and a 2-place predicate. Rather, the verb exhibits a semantic

continuity across these syntactically different uses, analogous to the one involved in the transitive

and intransitive uses of common verbs such as ‘to teach’. So in the pair of sentences ‘Jane teaches’

and ‘Jane teaches French’, the verb ‘to teach’ does not change meaning; whereas in the pair of

sentences ‘Jane is growing’ and ‘Jane is growing tomatoes’, the verb ‘to grow’ changes meaning.

Accordingly, the relation between ‘Σωκρὰτης ἔστιν᾽ and ‘Σωκράτης δίκαιός ἐστιν᾽ is analogous

to the one obtaining between ‘Jane teaches’ and ‘Jane teaches French’. Here is how Brown

formalizes her thesis: ‘X is (complete use) entails X is something and X is F entails X is. X is not

25 The label ‘semantic continuity thesis’ is not itself used by Brown. I adopt this label for ease of reference, by

freely taking inspiration from the title of Leigh 2008 (‘The Copula and Semantic Continuity in Plato’s Sophist’).

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(complete use) is equivalent to X is not anything at all’26. Following Burnyeat – among the several scholars endorsing Brown’s proposal – we can summarize this view by saying that the verb ‘εἶναι’ is ‘complete on its own, yet further completable by adding a complement’27.

Despite its influence, this innovative suggestion too, however, is not immune from objections, or so I shall argue28. The main difficulties I will point to concern the notions of ‘entailment’ and

‘completion’. I aim to show that while Brown’s thesis may correctly capture a phenomenon of the

Greek language, namely, that an existential use of the verb ‘εἶναι’ can easily lead to use of the same verb as a copula, I contend that it does not effectively illuminate the metaphysical view Plato spells out in the Sophist. In other words, the ‘semantic-continuity thesis’ may bear upon our understanding of aspects of the verb ‘εἶναι’ (as, after all, it is presented), but does not elucidate how the Kind Being works in the Sophist’s metaphysical theory.

Problems with the semantic-continuity thesis (1): Entailment. Let us focus on the two-pronged positive side of Brown’s formulation (numbering is mine, for ease of reference): [1] X is (complete use) entails X is something; and [2] X is F entails X is. One plausible way to understand entailment in [2] is that statements of predication have an existential component. The inference from ‘X is F’ to ‘X is’ is licensed because part of the claim made by ‘X is F’ is that ‘X is’, namely an existential

26 Brown 1999 [1986]: 477. 27 Burnyeat 2003: 10. Other supporters include, among many: Szaif 1998 [1996]: 346-56; 2003: 16-46; van Eck

2002; Kahn 2003 [1973]: IX-XII; Ademollo 2011: 278; Gill 2012: 165 n. 64, 175-6 (with qualifications). 28 Brown’s interpretation of Sph. 256e3-7 and 259a6-8 is exposed to objections similar to those I have levelled against the revisionist interpretation, cf. Leigh 2008: 114-9 (Leigh’s paper will also be read with profit for an effective criticism of Malcolm 2006).

149 claim29. If this is a sound way to make sense of [2], then [2] does indeed receive support from the

Sophist. We saw the ES urging at 251e8-252a10 that if no Kinds blend, Motion and Rest do not share in Being. And if so, statements such as ‘things really are in motion’ or ‘things really are at rest’ are precluded. I explained the grounds for this claim through the notion of levels of combination, whereby Plato appeared us to think that X’s combination with the Kind F must also entail X’s combination with the Kind Being. More precisely, X’s combination with the Kind Being mediates X’s combination with the Kind F. So, for X to have a property other than the property being, X must also have the property being: X must, in other words, exist. Thus, in the metaphysical state of affairs invoked to explain the statement ‘X is F’ both the Kind F and the Kind Being figure.

Hence, as far as [2] is concerned, Brown’s proposal can be accepted30.

We may ask, however, whether the same notion of entailment is operative in [1]. We may ask, that is, whether statements of existence have a copulative component. And here my agreement with Brown’s suggestion comes to an end. For it is not part of the claim made by ‘X is’ is that ‘X is something’, namely a predicative claim. As a matter of fact, the metaphysical state of affairs invoked in the Sophist to explain the statement ‘X is’ is X’s participation in the Kind Being, period31. If a predicative claim were lurking behind ‘X is’, another Kind should be invoked in the state of affairs explaining this statement. But this is not how the ES expresses himself.

Surely, though – critics will protest – if X is (viz. exists), then X will be also variously characterized? In reply to this objection, I shall begin by urging at least some caution on

29 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 7-8, 202 (Crivelli also describes this as ‘the view that the copula has existential import’).

Compare Moore 1936: 187 (‘It seems to me that “This exists” (in this usage) always forms part of what is asserted by “This is a book,” “This is red,” etc.). 30 Even O’Brien, who is among the boldest opponents of Brown’s view, seems ready to grant at least this much

(2013a: 226-7). Cf. also Crombie 1962: 499-500. 31 Cf. also Leigh 2008: 117-8.

150 generalizing on this point too light-heartedly. It is far from clear, for example, in what sense the

χώρα of the Timaeus could be ‘something’, while being deprived of every attribute32; or in what sense the Idea of the Good evoked at Republic 509b9-10 could be ‘something’, while being

‘beyond essence in rank and power’ (ἐπέκεινα τῆς οὐσίας πρεσβείᾳ καὶ δυνάµει). Both, however, certainly exist33. But even leaving this point aside, and focusing just on the Sophist, it seems to me that the claim that ‘X is (complete use) entails X is something’ faces the following dilemma: a) On the one hand, if the claim that ‘if X is, then X will be also variously characterized’ is

understood in terms of co-extensiveness, i.e., as expressing something like an Aristotelian

proprium34, then it could comfortably be accepted even by those who reject the semantic-

continuity thesis. To say that for every X, if X exists (i.e. if the property of existence belongs

to it), then X is also F (for some property F different from existence) is not to say: to exist =df

to be F. Thus, if the claim that ‘if X is, then X will be also variously characterized’ is

understood in terms of co-extensiveness, it is not really grist for Brown’s mill, any more than

for her opponent’s. b) On the other hand (second horn of the dilemma), if the claim that ‘if X is, then X is variously

characterized’ is understood according to a stronger notion of entailment, e.g. as suggesting

that 1-place being has some copulative import, then the distance Brown claims for herself

from Owen’s view, as summarized by the slogan ‘to be is to be something’, becomes much

less wide, perhaps disappears and the elliptical account of 1-place being casts shadows over

32 Cf. Ti. 50d7: πλὴν ἄµορφον ὂν ἐκείνων ἁπασῶν τῶν ἰδεῶν ὅσας µέλλοι δέχεσθαί ποθεν; 51a3: πάντων ἐκτὸς

αὐτῷ προσήκει πεφυκέναι τῶν εἰδῶν; 51a7: ἄµορφον, πανδεχές. This is not contradicted by the fact that the χώρα contains ‘traces’ (53b2: ἴχνη) of the elements. 33 Cf. Ti. 52a8 for the former; R. 518c9, 526e3-4, 532c6 for the latter. 34 So that relation obtaining between ‘X is’ and ‘X is variously characterized’ would be comparable to the one obtaining between ‘human beings’ and ‘capable of laughing’.

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her account too. And while I shall leave open whether a) or b) is the case, and while I am fully

aware that Brown insists on carefully distinguishing her view from what I called the

‘revisionist view’, I should notice that, in a more recent paper, Brown plainly states that ‘the

core of being is being something’35; and that Kahn is ready to interpret Brown’s thesis as an

‘advancement’ of Owen’s, namely, one on which ‘most if not all existential uses of einai are

potentially predicative’36. If this quite elusive notion of ‘potentiality’ is meant to suggest, as I

suspect, that occurrences of 1-place ‘is’ are destined to be ‘actualized’ in occurrences of 2-

place ‘is’, then it seems to me that we are essentially dealing with an ellipsis in disguise.

35 Brown 2012: 288. Interestingly enough, Hestir 2016: 139, who explicitly follows Brown (p.138 n.90), accounts for Plato’s use of ‘εἶναι’ by saying that ‘within all [existential] uses [of ‘εἶναι’] there is a potential existential construction available for emphasis, yet within all existential constructions there is an implicit predicative construction asserting the ultimate ground of existence’ (my emphasis). It seems to me that there is no appreciable difference between the familiar revisionist notion of ‘ellipsis’ and of ‘implicit predicative construction’. 36 Kahn 2003: IX (my emphasis). Similarly, a number of scholars (even sympathetic to Brown’s reading) have often read the semantic-continuity thesis as a variation on the theme of what I previously called ‘the revisionist view’. Here are some examples. McCabe 1994: 206 n. 37 quotes Brown for the claim that the complete use of ‘is’ is ‘merely an elliptical way of talking, […] an incomplete one in disguise’. For van Eck 2002: 82, who follows and develops the semantic-continuity thesis, ‘the complete use of ‘being’ does not simply convey the notion of existence, but rather that of ‘being something’ with different possible complements’. For Notomi 2007: 259, ‘Lesley Brown develops Owen’s point and rightly concludes that Plato’s occasional use of the complete use of ‘to be’ is not a distinct use, but constitutes an elliptical form of the incomplete use’. Sedley 2009: 11 summarizes the semantic continuity thesis by saying that the complete use of ‘is’, ‘which to Anglophone readers may look like a switch to the existential sense, is in ancient Greek usage still a way of saying that the bottle is something, albeit without this time specifying what’ (italics in the text). Menn, forthcoming, who is instead critical of Brown’s proposal, affirms: ‘I take Brown’s view […] to be a variation on Owen’s, although she herself seems to feel there is a deep difference; how great the differences appear depends on how far away you stand’. I regard Menn’s remark as applicable also to Gill 2012: 165 n. 64, 175-6, who maintains (building on Thomas 2008: 654-6) that the inference from ‘X is’ to ‘X is F’ is licensed only for that value of F capturing X’s nature. The surface qualification does not make the bulk of the claim more convincing.

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Problems with the semantic-continuity thesis (2): Completion. The foregoing also provides for the appropriate background to illustrate the difficulties pertaining to the notion of ‘completion’ involved in the semantic continuity thesis. It is at least puzzling how something already complete may be claimed to be further completable37. For, it is unclear in what sense the addition of a complement counts as a completion of the verb εἶναι, if this last is regarded as already complete.

So unclear that one might wonder whether, within this interpretative framework, the distinction between completeness and incompleteness is blurred to the point of being ultimately removed.

Consider how Burnyeat sets out the ‘is/teaches’ analogy: ‘Suppose someone rings up and asks what you are doing. You reply, “I am teaching”. This is a complete answer to the question. But a more complete answer would be “I am teaching French”’38. One may wonder, however, whether completeness is really a matter of degree. Suppose someone said in 1940: ‘Lang’s De

Speusippi Academici Scriptis includes the complete collection of Speusippus’ fragment’. But then suppose also that someone (rightly) contended, after 1981, that ‘Tarán’s Speusippus of Athens includes a more complete collection of Speusippus’ fragment than Lang’s’. What the comparative

‘more complete’ really suggests is that Lang’s collection was not in fact complete, because a number of fragments were missing. In other words, comparative modifications of the adjective

‘complete’ are loose ways of speaking: as a matter of fact, something is complete if it has all the necessary parts proper to it; and something is incomplete if it does not39. Completeness, taken

37 Cf. O’Brien 2013a: 225 and n.6. 38 Burnyeat 2003: 10 (emphasis mine). I quote Burnyeat for clearness’ sake, but his remarks are in perfect harmony with Brown’s (cf. e.g. Brown 1994: 225). 39 Cf. Arist. Metaph. Δ 16.1021b12-4. The Oxford English Dictionary defines ‘complete’ as follows: ‘Having all its parts or members; comprising the full number or amount; embracing all the requisite items, details, topics, etc.; entire, full’ (my emphasis). Brown’s characterization of the ‘C1’ complete use (as she dubs it) is consequently somewhat misleading. She writes that ‘C1’ is ‘a use which neither has nor allows a complement’ (my emphasis). But

153 stricto sensu, is an all-or-nothing concept: either a thing is complete or it is not40. A complement adds something to a complete verb, but does not necessarily complete it. Or, if it is claimed to do so, it means that it expresses one of the necessary parts of the meaning of the verb. And if we apply this to the verb ‘εἶναι’, then the complete use thereof is ultimately a copula which has not yet been given a complement41, i.e., again, an ellipsis of 2-place being.

Here is another way of making the same point. Consider the characterization of the complete use of ‘εἶναι’ that Brown labels ‘C2’: C2 is a complete use ‘where there is no complement (explicit or elided) but which allows a complement’42. It seems to me that such a characterization would be in all essentials equivalent to the following, more nuanced, characterization of incompleteness, which I shall label ‘I2’: I2 is an incomplete use where there is a complement but which allows the absence of a complement43. In which case, one might well wonder whether a C2 complete use expresses no more completeness than incompleteness (according to an I2 notion of incompleteness). So, the doubt arises that those of completeness and incompleteness become such coarse-grained notions to end up being explanatorily ineffective.

really a complete predicate is one which does not need a complement to constitute a meaningful grammatical unit (one for which, that is, a complement is not a ‘requisite item’, as per the Oxford English Dictionary’s definition). To replace ‘need’ with ‘allow’ opens the door to an alleged alternative characterization of completeness (what Brown labels ‘C2’ complete use, see below), for which there is no room if ‘need’ is preserved. 40 Pun: borrowing Burnyeat’s own words about the concept of existence (2003: 21). 41 Cf. again O’Brien 2013a: 225. 42 Brown 1999 [1986]: 459. 43 Compare Brown 1994: 228: ‘complete being is intimately related to, and derived from, incomplete being – being such and such – without merely reducing to it’ (emphasis mine).

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One way to circumvent this difficulty is to replace the notions of ‘complete’ and ‘incomplete’ with those of ‘complemented’ and ‘uncomplemented’44. Now, I am perfectly happy to acknowledge that this might well capture a salient feature of the Greek language and that, in this regard, the ‘is-teaches analogy’ is instructive as to the syntactical behavior of ‘εἶναι’ in classical

Greek. However, one may ask what exactly is the relation between ‘complemented’ and

‘uncomplemented’ uses of ‘εἶναι’ and, moreover, what are the metaphysical states of affairs they are meant to correspond to. In particular, if ‘uncomplemented’ uses are deemed to entail

‘complemented’ ones, then the objection about the notion of ‘entailment’ I raised in the previous sub-section applies again45. In other words, problems seem to arise when one regards

‘uncomplemented’ (existential) occurrences of ‘is’ as ‘pregnant with the incomple copula’46.

44 This is, for example, how White 1993: XXII-XXVII explains the notion of being in the Sophist (but see Brown

1999 [1986]: 461 n.9* for sensible perplexities about how White develops this intuitions). See also Lorenz 2006: 79:22: ‘The crucial point [scil. of Brown’s interpretation] is that the bare use [of ἐἶναι] allows complementation’. 45 Another option is to invoke that ‘transitive’ and ‘intransitive’ uses of a verb. Thus, ‘to teach’ is just one of the several cases in which a transitive verb is used intransitively with no change in the meaning. Other examples include the verb ‘to finish’ (‘Have you finished your homework?’ – ‘I haven’t finished yet’), or ‘to read’ (‘Have you read Picketty’s last book?’ – ‘I don’t like reading’). But if so, this is not the distinction Brown should want to account for the verb ‘εἶναι’. For the intransitive use of a verb is not at work just when the verb takes no complement at all, but just when the verb takes no direct object. So, if I say ‘Justin advances slowly’, a complement is added and the verb is intransitive. Moreover, O’Brien 2013a: 225-6 remarks that in an intransitive use of a transitive verb the meaning of the verb circumscribes, even silently, the nature of the object it takes when used transitively. We know that what can be taught is something teachable, that can be eaten is something edible, even though the direct object is left unspecified. Not so for the verb ‘to be’, which leaves entirely open what kind of being is the subject of which it is predicated. 46 Quoting Kahn 1981: 108. In cauda, I should like to note that, in my view, one way to make progress here is to observe that the claim that ‘εἶναι’ exhibits a semantic continuity across syntactically different uses, and the claim that ‘to be is to be something’ do not need to go together. Thus, one can suggest that an existential use of the verb ‘εἶναι’ can easily lead to a use of the same verb as a copula (with no change in the meaning of the verb), without also be committed to the claim that ‘uncomplemented’ (existential) occurrences of ‘is’ are ‘pregnant with the incomple copula’ or that ‘the core of being is being something’.

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Conclusion. I have argued that the two-pronged positive side of Brown’s formulation (‘X is

(complete use) entails X is something and X is F entails X is’) is not fully supported by the text, except for the claim that the copula has existential import. I shall defer some considerations on the negative side (‘X is not (complete use) is equivalent to X is not anything at all’) to chapter 6. But letme warn about one point for the time being. While I am committed to the claim that the copula has existential import, such a commitment is exclusively restricted to the positive uses of the copula.

The negative use of the copula, in my view, is and must be uncommitted. This is not to say, as Owen worried, that Plato ‘has found a use of the verb “to be” in which only its positive occurrences have significance’, nor that he retains ‘a positive use of the verb as luminous but reject[s] the negative as wholly dark’47. Both the positive and negative uses have significance: it is just that the latter does not entail the non-existence of the subject, because, as we shall see, it does not outlaw the participation in Being of the subject of which it is predicated. Thus, the Sophist does not license the claim, as Brown sees, that the statement ‘X is not F’ entails that X does not exist48. The reason for this is, again, to be found in the state of affairs which explains the statement ‘X is not F’. For the appropriate metaphysical analysis of the statement ‘X is not F’ is that X partakes in Difference with respect to F49. There is no question of denying X’s participation in the Kind Being. Indeed, in order to partake in the Kind Difference, X must partake in the Kind Being with respect to the Kind

Difference. So not only is it not part of the claim made by ‘X is not F’ is that ‘X is not’, namely a claim of non-existence; but it is a crucial and distinctive aspect of Plato’s account of not-being that

47 Cf. Owen 1971: 229. I return to this issue in §4.1. 48 Cf. again Crombie 1962: 499-500. This is what happens if what Brown calls ‘Unhealty Schema’ is implemented (cf. Brown 1994: 229): X is F à X is; X is not F à X is not. I leave out of consideration whether Plato had ever operated with the Unhealty Schema (Brown suggests that he did at R. 475-80). 49 For example, ‘Motion is different from Identity’ (256a3) is analyzed as ‘Motion partakes in Difference with respect to Identity’ (256a5; 256b2-4).

156 negative predications presuppose the existence of their subjects, namely their participation in the

Kind Being. Accordingly, in negative predications the verb εἶναι has an exclusively copulative meaning.

So, while I profess commitment to the claim that the copula has existential import, I stand by the view that, in Plato’s Sophist, 1-place being, as analyzed in terms of participation in the Kind

Being, has a genuinely existential meaning. To the extent that an independent Kind Being is given pride of place in Plato’s eidetic realm and participation in it is thematized, then – I submit, contrary to the post-Kahn orthodoxy – existence does emerge as a distinct concept in Greek philosophy50. On the other hand, when a complement is added to a form of the verb εἶναι and we are in the presence of 2-place being, the meaning is copulative, which includes an assertion of the existence of the subject of which it is predicated, but is not confined to it. The state of affairs explaining this second meaning involves participation in two Kinds, the Kind Being and another Kind F.

The semantic-continuity thesis may correctly capture a phenomenon of the Greek language, namely, that an existential use of the verb ‘εἶναι’ can easily lead to use of the same verb as a copula.

It may even effectively account for the grammatical counterpart of the metaphysics of other dialogues, e.g. Republic, Symposium or Timaeus – although it falls beyond the scope of this dissertation to ascertain it. In my view, however, it throws limited light on the metaphysical view

Plato spells out in the Sophist. The reason is that in no other dialogue Plato isolates a Kind Being.

To assume, as e.g. Kahn does, that ‘in the Sophist and the Republic […] Plato has only one concept

50 One might even wonder whether we could go so far as to say that, since the copula has existential import, but the existential ‘is’ does not have copulative import, there is a salient sense in which, if there is such a thing as a systematic and unified ‘network of interdependent concepts’ – as Kahn calls it –formed by the variety of uses of einai

(Kahn 2003 [1973]: IX), the center of gravity of this network is not ‘the notion of predication’, but that of existence. While I do not claim full commitment to this view, which would require a lot more textual support, I should like to signal that this would be one fruitful way to develop the insights of West 2016 – for whom, contra Kahn, the original use of the Indo-European verb corresponding to εἶναι is the existential one.

157 of Being […] a concept that will cover the notions of existence predication, identity, truth, and perhaps more’51, means to overlook that in dialogues such as Republic or Timaeus, ‘being’ (τὸ ὄν,

οὐσία) refers to the intelligible domain in general, as opposed to the domain of ‘becoming’ (γένεσις); but in the Sophist Plato singles out being as just one among the Kinds. This can hardly be without consequences for the study of Plato’s conception of being.

51 Kahn 2003 [1973]: XII. One gets the same impression from Brown 1994, where the Republic and the Sophist are taken to operate with the same concept of being (though Brown argues that the concept of not-being undergoes a significant change from the former to the latter dialogue).

Chapter 5

Quantification, Modality and Power

Among the reasons that have led scholars to deny the presence of any notion of existence in Plato’s thought is the one that we cannot find in the dialogues (or, for that matter, in ancient philosophical texts more generally) anything like the quantified conception of existence defended by Frege,

Russell and Quine; or any version of the modal conception of existence operative in discussions about creation among medieval (both Islamic and Latin) and early modern philosophers1.

One might suspect that the arguments I have developed in the previous three chapter were aimed at finding in the dialogues at least some version of either of these two conceptions of existence. After all, even in recent literature there have been attempts to show that Plato’s notion of existence does not essentially differ from the quantified one advocated in the Frege-Russell tradition2. Yet, I should like to make clear that was by no means my goal. In the present chapter, I want to show that, while I think Plato does operate with a notion of existential being, corresponding to the property obtained via participation in the Kind Being, nothing in the text suggests that this notion is to be accounted for either in quantificational (§5.1) or modal terms (§5.2).

So how should we understand Plato’s notion of existence? This seems quite a relevant issue, because one might protest that an account of existence claiming that existence is a property of

1 This is crystal clear in Kahn 1976: 323; but also, I believe, in Gilson 1952. See also the remarks in Knuuttila-

Hintikka 1986: IX-XII and White 1993: XXVII-XXVIII. 2 Cf. Thomas 2008: 657-8, which I discuss below.

158 159 everything that exists seems unilluminating unless more can be said about that property3.

Unfortunately, no straightforward answer to this question is found in the Sophist (nor, for that matter, in any other dialogue). We are persistently told that being (simpliciter) is an attribute obtained in virtue of the participation in the Kind Being, but there seems to be no comparable clear stance on what exactly it means for something to be.

Still, there is one candidate answer that appears more promising than others as a solution to our puzzle. It is the so-called ‘dunamis proposal’4, namely the ‘ὅρος’ of being the ES puts forward at 247d8-e4 in the context of his critical assessment of the materialists. We encountered this proposal in the first chapter:

I say, then, that a thing genuinely is if it has some power, of whatever sort, either to act

on another thing, of whatever nature, or to be acted upon, even to the slightest degree

and by the most trivial of things, and even if it is just the once. That is, the definition that

defines the things that are as being, I propose, is nothing other than power’5.

3 Cf. e.g. Dale 2009: 231. However, one might observe, with Butchvarov 1979: 82-3, that three types of questions about existence should be distinguished: (1) What does exist?; (2) What is it for something to exist?; (3) What is the general status of existence? i.e., What sort of situation, or fact, or state of affairs, is the existence of something? Is existence a property, an “essence”? Question (3) Butchvarov judges ‘more fundamental than the second, and [he adds that] an orderly investigation of existence must begin with it’. Thus, to say that being is a property (of which a Kind is metaphysically responsible) is perhaps not such an uninformative claim as it may appear at first blush. 4 The label is due to Brown 1998. As noted by Fronterotta 1995: 320 n. 2 and Leigh 2010: 65 and n. 6, this ὅρος has generally attracted the attention of the scholars comparatively less than other passages or doctrines of the dialogues. Thus, influential studies on the Sophist, such as Bluck 1975 [1963], Frede 1967 or Seligman 1974, either simply pass over this ὅρος or barely devote a few lines to it. It might be significant that, unlike these modern interpreters, ancient authors seem to have taken our ὅρος more seriously, cf. e.g. Procl. PT III 9.38.4-8, 21.74.11-18; Damasc. Pr. II 75.20-21; Simp. in Ph. 827.2-3; but see perhaps already Arist. GC I 7; Epicur. Ep. Hrd. §67; and especially the Stoic texts quoted and examined by Brunschwig 1994 [1988]. 5 The formula is repeated at 248c5, slightly differently phrased: ἡ τοῦ πάσχειν ἣ δρᾶν […] δύναµις.

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The peremptory tone with which this proposal is broached by the ES, including the insistent usage of a vocabulary one would tend to associate with the notion of definition (e.g. ‘ὅρος’ [247e3;

248c4], ‘ὁρίζειν’ [247e3], ‘οὐκ ἄλλο τι’ [247e4]), might recommend the ‘dunamis proposal’ as an appropriate answer to the question: ‘What is it for something to be?’.

But things are hardly so easy. We have seen that the materialists end up accepting the ‘dunamis proposal’, but the idealists stubbornly make opposition. And we have also seen that even after the refutation of the idealists, the ES does not return to the dunamis proposal, as one might perhaps have expected. Instead, the dunamis proposal seemingly disappears from the dialogue and gets temporarily replaced by the logos of being stated by the ‘children’s prayer’, which will soon come under fire too and be dismissed. One might therefore surmise that the ‘dunamis proposal’ was not a serious Platonic definition of being, but a provisional polemical formula only meant to serve to advance the argument6. Accordingly, it looks as though Plato stops short of endorsing what appeared to us as the most promising candidate to illuminate his conception of existential being.

It will not come as a surprise, then, that several commentators, from different quarters, have boldly concluded that in effect Plato deems pure being indefinable – and that this emerges via negativa from the doxographic section of the Sophist, which is aporetic7.

Nevertheless, I intend to entertain the hypothesis that this cannot be the whole story and that

Plato is here inviting the reader to work out part of the argument for herself. Thus, I shall propose to distinguish between the surface of the dialectical exchange staged in the dialogue and a Platonic

6 The main proponent of this reading has been Diès 1909, followed by several commentators. But see already the dubitative remarks by Campbell 1867: 124 n.5. 7 Cf. e.g. Diès 1909: 17 and passim; Shorey 1903: 39, 1933: 298-9; Moravcsik 1962: 30; Guthrie 1978: 140;

Notomi 1999: 218; Crivelli 2012: 101.

161 doctrinal undercurrent8. I will argue that although the Sophist does not overtly endorse any

‘official’ solution to what it means for something to be (simpliciter), there are reasons to think that through the ‘dunamis proposal’ Plato wants at least to hint at the right solution.

5.1. Existence and Quantification

Outline of the quantificational account of existence. In this section I set out to show that Plato’s conception of being is at odds with a reputable and widespread ontological tradition in contemporary philosophy, most notably represented by Frege, Russell and Quine. Let me first provide a brief sketch of the conceptions of existence defended by these philosophers. Though not identical, these conceptions arguably share at least the following two theses: (i) existence is not a real property of individuals – an idea often traced back to the Kantian motto ‘existence is not a real predicate’9; and (ii) the notion of existence is captured (not by a predicate-term, but) by the existential quantifier of the canonical notation of elementary logic.

8 The problem of the relationship between the dialogical and the authorial level is too complex to be dealt with here. Nevertheless, it seems to me a healthy (and quite widespread) hermeneutic practice not to identify mechanically the dramatic outcome of a dialogue with Plato’s own philosophical convictions, cf. e.g. Burnyeat 2002; Sedley 2004: 6-8, 28 and passim; Gill 2012: 5; but see especially Erler 2007. 9 Cf. Kant, KGS II: 72 (Beweisgrund); Kritik der reinen Vernunft A598-9/B626-7, with Stang 2015. Kant denies that existence is a real predicate (or a determination: the two expressions are synonymous), while allowing that it is a logical predicate (in the Beweisgrund (II: 72) he goes so far as to allow that one can safely use ‘existence’ as a predicate, provided that one does not derive existence from merely possible concepts). A logical predicate, for Kant, is any concept that can figure in a judgment, either as subject or as predicate. A real predicate is, arguably, one of the marks analytically contained in the subject-concept (cf. Stang 2015: 595-6 for both definitions). Contemporary analytic philosophers after Frege deny that it is a logical predicate. For critical remarks on the slogan (in its contemporary analytic version), cf. Barnes 1972: 39-45. The idea that existence is not a real property can, in any case, safely be traced back before Kant, cf. e.g. Gassendi in Descartes, Meditationes, AT VII, 322-5; Hume, A Treatise on Human Nature, 1.2.6.

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Frege developed this view by maintaining that existence is not a property of individuals, but of concepts10. The property in question is that of being instantiated. The existential quantifier (‘∃’) captures such a property. More precisely, ‘to exist’ is a second-level predicate, which expresses a second-level concept under which a first-level concept falls if and only if it has at least one instance. For example, in the quantified formula ∃xFx the existential quantifier tells us that there is at least one thing for which the first-level predicate-term F is instantiated11. Similarly, Russell conceived of existence as a property of propositional functions. The existential quantifier captures such a property, and tells us that a certain propositional function ‘x is F’ is true for at least one value of its variable12. On Quine’s view, (i) and (ii) are set out quite differently. Quine does not deny that existence is a feature of individuals. Indeed, existence is a trivial feature of anything whatsoever: everything exists13. Since, however, ordinary predicates discriminate, i.e., split the world into those things which do and those which do not possess them, it follows that existence cannot be a real predicate (it is not the case that there are things which do not exist). Its notion is, again, captured by the existential quantifier. But what the quantifier expresses in ∃xFx is less that the concept F has the property of being instantiated, or that the propositional function Fx has the property of being sometimes true, than that the variable bound by the quantifier has a value.

Whence, the famous motto setting the criterion of ontological commitment: ‘to be is to be the value of a bound variable’.

10 Frege 1884: §53. The best illustration of the Fregean view of quantification as a second-level function remains

Dummett 1973: 34-53. Menn 2008 credits Al-Fārābī for having first set forth this idea (in the Kitāb al-Hurūf). Cf. also Kant, Beweisgrund II: 72-3. 11 This way of conceiving of existential statements is often framed within set-theory. If ∃xFx, then the number of Fs, that is of the members of the set F (which are the things instantiating the concept F) is not zero. 12 Cf. Russell 1905. 13 Cf. Quine 1948: 21.

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The application of the quantified notion of existence to Plato and its problems. Some commentators, for example Thomas, have argued that, although Plato obviously lacked the canonical notation of modern symbolic logic, and thus the notion of a quantifier, ‘the concept of existence we post-Fregeans, post-Russellians possess’ – as she puts it – is in all essentials to be found already in Plato14. Leaving aside the purported extent of the pronoun ‘we’, it seems to me that this view can be questioned and that Plato would not have shared a quantificational conception of existence. This is not, again, for the trivial reason that he lacked the modern logical notion of a quantifier. There are two more weighty reasons:

1) First, there is no evidence that Plato thought of the verb ‘to be’, used as a complete predicate and expressing participation in the Kind Being, as an expression telling us something about quantity – i.e., letting us know that for a number n>0 of things a certain property F is instantiated or exemplified. Frege famously stated in §53 of the Grundlagen: ‘existence is analogous to number. Affirmation of existence is in fact nothing but denial of the number nought’. He is echoed, among others, by Van Inwagen, one of the most prominent recent advocates of the quantified notion of existence, who writes: ‘the concept of being is closely allied with the concept of number: to say that there are Xs is to say that the number of Xs is 1 or more – and to say nothing more profound, nothing more interesting, nothing more’15.

The ascription of a view along these lines to Plato faces two difficulties. First, for Plato a numerical attribute is obtained by participation in the relevant Kind whose name names that attribute – e.g. oneness is obtained by participation in the Form of Oneness16. And the Form of

14 Cf. Thomas 2008: 657-8. 15 Cf. Van Inwagen 2001: 4. See already Van Inwagen 1998: 236. 16 Cf. Phd. 101c4-7: οὐκ ἔχεις ἄλλην τινὰ αἰτίαν τοῦ δύο γενέσθαι ἀλλ' ἢ τὴν τῆς δυάδος µετάσχεσιν, καὶ δεῖν

τούτου µετασχεῖν τὰ µέλλοντα δύο ἔσεσθαι, καὶ µονάδος ὃ ἂν µέλλῃ ἓν ἔσεσθαι.

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Being is not a most generic Form of Quantity. Second, if Plato were committed to such a conception of existence, the top-down order of priority distinctive of his metaphysics would be subverted. For the existence of a given Form F would be explained from its instantiations.

But surely, it might be objected, Plato thinks existent things are countable entities? Consider for example the first argument sustaining the claim that it is impossible to say what is not in the

Sophist (237b7-e7)17. The ES argues against the possible suggestion that even if ‘not being’ cannot be applied to any being, it could nonetheless be applied to something. His strategy to dispose of this proposal consists in stressing there is no ‘something’ (τι) which is not also a ‘being’ (ὄν): we always apply ‘something’ to a thing that is. More precisely, he pursues this strategy by urging that whoever says ‘something’ (τόν τι λέγοντα) says ‘at least one thing’ (ἕν γέ τι λέγειν), since the indefinite pronoun ‘something’ (τι) is a sign of one (ἑνὸς […] σηµεῖον). But the numerical attribute

‘one’ can only be applied to something that is18. So that, since ‘something’ and ‘one’ can only refer to beings, ‘not-being’ cannot be applied to ‘something’. This passage suggests that Plato is committed to the view that numerical attributes imply existence: if something is countable, it must also exist. At 238b6-8, the ES goes even further and submits that we cannot think or speak of something ‘without number’ (χωρίς ἀριθµοῦ). The referents of contentful thought and meaningful speech must be countable entities19.

While I agree with this reconstruction of the argument in this passage, I think it cuts no ice against the claim that Plato did not conceive of existence in quantificational terms. For the claim

17 Analysis in Crivelli 2012: 32-42. 18 This premise is not stated, but should likely be supplied, cf. again Crivelli 2012: 38. On the relationship between ‘something’ and ‘being’ in this argument and the Sophist more generally see Aubenque 1991 (who correctly stresses the difference between the Stoic and Plato’s view on the matter, see below n. 21). 19 Cf. Thomas 2008: 641-3.

165 that numerical attributes imply existence means that for every numerical attribute F, and for every object X, if F holds true of X, then x must also exist. Nothing in this formulation commits us to (or even suggests) the claim that existence statements are statements about number (of instantiations).

2) Second, Plato is not committed to the view that properties (and therefore the predicates denoting them) must discriminate. Consider Russell’s following remark from The Philosophy of

Logical Atomism:

‘There is no sort of point in a predicate which could not conceivably be false. I mean,

it is perfectly clear that, if there were such a thing as this existence of individuals that

we talk of, it would be absolutely impossible for it not to apply, and that is the

characteristic of a mistake.

Russell explains that if you consider ‘exists’ as a genuine predicate, you are doomed to circularity:

You get into confusion through language, because it is a perfectly correct thing to say

“All the things in the world exist”, and it is so easy to pass from this to “This exists

because it is a thing in the world”20.

I take it that Plato would not have shared either of Russell’s points. As we have seen in the previous chapter, Plato holds that there are some Kinds that are universally participated in. These

Kinds, just like every other Kind, are metaphysically responsible for the properties their names name. The Kind Being is one such Kind. Therefore, the property caused by the Kind Being is indeed real, but does not split the world into those things which do and those which do not possess it: the property of being does not fail to apply to anything21. Thus, the property of being is a real property and not merely a trivial feature which we tend to ascribe to things because of a deception

20 Both quotations are from Russell 2010b [1918]: 77. 21 Moravcsik 1962: 28 claims that for Plato ‘existence is not an attribute [because] it does not separate a certain class of entities from all else’. But there is no evidence that for Plato attributes must separate classes of entities.

166 deposited in ordinary language. Nor will we thereby find ourselves trapped in the quicksand of circularity. For Plato, unlike Russell, would not expound ‘all the things in the world exist’ by passing from this to ‘this exists because it is a thing in the world’. Instead, he explains ‘Motion is’ as ‘Motion partakes in the Kind Being’. So there is no circularity, but only the appeal to what Plato customarily regards as the adequate cause of something’s possession of a certain property.

Plato is not a ‘Meinongian’ either. Until recent times, the main rival of the conception of existence defended by Frege, Russell and Quine was Meinong’s. Someone who conceives of the history of the concept of existence along these (narrow) binary coordinates (Frege-Russell-Quine vs

Meinong) might think that my considerations in the previous sub-section were meant to pave the way for the dubious portrayal of a Meinongian Plato. Nothing could be further from my intentions.

As a matter of fact, the foregoing remarks are also effective against attempts to assimilate Plato’s conception of existence to Meinongianism. According to Meinong’s Gegestandtheorie, existence is a full-fledged property splitting the world into into things which possess it and things which do not22. Thus, existence is not captured by the existential quantifier of the canonical notation of elementary logic and it is entirely legitimate to say that there are objects that do not exist. The principled reason for this is that Meinong postulated a general notion of ‘object’ which branches out into existing and non-existing objects. Non-existent objects, including (but not confined to) fictional objects and possibilia, are not a pure nothing, they just subsist. This is enough to refer to them: it is just because of a mere ‘prejudice in favor of the actual’ (Das Vorurteil zugunsten des

Wirklichen), as Meinong puts it, that some philosophers think we cannot.

22 Cf. Meinong 1904. See also Berto 2013 for a recent extensive defense of a version of Meinongianism. My hunch is that Berto (2012 and 2013: 61-2) has some tendency to liken Plato’s position to Meinong’s.

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Plato, I submit, would not have subscribed to such a conception of existence either. There are at least two reasons why he would have rather not. I have already mentioned that Plato is not committed to the view that properties must discriminate. Notably, he does not think that the property being splits the world into things which possess it and things which do not: everything possesses it. So for Plato it is not the case that the world is divided between existent and non- existent objects. Second, and correlatively, Sph. 237d1-2, along with other passages, shows that

Plato did not admit that there is ‘something’ (τι) that is not also a ‘being’ (ὄν): whenever we apply

‘something’, we apply it to a thing that is. More precisely, since the particular quantifier

‘something’ expresses the numerical attribute ‘one’ and this last implies existence, then

‘something’ will have existential import too. Thus, let S stand for the predicate ‘is something’: for every x, if S holds true of x, then x must also exist. Accordingly, there is no room in Plato’s ontology for an ‘object’ (as Meinongians would put it) which is ‘something’ without existing23.

23 Courtine 2007: 95-8 perceptively stresses that it is this ‘interdit platonicien de la « tino-logie » qui sera précisément et qui devait être levé bien plus tard dans l’École de Brentano’, including, of course, Meingong himself. In the antiquity, the Stoics famously made a major attempt to distinguish ‘something’ (τι) from ‘being’ (ὄν), on which see the magisterial paper by Brunschwig 1994 [1988]. The Stoics designed an articulated hierarchical map of reality having the supreme genus of ‘something’ (τι) atop. This genus then branches out into bodies and incorporeals. The former exist, the latter just subsist (ὑφίστανται). In a nutschell, the basic argument for this proposal works as follows. The Stoics conceived of ‘existence’ as the capacity to act or to be acted upon (ποιεῖν καὶ πάσχειν), i.e. to be part of a causal relation. But since the Stoics also thought that bodies alone, viz. tri-dimensional solids with resistance, have such a capacity, because there is no acting or being acted upon without contact and contact can only occur between bodies, they inferred that bodies alone exist. Still, the Stoics also urged that incorporeals, including time, place, void, the sayable (λεκτόν) and possibly fictional objects, are not just a blank nothing: they just subsist as ‘something’ and are a legitimate and genuinely significant subject of predication. It is remarkable that the Stoics, as thoroughly proved by Brunschwig 1994 [1988], elaborated such a complex ontology in a dialectical confrontation with Plato’s Sophist. The contrast between the Stoics and Plato is also stressed by Aubenque 1991b. For some coordinates on the medieval developments of this ‘tinological’ model, see the brief overview by Aertsen 2011.

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5.2. Existence and Modality

Three examples of the modal conception of existence. There is another relevant respect in which

Plato’s conception of being, as analyzed in terms of participation in the Kind Being, differs

significantly from that of other figures of the history of philosophy, e.g., Avicenna, Descartes,

Kant and Meinong. Again, these philosophers’ conceptions of being obviously differ from one

another in many respects. Still there is arguably a common denominator among them: they

conspicuously involve modal notions. Here are some rough and compressed examples:

• Consider how Avicenna begins his proof of the necessary existent in the Salvation:

‘Undoubtedly there is existence, and all existence is either necessary or possible. If it is

necessary, then in fact there is a necessarily existent being, which is what is sought. If it is

possible, then we will show that the existence of the possible terminates in a necessarily

existent being’ (II.12.566-7). The discussion of these two modes of existence is related to the

distinction between essence and existence. For (non-mental) existence is not included in the

quiddity of a possible (contingent) thing, which in itself may or may not exist. If a possible

thing exists, then it must have a cause outside it. Thus, everything except the uncaused (or

self-caused) first principle, which is necessary as to its own existence, is in itself, only

possible. It exists insofar as it is rendered necessarily existent by something else (ultimately

God). (Non-mental) existence is then the transition from the realm of the possible to that of

the necessary24.

• Kant objected to (a version of) the ontological argument that the predicate ‘is’ figuring in a

judgement does not add a new predicate to the concept of the subject. In an existential

24 Cf. Lizzini 2003. Notice that this does not commit Avicenna to admit non-existent things. All contingent

things do exist. ‘Thing’ and ‘existent’ are intentionally different and extensionally identical. Things are contingent in themselves and exist necessarily by virtue of the necessarily existent principle.

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judgement, ‘I only posit the subject in itself with all its predicates and indeed posit the object in

relation to my concept’. A concept expresses ‘the mere possibility’ of an object, the predicate

‘is’ (in its existential meaning) its actuality: two modal categories. ‘But the actual contains

nothing more than the merely possible’. Whence, the notorious ‘hundred dollars’ argument25.

• We saw Meinong launching his ‘Theory of Objects’ to free philosophical discourse from the

‘prejudice in favour of the actual’26. And, by contrast, Quine’s quantificational account of

existence was aimed, among other things, to save ‘the good old word “exist”’ from those

philosophers (in all likelihood a silent polemical reference to Meinong) who ruined it by

espousing unactualized possibles and limiting the word ‘existence’ to actuality. Whence, the

other most famous argument of ‘the fat man in the doorway’, who, along with all other

possibilia would allegedly contribute to overpopulate the universe27.

No modal conception of existence in Plato. The expectations of a reader who will look for similar modal treatments of being in Plato’s dialogue will be frustrated. Unlike all these philosophers,

Plato did not frame his conception of participation in the Kind Being in modal terms. More precisely, in analysing 1-place being in terms of participation in the Kind Being, he was not concerned with the gap between mere possibilia and actual existents or between contingent and necessary beings. His view of being as a property obtained via participation in the Kind Being is embedded in his own metaphysics of the Forms and is to be understood within this distinctive framework. I am not suggesting that there is no way to make Platonism amenable to modal

25 Cf. again Stang 2015: 619-22. 26 Cf. Meinong 1904: 3-7. 27 Cf. Quine 1948: 23-4.

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ontological analysis or to draw a modal account of existence from Platonic metaphysical premises.

But such a modal analysis of being is foreign to Plato’s dialogues. So although I would agree that

there is a sense in which Plato’s discussion of not-being was ‘the fountainhead of subsequent

discussion of non-existent individuals’, I would not go so far as to say that Plato’s ‘treatment of these

matters is the precursor of all later treatments of the problem’28. This is worth emphasizing, I think,

especially in consideration of the fact that, as is well known, Quine gave such a problem the notorious

and influential label of ‘Plato’s beard’ and, in addition, misleadingly suggested that this ‘is the old

Platonic riddle of non-being’29. We will see in chapter 6 why this suggestion should be resisted.

5.3. The Dunamis Proposal

In the last two sections I have argued that there is no textual ground to account for Plato’s notion

of being (viz. of the property obtained by participation in the Kind Being) either in quantificational

or in modal terms. It is now time to turn to the positive interpretative hypothesis concerning the

‘dunamis proposal’ that I announced in the opening of this chapter. Let me quote again the proposal

in full for ease of reference:

I say, then, that a thing genuinely is if it has some power30, of whatever sort, either to

act on another thing, of whatever nature, or to be acted upon, even to the slightest degree

28 Both quotations are from Rescher 1969: 74-5. 29 Cf. Quine 1948: 21. See on this point Thomas 2008, and also p.95 n.36 above. A suggestive discussion of

Plato’s aporia of non-being, not always historically flawless but philosophically penetrating, can be read in Sasso 1995: 39-55, 199-207. 30 Minor point of translation: to render ‘δύναµις’ as ‘capacity’ (as Rowe and others do) might perhaps deceptively

suggests a distinction between the capacity and its use. Similarly, ‘potentiality’ or ‘potency’ have immediate Aristotelian echoes. Thus, I have settled for the translation ‘power’, which seems to me the least misleading.

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and by the most trivial of things, and even if it is just the once. That is, the definition31

that defines the things that are as being, I propose, is nothing other than power’.

λέγω δὴ τὸ καὶ ὁποιανοῦν τινα κεκτηµένον δύναµιν εἴτ᾽ εἰς τὸ ποιεῖν ἕτερον ὁτιοῦν

πεφυκὸς εἴτ᾽ εἰς τὸ παθεῖν καὶ σµικρότατον ὑπὸ τοῦ φαυλοτάτου, κἂν εἰ µόνον εἰς ἅπαξ,

πᾶν τοῦτο ὄντως εἶναι: τίθεµαι γὰρ ὅρον ὁρίζειν τὰ ὄντα ὡς ἔστιν οὐκ ἄλλο τι πλὴν

δύναµις32.

The formula is repeated at 248c4-5, in slightly different phraseology:

I think we proposed that it was a sufficient definition of beings that they should have the

power either of being acted on, or of acting on, even in relation to the slightest thing?

Ἱκανὸν ἔθεµεν ὅρον που τῶν ὄντων, ὅταν τῳ παρῇ ἡ τοῦ πάσχειν ἢ δρᾶν33 καὶ πρὸς

τὸ σµικρότατον δύναµις;

The dunamis proposal establishes that to be is to have the power to act or being acted upon.

31 The translation ‘definition’ will be justified in the next sub-section. 32 Cf. Campbell 1867: 124 n.5 for textual issues. Campbell speculates that ‘there is probably an ellipse of ‘δεῖν’ at 247e4 after ‘ὁρίζειν’, but he does not print it in the main text, as instead does Robinson in the new OCT (cf. Duke et alii 1995: ad loc. and Robinson 1999: 150 for his discussion of this choice). I follow Rowe in rejecting Robinson’s insertion of δεῖν, which is not attested in the MSS tradition and does not actually solve the grammatical issues of the sentence, which remains arduous. Diès 1925: 355 follows the MSS too. 33 I take ‘δρᾶν’ to be a mere synonym of ‘ποιεῖν’. Notice also that both formulations of our ὅρος include a disjunctive formula (247e1: ‘εἴτ᾽… εἴτ᾽’; 248c5: ἢ). The power in question is therefore that of acting or being acted upon. This need not mean that acting and being acted upon are mutually exclusive. For at 248c8 the disjunction is replaced by a conjunction: τοῦ πάσχειν καὶ ποιεῖν. The disjunction in the two main statements of the proposal is therefore inclusive.

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Criterion or definition? A first issue to investigate pertains the predicative status of this proposal.

One might incline promptly to assume that ‘ὅρος’ (repeated twice: 247e3, 248c4) indicates a definition, viz. a complete account of something’s essence. Indeed, at 247e3 we also have the emphatic (if grammatically quite puzzling) phrase ‘ὅρον ὁρίζειν’ which, together with the general solemn tone of the ES’ pronouncement34, seems to lay stress on the fact that we are in the presence of a formal account of being. This supposition may be further corroborated by ‘ὁποιανοῦν’ at 247d8, which is presumably meant to point to the universal value of this characterization, that is its application to all beings (qua beings).

This seems to me the most natural way to read these lines and, in fact, it is how a conspicuous number of exegetes have interpreted them since the antiquity35. I shall dub this the ‘definition reading’. However, it will be necessary to articulate and justify this reading more adequately and comprehensively, especially since there is also a long and distinguished line of commentators – first among them Cornford – who have contended that the ‘dunamis proposal’ gives not a definition but a mere mark or criterion of being36. I shall refer to this as the ‘criterion reading’.

34 Exhibited, for example, by declarative verbs at the first person singular (cf. 247d8: λέγω; e3: τίθεµαι). Cf.

Cordero 2000: 42 and Leigh 2010: 65-7 (pace Centrone 2008: 147 n.107). 35 Cf. the ancient autors mentioned above at n.4 of this chapter and, among the modern interpreters: cf. e.g. Grote

1875: 416–17, 436–44; Zeller 1875: 574-84; Diès 1909: 17-38; Souilhé 1919: 154; Heidegger 1992 [1924/5]: 463-86; Friedländer 1930: 267; Owen 1971: 229-30 n. 14; Guthrie 1978: 139 n.2 (though, curiously, in the main text he refers to the ‘dunamis proposal’ as a ‘criterion’); de Rijk 1985: 101-2 and n. 12; Cordero 1993: 47-8 n.58; Fronterotta 1995; Leigh 2010; Gill 2012: 96-7; Teisserenc 2012: 91-5; Hestir 2016: 105-43; Sabrier 2016: 55-62; Lefebvre 2018: 315- 6, 323-4. 36 Cf. e.g. Cornford 1935: VII-VIII, 238 n.3; Cherniss 1944: 452-3 n.897; Moravcsik 1962: 37; Bluck 1975 [1963]:

93; Seligman 1974: 31-2; Brown 1998: 192-3; Politis 2006: 158 and n.16; Castelli 2007: 432-3. Dixsaut 2001: 153-4 n.2 says that ‘cette célèbre « définition provisoire » de l’être par la puissance n’est pas une définition, mais c’est à coup sûr un critère’ (my emphasis). However, in Dixsaut 2015: ch. 2 she seems to have significantly modified such a clear-cut position (which was left unargued in her 2001 book). Here she claims that ‘la formule de l’Étranger est une

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Before turning to considering the main argument submitted by the latter fringe of interpreters against the ‘definition reading’, let me preliminarily emphasize one point that has seldom adequately been brought out in the studies. It is one issue to determine the predicative status of the ‘dunamis proposal’; quite a different issue to verify whether Plato himself endorsed it. Thus, one might embrace the ‘definition reading’, without committing herself to the claim that this is the ‘official’

Platonic definition of being37. With this proviso, let us move to the heart of the controversy.

Partisans of the ‘criterion reading’ maintain that ‘λόγος’, and not ‘ὅρος’, is the standard

Platonic term for a definition38. The latter term must instead be understood as designating a mark or a criterion, not a definition. We may wonder what exactly distinguishes the two. Although

Cornford and the other proponents of the ‘criterion proposal’ do not spell this out explicitly, we may gather from their considerations that what they have in mind is somewhat akin to the

Aristotelian distinction between a definition and a proprium39.

According to the standard account of the Topics, a proprium (ἴδιον) is ‘something which does not indicate the essence of a thing, but yet belongs to that thing alone, and is predicated convertibly of it’40. Thus, a proprium does not capture what something essentially is – as a definition does41 –

définition « délimitante » de cette sorte et il n’y a pas lieu de trancher entre critère et définition ; définir un étant en tant qu’il est, c’est fournir un critère à quoi reconnaître son « étance »’, and adds latet that ‘toute la suite du Dialogue repose sur cette définition qu’on voudrait provisoire’; see n.50 below. 37 This is, for example, the case of Diès 1909: 17-38. 38 Cf. also Dancy 2004: 23-5 on this point. 39 The only scholar I know of who explicitly appeals to Aristotle’s distinction between a proprium and a definition to illuminate the status of the characterization of being in the Sophist is Castelli 2007: 432. 40 Cf. Top. A 1.102a18-20: ὃ µὴ δηλοῖ µὲν τὸ τί ἦν εἶναι, µόνῳ δ᾽ὑπάρχει καὶ ἀντικατηγορεῖται τοῦ πράγµατος. 41 Cf. Top. A 1.101b37-8: ἔστι δ᾽ὅρος µὲν λόγος ὁ τὸ τἰ ἦν εἶναι σηµαίνων.

174 but an attribute that is coextensive to a species by belonging to all and only them42. In other words, among the necessary properties predicated convertibly of a subject, Aristotle distinguishes between those which are just necessary (proprium), and those which are not only necessary but also essential (definition). Thus, the Sophist’s ‘ὅρος’ of being, according to the advocates of the

‘criterion proposal’, is only a feature belonging to all beings, but does not capture the feature which makes them being43.

This objection can be answered. Admittedly, ‘ὅρος’ (etymologically: ‘demarcation’, ‘spatial limit’) is not for Plato a technical term as it will be for Aristotle, and it should not systematically be taken to indicate a proper definition in the dialogues44. Nevertheless, this by no means implies that it never designates a definition, as passages from Gorgias, Phaedrus, Republic and Statesman show45. On a purely terminological ground, then, this first argument is less than decisive46.

But how can we make sure whether ‘ὅρος’ stands for a ‘definition’ or a ‘criterion’ in the

‘dunamis proposal’? Testing it against the Topics’ technical account of definition47 will hardly do, because it is doubtful that Plato shares all the logical rules and requirements imposed by Aristotle.

42 Cornford 1935: 238 n.3 uses the telling example of ‘being capable of laughter’ as a feature belonging to all and only human beings, although it does not express their definition. 43 This reading is able to accommodate ‘ὁποιανοῦν’ at 247d8, as a proprium too applies to all the members of a genus. 44 Cf. Ast 1835-8: II 476. 45 Pace de Strycker 1968: 144. Cf. Grg. 488c8-d1: ἢ ὁ αὐτὸς ὅρος ἐστὶν τοῦ βελτίονος καὶ τοῦ κρείττονος; τοῦτό

µοι αὐτὸ σαφῶς διόρισον, ταὐτὸν ἢ ἕτερόν ἐστιν τὸ κρεῖττον καὶ τὸ βέλτιον καὶ τὸ ἰσχυρότερον; Phdr. 237c8-d1: περὶ ἔρωτος οἷόν τ' ἔστι καὶ ἣν ἔχει δύναµιν, ὁµολογίᾳ θέµενοι ὅρον; R. 331d2-3: οὐκ ἄρα οὗτος ὅρος ἐστὶν δικαιοσύνης, ἀληθῆ τε λέγειν καὶ ἃ ἂν λάβῃ τις ἀποδιδόναι; Plt. 266e1: ἐπὶ τὸν τοῦ βασιλέως ὅρον. 46 For Brown too we cannot adjudicate the issue by simply looking at Plato’s terminology (cf. Brown 1998: 192-

93) and she adduces philosophical reasons (that I consider below) to reject the ‘definition reading’. 47 As Castelli 2007: 430 does.

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And after all, Aristotle himself hesitates about what status our characterization of being had for

Plato: at Top. E 139a4-8 he accepts it as a proprium48; while at Top. Z 146a22-23 he rejects it as a definition. Which shows that for Aristotle the formula can only be a proprium, but also that Aristotle was not entirely sure of the predicative status that the formula had for Plato.

Instead of looking at the Sophist with Aristotelian lenses, it seems more promising to scrutinize two textual signposts internal to the dialogue that suggest, I submit, that the ‘dunamis proposal’ is meant to be a definition. (i) First, the ES is improving on the materialists’ characterization of being as identical (ταὐτὸν) with body, which is intended as a definition49. Both are broached as answers to the definitional question about being launched by the ES, as I argued in chapter 1. (ii) Second, the ES emphasizes that, according to the ‘dunamis proposal’, beings are

‘nothing other than power’ (247e4: οὐκ ἄλλο τι πλὴν δύναµις). Not only does the phrase ‘οὐκ ἄλλο

τι πλὴν’ in itself intuitively suggest more than a mere mark, but is also often used by Plato in definitional contexts. For example, in the Phaedo learning is defined as ‘nothing other than recollection’ (72e4-5: ἡ µάθησις οὐκ ἄλλο τι ἢ ἀνάµνησις τυγχάνει οὖσα). At R. 338c1-2,

Thrasymachus defines justice as ‘nothing other than the advantage of the stronger’ (τὸ δίκαιον οὐκ

ἄλλο τι ἢ τὸ τοῦ κρείττονος συµφέρον). And at Tht 146d, in what may be the dialogues’ definition

‘zero’ of ἐπιστήµη, Theaeteus declares that knowledge is ‘geometry [but also] crafts such as cobbling, whether you take them together or separately. Knowledge is nothing but them (οὐκ ἄλλο

τι ἢ ἐπιστήµη εἶναι)’. Later, at 151e2, the first proper definition of ἐπιστήµη establishes that it ‘is nothing but sensation (οὐκ ἄλλο τί ἐστιν ἐπιστήµη ἢ αἴσθησις)’. More generally, the formula ‘οὐκ

ἄλλο τι’ strongly suggests that what comes after it is meant to provide a full and exclusive account

48 But be aware that Brunschwig 2007: 238 casts doubts on the authenticity of the passage. 49 Cf. Sph. 246b1: ὀριζόµενοι; and Tht. 163a7-8, 164a6-7 for the definitional use of ταὐτὸν.

176 of the true nature of the object referred to (whether or not it actually succeeds in doing so from Plato’s standpoint).

It can therefore be concluded that not only does nothing force us to believe that ‘ὅρος’ must indicate a mere mark, but there is also significant evidence that it does not indicate a mark and that the ‘dunamis proposal’ is therefore meant to be a definition50. Again, let me stress that this is not yet to say that the ‘dunamis proposal’ contains the Platonic definition of being. For it remains to be seen

– and this is obviously the most delicate issue – whether Plato endorses this definition or introduces it just for dialectical purposes and then abandons it. Three points have appeared to commentators to speak in favor of the latter option. I will scrutinize them one at a time in the following three sub- sections, by simultaneously providing a philosophical exegesis of the content of the ‘dunamis proposal’.

[1] Dunamis vs ousia. The first point concerns the priority of οὐσία over δύναµις in Plato’s ontology. It has been contended that for Plato ‘what it is to be can scarcely be cashed in terms of having this or that power, for (Plato would have insisted, I think) things have powers in virtue of what they are’51. I shall ask two questions: (a) Is this true? And (b) how exactly would this be an impediment for the ‘dunamis proposal’ to be accepted by Plato?

50 Dixsaut 2015: ch.2 argues that this cannot be ‘une définition dialectique, qui n’arrive, quand elle arrive, qu’au terme d’un examen’; and likens this definition to methematical postulates (hence, the title of the paragraph where this remark appears: ‘L’hypothèse de la puissance’). I believe there is something deep in this observation. As a matter of fact, the ‘dunamis proposal’ does come at the end of an examination, viz. of the critical assessment of other views on being. But this is of course not the end of the ES’ investigation on being, but – one might say – the transition into its new beginning. Thus, the ‘dunamis proposal’ (which, nota bene, is stated around the dialogue’s centre) seems to pave the way for a new starting point for investigation, and the subsequent discussion of the κοινωνία τῶν γενῶν will implement it and therefore verify it. 51 Brown 1998: 193 (my emphasis). Unfortunately, Brown does not elaborate on this interesting remark, nor does she corroborate it with due references to the relevant passages. But we are fortunate to possess the thorough treatment of

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(a) To answer the first question, a brief excursus on Plato’s philosophical uses of ‘δύναµις’ may prove helpful52. This term recurs frequently in Plato, even more often than ‘εἶδος’ or ‘ἰδέα’, and with many different shades of meanings53. A perfectly unified and consistent account of δύναµις seems hard to extrapolate from the dialogues; and wherever δύναµις is discussed it is framed in a larger context (epistemological, ethical, ontological etc.) and discussed in a way relevant to that context.

This does not eo ipso rule out, however, that some persistent doctrinal elements may be identified. For example, in a number of passages belonging to dialogues ordinarily considered prior to the Sophist, Plato brings out a tight connection between δύναµις and οὐσία. In some of these passages, the latter seems to be regarded as prior to the former54. Perhaps the most well-known example comes from Phdr. 270d1-7, framed in Socrates’ discussion of Hippocrates’ method for knowing ‘τὸ περὶ φύσεως’55. The gist of the passage is that in order to know the nature of something

(simple) one must investigate its power to act and being acted upon56. Thus, Socrates describes a method of inquiry which proceeds from the determination of something’s powers towards that of its

Souilhé 1919: 71-168, who comes essentially to the same conclusion (see esp. 155-8) and substantiates it appropriately. 52 The most valuable treatment of this issue, besides the Souilhé work mentioned in the previous note, is Lefebvre

2018: 183-346. But see also the useful little paper by Bury 1894. 53 Cf. e.g. Euthphr. 10a-11a; Hp.Mi. 365a-c; Hp.Ma. 366b-c; Grg. 476b-c; R. 477 b-d; Phdr. 270c-d; Tht. 174b.

Souilhé 1919: 71-168 lists and discusses almost all the occurrences. 54 E.g. Prt. 349b; Chrm. 168d; Phd. 97c. These and other passages are helpfully listed by Diès 1909: 26-28 and

Souilhé 1919: 155-6. 55 On ‘δύναµις’ in the Corpus Hippocraticum in relation to the Phaedrus, see also Jouanna 1977. 56 Cf. Phdr. 270d1-7: πρῶτον µέν, ἁπλοῦν ἢ πολυειδές ἐστιν οὗ πέρι βουλησόµεθα εἶναι αὐτοὶ τεχνικοὶ καὶ

ἄλλον δυνατοὶ ποιεῖν, ἔπειτα δέ, ἂν µὲν ἁπλοῦν ᾖ, σκοπεῖν τὴν δύναµιν αὐτοῦ, τίνα πρὸς τί πέφυκεν εἰς τὸ δρᾶν ἔχον ἢ τίνα εἰς τὸ παθεῖν ὑπὸ τοῦ, ἐὰν δὲ πλείω εἴδη ἔχῃ, ταῦτα ἀριθµησάµενον, ὅπερ ἐφ᾽ ἑνός, τοῦτ᾽ ἰδεῖν ἐφ᾽ ἑκάστου, τῷ τί ποιεῖν αὐτὸ πέφυκεν ἢ τῷ τί παθεῖν ὑπὸ τοῦ;

178 essence. One might thing that this epistemological priority is to be explained through a phenomenological priority. Thus, on this construal a power is the perceivable manifestation of something’s essence, which is instead hidden and unobservable57. Finally, this phenomenological priority might in turn be cashed in terms of metaphysical dependency: powers are dependent upon the natures which they manifest. This is one possible reconstruction of the background of the gloss that things have powers in virtue of what they are.

However, there are reasons to question this construal. To begin with, the straight identification of a power with the observable effects or manifestations of a nature is doubtful. As Lefebvre has persuasively demonstrated, for Plato a δύναµις, unlike an ἔργον, does not belong to the perceivable order58. Thus, at R. V 477c6-9 Socrates affirms that ‘a power has neither color nor shape nor any feature of the sort that many other things have’59. Instead, it is that in virtue of which an ἔργον is produced: ‘la puissance elle-même – Lefebvre writes – est ce qui est posée comme condition pour que la chose accomplisse son ergon: c’est une cause’60.

One may still rejoin that even if a power is not the observable manifestation of an essence or nature, it must nonetheless depend upon it. For something has a certain power as opposed to another depending of what kind of thing it is. For instance, the power of running belongs to human beings but not to fishes. In other words, the metaphysical dependency point might be preserved even once the phenomenological priority point is given up.

57 Cf. Souilhé 1919: 188; Bury 1894: 299; Cornford 1935: 235-7. I take φύσις to stand for οὐσία in these contexts. 58 Cf. Lefebvre 2018: 304-5. 59 δυνάµεως γὰρ ἐγὼ οὔτε τινὰ χρόαν ὁρῶ οὔτε σχῆµα οὔτε τι τῶν τοιούτων οἷον καὶ ἄλλων πολλῶν. 60 Cf. Lefebvre 2018: 306 (my emphasis). On the relation between ‘power’ and ‘cause’, cf. also Bury 1894: 298.

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To this counter-objection it can be replied that, despite its intuitiveness, the metaphysical dependency point does not seem to have in Plato’s dialogues the solid textual support it requires for itself. Thus, there are passages where power and essence seem very much treated as interchangeable notions. At La. 192b-c, Socrates, in requesting a definition of courage, asks: ‘What power (τίς οὖσα

δύναµις) is it which, because it is the same in pleasure and in pain and in all the other cases in which we were just saying it occurred, is therefore called courage?’. Laches replies that ‘it is a sort of endurance of the soul, if it is necessary to say what its nature (τό πεφυκὸς) is in all these cases’. Here,

‘τό πεφυκὸς’ stands for ‘φύσις’61. Therefore, Laches identifies ‘nature’ and ‘power’, a move already implicit in the phraseology of Socrates’ question and in fact not disputed by Socrates in the continuation of the dialogue. Another example comes from the ouverture of the Gorgias. Here

Socrates declares his interest in learning from Gorgias ‘what the power of his craft is’ (447c1-2: τίς

ἡ δύναµις τῆς τέχνης τοῦ ἀνδρός)62. But a few lines later this question is expressed in a slightly different phraseology: at 448e6-7 Socrates makes clear that what he wants to know is not ‘what

Gorgias’ craft is like, but what craft it is (ἀλλ' οὐδεὶς ἐρωτᾷ ποία τις ἡ Γοργίου τέχνη, ἀλλὰ τίς)63.

In other passages, that have been regarded as unmistakably stating the dependency of power from essence (or nature), the two concepts seem rather to constitute a hendiadys. For example, at

Phdr. 237c8-9, a ‘definition’ (ὅρος) of love (ἔρως) is obtained through a specification of ‘what love is and what powers it has (περὶ ἔρωτος οἷόν τ᾽ ἔστι καὶ ἣν ἔχει δύναµιν)’. Similarly, at R. 358b4-6

Socrates declares that he wants ‘to know what justice and injustice are and what power each itself has when it’s by itself in the soul (ἐπιθυµῶ γὰρ ἀκοῦσαι τί τ' ἔστιν ἑκάτερον καὶ τίνα ἔχει δύναµιν

61 Notice the occurrence of πεφυκός at Sph. 247e1. 62 See also Grg. 455d7. 63 See also Grg. 462c10-d1; 463c5.

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αὐτὸ καθ' αὑτὸ ἐνὸν ἐν τῇ ψυχῇ)’. At Leg. 643a5 the Athenian sets the task of determining ‘what education is and what powers it has’ (τί ποτ᾽ ἐστὶν καὶ τίνα δύναµιν ἔχει)64. One might wonder whether the καὶ in all three passages is to be considered epexegetical, as the definitions of love, justice and education are cast in terms of their functional powers and causal operations65.

But if this is correct, what sense would it make to establish an epistemological priority of

δύναµις over οὐσία, or even to distinguish the two at all? My sense is that a δύναµις can aptly be characterized as the functional aspect of an οὐσία. Thus, from the investigation of the performed function of an essence, one attains a grasp of that essence (e.g. the power of reasoning reveals that a human being is a rational animal). Thus, δύναµις and οὐσία appear less two entities connected by a relation of metaphysical dependence, than the same thing considered from two different aspects66.

Hence, the textual ground of the claim that ‘things have powers in virtue of what they are’ is less secure than it may seem and would at least require major qualifications67.

64 Cf. also Leg. 892a3: ὂν τυγχάνει καὶ δύναµιν ἣν ἔχει. On both these Laws passages, cf. Ritter 1896: 11-12. 65 Similar cases can be made, I believe, about such passages as Prt. 349b, Phlb. 29b or Ti. 50b6-8. 66 In this regard, the use of δύναµις in relation to names at Cra. 394a-e is noteworthy. Here Socrates brings out an intriguing comparison between the physician and the knower of names. The former is able to see that two drugs that have different external appearences (colors, perfumes etc.) and are taken to be different by the layman, are in fact the same drug. How could the physician do that? Because she is able to see that they have an identical power (δύναµις) to cure. Likewise, the knower of names is not deceived by superficial differences in letters and syllables, but considers only the power (again, δύναµις) of names. Here ‘δύναµις’ appears very much to denote the ‘meaning’ or ‘sense’ of a given name. See on all this the perceptive remarks by Ademollo 2011: 169-178. 67 Curiously enough, Bluck 1975 [1963]: 92 n.1, who otherwise accepts Cornford’s reading of the passage (only on the basis of the argument about the meaning of ‘ὅρος’), is basically in agreement with the reading I am presently defending. For he avers that since a δύναµις reveals something’s nature, it ‘might easily be identified with the thing itself. The ‘being of a thing is simply the function that it performs’. See also de Rjik 1986: 101: ‘to view a thing’s true nature in its true function […] is truly Platonic thinking, indeed’.

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(b) Perhaps some may remain unconvinced and object that, as a matter of fact, nowhere does

Plato feel free straightforwardly to identity being and power as he does in the Sophist. Fair enough.

And yet, it seems to me that some misconception lies behind this complaint. The fact is that even if the claim that powers metaphysically depend upon essences were true, it could perhaps be a problem only if what is at issue with the ‘dunamis proposal’ were the essences or natures of things. However, this cannot be what the ‘dunamis proposal’ is about. What the ES asks his predecessors and the parties of the gigantomachy, as we have seen in chapter 1, is not what it is for something to be the specific being it is, or to have the determinate nature or essence it has. Instead the ES asks simply

(but unprecedentedly) what it is for something to be (simpliciter)68. In other words, the objection that since for Plato ‘things have powers in virtue of what they are’ then it cannot be the case that Plato defined being as power, conflates the problem of what a thing is with the problem regarding the fact that it is. By contrast, I want to suggest that in the Sophist Plato might have reasoned (and encouraged the reader to work through the insight) that if a determinate essence is to be known from its determinate power to act and to be acted upon, then the case can be made that the being of an essence or nature is itself power69. The implicit proviso is of course that in this context

‘δύναµις’ should be understood in its most general and neutral meaning70, i.e. as a primitive

68 Cf. Dixsaut 2015: ch.2: ‘il ne s’agit pas de posséder une nature ou une qualité, mais d’être’. 69 Cf. Fronterotta 1995: 322-3 and Lefebvre 2018: 311-3. 70 Not, as Brown puts it, as ‘this or that power’ (see above p.168). Cf. Castelli 2007: 416-21; and also Centrone

2008: 149 n.107: ‘Il carattere onnicomprensivo della formula suggerisce di intendere la δύναµις nel senso più neutro possibile, come capacità generica o possibilità, piuttosto che come ‘potenza’’. One remark is worth making in order to avoid ambiguity. Since the term ‘δύναµις’ will later be linked to the modal notion of ‘potency’ or ‘possibility’, one might wonder whether the ‘dunamis proposal’ is not in fact a modal conception of being, and that therefore the considerations made in §5.2 should be revised. But this is not the case: for here, as elsewhere, ‘δύναµις’ is not contrasted with another modal notion comparable to those actuality or necessity. The oppositions potency-actuality or possibility-necessity are probably the result of theoretical developments derived from Aristotelian doctrines, foreign

182 ontological feature that abstracts from every relationship to a specific domain and every intensive determination of its operational sphere71.

There is therefore no compelling reason to stigmatize the view that being is δύναµις as un-

Platonic, as interpreters have perhaps too quickly concluded. To further develop this reading, we need to extend our analysis to the concepts of ποιεῖν and πάσχειν, that I have intentionally left aside so far. They too of course have a prominent role in the ‘dunamis proposal’ and are anchored to the

δύναµις even outside the Sophist72. It is now time to inspect what Plato meant by them73.

[2] Acting and being acted upon. The second point that commentators have stressed to deny that the ‘dunamis proposal’ could be endorsed by Plato concerns the pair of concepts of ποιεῖν and

πάσχειν and its role in the gigantomachy, notably in the refutation of the idealists. To cut a long story short – but I will go into more detail shortly – the drift of this objection is that if the ‘dunamis proposal’ were actually subscribed to by Plato himself, it would apply to Forms as well, with the cumbersome implication that Forms would have the power of being affected and this would in turn

to Plato. Instead ‘δύναµις’ stand for power or active force. If this were not so, one would have to infer that when Plato calls the Good at R. 509b9-10 ‘beyond essence in rank and power’ (ἐπέκεινα τῆς οὐσίας πρεσβείᾳ καὶ δυνάµει ὑπερέχοντος) (509B9–10) he means that it has the highest degree of possibility or potency (as opposed to actuality), which is scarcely implausible. 71 This last remark enables us to dispose of a possible stumbling block for this interpretation. At R. V 477c1-d2

Socrates famously states that ‘powers are a certain kind of beings that enable us […] to do whatever we are capable of doing’ (δυνάµεις εἶναι γένος τι τῶν ὄντων αἷς δὴ καὶ ἡµεῖς δυνάµεθα ἃ δυνάµεθα); and that each determinate power is determined by reference to what is set over and what it does’. As Dixsaut 2015: ch.2 observes, ‘Socrate ne définit donc pas la puissance mais il énonce comment définir une puissance : par ce sur quoi elle s’exerce, et par ce qu’elle effectue’ (her italics). Notably, the focus in this passage is on cognitive powers. 72 Cf. e.g. Phdr. 270d4-7; Tht. 156a6-7. 73 A large-scale investigation of the concepts of ποιεῖν and πάσχειν in Plato’s dialogues can be read in Macé

2006, whose analysis of the Sophist’s section under discussion (indebted to Brisson 2008), however, I do not share.

183 inevitably jeopardize one of the pillars of the metaphysics of Forms, namely their immutability74.

Let us inspect the text more closely to figure out why this would be the case.

A modicum of context needs to be provided. The ‘dunamis proposal’, as we have seen in chapter 1, is offered by the ES to the materialists as an improvement of their definition of being in terms of corporeality and tangibility. The materialists’ definition proved unable to account for the existence in the soul of non-bodily ethical properties (virtues and vices such as justice, injustice, wisdom etc.), which the materialists readily granted. Thus, they are led to give up their original view and to endorse the ‘dunamis proposal’, which is supposed to accommodate both corporeal and incorporeal entities. How so?

Unfortunately, Plato does not spell this out. One might think that, as far as bodily beings are concerned, they are endowed with the power of acting and being acted upon in that their corporeal nature enables them to exercise some type of physical causality on one another (e.g. through collision). Thus, ‘ποιεῖν’ and ‘πάσχειν’ would respectively indicate the production or the affection of some sort of physical change, e.g. a modification in something’s bodily constitution or location75. But of course this could not account for incorporeal entities. We need broader notions of acting and being acted upon. Thus, some interpreters went so far as to claim that ‘the characterization boils down to saying that anything which can be a subject or a predicate in a genuine assertion exists’76. Yet, this construal too will scarcely do, because it implies that the

74 Cf. e.g. Brochard 1912 [1908]: 139-41; Diès 1909: part. 54-63 and 1925: 286-90. ‘Developmentalist’ interpreters, e.g. Lutosławsky 1897: 423-5, see of course no problem with this implication. They are ready to accept that Plato endorses the ‘dunamis proposal’ and that he modified his view in the later dialogues. The reasons why I do not subscribe to this narrative are spelled out at pp. 58-60 above. 75 Cf. Beere 2009: 7. See also Tht. 156a-b, where a similar physicalist interpretation of the formula ‘power of acting and being acted upon’ (a6-7) is ascribed to the so-called ‘κοµψότεροι’. 76 Moravcsik 1962: 37.

184 materialists would not merely be persuaded to enlarge their ontological commitment and to endorse a more inclusive account of being; they would be led to utterly subvert their original view77. However ‘reformed’ these materialists may be, that would probably be asking too much of them. If we look more closely at the refutation of the materialists, a more promising strategy suggests itself. The ES brings the materialists to acknowledge the existence of incorporeal entities by first making them agree ‘that each soul is just or wise by virtue of the possession or presence of justice or wisdom, and that the opposite sort of soul is opposite by the possession or presence of the opposites of these’78; and then ‘that what is capable of being added to and taken away from a thing is without doubt a something’79. Thus, the incorporeal entities the materialists are led to countenance are recognized as having a power (τό γε δυνατόν) of making a soul to be in a certain way (e.g. justice makes a soul just). One is therefore invited to suppose that the power of acting and being acted upon is some type of causal power such that for X to act on Y is for X to make Y to be in a certain way, i.e. to cause Y’s possession of a determinate attribute80. Such a construal

77 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 87. 78 247a5-7: δικαιοσύνης ἕξει καὶ παρουσίᾳ τοιαύτην αὐτῶν ἑκάστην γίγνεσθαι, καὶ τῶν ἐναντίων τὴν ἐναντίαν

(italics mine). 79 247a9-10: τό γε δυνατόν τῳ παραγίγνεσθαι καὶ ἀπογίγνεσθαι πάντως εἶναί τι φήσουσιν (italics mine).

Admittedly, it is unclear why the materialists are so compliant and promptly willing to concede this point. Perhaps, the reason why Plato is so quick in this exchange is not only that would a detailed and rigorous argument lead him too far afield, but one might also speculate that he regarded that argument had already extensively provided in the Theaetetus (which, as is well-known, stages a conversation happened the day before the one presented in the Sophist). It seems to me implausible, by contrast, that Plato took the reductionist view explaining psychical properties as arrangements of material entities simply not to deserve careful consideration, as suggested by Brown 1998: 189. 80 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 87 (who, however, speaks of ‘quasi-causal power’; it is unclear to me what the qualification

‘quasi’ is supposed to convey). One might wonder whether these ethical properties (justice, wisdom etc.) are in effect familiar Platonic Forms. We cannot be sure, as Brown 1998: 199 n.35 prudently observes. But if the causal interpretation of the ontological status of the Forms I provided in ch.2 is on the right track, there might be significant resemblances. This would also have the additional benefit of enabling the ES to rely on a common platform for his

185 seems to square well with the ES’ previous use of the substantive ‘πάθος’ and the verb ‘πάσχειν’ in the second argument against the monists (which immediately precedes the gigantomachy)81. For example, at 245a1-3, the ES stresses that ‘something divided up into parts is not in any way prevented from having oneness as an attribute covering all its parts’82. Thus, if this reading is on the right track, it appears that through the ‘dunamis proposal’ Plato proposes a definition of being in causal terms, such that to exist is to have the power of taking part in a causal relation83.

With this in mind, let us now turn to the Friends of the Forms. One might expect them be ready to accept the ES’ proposal, which after all was broached to account also for the existence of incorporeal entities. And yet, they obstinately reject it. As we saw in chapter 1, they protest that the ‘dunamis proposal’ may well apply to corporeal things (the inhabitants of the realm of becoming) but not to Forms.Why so? Because if it applied to Forms, this would result in them having the power to be acted upon; but to be acted upon entails to be set in motion (κινεῖσθαι), and

Forms are by definition immobile (τὸ ἠρεµοῦν). This stance of the idealists’, however, elicits a baffling paradox. By their own admission, Forms are not only immobile but also intelligible

exchanges with materialists and idealists and thus of facilitating the transition from the exchange with the former to that with the latter. 81 Cf. ch. 1 n.85. 82 Cf. Ἀλλὰ µὴν τό γε µεµερισµένον πάθος µὲν τοῦ ἑνὸς ἔχειν ἐπὶ τοῖς µέρεσι πᾶσιν οὐδὲν ἀποκωλύει, καὶ ταύτῃ

δὴ πᾶν τε ὂν καὶ ὅλον ἓν εἶναι. See also 245c1-3: Καὶ µὴν ἐάν γε τὸ ὂν ᾖ µὴ ὅλον διὰ τὸ πεπονθέναι τὸ ὑπ' ἐκείνου πάθος, ᾖ δὲ αὐτὸ τὸ ὅλον, ἐνδεὲς τὸ ὂν ἑαυτοῦ συµβαίνει. Cf. Leigh 2010: 73-4 on the relevance of these passages for the interpretation of the ‘dunamis proposal’. 83 A view partly similar to this has been discussed in contemporary analytic philosophy under the label of

‘Alexander’s dictum’ (introduced by Kim 1993: 22). The name ‘Alexander’ refers to the Australian philosopher Samuel Alexander (1859–1938), who defended the view that to be is to have causal powers in his Space, Time and Deity (cf. Alexander 1920: 8). For recent discussions of Alexander’s dictum see the papers included in Topoi 22.2 (2003), devoted to ‘Causal criteria of reality’. Berto 2012 (and 2013: 61) explicitly links Alexander’s dictum with the Sophist’s dunamis proposal.

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(246b7: νοητὰ); yet it looks as if to be known is a way of being affected (though it is unclear whether the idealists would concede this too); therefore, it looks as if Forms must in some sense be set in motion in order to be known. Despite the idealists’ resistence, then, it seems that both motion and motionlessness are required for knowledge of Forms to be possible84. Where do things go wrong?

The text does not offer a straightforward answer85. The ES simply follows up with a notorious rhetorical outburst:

‘But – Zeus! – what is this? Are we in any case going to be so easily persuaded that

motion and life and soul and wisdom are truly absent from what perfectly is, and that

it does not live, or think, but sits there in august holiness, devoid of intelligence, fixed

and immovable?’86.

The question is rhetorical in that it calls for a negative answer. And Theaetetus agrees that a positive one would indeed be terrible (δεινὸν). Thus, the two interlocutors come to agree that being must have intelligence, life, soul, and therefore should not exclude motion (249a4-b3).

This conclusion, and the argument that leads to it, have been interpreted in many different ways87. In broad outline, the main interpretative proposals are two88. (a) Some think the ES urges

84 Cf. Keyt 1969: 2 for an analysis of the paradox. 85 It is also unclear whether from now on Theaetetus still acts as the idealists’ spokesman. 86 Sph. 248e7-249a2: τί δὲ πρὸς Διός; ὡς ἀληθῶς κίνησιν καὶ ζωὴν καὶ ψυχὴν καὶ φρόνησιν ἦ ῥᾳδίως

πεισθησόµεθα τῷ παντελῶς ὄντι µὴ παρεῖναι, µηδὲ ζῆν αὐτὸ µηδὲ φρονεῖν, ἀλλὰ σεµνὸν καὶ ἅγιον, νοῦν οὐκ ἔχον, ἀκίνητον ἑστὸς εἶναι; 87 See ch. 1 n.109. 88 The difference between the following two readings partly depends on the meaning attached to the notorious phrase ‘τῷ παντελῶς ὄντι’: (1) extensive (‘the totality of what there is’, ‘all-inclusive being’ ‘everything that is’, ‘what altogether is’); or (2) intensive (‘what perfectly is’, ‘perfect being’, ‘real reality’). Cf. Fronterotta 1995: 339-40 and

187 an enlargement of the idealists’ ontological commitment, by asserting that (at least some) changing entities (e.g. intellect and soul) should be included in the domain of what exists89. (b) Other interpreters think that the ES is making a point about the structural features of perfect being, by stating that Forms are subject to some type of motion (non-physical and non-intrinsic) that does not however undermine their immutability90.

Now, the view of the idealists has of course striking resemblances with Plato’s own. The terminological and doctrinal affinities are unmistakable91. Thus, some commentators have argued

– in effect defending the view of the Friends of the Forms – that if the ‘dunamis proposal’ were actually subscribed to by Plato himself, it would apply to Forms too, with the cumbersome implication that Forms would have the power of being affected and therefore give up their immutability. However, this rejoinder cuts no ice for at least two reasons:

First, whichever of interpretations (a) and (b) we resolve to embrace, the drift of the argument does not clash with any of the cornerstones of Plato’s metaphysics of Forms. If we accept a reading of the (a) type, then as early as the Phaedo Plato was perfectly ready to acknowledge not only the

Politis 2006: 162-3 for discussion. My translation ‘what perfectly is’ unveils my preference for the latter option. I leave for a future occasion a defence of this view, but nothing I will say here depends upon this reading. 89 Cf. e.g., Brochard 1912: 138-9; Diès 1925: 288-9 n.1; Cordero 1993: 44-46; Menn 1995: 23, 71 n.5; Brown

1998: 201-2; Miller 2004: 357-8; Brisson 2008; Karfik 2011: 139. 90 Some think the motion in play is ‘mere Cambridge change’, e.g. Reeve 1985: 61; McPherran 1986: 244-50;

Silverman 2002: 158, 260; Thomas 2008: 644; Gill 2012: 237-8 (already Moravcsik 1962: 39-40 and Runciman 1962: 81-2). Others think it is intellective motion or the time-immune and rational causal interconnection binding forms together and making the eidetic domain an integrated and dynamic organism (cf. Ti. 30c5-31b3), cf. e.g. Zeller 1889 [1859]: 686-98; Apelt 1891; Gomperz 1925 [1902]: 444-5 and n. 2; Rodier 1957 [1905]: 63-5; Stefanini 1949: 205; de Vogel 1953; Pester 1971; Gerson 2006; Fronterotta 2007: 81-97; Ferrari 2012; Perl 2014; Fronterotta 2020. Cherniss thinks the argument is meant to convince the idealists to allow a Form of Motion into the intelligible realm (cf. Cherniss 1944: 437-42 and 1957: 239). Whatever the strength of this reading (cf. Gerson 2006: 293 for some criticisms), Cherniss did not deem this an innovation or recantation of Platonic metaphysics at all. 91 Cf. Cornford 1935: 243-6 for some parallels.

188 existence of souls and intellects, but also of perceptible particulars92. If we accept a reading of the

(b) type, then the Forms’ immutability is still preserved, so the power to act and be acted upon does not threaten the stability of the realm of perfect being. The only scenario in which the application of the ‘dunamis proposal’ would dreadfully clash with the main tenets of Plato’s metaphysics, as we know of it from the so-called ‘middle dialogues’, would be if it introduced physical motion in the realm of Forms93. But surely this is not what the ES is suggesting, because, as we have seen, as early as in the refutation of the materialists were the notions of ποιεῖν and

πάσχειν redeemed from a purely physical meaning – otherwise, the ‘dunamis proposal’ could not possibly accommodate the incorporeal entities the materialists had been led to recognize.

Second, it should be recalled that the ‘dunamis proposal’ has a disjunctive structure: being is the power to act or to be acted upon. That Forms can ‘act’ (ποιεῖν) was already explicit in such dialogues as Phaedo (100d5) and Hippias Major (296c2-3, 297a4-8, 300a9)94, and is confirmed by the Sophist95. So even if one baulks at the claim that Forms can somehow be affected, this would be insufficient ground to conclude that the ‘dunamis proposal’ does not apply to Forms,

92 Cf. Phd. 79a6: δύο εἴδη τῶν ὄντων. See also Symp. 205b8-c1 (to compare with Sph. 219b4-6 and Plt. 258e1-

2). Similarly, at Phd. 76d7-9 Socrates refers to the Form as ‘τοιαύτη οὐσία’, by so suggesting that there is another type of οὐσία, and therefore that sensibles too exist, though not in the same way as the Forms. 93 To be more precise, there is also another scenario, namely, the one suggested by those interpreters who think that with his rhetorical outburst at 248e7-249a2 the ES is pushing the idealists to include (at least some) changing entities (e.g. intellect and soul) in the domain of what is really real (and not simply of what exists). This reading has been defended by Heidegger 1992 [1924/5]: 482; Cornford 1935: 241-7; Grube 1935: 295-7; Ross 1951: 102-3, 105- 11, 137, 233; Crombie 1963: 419-21; Notomi 1999: 218-20. If this were correct, it would imply a veritable revolution in Plato’s thought. For earlier dialogues describe the soul as ‘more similar’ (cf. Phd. 79b16: ὅµοιότερον) to Forms than bodies, and as ‘akin’ (Phd. 79d3, Rsp. 601e2: συγγενής) to Forms, but never as real as the Forms. However, in the Timaeus (35a1-4) the intermediate status of the soul is unmistakably reasserted. 94 Cf. ch.2 n.26. 95 256d12-e2: ἡ θατέρου φύσις ἕτερον ἀπεργαζοµένη τοῦ ὄντος ἕκαστον οὐκ ὂν ποιεῖ.

189 because the Forms’ power to act is sufficient to satisfy it. In other words, to deny that the ‘dunamis proposal’ applies to Forms entails that Forms have no causal power whatsoever.

The foregoing suggests that, despite the terminological and doctrinal assonances, it is doubtful that the Friends of the Forms’ view faithfully reflects Plato’s own in previous dialogues – let alone that the refutation of the idealists is a self-criticism on Plato’s part. Instead, there are reasons to think that the idealists’ account represents too rigid an interpretation of Plato’s theory of Forms96, namely one which is unable to account for the Forms’ causal nature and reduces Forms to transcendent monoliths having no connection whatsoever with the sensible world.

[3] Dunamis in the later stages of the dialogue. Confronted with ‘dunamis proposal’, the materialists end up accepting it, ‘given that – Theaetetus says – they presently have nothing better of their own to offer’97. As a reply to this gloss of Theaetetus’, the ES appends the following rider:

‘perhaps something else will occur both to us and to them later on. Meanwhile so far as this group

[scil. the giants] is concerned, let this stand as agreed’98. Some commentators have interpreted these two remarks as the smoking gun of the provisional character of the ‘dunamis proposal’ and, by the same token, as Plato’s patent warning to the reader not to take that proposal seriously, as the ‘official’ Platonic definition of being99. Such a construal seems to have quite good textual

96 For a similar conclusion, though defended from a different standpoint than mine, cf. Natorp 1903: 292-3 and

Shorey 1903: 184 n. 433; Cornford 1935: 242-4; Cherniss 1944: 439-40 n.376. 97 247e5-6: Ἀλλ' ἐπείπερ αὐτοί γε οὐκ ἔχουσιν ἐν τῷ παρόντι τούτου βέλτιον λέγειν, δέχονται τοῦτο. 98 247e8-248a2: ἴσως γὰρ ἂν εἰς ὕστερον ἡµῖν τε καὶ τούτοις ἕτερον ἂν φανείη. πρὸς µὲν οὖν τούτους τοῦτο

ἡµῖν ἐνταῦθα µενέτω συνοµολογηθέν. 99 Cf. e.g. Brochard 2012 [1908]: 136-40; Diès 1909: 17-38 and passim; Souilhé: 1919: 155; Cornford 1935:

VII-VIII, 238 n.3; Cherniss 1944: 452-3 n.897; Moravcsik 1962: 37; Guthrie 1978: 139-41.

190 support, because after the refutation of the idealists our ὅρος of being is never again explicitly thematized in the dialogue and seems to have simply been dropped by the two interlocutors.

However, this reading faces a difficulty. It sits uneasily with the significant textual datum that in the ensuing pages of the dialogue the concept of δύναµις is taken up by the ES, abruptly and with no explicit justification, to describe the participatory relation connecting the Forms with one another100. I shall mention four relevant occurrences:

• In reply to the puzzle of the so-called ‘late-learners’101, the famous question is asked whether

Kinds are interconnected in any way. At 251e8-9, a first option is envisaged (and then rejected),

that no kind has the power of combining with any other (πρῶτον µηδενὶ µηδὲν µηδεµίαν δύναµιν

ἔχειν κοινωνίας εἰς µηδέν).

• At 252d2, a second option is envisaged (and rejected too), that everything has the power of

combining with everything else (πάντα ἀλλήλοις ἐῶµεν δύναµιν ἔχειν ἐπικοινωνίας).

• At 253e1-2 the dialectician’s task is said to consist, among else, in knowing ‘how to determine,

kind by kind, how things can or cannot combine (κοινωνεῖν ἕκαστα δύναται καὶ ὅπῃ µή,

διακρίνειν κατὰ γένος ἐπίστασθαι.).

• The fourth passage occurs at the beginning of the deduction of the greatest Kinds. At 254c4-

5, the ES sets the agenda for the subsequent inquiry. The first two investiganda are: first, ‘what

these greatest kinds are like’ (ποῖα ἕκαστά ἐστιν); and second, ‘how they stand when it comes

to their power to combine with each other’ (ἔπειτα κοινωνίας ἀλλήλων πῶς ἔχει δυνάµεως).

100 Cf. Heidegger 1992 [1924/5]: 474-80; Sayre 1983: 227; Movia 1991: 254; Fronterotta 1995: 323-4, 331-4 and passim; Cordero 2000: 42-3; Gavray 2006; Centrone 2008: 149 n. 107; Leigh 2010: 79-80; Gill 2012: 229-30. 101 See above ch.3 n.3 on this label.

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In all these passages, that there is such a thing as a power to combine is simply presupposed. The remainder of the dialogue builds on this result102. The lack of any explicit rationale for the renewed employment of the concept of δύναµις makes the supposition arise that Plato is inviting the reader to bridge the gap between the two sections of the dialogue and to complete the argument autonomously. Thus, one is invited to conclude that for a Kind to be is to have the power to combine with other Kinds.

However, there is still the encumbrance of the two provisos quoted above, which seem to hint at the provisional character of the ‘dunamis proposal’ (247e5-248a2). To start with, it must be clear that, as they are formulated, neither is in itself an inescapable declaration of tentativeness. In the former (247e5-6) Theaetetus says that the materialists presently (ἐν τῷ παρόντι) have nothing better of their own to offer. This need not mean that the ‘dunamis proposal’ is provisional. Surely, it may also mean that Plato is here cutting short an exchange with thinkers who would probably be much more dialectically pugnacious. The latter statement (247e8-248a2) is introduced by the

ES with an ‘ἴσως’, which does not compel us to assume that a different account of being will have to occur: it may or may not occur.

Still, I want to offer for consideration a more complex reading of the latter statement, that seems to me to place it better in its argumentative context. In my view, that statement (247e8-248a2) can suitably be interpreted by distinguishing between the surface of the dialectical exchange staged in the dialogue from a Platonic doctrinal undercurrent103. The ‘dunamis proposal’ is in effect replaced, on the dramatic level, by the account of being stated at 249d3-4 with the ‘children’s prayer’. From

102 Remember also that the Form of Difference is said to make (ποιεῖ) other things not-beings, by renderding them different from the Kind Being (256d12-e2), cf. above n.95. 103 See above n.8 of this chapter.

192 then on, that account will take the spotlight and trigger the discussion of the combination of Kinds.

However, if one follows the train of thoughts of the refutation of the idealists, it seems to me that the account of being of the ‘children’s prayer’ should not be its natural conclusion. The idealists rejected the ‘dunamis proposal’ because they feared that it would entail the presence of motion in the realm of true being; but the ES urges that, in some sense, being should not exclude motion (249b2-3); therefore, he removes the main obstacle for the idealists’ rejection of the ‘dunamis proposal’. One would expext the ES to return to the ‘dunamis proposal’ at this point. And yet, this is not what happens. Instead, the ES now focuses on the logos of being of the ‘children’s prayer’ and the

‘dunamis proposal’ seems to be given up. With that, the question of being that has run through the entire doxographic section will remain unanswered. But the renewed employment, without any justification, of the concept of δύναµις in the ensuing pages of the dialogues, invites the reader, I submit, to bridge the gap between the two sections of the dialogue and to complete the argument autonomously. Thus, at the level of the dialectical exchange staged in the dialogue, the question of being remains unanswered and the ‘dunamis proposal’ disappears; but there also seems to be a

Platonic doctrinal undercurrent, on which the latter provide an answer to the former. The question whether the the ‘dunamis proposal’ gives the Platonic definition of being can therefore be answered in the affirmative, with the proviso that this require a significant interpretative supplement and that, at the dramatic level, the Sophist’s problem of being remains unsolved.

Coda. If the foregoing is correct, then Plato hints at the claim that being is the power to act or be acted upon, without this constituting any revolution in his thought104. In the examination of the refutation of the materialists, I pointed out that this power can be further analysed as the power to be

104 As Sayre 1983: 224-9, among many others, thinks.

193 part of a causal relationship. Moreover, in the previous chapters I argued that being is the property obtained by participation in the Kind Being105. I conclude that this property is the power to act or be acted upon, viz. to be part of a causal relationship.

105 One might object that in order to participate in the Kind Being, something must already exist, i.e. have the power to be acted upon by the Kind Being. If so, Plato’s account of existence is caught in a vicious circle between conditioned and unconditioned. As I argued in ch.3, I think this is a genuine problem for Plato’s view, but one that would arise with every conception of existence and not just with the ‘dunamis proposal’.

Chapter 6

Being and Not-Being

In this chapter I complete my metaphysical analysis of the Kind Being, by investigating the role of this Kind in Plato’s account of not-being. I shall argue that the isolation of a Kind Being is a necessary condition for that account. In particular, I will show that Plato’s solution to the puzzle of not-being (stated at 258d5-e3) hinges on the demonstration of the existence of a Form or Kind of Not-Being (258c4, d6: εἶδος; 260b7: γένος), which, on the one hand, is set against the Kind

Being, but, on the other hand, also partakes in it – and, therefore, is. Thus, were there no Kind

Being, Plato could not bring his ambitious project about not-being to completion. I will develop my argument by focussing first on Plato’s prospect of joint illumination of being and not-being stated at 250e5-251a3. What is it?

A few words of context first. As we saw in chapter 1, the aporetic section of the Sophist reaches its summit at 249d9-250d4. The definitional inquiry into being kicked off at 242b10 runs aground with the ES’ refutation of the characterization of being stated by the so-called ‘children’s prayer’ (249d3-4). The ES finally disenchants Theaetetus about the seemingly constructive results of their previous endeavors: just as they found themselves confused about not-being, so too are they now in a state of equal (if not higher) puzzlement (ἀπορία) about being.

The threat of an equal obscurity of being and not being was heralded as early as 242b10-

243c5. Once the illustration of the puzzles about not-being had been completed and the ES had declared himself in a state of aporia with respect to not-being, he foreshadowed the possibility that, despite the apparent present clarity of being (τὸ ὄν), he and Theaetetus might end up realizing

194 195 they have made over-hasty judgements about it too, and to be in a state of perplexity even with respect to being1. Indeed, this very supposition prompts the inquiry into being he is about to pursue with Theaetetus. Later, amid the criticisms of the dualists (244a7-8), the worry was renewed that certainties about being might soon start to crumble2. And at 245e8-246a2 the gigantomachy was prefaced by the caveat that the views of all thinkers addressed in the so-called doxographical section of the dialogue should be borne in mind fully to realize that ‘being is no less problematical than not-being when it comes to saying what exactly it is’3.

We were therefore prepared for the worst. And yet, just like at Prm. 135b5-d7 the criticisms raised against the doctrine of Forms in the first part of the dialogue did not prevent the interlocutors from aiming at a possible resolution, so too at Sph. 250e5-251a3 there seems to be room for hope.

The ES predicts that, precisely because being and not being are equally puzzling, they might turn out to be also jointly illuminated: so far as one will be clarified, the other will be too. Here is the statement of this prospect of joint illumination:

So let this be our account of the issues that are puzzling us. And since being and not

being have turned out to be equally puzzling, the hope now must be that in whichever

way one or the other of them reveals itself to us, whether with a lesser or a greater

degree of clarity, so the other will too; and if we’re not able to get a sight of either of

them, we will at any rate put on the best show we can as we thus push our way through

our account of both of them simultaneously4.

1 Notice the pun at 243c5 where not-being is referred to as ‘θάτερον’. See below n.4. 2 ἡµεῖς δὲ πρὸ τοῦ µὲν ᾠόµεθα [scil. τί σηµαίνει ὂν], νῦν δ’ ἠπορήκαµεν. 3 ἵν’ ἐκ πάντων ἴδωµεν ὅτι τὸ ὂν τοῦ µὴ ὄντος οὐδὲν εὐπορώτερον εἰπεῖν ὅτι ποτ’ἔστιν. 4 Τοῦτο µὲν τοίνυν ἐνταῦθα κείσθω διηπορηµένον· ἐπειδὴ δὲ ἐξ ἴσου τό τε ὂν καὶ τὸ µὴ ὂν ἀπορίας µετειλήφατον,

νῦν ἐλπὶς ἤδη καθάπερ ἂν αὐτῶν θάτερον εἴτε ἀµυδρότερον εἴτε σαφέστερον ἀναφαίνηται, καὶ θάτερον οὕτως

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Owen famously baptized this announcement ‘the Parity Assumption’ (hereafter PA)5. The exegetical fate of PA has been peculiar. Some have ascribed to it pivotal importance for a proper understanding of the dialogue’s overall argument6. Others have downplayed it, by providing little or no explanation of it7. But both when it has received attention and when it has been discussed just en passant, PA has typically been read as adumbrating a point concerning the semantics of the verb ‘εἶναι’. Here are two examples. Owen suggests that the prospect of joint illumination hints at the claim that both positive and negative occurrences of ‘εἶναι’ should be justified through appeal to an incomplete use of that verb8. Similarly, Crivelli briefly glosses on the announcement by saying that ‘just as the negative ‘not to be’ will remain unanalyzed and as problematic as ever in so far as it is used to deny existence, so also the affirmative ‘to be’ will remain unanalyzed in so far as it is used to attribute existence’9.

ἀναφαίνεσθαι· καὶ ἐὰν αὖ µηδέτερον ἰδεῖν δυνώµεθα, τὸν γοῦν λόγον ὅπῃπερ ἂν οἷοί τε ὦµεν εὐπρεπέστατα διωσόµεθα οὕτως ἀµφοῖν ἅµα. Notice again the two forward-looking occurrences of θάτερον at 250e7-8 (see above n.1 of this chapter). At 251a2 I retain, with Campbell, Burnet and others, the διωσόµεθα of βΤW, against the new OCT’s διακριβωσόµεθα and several other proposed emendations. See for discussions Campbell 1867: 136, Rowe 2015: 182, Notomi 2007: 260-1 n.15, Rodriguez 2020: 23, n.49; contra Cornford 1935: 251 n.1, followed by Fronterotta 2007: 394-5 n. 208. The MSS’ reading is regarded as grammatically possible even by Robinson 1999: 154. 5 Cf. Owen 1971: 230. I share the uneasiness felt by other interpreters with this label (cf. e.g. Notomi 2007: 260 and Rodriguez 2020). Notably, I shall suggest that unqualified appeal to ‘parity’ is problematic. Nonetheless, I shall retain the label for convention. 6 Cf. Owen 1971: 229-31 and passim (according to O’Brien 1995: 56, the ‘parity assumption’ is for Owen ‘le fil d’Ariane de l’ensemble du raisonnement de l’Étranger sur l’être et le non-être’, though ‘malheureusement, Owen n’a pas su retenir ce fil’); more recently Notomi 2007: 257-61, Thomas 2008: 649-53 and Rodriguez 2020. Some remarks will be also read in Gill 2012: 6-8, 148-9, 204 n.6. 7 Cf. e.g. Cornford 1935: 251-2; Seligman 1974: 43; Bluck 1975 [1963]: 106; de Rijk 1986: 110-13; Cordero

1993: 252 n. 265; Fronterotta 2007: 395 n. 208; Crivelli 2012: 101. 8 Cf. Owen 1971: 230. So just as ‘A is not’ is justified only when it is completed into ‘A is not B’, so too, according to Owen, ‘A is’ is justified when it is completed into ‘A is A’. 9 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 101.

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In this chapter, I want to challenge this prevalent approach and propose a fresh reading of PA. I argue that PA is indeed relevant to interpreting the argument deployed by the ES, but that this is not due to facts about the uses of the verb ‘to be’, but to the recognition of the status of being and not-being as genuine Kinds. Since PA is a forward-looking statement, an adequate interpretation thereof will demand substantive incursions into later stages of the dialogue. In particular, I will bolster my interpretation by scrutinizing in detail the formulae of not-being at 258a11-b4 and 258d5-e3 and by showing that a conception of Being as a Kind is key to Plato’s solution to the riddle of not-being.

Here is my plan. I shall start, in §6.1, by dwelling on the components of the statement of PA and its background at 249d9-250d4. I rehearse claims made in chapters 1 and 2 regarding Plato’s introduction in that passage of a positive conception of Being as a Kind, and propose to link that move to PA. Next, I show in §6.2 that the solution defended by the ES at 258d5-e3 hinges on the demonstration of the existence of a Form or Kind of Not-Being (258c4, d6: εἶδος; 260b7: γένος).

On the reading I will defend (called in the literature ‘analogy reading’) this Form is neither identical to the Form of Difference as a whole nor to any part of the Form of Difference (as per various versions of the so-called ‘generalizing reading’), but is only one of the parts in which Difference constitutively fragments, namely, the specific part of Difference set against the Kind Being10. The isolation of a Kind Being will therefore prove crucial for Plato’s solution of the puzzle of not-being on two fronts: Not-Being will be shown, on the one hand, to be that specific part of Difference set against the Kind Being; on the other hand, it will also be shown to partake in being – and, therefore, to be. Section §6.3 wraps up the argument and shows the advantages of my reading over rival ones.

10 For the labels ‘analogy reading’ and ‘generalizing reading’ cf. van Eck 2002 and Brown 2012. Supporters of the ‘analogy reading’ include: Dixsaut 1991; O’Brien 1995; Fronterotta 2007. Supporters of the ‘generalizing reading’ (which is the traditional interpretation) include: Campbell 1867: 161; Diès 1925; Cornford 1935; Frede 1967, 1992; McDowell 1982: 120-1; Bostock 1984; Van Eck 2002; Brown 2012.

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6.1. The ‘Parity Assumption’: Its Formulation and Background

The formulation of PA. What exactly is the content of PA? What does motivate the ES’ confidence

in advancing this forward-looking prediction at this stage? And does he deliver on his promise? If

so, how? These questions will guide the ensuing analysis. Let me first pause on the formulation of

the prospect. It includes three remarks:

1) The first remark (250e6-7) posits that being and not being have turned out to be equally (ἐξ

ἴσου) hard to grasp. The previous prediction at 245e8-246a2 suggests that the difficulty

concerns their definability, viz. to say what they are11. Not-being has proved puzzling because,

to the extent that it has been so far understood as a denial of existence, it revealed itself

unthinkable, unsayable and a fortiori undefinable12. Being has proved puzzling because none

of the theories surveyed and assessed by the ES has provided for a satisfactory definitional

account of being. We do not know, as things presently stand, what being and not-being are.

2) The second remark (250e7-251a1) is meant to draw a consequence from the first13. Since

being has proved as perplexing as not-being, there is at least hope that in whichever way we

will be able to clarify either being or not-being, we will also be able to clarify the other

(καθάπερ […] οὕτως), on the ground that the levels of clarity (or darkness14) of both run in

parallel15.

11 Cf. 246a1-2: τὸ ὂν τοῦ µὴ ὄντος οὐδὲν εὐπορώτερον εἰπεῖν ὅτι ποτ’ἔστιν. 12 Cf. 238c10-11: ἀδιανόητόν τε καὶ ἄρρητον καὶ ἄφθεγκτον καὶ ἄλογον. 13 Notice the ἐπειδὴ at 250e6. 14 I take it that the emphasis at 250e8 is on σαφέστερον (see also Campbell 1867: 136): what hope could there

be for a joint obscurity? 15 Although it is presented as a consequence of the first remark, the second does not in fact directly follow from

it. A prospect of joint illumination of two explananda is of course not in itself entailed by their equal obscurity. A trivial example: the biographical data of Lucretius and Theon of Smyrna are both for the most part obscure, but no

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3) The third remark (251a1-3) is a rider. Even if the two interlocutors will not be able fully to

grasp being and not-being, still, by probing both of them in parallel they will at least push

their way through their account (λόγον) of them16. Since the first remark is best interpreted,

as I argued above, as concerning the definition of being and not-being, probably the proviso

stated in the third remark is to be construed as forewarning that even though a full definition

of being and not-being will not be achieved, we can still aspire, by treating being and not-

being in parallel, to shed some light on them. Notably, as I shall show, salient traits of their

ontological status will emerge: we might not be in a position to say what they are, but maybe

we could elucidate something about what sorts of things they are17.

Thomas has argued that PA allows either a strong or a moderate reading18. [a] On a strong reading, the prospect requires a perfectly symmetrical clarification of being and not-being, so that for every clarificatory claim regarding being there will be a corresponding clarificatory claim about not-being. But it is doubtful that the evidence lends support to such a strong reading. The text only

prospect of joint illumination sensibly arises about them. Presumably, the implicit additional motivation for the ES’ inference is that being and not-being are also closely related to each other, in that the latter is in some sense the negative counterpart of the former. And since, perhaps, negative counterparts are here assumed to be somewhat parasitic on the positive items they are contrasted with (in that they are expressed with a negation particle and the name of the positive item they are contrasted with), the ES’ inference seems, on the face of it, permitted. In fact, it will soon become clear that things are hardly so straightforward, not least because the negation particle demands a semantic analysis on its own. 16 After Campbell 1867: 136, scholars customarily see here an allusion to the epic image of the voyage between the monsters Scylla and Charybdis (cf. Owen 1971: 231; Notomi 2007: 261 n.18; Crivelli 2012: 101; Rodriguez 2020: 24). 17 Cf. Rodriguez 2020 offers a different account of the third remark (and of PA as a whole), centred on what he takes to be a salient aspect of Plato’s aporetic method. Whilst not overtly in conflict with Rodriguez’, the reading of the prospect of joint illumination I shall provide presently differs nonetheless substantially from his. Perhaps the two might be integrated in some respects. 18 Cf. Thomas 2008: 651.

200 suggests that being and not being will be (hopefully) clarified to an equal degree19, which neither contains nor compels any commitment to the view that for every clarificatory claim regarding being there will be a corresponding one about not-being. Some claims might be the same but nothing requires that every claim must be the same20. The point of the requirement is that being and not-being will be treated conjointly and that they will equally illuminate each other. Even if they were just coupled in sharing a common root and, by the same token, a common solution21, the condition imposed by the second remark would be satisfied. [b] A moderate reading of the prospect of joint illumination is therefore more plausible: what is required is only that some clarificatory claims made about being will be mirrored by a corresponding clarificatory claim about not-being22.

The background of PA: introducing the Kind Being. The statement of PA immediately follows the refutation of the final account of being stated by the ‘children’s prayer’ at 249d3-4. The refutation spans from 249d9 to 250d4. Despite its refutative nature, it also broaches noteworthy positive details about how being should be conceived of. Notably, as we have seen in chapters 1 and 2, it is at this stage of the dialogue that Plato’s conception of Being as a separated Kind makes its way into the dialogue. To be sure, the term ‘γένος’ will not reappear until 253b9; and we will only encounter ‘εἶδος’ again as early as 252a7. But this is scarcely significant, at least for the

19 The correlation καθάπερ/οὕτως is spelled out through the comparatives ἀµυδρότερον and σαφέστερον. 20 One could push this objection farther (though I shall not develop this point here): not only does nothing require that every claim must be the same; rather, the identity of the indiscernibles would rather impede it. Thomas 2008: 651- 2 defends a version of the moderate reading too. The distance from my account and hers will emerge in due course. 21 Cf. Notomi 2007: 262. 22 This is one of the reasons why I regard the label ‘Parity Assumption’ as potentially misleading (see above n.5). For ‘parity’ suggests a strong reading which does not seem to me supported by the text.

201 present purposes. For at 254d4-5, the ES will retrospectively refer to Being, Motion and Rest as the ‘greatest of the Kinds (τῶν γενῶν) we have just been talking about (ἃ νυνδὴ διῇµεν)’. And a few lines above, at 254c3 these to-be-selected Kinds are called Forms (τῶν εἰδῶν). Thus, when the

ES affirms that [i] Being (τὸ ὄν) is a third thing (τρίτον τι) beside Motion and Rest and different from them (ἕτερον δή τι) (250b8-c3); [ii] that it encompasses Motion and Rest (b9: περιεχοµένην), which in turn [iii] are because of their combination with Being (250b10-11: πρὸς τὴν τῆς οὐσίας

κοινωνίαν); and [iv] Being has its own nature (c6: κατὰ τὴν αὑτοῦ φύσιν); what he is in effect pointing out is that Being is a Kind (or Form) in its own right.

Hence, surprisingly enough, within the very context of a refutation – the conclusive one of the aporetic section of the dialogue23 – the ES includes also substantive positive doctrinal elements, that, although suitably prepared by the previous pages, are in fact novel. One would therefore reasonably suppose that the ES’ hope for a joint illumination of being and not-being has at least something to do with these novel claims.

Let us assume such a supposition as a working hypothesis. To test it, we need to ask, first, whether the isolation of Being as an independent Kind will play any significant role in the upcoming course of argument and, second, whether it will contribute to Plato’s solution to the puzzle of not-being. That the first question should be answered in the affirmative is quite a platitude. The notion of Being as a standalone Kind will be assumed as an established result throughout the subsequent phases of the dialogues and will be key to the account of the combination and distinction among the five greatest Kinds. To answer the second question, on the other hand, we first need to inspect how Plato solves the puzzle of not-being. This I will attempt in the following section. Thus, I will argue that this second question too should be answered

23 Cf. 250e5: Τοῦτο µὲν τοίνυν ἐνταῦθα κείσθω διηπορηµένον.

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positively and, as announced above, that the isolation of a Kind Being is a necessary condition for

Plato’s account of not-being. Were there no Kind Being, Plato could not bring his ambitious project

about not-being to completion, because the solution to the puzzle of not-being that he states at

258d5-e3 hinges on the demonstration of the existence of a Form or Kind of Not-Being (258c4,

d6: εἶδος; 260b7: γένος) which is set against the Kind Being, but also partakes in it. Thus, I will

try to show that by advancing PA right after broaching a conception of Being as an independent

Kind, Plato is prefiguring that both Being and Not-Being should be treated as independent Kinds.

6.2. The Outcome: Not-Beings and the Form of Not-Being

The Stranger’s victory cry. I find it expedient, to make my case, to skip to the end of the

investigation and proceed backwards. At 258c7-11, the ES finally declares that Parmenides’

prohibition has been infringed24. Indeed, he triumphantly stresses that he and Theaetetus went well

beyond Parmenides’ dictum. Parmenides forbade that ‘not beings are’25; whereas ‘we have not

only demonstrated that not being is, but have also shown the form of not-being that actually is’

(258d5-7: Ἡµεῖς δέ γε οὐ µόνον τὰ µὴ ὄντα ὡς ἔστιν ἀπεδείξαµεν, ἀλλὰ καὶ τὸ εἶδος ὃ τυγχάνει

ὂν τοῦ µὴ ὄντος ἀπεφηνάµεθα). We are therefore induced by such a peal of trumpets to presume

that the ontological enterprise of the Sophist has been accomplished. So if PA is respected, this is

the laboratory for ascertaining it. By the same token, if the interpretative working hypothesis I

have been developing stands, this is the laboratory for validating it. We should check, that is,

24 I shall not enter the debate on the meaning of the parricide. I believe O’Brien (1995, 2005, 2011) has the last

word on this issue (pace Notomi 2007). 25 Cf. 28B7.1 DK: οὐ γάρ µήποτε τοῦτο δαµῆι· εἶναι µὴ ἐόντα; quoted twice at Sph. 237a8-9 and 258d2-3. Cf.

O’Brien 2005b: 122-5 and passim on Plato’s attitude toward this Parmenidean verse.

203 whether in the solution proclaimed by the ES, and in the arguments bolstering it, the recognition of being and not-being as Kinds has any major role. I aim to demonstrate that it does.

The ES’ declaration has two main components. Against Parmenides, they have demonstrated

(ἀπεδείξαµεν) that:

1) not beings are; and they have also shown (ἀπεφηνάµεθα)

2) the Form of not-being that actually is.

I will examine these two components one at a time in the following two sub-sections.

[1] Not beings are. The first component is proved by showing that things that are different from the

Kind Being can legitimately be called ‘not-beings’, without this bringing with it the burdensome implication that they do not exist. The risk of this implication is in fact dispelled by showing that negation particles does not necessarily indicate contrariety, and that what is different from the Kind

Being also participates in it, and therefore exists. Let us inspect the details of the argument.

Parmenides enshrined that not-beings can never be said to be. The ES wants first to show that instead this is possible. His argument spans throughout 255e8-256e7. In this stretch of text, the ES gives a sample of how Kinds combine with each other (the second project of the agenda set at

254c4-6), by singling out Motion as a specimen and exploring its combinatory relations with the other four of the selected greatest Kinds.

The analysis of these relations first includes the claim that Motion, being different from Rest,

Identity and Difference, is not any of them (not-Rest, not-Identity, not-Difference)26. This

26 (1) ‘Motion is not Rest’ (255e14: Οὐ στάσις ἄρ’ἐστίν [scil. κίνησις]) is justified by ‘Motion is completely different from Rest’ (255e11-2: ἔστι παντάπασιν ἕτερον στάσεως); (2) ‘Motion is not Identity’ (256a5: οὐ ταὐτὸν ἄρα ἐστίν [scil. κίνησις]) is justified by ‘Motion is different from Identity’ (256a3: ἡ κίνησις ἕτερον ταὐτοῦ ἐστιν); (3)

204 inference is based on the principle that since X is different from Y, then we can legitimately say that X is not-Y27. This principle operates on the intuitive notion that if X is different from Y, then X is not identical to Y; and X is not-Y is a legitimate way of expressing lack of identity. At this stage of the argument, the semantic grounds of the principle are not yet spelled out, though they are pragmatically presaged. They will be articulated as early as 257b1-c3, through an analysis of the meaning of negative particles. I will have more to say on this later in this chapter (and in the

Appendix). For now, suffice it to say that the ES will maintain that when a negative particle (µή or

ὄυ) is prefixed to the name that follows it, it only indicates difference from (and not contrariety to) what that name designates. So ‘Motion is not Identity’ does not signify that Motion is contrary to Identity, but only that it is different from it. If it were contrary to Identity, it could not partake in it, because contraries cannot partake in each other28. But Motion, just like everything else, partakes in Identity, because it is identical to itself (256a7-9). Therefore, Motion is only different and not contrary to Identity.

So X is different from Y = X is not-Y. Now, X’s difference from Y is analyzed in terms of X’s participation in the Kind Difference with respect to Y. On the face of it, the analysis sounds somewhat befuddling. One would presume that X is different from Y in virtue of its own identity; that X’s identity, that is, yields also its difference from other things. In other words, we incline to think that statements of difference are entailments of statements of identity (A=A à A≠B). But Plato explains things

‘Motion is not Difference’ (256c7: οὐχ ἕτερον ἄρ’ἐστί [scil. κίνησις]) is justified by ‘Motion is different from Difference’ (256c4-5: ἡ κίνησίς ἐστιν ἕτερον τοῦ ἑτέρου). 27 Why the hyphen? It is meant to reflect how Plato expresses himself. At this stage of the argument the negation particle is invariably prefixed to the nominal predicate and not to the verb ‘to be’, meaning that Plato gives it a narrow scope: it negates neither the whole sentence nor the whole copular predicate (as we would call it), but only the nominal part of the copular predicate. See the previous note, plus McDowell 1982: 117 and Crivelli 2012: 171. I shall return to this point later. 28 Cf. Phd. 103d-105b; Sph. 252d2-10.

205 otherwise. At 255e4-6 the ES claims that ‘each one of [the kinds] is different from the rest not through its own nature, but rather through its sharing in this other form, difference’29. This suggests, I believe, that Plato intends to describe a maximally fine-grained metaphysical network such that each true statement, including statements of difference, tracks objective relations among entities. Thus, ‘X is different from Y’ is true because X partakes in a distinctive Kind, i.e. Difference, in relation to Y. For example, Motion is different from Identity ‘because of its association with Difference, because of which it separates off from Identity’ (256a3-b3). Hence, the state of affairs grounding the statement

‘Motion is not Identity’ is Motion’s sharing in Difference in relation to Identity. To sum up: Motion is not Rest, Identity and Difference because it is different from each of them; and it is different from each of them because it partakes in Difference in relation to each of them.

On these grounds, the ES can now proceed to cashing out his results by focusing on the relationship between Motion and the last to-be-considered of the five selected Greatest Kinds, viz.

Being. Just as Motion is different from Rest, Identity and Difference, then, to the extent that Being is recognized as a Kind in its own right (and this is a key point), Motion is also different from it

(256d5: τὴν κίνησιν ἕτερον εἶναι τοῦ ὄντος). But since statements of difference such as ‘X is different from Y’ have so far been equated to ‘X is not-Y’, then from ‘Motion is different from

Being’ it can safely be inferred that Motion really is (a) not-being (d8: ἡ κίνησις ὄντως οὐκ ὄν

ἐστι). From this, the ES draws the following conclusion, which includes a universalization of the principle (256d11-2): ‘it is therefore necessarily the case that not-being be about motion and with respect to all kinds’30.

29 ἓν ἕκαστον γὰρ ἕτερον εἶναι τῶν ἄλλων οὐ διὰ τὴν αὑτοῦ φύσιν, ἀλλὰ διὰ τὸ µετέχειν τῆς ἰδέας τῆς θατέρου. 30 For the translation and the syntax of this sentence (including the veridical sense of ‘ἔστιν’ at 256d11 and the converse use of ‘to be’) see Crivelli 2012: 167-8. See also pp. 172-4 for an effective refutation of the reading of these lines proposed by van Eck 2002.

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The subsequent lines (256d12-e4) unpack this conclusion. They explain that the nature of

Difference renders all Kinds (πάντα [γένη])31 different from Being32 and therefore makes (ποιεῖ) each of them a not-being (οὐκ ὄν). Hence, it will be correct to say that all Kinds (including Motion) are equally not-beings (σύµπαντα […] οὕτως οὐκ ὄντα). This explanatory remark suggests, then, that for anything to be a not-being means to be different from the Kind Being; and this applies to everything except the Kind Being, which of course cannot be different from itself33. We can finally speak, with no fear of sophistical complaints, of ‘not-beings’.

This is not, however, the whole story. To complete the picture the ES takes care to dwell on positively assigning being to not-beings. As we have seen in previous chapters, the property being is recurrently metaphysically explained in terms of participation in the Kind Being. Thus, it will not come as a surprise that in the very same sentence in which the ES announces that Motion really is a not-being (256d8: οὐκ ὄν ἐστι), he adds the crucial proviso that Motion is also a being, since it partakes in Being (d8-9: καὶ ὄν, ἐπείπερ τοῦ ὄντος µετέχει). As he expounds his point in the subsequent lines (256d12-e4), he emphasizes consistently that, whilst all Kinds are not-beings in virtue of their participation in Difference with respect to Being, they should also be recognized as beings (ὄντα), because they partake in Being (µετέχει τοῦ ὄντος) on top of their being different from Being. Therefore, pace Parmenides, not-beings are. QED.

The pivotal role of a conception of Being as a genuine Platonic Kind in this first component of the ES’ conclusion is evident. The Kind Being is key to demonstrating that ‘not-beings are’ on two fronts. First, it is that which not-beings are different from (Motion is a not-being because it is

31 I supply ‘γένη’ from the preceding sentence (same line). The Kind Difference was previously claimed to be partaken in by all the selected greatest Kinds (255e4-5). At 259a4-6 the point will be claimed to apply universally. 32 Except the Kind Being itself (cf. 259b4), as we shall see shortly. 33 See previous note.

207 different from Being). Second, it is the Kind by partaking in which not-beings are (Motion is a not- being, but is because it partakes in Being). Were there no Kind Being, Plato could not bring this first part of his ambitious project about not-being to completion.

[2] The Form of Not-Being that actually is. Look now at the second component of the ES’ declaration at 258d5-6: ‘we have also shown the form of not-being that actually is’. How has this been proved? The answer, as I shall argue in the rest of this chapter, is two-pronged:

• First, the ES proves, through his notorious ‘doctrine of the parts of Difference’, that there is an

independent Form (or Kind) of Not-Being. More precisely, he maintains that the Kind Difference

has a peculiar nature such that it constitutively fragments in a plurality of parts, each of which is

set against a positive Kind. On the interpretation I defend (called in the literature ‘analogy

reading’34), the ES suggests that each part of Difference should in turn be regarded as a Form (or

Kind), so that the Form of Difference is then a collection of parts that are themselves Forms, and

the Form of Not-Being is one of such parts, namely, the part set against the Kind Being. In this

sub-section I will spell out my reading. In the next sub-section I will show why it is preferable

to its rival (‘generalizing reading’), according to which the Form of Not-Being is simply identical

to the Form of Difference or to any part of that Form.

• Second, the ES shows that the Kind Difference, with all its parts, partakes in the Kind Being.

He can therefore conclude that, shocking as it may sound, the Form of Not-Being actually is.

Let us go into the details of the text. Starting from 257c5 the ES develops a sophisticated (and controversial) account of ‘the parts of Difference’. To illustrate this notion, at 257c7-d2 he draws a notorious analogy between Difference and knowledge (ἐπιστήµη). Knowledge is in some degree

34 Cf. above n.10.

208 a single thing (µία […] που)35, but it articulates in a plurality of parts (πολλαί […] ἐπιστῆµαι), viz. the specific branches of knowledge. Each of these parts is marked off from knowledge by being applied to its specific object, from which it also receives its name (ἐπωνυµίαν). For example, literacy is of letters; arithmetic of numbers (ἀριθµοί). Analogously, the nature (φύσις) of

Difference, despite being a unitary entity (257d4-5: µιᾶς οὔσης), is constitutively fragmented in a plurality of parts. Each of these parts is marked off from Difference by its opposition to a specific

Kind, namely, its positive counterpart36, from which the relevant part of Difference also takes its name. Thus, the not-beautiful is the part of Difference set against the nature of the Beautiful; the not-large against the nature of the Large37.

Among the parts of Difference, the ES singles out also one opposed to Being (258a11-b4):

35 For the meaning of ‘που’ as ‘in some degree’, cf. LSJ, s.v. ‘που’ II. 36 Cf. 257c7-8: ἡ θατέρου µοι φύσις φαίνεται κατακεκερµατίσθαι; 258d7-e2: τὴν γὰρ θατέρου φύσιν

ἀποδείξαντες οὖσάν τε καὶ κατακεκερµατισµένην ἐπὶ πάντα τὰ ὄντα πρὸς ἄλληλα. The same vocabulary of fragmentation and parthood is used at Men. 79b4-c9 in relation to virtue. Some commentators think the positive counterpart of each part of Difference is not a Kind but its participants. Not-beautiful is set against (not the Form of the Beautiful but) beautiful things, cf. e.g. Frede 1967: 86-9; Bostock 1984: 115-6; Denyer 1991: 137-9; Frede 1992: 408-9. They have been rightly criticized on the ground that ‘the nature of the beautiful’ (257d12-13) can hardly refer to anything but the Form of the Beautiful, cf. e.g. Kostman 1973: 200; van Eck 1995: 27-8, O’Brien 2005b: 157-8, 2011: 213-15; Brown 2012: 278-9. Crivelli 2012: 208-12 is aware of this objection and attempts to salvage the Frede- Bostock-Denyer reading by suggesting that ‘beauty is not that from which something is different but that with which the kind difference is linked so as to give rise to a special part of itself [and that] it is left to the reader to realize that [the link between difference and beauty] amounts to difference from everything that falls under beauty’. This attempt is unpersuasive: at 257d7 the ES says that not-beautiful is ‘the part of difference contraposed to the beautiful’ (τῷ καλῷ τι θατέρου µόριον ἀντιτιθέµενον). It seems to me that this means precisely that Beauty is that from which the not-beautiful is different. 37 A serious philosophical problem lies, I believe, beneath the surface of this seemingly simple analogy. I can only hint at it. The claim of a constitutive internal fragmentation of Difference prompts the question of how a Form of Difference can be conceived of. If ‘different’ is always said ‘in relation to something else’ (πρὸς ἄλλο), what is left to think about difference in itself? What is difference anyways? For an insightful treatment of this issue, I refer the reader to Hegel’s Wissenschaft der Logik, II 266 (note that Hegel too conceives of difference in terms of negativity).

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ES: So, it seems, the contrast of the nature of a part of difference and that of being,

which are mutually opposed, is, if it be permissible to say so, a being no less than

Being itself and it does not mean contrariety to it, but only difference from it.

THT: That is quite clear

ES: How shall we call it?

THT: Clearly this is precisely not-being, which we were seeking for the sake of the

sophist38.

The part of Difference contrasted with the Kind Being (and only with it) is no less than the long-awaited not-being (b7: τὸ µὴ ὄν). Theaetetus has now his eureka moment39 - though the ES will soon point out to him that the argument demands yet a further step, namely the analysis of sentence components. It is worth noticing that, in spite of what is often believed, not-being is not identified with the Kind Difference as a whole, nor with any part of Difference whatsoever40. Not- being is just one among the parts of Difference, on a par with others, and contrasted with one single

38 {ΞΕ.} Οὐκοῦν, ὡς ἔοικεν, ἡ τῆς θατέρου µορίου φύσεως καὶ τῆς τοῦ ὄντος πρὸς ἄλληλα ἀντικειµένων

ἀντίθεσις οὐδὲν ἧττον, εἰ θέµις εἰπεῖν, αὐτοῦ τοῦ ὄντος οὐσία ἐστίν, οὐκ ἐναντίον ἐκείνῳ σηµαίνουσα ἀλλὰ τοσοῦτον µόνον, ἕτερον ἐκείνου. {ΘΕΑΙ.} Σαφέστατά γε. {ΞΕ.} Τίν' οὖν αὐτὴν προσείπωµεν; {ΘΕΑΙ.} Δῆλον ὅτι τὸ µὴ ὄν, ὃ διὰ τὸν σοφιστὴν ἐζητοῦµεν, αὐτό ἐστι τοῦτο (translation after Crivelli 2012: 216, slightly modified). The subject of the first sentence is ‘ἀντίθεσις’. So prima facie it looks as though not-being is the very opposition between a part of Difference and Being, not the part of Difference itself. This is how e.g. Dixsaut 1991: 204 ingeniously interprets these lines. Yet the ensuing lines strongly suggest that not-being is in fact a part of Difference, not a ‘mise en opposition’, as Dixsaut puts it: see e.g. 258e2: µόριου αὐτῆς [scil. τῆς θατέρου φύσεως, picked from d7] (with n. 66 below); but also 258b11-c5 where τὸ µὴ ὄν is considered on a par with τὸ µὴ καλόν, which was in turn described as a certain part of Difference (257d7: τι θατέρου µόριον) opposed to the Beautiful. Following Lee 1972: 274-5 and n.11 (see also Centrone 2008: 205 n.140), we may therefore regard ‘ἀντίθεσις’ as a slip, cf. Arist. Cat. 3b10-12 and EE 1224a19-20 for similar cases. 39 As Brown 2012: 269 nicely calls it. 40 See next sub-section for more details.

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Kind, viz. Being. Thus, at 258c1-4 – a passage meant to draw an inference from the previous lines

(notice the initial ‘οὖν, ὥσπερ εἶπες’) – not-being (τὸ µὴ ὄν) is unambiguously regarded as coordinate with not-big (τὸ µὴ µέγα) and not-beautiful (τὸ µὴ καλόν), and not as superordinate to them, or as a generic label ranging over them41.

Moreover, all the parts of Difference, including not-being, have as much being as their positive counterparts (257e11-258b5). For, since Difference itself is, by partaking in Being, one should acknowledge that its parts too are beings (258a9: τὰ µόρια αὐτῆς µηδενὸς ἧττον ὄντα τιθέναι).

There is therefore a salient sense in which not-being, i.e., the part of Difference set against the

Kind Being, is (259a2: εἶναι τὸ µὴ ὄν)42.

The ontological status of the parts of Difference is left quite underdetermined in the stretch of text just examined (257c5-258c5). We are told that they are beings, just as their positive complements (257e6; 258a9); that they bear a name (257d9-11)43; and that they are stably in possession of their own nature (258b11-c5). But throughout the dialogue, especially the last feature is systematically associated with Kinds44. So one might suppose that the ES thinks that the parts of Difference are themselves Kinds. There is evidence that confirms this supposition.

• Not-Being, namely the part of Difference opposed to the Kind Being, is twice explicitly

labeled as a ‘Form’ (258c4: οὕτω δὲ καὶ τὸ µὴ ὂν κατὰ ταὐτὸν ἦν τε καὶ ἔστι µὴ ὄν, ἐνάριθµον

τῶν πολλῶν ὄντων εἶδος ἕν; d6: τὸ εἶδος ὃ τυγχάνει ὂν τοῦ µὴ ὄντος).

41 Notice the ὥσπερ…οὕτω construction at 258b11-c2. 42 Cf. Plt. 284b7-8. 43 This marks a contrast with Aristotle, who thinks that ‘not human being’ is not really a name, but only an

‘indefinite name’ (ὄνοµα ἀόριστον), cf. Int. 16a30-32, 19b8-10. This view of Aristotle’s is of a piece with his rejection of negative kinds, on which see below. 44 Cf. Sph. 255b1, d9, e5; 256e1; 257a9, c7, d4, 12; 258a8.

211

• A few lines later, it is also referred to as a ‘Kind’ (260b7: Τὸ µὲν δὴ µὴ ὂν ἡµῖν ἕν τι τῶν

ἄλλων γένος ὂν ἀνεφάνη, κατὰ πάντα τὰ ὄντα διεσπαρµένον).

• In the same section of the dialogue, not-being will be also regarded as something blending

with other things (260b11: µείγνυται; c1,2: µειγνυµένου), which things can partake in (260d7:

τὰ µὲν µετέχειν τοῦ µὴ ὄντος) and combine with (260e2: κοινωνεῖ τοῦ µὴ ὄντος; e5: τὴν

κοινωνίαν αὐτῶν τῷ µὴ ὄντι). Talk of blending, participation and combination is standardly

associated with genuine Platonic Kinds.

The last remark in the last bullet point is especially noteworthy for the present purposes. For it suggests that for X to be a not-being means to combine not generically with Difference, but with that specific part of Difference opposed to Being, viz. Not-Being. So when the ES avows that X is different from Y because of its combination with Difference (e.g. 256b2-3), one could bring this claim into a sharper perspective thanks to the doctrine of the parts of Difference and say that X partakes not just generically in Difference, but really in that specific part of difference which is opposed to Y. So Motion is not-Rest because it is different from Rest (255e11-2); and it is different from Rest because it partakes in Difference with respect to Rest, i.e., in that specific part of

Difference (Not-Rest) which is set against the Kind Rest. Likewise, Motion is not-Being because it is different from Being (256d11); and it is different from Being because it partakes in Difference with respect to Being, i.e., in that specific part of Difference (Not-Being) which is set against the

Kind Being.

The foregoing suggests that Not-Being is, accordingly, a bona fide Platonic Kind, with its own distinctive nature and responsible for its participants’ possession of the property its name names.

As O’Brien puts it, Not-Being is ‘une forme au sens le plus classique de ce terme : à savoir la

212 réalité qui permet d’appréhender […] l’unité qui fait en sorte que tout être est aussi non-être’45.

Things can legitimately be said to be ‘not-beings’ because they partake in Difference with respect to Being, namely, that part of the Kind Difference opposed to the Kind Being. This part is the Kind

Not-Being. Further, the Kind Not-Being is itself said to be insofar as, just like any other part of

Difference, it partakes in the Kind Being. For, since the Kind Difference partakes in Being, its parts will do so too (258a8-9). Therefore, the second component of the conclusion stated by the

ES at 258d5-7 has been demonstrated as well: the two interlocutors have discovered a Form of

Not-Being (namely of the part of Difference opposed to the Kind Being) that actually is (because it partakes in Being).

The isolation of a Kind Being is therefore key to this part of Plato’s solution of the puzzle of not-being on two fronts: on the one hand, it is the positive Kind against which that specific part of

Difference named Not-Being is set; on the other hand, it is the Kind by partaking in which Not-

Being is. Once again, were there no Kind Being, Plato could not bring this crucial part of his ambitious project about not-being to completion.

By the end of the ‘communion of Kinds’, both Being and Not-Being are therefore characterized as Kinds. This result of the investigation will not be questioned in the remainder of the dialogue. We saw the ES stating PA right after broaching a conception of Being as an independent Kind. I advanced the working hypothesis that the two moves were not without relation and that, through PA, Plato was prefiguring that both Being and Not-Being should be treated as independent Kinds. The foregoing examination lends support to that hypothesis. However, both the syntax and the philosophical meaning of the stretch of text just examined are vexed and it behooves us to consider rival construals.

45 O’Brien 1995: 71.

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Critical assessment of the ‘generalizing reading’. Traditionally, scholars have interpreted Plato’s conception of not-being in the Sophist differently, that is by identifying not-being either with the

Form of Difference as a whole, or with any part of that Form – and not, as I have suggested, with that specific part of Difference set against Being. This line of interpretation has been labelled in the literature the ‘generalizing reading’46. In this sub-section I intend to argue that the ‘generalizing reading’ is unconvincing.

To begin with, it is worth noticing that even supporters of the ‘generalizing reading’ often openly acknowledge that the train of thoughts set by the Knowledge-Difference analogy clearly makes the needle of the scale lean towards the ‘analogy reading’47, as I myself tried to make it apparent in the previous sub-section. So one must have very good reasons to depart from it.

Supporters of the ‘generalizing reading’ have proposed the following four:

1) Grammar. A first point concerns the phrase ‘τῆς θατέρου µορίου φύσεως’ at 258a1148.

Advocates of the ‘generalizing reading’ propose the translation ‘of a part of the nature of

Difference’, instead of ‘of the nature of a part of Difference’49. But the word order speaks

against this translation50. Had Plato meant ‘of a part of the nature of Difference’, I believe he

would have written ‘τῆς θατέρου φύσεως µορίου’51. This problem would be of limited

46 Cf. above n.10. 47 Cf. Van Eck 2002: 79 and Brown 2012: 284-5. 48 Lee 1972: 281-3 and Crivelli 1990: 77-8 list the possible syntactical construals. 49 Cf. e.g. Campbell 1867: 161; Diès 1925: 373; Cornford 1935: 291; Frede 1967: 90; Lee 1972: 283; Cordero

1993: 183; Dixsaut 1991: 203-4 and n.45; Brown 2012: 285. 50 Crivelli 2012: 216 n.121 too contends that the latter translation is the only grammatically legitimate, though he does not explain why. 51 Compare 257d4: τὰ τῆς θατέρου φύσεως µόρια. See also De Rijk 1986: 172-3 and n.15; O’Brien 1995: 114-

5; van Eck 2002: 77-8. Note that the adnominal genitive accompanying ‘φύσις’ systematically either precedes or

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philosophical significance if it were not of a piece with that of the rendering and interpretation

of the subsequent elliptical phrase ‘τῆς τοῦ ὄντος’, which instead has more far-reaching

consequences. Given the word order of ‘τῆς θατέρου µορίου φύσεως’ at a11, the most natural

reading suggests to supply just ‘φύσεως’ (τῆς τοῦ ὄντος <φύσεως>)52. But some propose to

read the phrase as ‘τῆς τοῦ ὄντος <φύσεως µορίου>’ (‘a part of the nature of Being’) or ‘τῆς

τοῦ ὄντος <µορίου φύσεως>’ (‘the nature of a part of being’)53. Grammatically, both these

construals are possible54, but the latter makes the syntax ambiguous55 and both

uneconomically make the phrase doubly elliptical. More importantly, at least two further

weightier considerations discourage them:

First, just one line below (259b2), the positive pole of the contrast (ἀντίθεσις) is expressly

‘being itself’ (αὐτοῦ τοῦ ὄντος), i.e. the proprietary Kind Being, not a purported part thereof56.

The ES emphasizes that (the nature of) the part of Difference set against (the nature of) Being

follows ‘φύσις’, with no interposed words, in virtually all occurrences of ‘φύσις’ in the dialogue (228a7; 245c9; 250c6; 255b1, d9, e5; 256c2, e1; 257a9, d4, d11; 258a8, b10, d7). To be sure, at 258a9 the ES speaks of ‘the parts of it’ (τὰ µόρια αὐτῆς), where ‘αὐτῆς’ picks the previous ‘ἡ θατέρου φύσις’ at a7-8 (which recurs at 258d7). But this is less than decisive. First, I do not deny that Plato could speak of ‘parts of the nature of Difference’ (τῆς θατέρου φύσεως µόρια), but that the word order at 258a11 licenses such a translation. Second, a few lines below, at 258b11-c4, the ES states the key conclusion that Not-being, just like any other part of Difference, is stably in possession of its own nature (βεβαίως ἐστὶ τὴν αὑτοῦ φύσιν ἔχον). The emphasis on ‘φύσις’ at 258a11 is surely meant to prepare this conclusion. 52 Cf. Lee 1972: 283; Dixsaut 1991: 203-4 and n.45; O’Brien 1995: 114-5. When I say ‘supply’ I mean mentally and do not recommend an emendation of the text. 53 Cf. Campbell 1867: 161; Diès 1925: 373; Cornford 1935: 292; Frede 1967: 90. 54 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 216 n.122 (but again, with no explanation). 55 As O’Brien 1995: 113 points out, if one reads ‘τῆς τοῦ ὄντος <µορίου φύσεως>’, it would be unclear whether the article ‘τοῦ’ governs ‘ὄντος’ or ‘µορίου’ (‘the nature of a part of being’ or ‘the nature of the part of a being’). 56 Cf. 257a1: τὸ ὂν αὐτὸ. Cornford 1935: 289 thinks ‘τὸ ὄν’ primarily means the Form of Being, but may also be intended to cover ‘anything that is real’. I see no evidence for this option; nor does he adduce any. Instead, ‘αὐτοῦ τοῦ ὄντος’ is reminiscent of Plato’s standard designation of a Form as ‘αὐτὸ τὸ φ’.

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has no less being (οὐδὲν ἧττον […] οὐσία) than its positive counterpart, which is referred to

at 259b2 as ‘αὐτοῦ τοῦ ὄντος’. It is natural then to regard ‘αὐτοῦ τοῦ ὄντος’ as echoing ‘τῆς

τοῦ ὄντος <φύσεως>’ and both as referring to the Kind being – φύσις + genitive and ‘αὐτὸ τὸ

F’ are standard Platonic formulae to designate Forms. If this were not so, it would be unclear

why ‘αὐτὸ τὸ ὄν’ is invoked.

Second, both rival construals of the text (i.e. τῆς τοῦ ὄντος <φύσεως µορίου> and τῆς τοῦ

ὄντος <µορίου φύσεως>) suppose a reference to some ‘parts of Being’ on top of the ‘parts of

Difference’. Yet, an alleged doctrine of the ‘parts of Being’ has simply no place in the ES’

argument and there is no trace of it elsewhere in the dialogue57.

2) Analogy vs example. At 257b3-7 the ES prefaces the ensuing semantic analysis of negation

particles (b9-c3) with two remarks. He first claims that ‘when we say ‘not being’, it seems,

we’re not saying that it is the contrary of being, we’re just saying it is different’58. Next he

affirms: ‘οἷον ὅταν, we say ‘not big’, does our use of the expression appear to you to indicate

the small any more than the equal?’. I left ‘οἷον ὅταν’ untranslated because it is the critical

phrase. Supporters of the ‘analogy reading’ take it to introduce an analogy (‘Just as when we

say…’). Contrariwise, supporters of the ‘generalizing reading’ take it to introduce an example

(‘For example, when we say…’)59. Thus, ‘not big’ would be an instance of ‘not being’. By the

same token, ‘not being’ would be a general label ranging over any ‘not-F’, later characterized

as parts of Difference.

57 As emphasized by Lee 1972: 283-4; O’Brien 1995: 113-4. 58 Ὁπόταν τὸ µὴ ὂν λέγωµεν, ὡς ἔοικεν, οὐκ ἐναντίον τι λέγοµεν τοῦ ὄντος ἀλλ' ἕτερον µόνον. As Crivelli 2012:

179-80 and n. 11 remarks the article ‘τὸ’ in front of ‘µὴ ὂν’ indicates that the remark concerns what we say when we use the expression ‘not-being’. 59 Cf. e.g. Kostman 1973: 203; Frede 1992: 406; Brown 2012: 275; Crivelli 2012: 182-3.

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Grammatically, both options are acceptable60. But the ‘generalizing reading’ has been

preferred on two grounds. First, some have urged that Plato frequently uses ‘οἷον ὅταν’ to

introduce an illustration of a general claim61. But this is less than cogent, because Plato also

uses ‘οἷον ὅταν’ to present an analogy or comparison, e.g. at Ti. 43e462. Second, it is contended

that introducing an analogy by means of a question, as the ‘analogy reading’ requires, is

awkward63. But it is doubtful that appeal to euphony or prose elegance constitutes conclusive

evidence in this context. Instead, the ‘analogy reading’ is corroborated by a point that seems

to me more substantive. At 258c1-4 – a passage meant to draw an inference from the previous

lines (notice the initial ‘οὖν, ὥσπερ εἶπες’) – not-being (τὸ µὴ ὄν) is unambiguously regarded

as coordinate with not-big (τὸ µὴ µέγα) and not-beautiful (τὸ µὴ καλόν), and not as

superordinate to them, or as a generic label ranging over them64. Not-being must be counted

as one of the many beings, and be considered on a par with not-big, not-beautiful etc. Just as

Being is a Kind in its own right, and not a genus of all genera encompassing all other Kinds;

so too, not-being is on a par with other parts of Difference. Hence 257b3-7 does not prove the

‘generalizing reading’.

3) Being vs essence. Summarizing his achievements at 258d5-e3, the ES declares: ‘for having

shown that the nature of difference is65 and is cut up into pieces over all beings in their

60 Cf. LSJ, s.v. ‘οἶος’ V 2 a,b. 61 Cf. Phd. 70e6; Cra. 394d6, 424e1; R. 462c10. For this argument cf. Brown 2012: 275 n.13. 62 Brown 2012: 275 n.13 fails to mention this occurrence. 63 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 183. 64 Notice the ὥσπερ…οὕτω construction at 258b11-c2. 65 Van Eck’s rendering of οὖσαν at d7 as ‘is something’ (cf. van Eck 2002: 73) is disputable. It renders ‘οὖσαν’ as if it were ‘οὖσάν τι’. The underlying reason for this choice seems clear enough: it is an application of the Owenian

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relationships with each other, we have dared to say of the part of it that is contraposed to the

being of each thing that it was the very thing that not-being really is’66. Notice that the ES’

résumé includes several aorists (ἀπεφηνάµεθα, ἀποδείξαντες, ἐτολµήσαµεν). We are therefore

invited to read this second formula of not-being on a continuum with that of 258a11-b4: the

ES is rehearsing what was proved before67. So we are not in the presence of two distinct

formulae of not-being, not even two complementary ones.

Now, what is ‘the being of each thing’ (τὸ ὂν ἑκάστου) mentioned at 258e2? Champions

of the ‘generalizing reading’ read ‘ἑκάστου’ as an ‘adnominal’ genitive. So ‘the being of each

thing’ is taken to express any specification of the Kind Being, any being-something, i.e. any

part of Being. In other words, ‘the being of each thing’ is the essence of each Kind. The only

other occurrence of ‘τὸ ὂν ἑκάστου’ in Plato’s corpus is at Ep. 7.343a1 and seems to chime

with this reading. Accordingly – so the advocates of the ‘generalizing reading’ conclude –

since ‘τὸ ὂν ἑκάστου’ indicates the essence of each Kind and the two formulae of not-being

slogan ‘to be is to be something’. But even if the slogan were key to interpreting the Sophist (and I think it is not so), the translation would nonetheless be unacceptable. See O’Brien 2013a: 231. 66 τὴν γὰρ θατέρου φύσιν ἀποδείξαντες οὖσάν τε καὶ κατακεκερµατισµένην ἐπὶ πάντα τὰ ὄντα πρὸς ἄλληλα, τὸ

πρὸς τὸ ὂν ἑκάστου µόριον αὐτῆς ἀντιτιθέµενον ἐτολµήσαµεν εἰπεῖν ὡς αὐτὸ τοῦτό ἐστιν ὄντως τὸ µὴ ὄν. At 258e2 the textus receptus found in βΤWY and Simp. in Ph. 136.26 reads ‘ἑκάστου’. O’Brien 1995: 66-70 has thoroughly demonstrated that the reading ‘ἕκαστον’ found at Simp. in Ph. 238.26, printed by most modern editors (including Heindorf, Stallbaum, Campbell, Burnet, Diès, Robinson) and read by most commentators (including Cornford 1935, Lee 1972, Frede 1992: 410, Brown 2012) is no more than a Neoplatonic intervention, meant to read back into Plato’s text the definition of non-being required for Plotinus’ identification of the ‘non-being’ of the Sophist with the ‘receptacle’ of the Timaeus. The MSS reading is also accepted, among others, by Owen 1971: 239-40; Dixsaut 1991: 205-6 n.46; Cordero 1993: 184, 270; van Eck 2002: 75-6; Fronterotta 2007: 454-5; Centrone 2008: 207-9; Crivelli 2012: 219 n. 130; Rowe 2015: 162, 182. Brown 2012 retains ‘ἕκαστον’, but does not discuss O’Brien’s findings. 67 See Van Eck 2002: 77 and Brown 2012: 288, pace Lee 1972: 284 and O’Brien 1991, 1995: 70-1, 2005 who think that the two formulae (O’Brien calls them ‘definitions’) make different points. Dixsaut 1991: 206 n.46 too thinks the second formula does not repeat the first, but for reasons yet different from those of Lee and O’Brien.

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are of a piece, then at 258a11-b4 the ES is implicitly invoking parts of Being: being is always

being-F and not-being is always not-being-(a)-F. I have three replies:

• First, the linchpin of this interpretation is that the genitive ‘ἑκάστου’ is ‘adnominal’. But,

on reflection, we are not obliged to read it this way. It seems to me that nothing really

prevents ‘ἑκάστου’ from being a genitive of possession and referring not to the

determinate being (the essence) of each thing, but to the being possessed by each thing,

i.e. in which each thing partakes: in short, the Kind Being68. Crivelli objects that had Plato

meant ‘the being in which all things participate’, he would have used ‘τὸ ὄν πάντων᾽

rather than ‘τὸ ὂν ἑκάστου’69. Not necessarily. For example, at Symp. 189e5 Aristophanes

starts his myth by saying that in the beginning ‘the shape of each human being was

completely round’ (ἔπειτα ὅλον ἦν ἑκάστου τοῦ ἀνθρώπου τὸ εἶδος στρογγύλον). He

describes the shape common to all human beings but he does not use ‘πάντων’.

• Second, my reading of ‘τὸ ὂν ἑκάστου’ is borne out by the ES’ following warning at

259e6-7: ‘so let no one accuse us of having dared to declare that not-being is the contrary

of being and then say that it is’ (µὴ τοίνυν ἡµᾶς εἴπῃ τις ὅτι τοὐναντίον τοῦ ὄντος τὸ µὴ

ὂν ἀποφαινόµενοι τολµῶµεν λέγειν ὡς ἔστιν). This remark – clearly echoing 258b3-4 –

is inferred from the previous summary at 258d5-e5 (notice the initial ‘τοίνυν’). The tight

connection between the two passages is displayed even linguistically: compare the

68 This option is adumbrated by van Eck 2002: 79 and Dixsaut 1991: 206 n.46. In particular, the latter writes:

‘l’expression “l’être de chaque chose » ne renvoie ici nullement à un être précisément déterminé: à chaque Forme, seulement à l’être dont l’Etranger rappelle ici qu’il est participé par chaque chose qui est’ (my emphasis). Unfortunately, Dixsaut does not develop this insight and indeed spoils it, by maintaining that in the opposition established by the second formula, ‘l’être se trouve aussi morcelé et relié’, which suggests an alleged doctrine of the parts of Being, never actually thematized by Plato. Notice also that in other dialogues Plato seems to favor different locutions to designate the determinate being (essence) of each thing, cf. e.g. Cra. 423e9: ἕκαστον ὃ ἐστιν. 69 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 219 n.132.

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occurrences of the verbs ‘ἀποφαίνω’ and ‘τολµαῶ’ at 258e7 (ἀποφαινόµενοι τολµῶµεν)

with those at 258d7 (ἀπεφηνάµεθα) and 258e3 (ἐτολµήσαµεν). The ES means to clear the

field from a possible misconstrual of the conclusion just stated. He warns that having

dared (ἐτολµήσαµεν) to say that not-being (τὸ µὴ ὄν) is the part of Difference contraposed

(ἀντιτιθέµενον) to the being of each thing (τὸ ὂν ἑκάστου), they have not dared ([µὴ]

τολµῶµεν) to say that not-being is the contrary (τοὐναντίον) of being (τοῦ ὄντος). All the

emphasis is on the contrast between being something ‘contraposed’ and being a

‘contrary’. Thus, the possible mistake the ES wants to prevent concerns the

characterization of not-being, not the identification of its positive counterpart. And so it

would seem that the two expressions ‘the being of each thing’ (258e2) and ‘being’ (e6)

have in effect the same referent. And since the ‘being’ mentioned at e6 will be soon

designated as one of the Kinds (259a5: τὰ γένη), it can be inferred that ‘τὸ ὂν ἑκάστου’

stands for the being in which each thing partakes, namely, the Kind Being.

• Third, while the occurrence of the same phrase at Ep. 7.343a1 cannot admittedly be

accounted for in this way, one may nonetheless doubt that it really constitutes counter-

evidence. The contexts are so different that the comparison seems hardly germane70. The

Epistle (even assuming its authenticity71) focusses there on the means for obtaining

knowledge of every single object individually. The Sophist, instead, revolves around the

interconnection among Kinds, one of which is Being. There is no question of a Kind

Being in Ep. 7 and this makes all the difference. To bracket this discontinuity means to

70 While van Eck 2002: 79 puts much weight on this passage, Crivelli 2012: 219 n.130 is more cautious and says that the meaning of ‘τὸ ὂν ἑκάστου’, at Ep. 7.343a1 is obscure. 71 In any case recently disputed by Burnyeat-Frede 2015.

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overlook the specificity of the Sophist’s doctrine and argument72. It is therefore

unadvisable to rely on this passage to adjudicate which reading of the Sophist to adopt.

4) Not-being and falsehood. A fourth objection against the ‘analogy reading’ contends that it

implies a striking discrepancy between the not-being invoked at 258b7 and d6-e7 and that

mentioned at 256e6-7 (‘In relation to each of the Forms, then, there is a lot of being and an

unlimited quantity of not-being’73). For the unlimited ‘not-being’ of the latter passage seems

to refer to all the Forms from which each Form is different (not-F; not-G etc.), not just the part

of Difference set against the Kind Being. I bite the bullet: there is a discrepancy indeed, and

it is intended. At 256e6-7 what is at issue are not being and not-being simpliciter, but

‘concerning (περὶ) each of the Forms’. ‘Being περὶ X’ is not the same as the Kind Being74.

Instead, it refers to the positive determinations belonging to X, i.e. the sum of the Kinds in

which X partakes, including but not restricted to the Kind Being75. By the same token, ‘not-

being περὶ X’ is not the same as the Kind Not-Being evoked at 258d6, but what X is not

identical to, which includes both the Kinds in which X partakes and those in which it does not

partake76.

72 Similarly, could we legitimately read the Timaeus’ conception of the χώρα back in Tht. 181c6 (ἆρα κινεῖσθαι

καλεῖς ὅταν τι χώραν ἐκ χώρας µεταβάλλῃ ἢ καὶ ἐν τῷ αὐτῷ στρέφηται;)? Motion has a prominent role in both, but a joint interpretation would be patently far-fetched. 73 Περὶ ἕκαστον ἄρα τῶν εἰδῶν πολὺ µέν ἐστι τὸ ὄν, ἄπειρον δὲ πλήθει τὸ µὴ ὄν. The objection is raised by Van

Eck 2002: 79-80. 74 See Kostman 1973: 194 for valuable remarks on the phrases ‘being περὶ x’ and ‘not-being περὶ x’, though I do not share his account of difference in terms of incompatibility. 75 In the case of Motion, the selected specimen to explain the communion of Kinds, the multiple being includes

Being, Identity and Difference. 76 In the case of Motion, the unlimited not-being includes Rest, Being, Identity and Difference.

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One might wonder why Plato would somewhat ambiguously use the same two phrases

(τὸ ὄν and τὸ µὴ ὄν) to refer to different things. In my view, the answer is this. As is known,

the notions of ‘being περὶ x’ and ‘not-being περὶ x’ will be crucial for the subsequent accounts

of true and false sentences77 and Plato here heralds these future doctrinal developments, which

– nota bene – will require an entirely new argument, centered on the structure and syntactical

components of a sentence78. So Plato uses the same two phrases (τὸ ὄν and τὸ µὴ ὄν) to refer

to four different things, precisely to disclose the fraud of the sophist:

- false statements are about something that is, viz. which partakes in the Kind Being;

- but they say about (περὶ) it things that are not as if they are, i.e. things in which it

does not partake, as if it partakes in them;

- and things that are as if they were not, i.e. things in which it partakes, as if it did not

partake in them.

In fact, these subtle distinctions seem to me part of a precise project of language

clarification. It is worth recalling that the inquiry into not-being was claimed to be mainly

concerned with ‘the correct way of speaking about not-being’ (239b4: τὴν ὀρθολογίαν περὶ

τὸ µὴ ὄν). Interestingly, the term ‘ὀρθολογία’ is apparently forged by Plato. It is not attested

before him and, what is more, this is the only occurrence of this word (or its cognates) in the

whole Platonic corpus. Indeed, according to the TLG, the earliest post-Platonic occurrence of

this term dates about half a millennium later and is found in the grammarian Aelius

77 See the cross-reference at 263b11-12 (ἔφαµεν). Notice that ‘περὶ + genitive’ occurs six times at 263a5-d1.

Burnyeat 2002 convincingly shows that Plato was aware that the qualification ‘περὶ + genitive’ is key to the solution of the paradox of falsehood well before writing the Sophist, though only in this dialogue he offers a precise diagnosis of the paradox of falsehood. See already Shorey 1903: 54-6. 78 Cf. 260a7-8: ἔτι δ’ ἐν τῷ παρόντι δεῖ λόγον ἡµᾶς διοµολογήσασθαι τί ποτ’ ἔστιν, which suggests that a new topic is broached.

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Herodianus79. This phrase can be interpreted as referring to the correct way in which ‘is not’

is predicated of a given subject. This is probably part of what it is meant to convey, but I think

something more can be said. For ‘ὀρθολογία’ can also be taken to indicate the correct

application of the name ‘τὸ µὴ ὄν’, in a way reminiscent of the more familiar notion of

‘ὀρθότης τῶν ὀνοµάτων’. In fact, this was the original question asked by the ES at 237c2:

‘what this name, ‘not-being’, should be applied to?’ (χρὴ τοὔνοµ' ἐπιφέρειν τοῦτο, τὸ µὴ ὄν).

Now, Forms are arguably regarded by Plato as playing a special role in setting the norm for

the correct use of language80. Notably, they are in some sense the privileged bearers of the

terms that we use to to describe the world and their participants inherits their name from

them81. To recognize the status of Not-Being as a Form means to secure the adequate reference

to the name ‘τὸ µὴ ὄν’ and to enable therefore any speaker to use this name meaningfully.

Thus, the project of language clarification about not-being carried out by the Sophist seems to

me to concern both how ‘is not’ is predicated of a given subject and what the correct reference

of the name ‘not being’ is.

5) The contrary of Being. Finally, Crivelli raises the following objection: if the not-being

countenanced by the ES were the part of Difference ‘corresponding to the kind being taken

on its own […] Plato would be reintroducing a type of not-being which he had long declared

off-limits’82. I take it that the not-being off-limits Crivelli evokes is ‘that which in no way is’

79 Cf. Hdn. Gr. III 2.513.6. See ch.1 n.16. 80 Cf. Cra. 435e6-440e1, with Cambiano 1991 [1970]: 181-5 and Barney 2001: 138-55. 81 Cf. Phd 102b1-3, R. 596a7–9, Prm. 130e5-131a2. 82 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 218. I am not sure how this remark of Crivelli’s is supposed to square with his own previous analysis at Crivelli 2012: 166-75 (see esp. p. 175: ‘[the Visitor] means that not only is the kind change a not-being because it is different from the kind being, but also in general all kinds other than being are not-beings because they are different from the kind being’).

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(τὸ µηδαµῶς ὄν) mentioned at 237b7-8, which had caused so much trouble for the capture of

the sophist. Thus, Crivelli thinks that if the not-being vindicated by Plato were the part of

Difference contrasted with the Kind Being taken on its own, then Plato would implausibly

rehabilitate ‘that which in no way is’.

This objection can be answered. The semantic analysis of negative particles at 257b9-c3

establishes that when ‘µή’ and ‘οὔ’ are prefixed to the name that follows them, they need not

signify the contrary of the extra-linguistic correlate of that name, but only something different

from it83. Hence, ‘τὸ µὴ ὄν’, if interpreted as the part of Difference contrasted with the Kind

Being taken on its own, need not mean the contrary of the Kind Being – which the ES

identifies with ‘that which in no way is’ at 258e6-259a1 – but only something different from

the Kind Being. Accordingly, the ‘analogy reading’ does not implicate the cumbersome

consequence of implausibly making Plato rehabilitating the type of not-being which he had

long declared off-limits.

I conclude that none of the objections against the ‘analogy reading’ is effective and that not only does the ‘generalizing reading’ not have the textual support it requires from the Sophist, but passages such as 258c1-4 speak against it. As I suggested above, not-being (τὸ µὴ ὄν) is here unambiguously regarded as coordinate with not-big (τὸ µὴ µέγα) and not-beautiful (τὸ µὴ καλόν), and not as superordinate to them, or as a generic label ranging over any of them. Not-being has its own distinctive nature (258b11: τὸ µὴ ὂν βεβαίως ἐστὶ τὴν αὑτοῦ φύσιν ἔχον), and Plato never states or suggests that this nature is some sort of collection of the natures of not-big, not-beautiful etc., which is instead discouraged by his repeated emphasis on the fact that not-being is ‘one’

83 {ΞΕ.} Οὐκ ἄρ', ἐναντίον ὅταν ἀπόφασις λέγηται σηµαίνειν, συγχωρησόµεθα, τοσοῦτον δὲ µόνον, ὅτι τῶν

ἄλλων τὶ µηνύει τὸ µὴ καὶ τὸ οὒ προτιθέµενα τῶν ἐπιόντων ὀνοµάτων, µᾶλλον δὲ τῶν πραγµάτων περὶ ἅττ' ἂν κέηται τὰ ἐπιφθεγγόµενα ὕστερον τῆς ἀποφάσεως ὀνόµατα.

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(258c4; 260b7)84. Accordingly, not-being is just one among the parts of Difference, namely the one set against the Kind Being. Not-being is not a collection of parts of difference, but a part coordinate with the others, provided with its own nature.

Negative Kinds. Before concluding this chapter, it is worth considering another objection, which is only indirectly related to the opposition between ‘analogy reading’ and ‘generalising reading’.

This objection pertains to the characterization of the parts of Difference as Kinds. One might protest that the only Kind or Form is Difference and that there is no textual ground to metaphysically describe the parts of Difference as themselves Kinds. I say that this is only indirectly related to the opposition between ‘analogy’ and ‘generalising reading’, because surely one might still endorse the ‘analogy reading’ without taking the parts of Difference to be themselves Kinds. Thus, one might think that not-being is only the specific part of Difference set against the Kind Being (and not the Kind Difference as a whole or any part of Difference), without

84 According to Crivelli 2012: 219, the ES suggests that not-being is ‘a collection of indefinitely many kinds’ at

260b-7, where he states that ‘Not-being appeared to us to be a single kind among the others, disseminated among all being (Τὸ µὲν δὴ µὴ ὂν ἡµῖν ἕν τι τῶν ἄλλων γένος ὂν ἀνεφάνη, κατὰ πάντα τὰ ὄντα διεσπαρµένον)’ (transl. Crivelli, italics mine). I disagree for three reasons. First, the verb favored in the Sophist to suggest that a Kind parcels out in a plurality of other Kinds (and might therefore be regarded as a collection of them) is not ‘διασπείρω’, but ‘κατακερµατίζω’ (257c7-8; 258e1). Second, the participle ‘διεσπαρµένον’ is better interpreted as simply indicating that the Form of Not-Being is participated in by all Kinds (except, of course, Being itself, cf. 259b3-4). This is suggested by the ES’ ensuing remark at 260b10-11. He says that it should next be enquired whether not-being also ‘blends’ (µείγνυται) with opinion and speech. They should check, that is, whether among the things with which not- being blends there are also opinion and speech. Thus, the verb ‘µίγνυµι’ (also occurring at 260c1,2) replaces ‘διασπείρω’. Since ‘µίγνυµι’ (or ‘συµµίγνυµι’) was one of the ES’ chosen terms to express participation (e.g. 252e2; 253c2; 254e4; 256b9; 259a4), we may infer that ‘διασπείρω’ has a similar sense. Third, Crivelli’s reading (like the ‘generalizing reading’) is difficult to reconcile with the ES’ remark that Not-Being is ‘a single kind’ (ἕν). Notice that in this case there is no qualification, similar to the ‘που’ occurring at 257c10 about knowledge (and Difference), signalling that not-being is ‘one’ only qualifiedly, or in a certain degree.

225 subscribing to the additional claim that this part is itself a Kind. With this proviso, let us check what impact this objection has.

To begin with, I have argued above that Not-Being, viz. the part of Difference set against

Being, is twice explicitly labeled as a ‘εἶδος’ (258c4, d6), once ‘γένος’ (260b7) and the ES uses with regard to it the language of participation, blending and combination which is typical of Kinds

(260b11, c1-2, d7, e2, e5). Thus, at least as far as Not-Being is concerned, there is indeed textual ground to characterize it as a Kind. Admittedly, though, all these references concern specifically

Not-Being and are not explicitly extended to the other parts of Difference. Nevertheless, we have seen that at 258c1-4 not-being (τὸ µὴ ὄν) is unambiguously regarded as coordinate and on a par with not-big (τὸ µὴ µέγα) and not-beautiful (τὸ µὴ καλόν). Since Not-Being is explicitly considered on a par with the other parts of Difference, it seems to me legitimate to extend the characterization of Kind or Form to all parts of Difference85. So it can be inferred that Plato countenances negative Kinds. And although the doctrine of the parts of Difference is a novelty of the Sophist, it is worth observing that Plato had mentioned negative Kinds long before this dialogue: for example, the Euthyphro mentions a Form of the Impious (d2-5: ἀνόσιον); the

Republic of the Unjust (476a4: ἀδίκου); the Phaedo of the Unmusical and the Unjust (105e1:

ἄµουσον […] ἄδικον). The admission of such Kinds raises a lot of other problems, notably of the ethical side, but it is hard to deny that Plato countenances them.

The conclusion that the parts of Difference are genuine Kinds faces three further difficulties:

• In two passages of the Metaphysics and one of On Ideas86, Aristotle contends that the Platonic

‘One Over Many’ argument entails the postulation of Forms of negations. In all these texts,

85 Pace Fine 1993: 115. Among the commentators maintaining that Plato countenances negative Forms in the

Sophist are Moravcsick 1962: 68-72, Frede 1967: 92-4 and Crivelli 2012: 204-14. 86 Cf. Metaph. A 9.990b13-4; M 4.1079a9-10; Alex. Aphr. in Metaph. 80.15-81.7.

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this outcome is evaluated negatively, though only in On Ideas Aristotle supplies a full

argument87. What is less clear is whether Aristotle thinks the Platonists themselves admit of

Forms of negations; or rather the ‘One Over Many’ argument commits them to those Forms,

even if in fact they want to reject them. On Ideas is oblique on this88, but seems to presuppose

that the Platonists accept Forms of negations. Alexander confines himself to reporting that the

Platonists did not want ideas of indefinite or indeterminate things; or of things of which one

is primary, another secondary (81.5-7). Nowhere, though, does he say that the Platonists did

not accept ideas of negations tout court. The Metaphysics is not entirely consistent. At A

9.990b13-4, Aristotle includes the ‘One Over Many’ argument’ among those from which ‘it

follows that there are Forms of things of which we think (οἰόµεθα) there are no Forms’. The

text is repeated verbatim at M 4.1079a9-10, except for ‘we think’ which is replaced as ‘they

think’ (οἴονται). Various strategies have been adopted to harmonize the two passages89. But it

remains uncertain whether Aristotle means that the Platonists reject or ought to reject Forms

of negations90. So, on balance, it is doubtful that these Aristotelian passages provide cogent

evidence against my case.

• Some commentators appeal to Plt. 262a3-264b6, 265a1-6 to prove that Plato rejected Forms

of negations91. In these passages the ES seems to deny that negative predicables match proper

87 In short, the problem with negative Forms is that, if one countenances them, there would then be a single idea of heterogeneous and utterly different things – e.g. the idea of not-horse would group together lines and human beings. And this seems absurd to Aristotle. 88 It says that the argument ‘establishes’ (κατασκευάζειν) Forms of negations, which does not settle the issue. 89 See the recent discussion of Frede 2012: 269-70. 90 See the prudent observations by Berti 2004 [1962]: 281-2 and Frede 2012: 274-5. 91 Cf. e.g. Cherniss 1944: 263-5; Ross 1951: 168.

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Kinds. So for example ‘barbarian’ does not designate a proper Kind, because it turns out to be

nothing but a name for ‘not-Greek’ and ‘not-Greek’ is not a proper, joint-carving Kind – it is

a ‘part’ (µέρος), but not all parts are also Forms. To this objection one can answer, first, that

the Statesman does not deny outright that that negative predicables match proper Kinds. What

he does deny is that no part necessarily is also a Form (263b10: µέρος δὲ εἶδος οὐδεµία

ἀνάγκη), which does not exclude that a part might in some cases be a Form. Second, as Crivelli

observes, in the Statesman Plato is not concerned with the existence of negative Kinds, but

with their use in correct division92.

• Ross contends that Forms of negative concepts occasionally mentioned before the Sophist (e.g.

the Euthyphro’s Impious or the Republic’s Unjust) are not really negative Forms, because they

have ‘a positive as well as a negative meaning’93. For example, ‘unjust’ is not just everything

that is not just, but has a positive meaning (perhaps Ross alludes to the contrary of ‘just’). I must

confess this point is not entirely clear to me and Ross never spells out what this alleged positive

meaning would be. But in any case this does not seem to prove that there are no negative Kinds,

but that the meaning of the terms denoting them is both positive and negative.

More generally, what alternative construals ultimately fail to do is to adequately account for the textual evidence in the Sophist. Whatever Aristotle or the Statesman or other dialogues have to say on the matter, the fact remains that Plato, as we have seen, deploys a good deal of his standard terminology of Forms to refer to Not-Being. And there are reasons to regard Not-Being as a specimen for any other part of Difference. The exegesis proposed in this chapter has the advantage of doing justice to this evidence.

92 Cf. Crivelli 2012: 212-4. 93 Ross 1951: 168-9.

Conclusion

Wrap-up. Here are the five main claims I have defended in this dissertation:

1. The isolation of a Kind Being is a result of Plato’s engagement with the paradox of falsehood

and the consequent puzzle of not-being, triggered by the seventh definition of the sophist at

Sph. 240d2-241a2. That paradox prompted a definitional search for Being, governed by the

question ‘What is being?’. Such a search is structurally reminiscent of salient aspects of

definitional quests staged in the early dialogues. But there is also a difference: for the first

time the definiendum is not a being (e.g. beauty, courage), but being itself. The Kind Being

captures the definiendum of the question ‘What is being?’.

2. The Kind Being is, just like any other Platonic Kind, first and foremost conceived of by Plato

as a robust causal principle, metaphysically responsible for the property its name names, i.e.

being. This property is neither the property of being something or other, nor the property of

being identical to itself or being variously characterized, but just the property of being

(simpliciter), which, contrary to the orthodoxy established especially by the studies of Kahn,

Frede and Owen, I have suggested to understand in terms of existence. The still widespread

thesis that Plato is unaware of purely existential uses of ‘εἶναι’, does not therefore withstand the

evidence of the Sophist’s text. Similarly, Brown’s ‘semantic-continuity thesis’ – which too is

ultimately governed by the owenian slogan ‘to be is to be something’ – may correctly capture

a phenomenon of the Greek language, namely, that an existential use of the verb ‘εἶναι’ can

easily lead to use of the same verb as a copula, but it does not successfully account for the

228 229

metaphysical view Plato spells out in the Sophist. In other words, the ‘semantic-continuity

thesis’ may bear upon our understanding of aspects of the verb ‘εἶναι’, but does not illuminate

how the Kind Being works in the Sophist’s metaphysical theory.

3. The claim that the property obtained via participation in the Kind Being should be understood

in terms of existence is not meant to attribute to Plato either a quantified conception of

existence close to the one defended by the Frege-Russell-Quine tradition; nor a modal

conception of existence comparable to the one deployed by discussions about creation among

medieval (both Islamic and Latin) and early modern philosophers, e.g. Avicenna, Aquinas,

Descartes or Kant. So how should we understand Plato’s notion of existence? While the Sophist

is not fully explicit on this point and seems not to overtly endorse any ‘official’ solution to what

it means for something to be (simpliciter), I have argued that Plato might be hinting at the right

answer to this question at 247d8-e4, with the so-called ‘dunamis proposal’, though he leaves to

the reader to work out part of the details for herself.

4. The characterization of the Kind Being as a so-called ‘vowel-Kind’ involves two main

features. First, Being is all-pervasive, viz. everything partakes in it. But this means neither

that Plato is committed to an extremely expansive ontology countenancing all sorts of fictional

entities, nor that the Kind Being is a most generic genus encompassing all genera. Being is a

Kind on a par with (viz. coordinate to) others, and not the genus at the top of a putative

universal Porphyrian tree. The second thing we learn from the vowel-analogy is that

participation in the Kind Being is a necessary condition for the combination with other Kinds.

I have explained this by assigning to Being a twofold role in the mechanics of combination.

On the one hand, Being is metaphysically responsible for the existence of the combining

Kinds. On the other hand, it works as a relational property connecting those Kinds. The latter

function is reflected by the use of the verb ‘εἶναι’ as a copula.

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5. The Kind Being is a necessary condition of Plato’s account of not-being. Plato’s solution to the

puzzle of not-being (stated at 258d5-e3) hinges on the demonstration of the existence of a Form

or Kind of Not-Being (258c4, d6: εἶδος; 260b7: γένος), which is the part of the Kind Difference

set against Being, but which also partakes in Being – and, therefore, is. Thus, were there no

Kind Being, Plato could not bring his ambitious project about not-being to completion. I have

developed this reading by proposing a fresh reading of the prospect joint illumination of being

and not-being stated at 250e5-251a3, on which this forward-looking prediction is not due – as

per the current orthodoxy – to facts about the uses of the verb ‘to be’, but to the recognition of

the status of being and not-being as genuine Kinds.

The paradox of falsehood and Plato’s three-pronged strategy: closing remarks. I would like to conclude by making some final observations on how the isolation of a Kind Being contributes to disentangling the paradox of falsehood and the related puzzle of not-being. This will enable us to have in sight the essentials of the overall trajectory of Plato’s argument in the Sophist.

The paradox of falsehood and the puzzle of not-being had been triggered by the seventh definition of the sophist (240d2-241a2; 264b11-268d5)1. On one possible construal, as I pointed out in ch.1 (p.16), the paradox is based on the sophistical assumption that negative predication entails non-existance, so that if it is false that X is F, then X is not F; but if X is not F, it follows that X is not, viz. does not exist. But since what does not exist cannot even be referred to, then it cannot even be thought or said; whence, the impossibility of falsehood.

Plato’s strategy to disarm this sophistical argument includes, among else, three interrelated manoeuvres:

1 To that definition the ES will return at 264b11-268d5, after his painstacking ontological detour. Cf. Dixsaut 1992.

231 a) He shows that false predication does not entail non-existence. Thanks to an analysis of the

structure of sentences (259d9-262e10), according to which a minimal simple sentence has two

main components, a name (ὄνοµα) and a verb (ῥῆµα)2, Plato argues that every logos targets two

different things: it says one thing about (περὶ) one thing3. Based on this fundamental assumption,

he shows that truth and falsehood are determined neither by the name alone, nor by the verb

alone, but by the relation between them. Thus, a false logos says, about something, that things

that are not, are; or that things that are, are not. This is in turn explained through an analysis of

negation in terms of difference (as opposed to contrariety): the things that ‘are not’ are just

different from those in which the item denoted by the ὄνοµα partakes. Thus, if X is not about Y,

it does not follow that X does not exist: falsehood does not entail non-existence. b) Complementarily, Plato also metaphysically secures the existence of the referents of meaningful

speech by isolating an all-pervasive Kind Being. Thus, everything partakes in (or combines

with) Being and, in virtue of this participation, exists. The impossibility of absolute not-being

has its counterpart in the attribution of the property of being to all that is. This property is secured

by appeal to participation in the all-pervasive Kind Being. c) Finally, Plato identifies a specific referent to the name ‘τὸ µὴ ὄν’, i.e. a Form in its own right

that he singles out among the parts of that peculiar Form that is Difference. Not-Being is a

Kind identified with that part of Difference set against the Kind Being (whose existence, again,

is therefore a necessary condition for Plato’s account of not-being) and that also partakes in

2 Straightforward as it may sound, the historical importance of such an analysis, which will be inherited and developed by Aristotle in his De interpretatione (cf. Ademollo 2015) and thereby delivered to the following centuries, can hardly be overestimated. 3 As Crivelli 2012: 5 points out, in Plato’s account ‘there are no proposition-like unitary targets of acts of saying’.

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Being. With this the ontological conditions for the sayability of Not-Being are fulfilled: ‘τὸ

µὴ ὄν’ is a name with its own distinctive referent.

The investigation pursued in this dissertation was meant to make progress in the understanding of Plato’s distinctive contribution to the study of being and therefore in the elaboration of an adequate answer to that question: what is being for Plato? In my view, no univocal answer can be given to such a question, because Plato dealt with different philosophical problems involving in a relevant way the notion of being. On the one hand, he was concerned with the problem of determining the fundamental, permanent and unchanging reality contrasted with the inconstant flux and variety of perceptible things. The former he called ‘being’ and identified with the plurality of intelligible Forms, i.e. of those objective realities that are what they are unqualifiedly; the latter he called ‘becoming’, and identified with the domain of sensible particulars, that are what they are only in a qualified way. This problem was of a piece with the one of determining in virtue of what things are called whatever they are called. In this sense, then, Being is ‘the domain of definable entities – the objects about which one asks the Socratic ‘What Is X?’ question’4, in any of its occurrences (e.g. ‘What is beauty?’, ‘What is justice?’ etc.). On the other hand, Plato was led, through his engagement with the paradox of falsehood and the consequent puzzle of not- being, to concern himself with the problem of determining that in virtue of which things are called beings (as opposed to nothing at all). In this sense, Being is just one among the Forms, namely that specific object about which one asks the question, ‘What is being?’.

4 Cf. Code 1986: 426.

Appendix Not-Being, Contradiction and Difference: Simplicius vs Alexander of Aphrodisias

At Sph. 258d5-6 the ES triumphantly states: ‘we have also declared that the form (εἶδος) of not- being (τοῦ µὴ ὄντος) actually is’. One and the same Form, Not-Being, is not, in virtue of its own nature (258c2-3: τὸ µὴ ὂν […] ἔστι µὴ ὄν); but also is, because it partakes in Being, by being a part of Difference. On the face of it, this might strike as a sheer violation of the principle of non- contradiction: one and the same thing at once is and is not. And as a contradiction it was regarded by Alexander of Aphrodisias, according to Simplicius’ testimony1. In this Appendix I shall examine Alexander’s objection and uphold Simplicius’ defense of Plato in response to it.

Alexander’s objection. Aristotle concludes his criticism of Eleatic monism in Physics A by assessing alternative attempts made by some anonymous philosophers to respond to Eleatic arguments:

Some people yielded to both arguments: (α) to the one that all things are one, if being

signifies one thing, [by saying] that not-being is; and (β) to the one from dichotomy,

by positing indivisible magnitudes2.

1 Cf. Simp. in Ph. 134.19-33. Presumably, Alexander raised this objection in his lost commentary on the Physics

(part of which has now been recovered by Rashed 2011). I should leave out of consideration Simplicius’ strategy in (mis)quoting and critically assessing Alexander’s views, on which see Rashed 2011: 23-9. 2 Arist. Ph. A 3.187a1-11: ἔνιοι δ’ ἐνέδοσαν τοῖς λόγοις ἀµφοτέροις, τῷ µὲν ὅτι πάντα ἕν, εἰ τὸ ὂν ἓν σηµαίνει,

ὅτι ἔστι τὸ µὴ ὄν, τῷ δὲ ἐκ τῆς διχοτοµίας, ἄτοµα ποιήσαντες µεγέθη (translation is mine).

233 234

The identity of these unnamed respondents is disputed3. Possible candidates include, on the one hand, the Atomists; on the other, Plato (α) and Xenocrates (β). I shall not adjudicate this case, nor shall I offer an interpretation of these lines of the Physics. Instead, I will focus on one aspect of

Alexander of Aphrodisias’ reading of them. Alexander thinks Aristotle refers here to Plato and

Xenocrates. Notably, he thinks that (α) alludes to the Sophist4. In addition, he contends that the

Sophist’s account of not-being falls into a contradiction. The objection is reported by Simplicius’ commentary on the Physics:

And Alexander says that he [i.e. Plato] agrees on the one hand that Being is one, but

he still does not on the other agree that all things are one, when he assumes that among

all things are not only Being but also not-being. ‘And it is not’, he says, ‘in this way

that he [i.e. Plato] said that not-being existed, as being some thing among the things

that are under being. For he was not saying that there was something not existing and

something existing, nor that [it is that] which is included in what is assumed to be, but

[it is] that which has nature different from what was agreed and postulated, when he

accepted that Being was one and was spoken of in only one way. But agreeing to the

premise that what is besides being is not, but saying that there is something different

from the being assumed in the premise, he [i.e. Plato] expresses a contradiction. For,

granting that what is besides being does not exist, he says that on the contrary what is

besides being does exist and falls into the contradiction by saying that not-being exists

simply. If however someone were to say that not-being exists, but not the simple not-

being, but some not-being, he does not fall into the contradiction. For that which is

3 Cf. Clarke 2019: 146-7 and nn. 2 and 5. 4 Cf. 134.14-18; 135.15-17.

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something other is not other. For it was shown that being was not one in number

through its being taken that it was spoken of in one way’. These then are the words of

Alexander5.

According to Alexander, Plato was committed to the view that being is one (ἓν τὸ ὂν) – viz. ‘is spoken of only in one way’ (µοναχῶς λέγεσθαι)6 – but did not also embrace the Eleatic extremism that all things are one (πάντα ἓν εἶναι). For he further claimed that among all things (τῶν πάντων) there is not only being, but also not-being (µὴ µόνον τὸ ὄν, ἀλλὰ καὶ τὸ µὴ ὄν). Thus, being is univocal, but existence monism is false.

Alexander flags that this view should be distinguished from two apparently similar ones:

a) The view on which ‘there was something not existing and something existing’ (τὸ τὶ µὲν µὴ

ὂν τὶ δὲ ὄν). I take this to be a reference to the Stoic theory of the supreme genus7. Thus,

Alexander suggests that in saying that both being and not-being are, Plato does not mean that

they are species of an overarching genus, as per the Stoic account8.

5 in Ph. 134.19-33: Καὶ ὁ µὲν Ἀλέξανδρός φησιν αὐτὸν τὸ µὲν εἰ ἓν τὸ ὂν συγχωρεῖν, πάντα δὲ ἓν εἶναι µηκέτι

συγχωρεῖν τιθέντα τῶν πάντων µὴ µόνον τὸ ὄν, ἀλλὰ καὶ τὸ µὴ ὄν. “καὶ οὐχ οὕτως, φησί, τὸ µὴ ὂν εἶναι ἔλεγεν ὡς ὄν τι τῶν ὑπὸ τὸ ὄν. οὐ γὰρ τὸ τὶ µὲν µὴ ὂν τὶ δὲ ὄν, οὐδὲ τὸ ἐν τῷ κειµένῳ ὄντι περιεχόµενον, ἀλλὰ τὸ ἄλλην φύσιν ἔχον παρὰ τὸ ὡµολογηµένον καὶ κείµενον ἔλεγεν εἶναι δεξάµενος τὸ ὂν ἕν τε εἶναι καὶ µοναχῶς λέγεσθαι. ὁ δὲ συγχωρήσας τῇ προτάσει τῇ παρὰ τὸ ὂν οὐκ ὄν, λέγων δὲ εἶναι ἄλλο τι τοῦ ὄντος τοῦ εἰληµµένου ἐν τῇ προτάσει, εἶναι τὴν ἀντίφασιν λέγει. δοὺς γὰρ τὸ παρὰ τὸ ὂν µὴ εἶναι λέγει πάλιν τὸ παρὰ τὸ ὂν εἶναι καὶ τῇ ἀντιφάσει περιπίπτει τῇ τὸ µὴ ὂν ἁπλῶς εἶναι λεγούσῃ. καίτοι εἴ τις λέγοι µὲν εἶναι τὸ µὴ ὄν, µὴ τὸ ἁπλῶς δὲ µὴ ὄν, ἀλλὰ τὸ τὶ µὴ ὄν, οὐ περιπίπτει τῇ ἀντιφάσει. τὸ γὰρ ἄλλο τι ὂν ἄλλο οὐκ ἔστιν. οὐ γὰρ ἓν κατὰ τὸν ἀριθµὸν τὸ ὂν ἐδείχθη διὰ τοῦ ληφθῆναι µοναχῶς λέγεσθαι.” ταῦτα µὲν οὖν ὁ Ἀλέξανδρος. 6 I take the καὶ at 134.24 to be epexegetic. 7 Cf. SVF II 329-335, 371 with Brunschwig 1994 [1988]; see ch.5 n.26. Alexander criticizes the Stoic theory of the supreme genus at in Top. 359.12-6 (= SVF II 329). Plot. VI 1.25.9-10 probably takes his cue from Alexander. 8 The Middle Platonist Severus attempted a synthesis between the ontologies of Plato and the Stoics in commenting on Ti. 27d-28a, cf. Sedley 2005: 128-9. He is adamantly criticized by Plot. VI 2.1.21-3 and Procl. in Ti.

236 b) The view on which not-being is something that falls under being (ὄν τι τῶν ὑπὸ τὸ ὄν)9. Which

means: Plato, for Alexander, regarded being and not-being as coordinate.

Thus, Alexander takes Plato to be committed to the position that the totality of things includes being (which is univocal) and not-being (that has a different nature (ἄλλην φύσιν) than being) one alongside the other, and neither subordinate to the other.

Alexander protests that this view of Plato’s is contradictory (ἀντίφασιν). His argument can be outlined as follows.

(i) Plato thinks that being is one, i.e. univocal;

(ii) he further agrees that what is besides Being is not (παρὰ τὸ ὂν οὐκ ὄν);

(iii) but he also claims that there is something different from Being (εἶναι ἄλλο τι τοῦ

ὄντος);

(iv) ∴ what is other than Being both is and is not.

(v) ∴ ⊥.

Alexander presumes to detect the crux of Plato’s purported blunder in the fact that he operates with a notion of absolute not-being (τὸ ἁπλῶς µὴ ὄν). From this point of view, Plato appears to

Alexander still fully enmeshed in the Eleatic perspective, for he seems to have made the same burdensome identification between not-being and sheer nothing the Eleatics were guilty of10. At the same time, however, Plato would not have refrained from juxtaposing absolute not-being to

I 227.13-18. Alexander too might be alluding to Severus here. Notice that at in Ti. 212.8-9, Proclus mentions Severus, alongside Plutarch and Atticus, as an opponent of the Peripatetics. 9 Plotinus attacks this view too at VI 2.1.23-25 and regards it as ‘ridiculous’ (γελοῖον). It is unclear whether this view has historical references. A possible candidate is Sen. Ep. 58.8. 10 Cf. Simp. in Ph. 134.10-12; see also 115.11-15; 118.2-3; Phlp. in Ph. 62.4-8.

237 being, and, by the same token, from daring to say that not-being (i.e. sheer nothing) is. At

Parmenides’s crossroads, Plato would implausibly take both roads.

The elucidation of the objection gains in clarity if we bring in the Aristotelian text Alexander was presumably commenting on. At Ph. A 3.187a3-5 Aristotle avers: ‘But it is also obvious that it is not true that if being signifies one thing, and if it is impossible for the contradictory (ἀντίφασιν) to hold at the same time, then there will be nothing that is not’11. It is untrue because not-being exists qualifiedly, i.e. as not-being something (τὸ τὶ µὴ ὄν) and not as not-being simpliciter12. On

Alexander’s view, Plato accepts that being signifies one thing, but also says that unqualified not- being exists: therefore, he felt into that very contradiction Aristotle assumes in these lines to be impossible. Had Plato seen that not-being exists qualifiedly and not simpliciter, he could have circumvented all difficulties13. This probably solicits a revision of premise (ii): it is not the case –

Alexander seems to suggest – that what is besides being does not exist at all; instead, to say that being signifies one thing does not prevent what is besides being from not being something or other.

Simplicius’ reply. Is Alexander’s objection sound? As Simplicius rightly contends, there are reasons to doubt so14. In fact, Plato by no means ends up countenancing absolute not-being in the

Sophist. The ES is unambiguous on this point (258e6-259a1):

11 φανερὸν δὲ καὶ ὅτι οὐκ ἀληθὲς ὡς, εἰ ἓν σηµαίνει τὸ ὂν καὶ µὴ οἷόν τε ἅµα τὴν ἀντίφασιν, οὐκ ἔσται οὐθὲν

µὴ ὄν. Transl. after Clarke 2019: 146. 12 Compare Arist. SE 5.166b37-167a4. 13 Cf. Simp. in Ph. 136.28-31. 14 Cf. Gavray 2007: 78-80 for a first overview of Simplicius’ argument. Ross 1936: 480 agrees with Simplicius.

I should leave out of consideration Porphyry’s reply to Alexander (cf. Simp. in Ph. 135.1-14) and Simplicius’ further reply to it.

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So let no one accuse us of having the temerity to declare that not-being is the contrary

of being and then say that it is. We have long since waved goodbye to talking about any

opposite to being, no matter whether it is or is not, or whether an account can be given

of it or it is completely unaccountable15.

The alleged contrary of being is no other than ‘that which in no way is’ (τὸ µηδαµῶς ὄν) mentioned at 237b7-816, which had caused so much trouble for the capture of the sophist. It is also the not- being thematized in the Parmenides’ sixth deduction, where it is argued that when ‘τὸ µὴ ἔστιν’ signifies sheer ‘absence of being’ (οὐσίας ἀπουσίαν), it signifies ‘without qualification that not- being is in no way at all and does not in any way partake of being’17. But this is not the not-being the ES boasts of having unveiled at 258d6. The contrary of being remains as impossible as ever by the end of the Sophist. The rationale for this is that contraries cannot partake in each other (Phd.

103d-105b; Sph. 252d2-10). But Being is all-pervasive (259a5-6), therefore there can be nothing that does not partake in it. The Form of Not-Being is not an exception. Just like anything else, it does partake in Being and therefore is not the contrary of Being. Instead, it is only different from it, or, more exactly, it is the part of Difference set against it.

The seeming contradiction entailed by the statement ‘Not-Being is’ is therefore diluted once we inspect the states of affairs behind the words. ‘Not-Being is’ would indeed give rise to a contradiction if it established that Not-Being does and does not partake in Being at once. But the

15 Μὴ τοίνυν ἡµᾶς εἴπῃ τις ὅτι τοὐναντίον τοῦ ὄντος τὸ µὴ ὂν ἀποφαινόµενοι τολµῶµεν λέγειν ὡς ἔστιν. ἡµεῖς

γὰρ περὶ µὲν ἐναντίου τινὸς αὐτῷ χαίρειν πάλαι λέγοµεν, εἴτ' ἔστιν εἴτε µή, λόγον ἔχον ἢ καὶ παντάπασιν ἄλογον· On this ‘farewell’ of the ES, see Cornford 1935: 295 and especially O’Brien 2011. 16 Notice the repetition of ‘τολµάω’ at 237b8 and 258e7. 17 Prm. 163c5-7: τοῦτο τὸ µὴ ἔστι λεγόµενον ἁπλῶς σηµαίνει ὅτι οὐδαµῶς οὐδαµῇ ἔστιν οὐδέ πῃ µετέχει οὐσίας τό γε µὴ ὄν (italics mine). Notice the repeated denial, in the ensuing lines, of participation in being (c8-d1: οὐδαµῶς οὐσίας µετέχειν; d6: µεταληπτέον οὐσίας οὐδαµῶς; d8: οὐδαµῇ µετέχει οὐσίας).

239 state of affairs expressed by ‘Not-Being is’ is not that Not-Being does not partake in Being, but that its nature is that of that part of Difference set against Being. Not only does this not preclude participation in Being, but demands it, because Difference, just like every other Kind, must partake in Being. By the same token, no contradiction was involved in the crisp interim conclusion drawn at 256d8-9 about Motion: ‘it’s clear, then, that Motion really is a not-being – and a being, given that it shares in Being’ (Οὐκοῦν δὴ σαφῶς ἡ κίνησις ὄντως οὐκ ὄν ἐστι καὶ ὄν, ἐπείπερ τοῦ ὄντος

µετέχει). The states of affairs referred to by ‘οὐκ ὄν’ and ‘ὄν’ are not respectively lack of participation in Being and participation in Being, but two separate participatory relations: respectively in Difference with respect to Being (viz. lack of identity with Being); and in Being.

But why then call it ‘not-being’ at all? The negative particle seems inescapably to evoke that impossible notion of a contrary of being. Not so. The semantic analysis of negative particles at

257b9-c3 is meant to dispel precisely this doubt:

So when a negation is uttered we will not concede that it signals a contrary, but only

this much, that ‘not’ and ‘not-’ when prefixed to the names that follow them point to

something other than those names – or rather other than the things to which the names

following the negation relate18.

This passage have been discussed lengthily in the literature19. But its key message is clear enough: negation particles do not signify contrariety but only difference. So ‘not-F’ does not signify the contrary of F, i.e., what is constitutively prevented from partaking in F; instead, it signifies just what is different from ‘F’, which does not exclude participation in F. Thus, as the ES

18 Οὐκ ἄρ', ἐναντίον ὅταν ἀπόφασις λέγηται σηµαίνειν, συγχωρησόµεθα, τοσοῦτον δὲ µόνον, ὅτι τῶν ἄλλων τὶ

µηνύει τὸ µὴ καὶ τὸ οὒ προτιθέµενα τῶν ἐπιόντων ὀνοµάτων, µᾶλλον δὲ τῶν πραγµάτων περὶ ἅττ' ἂν κέηται τὰ ἐπιφθεγγόµενα ὕστερον τῆς ἀποφάσεως ὀνόµατα. 19 Cf. at least Dixsaut 1991 and O’Brien 1995.

240 points out at 257b3-4, ‘when we say ‘not being’, it seems, we’re not saying that it is the contrary of being, we’re just saying it is different’. Thus, pace Alexander, Plato does not rehabilitate absolute not-being by raising it to the rank of a Kind (in Ph. 136.10-11).

Note that Simplicius does not confine himself to replying to Alexander’s objection. He also seems to offer a plausible and interesting diagnosis of his interpretative oversight:

It is necessary to comprehend that the Being assumed by Plato is what is studied in

accordance with the bare peculiarity of Being itself, which is set in the division against

both the other genera and not-being. For he says that this too is a genus, but not perfect

being which contains all the genera in itself. To that, perfect not-being would be

opposed, if it is possible to speak of opposing with regard to it. This kind of being

would not be a genus, if genera are opposed to one another in a division20.

Simplicius suggests that Alexander conflated two distinct concepts of not-being: the not-being triumphantly proclaimed by the ES at 258d6; and the absolute not-being which is contrasted with the whole realm of Forms in passages such as R. 477a6 (τὸ µηδαµῇ ὄν). This not-being is, for

Simplicius, identifiable with pure nothing (if we may even say so). And it is true that, under this specific respect, Plato is in full agreement with Parmenides21. Still it is not this not-being that he strives to give citizenship to in the Sophist.

20 in Ph. 136.21-27: Ἐννοῆσαι δὲ χρὴ ὅτι τὸ ὑπὸ τοῦ Πλάτωνος εἰληµµένον ὄν ἐστι τὸ κατ' αὐτὴν τοῦ εἶναι τὴν

ἰδιότητα ψιλὴν θεωρούµενον, ὃ καὶ ἀντιδιῄρηται πρός τε τὰ ἄλλα γένη καὶ πρὸς τὸ µὴ ὄν· καὶ γὰρ τοῦτο γένος εἶναί φησιν, ἀλλ' οὐχὶ τὸ παντελῶς ὂν τὸ καὶ τὰ γένη πάντα ἐν ἑαυτῷ συνῃρηκός· ᾧ τὸ παντελῶς µὴ ὂν ἀντικέοιτο, εἰ καὶ τὸ ἀντικεῖσθαι δυνατὸν ἐπ' αὐτοῦ λέγειν. τὸ δὲ τοιοῦτον ὂν οὐκ ἂν εἴη γένος, εἴπερ τὰ γένη ἐναντία διαιρέσει ἐστὶ τῇ πρὸς ἄλληλα (emphasis mine). 21 As frequently emphasized by O’Brien (cf. e.g. O’Brien 1995, 2005, 2011, 2013a).

241

Further, Simplicius’ diagnosis indicates that this mistake of Alexander’s is of a piece with the conflation of two separate (but complementary) concepts of being: on the one hand, being is the entire realm of forms, that ‘which contains all the genera in itself’ (which Simplicius correctly finds evoked at 248e8-249a1: τῷ παντελῶς ὄντι)22; on the other, being is just one among the Forms.

This is the concept of being decisive for the inquiry into not-being pursued in the Sophist; and the

Form of Not-Being is set against it, not against the whole eidetic realm23.

22 Cf. in Ph. 137.4-7. 23 As mentioned in the Introduction, in drawing this distinction, Simplicius might be taking his cue from his master Damascius, cf. Pr. II 56.9-16.

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