NECESSITY AND TELEOLOGY IN ARISTOTLES PHYSICS

Jacob Rosen

A DISSERTATION

PRESENTED TO THE FACULTY

OF PRINCETON UNIVERSITY

IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE

OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

RECOMMENDED FOR ACCEPTANCE

BY THE DEPARTMENT OF

PHILOSOPHY

Advisers: Hendrik Lorenz and Benjamin Morison

November

Copyright by Jacob Rosen,

ABSTRACT

Some of Aristotle's arguments for teleology involve a distinction between twoways of being necessary: it seems that being necessary in one of these ways pre-cludes being for the sake of something, while being necessary in the other way en-tails it. is second way, which consists in being necessary for the achievement ofan end, is occasionally (six times in all) referred to as a matter of hypothetical( ) necessity. I inquire into the meaning of this phrase, beginningwith a survey of the uses to which Aristotle, throughout his writings, puts the no-tion of a hypothesis. One upshot is that hypothetically necessary ought simplyto mean necessary on an assumption, where (nearly enough) q is necessary on theassumption that p i (i) not necessarily q and (ii) necessarily, if p then q. e onlypassage where it is really dicult to understand the phrase this waywhere one istempted to think it needs a richer meaning, such as necessary for the achievementof an endis the rst half of Physics II.. I oer a close reading of this passage,one of whose virtues is that it preserves the phrases broad, straightforwardmeaning. Finally I consider how widely hypothetical necessity, thus broadly inter-preted, reaches in the natural world according to Aristotle. I suggest that there israther less of it than is generally supposed: this partly explains why it is called byname only in connection with end-related cases. Regarding the anti-teleologicalkind of necessitywhich might appear to involve necessitation of later states byantecedent conditions, and so to be a species of hypothetical necessityI arguethat it is not something we would call necessity at all. I work to elucidate what itis, as well as why and how far it is incompatible with teleological relations.

iii

CONTENTS

Abstract iii

Introduction .. What does hypothetically necessary mean .. Teleology and necessity .. Background: causation in Aristotle

Chapter . e meaning of hypothetically necessary .. Where and how oen hypothesis appears .. Hypothesis in the Organon .. Hypothesis in physical writings and Metaphysics .. Rhetoric: a hypothesis need not be a proposition .. Politics: can hypothesis mean end? .. From a hypothesis .. Hypothetically necessary

Chapter . Reading Physics II. .. e opening question .. e wall theory .. Disagreement .. Disagreement .. e relation between disagreements and .. Extrapolating general principles .. Compatibilism? .. Remaining questions of interpretation

Chapter . Backward- and forward-owing necessity .. e meaning of hypothetical .. Being due to hypothetical necessity .. Necessity in Parts of Animals .. One-directional necessitation? .. Intuitive plausibility .. Result

Conclusion

Bibliography

iv

INTRODUCTION

One of Aristotles techniques for articulating his teleological picture of the natural

world, and for clarifying how it diered from other scientic views of his day, is

by invoking and distinguishing dierent senses of necessity. In one sense of the

term, Aristotle regards necessity as an exclusive alternative to teleology: he will

write not for the sake of something, but from necessity (Physics II., ),

or not from necessity, but for the sake of something (Generation of Animals II.,

). On the other hand, he sometimes calls something necessaryas do

weprecisely because it is required for the achievement of an end. (You can invite

someone to justify an action by asking, was that really necessary?) In these cas-

es, necessity entails teleology.

ese two ways of being necessary are explicitly contrasted in Physics II., and

again in the rst chapter of Parts of Animals. It is not clear quite what the rst sort

of necessity, the anti-teleological kind, is. e second kind is clearer, in a way, but

it is hard to see how it is supposed to help explain natural phenomena that do not

involve any deliberation or intentional action. We can understand how the fact

that stone is necessary for the building of a house could gure in explaining an or-

der sent o by a house-builder to the local quarry; but how does the fact, say, that

roots are necessary for nourishment help explain a plants putting down roots?

e house-builder can do some reasoning: this is to be done, this requires that,

therefore . A plant does no such thing. us it is a challenge to learn something

specically about Aristotles natural teleology from his discussions of necessity.

.

As my starting point, I raise a question not so much about what Aristotles doc-

trine was, as about the language he uses to express it. He appears to refer to the

end-related kind of necessity, in contrast to the other, as hypothetical ( -

). is is curious, because on the face of it hypothetically necessary should

simply mean necessary on an assumption, or conditionally necessaryand being

conditional is hardly distinctive of end-related necessity. e other sort, if it is re-

ally necessity at all, should be conditional as well: it is necessary for this to happen

now if such-and-such conditions obtained earlier. A popular solution is to main-

tain that hypothetically necessary does not simply mean conditionally necessary,

but rather something more elaborate: for example, necessary as a conditio sine

qua non for the achievement of an end. But little argument has been given, be-

yond appeals to its immediate context, that the phrase has this more elaborate

meaning; and no one has explained how it could, given the meanings of its con-

stituent words.

In chapter one, I survey the ways in which Aristotle uses the word hypothe-

sis () throughout his writings. e description in Bonitz Index Aris-

totelicus is correct: a hypothesis is something assumed as a basis for something

(id quod ponitur tamquam fundamentum, Bonitz () ). Oen it is a

proposition assumed as a premise for some course of reasoning (sections . and

.), but other sorts of thing may also be assumed, and for other purposes (section

.). Sometimes what is assumed is an end, or a proposition stating that some end

is achieved; but hypothesis no more means end in such cases than father

means carpenter when it refers to a carpenter. To be sure of this, I look carefully at

the relevant passages (they are in the Politics: statements such as the hypothesis

of democracy is freedom), and show that they all make good sense with hypoth-

esis meaning assumption (section .).

If hypothesis never means end, it is hard to see how a phrase of the form

+ hypothesis could mean anything like for the achievement of an

end.

. See section ., including note on page , for references.

Focusing specically on the prepositional phrase (hypotheti-

cally), I check the passages in which it modies something other than necessity

(section .). Some are very obscure, but the intelligible passages are all intelligible

when we take to mean on an assumption. It seems that hypotheti-

cally necessary means no more than necessary on an assumption. ere is no

great diculty interpreting it this way when it appears in Parts of Animals, Gener-

ation and Corruption, and De Somno (section .).

at leaves the rst half of Physics II., one of the passages in which Aristotle

contrasts the anti-teleological and end-related kinds of necessity. One task of

chapter two is to resist the appearance that hypothetical necessity refers speci-

cally to the latter in contrast to the former. is my reading does: it results that

Aristotles train of thought turns out poorly signposted, but still cohesive and in

decent order (section .). is leaves us with a choice: either say that a technical

term is used with a meaning nowhere securely attested (i.e., that hypothetically

necessary means necessary for the achievement of an end), or say that a passage

has misleading signposts. I opt for the latter, but what is most important is to see

the choice. Aristotles work quite generally displays a rare mixture of precision and

sloppiness, and as interpreters we need to have a view as to which are the ways in

which he is careful and which are the ways in which he is not.

Now if I am right that hypothetically necessary means nothing more than

necessary on an assumption, then we need to explain why the phrase is used exclu-

sively to describe things which are necessary relative to an end (chapter three).

Why does Aristotle never say, for example, that Socrates death was necessary on

the assumption that he drank hemlock, and therefore hypothetically necessary?

We could put it down to coincidence: aer all, the phrase hypothetically neces-

sary appears only six times in Aristotles entire corpus. Or perhaps Aristotle in-

. Physics II., , ; Parts of Animals ., , ; Generation and Corruption., ; De Somno , .

troduced the phrase during some period of fascination with the parallel between

natural teleological explanations, on the one hand, and chains of practical rea-

soning on the other, the latter of which, on Aristotles model, precisely involve

deducing what is to be done now from the hypothesis of an ends future achieve-

ment. In contrast there may have been no practice, as there is in physics class-

rooms today, of assuming initial conditions and deducing the later state of a sys-

tem. But a third explanation would be that, according to Aristotles substantive

views about nature, every interesting case of conditional necessity in nature just is

a case in which it is necessary for something to obtain or occur if some given end

will be realized. Maybe he didnt believe that earlier conditions necessitate later

states.

e last proposal may seem like a non-starter, given that Aristotle oen writes

in his biological works of things coming about from necessity based upon an-

tecedent conditions, such as a mans head being moist, or an animal being fright-

ened (section .). But if, as I suggest in section . and argue more fully in .,

these passages employ a version of (so-called) necessity that is not really necessity

at all, then the proposal turns out to have some plausibility. I explore how it can

be supported, and what qualications are needed to make it defensible (sections

..).

All this work shows that we do well to take the phrase to have a

consistent meaning across dierent contexts, and a meaning that arises composi-

tionally from the meanings of its component words. Besides the immediate conse-

quences to the interpretation of Physics II. and Parts of Animals I., this result has

broader methodological implications. is not the only technical

phrase that interpreters have tended to interpret according to the convenience of

the passage immediately before them, while exerting less eort than they might to

discover a unied meaning of the term throughout the corpus. Of course there is

no guarantee that Aristotles linguistic usage is fully consistent; sometimes

pressures of context must win out over the desire for uniformity. However, re-

sources such as the TLG make it easier than ever before to examine every appear-

ance of a term, and try to nd out whether one meaning can account for all of

them. When dealing with a term of art in particular, not one of natural language, I

think we should be biased toward ascribing the fewest dierent meanings possi-

ble. is dissertation is an experiment in applying that bias to the interpretation

of hypothetical necessity. I think it has been fairly successful, and aim in the fu-

ture to apply similar methods to other terms, such as (acciden-

tally) and (simply, without qualication).

.

My second object is to clarify Aristotles view of natural teleology itself, and how

he understands its dierence from others that were current during his time. I take

somewhat dierent approaches to this question in chapter (on Physics II.) and

in chapter (on Parts of Animals I.).

.. e intrinsic direction of causes and changes

At the beginning of Physics II., Aristotle illustrates (or rather parodies) a type of

explanation which purports to account for a things generation wholly in terms of

an anti-teleological kind of necessity. What exactly are the essential features of

this type of explanation? I believe they are best understood in terms of intrinsic

direction toward an end, or lack thereof, on the part of activities and of the e-

cient causal powers that bring them about. In a nutshell, a process occurs from

necessity in the present sense just in case every basic process from which it is

composed is intrinsically aimless. Aristotle seems to presuppose a plausible prin-

ciple linking processes to their ecient causes, namely that a basic process is in-

trinsically aimless just in case its proximate ecient cause is an intrinsically aim-

less power. (To get a sense of the dierence between an intrinsically aimless power

and an end-directed power, compare fragility with the power for photosynthesis.

Of course fragility may serve an end in the design of some complex objectper-

haps a fusebut in its own right, I think, it is just a brute disposition.)

In two other works, Generation of Animals (see ..) and Generation and Cor-

ruption (see ..), Aristotle makes room for a distinction between what (if any-

thing) an activity is for intrinsically or in its own right, and what it may be for in

virtue of the larger context in which it is embedded. In particular, an intrinsically

aimless activity may count as occurring for an end if it occurs at the instance or

under the control of a cause or power which is directed towards that end. (As far

as I can see, this cause will always be a non-proximate cause. e motions in a

clock seem to me a good illustration of the phenomenon.) is possibility does

not seem to be countenanced in Physics II.; perhaps this is a pedagogically moti-

vated simplication, or perhaps the other works were written later and show a

process of renement in Aristotles ideas.

e key point of dispute between Aristotle and his theoretical opponents is

presented in this chapter as one about what nature of ecient causes there are,

and whether or not certain changes and processes are directed towards the attain-

ment of ends.

.. Order of explanation and of necessitation

Aristotles discussions of hypothetical and other kinds of necessity have made it

seem to some that the question of teleology hinges crucially on the temporal di-

rection of necessitation in the natural world: necessitation of later states by earlier

ones is non-teleological; necessitation of earlier states by later ones is teleological.

is seems to be a mistake. Suppose there were an infallible doctor: necessarily, if

he initiates treatment, then the patient recovers. Surely this does not preclude him

from applying medical treatment for the sake of his patients health.

Instead of necessitation, interpreters may look to order of explanation. For

example, when Aristotle says that a wall is not due to its ingredients except as due

to matter, but comes about for the sake of protecting things, he is oen taken to

be asserting the priority (in some sense) of nal causation over material causation

(see .).

I have tried to avoid this approach in chapter . I nd these sorts of claims ob-

scure and not very helpful in getting to the heart of Aristotles position. It seems

better to move away from ideas about what is more a cause than what, or what

causes what rst (where the order is not temporal order), and instead try to ar-

ticulate yes/no questions about whether or not a given cause or change has a cer-

tain characteristic. Nevertheless, it must be granted that there is something to the

question of order. is is explicit in Parts of Animals, where Aristotle raises the

question whether animal generation should be explained in terms of what the ani-

mal is like once grown, or the other way around. His attitude is indicated by the

remark,

, - , , .

It is more the case that this and that goes on in house-building because theform of the house is such-and-such, than that the house is such-and-such athing because it comes into being in a given way. (PA I., .)

Given that there is of course causation in both directionsnal causation

from house to house-building, ecient causation from house-building to house

it is hard to know what to make of the idea that one is more due to the other than

vice versa. Still, for all that causal relations come in various kinds and run in more

than one direction, Aristotles theory of science requires us to order our knowl-

edge according to a single, one-directional relation of dependence. In creating a

science of biology, we must settle which facts are to be demonstrated from which,

. All translations from the Greek are my own, unless otherwise indicated.

and hence must make all-considered judgments as to which facts are more basic

and more explanatory.

erefore, in chapter I give myself over somewhat to questions of order. I

propose that Aristotles nature includes no causally interesting necessitation of lat-

er states by earlier ones, and do my best to make this proposition plausible. Given

that a science consists of less fundamental truths demonstrated from more funda-

mental truths, and that demonstration requires necessary entailment, this has im-

plications as to which propositions will gure as the more fundamental truths in

an Aristotelian science of biology. In particular, we will not nd facts about e-

cient causal processes guring as principles from which the results of those

processes are demonstrated.

. :

Aristotle conceives of being somethings endbeing what it is foras a way of be-

ing among its causes. So before getting into the main body of the dissertation, I

would like to make some general remarks about causation in Aristotle. Some of

what I say will be controversial, but I wont try to argue for it here. My main pur-

pose in saying it is to articulate a number of presuppositions that will be in the

background of my discussions later on.

.. Causal relations are metaphysical relations

Because Aristotles notion of an aition or aitia is not exactly the same as our no-

tion of a cause, scholars have experimented with translations other than cause. A

popular one is explanation (or explanatory factor, vel sim.). e motivation is

. Since aitiai are whatever answers a why-question, and whatever answers a why-question is

good, but glossing (what I will continue to call) causation in terms of explanation

can lead to confusion. Explaining something is an epistemic activity, whereas cau-

sation is a metaphysical relation out there in the world. We should be careful both

that we do not identify causal and explanatory relations, and that we do not rev-

erse their order of priority. Causation is prior to explanation; the holding of causal

relations is what grounds the correctness of correct explanations.

Another point is that the appropriateness of an explanation is subject to very

complicated pragmatic constraints, so that a lot of extraneous, confusing issues

enter the discussion when we replace questions about causation with questions

about what is explanatory.

.. e four causes are four causal relations.

Aristotles view is not that there is a single causal relation and four types of thing

which can stand in this relation to something, or four (non-causal) relations in

which a cause of X might stand to X. Rather, it is that there are four dierent

causal relations. Aristotle introduces them as , ways, and oen refers to

them not with bare nouns such as form or end but with adverbial phrases such

as as form or as an end (cf. p. , note ). ese are dierent ways in which

one thing can ground or be responsible for another.

is means that even when the same thing is, for example, the formal cause of

X and the nal cause of X, there is still a distinction between formal and nal

cause. e one thing stands in two dierent relations to X: the relation of formally

causing on the one hand, and the relation of nally causing on the other. e same

goes when a single thing is the material cause of X and the moving cause of X.

an explanation, it follows that an aitia is simply an explanatory factor, whatever this may be,Moravcsik (), p. . It is a great improvement to cease thinking of an aitia as a cause and totreat it instead as an explanation, a because, Annas (), p. . Nussbaum () translatesreason. Barnes () uses both reason and explanation, explaining himself on pp. .Freeland () and Gotthelf () advocate returning to the traditional translation cause.

(Hence, if a theorist says that the basic material constituents of the world are re-

sponsible for all the changes in the world, it would be wrong to describe that theo-

rist as appealing only to material causation. e theorist appeals both to material

and to moving causation: its just that he says that the material and moving causes

in nature are the same stus.)

.. What sorts of things are caused

Aristotles causal talk is quite irregular. However, we can class many of his causal

ascriptions under four main heads, according to whether what is being caused is

substantial or non-substantial, and whether it is an object/feature or a change.

us a cause may be a cause of a ; it may be a cause of a things

or ; it may be a cause of a things having some feature, in which case it

is a cause of to ; or it may be a cause of a non-substantialchange, in which case it will be a cause of F to .

.. Examples

... Moving causes

: the house-builder is a cause of the house.

. Philoponus in Ph may be making this mistake when he writes (.-), , , ; If forms invari-ably followed upon the power of the matter, what need would there be for the productive causeImean, nature? (emphasis added). Charles (), p. seems to make a similar slip when hewrites, Many of [Aristotles] predecessors erred, in his view, in thinking that such phenomena[viz., physical, biological and psychological] could be explained in terms of material causationalone. It is true that according to Aristotle most of the earliest philosophers dealt only with mater-ial causation, i.e., with the question what things are made from (Meta. ., ). But in thepassage Charles quotes, , Aristotle is pointing up the insuciency of appealing to mater-ial elements as the only moving causes. Charles himself more correctly describes Aristotles target afew sentences later as the wish to employ only the resources of material causation and ecientcausation (involving the matter alone) (p. , emphasis added).

: the house-builder is a cause of the houses coming into being.

: the house-painter is a cause of being blue to the house.

: the house-painter is a cause of becoming blue to the house.

... Final causes

: shelter is a cause of the house.

: the house, and therefore shelter, are causes of the houses com-

ing into being.

: prettiness is a cause of being blue to the house.

: being blue and prettiness are causes of becoming blue to the house.

... Formal causes

: the capacity to shelter bodies and goods is the formal cause of the

house.

: the form of house (i.e., the capacity to shelter bodies and goods) is

the formal cause of the houses coming into being.

: the color blue is the formal cause of being blue to the house.

: the color blue is the formal cause of becoming blue to the house.

... Material causes

: wood and stone are causes of the house.

. Assuming a change is goal-directed, the endpoint of the change will be its immediate nalcause. Whatever the endpoint in turn is for, will be a remote nal cause of the change. See .... Metaphysics ., . I dont insist that this is a perfectly adequate denition of house.. Im not sure about this, but my best guess is that the formal cause of a change is the form ofthe changes endpoint. (Perhaps if the change is from form to privation, its formal cause is theform of its starting point.) Cf. Phys II., -.

: wood and stone are causes of the houses coming into being (by

underlying the change in question).

: the house is a cause of being blue to the house (since it is the sub-

ject, ). Stone is a cause of solidity to the house.

: the house is a cause of becoming blue to the house (since it is the

subject, , of the change).

. Aristotles examples of material causes in Phys II. are always the matter of a thing, not thesubject of an attribute. However, his characterization of the material cause at as that out ofwhich a thing comes to be and which persists ( ) harkens backto the discussion of change in Phys I., where the persisting () subject of an accidentalchange and of its resultant attribute was treated in the same way as the matter of generation and ofits resultant substance. Cf. Metaphysics ., -.

CHAPTER THE MEANING OF HYPOTHETICALLY NECESSARY

ere are two broad questions in this dissertation. One is about the meaning of

the phrase hypothetically necessary; the other is about the nature of Aristotles

natural teleology and his understanding of how it diered from other current

theoretical approaches. e present chapter is devoted entirely to the rst. Its job

is to convince us that we should go into the interpretation of the central text to be

treated in chapter two, namely Physics II., with a strong presumption as to the

meaning of hypothetically necessary in that text. e presumption is that this

phrase means simply necessary on an assumption, or conditionally necessary, and

does not carry any teleological content.

My method is simple. I begin with an overview of Aristotles use of the word

hypothesis on its own, and show that it never means anything like end. e only

context in which it has been thought to have such a meaning is in the Politics,

where Aristotle occasionally refers to the ends of political constitutions and their

legislators as hypotheses of those constitutions and legislators. e relevant pas-

sages can be understood perfectly well by taking hypothesis to have its usual

meaning of assumption or premise. Next, I go through every appearance of the

prepositional phrase from a hypothesis ( , also translated hypo-

thetically) in which it modies something other than necessity. As we should ex-

pect given the meaning of hypothesis on its own, the prepositional phrase never

means anything like relative to an end. Finally, I discuss the passages outside of

Physics II. in which Aristotle uses the phrase hypothetically necessary (-

or , literally necessary from a hy-

pothesis). Although the things called hypothetically necessary are in fact neces-

sary for the achievement of some end, there is no good reason to incorporate this

. Bonitz () . Cf. Newman () ad .

fact into the meaning of the phrase hypothetically necessary. e passages are

naturally understood when we take it to mean necessary on an assumption.

.

e word hypothesis is used times in Aristotles corpus. It occurs most fre-

quently by far in the Prior Analytics ( times), especially in discussions of proof

by reductio (where the proposition that is or should be assumed for reductio is

called a hypothesis) and of hypothetical syllogisms more generally (these syllo-

gisms or their conclusions are completed or deduced from or through a hypothe-

sis). e Politics comes in a distant second with occurrences, and the Posterior

Analytics comes third with .

Of the words appearances, are in the phrase , which I will

translate hypothetically or from a hypothesis. is phrase is used times in

the Prior Analytics, always describing hypothetical syllogisms, and it is used in the

same way times in the Topics and probably times in the Posterior Analytics

(this is in AnPst ., where Aristotle considers whether one could demonstrate a

denition hypothetically: it isnt completely clear what he has in mind, but it looks

as though hes talking about hypothetical syllogisms). at leaves further uses

of , and these are quite varied: Aristotle speaks of knowing hypo-

thetically, of being good hypothetically, of being false hypothetically, of being a

citizen hypothetically, and so on. Six times, he speaks of being necessary hypothet-

. e numbers in this section derive from TLG searches. e TLG database does not includealternate manuscript readings, and contains occasional misprints; but for the purposes of a generaloverview, I think we may have adequate condence in the numbers. Of course, the frequency withwhich a term appears in a work is not a sure guide to the importance of the term in that work. Iam using these numbers merely to give a preliminary orientation.. From a hypothesis is used to modify four dierent verbs in such contexts. () show(): AnPr ., , , , . () argue (): AnPr ., . ()complete (): AnPr ., , ; ., , . () agree (): AnPr .,.

ically. It is this usage that I ultimately want to understand: what does Aristotle

mean when he calls something hypothetically necessary?

Here is a list of works containing the word hypothesis, along with the number

of times hypothesis appears in the work.

AnPr EE PA

Pol Frag GA

AnPst Phys lineis

Meta NE Poet

Top Rhet somno

DC GC spiritu

.

e paradigmatic uses of hypothesis seem to be found in the logical works.

.. Hypothesis as a kind of deductive principle

e only explicit discussions of what a hypothesis is are in Posterior Analytics

. and .. ere are some problems of interpretation, but it seems pretty cer-

tain that the same notion of hypothesis is under discussion in both passages, and

that the following things are true of it:

. A hypothesis is a proposition ().

. It is a deductive principle ( ), which means or entails

that

a. ere is no demonstration of it, and

b. It gures as a premise in demonstrations.

. It gures as a deductive principle for a single special science (unlike axioms,

which are principles of all sciences, or at least of more than one science).

A demonstration is a deduction that yields knowledge of its conclusion. One

condition on this is that its premises be more basic (more knowable by nature)

than its conclusion. So point () entails that hypotheses are true (since only

truths can be known) and that they cannot be deduced from any truths more ba-

sic than they are. However, they are not the most basic truths there are: a hypothe-

sis is in some sense less fundamental and less self-evident than an axiom. In .

Aristotle says that that which through itself necessarily is and necessarily seems

to be is not a hypothesis. Probably he thinks that such a thing is an axiom.

us an axiom, such as the proposition that one thing cannot both belong and not

belong to another thing at the same time and in the same respect, would be true

through itself and would have to be seen to be true through itself. In contrast, a

hypothesis fails at least one of these two conditions. Perhaps one acquires con-

dence in a hypothesis by induction () rather than by mere consideration

of the proposition itself, so that it is not through itself that the hypothesis seems to

be the case.

Does a hypothesis also fail to be through itself? It is not clear what this would

amount to. Aristotle could hold that hypotheses are true in virtue of some other

. See Barnes () ad (pp. ) for the question whether axioms must be common toall sciences or just more than one.. AnPst ., . AnPst ., ; cf. -.. A., -. .. Barnes (), p. thinks that Aristotle is referring to all the principles of a science, not justaxioms, and that hypothesis in AnPst A. does not mean what it meant in A., i.e. a kind ofprinciple of a science. is seems to me to rest on a misunderstanding of , for which seethe next section and note .. But see Bolton (), p. for an argument that propositions known inductively are knownthrough themselves (emphasis original).

truth(s) obtaining, but it is not clear what those other truths would be. ey must

not entail the hypothesis, since otherwise it would not be a deductive principle (it

could be deduced from truths more basic than it, and that would be to demon-

strate it). Could they be the individual instances of the general truth stated by the

hypothesis? (A holds of this B, A holds of that B, etc., where the hypothesis is

A holds of all B?) However exactly it works, a hypothesis is a second rate princi-

ple, a runner-up to axioms.

In addition to distinguishing them from axioms, Aristotle also distinguishes

hypotheses from denitions (). A denition, like a hypothesis and unlike

an axiom, is a principle of a single science. Aristotles descriptions of the dier-

ence between hypotheses and denitions are hard to sort out, and it would be dis-

tracting to worry about them now. In some sense or other, a denition is sup-

posed to make clear what something signies, whereas a hypothesis says that

something is or is not. It is unclear whether this means that denitions are not

propositions whereas hypotheses are, or whether denitions and hypotheses are

two dierent kinds of proposition (e.g., with denitions stating that such-and-

such is the essence of a kind, and hypotheses stating that a kind exists or that a

given item is a member of a given kind).

We can now add two more features of hypotheses as treated in Posterior Ana-

lytics . and . Since these two pretty much complete the picture, I will re-

produce the full list.

. A hypothesis is a proposition.

.a.It says that something is or is not (unlike a denition).

. It is a deductive principle, which means or entails:

.a. ere is no demonstration of it;

.b. It gures as a premise in demonstrations.

. See emistius in AnPst .; Philoponus in AnPst .; Barnes (), pp. -.

. It gures as a deductive principle for a single special science (unlike an axiom).

. Its truth is not maximally self-evident or self-grounding (unlike an axiom).

... Relative hypotheses

At a certain point in ., Aristotle considers a case in which a demonstrable

proposition is not demonstrated, but simply assumed. He has a didactic context

in mind: a teacher might invite a pupil simply to accept something as true without

proof (presumably, justication is to be given later). When this happens, Aristotle

says, the proposition assumed is not a hypothesis full stop, but it is a hypothesis

relative to the student ().

is seems exactly the right thing to say, given the characterization of hy-

potheses I have been summarizing. Speaking without qualication, there is a

demonstration of the proposition, and so it is not a deductive principle (see .a

above). Relative to the learner, on the other hand, there is no demonstration of it.

e learner deduces things from it, but does not deduce it from other things; it

functions for him as a principle.

.. Reduction to the impossible and other hypothetical syllogisms

Although the usage Ive been discussing is the one that is best described in

Aristotle, it is not the one that is most commonly used. e most numerous use of

hypothesis is in the Prior Analytics, and this in two contexts. One is the discus-

. , .. Barnes, by contrast, seems to take Aristotle to be introducing a new sense of hypothesis(the type of supposition dened here, Barnes (), p. ), on which it is a relative term. ismisses the force of lines , which describe the terms relative application precisely in termsof its primary, unqualied use: it is a hypothesis not without qualication, but only in relation tothat person. Waitz (), p. too misses the contrast between and , so thatin his eyes Aristotles statements in . and . inter se videntur pugnare.

sion of so-called hypothetical syllogisms; the other is the discussion of proof by

reduction to the impossible. In neither context is it plausible that Aristotles hy-

potheses are intended to be deductive principles.

... Hypothetical syllogisms

Hypothetical syllogisms are ones in which the premises somehow do not en-

tail the conclusion in a fully direct way; instead, the conclusion is drawn or

proven from or through some additional hypothesis ( , -

). e primary examples are arguments by reductio, which seem to rely on

the hypothesis that whatever entails something false (or impossible) is itself false

(or impossible). In the Topics Aristotle mentions arguments in which a conclusion

is rst drawn for some subset of the items of interest, and then generalized based

on the hypothesis that whatever holds of some holds of all.

Aristotle doesnt spell out in detail what the role of the hypothesis is in a hypo-

thetical syllogism. My impression is that it does not gure as a premise, but rather

serves to license an inferential move. If so, then it is clearly not functioning as a

hypothesis of the kind described in Posterior Analytics A. and , since that kind

of hypothesis was said to serve as a premise in demonstrations. Furthermore, ar-

guments by reductio can be employed in the examination of any subject matter, so

that the hypothesis they depend on must not be proper to any one special science.

. Topics ., . Smith (), p. thinks the hypothesis does serve as a premise: in his comment on A., he writes, us, these arguments are deductive only from (ek) an assumption, i.e.,deduce from an assumption as a premise: they are not really deductions of their ultimate conclu-sions, but of something else. In Ross (), pp. -, hypothetical argument is analyzed into asyllogistic and a non-syllogistic part, with the hypothesis being used in the non-syllogistic part,hence not at least as a formal premise.

... Hypothesis as what is assumed for reductio

One very common context for hypothesis is when Aristotle is discussing

proof by reduction to the impossible. He uses the word to refer to the proposition

that is or should be assumed for reductio, i.e., the contradictory of the proposition

to be proved, or occasionally to a proposition that might mistakenly be assumed,

such as the contrary of the proposition to be proved. Again, these are obviously

not hypotheses of the kind described in Posterior Analytics A. and , since those

are true and are principles, whereas these are false (or at least taken by the arguer

to be false), and are assumed in order then to be rejected, not as premises from

which to infer further truths.

.

In the physical writings and in the Metaphysics, the meaning of hypothesis typi-

cally seems close to the one given in Posterior Analytics A. and . A hypothesis

is a proposition taken to be true without proof, and used as a more or less funda-

mental premise.

In some contexts it looks as though the hypothesis might count among the

principles of a special science. For example, in De Caelo, Aristotle works with an

assumption as to what simple motions there are, and the assumption that for each

simple body, a dierent simple motion is natural to it. He refers to these as the

rst or primary () hypotheses, and as the hypotheses concerning the

motions. In the Physics, he says that a special scientist need not concern himself

. Contradictory: AnPr ., , ; ., , ; ., passim; ., passim. Contrary:AnPr ., .. e only simple motions are straight and circular, De Caelo ., . ere is a singlenatural motion of each of the simple bodies, De Caelo ., , .. De Caelo ., and .. De Caelo ., .

with objections to the principles of his science, and that in physics it is a hypoth-

esis that nature is a principle of change. In Metaphysics ., the Philosophical

Lexicon entry on principle (), the hypotheses of demonstrations are cited

as examples of principles in the sense of that from which a thing is knowable pri-

marily. In these passages a hypothesis is at least a quite fundamental premise,

and possibly a deductive principle of a science.

In Metaphysics and , Aristotle speaks several times of the hypotheses

maintained by believers in Forms and/or separate mathematical objects. Since

the hypotheses are false (., ), they cannot be genuine deductive princi-

ples; but they seem to be fundamental premises of theories, at any rate.

In places it isnt clear how fundamental an assumption a hypothesis is meant

to be, where it lies on the continuum between a principle of a science and a merely

local, tentative assumption. Examples: () It is clear that the surface of water is

like this [sc. spherical] if we take as a hypothesis that water by nature always ows

into what is more hollow: and what is nearer to the center is more hollow. ()

Certain theorists say things contrary to mathematical doctrines (

); and yet it is right () either not to displace them [sc. the doc-

trines], or to do so by means of accounts more trustworthy than the hypothe-

ses. () In Generation of Animals, Aristotle proposes three hypotheses about the

generative motions imparted by parents, in order to explain why ospring may re-

semble one or another ancestor to a greater or lesser degree. It is not clear

whether these are meant to be deep principles, or just plausible ad hoc assump-

. Physics VIII., -. Metaphysics ., -. , , .. Metaphysics M, , ; ; , . N, , .. De Caelo ., -.. De Caelo ., -. .. GA IV., -.

tions which Aristotle hoped eventually to replace or derive from more basic

truths.

. :

According to Bonitz, in rhetoric the word hypothesis signies the topic under

discussion (eam rem signicat de qua agitur, -). us at Rhetoric III.,

, Aristotle says that unusual and high-sounding words are more appropri-

ate to poetry than to prose, because in prose the hypothesis is lesser than in poetry.

Roberts (in the Oxford translation edited by Barnes) oers subject-matter as a

translation of hypothesis here.

Bonitz also cites the phrase speak in relation to a hypothesis (

), at Rhet II., , as an example of this usage. In fact, it isnt clear that

the word has the same meaning here. Aristotle has just said that the same meth-

ods are applicable whether one must convince many judges or only one; he now

says, and likewise whether one is addressing someone who disagrees or a hypoth-

esis. Hypothesis does not seem to mean the topic under discussion, as Bonitz

suggests. Perhaps it refers to an assumed opponent, as opposed to an actual one.

In any case, these examples indicate that a hypothesis is not always a proposi-

tion. Linguistically, the word should signify an act of laying down or positing or

assuming (), and by extension the result of such an act, i.e., something

laid down or posited or assumed. We know that propositions are not the only

thing that one can assume. For instance, Aristotle says in NE VI. that cleverness

is the ability to achieve any assumed goal ( , ).

. , . -.. is is parallel to how means the activity of growing and also that which grows (PhysicsII., ) and how means both the activity of making and what is made (specicallypoetry).

. :

Bonitz claims that in Aristotles political doctrine, the notion of a hypothesis is

close to the notions of an end or goal () on the one hand, and a dening

characteristic () on the other. (e notions of end and dening characteris-

tic are, of course, not equivalent. e idea must be that any kind of constitution

will have some feature that it both aims to instantiate (the feature is an end), and

to some degree succeeds in instantiating (the feature is a dening characteristic):

for example, a constitution is a democracy only if it aims at, and to some extent

succeeds in achieving, freedom.) is claim should be considered carefully. For if

there are any contexts in which hypothesis really means something like end, this

would be evidence that necessary from a hypothesis can mean something along

the lines of necessary for an end.

However, Bonitz himself explains Aristotles usage in a way that makes clear

how the word hypothesis can be used to refer to ends without meaning end.

e explanation, to quote Bonitz quoting Aristotle, is that in actions, that for the

sake of which is a principle, just as hypotheses are in mathematics. is state-

ment is based in Aristotles model of practical (and productive) reasoning, accord-

ing to which the reasoner begins from a premise describing the realization of an

end, and makes a series of inferences (presumably relying on additional premis-

. in doctrina politica (quoniam , . ) non multum diert a notionibus et.. Of course, means from, not for; but the phrase could be taken to express the thought thatsomething is necessitated by, its necessity derives from, an end.. Bonitz , quoting NE ., .. e premise in reasoning seems to be that an end must or needs to be realized. In Movementof Animals ch. , Aristotles examples involve verbal adjectives ( , ; , ; , ; ,-; , ) or the verb need ( , -). NE . gives anexample using a premise about what is advantageous ( , -)and an example involving a premise about what is required ( ,). On the other hand, when something is necessary on a hypothesis, the hypothesis would

es about what means are available and eective) until she arrives at the specica-

tion of something it is now in her power to do. Given this model, when one

speaks of premises or assumptions in connection with practical matters, it will be

clear that one is referring either to propositions about ends or to propositions

about the available means to those ends. Oen, it will be clear that one is referring

specically to propositions about ends. For example, if I speak of the hypothesis

of a democratic legislator in contrast to that of a tyrant, it will be clear that I am

talking about his end, since the interesting dierences between a democrat and a

tyrant lie in their ends, not in the means available to them.

Here, then, is a possible explanation for Aristotles use of hypothesis in the

Politics to refer to the ends of political actors and regimes. Let us look at the pas-

sages and see whether the explanation succeeds.

.. Socrates hypothesis in the Republic

Perhaps the best place to start is with Aristotles criticism of Platos Republic,

since the role of a political hypothesis as a starting point for argument is easiest to

see there. In Politics II., Aristotle raises a number of objections to the sharing

of wives, children, and property advocated in Republic book . His objections are

of two broad types. On the one hand, he rejects the basis on which Platos Socrates

rests his arguments for communism, namely the claim that a city should be as

unied as possible. On the other hand, he argues that Socrates communist

arrangements would not conduce to unity in any case. We can think of the rst

sort of objection as external, and the second as internal (since it aims to show that

Socrates proposals are unsuccessful by his own standards). Here is how Aristotle

introduces his discussion:

seem to be the proposition that an end is or will be achieved, not the proposition that it should ormust be achieved. (It is not necessary that if there should be a house tomorrow, then foundationsare laid today.)

, , . , , , , , -. - .

ere are many diculties with having everybodys wives be common, and inparticular, the reason for which Socrates says that things should be legislatedthis way can be seen not to result from his logoi (words, arguments, discus-sion). Moreover, the end which he says the city must attain is impossible ashe states it, and how it should be interpreted is not at all determined. I mean,for the entire city to be as far as possible one, on the grounds that this is best:Socrates takes this as his hypothesis. (Politics II., )

e rst sentence announces an internal criticism: Socrates reason for his leg-

islation, namely unity for the city, will not be achieved through the measures he

describes (cf. Pol II.). e second sentence announces an external criticism: it is

impossible for a city to be fully one, since, as Aristotle will go on to say, whatever

surpasses a certain degree of unity is ipso facto not a city. Hence perfect unity is

not a correct aim for legislation.

Now Aristotle refers to the citys unity as Socrates hypothesis; and he does so

again in chapter II.:

. I take logoi to refer ambiguously to Socrates descriptions of communist measures, and his ar-gument () that those measures will lead to unity by arranging for all citizens to be pleasedand pained by the same things.. Jowett (Barnes (), p. ) and Newman () vol , p. understand the two sen-tences the other way around, with the rst indicating that unity is not shown by Socrates to be de-sirable, and the second that Socrates means towards that end are impossible to implement. Jowetttranslates, the principle on which Socrates rests the necessity of such an institution evidently isnot established by his arguments. Further, as a means to the end which he ascribes to the state, thescheme, taken literally, is impracticable, and how we are to interpret it is nowhere precisely stated.Against this, there are no arguments for the goodness of civic unity in the Republic, and Socrates infact refers to its goodness as a starting point for discussion ( , Rep ). Also,the language of the rst sentence is mirrored at the beginning of chapter , where Aristotle giveshis internal criticism.Reeve () altogether fails to see that two types of criticism are being announced, translating itis not evident from Socrates arguments why he thinks this legislation is needed. Besides, the endhe says his city-state should have is impossible.

- . , .

One must think that the cause of Socrates error is that his hypothesis is notcorrect. Both a household and a city must be one in some way, but not in everyway. (Pol II., )

It is easy to see why the label hypothesis is appropriate if we look at the passage

in the Republic to which Aristotle is most likely referring. is is the passage in

which Socrates begins his defense of communism.

, - , , , () , ; , . (b.) ; - ; .

en isnt the rst step towards agreement to ask ourselves what we say is thegreatest good in designing the citythe good at which the legislator aims inmaking the lawsand what is the greatest evil? And isnt the next step toexamine whether the system weve just described ts into the tracks of thegood and not into those of the bad? Absolutely. Is there any greater evilwe can mention for a city than that which tears it apart and makes it many in-stead of one? Or any greater good than that which binds it together and makesit one? ere isnt. (Rep V, , translation by Grube/Reeve in Cooper())

Socrates and his interlocutor Glaucon agree to begin their discussion of the

merits of communism from the premise that the greatest good for a city is what-

ever unies it, and the greatest evil for a city is whatever destroys its unity. Socra-

tes can then go on to argue that sharing wives, children, and property is best for a

city by arguing that it unies a city more than any alternative arrangement. e

goodness of unity thus functions as an unargued premise for argument, which is

precisely what a hypothesis is.

Aristotles phrasing leaves it ambiguous exactly what he is labeling a hypothe-

sis. It could be the proposition that it is best for the entire city to be as far as possi-

ble one, or it could be the property of being as far as possible one. As were about

to see, he sometimes does clearly refer to a property as a hypothesis.

.. e hypothesis of democracy is freedom

e passage that Bonitz lists rst () as an example of hypothesis

referring to an end, is Aristotles statement at the beginning of Politics VI. that

the hypothesis of democracy is freedom:

( , ).

e hypothesis of democracy is freedom (for people are accustomed to saythis, that only in this constitution do people share in freedomfor, they say,this is what every democracy aims at). (Politics VI., -.)

Unlike in the criticism of Plato, here the hypothesis is ascribed to the constitu-

tion rather than to the person who designs or legislates the constitution. It is

probably best to understand this ascription as derivative: it is the hypothesis of the

constitution insofar as the constitution was legislated, or is structured as if it had

been legislated, by someone who took freedom as a starting point for his design.

e two things Aristotle says in explanation of his statement that freedom is

the hypothesis of democracy are, rst, that freedom is a distinctive feature of

democracy (or at least, people think it is), and second, that every democracy aims

at freedom (again, at least people think it does). us we can see why Bonitz takes

this passage to indicate that hypothesis means something akin to (dening

characteristic) and (end). But again, there is no need to ascribe a new

meaning to hypothesis: Aristotles line of thought makes good sense if we take

him to be saying that freedom is the premise of democratic design and legislation.

Not that every premise behind a constitutions design must involve something

unique to that constitution: presumably, things such as stability and auence are

among the basic aims of more than one kind of legislator. But the ones worth

mentioning will be at least distinctive, if not unique (in fact, Aristotle probably

does not endorse the claim that freedom is unique to democracy). Second, the

structure of the reasoning involved in designing a constitution is such that the

starting points are pretty much guaranteed to function as aims. When the legisla-

tor begins by xing certain features of his constitution, and then designs the rest

of the constitution in accordance with them, he is in eect choosing the remain-

ing features (or at least some of them) for the sake of the ones he xed at the be-

ginning (see pp ).

e hypothesis is said to be a property, freedom, rather than a proposition. We

could take this as a kind of periphrasis, with the hypothesis really being a proposi-

tion such as that it is best for the city to be as far as possible free, or that the city

must be free. But it isnt necessary to do that, since, as weve seen (section .),

Aristotle allows for non-propositional hypotheses.

.. e tyrants hypotheses

e second passage cited by Bonitz (-) regards the purposes of tyrants.

, - , , , .

. is is hard to demonstrate, because it is hard to know what freedom () means inthe present context: is it being used in the same sense as when Aristotle uses it to signify non-slaves in contrast to slaves (e.g., Politics I., ); or as when he refers to the free in contrast tothe wealthy (e.g., Pol IV., : a constitution is a people [i.e., a democracy] when the freeare in charge, and an oligarchy when the wealthy are; but it turns out that the former are many andthe latter few.)? If it is, then Aristotle clearly thinks that there are many free people under non-de-mocratic constitutions. In any case, we should note that Aristotle thinks the typical democraticunderstanding of freedom, as doing whatever one wishes, is mistaken (Pol V., -). ismakes it probable that he thinks freedom properly understood is most fully enjoyed under somenon-democratic type of regime.

e purposes of tyrants all refer back to these three terms. For all tyrannicalelements may be referred to these hypotheses: that people not trust each other,that they have no power, and that they think small. (Pol V., -)

As in the remark about democracy, we nd talk of hypotheses closely associated

with mention of and of purposes (, the three clauses). But

again, the association of these elements does not entail sameness of meaning. As

for the three , I am inclined to take them as terms, in the Analytics sense of

components of propositions. Aristotle has in fact given us three terms in the pre-

ceding lines or so: labels for the characteristics that tyrants aim to instill in

their subjects. ese are smallness of soul, mistrust of one another, and powerless-

ness. Aristotle can now conrm that the purposes of tyrants all refer back to one

or another of these three terms by claiming that every tyrannical element can be

referred to one or another hypothesis built from them.

Exactly what the three hypotheses are, and just how they are related to the

clauses, is dicult to determine. ere seem to be two possible construals of

the syntax of the clauses: they may either be nal clauses or object clauses

(Goodwin (), ; see for subjunctive in object clauses). Object

clauses usually follow verbs that signify striving, planning, or bringing something

about, and can stand in apposition to an object accusative such as

(Goodwin (), p. ). Final clauses may express the end or purpose of the ac-

tion of any verb; they would stand in apposition to a phrase such as ,

for the sake of this, rather than a bare , this.

I think it is better to take the clauses as object clauses, and ll out Aristotles

somewhat elliptic sentence by understanding in front of each :

, [ ,] , [ ,] -, [ ,] .

. , ; , ; , .

For all tyrannical elements may be referred to these hypotheses: some to this that people not trust each other, some to this that they have no power, andsome to this that they think small.

us each (this) has (hypotheses) as its antecedent, and so

each object clause, being in apposition to a , expresses the content of one of

the three hypotheses. I prefer this interpretation largely because it feels better to

let , these hypotheses, refer cataphorically ahead to the

subsequent three phrases, rather than anaphorically back to the mention of three

.

e passage is not straightforward, but in any event, whatever exactly the hy-

potheses are, it seems unproblematic to maintain that Aristotle refers to them as

hypotheses because they are laid down as starting points for the tyrants thought

and action, and not because they are goals or specications of goals.

Later in the chapter, Aristotle describes an alternative way to ensure the

longevity of a tyranny, almost opposite to the method we have just seen. Again

he uses the term hypothesis, but I think in a signicantly dierent way.

-, , , , . .

. If instead we take the clauses as nal clauses, then I think it is best to construe and as standing in apposition to , and to supply a participle such as. us:

, [] , , .

For all tyrannical elements may be referred to these hypotheses, some havingbeen done in order that people not trust each other, some in order that they haveno power, some in order that they think small. (Pol V., a-)

On this construal, we are not told explicitly what the hypotheses are. Our choices seem to be eitherto supply our own (for example: they must not trust each other, they must have no power, theymust think small), or to suppose that is simply picking up from a line before,and that Aristotle is referring to exactly the same things (in my view, the terms smallness of soul,mistrust, and powerlessness).

, .

Just as one way of destroying a kingship is to make its rule more tyrannical, soa way to preserve tyranny is by making it more king-like, guarding just onething: power, i.e., that he rule not only those who are willing but also thosewho are not willing (for if this goes, being a tyrant goes). But while this, like ahypothesis, must remain, he must either do or seem to do other things, play-ing well the part of a king. (Politics V., .)

is time the hypothesis (or, that which must remain like a hypothesis) is not

presented as a premise or origin of everything else the tyrant does; to the contrary,

it appears to serve as a check and limit on the tyrants actions, which in themselves

tend in an opposed direction. Indeed, even in its relation to the constitutional

form of tyranny, the hypothesisthe power to rule both willing and unwilling

subjectslooks more like a conclusion than a premise. Aristotle says, if this goes,

being a tyrant goes, which evokes the rule that if a conclusion doesnt hold then

the premise doesnt hold: being a tyrant ( ) stands in the place of

premise, and power stands in the place of conclusion.

I would suggest that Aristotle is invoking a dierent context for the use of hy-

pothesis than those in which hypotheses function as premises. Consider instead

his descriptions of dialectical confrontations in which the respondent is said to

uphold (), and the questioner to attack (), a hypothesis. Aristo-

tles tyrant is doing something like playing the role of respondent. In taking up the

king-like behaviors and pretenses that Aristotle recommends, he is not positively

arguing or working for power; rather, he is making what concessions are required

while doing his utmost to avoid compromising his power. Aristotle says that the

. e.g., Physics II., -: .. Topics ., -: .e same hypotheses are dicult to attack as are easy to uphold. Topics ., : . One should take care not to uphold an implausible hypothesis.

tyrant must guard, , this power; this too is a word that comes up in di-

alectical contexts.

.. Criticizing the hypothesis of Spartas legislator

, - , . - , - .

One could also criticize the hypothesis of [Spartas] lawgiver in the followingway (this is precisely what Plato has criticized in the Laws): for the entire sys-tem of laws is oriented towards a part of virtue, namely military virtue, since itis useful for conquering. Well then, they were preserved while they were wag-ing war, but began to perish once they were in power, because they didntknow how to be at leisure, not having practiced any other kind of trainingmore elevated than that for war. (Politics II., .)

Based on the corresponding passages in Platos Laws, it appears that the hypothe-

sis Aristotle has in mind is something to the eect that a city is well-governed if

and only if it is well-prepared to be victorious in war ( , ,

, ). It is a consequence of making this his premise that the law-

giver arranges his laws so as to promote military virtue to the neglect of other

virtues. e hypothesis is about the importance of military conquest, and the crit-

icism of that hypothesis is that it results in cultivating a mere part of human

virtue.

is passage from Laws I indicates the nature of the hypothesis:

{.} - , , . ;

{.} .

. NE ., : , . Noone would call someone who lived like this happy, unless he were guarding a thesis.

{.} , , ;

A: But explain this point to me rather more precisely: the denitionyou gave of a well-run state seems to me to demand that its organization andadministration should be such as to ensure victory in war over other states.Correct?

C: Of course, and I think our companion supports my denition.

M: My dear sir, what other answer could one possibly make, if one is aSpartan? (Plato, Laws , translation by Saunders in Cooper ().)

is passage from Laws III shows that the over-narrow focus on the military

part of virtue is seen as a consequence of the hypothesis. (See also Laws IV,

.)

{.} , , - , - .

A: And I remind you againto recollect the beginning of our discus-sionof what you two recommended: you said that the good legislator shouldconstruct his entire legal code with a view to war; for my part, I maintainedthat this was to order him to establish his laws with an eye on only one virtueout of the four. (Plato, Laws , tr. Saunders.)

.. Dont bring together everything proper to the hypothesis

, , .

ose who establish constitutions try to bring together every single elementthat is proper to the hypothesis, but it is a mistake to do this, as we said earlierin our discussion about how constitutions are destroyed and preserved. (Poli-tics VI., -.)

To understand this remark, it is important to bear in mind that Aristotle oers it

in the context of a discussion of democracy, which he regards as a deviant (-

) form of constitution. A deviant constitution, such as democracy or oli-

garchy, will be functional and stable only if it is moderate: for many democratic-

seeming elements destroy democracies, and many oligarchic-seeming elements

destroy oligarchies. It is like a hooked or snub nose, which may be beautiful so

long as it deviates only moderately from the straight, but as the curvature be-

comes more extreme, the nose will rst become unseemly (lose its ), and

nally stop appearing to be a nose at all (-). Likewise, a constitution can

be adequate if it is somewhat democratic or oligarchic, but if it goes too far it will

get worse, and nally stop being a constitution.

erefore, if you are establishing a constitution based on the hypothesis of

freedom (or the hypothesis that it is best for the city to be maximally free), you

would do well not to follow out every consequence of that hypothesis, and not to

institute every possible measure that would promote freedom. Otherwise your

eorts are likely to be self-defeating (you will not produce a constitution at all, but

something analogous to the body part too distorted to qualify as a nose), and at

best you will produce a very bad constitution.

.. External and internal evaluation

, , , , .

Concerning the constitution of the Spartans and of Crete, and perhaps theother constitutions too, there are two things to inquire: rst, whether anythinghas been legislated well or not well in comparison to the best arrangement;second, whether anything has been legislated contrary to the hypothesis andcharacter of the constitution intended. (Politics II., .)

. Politics ., -. .

Aristotle announces two sorts of criticism to which a constitution may be subject.

One is external, or absolute, and consists in seeing to what extent the constitution

achieves or fails to achieve an unqualiedly optimal arrangement of laws, oces,

and courts. e other is internal, and consists in seeing to what extent the ele-

ments of the constitution harmonize with or contradict the hypothesis and char-

acter () of the constitution envisaged by its legislators. I do not know what

distinction (if any) Aristotle has in mind between a constitutions hypothesis and

its character.

Of the criticisms that Aristotle proceeds to make, it is not always obvious

which are external and which internal. However, we have seen a clear case of ex-

ternal criticism in section ..: the Spartan constitution is premised upon an in-

correct hypothesis, namely that the city is well-governed if and only if it is well

prepared to conquer in war. ere are two places in which Aristotle clearly marks

an internal criticism, by saying that some measure is detrimental specically rela-

tive to a choice or intention of the legislator. First, the women:

- . , , .

Further, the license of their women is detrimental both to the purpose of theconstitution and to the happiness of the city. For though the legislatorwants the entire city to be tough, he displays his wish in relation to men,whereas he has completely neglected the women. (Politics II., , .)

Women are not adequately trained and disciplined, and this is not just bad in

itself, but undermines the aims and values to which Sparta herself is committed. If

there is a dierence between hypothesis and character, I would venture that this

case involves the constitutions hypothesis: the hypothesis (that the city should be

primed for victory in war) requires that the citizens be tough, and yet the laws al-

low half of the population to be undisciplined and frivolous.

Second, the meals:

. , - , , . , .

Nor were things legislated well concerning the common messes called phiditiaby the person who rst set them up. ey should have been nanced fromcommon funds, as in Crete. Among the Spartans, each person must con-tribute, even though some are very poor and cannot lay out this expense, withthe result that the lawgiver achieves the opposite of his purpose. For he wantsthe arrangement of the common messes to be democratic, but they turn outnot at all democratic when they are legislated in this way. (Politics II.,.)

Requiring every participant in the common meals to contribute funds for

them undermines the democratic intent behind instituting such meals in the rst

place. Of course the Spartan constitution as a whole was not meant to be democ-

ratic, but it was meant to incorporate democratic as well as oligarchic elements.

By botching one of its democratic elements, the legislator failed to create or main-

tain the desired balance of democracy and oligarchy.

.. Defects in Carthages constitution

- , .

Most of the things one could criticize on account of its deviations [from thebest] turn out to be common to all the constitutions we have discussed. Of thethings to criticize in relation to the hypothesis of aristocracy and polity, someincline more towards the people, some towards oligarchy. (Politics II.,.)

Aristotle distinguishes, in similar terms to what we saw above (..), between ex-

ternal and internal criticism. From an external standpoint, we can simply note all

errors and defects. On the other hand, we can criticize a constitution based on

values internal to it, by pointing out ways in which its arrangements conict with

the basic premise from which it was designed. at premise, as weve seen, is re-

ferred to as the hypothesis of the constitution in question.

.. Education of reason and habit (missing the best hypothesis)

. - - , .

It remains to consider whether children should be educated rst by reason orby habits. For these must harmonize with each other in the best way: for it ispossible for reason completely to miss the best hypothesis, and for someone tobe similarly led by his habits. (Politics VII., .)

As we know from the Nicomachean Ethics, complete human virtue requires both

an excellent habituated condition of the non-rational part of the soul and an ex-

cellent condition of the reasoning faculty. Here Aristotle briey (and somewhat

cryptically) alludes to one of the reasons why both are needed. If ones rational

faculty has not been properly educated, then he is liable to reason from less than

optimal premises about what to do. (Given Aristotles model of practical rea-

soning (cf. pp ), these will be premises about what ends should be realized.

Perhaps, as Reeve (), p. thinks, Aristotle has in mind a single premise

about the ultimate end, i.e., a view about what happiness is; but it seems just as

likely that he envisages an ethical agent making a series of judgments from day to

day as to what more immediate ends should be pursued in the particular situa-

. I follow Newman () ad loc. in understanding to refer to deviations from thebest arrangement (as at Pol ., ), rather than deviations from the three correct forms ofconstitutions (tyranny from kingship, oligarchy from aristocracy, democracy from polity).

tions in which he nds himself.) If his habits are no good, then no matter how

well he reasons, his behavior will be just as bad as if he had no understanding.

.

So far, we have seen the word hypothesis used in Aristotle to refer to various

sorts of things that may be assumed or posited. One such sort of thing is a goal,

and Aristotle occasionally refers to goals as hypotheses. However, we have seen no

reason to think that the word hypothesis means anything dierent when refer-

ring to goals than when it refers to other assumed or posited things, such as

premises in arguments. In both cases, it just means something like assumption.

Now I will turn to the prepositional phrase , hypothetically or

from a hypothesis. Given what hypothesis means in isolation, we should ex-

pect this prepositional phrase to mean something like on an assumption. On the

other hand, if hypothetically necessary means necessary for the achievement of

an end, then hypothetically must be capable of meaning something like relative

to an end. Apart from the disputed passages about necessity, are there any places

where hypothetically appears to have an end-related meaning?

.. Syllogisms

e most numerous use of hypothetically is in the Prior Analytics, in

connection with so-called hypothetical syllogisms. ese are syllogisms such that

they or their conclusions are proven, argued, completed, or agreed to from a hy-

pothesis. Aristotle oen refers to them as , syllo-

. See chapter ., note on page for references.

gisms from a hypothesis; I think we should understand a verb in participle form

such as or , proven or argued.

Obviously, from a hypothesis has nothing to do with ends in this connec-

tion. It just means something like based on an assumption, the assumption being

perhaps that whatever entails something false is false, or that whatever is true of

one is true of all the members of a given class.

.. Resulting

It makes no dierence that the impossibility resulted from a hypothesis (

); for the hypothesis we took was possible, and when something possi-

ble is assumed, nothing impossible should result from it (Physics VII.,

). Here Aristotle is proving the impossibility of one proposition, p, by as-

suming the truth of a second proposition, q, which is known to be possible, and

showing that p & q entails something impossible. e method is described at Top-

ics VII., -:

Examine not only whether something impossible follows immediately fromthe thesis, but also whether it is possible for it to obtain from a hypothesis (), as it does for those who say that being empty is the same as beingfull of air. Clearly, if the air goes out, the thing will be not less but more empty:so assuming something, whether true or false (it makes no dierence), the oneis removed and the other is not. Hence they are not the same.

. e terminology is introduced at Prior Analytics ., -, in the follow-ing words: It is necessary that every demonstration and every deduction should prove []either that something belongs or that it does not, and this either universally or in part, and furthereither probatively or hypothetically. Here hypothetically modies prove.. See section .... , .. , , , , . ( ) , . .

In these passages again it is obvious that the meaning of from a hypothesis

has nothing to do with ends. Aristotle is simply talking about one thing being en-

tailed by another.

.. Knowing

In two passages in the Posterior Analytics, Aristotle speaks of knowing some-

thing (eidenai, epistasthai) from a hypothesis. In one, Aristotle rehearses an argu-

ment (which he rejects) that there is no knowledge; in the other, he argues (in his

own voice) that there are no innite chains of predication in demonstrative sci-

ence. Both arguments involve considering the case in which we prove some-

thing, p, from premises that we do not know to be true. Aristotle says that such a

proof does not yield knowledge of p without qualication, but only knowledge of

p from some things or from a hypothesis ( , ; , ,

, ).

ough it isnt clear precisely how knowledge from a hypothesis should be an-

alyzed, the general idea is clear enough: it consists, roughly, in knowing (without

qualication) the truth of a conditional, i.e., that if one thing (the hypothesis) ob-

tains, then another thing (the conclusion) obtains. e hypothesis in question,

then, is a premise or conjunction of premises. Grasping a proof of something, p,

from this premise or these premises, but not knowing that the premises them-

selves are true, one knows p merely from a hypothesis (assuming, of course, that

one does not know p in some other, independent way).

As before, it is obvious that the meaning of from a hypothesis has nothing to

do with ends.

. Posterior Analytics ., -; ., -.. According to Barnes (), p. , Aristotles phrase is ambiguous between if is the case,then a knows that P and a knows that if is the case then P. e latter is favoured by the contextof the argument, and by Aristotles few words on the hypothetical syllogism . But probably Aris-totle has not seen the distinction.

.. Wishing

And he will wish good things [to his friend]: simply those that are good sim-ply, and, for those that are good for that man, from a hypothesis.

In the course of his discussion of friendship in Eudemian Ethics book VII, Aristo-

tle considers the ways in which friendship is possible between a decent man and a

bad man. As throughout the treatise, the text here is quite damaged and it isnt

certain what Aristotle wrote. However, the particular clause Ive quoted seems al-

right. Aristotle is distinguishing two ways in which the decent man will wish his

not-so-virtuous friend well, based on a distinction he made earlier, in VII.,

-, between two classes of good things (and, along the same lines, two

classes of pleasant things): those that are simply good, or good full stop, and those

that are good for someone but not good simply. To explain the dierence, he says

that what is advantageous to a healthy body is simply good for a body, whereas

what is advantageous only to a sick body, such as drugs or incisions, is not simply

good for a body. He goes on to say, likewise in the case of soul (): thus he

holds, quite generally, that what is good for a man in good condition, i.e., a virtu-

ous and healthy man, is simply good, while what is good only for a man in bad

condition is not simply good. It seems clear that the notion of good for here

means what truly benets or improves the person, or what furthers his achieve-

ment of truly good endswhether or not he himself wants it or regards it as good,

and whether or not it furthers the achievement of any ends he wishes to achieve.

. EE ., -. , [mss: ], .. See also EE VII., ; Pol VII., -; MM II..... ree reasons: Aristotle has another, separate distinction between what is good and what ap-pears good; my interpretation ts the medical example; Aristotle says (-) that the decentman is useful to the bad one relative to natural choice as opposed to actually obtaining choice.

ings that are good for someone in bad condition are a sort of corrective to a

bad situation.

Now, in friendship between good men, there is no dierence between what is

good for the friend and what is good simply. But if your friend is not altogether

virtuous, the two sorts of good will come apart. Aristotle says that there is a quali-

cation to the way in which you will wish your friend the rst kind of good: you

will wish him these not simply but from a hypothesis. What is the nature of this

qualication?

Someone looking for an end-related meaning of hypothetically might pro-

pose that wishing something hypothetically means wishing it for the sake of some-

thing else, as opposed to wishing it for its own sake. In support of this, one could

point to the end of the sentence whose beginning I quoted above: [he will wish

for] these things [i.e. those that are good only for the friend] for the sake of things

that are good simply, just like drinking medicine: he doesnt wish it, but wishes it

for the sake of such-and-such. e thought would be that there is a distinction

between wishing for something specically as a means, and wishing for it, if not

necessarily as an ultimate end, at least not as a means to anything in particular.

ings that are simply good, such as health and riches, are wished for in the sec-

ond way, i.e., simply, whereas things that are good only for someone in bad condi-

tion are always wished for hypothetically, i.e., as means to some denite simply

good thing. On this proposed reading, the simply good thing would be the hy-

pothesis relative to which the good-for-him thing is wished.

On the other hand, we could understand the qualication in a dierent way,

one more in line with the uses of hypothesis we have seen before. Namely, we

could understand wishing something hypothetically as wishing it conditionally:

wishing it if , or given that . e thing wished for is only desirable because

. EE VII., -. [mss. ] , {} , .

some undesirable condition now obtains, and so one doesnt wish simply for the

medicine, or the punishment, or whatever, because one would rather that the con-

dition making it desirable didnt obtain. Only holding xed that so-and-so is in

such-and-such bad condition, do you wish for the thing in question.

I dont know exactly how the notion of wishing something if q, or wishing

something given that q, should be spelled out, but it is evidently parallel to that of

knowing something hypothetically. I suggested that knowing q hypothetically

might consist in knowing, for some p, that if p then q, while knowing neither p

nor q. Wishing that q hypothetically could consist in wishing, for some p, that if p

then q, but wishing neither that p nor that q. (I wish that if his leg is gangrenous

then it is amputated, but I dont wish that his leg is gangrenous or that his leg is

amputated.)

It is worth making a comparison to Socrates argument in Platos Gorgias, c

., that tyrants and orators do not do what they wish. e argument opens with

the claim that if someone does a for the sake of b, then he wishes b, not a. Exam-

ples in the place of a are drinking medicines and sailing; examples in the place

of b are health and wealth. us the sorts of things that Aristotle will call simply

goodhealth and wealthare treated in the Gorgias as things wished for their

own sake, or at any rate, things not wished for the sake of something else.

Socrates goes on to introduce a partition of all things into those that are good,

those that are bad, and those that are in between. ings in between are ones that

sometimes partake of the good, sometimes of the bad, and sometimes of neither.

Having secured an agreement that in-between things are always done for the sake

of good things, or for the sake of the good, he infers:

en we do not wish to kill, or exile people from cities, or conscate goods,simply just like that ( ), but rather if these things are benecial we

. Sailing is described as a dicult and dangerous undertaking, . Cf Dodds (), p. ad : e Greeks did not go on pleasure cruises, or take sea voyages for their health; sail-ing was still a dangerous business, as Demosthenes speeches on bottomry suciently show, andoen highly uncomfortable; Hesiod thought it folly.

wish to do them, and if they are harmful we do not wish to do them. For wewish good things, as you agree, not things that are neither good nor bad, northings that are bad.

It isnt obvious that this is the right conclusion to draw, but that is an issue we

neednt address here. What I want to take home is: (a) Socrates distinction be-

tween what is good and what is in between, but partakes of the good in a given sit-

uation, seems to match Aristotles distinction between what is simply good and

what is not simply good but good for someone. (b) Socrates uses the adverb sim-

ply () to modify wish (), as does Aristotle. (c) What simply

means in the Gorgias is without distinction, and the needed distinction is ex-

pressed with if.

Something similar is going on in EE as in the Gorgias, and if EE is an early

work we might expect it to formulate things in Academic ways. In the Gorgias,

as in the EE passage, there is a distinction between wishing something for the sake

of something else and wishing something in its own right. But what is contrasted

to wishing something simply is wishing it if something is the case, not wishing it for

the sake of something else. So understanding from a hypothesis in EE to mean

conditionally or on an assumption makes Aristotles formulation run parallel to

Platos. Combined with the fact that this reading best matches Aristotles use of the

phrase elsewhere, this leaves us with good reason to accept the reading.

.. Employment of virtue

( , ) , . , -, , ( -

. Gorgias c -, my translation.. It does so in other respects, such as its use of the Academic term (employment) inplace of the more typically Peripatetic (activity or actuality).

), - .

We say (and we have den