Essence, Modality, and Identity

Philosophy Compass, 2011

According to Essentialism, an object’s properties divide into those that are essential and those that are accidental. While being human is commonly thought to be essential to Socrates, being a philosopher plausibly is not. We can motivate the distinction by appealing—as we just did—to examples. However, it is not obvious how best to characterize the notion of essential property, nor is it easy to give conclusive arguments for the essentiality of a given property. In this paper, I elaborate on these issues and explore the way in which essential properties behave in relation to other related properties, like sufficient-for-existence properties and individual essences.

2014

This is the translation of a course that Paul Ricoeur taught at the University of Strasbourg in 1953-1954 and several times since then. It circulated in a mimeographed version made at the Sorbonne in 1957 and was published as a course in 1982. The French edition by Jean-Louis Schlegel appeared in 2011. Several other courses will become available electronically in the near future. There are three main benefits in the publication and translation of this course. The first is Ricoeur's genuine contribution to the scholarship to Plato and Aristotle. This course represents his most detailed discussion of two philosophers who have remained his discussion partners until the end. Ricoeur sets for himself a long-term and a short-term goal. The long-term goal is rather ambitious and would make many commentators uncomfortable by its breadth. It is nothing less than "to work out the ontological foundations of our Western philosophy, so as to understand its intention by way of the history of its beginning" (p. 1). The short-term goal is more manageable. He wants to have a debate between Plato and Aristotle about being, essence, and substance, but against the traditional view at Ricoeur's time that Plato is a philosopher of essence and Aristotle a philosopher of substance. If we look beyond Platonic essentialism and Aristotelian substantialism, we see, Ricoeur argues, that they share a common ground. This comparison is divided into two parts, one on Plato and the other on Aristotle. The part on Plato

Apeiron, 2008

1991

Analysis and Metaphysics, 2017

This article is a study of the correspondence between Forms and particulars in Plato. Its primary purpose is to determine whether they exhibit an ontological symmetry, in other words, whether there is always one where there is the other. This points to two questions, one on the existence of things that do not have correlative Forms, the other on the existence of Forms that do not have correlative things. Both questions have come up before in the scholarly literature on Plato, but the answers have not been sufficiently sensitive to the intricacies of the questions. Nor have they been adequately resourceful with what little evidence there is in the original sources. The intention here is to make up for that deficiency, not just with better answers, but also with better insight into the questions.

2018

A pro p er assay o f P lato's ontology w ould trea t o f all th e d ifferen t kinds o f things w hich, according to P lato, are said to be. I t w ould divide those kinds into th e prim itive and, i f th ere are any, th e derived, and then show , w here possible, how the la tte r kind o f beings arise from the form er. In addition, it m ight try to explain w hy P lato stkrts h o rn the prim itives h e does, th a t is, w hy he thinks them th e b est arxai. F inally, perhaps, it w ould iso late and discuss any m eta-principle w hich Plato relies on, and th e very categories o f the ontological theory, w ith the aim o f showing how they are to b e assim ilated to th e theory itself. W hat follow s w ill n o t be a pro p er assay o f P lato's ontology. I do n o t have the tim e to do a p ro p er assay, although the lack Of tim e is only a prôphasis. I d o n o t know how to com plete all diese tasks. So, in deference to m y fellow sym posiast, I propose to exam ine on this occasion three closely related issues in the interpretation o f P lato 's m etaphysics, die separation o f Form s, participation, and th e nature o f particulars1. In the com pass o f th is talk, I cannot do ju stice to all three o f these issues, indeed probably to none o f them . A fo rtio ri, I cannot d o a sem blance o f ju stice to the closely related topics o f predication, both ontological and linguistic; the status o f A ristotle's rem arks about P lato's m etaphysics and h is ow n treatm ent o f these issues, o r th e vexing problem o f th e developm ent o f Plato's thinking. N onetheless, I cannot avoid these topics. S o please regard th e claim s I stake about these m atters as prom issory. I hope to cash them later. I: Rem arks on the strategy. T he key to understanding P lato's m etaphysics is to determ ine th e various roles essence, ο υ σ ί α , plays w ithin i t I assum e th a t Plato's m etaphysical inquiries begin w ith and from the Socratic 'W h a t is X ' question. The answ er to th is question is a (linguistic) definition, λ ό γ ο ς , w hich h as th e form o f a subjectpredicate sentence consisting o f a subject-term , the definièndum , a copula, and a predicate-expression, die definiens. (A s a m atter o f convenience, how ever, I shall often use 'definition* to refer ju s t to the definiens.) The subject term is usually a nam e o r noun phrase, e g . , ' Justice' o r 'T h e Ju st Its e lf, w hile th e predicateexpression is a com plex phrase. The nam e signifies the object w hose essence w e are seeking. T he predicate signifies the essence o f th at Object. Thus w hen w e know th e answ er to a W hat is X question, w e know the essence o f X. O ne question w e m ust answ er is w hat kinds o f things possess essences, or, equivalently, can serve as the subject o f a d efin itio a G early Form s c a a It is n o t clear w hether particulars such as Socrates are definable. T h e w orry here is n o t w hether there are Form s o f natural kinds, as opposed to Form s restricted in population to ineom plete properties. I shall p o sit Form s o f natural kinds. M y concern, rather, is w hether particulars in natural kind classes are definable, o r to p u t it differently, w hether they have essences. A second question concerning definitions is how the essence signified by the definiens applies to the definable subjects. In the w e find a distinction betw een tw o w ays a w ord o r a predicate m ay apply to an o b je c t It m ay apply in virtue o f w hat an object H as, o r it m ay apply in virtue o f w hat an object Is^. ' B eautiful' applies to H elen in virtue o f the Beauty w hich she H as, n o t in v irtue o f w hat she Is. In those cases w here there are F o rm s,-an d at the very least there are Form s fo r relatives and incom plete notions like B e a u ty -, the tex t m akes it clear that 'b eau tifu l' applies to Beauty itse lf in virtue o f w hat it Is. W hen it applies to o ther things, such as H elen, it does so in a secondary o r derivative m anner. H aving granted th a t there are Form s fo r predicates such as 'm a n ', th e second question can be p u t as follow s: does the essence signified by a definiens apply to w hatever it applies to in virtue o f w hat th at thing Is, in virtue o f w hat it H as, o r in virtue o f eith er w hat it Is o r w hat it H as. The final question is w hat are the m etaphysical consequences o f the fact th at som ething does o r does n o t have an essence, both w ith respect to the Form s them selves, particulars, arid their relation to orie another. How we answ er thesé questions w ill partially determ ine w hat we m ake o f Plato's account o f particulars, o f participation, and o f the separation o f Form s. If, fo r instance, we conclude th at particulars are no t definable, we can claim th at Form s are definitionally separate from particulars in th at the definition w ill apply only to th e Form of, say, M an. I f we add the thesis th a t possession o f essence is sufficient for existence, w e can th en conclude that Form s are ontologically separate from particulars; being definable they are capable on th e ir ow n o f existing apart from particulars (and perhaps from o th er Form s). On the other hand, w e m ay w ant to argue th at although particulars cannot possess essences in the sam e m anner as Form s do, they m ust have essences le st they be bare particulars. P articulars w ill then have essences, w hereas Form s are essences. A m ong o ther issues raised by this possibility is the nature o f the participation relation itself. Traditionally, a t le ast in one tradition, participation has been equated w ith the relation betw een a p articu la ran d a Form , and opposed to the relation betw een a Form and its essence, w hich we can call 'B ein g '. A re w e th en to conclude th at a particular's having an essence is due to its participation in a Form ? T he status o f the participation relation and its interplay w ith essence leads directly to th e third o f our questions. I f particulars lack essences entirely, w hat are they and how do they com e to be w hat they are?

The Journal of Philosophy, 1987

2014

This is the translation of a course that Paul Ricoeur taught at the University of Strasbourg in 1953-1954 and several times since then. It circulated in a mimeographed version made at the Sorbonne in 1957 and was published as a course in 1982. The French edition by Jean-Louis Schlegel appeared in 2011. Several other courses will become available electronically in the near future. There are three main benefits in the publication and translation of this course. The first is Ricoeur's genuine contribution to the scholarship to Plato and Aristotle. This course represents his most detailed discussion of two philosophers who have remained his discussion partners until the end. Ricoeur sets for himself a long-term and a short-term goal. The long-term goal is rather ambitious and would make many commentators uncomfortable by its breadth. It is nothing less than "to work out the ontological foundations of our Western philosophy, so as to understand its intention by way of the history of its beginning" (p. 1). The short-term goal is more manageable. He wants to have a debate between Plato and Aristotle about being, essence, and substance, but against the traditional view at Ricoeur's time that Plato is a philosopher of essence and Aristotle a philosopher of substance. If we look beyond Platonic essentialism and Aristotelian substantialism, we see, Ricoeur argues, that they share a common ground. This comparison is divided into two parts, one on Plato and the other on Aristotle. The part on Plato

Inquiry, 2023

There has been much debate recently on the question whether essence can explain modality. Here, I examine two routes to an essentialist account of modality. The first is Hale's argument for the necessity of essence, which I will argue is-notwithstanding recent attempted defences of it-invalid by its very structure. The second is the proposal that it is essential to essential truth that it is necessary. After o ering three possible versions of the view, I will argue that each fails to provide a metaphysical explanation of necessity in terms of essence.

Nuova Critica, 2012

In this article I deal to a certain extent with the notions of unity-as such and of unity-substance taken in an alternative sense as phenomenological objects that necessarily imply a subject performing a phenomenological reduction. Further, commenting on the structure and meaning of certain statements in Theaetetus and Parmenides, I will point to the confusion that may result from a controversial ontological treatment of these notions. In this phenomenologically motivated view, I’ll try to show how their distinct ‘ontological’ content can lead to a deeper question which is that of two irreducibilities of a fundamentally incompatible character. That of a unity-as such taken as a unity devoid of any predicative content except for its strictly name sense and that of a unity substance taken as a bearer of various categorial attributes, with at least those of individuality and existence.