Quine and Aristotelian Essen tialism

by Douglas B. Rasmussen

[Reprinted from The New Scholasticism, Vol. LVIII, 3, Summer, 1984.]

318 Douglas B. Easmussen
form of "Kantianism"—a type of transcendental linguisticism.7
These comments, however, require development.
The distinction between essential and accidental predicates per-
tains to the different ways a term can be predicable of a subject.
Aristotle's discussion of the doctrine of the predicables occurs in
the Topics where he deals with terms as elements of propositions,
not as determinate ways in which things can be signified. The doc-
trine of the predicables notes the relationships between terms
which signify beings in rerum natura, e.g., ' man' and ' animal',
and describes their relationship as either one of definition, genus,
differentia, property, or accident—the latter being terms which do
not signify beings in rerum natura, or even aspects or parts of such
beings. In other words, the doctrine of the predicables notes vari-
ous ways terms can be related to each other, but it does not con-
cern itself with the ways in which terms can signify things—the
different ways things are said to be. (It is the doctrine of the
categories which concerns itself with this.) Accordingly, it would
be Platonistic to consider the various predicables as signifying
beings in rerum natura or even aspects or parts of such beings.
Yet, Porphyry's version of the doctrine of the predicables ac-
complishes just this. By making the individual the subject of
predication instead of the species term, he shifted the incidence of
the predicables from terms to individuals, and when he replaced
the definition with the species term, he made the species term,
e.g., ' man', an essential as opposed to accidental predicate. As a
result, the predicables came to note relationships between an indi-
vidual being and what was predicated of it, and this in turn made
the predicables a basis for ordering how terms signify things. The
doctrine of the predicables, thus, came to imply that, for example,
genera and species existed outside the human mind as metaphysi-
cally ultimate aspects or parts of individual substances. This had
disastrous results: (a) the species term, e.g., f man', no longer
7 See Henry B. Veatch, "Is Quine a Metaphysician?" The Review of
Metaphysics (March 1978) and Milton K. Munitz, Contemporary Analytic
Philosophy (New York and London, 1981), pp. 363-380 for a discussion
of Quine's Kantian turn.
Quine and Aristotelian Essentialism 319
signified the whole nature of an individual man but, rather, only
an essential part, viz., "manness"; (b) accidental predicates—
predicates which need not belong to the subject—were regarded
as signifying aspects of the individual; and (c) the individual,
qua individual, was divided into essential as opposed to accidental
features. The difficulties which flowed from these results brought
about by Porphyry's simple change are well known to the history
of philosophy: the inability of conceptual apprehension to know
first-substances, that is, the confinement of scientific knowledge to
universals 8—to " manness," not individual men; the bifurcation
of individuals into metaphysical parts with some features neces-
sarily belonging, e.g., "manness," and some being merely inci-
dental, e.g., being snub-nosed: and the supposition that we can
somehow determine what is essential or accidental to an individual
as such.
It is this view of the essence/accident distinction that Quine is
criticizing, for certainly if we have no way of signifying some in-
dividual, say Socrates, for what he is entirely in and for himself,
then how can we say that certain traits or features are essential
and others accidental ? In the Porphyrian view, ' man' does not
signify what Socrates is in his entirety, rather only part of
Socrates, and we have for some reason chosen this characteristic,
feature, etc. as essential. But why? Given that Socrates is some
X which has a variety of predicates that signify aspects or parts of
him, how can we say one feature (or some set of features) ulti-
mately—independent of some interest or concern—is essential to
Socrates? Quine's rejection of this view of the essence/accident
distinction is dead right! Apart from some way of saying what
Socrates is, it makes no sense to say some predicates are essential
and some are accidental.
The distinction between essence and accident, however, can be
defended if one rejects the Porphyrian view of the predicables
and returns to Aristotle's rendition of the doctrine. In this case,
the species term, e.g., 'man', is not one of the predicables but,
rather, the subject of predication.9 The species term signifies the
» See Walter Leszl, " Knowledge of the Universal and Knowledge of the
Particular," The Review of Metaphysics, 26 (December 1972) for a dis-
cussion of this problem.
• Richard I. Aaron, The Theory of Universals, 2d ed. (Oxford, 1967),
pp. 1-17 takes such criticism of Porphyry's account of the doctrine of the

DISCUSSION ARTICLE I:
Quine and Aristotelian Essentialism
by Douglas B. Rasmussen
W. V. 0. Quine has argued that Aristotelian essentialism is a
"metaphysical jungle," 1 that it is a position without a semblance
of sense. Quine holds that there are as many essences to a thing
as there are points of view from which to view it. What follows
is an examination and criticism of these claims.
Quine understands Aristotelian essentialism to be the view that
some attribute of a thing (quite independently of the language in which
the thing is referred to, if at all) may be essential to the thing and
others accidental. E.g., a man or talking animal, or featherless biped
(for they are in fact the same things), is essentially rational and acci-
dentally two-legged and talkative, not merely qua man but qua itself.2
Quine criticizes this position as expressing an unjustified inegali-
tarian attitude in regard to certain descriptions. For Quine it
makes no sense to say, independently of a linguistic or conceptual
system, that " X must be P." All such declarations depend on
the manner of referring to an object, not on the object itself. Ac-
cording to Quine, the Aristotelian essentialist position incorrectly
asserts that
an object, of itself and by whatever name or none, must be seen as
having some traits necessarily and others contingently, despite the fact
that the latter traits follow just as analytically from some other ways
of specifying the object as the former do from other ways of specify-
ing it.3
Quine contends that it is only when a certain way of specifying
an object is invoked that an object can he said to have necessary
as opposed to contingent features, but this distinction between
i The Ways of Paradox and Other Essays (New York, 1957), p. 174.
^ laid., pp. 173-174.
8 Quine, From a, Logical Point of View (New York and London, 1969),
p. 155.
316
Quine and Aristotelian Essentialism 317
features becomes incoherent when an object is correctly specified in
two conflicting ways; e.g., Jones is both a mathematician and a
cyclist. If Jones is described correctly as both a mathematician
and a cyclist, then Jones is both' essentially and accidentally ra-
tional and both essentially and accidentally two-legged, for when
Jones is described as a mathematician he is necessarily rational
and contingently two-legged, and when he is described as a cyclist
he is necessarily two-legged and contingently rational. But this
is absurd! Jones cannot of himself be, at the same time, both
necessarily rational and contingently two-legged and contingently
rational and necessarily two-legged. As Quine states,
Mathematicians may conceivably be said to be necessarily rational and
not necessarily two-legged; and cyclists necessarily two-legged and
not necessarily rational. But what of an individual who counts among
his eccentricities both mathematics and cycling? Is this concrete in-
dividual necessarily rational and contingently two-legged or vice-versa?
Just insofar as we are talking referentially of the object, with no spe-
cial bias towards a background grouping of mathematicians as against
cyclists or vice-versa, there is no semblance of sense in rating some of
his attributes necessary and others as contingent.4
Thus, Aristotelian essentialism cannot be made into a sensible
doctrine according to Quine.
There are three things that need to be said about Quine's at-
tack on Aristotelian essentialism. (I) It seems that his second
account of Aristotle's distinction between essential and accidental
predicates is confused in a manner somewhat akin to Porphyry's.5
(II) Quine assumes that the determination of what the nature or
essence of a thing is is accomplished through considerations that
depend uniquely upon language.6 (Ill) Quine upholds a modified
* Quine, Word and Object (Cambridge, 1960), p. 199.
6
Edward Black, " Aristotle's ' Essentialism' and Quine's Cycling
Mathematician," The Mon,ist, 52 (1968), 288-297 and Nicholas P. White,
"Origins of Aristotle's Essentialism," The Review of Metaphysics, 26
(1972), 55-85 have noted this confusion. Also, Ernest A. Moody, The
Logic of William of Ockham (New York, 1965), pp. 66-117 and H. W. B.
Joseph, An Introduction to Logic, 2d ed. rev. (Oxford, 1916), pp. 106-110
discuss Porphyry's jumbling of Aristotle's doctrine of the predicables and
the problems it creates.
«Robert Hollinger, "A Defense of Essentialism," The Personalist 57
(1976), 327-344 notes this assumption and how it mitigates Quine's criti-
cism of Aristotelian essentialism.

320 Douglas B. Rasmussen
entire nature of the individual, not some aspect or part. It sig-
nifies what sort of thing the individual is, and it is in terms of
this that a predicate is said to be either a definition, genus, dif-
ferentia, property, or accident. Thus, the predicables do not per-
tain to what is said of individuals as such, and so they do not de-
termine the ways a term can refer to reality. The conflation of a
logical doctrine to a metaphysical one that Porphyry perpetrated
is thereby avoided. There is no need to suppose that, for example,
genera or species exist outside the human mind as metaphysically
ultimate aspects or parts of things.
As just stated, the significance 10 of a species term is not some
predicables as mistaken, for this would mean that species terms "are in-
evitably subjects and cannot be predicates " (p. 6). Yet, this is not so.
The species term ' man', for example, can be a predicate in a statement
like " Socrates is a man," but what must be understood is that such a
proposition does not illustrate the doctrine of the predicables. What the
species term signifies provides the basis for determining the ways a term
can be predicable of a subject. To allow the species term to function as
a predicable in the doctrine of predicables is to connate signification with
predication and destroy all chance of a term signifying what something
is in its entirety. See fn. 5 above, especially the works of Moody and
Joseph.
10
In the Aristotelian tradition, a term's significance involves both in-
tension and extension and cannot be confined to one or the other. More
fundamentally stated, a term's significance cannot be of natures without
existents or of existents without natures. In this regard, it should be
noted that Quine takes a term's intension to be severed from its exten-
sion because of Frege's examples of how ' evening star' and ' morning
star' differ in meaning but name the same thing. This, however, is a
mistake. Simply because ' evening star' and ' morning star' existentially
denote the same thing, viz., Venus, does not imply that their meaning
lacks reference, that their intension is severed from their extension. Both
terms have what could be called semantic reference or referential signifi-
cance—namely, ' evening star' refers to a bright object in the sky at a
certain time (called evening) and in a certain location relative to other
celestial objects as viewed from the earth, and ' morning star' refers to
a bright object in the sky at a certain time (called morning) and in a
certain location relative to other celestial objects as viewed from the
earth. (There are no doubt more details to these respective references that
an astronomer could note.) The difference that is noted in the meaning of
' evening star' and ' morning star' is a difference that results from what
these terms refer to. It is only by confusing the function of a term (to
signify) and the function of a proposition (to assert) that the intension
of a term is separated from its extension. It is, however, a fallacy tft u_sej
Quine and Aristotelian Essentialism 321
aspect or part of the individual for Aristotle. The species term
signifies a single kind of entity; it has simple and direct significa-
tion. In fact, one could say that ' man' means men provided it
was not assumed that such a reference was accomplished without
the awareness of the nature of such men. In other words, the
species term ' man' is more than a mark or sound correlated with
an arbitrary grouping of entities, and yet it is different from a
term that means something-or-other (an X) possessing human
properties. " Man' signifies, for example, what Socrates, Plato,
and Quine, are—viz., their very being, their nature or identity.
Their essence understood in this way is not an essential as op-
posed to some accidental feature or trait (or set thereof) but, as
already stated, that in terms of which the distinction between es-
sential and accidental predicates is made.
Quine, however, seems to be aware of none of this, fie assumes
that there is no way of specifying what Socrates or any other in-
dividual is. At best, such individuals are all X's which have prop-
erties. From this perspective Quine tries and fails to make sense
out of the essence/accident distinction. Yet,
Quine's mistake lies in thinking that essence and accident are both rela-
tive to the individual. For Aristotle the essence of an individual is the
individual itself with all of its accidents: this means there is no dis-
tinction between essence and accident in the individual. What is essen-
tial is relative to the species. Rationality is essential to some things
but essential to them as being the kind of things they are; it is a dif-
ferentia and the differentia differentiates species, not individuals.11
It is the species term—more contemporarily stated, the natural
kind term—that tells us what an individual is, and it is relative
' meaning ' and ' meaningless ' to connote truth and falsity. Terms are not
propositions. There is a difference between signifying and asserting.
Furthermore, it seems that this confusion results from a Platonic view of
the relation between a term and actually existing beings, viz., there is an
assumption that terms must connect with the world in a one-to-one man-
ner. This is, however, an assumption the Aristotelian tradition rejects,
and a well-developed theory of abstraction avoids. See Douglas B. Ras-
mussen, " Wittgenstein and the Search for Meanings," Proceedings of the
Semiotic Society of America, (forthcoming 1983) and Mortimer J. Adler,
Some Questions about Language (La Salle, IL, 1976).
11
Black, " Aristotle's ' Essentialism' and Quine's Cycling Mathemati-
cian," pp. 293-294.
322 Douglas B. Rasmussen
to this term that the distinction between essential and accidental
predicates is made. Quine's cycling mathematician is only a prob-
lem for essentialism on the suppositions that essence and accident
are determined by reference to the individual qua individual and
that there is no way of specifying what the individual really is.
But neither of these suppositions Aristotelian essentialism holds,
nor are they obvious truths.
The crucial thing that needs to be realized about the species or
natural kind term is that it does not signify some property or
feature that is, as it were, alongside all the other properties or
features of the individual. What is signified is not something which
is extrinsic to or separate from all these other properties but,
rather, what is signified is manifested in these very properties.
Thus, thp natural kind or species term ' man' is not on the same
level of generality as ' cycling' or ' doing mathematics' (or any
of the terms which are regarded as either essential or accidental).
The abilities to cycle or do mathematics are uses we make of our
essence or nature. A man may choose to cycle or do mathematics,
or do both, or he may choose to give up one or the other, or both
activities. But he cannot choose or cease to be a man. He can-
not choose or cease to be a rational animal. The natural kind or
species term ' man' notes that men are animals with a conscious-
ness characterized by the ability to conceptualize or form abstrac-
tions and hence the abilities to reflect, use language, and choose.
It does not, however, note to what forms this conscious animal-
life will be put. It notes that it must be exercised in some way
but that it can be exercised in any way.12 It is the realization that
this rational animality must be manifested in some way that
causes us to say that, for example, Socrates, Plato, and Quine must
be men—that they cannot be otherwise—and it is also the realiza-
tion that it can be manifested in any way that causes us to say
that, to continue the example, Socrates, Plato, and Quine may or
may not be cyclists or mathematicians or both. Whatever their
choices or respective abilities, they would be manifesting, in one
12
Regarding the essence of man, Aquinas states that " the term ' man'
expresses it as a whole, because it does not prescind from the designation
of matter but contains it implicitly and indistinctly. . . . That is why the
term ' man' can be predicated of individuals." On Being and Essence, ed.
Armund Maurer, C.S.B. (Toronto, 1968), p. 44.
Quine and Aristotelian Essentialism 323
possible form, that which they must be and are—viz., human be-
ings. It is this fact that a natural kind or species term notes, and
it is in terms of such a fact that the essence/accident distinction
is made.
Though Quine's understanding of Aristotle's essence/accident
distinction is confused in a manner similar to Porphyry's, it might
be argued that the difficulties Quine attempted to raise can be
transferred to a new arena. The problem would now appear in the
following form: What justifies our saying that the nature of Jones,
Quine's cycling mathematician, is signified by the natural kind
or species term ' man' as opposed to terms like ' cyclist' or
' mathematician ' ? In virtue of what is Jones' nature classified as
rational animal rather than cyclist or mathematician ? An account
of the classification process will be offered shortly, but the criteria
in terms of which a thing's nature or essence is determined should
be stated. This is, however, a most complicated issue, but at least
two things can be said here. First, the nature or essence of X is
that without which X would not exist. For example, Jones would
continue to exist even if he no longer cycled or if he ceased to do
mathematics, but Jones would not continue to exist if he ceased to
be a man—ceased to be an animal and ceased to possess the ca-
pacity of reason. As already stated, the natural kind or species
term notes something more fundamental about Jones than the
terms 'cyclist' and 'mathematician' do. Jones' nature as a ra-
tional animal is manifested in his abilities to cycle and do mathe-
matics. He could, of course, have manifested his nature in other
ways. He did not have to be a cyclist or mathematician or both.
But Jones' nature as a rational animal had to be manifested in
some way. Second, the nature or essence of X is not only that
without which X would not exist but is also that which sorts X
from other objects and in terms of which X can be grouped with
other objects into a class. For example, Jones would also cease
to exist if he were no longer a sentient animal, but sentient animal
is not a sufficiently precise characterization of Jones' nature.
Where rational animal is sufficiently precise but not so precise as
to be in conflict with the first condition. As said, the process of
classification will be discussed shortly, but these two conditions 1S
13
See Baruch Brody, Identity and Essence (Princeton, 1980), pp. 84-134
for a discussion of the criteria in terms of which a thing's nature or

324 Douglas B. Rasmussen
provide an initial understanding of how the nature of something is
determined.
II
The foregoing comments can in one sense be regarded as agree-
ing with Quine's criticism of the essence/accident distinction—
namely, such a distinction presupposes a way of specifying or de-
scribing the object in question. Yet, this does not mean that the
process of specifying or describing X is accomplished by an appeal
to analyticity. But Quine does assume this, and it is, in fact, this
very assumption which makes the essence/accident distinction so
problematic for Quine. As Eobert Hollinger notes:
How are we to tell which of the properties ' necessarily rational' or
' necessarily two-legged' really expresses Jones' ' real essence ' ? On
the assumption that analyticity is the only criterion, there is no way
of telling, and indeed no sense to the claim, that this quest is valid.14
If we cannot explain what necessarily belongs to X by an appeal
to ' X "s meaning, frame of reference, language game, background
grouping, etc, then we cannot say anything is necessary to X. This,
however, assumes that necessity is only a result of considerations
that depend on language.15 It is only because Quine sees 'nec-
essarily rational' and ' necessarily two-legged' as resulting from
certain analytic or linguistic ways of specifying Jones that a con-
tradiction ensues—that is, Jones being both necessarily rational
and contingently two-legged and contingently rational and neces-
sarily two-legged. If essential as opposed to accidental features
were not determined in such analytic, linguistic ways, no con-
tradiction would necessarily result. This, of course, is the very
point Aristotelian essentialism notes—to say what X is and must
be ie is not a result of the meaning of ' X'.
essence is determined. Qualification and further explanation of the two
conditions stated are developed.
i* " A Defense of Essentialism," p. 329.
" See Panayot Butchvarov, The Concept of Knowledge (Evanston, IL,
1970), pp. 105-142 for a most devastating critique of the attempt to ex-
plain necessary truth by an appeal to purely formal or linguistic con-
siderations. Also, Arthur Pap, Semantics and Necessary Truth (New
Haven and London, 1958) still provides a most effective criticism of the
attempt to deprive necessary truth of factual or ontological import.
16
Milton ]?isk has noted that hidden behind Hume's claim that we can
have no idea of natural necessity is an ontology which itself eliminates
Quine and Aristotelian Essentialism 325
Furthermore, Quine's claim that Aristotelian essentialism in-
volves a contradiction—namely, Jones both is and is not essentially
rational and essentially two-legged—rests on a confusion " of the
following statements:
(1) all cyclists are essentially two-legged but not essentially ra-
tional
(!') "all cyclists are two-legged" is necessarily true while "all
cyclists are rational" is not
(2) all mathematicians are essentially rational but not essentially
two-legged
(2') "all mathematicians are rational" is necessarily true while "all
mathematicians are two-legged" is not
It should be noted that nothing follows from the truth of (!') and
(2') about what features constitute Jones' nature. The truth of
(!') does not imply (1), and the truth of (2') does not imply (2).
In fact, both (1) and (2) are false. They fail to meet the first
condition for being the essence or nature of something. A cyclist
can continue to exist if he loses a leg, and a mathematician can
exist even if he no longer can do mathematics. Jones, Quine's
cycling mathematician, will cease to exist only when he ceases to
be both animal and rational. (It should, by the way, be noted that
rationality does not constitute the nature or essence of man but
is, rather, the differentia. It meets the second condition for being
the nature of man, but it does not meet the first condition. Thus,
Quine's claim that a contradiction follows for Aristotelian essen-
tialism from the truth of (!') and (2') when conjoined with the
fact that Jones is a cyclist and a mathematician rests on a con-
fusion.
Quine's difficuties seem based on a failure to understand how the
significance> of natural kind or species terms is determined. The
significance of a natural kind or species term is not determined by
necessity from the world—namely, an ontology which holds " impressions "
as the primary entities. In fact, Hume's claim can be inverted to show
that his ontology is impoverished. Nature and Necessity (Bloomington
and London, 1973), p. 4; Baruch Brody, Identity and Essence, and Ron
Harre and E. H. Madden, Causal Powers (Totowa, NJ, 1975), aa well as
Ksk, offer most persuasive arguments for the existence of natural
necessity.
17
This confusion is noted by Brody, Identity and Essence, pp. 86-87.

326 Douglas B. Rasmiissen
an appeal to meanings—by a procedure of inspectio mentis.
Eather, it results from an empirical ls process—a process that is
neither immediate nor infallible 19—but a process which nonethe-
less can tell us what something is. Too often accounts of the
essence or nature of something give the impression that the natural
kind or species term is a closed a-eontextual repository of omni-
science which provides a non-empirical path to knowledge. This
is not true. Natural kind or species terms are instruments which
signify what a thing is, but they are not " ideas " which one some-
how unpacks in order to achieve " a priori" or " conceptual"
truth.20 Furthermore, to say that a term signifies what something
is does not mean that the thing is at once completely and ex-
is This process, however, is empirical in a different sense than that which
is usually meant in classical British empiricism. In that tradition, the
objects which are presented in sense perception are also and necessarily
recognized 6j/ sense perception, while in an older empiricist tradition, the
objects which are presented in sense perception are not necessarily recog-
nized by sense perception. According to this older empiricist tradition, the
core empiricist claim, " Nihil in intellects, quid non prius erat in sensu,"
is interpreted to mean that all objects of knowledge are without excep-
tion presented in sense perception, but this does not mean that they are
thereby recognized 6j/ sense perception. As Etienne Gilson once noted,
" The senses carry a message which they cannot interpret." The human
intellect, reason, must discover and interpret what the senses present. In
this older empiricist tradition, there is no bifurcation of human knowledge
into two kinds—the rational/conceptual and the sensory/empirical.
Eather, human knowledge is regarded as involving both the rational and
sensory, the conceptual and empirical, and though they can be distin-
guished, they are not separable. It is in the terms of this older empiricist
tradition that the procedure for determining a natural kind term's sig-
nificance is said to be empirical.
19
Fallibilism is most certainly true. Yet, it should not be interpreted
too strongly. For example, being human does not require the possibility
of error; rather, it merely allows for the possibility of error. See Douglas
B. Rasmussen, " The Open-Question Argument and the Issue of Con-
ceivability," Proceedings of the American Catholic Philosophical Associa-
tion, 56 (1982), 162-172.
20
In the Aristotelian tradition, a concept is not an object of direct
awareness which one inspects in order to discover truth. To the extent
" meaning" is regarded as an object of direct awareness which one in-
inspects to discover a priori truth, it is not something that could be
countenanced. See Adler, Some Questions about Language, pp. 62-63.
Also, see Norman J. Brown, "A Kind of Necessary Truth," Philosophy,
50 (1975), 49.
Quine and Aristotelian EssentiaUsm 327
haustively known. A person can know something about X without
thereby knowing everything there is to know about it. The ap-
prehension of X's nature may at first be incomplete and vague,
but one has at least some apprehension of it. We can come to
know more and more about X's nature.
To properly understand the process by which the significance of
a natural kind or species term is determined, the role of real
definition 21 in human cognition must be grasped. As already
stated, knowledge of X's nature is not accomplished all at once.
It proceeds in steps. We begin with some knowledge of a thing's
nature and come to know more and more. It is in this process
that real definition plays an important role. The human knower
needs something to state in brief what is expressed by the natural
kind or species term. Moreover, the knower needs something to
set the overall limits of the nature of the being in question. Thus,
the role of real definition is one of classification. The accuracy of
real definitions ultimately determines how well our conceptual
" maps " reflect the world. Yet, the process is not automatic;
neither is it infallible, but it is nonetheless one of the steps in
human cognitive development that is accomplished.
It is important to realize that a real definition is not a descrip-
tion; it does not mention all the characteristics or features of X.
If a definition were to do this, it would defeat its very purpose,
viz., to distinguish X from all other realities. Instead, there would
be an indiscriminate, undifferentiated conglomeration of charac-
teristics and nothing would be distinguished or recognized. We
could never state what anything is. A real definition seeks to state
the fundamental, distinguishing characteristic of the reality to
which the natural kind or species term refers—those features,
traits, characteristics, etc., without which X would not be the kind
of thing it is—in other words, a definition per genus et
diferentiam.
21
Other than philosophical fashion, there does not seem to be any com-
pelling reason to confine ourselves to nominal definitions. As Panayot
Butchvarov has observed: " Contrary to the usual philosophical opinion,
there is no obvious general difficulty regarding the notion of a real defini-
tion. . . . There is no more reason for regarding such statements as being
about language, or as being true in virtue of facts about language, than
there is for so regarding necessary statements in general." Being Qua.
Being (Bloomington and London, 1979), p. 134. Also, see fn. 15 above.
 Quine and Aristotelian Essentialism 329
328 Douglas B. Easmussen
Such defining characteristics are cognitively determined; that is, thing we need to know about X by a process of skillful deduction.
they are determined by appealing to all that is known regarding Such a viewpoint confuses the logical with the real by making the
the reality to which the natural kind or species terra refers. A definition the object of knowledge rather than a most concise
formulation of what is known. This might be legitimate for
real definition is a condensation of a large body of facts regarding
Leibnizian essentialism, but it certainly is not legitimate for
the reality in question. It is not " intuited " from one's armchair.
The defining characteristics are those which not only distinguish Aristotelian essentialism.
X—for there may be many distinguishing characteristics—but do A real definition's cognitive function also implies that the sig-
nificance of the natural kind or species term is open-ended: it
so fundamentally. Fundamental characteristics are those distin-
subsumes all the characteristics of X, both known and yet-to-be-
guishing characteristics on which all the other characteristics (or
discovered. This allows natural kind or species terms to be both
greatest number of others) depend. " Metaphysically, a funda-
at the foundation of our present knowledge and also at the cutting
mental characteristic is that distinctive characteristic which makes
edge of scientific theory and advancement. Aristotelian essentialism
the greatest number of others possible; epistemologically, it is the
is compatible with those cognitive developments that sometimes
one that explains the greatest number of others."22 A full ac-
occur at the edges of a science which require that the fundamental
count of this process cannot be detailed here.23 Yet, every real
distinguishing characteristic (s) of an entity be changed or that an
definition should be regarded as having the following preamble:
entity be identified descriptively and not grouped into a class—as,
" After full consideration of all the known facts pertaining to this
for example, certain primitive organisms are treated in biology be-
group of existents, the following has been demonstrated to be their
cause they share characteristics with both plants and animals and
essential, therefore defining, characteristic. . . ." 24 Thus, the very
thus cannot be classified as either plants or animals. It must be
character of a real definition's cognitive function implies the exist-
remembered that definitions are a classificatory device which serves
ence of numerous other characteristics, features, traits, etc. in the
a cognitive function by allowing man to order his knowledge of
nature of the reality defined. This is not to say, however, that the
reality, and though they reflect (if carefully developed) the struc-
definition entails all that constitutes X's nature. The definition of
ture of the world, they are nonetheless tools or instruments for
X is not the nature of X; rather, it is a formulalike expression
knowing, not reality as such. Eeal definitions can change and grow
which notes those features that allow us to pick X out from every-
as man's knowledge changes and grows, but this does not mean that
thing else. To let the definition of X be regarded as somehow en-
the nature of a thing (provided it is not an artifact) changes when
tailing all of X's features would imply that we could learn every-
man's knowledge of it changes.
2 2 Ayn Rand, Introduction to Objectivi&t Epistemology (New York, Metaphysically speaking, the nature of X is not determined by
human cognition. A thing is what it is. Epistemologically speak-
1979), p. 59.
23 A full account of this process would involve explaining the role ing, the real definition of X is dependent on human knowledge—
essences play in scientific explanation. Baruch Brody argues that " a on all that is known about X—for the essential defining feature
deductive-nomological explanation of a particular event is a satisfactory
of a being is not, and indeed cannot be, determined in a vacuum.
explanation of that even when (besides meeting all of Hempel's require-
ments) its explanans contains essentially a statement attributing to a Furthermore, human interests and needs do play a role in deter-
certain class of objects a property had essentially by that class of ob- mining which areas of knowledge are more developed. For ex-
jects (even if the statement does not say that they have it essentially), ample, our knowledge of the human body is no doubt as great as
and when at least one object involved in the event described in the ex- it is because of our interest and need to maintain physical health.
planandum is a. member of that class of objects." Identity and Essence, p.
147. Also, see Harre and Madden's Causal Powers, especially chapters 4, 5, Yet, this does not mean that we cannot give an account of what
the human body really is. Bather, it merely illustrates something
and 6.
2* Rand, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, p. 64. that we already know. Much of what we decide to investigate

330 Douglas B. Rasmussen
and examine is determined by our interest and needs.25 Such a
consideration, however, does not suffice to show that X's nature is
merely a function of the point of view from which it is considered.
We can still know what X really is.
Ill
Quine, however, thinks that a concern for what X really is is a
mistaken way of looking at the issue. For Quine, human knowl-
edge is confined to a web of beliefs such that any attempt to estab-
lish what X really is is meaningless. As Quine has stated:
" How much of our science is merely contributed by language and
how much is a genuine reflection of reality t " is perhaps a spurious
question which itself arises wholly from a certain particular type of
language. Certainly we are in a predicament if we try to answer the
question; for to answer the question we must talk about the world as
well as about language, and to talk about the world we must already
impose upon the world some conceptual scheme peculiar to our lan-
guage™ [emphasis added],
Quine has taken the distinction between truths based on meaning
and truths based on fact and has expanded the former in such a
way so as to make all truths dependent on meaning, viz., de-
pendent on an entire conceptual system.27 There is no way to get
" outside " of a conceptual/linguistic system—no way to say .what
things really are. Quine, however, does not contend that we are
25 Barry Stroud has suggested that Wittgenstein's view of necessity
(and definitions) is not that of a radical conventionalist but, rather, of
someone who regards knowledge as something which is directed by our
fundamental interests and needs (our form of life?). According to
Stroud, Wittgenstein's target is the Platonic conception of knowledge
which treats concepts, propositions, and arguments as existing in isola-
tion from human life. Whether this is the correct interpretation of Witt-
genstein or not, it does seem like something which Aristotelian essentialism
could accept. See Stroud's " Wittgenstein and Logical Necessity" in
Pitchier (ed.), Wittgenstein The Philosophical Investigations (Garden
City, NY, 1966), pp. 477-496.
26
27 from a Logical Point of View, p. 78.
"The relativistic thesis to which we have come is this, to repeat: it
makes no sense to say what the objects of a theory are; beyond saying
how to interpret or reinterpret that theory in another," Quiue, Ontological
Relativity and Other Essays (New York, 1969), p. 51.
331
Quine and Aristotelian Essentialism
V£ , _
stuck with our particular conceptual scheme. We can change it,
but only gradually, bit by bit, as a mariner would rebuild his ship
at sea, plank by plank.
We can improve our conceptual scheme, our philosophy, bit by bit
while continuing to depend on it for support; but we cannot detach
ourselves from it and compare it objectively icith an unconceptualized
reality. Hence it is meaningless, I suggest, to inquire into the absolute
correctness of a conceptual scheme as a mirror of reality. Our stand-
ard for appraising basic changes of conceptual scheme must be, not a
realistic standard or correspondence to reality, but a pragmatic stand-
ard. Concepts are language, and the purpose of concepts and of lan-
guage is efficacy in communication and in prediction. Such is the ulti-
mate duty of language, science, and philosophy, and it is in relation
to that duty that a conceptual scheme has finally to be appraised 28
[emphasis added].
Ignoring the self-referential2" difficulty of what language or
conceptual scheme it is that allows Quine to speak of what the
purpose and duty of language, science, and philosophy are, and also
ignoring questions of what it is about which there is communica-
tion and prediction or what can be meant by ' efficacious' if we
forego attempting to know what things really are, there is in these
statements something else which deserves attention—a non
sequitur. The non sequitur is found in the claim that since we
must use a conceptual scheme—a language—to understand reality,
we are " therefore " imposing our concepts on reality and are un-
able to say what is really the case. The error is also found in the
claim that to know things objectively, to know them as they really
are, one " must " do so nonconceptually. Quine makes these claims,
but they do not follow. Why does Quine make these claims?
It could be that he just made an error, or it could be that he
takes the role of human interests and needs in determining our
classifications to be so great that knowledge of X's nature is im-
possible. But even granting that such infhience can be profound,
this still does not make knowledge of what X really is impossible.
It would nonetheless remain true that X is what it is, and we
28
29 From a Logical Point of View, pp. 78-79.
See Joseph P. Boyle, Jr., " Self-Referential Inconsistency, Inevitable
Falsity, and Metaphysical Argumentation," MetaphilosopKy, 3 (1972),
25-42.

Douglas B. Rasmussen
333
can slowly and with, great difficulty come to know it. Of course,
if X had no nature, then there would be nothing to know. Yet,
this would beg the question against Aristotelian essentialism.
There is, however, another explanation for Quine making these
claims—namely, Quine has made the Kantian turn. "While cer-
tainly not adopting Kantian language or accepting a fixed set of
categories or scheme, Quine holds with Kant that our knowledge
is structured by our conceptual system and thus we cannot know
what things really are. In other words, these claims represent a
transcendental linguisticism.30
Yet, if Quine is to he interpreted as following a Kantian view
of human cognition, then he can be responded to in the following
way: While it is most certainly true that human knowing proceeds
in a certain manner or fashion—that is to say, there is a mode of
cognition—this does not mean that the content of such cognition
is thereby determined by the manner in which it is known. There
is a difference between the mode of human cognition and the con-
tent of human cognition, and it is not necessary that the two be
identical in order to claim that such cognition can know what
things really are. Aquinas made this point nicely.
Although it is necessary for the truth of cognition that the cognition
answer to the thing known, still it is not necessary that the mode of
the thing known be the same as the mode of its cognition.31
In other words, simply because concepts/words must be employed
when we know or talk about X does not mean that we cannot know
what X really is or that talk of what X really is is (somehow)
meaningless. In fact, the implicit assumption of such thinking
is " that any knowledge acquired by a process of consciousness is
necessarily subjective and cannot correspond to the facts of reality,
since it is ' processed knowledge.' "32 Yet, to hold this assumption
would mean that a valid knowledge of reality would have to be
acquired without any means of cognition. In effect, this would be
30
Interpreting Wittgenstein is always a difficult matter. Yet, for a.
criticism of what seems to be a Wittgensteinian version of transcendental
linguisticism, see Douglas B. Rasmussen, " Necessary Truth, the Game
Analogy, and the Meaning-Is-Use Thesis," The Thomist (July 1982).
si Sum. cont. Gent., II, 75.
32 Rand, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, p. 108.
333
Quine and Aristotelian Hssentialism
like saying that a man cannot see because he has eyes. Certainly,
something has gone wrong here, but what?
There are, at least, two major things that have gone wrong.
First, there is the assumption that unless man can know every-
thing all at once, he cannot know anything. According to this
view, knowledge of X cannot be something which changes or de-
velops. In fact, unless man can claim to know sul specie aterni-
tatis, he cannot know the real. This view regards knowledge as a
static, timeless snapshot or picture. Such a conception of human
knowledge is misplaced and is indeed more appropriate to God
than man. Yet, Quine argues that unless one can claim that his
account of reality is an absolute insight, an insight not made from
any location or position, one cannot know the real but, rather, is
confined to his conceptual scheme or language. This, however, is
absurd. The entire enterprise of examining the nature of knowl-
edge would be of no concern for an infallible omniscient being;
epistemology exists precisely because man is a being who learns in
pieces, step by step, and who must use the proper procedures to
avoid error. The discovery that man is limited and fallible is not
the end of the attempt to know the real, but its beginning.33 The
recognition, then, that human knowing is neither complete nor
infallible should not be taken to imply that one is confined to his
" conceptual system" or " form of life" and cannot know the
real. The Kantian turn does not follow from the recognition that
man is not God!
The second thing that has gone wrong is that the means of
human cognition have been made the object of human cognition—
that is to say, the tools or instruments for knowing (be they con-
cepts, words, percepts, or whatever) have been made the primary
object of analysis and examination. Though the many twists and
turns of modern philosophy cannot be recounted here,34 there does
seem to have been a fundamental assumption made by Descartes
(and Locke) regarding the nature of human cognition—namely,
that " ideas" are the objects of human awareness—and it does
J3
See Douglas B. Rasmussen, " Austin and Wittgenstein on ' Doubt'
and 'Knowledge'," Reason Papers, 1 (1974), 51-60.
14
See John Frederick Peifer, The Concept in Thomism (New York,
952), pp. 9-28 for a discussion of modern philosophy from an Aristo-
telian/Thomistic perspective.

334 Douglas B. Kasmussen
seem that the difficulties created by attempts to reconcile this as-
sumption with knowledge of material substances or causal relations
created much of the impetus for the Kantian turn. It is indeed
most difficult to see how the Kantian view of human cognition
could be possible if previous philosophizing had not taken it upon
itself to make '"ideas" the objects of knowledge. The Kantian
claim that knowing is analogous to the process of creating arti-
facts wherein sense perceptions constitute the '" raw material"
and concepts constitute the " form" or " mold" depends on
treating percepts and concepts as what is known. The Kantian
claim that the formal element of the content of human knowledge
is contributed by the subject can succeed only if one assumes that
human thought can only attain what is given by thought, that
thought is what is directly known, and not things.
In contrast to this assumption is the Aristotelian view of the
cognitive relation which does not consider thought (or percep-
tion) as what is known but, rather, as that by which we know. On
this view, thought (or perception) is not something which needs
to be related to things but, rather, is that which relates the knower
to things. As Peter Geach has noted, " being of an X is not a
relation in which the thought or sensation stands but is simply
what the thought or sensation is." 35 Concepts and percepts are
inherently relational and are necessarily of or about something
other than themselves. It is thus quite impossible for all the ob-
jects of awareness to be in the last analysis nothing more than a
manifestation of consciousness. Knowledge of a world that exists
and is what it is can be attained. It is given in awareness but not
ultimately ly awareness. There is no Cartesian question regarding
the existence of an " external" world or doubt as to our ability to
know it. Eather, there is only a concern to explain how fallible,
limited human beings like ourselves accomplish the process of
knowing things.
The Aristotelian view of the cognitive relation is a competing
account to the Kantian one. Quine however, only assumes (or, at
least, his claims seem to presuppose) a Kantian view of cognition;
he does not argue for it. Yet, this is a fundamental, if not the
25 <J. E. M. Anseombe and P. T. Geach, Three Philosophers (Ithaca,
NY, 1961), p. 95.
Quine and Aristotelian Essentialism 335
fundamental, issue. The Kantian view of human cognition would
seem to be contradicted by the very character of awareness. Every
element of human knowledge is of something beyond itself such
that it is not something that can be directly known or examined.36
That which lacks this inherently relational aspect of reference to
an object other than itself is not an element of human knowledge.
Accordingly, percepts are not formless contents ("raw material")
and concepts are not contentless forms ("molds"). 37 The Kan-
tian turn need not necessarily be made if the inherently relation-
al character of awareness is recognized and applied to epistemo-
logical problems.
Yet, this is a most complicated issue and certainly one that can-
not be1 decided here. It is sufficient to note that Aristotelian es-
sentialism has not been shown to be absurd, and though there are
other issues 3S that must be handled before a proper characteriza-
tion of human knowledge can be made, it can nonetheless be ob-
served that the claim to know what things really are has not been
shown to be senseless. Cognitive realism is possible. It seems that
Quine is too quick, like indeed most contemporary philosophy, to
make the Kantian turn.39
St. John's University,
Jamaica, New York.
38 See Douglas B. Rasmussen, " Deely, Wittgenstein, and Mental
Events," The New Scholasticism, 54 (Winter 1980) for a discussion of
some of the implications of this claim.
'See fns. 18 and 20 above.
3
See Thomas A. Russman, "Selective Perception," Reason Papers, 7
1-32 for a discussion of the ambiguities present in the claim
that perception is theory-laden and a defense of a foundationalist account
of knowledge.
irtions of this paper were made possible by a summer fellowship
the Liberty Fund of Indianapolis, Indiana. Tibor Machan, Fred
ler, John Peterson, Andrew Reck, Jeremy Shearmer, and Henry Veatch
wuld also be thanked for their helpful questions and criticisms and, of
course, absolved of all blame.