The 'Analogia Entis' according to Franz Brentano
A Speculative-GrammaticalAnalysis of Aristotle's "Metaphysics'
Die Kategorieneintheilung des Aristoteles hat in einer
wunderbaren Weise dem Wechsel tier Zeiten getrotzt. --
Brentano
1. In the modern age the problem of individuation was
solved through a physicalistic reference. Usually the
solution was presupposed implicitly, but Kant made the
attending reduction explicit. Space and time, as forms of
intuition, are sufficient to provide every existing thing
with a unique indexing (x~, x2, x3, x4 ---- t). Thus space
and time are not c a t e g o r i e s any more, but indexical
p a r a m e t e r s which are part of the cognitive apparatus.
Going back to the origins of this turning point in the
history of thought, we see that the postulate of the
impenetrability of bodies was connected with the
extensional individuation of physical reality: in the res
e x t e n s a every space-time point must be outside every
other. Every existing thing, if it is to be individuated,
must obey such a postulate. This has the advantage of
reducing the metaphysical problem of the i n d i v i d u a t i o n
of a being to the easier problem of the i d e n t i f i c a t i o n
of a body through mathematico-physical coordinates.
Obviously, the reduction is not automatic: there must be
a Copernican revolution in the viewpoint. But this
metaphysical shift is not part of science, it remains
insensible and subterranean: it is enough to say that the
tree of knowledge has its roots deep into the earth.
If two different bodies could coexist within the same
space-time point, clearly the spatio-temporal indexing
would not be sufficient for individuation. At the time of
classical physics, from Descartes at least until Laplace,
one could not predict that such a condition might not
hold a priori, that is in a necessary and universal way.
But for more than a century now two theoretical
considerations, marginal at first, have gradually become
so crucial as to shake our confidence in the constituting
presuppositions of this m a t h e s & u n i v e r s a l i s : a clear sign
that a 'deus deceptor, valde callidus sive malignus' may
induce us in error even when the evidence is most
reliable.
Topoi 6 (1987), 51--58.
9 1987 by D. Reidel Publishing Company.
E n z o Melandri
The first of these two considerations was the
discovery of non-Euclidean geometries, or rather the
proved possibility to give them a coherent physico-
mathematical interpretation. This is a well-know fact
and we need not linger upon it. But it is worth making a
point which is important for our argument. The spatio-
temporal indexing, once non-Euclidean geometries are
admitted, is no longer sufficient to ensure individuation,
unless we specify the kind of geometry that is in
question, that is, the sign and degree of curvature of the
space being considered. And notice that the whole
question is independent of relativity theory, since it
originated before it and therefore can be understood in
its absence. Gauss was already aware of it.
The second consideration, less well-known in epis-
temology, goes back to Lotze and to his researches in
the physiology of spatial perception. 2 Lotze was able to
prove for the first time that the space perceived, that is,
spatial consciousness, is not based on some preexisting
form of intuition, but is itself the contingent result of an
operation of logical reorganization of local sensations.
So there is no innate form of spatial intuition. For if
there were one, it would be universal and necessary,
whereas from a genetic point of view topical sensations,
though localized, do not predetermine any unique and
logically cogent result. Which naturally does not exclude
that at some level of development of a spatial con-
sciousness there might be a convergence on Euclidean
geometry, say through a process of equifinality. But this
would be a fact to be explained, not an a priori binding
condition. Therefore proceeding from the bottom up we
get to the same result: the psychic space is as pluralistic,
in principle, as the geometric-axiomatic one. Not less
important will be the researches on time, on the
temporal flux, and on duration conducted by the
experimental psychologists of the turn of the century,
among whom are important Meinong and the Graz
school.
Even without recurring to later theories, like special
and general relativity, or to indeterminacy in micro-
physics, we have enough justification here to talk about
52 ENZO MELANDRI
a crisis of the foundations of contemporary knowledge
(not only of physics), which reopens in a completely
general way (and not only within metaphysics) that
problem of individuation that had previously been
forgotten because it was considered solved. This is
borne out by the research themes of the turn of the
century: the theory of judgment, the thesis of the
primacy of the proposition on the terms, the psychology
of acts, the independence of objectivity from existence
and in general the reappearance of an ontological
formulation of cognitive problems, not to mention the
great development of logic.
So when looking back more than a century later we
see the emergence, under various titles and beginning
from different disciplines, of an area of related inter-
ests within which in my opinion must be located the
"Aristoteles-renaissance", too. The development of
these studies (it will be enough to refer here to Zeller,
Prantl, and Trendelenburg) takes off from an interest
in the history of ideas, to be reconstructed with a
philologico-critical method, but issues, especially with
Brentano, in theoretical results which without repre-
senting novelties still constitute at the time very
important suggestions for a critical reflection. On the
other hand, in all the "renaissances", which Toynbee
interprets as contacts of a civilization with itself at
different times, the rediscovery of the ancient on the
part of the new becomes frequently the reason of
unpredictable developments.
Let us summarize. For Aristotle a principle of
individuation based only on the identification of a
space-time point would not have been sufficient. For
such a coincidence could have occurred through the
combination of two categories, space and time, in a
purely accidental manner, without any implication of
inherence in a substance. To such a space-time point
could belong many other categories, whereas the
essential implication of substance excludes such dis-
tributivity. Aristotle's problem, from a metaphysical
point of view, was that of seeing whether with the
means of declarative discourse it was possible to
identify what the discourse itself talks about. The
solution of this problem is the theory of substance. But
the identification of a space-time point does not support
such a construction, and does not exhaust referentiality
in the Aristotelian sense. The problem is not one of
"recovering" substance, but of beginning to reflect on
the meaning (perhaps new for us) of some very old
questions?
2. For Aristotle space and time are categories, not
parameters. This means that their combination does not
support a principle of individuation, because they lack
inherence in a substance. It would be like saying that
there is a coincidence of 'musical' and 'white' without
mentioning 'who or what' is musical and white. The
problem of individuation is solved by saying what/s that
we talk about, and this is an ontological problem. The
question of ontology cannot be solved by a "science of
being", 6wo-2oTia in general, as is the case for those
particular sciences which deal with a special ontic
determination, such as psychology, physiology, cos-
mology, and so on: Aristotle says that 'being is not a
genus', that is, it is not a particular object, which can
be circumscribed categorially. Thus the problem of
ontology becomes the converse problem, that is, that of
establishing what it means to be in discourse.
The question can be reformulated as follows: can
language understood as 26yoq d~o~avroc6q answer by
its means the question rt" gar,? -- concerning the quid,
the "what" we talk about? And this not only in the sense
of the category, of the predication which answers the
question by making being fall within an ontic genus, but
also and especially in the stronger, ontological, sense,
which expresses the modality of its relation with the "ens
per se", ~v raOdvrr, and determines its individuation
as well as its identification?
It is to Brentano's credit that he, developing a
well-known thesis of Trendelenburg, radicalized the
indirect way in which Aristotle addresses the onto-
logical problem, to repropose it in terms which it is
not abusive to define of speculative grammar. Trendel-
enburg 4 would have been the first one to notice, among
the moderns, that in Aristotle
if one thing is essentiallypredicated of another so that name and
concept of the predicate applies to it, then this occurs in a
grammatically different form than if the predicate merely gives its
name to the subject without being of the essence of the subject.5
And it is Brentano himself who speaks of Trendelen-
burg's peculiar ability to exploit the "speculative
content" of the ancient thinkers by starting with the
affinity that such content often has with the grammatical
peculiarities of "linguistic forms". 6
Let us proceed carefully. What are categories in the
Aristotelian sense? (We know that the term is generally
used in a very vague way.) They are the highest or most
general predications, which must be understood both in
 THE 'ANALOGIA ENTIS' ACCORDING TO FRANZ BRENTANO
the ontic sense of greatest genera, 12g~tara ygvrl, which
circumscribe a certain region or section of being, and in
the logical sense of predicates which cannot themselves
be subjects, that is, ~carq~ooiat with respect to which no
further predication is possible. The purely logical
conception of categories is the simplest and also the
least deceptive, but this reduction to mere predicates is
rejected by Brentano because Aristotle's logic -- or
better, analytic -- is not part of metaphysics or ~rOo)rr/
gartar0/ar/ (which is real science), but as formal science
deals only with fictitious entities like the "ens tamquam
verum', 6v aSg 6.2r/0gq, and not with real predication.
This remark will be better appreciated later, when
Brentano deals with trans-categorial or analogic pre-
dication, the 6/uwvf~pwg 7r For the
moment, it will be enough to remember the fact that
logic and metaphysics are equally interested in the
division into categories. 7 Categorial predication is thus
part of that way of relating to being which Aristotle calls
of "synonymy", ovvwv~l~wg ravqTooe~aOat , and which
consists in subsuming the t~v under its most general
ontic determinations. Synonymy must be understood as
internal to each of these highest genera. 8 For the
distinction and correlation of the logical and the
metaphysical sense in Aristotle see e.g. the corre-
sponding use of the apophantic 'tamquam', which works
synonymously (tO ~v ,~ 6v), and of the existential-
individual 'per se', which works transversally (r6 6v
~r 9 "participium praesens et perfectum" ( habens, habitus). 14
As against Kant and Hegel, who wanted to see in the
Aristotelian table of categories nothing more than a
merely inductive list without any systematic justification,
Brentano can establish how to get to this table by a
consistent and complete 6tas162 l~ The systematic
criterion coordinated with the procedure of division by
two and reutilization of the residue follows the order of
the growing closeness to o~)aia. Proceeding in the
reverse order, from the top down, we find first of all the
great division between the category of of~aia, the prime
substance relative to the individual, the fvroreipevov,
and all the other not substantial but accidental ontic
determinations, the ovlufleflrlr6m. Among these we
distinguish, according to the categories of inherence, the
gwztd~xovra, that is how much (aroaOv) and what
(z~ot6v); then come the dynamical affections, the
Ktvgaetg of acting (aroteCv) and suffering (zdo'zetv); in a
similar way, these are followed by the circumstances, rd
~v rtvt', where (arot3) and when (~roz~); and then, as the
only category not of affection or ardOog, which does not
53
modify the substance and is the most distant from it, we
have the category of rd arO6g rt, the external relations. 11
Thus for Brentano the Aristotelian categories are
exactly 2 3 ----8, as the result of three applications of the
8tafoeatg. le And in fact in Aristotle, too, occurs this
number, in inclusive alternative with ten. The two
residual categories, in this case, that is, having (~xetv)
and posture (regaOat), may be regarded as redundant
and subordinated to the ~ctvgaetr
Note in passing how this reformulation makes it
easier to understand the origin of the distinction,
not much used today, between relations proper, that
is external, and affections altering the substance, that
is internal: the latter are the last six ztdOr/, excluding
o~)aia and v~t z~O6g ft. And to go back to our previous
argument, it will be noticed that space and time are here,
consistently, not relations but affections of things. Space
and time are not parameters because they react on what
they contain.
Resuming the exposition of Brentano, we see now the
strict correspondence subsisting between the categorial
schemes and the grammatical forms of the "nomen
substantivum" (substance), the "nomen adiectivum"
(quality and quantity), the "verbum activum etpassivum"
(to act and to be acted on), the "adverbia loci et
temporis" (where and when) and the "praepositiones"
(external relations), respectively; the two residual
categories of having and posture may correspond to the
This correspondence, of course, does not become a
precise one in the absence of an adequate speculative
commitment, which could convincingly interpret as
anomalies the morphological deviations from the ideal
form, and which could continue to the end in the
direction of rational radicalization thus opened. E.g. an
abstract noun like 'whiteness' will have to be understood
not as a noun, nor as an adjective, but as a pure relation
extrinsic to the unity that joins together the innumerable
white things) 5
We can thus easily reach the conclusion, from
another point of view, that the eight (or ten) Aristotelian
categories completely exhaust the kinds of questions
that can be meaningfully asked about ontic determina-
tions, that is, about the 6Oocd of the r{ eo~/,.16 In fact,
this seems to be the way to get there genetically, starting
from the Socratic etoove(a. From this angle, too, the
exhaustivity of the categories does not force one to
regard their possible redundance as a capital defect.
From a logical point of view, the syllogistic principle
54 ENZO MELANDRI
intervenes as a test of the normality of categorial
predication. It is in this direction, toward the atEartg &d
ovMtoyto/~oO, that not so much Aristotle's logic as his
analytic, that is, his speculative grammar, developed.
E.g. in 'Socrates is white, and white is a color; therefore
Socrates is a color' the reduction to syllogistic morphol-
ogy proves deceptive. But theoretical reflection shows
that 'white' occurs the first time as a qualitative adjective
(inherence) and the second time as an abstract noun
(relation to one); finally the conclusion shoultl hold
again as an inherence. One can only conclude down-
ward: 'therefore Socrates is a colored thing.' One can
only go from the top down, or stay on the same level,
and nothing else: the syllogism does not allow us to
increase our knowledge ex terminis. But it has another
function, too: it is a test of order and regularity in
categorial predication. The reduction in syllogistic form,
however, requires as a supplement an independent
theoretical conception of grammatical morphology.
When this reduction is successful, this means that the
categories have a homogeneous application, without
holistic complications: a "mereological" application as it
were.
The principles of Aristotelian "synonymy", that is, of
pure categorial predication, can finally be reduced to
two: the principle of excluded contradiction and the
principle of relevance, that is, of categorial order. The
first one excludes that there be contradictory predicates,
or which is the same, infinitely many predicates in the
definition of the object; the second one entails the
necessity to follow a fixed order, from the top down or
viceversa, when considering the succession of the
various categories. Traditionally one always followed
the order from the top down, from substance to relation.
Aristotle himself does it that way. This order is
commonsensical and intuitive, since it is easier to think
downward than upward. But this procedure has the
drawback that it distracts attention from the fact that the
first division, the one between substance and accidents,
is radically different from all the others, those between
the various accidents. The order in terms of a maximum
and minimum of substantiality or a maximum and
minimum of relationality is not sufficient to fill the gap,
because the first division is between ontological and
ontic, whereas the others concern the ontic only. Going
from the bottom up, on the other hand, from the
relational to the substantial, we can see how the process
of integration of ontic determinations never reaches the
summit of oOaEa. Substance as ztOtbrq o~)oia may be a
category, but only in the residual ontic sense of a
Restbegriff.17
3. The problem of being must then receive a non-
synonymic formulation. This is what is meant first and
foremost by 'being is not a genus'. At the beginning
of the Categories Aristotle prefixed the distinction
between "homonymous" and "synonymous" terms. We
have already discussed the synonymous ones: they
are the categories understood as highest genera and
ultimate predicates. Of the homonymous (or equivocal)
ones is given a purely grammatical exemplification. But
elsewhere (Eth. Nicom., 1, iv, 1096b) he says, after
excluding the case of "fortuitous homonymy", that the
most important theoretical question is that of the
"homonymy by analogy". Thus predication can be
synonymic or categorial, but also homonymic or
analogical. The latter, too, is a predication, though its
terms do not fall within the categories. It concerns the
ontological, not the ontic, sense of being, and this
explains why Brentano, following Aristotle, does not
allow one to speak of the categories in terms of purely
logical predicates.
The disjunction would seem complete, if it were not
for paronymy. In the introduction of the Categories
paronymy comes last and is treated hurriedly, so much
so that it never raised much attention. Paronymic
predication concerns the relation between the casus
rectus and the other casus obliqui, or between the
meaning of a word or root and that of the other words
which derive etymologically from it. To put it in more
speculative terms, paronymy concerns the relation
between substance, which normally should be expressed
by the noun in the nominative, and accidents, which as
we saw should be expressed by other parts of speech
and different cases. Now the same thematic root can
work as a noun, an adjective, a verb, etc. To us, the
question seems strange, especially because Aristotle
himself tells us that the noun signifies by convention,
~ a r d ovvO~rrlv, and not by some intrinsic virtue, or
(~(met (De Int., ii, 16a). But we must consider the special
theoretical context of speculative grammar, the antiquity
of the problem and its connections with other areas of
knowledge. Its origins are in the theme of the
voktoO~og, of the creator of words and their derivations
from the grvkta, as we find it for example in Plato's
Cratylus, which for Aristotle is related with the analysis
of metaphors and analogies, treated in books I and II of
the Rhetoric. But the whole question can (in fact, must)
 THE 'ANALOGIA E'NTIS" ACCORDING TO FRANZ BRENTANO
be understood in a more strictly theoretical sense, and
then it becomes, as we will see, an integral part of the
analysis of the ~ctOtov~/~t9~ rare~.'oQegaOat, that is, of
accidental predication par excellence.1 s
To return to Brentano, he wants first of all to accept
the thesis of the complete dichotomy of synomymic
and homonymic predication, by including paronymic
predication under the homonymic one) 9 Homonymy is
the Aristotelian thesis of the ~022aZt~ ~ 2ey61aevov,
which applies properly to the "ens" (rv) and to the
"unum" (fv), but then extends easily to all transcen-
dental, that is, transcategorial concepts. To be precise,
what Aristotle says repeatedly is that "being is said in
many ways, but not equivocally (o~)z 6/xa)v~ptog):
rather, by analogy and relative to a one and to a unique
nature (d22dt rar'ava2oTs rat ~Q6~ ~v r.at nQrff
i~[av rtvdt r Brentano interprets the exclusion of
equivocity only as irrelevance of fortuitous homonymy
(which is fine), but analogy as inclusive not only of
proportion and proportionality but also of the relation
to an identical term? ~
All depends on how one expands analytically the
famous Aristotelian phrase zto22azt~ q 2ey6tzevov. To
say 'by analogy and with respect to a one etc.' could be a
hendiadys (fv 6t& 6vogv), which expresses one and the
same meaning by two words..In this case the legitimate
homonymy is the one regulated by analogy, which also
includes what the Scholastics used to call 'attributive
analogy'. Attributive analogy has three terms and
includes the reference to a one. But the phrase might
also not be a hendiadys, and then the analogy does not
include all cases, but only some of them. Among those
left out is precisely the one of the contingent relation to
a one, the zcObg gv ~cai ~rObg /xCav rtvdt (~Oatv. The
question could turn out to be purely nominal, but it is
worth mentioning.
The Scholastics used to distinguish three kinds of
analogy. The first one is called of proportionality, and in
it falls certainly the Aristotelian ta6~g 26ytov. The
equality of ratios is to be understood not only in a
quantitative or mathematical sense, but also in a
comparative one. According to proportionality, this
holds whenever a/b = c/d. This structure includes also
the so-called continuous analogy, avvr/zgg, where the
middle term sets the proportionality, as in a/b = b/c.
The Aristotelian ta6rqg ~67tov bears traces of the
many Pythagorean, Platonic, and Eudoxian speculations
on this subject, and is also the reason why many
Aristotelian commentators want the r~oarv to precede
55
the ~rot6v in the descending order of accidental
predications starting with the ogas Which, as we will
see, could have some intrinsic reasonableness: it is not
to be taken for granted that the qualification must
precede the distinction. Is it not the case that the "quale"
has its foundation in the "quantum"? Or is it only
viceversa?
Then there is the purely proportional analogy,
without either quantitative or comparative implications.
E.g. 'this thing is as hot as that thing is white'. A
proportion always has four terms, but here the analogy
- should we then call it continuous? -- uses a single
-
mode of comparison, that of qualitative attribution. Is
the principle of the ta6rq~ 267toy satisfied here? I
would think it is, provided that we understand it as
relative to a dSog, which qualitatively is something
more than a ~v s r~o22~v. We agree with Brentano on
the extreme importance of this non-quantitative form of
equality of ratios, which institutes some kind of
"preestablished" (though not always decidible) harmony
among all the forms of predication of being. Not only
quality but also all the other categories are subject
to this proportional modification of their ultimate
meaning.
We are thus left with attributive analogy, which is a
relation among three terms, that is, of two in relation to
one. In the Scholastic conception analogy is understood
from the point of view of a creature, that is, of the
dependence relation that each being has with the "ens
increatum", intrinsic origin and end of all things. All
beings therefore depend on the god, or on the nature at
once original and teleological, and this dependence is
related with their distance from the origin or the end: it
is a function of their proportionate imperfection. It is
doubtful whether we can still speak of analogy here, or
of analogical analogy, and so on, unless this concept
becomes itself equivocal, and in a derogatory sense. The
reference to a one is for Aristotle identical per se with
the reference to being, though the one and being do not
coincide in the in se: from an objective point of view
they are the same, but in the concept they are distinct.
He says that 30 ~v ~ca~rO 8v TavTOv 7ca112ia ~Oatg, but
from a logical point of view they are not the same, ot~z
r ~vi ,~Oyqg.21 Brentano puts this kind of relation to
the one, too, which seems transanalogical besides being
transcategorial, under the general title of the 6gogv~lttog
rarqTopefaOat. He sees that case, too, supported by a
principle of hidden analogy. But it is likely that he does
so not to be forced to admit, in addition to the first two
56 ENZO MELANDRI
grids, the synonymic one and the homonymic-analogic
one, a third one, paronymic, which would regenerate the
whole problem from which we started. 22
Let us summarize. In the homonymic predication
there are three grids: one is the analogy of propor-
tionality, the second is the simply proportional one, and
the third we can call equally well attributive analogy or
paronymic predication. The analogy of proportionality
is a system of quantitative or comparative relations,
which is decidable by the understanding. Given three
terms, the fourth one is always contained, even if for
the moment it is unknown. Sometimes, as in the
continuous analogy, one can deduce two terms over
four. But analogy besides being continuous can be itself
analogical, become an analogy of the analogy, move to
qualitative inherences by going from the bottom up. It
can bring us to saying, always respecting critical reason,
'this is as hot as that is white'. This a mere proportional
analogy in the predication of inherence, qualitative in
this case, of the second order. All of this is still
straightforward, and it holds for all cases of analogico-
proportional predication, not only the qualitative ones.
But when we pass on to attributive analogy, to the
pure and simple relation to a one, the one understood
thematically, how can we avoid noticing that we are
dealing with no restriction of the contingently such, of
what at any one time is understood thus-and-so, but is
relational in an abstract and ultimately arbitrary sense?
The third and last grid, the one of attributive analogy,
shows a decided inversion of tendency and involves a
regress to the fortuitous. The first two analogies could
perhaps be understood as successively upward, in
direction of a progressive ontic convergence on the
ontological. The third one cannot. It tends irresistibly to
trivialize itself into the c o m m o n sense of what is one at a
given time, according to the occurrence, the occasion,
the changeable and impermanent and ephemeral sense
of communicative discourse in act. At any rate, it is fatal
that the highest analogy, the attributive or paronymic
one, cannot be expressed if not in the same terms of the
lowest category, the least substantial, ~lrtO'ra of)os the
pure and simple relation :r06g ft.
There is of course the possibility of a recourse to the
One or the G o d as an object of the eminent reference.
But even admitting that we can reach such a persuasion,
how could this convince us that we have offered an
explanation of the problem of being? A theism born out
of desperation cannot suppress even in the believer the
deepest atheism of the purely intellectual or~pLg.
Perhaps the ;tt)7og d:to~avur6g can individuate the
being of which it guards the secret only if the speaker is
given the faculty of proceeding to infinity.
The Brentano of the essay on Aristotle would
certainly not agree with these conclusions of ours. But
even without considering the later development of his
thought, which tends to give to being a fundamentally
univocal meaning, what we get in the end from his
interpretation of Aristotle is that the analogia entis is
ultimately a lucus a non lucendo.
4. Aristotle's "transcendentalia" are not concepts
derivable from judgments of reflection, but simply
properties of being that are ubiquitous because they are
analogical. Unless we say that the very language by
which he tries to fix the sense of the reference to things
of this world, be they substances or accidents, is in its
turn an affection of the substance which we want to
express. But to objectivize a reflection in this sense, that
is, in the sense of a retroaction of being on its
individuation, we need different -- and later --
theoretical concepts.
In contrast with the above, a coherent analogical
interpretation of being will be given by Plotinus, though
at the cost of annihilating being. Plotinus refers to the
analogy that will later be called attributive, solving in
his own way the difficulties of Plato's Parmenides, by
assigning a strong sense to the relation with the one.
This is possible provided that we locate this one within
absolute transcendence, that is beyond being, g:tgretva
~ o~)txs and it is only by virtue of the dependence
on the one that being becomes what it is. The one and
being, distinct in the concept, do not coincide even
objectively any longer. The relation of participation in
the one is what gives substantiality to beings, and the
preeminence of this relation becomes the measure of
the attributive analogy. The converse relation, which
proceeds from the one to the world, becomes the
emanation from the ineffable center into the various,
degrading hypostases.
All of this is perhaps Platonic, but certainly not
Aristotelian. Aristotle criticizes the doctrine of ideas
because of its separateness, the hypostases, the so-called
third man argument etc. More significant, in my opinion,
is his unwillingness to admit a ktil~latg or alternatively a
ktg0e~tg as relations founding the dependence of being
from a single principle. Thus we can make sense of the
fact that the philology of the last century classified
 THE 'ANALOGIA ENTIS' ACCORDING TO FRANZ BRENTANO
Plotinus among the "Neoplatonists", a historiographic
category which has some intrinsic systematic value.
F r o m Plotinus descend the Arabic Aristotelians and
then the Scholastics. A n d perhaps it was just an echo of
the Scholastic, which he knew very well in its thomistic
formulation, that induced Brentano to classify paronymy
under the title of attributive analogy, or rather of
analogy of relation to a single term. e3
We must say that Aristotle is rather stingy in
exemplifying the paronyms. One of the clearest
paradigms concerns medicine and health. A p r o p o s the
~to22azd)g 2eyrltevov, he notes that
if the word is used equivocally and in virtue of nothing common
to its various uses, being does not fall under one science (for the
meanings of an equivocal term do not form one genus); but if the
word is used in virtue of something common, being will fall under
one science. The term seems to be used in the way we have
mentioned, like "medical" and "healthy". (Met.,K, ii, 1060b) 2a
Or that "being is said in many ways, but always with
reference to a one and to some one nature". Except for
proportional analogy,
all that "is" is related to one central point, one definite kind of
thing, and is not said to "be" by a mere ambiguity. Everything
which is healthy is related to health, one thing in the sense that it
preserves health, another in the sense that it produces it, another
in the sense that it is a symptom of health, another because it is
capable of it. And that which is medical is relative to the medical
art, one thing being called medical because it possesses it,
another because it is naturally adapted to it, another because it is
a function of the medical art. And we shall find other words used
similarly to these. (Met.,F, ii, 1003a--b) 25
I do not know whether or not it is legitimate to
generalize on the basis of these and the not many other
similar exemplifications which one finds on the subject.
But be that as it may, we can conclude that dealing with
being in the sense of paronymic predication belongs to,
and hence falls within the powers of, gerto~t~ 1. There-
fore the reference to the one does not indicate a
transcendence in the theological sense, but is something
accessible to science, even if to a science which among
its principles admits the teleological one. One will never
insist enough on the fact that that theoretical science
which Aristotle puts on the same level as physics and
mathematics, and which he calls Oeo2oyt~cO,being like
the other two subordinated to the ztOtbrq gztto~prl,
should be translated as teleology. A fortiori then the
science of substance, since it is part of the etQagr~/
57
gmtrrOl~l, must be competent to determine the :t06 q gv
rag ~rOOqpear vtvd ~(~atv.
F r o m a scientistic point of view, at this point one
would have to blame Aristotle for not having fully
developed a coherent language of science in general.
For certainly his acute observations on synonyms,
homonyms, and paronyms, though giving an overall
impression of great systematicity from an architectonic
point of view, are still insufficient, and hence unsatis-
factory, from the point of view of method. In sum,
the theory of categories leaves behind itself a residue:
the ontological notion of substance. The analysis of
the residue is done through the analogy, a more
powerful principle, which retroacts on the categories
and modifies their theory. A n d in its turn, the analogical
theory of the equality of ratios leaves behind itself
another residue, be that called attributive analogy or
paronymy: that of the ultimate reference to being or to
the one. This last residue, too, if it could be theorized,
would retroact on the two previous theories. But there is
in Aristotle no theory of the third predicative level
which does not simply consist of a reference to 'at a
given time'. So here arises a problem which, not being
solved, reacts with deep destabilizing effects on the
whole structure of Aristotelian gnto~p~1. The science of
substance remains a presupposition, a ,3:r62e~ptg which
cannot be reconstructed with the means of the 2670 ~
dJro(~avrtrr~.
There has been discussion for a long time on whether
or not for Aristotle it was legitimate to speak of super-
sensible substances. This pseudoproblem is certainly of
Aristotelian origin, but it is discussed in the aporiae
(Metaphysics B). Now the simple fact here, leaving along
the sterile exercise of "reading Aristotle's thought", is
that in Aristotle there are not even sensible substances.
Substance is something sublime, indeterminable and
inexistent.
But it would be a mistake to address a scientistic
objection to Aristotle. F o r Aristotle g~to~flr] is not
based on an exact/udO~]at~, since it is nothing else than a
66~a extended to a potentially general consensus. F r o m
this point of view the result he obtained must be
considered perfect.
5. A scientific language should be based on a semiotics
which is coherent, complete, and uniform. If some
theory had to precede this semiotics to distinguish
categories of signs and different semiotic functions
the result would not be scientific, unless the latter
58 ENZO M E L A N D R I
theory had in turn a coherent, complete, and uniform
semiology. But there is no semiotic r e p r o d u c t i o n which
is so indefinitely extended as to include the modifica-
tions of semiotics. If these are not present f r o m the
beginning, the result can be called in various ways, the
least appropriate of which seems to be semiotics, since
its n a m e is Erkenntnistheorie.
T h e objection to Aristotle, anticipating the modisti,
would be the following. T h e different parts of speech,
that is, noun, adjective, verb, etc., when expressed in a
speculatively correct manner, have (in agreement with
the modisti) different m o d i significandi. N o w it is true
that the diversity of these m o d e s can be m a d e precise, as
we saw, for the various species of categories, such as
substance, inherence, m o v e m e n t , etc. But the definition
c a n n o t be purely morphological, that is, ontic. It must
take into a c c o u n t the modi-fying factor which inter-
venes in the regress to h o m o n y m y and p a r o n y m y of the
individuating, that is, ontological, signification. T h e
residue re-modifies the determinations already acquired,
and we are not at all certain that this guarantees a
process of approximation. Since p a r o n y m y is modisti-
cally undecidable, and therefore the system remains
always open, we must be ready to accept its unpredict-
able catastrophe.
Only in a closed system, which tends artificially to
univocity, coherence, and completeness within itself,
would it be possible to have a perfectly formalized
language and hence a conclusive science. But f r o m the
point of view of language, that is, of communicative
discourse, this would be a solipsistic language, which
cannot speak to others, not about the world. 26 In spite of
its inadequacies, we prefer the clear c o m p e t e n c e of
Aristotle in his Sprachlogik, the logic of speech. A n d we
would like to c o n c l u d e by quoting a graffiti which
a p p e a r e d at one time at the Sorbonne:
q u a n d on indique la lune du doigt,
l'imb~cile regarde le doigt.
Notes
1 F. Brentano, Von der mannigfachen Bedeutung des Seienden nach
Aristoteles, Freiburg im Breisgau 1862, p. 193 (Olms, Hildesheim
1960). The book is dedicated to Trendelenburg, "meinem verheres-
ten Lehrer', and its motto is r6 dv 2~erctt ~to22ctz~~. For the
English translation I used F. Brentano, On the Several Senses of
Being in Aristotle, ed. and transl, by R. George, Berkeley, Los
Angeles & London, University of California Press, 1975.
2 H. Lotze, Medicinische Psychologie oder Physiologie der Seele,
Leipzig, 1852.
3 M. Heidegger, in his 'Vorwort' to W. J. Richardson's Heidegger,
Through Phenomenology to Thought, The Hague 1963, says that
Brentano's work was his first livre de chevet during his University
days (pp. ix--xi). And the affinity is clear between Heidegger's thesis
of the Seinsvergessenheit and the result of Brentano's work.
4 A. Trendelenburg, Geschichte der Kategorienlehre, I, Berlin 1846,
in F. Brentano, op. cit., Ch. V, w15.
5 F. Brentano, op. cit., p. 185. George, op. cit., pp. 123--24.
60p. cit., ib.
7 0 p . cit.,p. 194.
8 0 p . cit., Ch. V, w
9 0 p . cit.,Ch.V,w
lo Op. cit.,Ch.V, 915;p. 184.
11 Op. cit., Ch. V, 913; see tables on pp. 175 and 177.
12 Op. cit., Ch. V, 91; see also g l 3.
13 Op. cit., ib.
14 Op. cit.,Ch.V, 913.
15 Op. cit., lb., pp. 186--87.
16 Op. cit., Ch. V, 98.
17 On this point Brentano's opinion is expressed very cautiously; see
Ch. V, 913, pp. 148--50. It is interesting to consider Brentano's
position in the light of the successive development of his thought:
first his work on Aristotle's De anima (Die Psychologie des
Aristoteles, insbesondere seine Lehre vom 'nous poietikos', Mainz
1867), and then the celebrated Psychologie vom empirischen Stand-
punkt, Leipzig 1874, where occurs the theory of the "intentional" or
"inexisting object", by now entirely independent of Aristotle.
18 F. Brentano, Von der mannigfachen Bedeutung... , Ch. V, w
pp. 85 and 98.
19 Op. cit.,Ch.V, 93.
20 Op. cit.,Ch.V, 96, pp. 108--13.
2~ Op. cit., Ch. V, 99, p. 126, footnote 161 (Met.,F, ii, 1003b).
22 Op. cit., Ch. V, w p. 98, see also above, Note 17.
23 Op. cit.,Ch.V, 911, pp. 143--44.
24 The translation is from The Works of Aristotle, ed. by W. D. Ross,
Oxford, Clarendon Press 1908, Vol. VIII.
25 lb. See F. Brentano, op. cit., Ch. V, w p. 96.
26 We refer here to the distinction between "colloquial language"
and "formalized language" in A. Tarski, 'The concept of truth in
formalized languages', in Logic, Semantics, and Metamathematics:
Papers from 1923 to 1938, Oxford University Press, 1956, pp. 152--
278.
Dipartimento di Filosofia
Universit& di Bologna
via Z a m b o n i 38
Bologna, Italy