Two Levels of Aristotle’s Ontology

Christof Rapp, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München

Undisputably, Aristotle holds a unique place in the history of ontology. The ‘inquiry into being qua
being’ might be seen as the historically first attempt to formulate a comprehensive metaphysical
theory based on the notion of being, even though, of course, Aristotle’s interest in the notion of
being followed close upon Plato’s response to the Eleatic challenge. In what follows I want to suggest
that within Aristotle’s well-known contribution to the history of ontology two different levels should
be kept apart, an analytic-critical and a constructive level. On the first level Aristotle mainly provides
analytic-critical tools for overcoming the main problems of all dealings with the notions of being and
to be, while the second level consists in Aristotle’s ambitious project of conducting first philosophy
(i.e. the specific part of his philosophy that is meant to continue the old and time-honoured project
of identifying what Aristotle calls ‘first principles and causes’) as ontology, i.e. as an inquiry into being
qua being. The main rationale behind the suggestion to keep these two levels apart is the possibility
that one might fully endorse and adopt the tools provided by the first level, without accepting the
core tenets of the second level. Historically, something like this happened in early analytic philosophy
in the late 19th (Gottlob Frege) and first half of the 20th century (roughly from Rudolf Carnap on),
when traditional metaphysics (a significant part of which was inspired by Aristotle’s way of doing
ontology and metaphysics according to the second of these two levels) was largely rejected – not
least with reference to the analytic tool of distinguishing the different senses of ‘to be’, 1 a project
that seems strikingly congenial to the first of the two levels to be distinguished within Aristotle’s
ontology. In the same vein, it could be argued that the constructive level presupposes the analytic-
critical level, whereas it is conceivable to use the results of the analytic-critical level for a different
approach to metaphysics or even for a critical stance against ontology-based metaphysics.

1
See Rudolf Carnap: ‘Überwindung der Metaphysik durch logische Analyse der Sprache’, in: Erkenntnis 2
(1931/32), 219–241.
1
1. Some distinctions and definitions

To begin with, there are several uses and senses of the notion of ontology, not all of which are
equally pertinent to the discussion to follow. For several decades the Quinean use of the concept has
pervaded the philosophical literature on metaphysics; according to Quine’s predominant use,
‘ontology’ is always relative to a given scientific theory or to a language; it means the class of things
to whose existence a certain theory or language is committed. In contemporary metametaphysics
2
the limitations of this notion of ontology have become an issue; since this use does not seem to be
relevant for Aristotle’s engagement with ontology, it will not concern us any further. In a different,
possibly related sense, ontology is concerned with all answers to the question of ‘which kinds of
beings/entities are there?’; accordingly, ontology is mostly concerned with extensional answers, e.g.
by listing types or classes of entities to the existence of which we are committed – let us call this
latter sense ‘E-ontology’; it will only be indirectly relevant for the subsequent discussion. In a still
different sense, ontology deals with questions concerning the meaning and the different uses of the
word ‘being’ and its cognates. It could be looked upon as one distinct part or approach to
metaphysics among others (for who says that metaphysics needs to adopt an ontological frame?). In
contemporary metaphysics this third sense of ontology is often superseded by or reduced to the
study of ‘existence’ alone. At any rate, it is clear that ontology taken in this latter use is not so much
interested in extensional, but rather in intensional questions, so that it could be dubbed ‘I-ontology’.
This is the sense of ontology the following discussion will focus on.

In Aristotle we find I-ontological thoughts and inquiries in (at least) two different contexts or
with (at least) two different purposes, the first being mostly analytic-critical, the second constructive
or theory-building. As ‘analytic-critical ontology’ we might consider the analysis of the notion of
‘being’ originating from the attempt to overcome certain ‘snares of ontology’, i.e. puzzles, aporiae,
fallacious/eristic inferences, dubious ontologies deriving from what Aristotle takes to be an
inadequate handling of the word ‘is’ and its cognates. Analytic-critical ontology develops the tools for
diagnosing the flaws in former dealings with ‘being’ and ‘is’. Applying the tools of analytic-critical
ontology is often meant as an only preliminary or ‘logical-conceptual’ (logikôs) move designed to get
rid of elementary logical confusions. Analytic-critical ontology does not presuppose the idea of doing
first philosophy by way of inquiring into being qua being, nor does it presuppose other core
theorems of Aristotle’s first philosophy as formulated, above all, in his work Metaphysics. Under
Aristotle’s ‘constructive ontology’ I understand by contrast the idea that there is a science of being
qua being which inherits certain (though probably not all) characteristics from ordinary sciences as

2
See Chalmers, D./Manley, D./Waterman, R. (eds.), Metametaphysics. New Essays on the Foundation of
Metaphysics. Oxford: Oxford University Press2009.
2
presented in the Posterior Analytics – together with a conception of first philosophy according to
which first philosophy (a) either boils down to the study of being or (b) essentially rests on the study
of being or (c) includes the study of being as a proper part. Constructive ontology makes use of the
tools of analytic-critical ontology and refines some of these tools.

Aristotle’s analytic-critical ontology is a valuable contribution to the ‘criticism of metaphysics’

avant la lettre (similar to Carnap’s sense of ‘Overcoming metaphysics through logical analysis of
language’ 3); his contribution to constructive ontology is his most influential contribution to the
history of ontology and ontologically conceived metaphysics. The kind of metaphysics Aristotle wants
to overcome through the analytic-critical level of ontology, is, of course, the metaphysics of his
predecessors (to the extent that their theorems actually rest on certain assumptions concerning the
meaning of ‘to be’), most notably the metaphysical claims put forward by Eleatic thinkers, by Plato
and his followers in the Academy, the idea being that philosophical theories dealing with being and
‘to be’ are bound to commit flaws and fallacies when they fail to apply the tools that Aristotle
provides for the disambiguation of these notions.

If Aristotle deserves a place in the history of ontology (and who could doubt that he does?),
most probably, it is due to his merits in analytic-critical ontology no less than to his merits in
constructive ontology, or so I claim. 4

2. The analytic-critical level of ontology

In order to substantiate the above-mentioned claims about the two levels of Aristotle’s ontology, it is
crucial to give a survey of tools belonging to the analytic-critical rather than to the constructive level
of ontology. Arguably, Aristotle’s most significant contribution to analytic-critical ontology is the
discovery of different uses of ‘is’. This discovery was eventually condensed into the slogan ‘to on
pollachôs legetai’, i.e. ‘being’ is said in many ways (most prominently in his Physics and Metaphysics).
This slogan again was eventually associated with what became the standard account, according to
which ‘being’ is said in four main senses (per se, accidental, veridical, possible/actual). Independently

3
See footnote 1, above.
4
In the following article I am giving a very general survey of some core themes in Aristotle’s ontology, in order
to substantiate my main claim that two different levels or Aristotelian ontology should be distinguished. All
particular passages I am referring would deserve an in-depth exegetical discussion, some are the subject of
intense scholarly debates. However, due to the nature of this article and the number of different passages
quoted I cannot enter into these discussions.
3
of this comprehensive account Aristotle made various observations on the different uses of ‘is’ or
‘being’ – often without subsuming it under the heading of pollachôs legomenon.

Especially in the writings collected under the heading Organon we find many observations
and distinctions concerning the use of ‘is’ on the one hand (above all in Categories, De
Interpretatione, Posterior Analytics) as well as tools for analysing different meanings of all kinds of
terms on the other (Topics I). In general, the ‘analytic-critical’ level of ontology that we attempt to
delineate is closely related to the spirit and the purpose of the treatises in the Organon, in that these
treatises themselves are not meant to build scientific or philosophical theories, but are, on the
contrary, expected to deal with concepts and theorems that are topic-neutral (or mostly so) and
applicable to competing scientific or philosophical theorems; the method of dialectic set out in the
Topics, for example, is meant to be applicable to all themes and topics and to the assessment of all
kinds of theories. 5

Here, in the Organon, we also find the most basic elements for the analysis of ‘being’ and ‘to be’,
even though the acknowledgement of these elements might not (yet) amount to a comprehensive
theory of being as we know it from certain books in the Metaphysics. The Categories, for example,
defines ‘homonymy’ and clearly distinguishes different uses of the ‘is’ of predication, but never says
that ‘being’ is homonymous (or multivocal). In a passage of the Sophistical Refutations Aristotle
implies that ‘being’ is pollachôs legomenon, highlighting it as one of the difficult cases:

Ἡ δ’ ἀπάτη γίνεται τῶν μὲν παρὰ τὴν ὁμωνυμίαν καὶ τὸν λόγον τῷ μὴ δύνασθαι διαιρεῖν τὸ
πολλαχῶς λεγόμενον (ἔνια γὰρ οὐκ εὔπορον διελεῖν, οἷον τὸ ἓν καὶ τὸ ὂν καὶ τὸ ταὐτόν) …
– The error comes about in the case of arguments that depend on homonymy and the
account because we are unable to distinguish the various senses (for some terms it is not
easy to distinguish, e.g. one, being, and sameness) … 6

The quotation is taken from the discussion of fallacies deriving from homonymous terms (fallacia
aequivocationis). For example, the inference that those who know grasp, for it is those who know the
letters (i.e. the alphabet) grasp what is dictated to them, is false because of the homonymous term
‘to grasp’, which can be used both for the use and the acquisition of knowledge. Resolving such

5
It became quite common in Aristotle scholarship to say that the writings of Organon, owing to the peculiar
logical and methodological nature, represent a different level of discourse as, for example the Metaphysic. A
version of this thesis is developed in Burnyeat, M: A Map of Metaphysics Zeta. Pittsburgh: Mathesis
Publications 2001. For an attempt to distinguish the purpose of the Categories and Topics on the one hand
from the purpose and research program of the Metaphysics on the other, see Menn, S. 1995: ‘Metaphysics,
Dialectic, and the Categories.’ In: Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale 100, 311-337.
6
Soph. El. 7, 169a22-5. If not noted otherwise, the English translations are taken from the Revised Oxford
Translation (sometimes with minor adaptions to my own terminology): Barnes, J. (ed.). The Complete Works of
Aristotle. The Revised Oxford Translation, 2 vols., Princeton: Princeton University Press 1984.
4
fallacies is easy if one just disambiguates the homonymous terms in question. Interestingly (and
without any need), Aristotle admits that this is difficult for certain terms, such as one, being, and
sameness. Why is it more difficult to detect homonymy in these cases? In the Topics Aristotle
sometimes refers to hidden or concealed homonymies, which might also be true of the three terms
mentioned. However, what would it mean then for these three terms that their homonymy is
concealed? It is tempting to think that, whereas ordinary terms can be disambiguated by referring to
the different corresponding definitions, the three terms mentioned are repugnant to this standard
procedure, possibly because they are too general to be defined at all – at least by the standard
scheme of definitions, which requires a genus plus a specific difference. For how could these terms
be subsumed under any definite genus? Apparently, Aristotle does not regard “one”, “being”, and
“same” as typical terms; they are not regarded as names (onomata) with a unified significatum that
is pinpointed by a definition. At any rate, there are some attempts at highlighting the peculiar
character of ‘being’ or ‘is’ and at distinguishing different uses of them.

‘Being does not signify anything’

In De Interpretatione Aristotle famously acknowledges that ‘is’ or ‘being’ is not like an ordinary term
or predicate. Like other verbal predicates, ‘is’, ‘was’, ‘will be’ indicate the time and do formulate
assertions; unlike verbal predicates, however, they do not include a nominal element. According to
an often-repeated claim in Aristotle’s writings it makes no difference whether one says ‘she sits’ or
‘she is sitting’ (the corresponding Greek tenses do not capture the difference between the English
simple and progressive tense). In this transformation the participle ‘sitting’ represents the nominal
element in ‘to sit’. Now if this is so and if each and every verbal predicate can be turned into a
predicate with the copula ‘is’, this strongly suggests an exceptional role of ‘to be’ – at least in its use
as auxiliary verb. This can be taken as a warning against construing ‘to be’ as any other predicate
term. Aristotle thus acknowledges that ‘is’ can be looked upon as a sign of predication:

οὐ γὰρ τὸ εἶναι ἢ μὴ εἶναι σημεῖόν ἐστι τοῦ πράγματος, οὐδ’ ἐὰν τὸ ὂν εἴπῃς ψιλόν. αὐτὸ
μὲν γὰρ οὐδέν ἐστιν, προσσημαίνει δὲ σύνθεσίν τινα, ἣν ἄνευ τῶν συγκειμένων οὐκ ἔστι
νοῆσαι. – For not even ‘to be’ or ‘not to be’ is a sign of the thing (nor if you simply say ‘that
which is’); for by itself it is nothing but it additionally signifies some combination, which
cannot be thought of without the components. 7

7
De Int. 3, 16b22-5.
5
As opposed to other terms that are said to be ‘signs’ (sêmeion), because they ‘signify’ (sêmainei)
some definite thing (pragma), ‘to be’ is not a sign of anything – and this is not merely due to the
verbal form or to the infinitive, for even if one shifts to the participle to on, i.e. that which is, ‘is’ does
not become the sign of anything and, in this sense, does not signify anything. Aristotle even says that
taken by itself it is ‘nothing’, but only signifies the combination (sunthesis) when taken together with
terms that have a meaning or reference by being the sign of some definite thing. How is it possible
for ‘to be’ to signify the combination, given that it is explicitly said not to be the sign of anything? The
word that Aristotle uses, prossêmainei, seems to capture the idea that ‘to be’, though having no
meaning in the usual sense, indicates the combination (sunthesis) in addition to what the terms that
are thereby combined signify (in the usual sense of having a meaning or reference); he uses the same
word to say that all predicate terms indicate temporal stages (past, presence, future) and that all
quantifiers indicate whether an assertion is to be taken generally. It seems clear, hence, that Aristotle
is keen on distinguishing, on the one hand, the reference of nominal and predicative terms that they
have even apart from any sentence or assertion (for which he uses sêmainein), from certain
sentential functions (such as ‘indicating the combination’, ‘indicating the time’, ‘indicating the
quantity’) which are all captured by the technical term prossêmainein, i.e. what linguistic expressions
indicate in addition the meaning or reference of terms. 8 This might be part of the background for
why the term ‘to be’ is not analysable by the standard scheme of homonymy, namely that there is no
word or ‘name’ (onoma) that signifies the definienda singled out by several definitions, but needs to
be analysed in terms of the different ways it is used (assuming that the famous formula pollachôs
legetai can refer to multiple types of uses – whether they are strictly speaking definable or not – and
needs not refer to several definitions vis-à-vis one linguistic sign).

One-place and two-place uses of ‘is’

In several contexts Aristotle highlights the difference between one- and two-place uses of ‘is’. It is
unclear whether the several remarks on this difference add up to a coherent account. However, all
these observations might be seen as part of the attempt to account for the peculiar role of ‘to be’
and to contrast it to ordinary predicates. In De Interpretatione 10, to begin with, Aristotle refers to
‘is’ as a third component of the assertion, which comes close to an official acknowledgement of the
copulative use of ‘to be’:

8
For similar reasons, Gottlob Frege calls ‘is’ a ‘formal word’ (‘Formwort’ in German); see his Dialog mit Pünjer
über Existenz, in: Gottlob Frege, Nachgelassene Schriften, edited by Hermes, Kambartel, Kaulbach. Hamburg
1969, 71.
6
 Ὅταν δὲ τὸ ἔστι τρίτον προσκατηγορηθῇ, διχῶς λέγονται αἱ ἀντιθέσεις. λέγω δὲ οἷον ἔστι
δίκαιος ἄνθρωπος, τὸ ἔστι τρίτον φημὶ συγκεῖσθαι ὄνομα ἢ ῥῆμα ἐν τῇ καταφάσει – But
when ‘is’ is predicated additionally as a third thing, there are two ways of expressing
opposition. I mean, for example ‘man is just’; by ‘is as third thing’ I mean that either the
name or the verb is composed in the affirmation. 9

Prior to this passage Aristotle had emphasized that an assertive sentence usually consists of a
‘name’/nominal term (onoma) and a verb or predicative term (rhêma); also he made clear that it is
impossible to make an assertion without any rhêma or, at least, without any finite form of ‘to be’.
The simplest assertion thus consists of a nominal term (like ‘man’) plus a finite form of ‘to be’, like in
‘estin anthrôpos’ – ‘there is a man’. Compared to this latter sentence, the sentence mentioned in the
quotation, i.e. ‘man is just’, includes the ‘estin’ as a third component in a sense. However, saying that
these assertions include a third component does not contradict the fact that in each simple assertion
one thing is said of one other thing (and thus each assertion essentially consists of two components),
because the ‘is’ might be taken to be connected with the onoma or with the rhêma. 10 This is what
the quoted passage points out, and this is how the copula has come to be acknowledged as a “third”
component. As opposed to our modern understanding, Aristotle’s primary concern here is not the
distinction between the copulative and the existential use, but the definition of contradictory pairs in
accordance with the number of sentential components. The case in which ‘is’ is just the second thing,
as e.g. in ‘estin anthrôpos’ – which is mostly ignored in other writings of the Organon (most notably
because the canonical form of syllogistic premises and conclusions always requires two terms and
not one term plus a finite form of ‘to be’) – might be construed in this existential sense ‘there is a
man’, but since in Ancient Greek the finite verb form is thought to contain an implicit pronoun, it
might also be read as ‘(he/she/it) is a man’).

It seems that, on Aristotle’s analysis, existential claims can also be put forward with ‘is’ as a
third component. In Categories 10 Aristotle claims that both contrary statements ‘Socrates is sick’
and ‘Socrates is healthy’ are false if Socrates happens not to exist (which presumably implies the
temporal sense ‘exists now’’), which means that for contrary (as well as for privative) statements it is
not the case that one of the contrary statements is necessarily true if the other is false. 11 By contrast,
of the two contradictory statements ‘Socrates is sick’ and ‘Socrates is not sick’ the one is necessarily
true, if the other is false; for if Socrates happens not to exist, the affirmative ‘Socrates is sick’
becomes false, while the negative ‘Socrates is not sick’ becomes true. 12 The difference between

9
De Int. 10, 19b19-2, my translation.
10
Or this is the reading I developed in: Ch. Rapp: ESTI TRITON - Aristoteles, De Interpretatione 10, 19b21-22”,
in: Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie 73 (1991), 125-128.
11
Cat. 10, 13b14-19.
12
Cat. 10, 13b27-33.
7
these two cases seems to rely on the existential import of ‘is’ or ‘is not’. That both statements of the
contrary pair ‘Socrates is sick – Socrates is healthy’ become false if Socrates happens not to exist only
makes sense if we assume that the ‘affirmative’ ‘is’ does imply the existence of the subject; whereas
‘Socrates is not sick’ becomes true if Socrates happens not to exist because the negative ‘is not’
might be taken in two different ways, namely (i) that Socrates, who happens to exist, is not sick and
(ii) that Socrates, who happens not to exist, does not exist. Accordingly, the affirmative ‘is’ in
‘Socrates is sick’ might be taken to say or imply (i) that Socrates, who happens to exist, is sick and (ii)
that Socrates exists. Importantly, this is not a presupposition theory (at least not in the case of the
negative statement): for the predicative statement to make sense, the existence of the subject is not
presupposed, as can be seen in the negative case ‘Socrates is not sick’, which can have meaning and
can even be true if Socrates happens not to exist.

In a passage of Prior Analytics I 46, Aristotle addresses the difference between the ‘being not
equal’ and ‘not being equal’. 13 In the first case, he points out, there is something underlying, i.e.
there is some definite thing that happens to be not equal, i.e. unequal, whereas in the second case,
there is nothing underlying (or there need not be anything underlying?). He does not really elaborate
on the latter case, but probably his point is that there does not need to be something unequal
underlying that which is not equal. This corresponds to the treatment of the so-called indeterminate
(aoriston) predicate terms in De Interpretatione, such as ‘is not-white’, etc., where Aristotle tries to
show that such predicates do not imply a negative statement and thus do not provide the
contradictory counterpart to ‘is white’ (it is rather like the pair ‘is equal’ – ‘is unequal’ or like the
privative pair ‘is seeing’ – ‘is blind’). The affirmative statement seems to presuppose or to state that
there is some definite thing that has this qualification and it does not matter that the qualification
includes a denial (as the denial in ‘is not-white’ concerns the semantic, not the sentential function).
This complies with the account of Categories 10.

If this is so, it is puzzling that in De Interpretatione 11, Aristotle seems to deny the existential
import of the copulative ‘is’, where the assertion ‘Homer is a poet’ is said not to imply that Homer
exists: ‘for ‘is’ is accidentally predicated of Homer – for it is because he is a poet, not in its own right,
that the ‘is’ is predicated of Homer’. 14 Clearly, there is an issue with the difference of temporal and
atemporal uses of ‘is’ in this example. Had there never been a person by the name of Homer,
Aristotle would not take the assertion that Homer is a poet to be true. That he objects to the
inference that Homer exists, because he is a poet, is clearly due to a temporal understanding of
‘exist’, because the present tense – temporally understood – seems to imply that he still exists. Still,

13
An. Pr. I 46, 51b25-35.
14
De Int. 11, 21a25-28.
8
it is interesting that Aristotle describes this difference by saying that Homer is not said to be in his
own right (ou kath’ hauto), but only accidentally. In a famous passage of Aristotle’s Metaphysics Γ 2,
even ‘what is not’ is said to be in this latter sense, for what is not is what is not. 15

Now, being ‘in one’s own right’ is not the same as ‘existing’ (for maybe there are things that
are said to exist, but not in their own right – ‘to be in one’s own right’ seems to be more exclusive
than just ‘to exist’). Here is a suggestion for how to construe the relation between existence and
‘being in one’s own right’. If something is said to be something, for example, if Homer is said to be a
poet, we are not justified to infer, on this account, that he exists independently from what he/she/it
was said to be. Only if something is said to be ‘in its own right’ might one infer that it exists in a
robust sense – i.e. in a sense that is independent from whatever else he/she/it is or is not said to be,
such as e.g. a poet or not a poet.

In the Sophistical Refutations there are hints that the one-place use of ‘is’ is to be analysed as
an unqualified assertation and that this unqualified assertation amounts to an existential statement,
whereas the copulative ‘is’ of predication – ‘… is something’ – is meant to qualify and, thus, to
restrict the sense in which something is said to be.

“Οἱ δὲ παρὰ τὸ ἁπλῶς τόδε ἢ πῇ λέγεσθαι καὶ μὴ κυρίως, ὅταν τὸ ἐν μέρει λεγόμενον ὡς
ἁπλῶς εἰρημένον ληφθῇ, οἷον, εἰ τὸ μὴ ὄν ἐστι δοξαστόν, ὅτι τὸ μὴ ὂν ἔστιν·οὐ γὰρ ταὐτὸ
τὸ εἶναί τέ τι καὶ εἶναι ἁπλῶς. ἢ πάλιν ὅτι τὸ ὂν οὐκ ἔστιν ὄν, εἰ τῶν ὄντων τι μὴ ἔστιν, οἷον
εἰ μὴ ἄνθρωπος· οὐ γὰρ ταὐτὸ τὸ μὴ εἶναί τι καὶ ἁπλῶς μὴ εἶναι. φαίνεται δὲ διὰ τὸ
πάρεγγυς τῆς λέξεως καὶ μικρὸν διαφέρειν τὸ εἶναί τι τοῦ εἶναι, καὶ τὸ μὴ εἶναί τι τοῦ μὴ
εἶναι.– Fallacies depending on something being said without qualification or instead in a
certain respect and not in the proper sense occur when what is said for some part is taken
as having been said without qualification, for example, ‘If what is not is an object of
opinion, then what is not is.’ For ‘to be something’ and ‘to be’ without qualification are not
the same. Or, again, that what is, is not something that is, if it is not some one of things that
are, for example, if it is not a human being. For ‘to not be something’ and ‘to not be’
without qualification are not the same, but they appear to be the same because they are so
close in expression.” 16

In the quoted text Aristotle describes a fallacy that derives from the shift from a statement made
with a certain qualification to the unqualified version of the same statement. People are deceived by
this shift, as Aristotle explains, since often the unqualified statement very much resembles the
qualified version. Sometimes such a shift already occurs when someone leaves out the ‘when’ or the
‘how’ that qualifies a statement (Rhetoric II.24, 1401b24). The above-quoted lines apply this general

15
Met. IV 2, 1003b10.
16
Soph. El. 5, 166b37-167a6, translation by Hasper; see Hasper, P.-S., Rapp, Ch. (eds.) Fallacious Arguments in
Ancient Philosophy, (= Logical Analysis and History of Philosophy 15), Münster: Mentis 2013.
9
scheme to ‘being’, thus giving another account of the relation between the unqualified ‘to be’ and
the qualified ‘to be something’. In this sense it is a fallacy to infer from the qualified statement that
something is not a human being that it is not something that is, which again would amount to the
sophistical refutation that something that is is not. Here, the negative predication (namely that
something is not a human being) is construed as a restriction or qualification of the claim that
something is not. Similarly, it is said to be a fallacy to infer from the statement that something is the
object of opinion to the unqualified statement that something is: Even if Polyphemus is the object of
my opinion, it is not warranted to conclude that he is in an unqualified sense, i.e. that he (actually)
exists or, as argued above, that he exists in his own right.

Here is another passage that seems to equate the one-place use of ‘is’ to existence or to
‘being in one’s own right’.

“ἔνια δ’ ἄλλον τρόπον ζητοῦμεν, οἷον εἰ ἔστιν ἢ μὴ ἔστι κένταυρος ἢ θεός·τὸ δ’ εἰ ἔστιν ἢ
μὴ ἁπλῶς λέγω, ἀλλ’ οὐκ εἰ λευκὸς ἢ μή. – We seek some things in another fashion – e.g. if
a centaur or a god is or is not (I mean if one is or not simpliciter and not if one is white or
not).” 17

Inquiring whether a god or centaur is or is not seems to amount to inquiring whether it exists or not
(in particular, the example of the centaur seems to flag that non-existence is at stake). In the context
of the Posterior Analytics, where this quotation is taken from, this seems to make perfect sense,
since in this treatise, and more generally in the context of Aristotle’s theory of scientific
demonstration, it is important to distinguish between knowing that something exists and knowing
why it is. And it seems that the first kind of knowledge refers to existence, for example, that numbers
exist (in arithmetic) or that animals exist (in zoology); however ‘knowing that’ is not always restricted
to the acquaintance with objects that are said to exist; it can also refer to factual knowledge of
certain states of affairs, for example that noise (thunder) occurs in the clouds (so that the sense of ‘is’
ascribed to things we know by way of ‘knowing that’ might sometimes be existential, but might
sometimes also amount to ‘it is the case that’ or ‘it is true that’). At any rate this one-place use of ‘is’
and ‘is not’ is explicitly contrasted with the two-place use (whether e.g. something is white or not)
and is highlighted as ‘being simpliciter’ – a formulation that can similarly stand for both existence and
‘being in one’s own right’. The next passage, also taken from the Posterior Analytics, seems to
associate ‘being in one’s own right’ directly with the being of a substance. In contrast to the previous
passages though, ‘being in one’s own’ right’ does not primarily indicate a thing’s existence, but rather
its identity in the sense that such things are what they are without being something else:

17
APo. B.1, 89b31-33:
10
 “ἔτι ὃ μὴ καθ’ ὑποκειμένου λέγεται ἄλλου τινός, οἷον τὸ βαδίζον ἕτερόν τι ὂν βαδίζον ἐστὶ
καὶ τὸ λευκὸν <λευκόν>, ἡ δ’ οὐσία, καὶ ὅσα τόδε τι σημαίνει, οὐχ ἕτερόν τι ὄντα ἐστὶν
ὅπερ ἐστίν. – Again, what is not said of some other underlying subject – as what is walking
is something else that is walking (and what is white is something else that is white), while a
substance, and whatever signifies some ‘this’, is just what it is without being something
else.” 18

If we refer to something ‘that is walking’ it is what it is (i.e. walking) through being something else,
i.e. the thing that walks. This is the opposite of what it means to be ‘in one’s own right’ and it implies
a two-place use of ‘to be’ (in the wording of the example quoted this two-place use is concealed in
the formulation heteron ti on, i.e. ‘being something else’) in order to connect the being at stake with
a substrate.

3. Analytic-critical ontology at work in the Physics

Let us pause here to consider some examples of how Aristotle’s analytic-critical ontology is supposed
to work. The rationale behind the attempt to highlight such an analytic-critical level of Aristotle’s
ontology is that in many contexts Aristotle uses ontological distinctions and clarifications (as
discussed in section 2 above) without a view to his own metaphysical theory, but rather for the
purpose of identifying relatively basic and easy confusions in the theories of his predecessors and, in
particular, in the predecessors’ treatment of ‘being’ and its cognates. Examples of this critical
application of his ontological tools can be found in many of his treatises. Some of the most telling
examples are provided in the Physics (for more examples see section 4 below). Most notably, when
treating the Eleatic theories, Aristotle seems to take for granted that the paradoxical conclusions of
the Eleatic arguments (that there is not coming to be and no ceasing to exit, that there is only one
being, that there is no motion) are due to a misguided use of ‘one’ and ‘being’. 19 In this sense, he
begins the discussion of Eleatic monism in Physics A by referring to the different uses of ‘is’:

“ἀρχὴ δὲ οἰκειοτάτη πασῶν, ἐπειδὴ πολλαχῶς λέγεται τὸ ὄν, πῶς λέγουσιν οἱ λέγοντες
εἶναι ἓν τὰ πάντα, πότερον οὐσίαν τὰ πάντα ἢ ποσὰ ἢ ποιά, καὶ πάλιν πότερον οὐσίαν μίαν
τὰ πάντα, οἷον ἄνθρωπον ἕνα ἢ ἵππον ἕνα ἢ ψυχὴν μίαν, ἢ ποιὸν ἓν δὲ τοῦτο, οἷον λευκὸν
ἢ θερμὸν ἢ τῶν ἄλλων τι τῶν τοιούτων. ταῦτα γὰρ πάντα διαφέρει τε πολὺ καὶ ἀδύνατα
λέγειν. – The most pertinent question with which to begin will be this: In what sense is it
asserted that all things are one? For ‘is’ is used in many ways. Do they mean that all things
are substance or quantities or qualities? And, further, are all things one substance – one
man, one horse, or one soul – or quality and that one and the same – white or hot or

18
APo. A.4, 73b5-8.
19
See e.g. Soph. El. 7, 182b26-8.
11
 something of the kind? These are all very different doctrines and all impossible to
maintain.” 20

In order to motivate his claim that ‘is’ is used in many ways he just reminds the reader of the
different categories associated with different meanings of ‘being’ (see section 4 below). However, he
is less interested in going through his ten categories (as he seldomly goes out of his way to mention
all ten categories), but sticks to the category of substance and one non-substantial category, namely
quality. Aristotle insists that it would make a major difference for Eleatic monism whether it claims
that there is only one substance or that there is only one quality. As a claim about ‘is’ in the
substantial sense there would be one substance (of one kind, of course) and hence only one
substrate; as a claim about ‘is’ in the qualitative sense there would be only one predicate, specifying
one quality. One problem of the Eleatic approach is, hence, that it is far from clear which kind of
claim the Eleatic philosophers are going for; one other problem might be that, if they fail to make
clear which of the two claims they are defending, they might have both claims in mind – though in a
confused way. But if they are making both kinds of claims, we would end up, not with one, but with
two beings, namely one substance or substrate and one predicate.

In the following chapter of Physics A Aristotle directly tackles this latter point, for he draws
our attention to the difference between being a substrate and being a predicate of a substrate
(which again seems to be related in some way to the failure to account for the difference between
one-place and two-place uses of ‘is’: see section 2 above):

“ἄλλο γὰρ ἔσται τὸ εἶναι λευκῷ καὶ τῷ δεδεγμένῳ. καὶ οὐκ ἔσται παρὰ τὸ λευκὸν οὐθὲν
χωριστόν· οὐ γὰρ ᾗ χωριστὸν ἀλλὰ τῷ εἶναι ἕτερον τὸ λευκὸν καὶ ᾧ ὑπάρχει. – Being for
white will be different from what receives whiteness (as a substrate). And there won’t be
anything separate besides the white; for they differ not insofar as they are separate, but
insofar as the white and (the substrate) to which it belongs are different.” 21

The context from which this quotation is taken is quite typical of Aristotle’s analytic-critical use of
ontology. Aristotle attacks Parmenides’ monism, not on the basis of his developed ontological
theory, but rather on the basis of the alleged shortcomings of Parmenides’ uses of being, for
Parmenides seems to assume, or so Aristotle suggests, that ‘is’ is used in one way only. 22 Aristotle
illustrates this through the example ‘white’. If we suppose that everything is white and ‘white’ has

20
Phys. A.2, 185a20-7.
21
Phys. A.3, 186a28-9; my translation. For an in-depth discussion of this chapter see Quarantotto, D. ‘Physics I
3: Towards the Principles – Resolving the Eleatics’ Arguments for Absolute Monism’. In: Ierodiakonu, K.,
Kalligas, P., Karasmanis, V. (eds.), Aristotle’s Physics Alpha. Oxford: Oxford University Press 2019, 89–123.
22
For an analysis of the context of this particular argument, see Clarke, T., Aristotle and the Eleatic One, Oxford:
Oxford University Press 2019.
12
only one meaning, Parmenides’ envisaged conclusion would not follow – because of the difference
between what it is to be white and the white thing, i.e. the substrate that is capable of receiving the
white. Accordingly, Aristotle seems to postulate that in the case of being, even if one requires ‘being’
to have only one unified meaning, there remains the difference between being on the one hand and
the substrate that is said to be on the other, so that Parmenidean monism of being is inconsistent for
the simple reason that being a substrate is not the same as being than can belong to a substrate.

The following passage similarly presents analytic-critical ontology in its proper operation. The
context is the Physics’ discussion of whether there is anything like the infinite or not. Aristotle refers
to the several meanings of being, apparently in order to disambiguate the claim that the infinite
exists. Here he seems to tackle an ambiguity within the one-place use of ‘is’.

ἀλλ’ ἐπεὶ πολλαχῶς τὸ εἶναι, ὥσπερ ἡ ἡμέρα ἔστι καὶ ὁ ἀγὼν τῷ ἀεὶ ἄλλο καὶ ἄλλο
γίγνεσθαι, οὕτω καὶ τὸ ἄπειρον (καὶ γὰρ ἐπὶ τούτων ἔστι καὶ δυνάμει καὶ ἐνεργείᾳ·
Ὀλύμπια γὰρ ἔστι καὶ τῷ δύνασθαι τὸν ἀγῶνα γίγνεσθαι καὶ τῷ γίγνεσθαι), … – Being is
spoken of in many ways, and we say that the infinite is in the sense in which we say it is day
or it is the games, because one thing after another is always coming into existence. For of
these things too the distinction between potential and actual existence holds. We say that
there are Olympic games, both in the sense that they may occur and that they are actually
occurring. 23

What is at stake here are one-place locutions, such as ‘the day is’, ‘the games are’, ‘the infinite is’, the
ambiguity of which is difficult to render in modern English. As is well known, Aristotle opposes to the
idea that the infinite could exist in actuality, so that he is worried about the implications of saying
‘the infinite is’. He therefore refers to the example of recurrent games, such as the Olympic games:
by saying that they are we do not mean that they are taking place all the time, but that it is a
quadrennial event. Only for a few days every fourth year does the ‘being’ of the Olympic games take
on the actual sense that they are taking place right now, whereas for the rest of the time they are in
a non-actual or merely potential sense. The same is true of the day, since days alternate with nights,
so that they are half of the time in the actual and half of time in the non-actual sense. The
observation that ‘being’ can be ambiguous between ‘being in actuality’ and ‘being in potentiality’ is
closely connected with Aristotle’s own metaphysics and does not yet occur in the Organon. Still,
there is a difference between a fully developed modal theory of being and the observed ambiguity as
such. The quoted passage from the Physics highlights the multivocity of ‘being’ in order to avoid false
metaphysical implications of saying that the infinite is – for it is only in the sense in which the
Olympic games alternate between being actual and non-actual, which means that the infinite is

23
Phys. Γ.6, 206a21-5.
13
never present as a whole at the same time. Note that if ‘is’ alone is construed as meaning both that
something is in actuality and that something is in potentiality, the absolute ‘is’ plays a role similar to
ordinary predicates in that it assigns the subject in question to one of two modes of being, either to
the class of beings that are potential or to the class of beings that are actual.

4. The birth of the Categories from the spirit of analytic-critical ontology

It is difficult to clearly locate the Categories within the scheme of analytic-critical and constructive
ontology. On the one hand the treatise does include important ontological commitments (e.g. that
without primary substances nothing else would exist), on the other hand it is clearly not the sort of
treatise that argues for a certain metaphysical position and defends it against competing positions.
Compared to the Metaphysics, the place where Aristotle unfolds his own metaphysical theory about
first principles and causes, the Categories lacks causal language and references to what he takes to
be first principles. Rather the Categories belongs to the kind of works that are mostly interested in
divisions and classifications.

The Categories’ two most significant tenets, however, clearly and directly derive from tools
of the analytic-critical ontology: The most important tenet of the Praedicamenta (= Cat. 4-9) is that
there are ten categories. The corresponding chapters mainly elaborate on this division and offer
numerous subdivisions. The most important tenet of the Antepraedicamenta (= Cat. 1-3) is Aristotle’s
fourfold ontology. He distinguishes (i) beings that are neither SAID OF nor IN something else, (ii)
beings that are SAID OF something else, without being IN anything, (iii) beings that are IN a substrate,
without being SAID OF anything else and (iv) beings that are IN a substrate and are SAID OF
something else). The fourfold ontology directly derives from the division of the two relations of being
SAID OF something and being IN something, which is an important tool within analytic-critical
ontology. Perhaps one could characterize the Categories as elaborating on classifications built upon
basic divisions of analytic-critical ontology. At any rate it is clear that the division of beings into ten
categories becomes an important tool for Aristotle when he criticizes competing accounts that fail to
provide any such distinction.

For the present purpose it might suffice to focus on two main contributions of the Categories
to analytic-critical ontology: first the distinction between the essential is and the ‘is’ of non-essential
predication, second the subdivision of beings in accordance with the different genera of being. In
order to understand these distinctions in the Categories as an attempt to critically deal with
shortcomings of previous philosophers, it might be useful to recall a context in which the use of ‘is’

14
caused troubles, because in ‘X is Y’ the Y was expected to say what X really and essentially is.
Something like this is the offspring of predicational monism, as it was ascribed to Parmenides, 24
namely the idea that there is only one predicate that can be truly predicated of what is – presumably
the predicate ‘being’. An echo of this kind of puzzlement can be found in Plato’s Sophist that similarly
provides strategies to overcome the snares of Eleatic ontology; here, Plato has the Eleatic stranger
say:

“Surely we‘re speaking of a man even when we name him several things, that is, when we
apply colours to him and shapes, sizes, defects, and virtues.” 25

The kind of confusion that this remark is meant to dissuade consists in thinking that there is a
problem about calling a man who is essentially a man something other than ‘man’, for this could
seem to imply that one single thing turns out to be many things (e.g. a certain colour, shape, size,
etc.) or to be something else (a certain colour, shape, size, etc.) essentially. The Categories’
distinctions can be read as a reply to this problem. There is only one thing that can be SAID OF a man,
i.e. there is only one species (together with its genera) that a man essentially is, but there are many
other things that can be IN a man at the same time; at least, there can be as many predicates as
there are categories: one man can have a certain quality, a certain quantity, a certain location, etc. at
one and the same time.

The essential ‘is’ vs. the ‘is’ of linguistic predication

It is one of the backbones of Aristotle’s Categories that, as already indicated, in some predications
something is SAID OF the subject or substrate, whereas in some other predications something (an
attribute or accident) is said to be IN the subject or substrate. At first glance, this seems be a
difference holding between different linguistic predications; however Aristotle is not only interested
in linguistic predication, but also in the ontological or metaphysical relations holding between
different beings (onta). When X is SAID OF Y, X says what Y is, and it seems that he is speaking of two
entities, X and Y, where Y instantiates X and is thus more general than Y; for example, when there
‘man’ is SAID OF a particular man, this involves a particular substance (i.e. a first or primary
substance in the idiom of the Categories) and a species that, in the idiom of the Categories, is said to
be a secondary substance. Primary and secondary substances are treated as different kinds of

24
See Curd, P., The Legacy of Parmenides, Princeton: Princeton University Press 1997.
25
Plato, Sophist 251A. For Aristotle’s response to Plato in his Catetories see: Mann, W.-R. 2000, The Discovery
of Things. Aristotle’s Categories & their Context. Princeton: Princeton University Press 2000.
15
entities or beings, so that the relation holding between primary and secondary substances is an
ontological or metaphysical, not just a linguistic relation. If, by contrast, X is IN Y (not in the
mereological sense of ‘in’, as Aristotle emphasizes), X does not say what Y is nor is it instantiated by
Y; rather X characterizes Y in one or other respect (in the modern usage one could say that X is
exemplified, but not instantiated by Y; for example, my green bicycle helmet exemplifies the colour
green, but does not instantiate it, it instantiates the universal kind of bicycle helmets). Still, it is
similarly true to say that if X is IN Y (in the peculiar idiom of the Categories), this involves two distinct
kinds of entities, namely the substrate Y that is capable of receiving an attribute like X on the one
hand, and the attribute X, which according to another Aristotelian distinction might be either
individual or universal and depends for its existence on being exemplified by some substrate.

Now, the metaphysical relation consisting in the fact that X is SAID OF Y, is mirrored in a
linguistic predication of the type ‘y is x’. This is best illustrated in the following passage:

“It is clear from what has been said that of the things that are said of a substrate (τῶν καθ᾽
ὑποκειμένου λεγομένων) both each thing’s name and its definition are necessarily
predicated (κατηγορεῖσθαι τοῦ ὑποκειμένου) of the substrate. For example, man is said of
a substrate (καθ᾽ ὑποκειμένου λέγεται), the particular man, and the name is also
predicated (καὶ κατηγορεῖταί γε τοὔνομα), since you will be predicating man of the
particular man (κατὰ τοῦ τινὸς ἀνθρώπου κατηγορήσεις), and also the definition of man
will be predicated of the particular man (κατὰ τοῦ τινὸς ἀνθρώπου κατηγορηθήσεται),
since the particular man is also a man. Thus both the name and the definition will be
predicated of the substrate (κατὰ τοῦ ὑποκειμένου κατηγορηθήσεται).” 26

In this passage Aristotle distinguishes between what is SAID OF a substrate, say the species man, and
the corresponding name (here ‘man’) and the corresponding definition (say ‘biped animal’). Both the
name and the definition are linguistic entities, they can be predicated of a subject within a linguistic
predication. Such a predication (e.g. ‘S is a man’, ‘S is a biped animal’) is made true by the fact that
‘man’ is actually SAID OF the substrate S. It is peculiar to the (metaphysical) relation of BEING SAID
of, as we will see, that both the name and the definition can be predicated of the subject. In this
passage Aristotle carefully distinguishes between ‘is said of’ (in Greek: legesthai tinos) and ‘is
predicated of’ (in Greek: katêgoreisthai), which is likely to capture the difference between the
linguistic and the metaphysical level, for ‘being predicated’ (katêgoreisthai) is always used together
with names and definitions, i.e. the linguistic entities that are actually predicable in the linguistic
sense.

26
Aristotle, Categories 5, 2a19-27.
16
 What about the other metaphysical relation then, i.e. the relation consisting in the fact that X
is IN Y? Is there also a corresponding linguistic predication? Yes, there is, but for the most part this
predication does not have the form ‘y is x’.

But as for things which are in a substrate, in most cases neither the name nor the definition
is predicated of the substrate (κατηγορεῖται τοῦ ὑποκειμένου). In some cases there is
nothing to prevent the name from being predicated of the substrate, but it is impossible for
the definition to be predicated. For example, white (τὸ λευκὸν), which is in a substrate (the
body), is predicated of the substrate (κατηγορεῖται τοῦ ὑποκειμένου); for a body is called
white. But the definition of white will never be predicated of the body. 27

The main purpose of this passage is to point out that, when X is IN Y, the definition of X can never be
predicated of Y. This is the ‘name and definition-test’, by which Aristotle wants to flesh out the
difference to the case when X SAID OF Y, for in this latter case, as we have seen, it always possible to
predicate both the name and the definition. If the definition X is predicable of Y, this is a sign that X
actually says what is. This is not the case when X is IN Y; for example, if grammar is IN the soul, the
definition of grammar cannot be predicated of the soul, for this is not what the soul is. What about
the name of X, when X is IN Y? Aristotle says that in most cases neither the definition nor the name is
predicable. Test: If knowledge of grammar is IN Socrates’ soul, it is still not possible to predicate the
name, namely ‘knowledge of grammar’, of Socrates or Socrates’ soul (which would yield
‘Socrates/Socrates’ soul is knowledge of grammar’.) Similarly, if justice is IN Socrates, we cannot
predicate the name of it, namely ‘justice’, of Socrates (which would yield ‘Socrates is justice’). What
could be predicated in these two examples is ‘knowledgeable-in-grammar’ or ‘just’ – but these are
not the names of the attribute that is IN the substrate, but, in Aristotle’s terminology, only
paronymous forms. The exception to the general rule that Aristotle mentions is ‘white’: if ‘the white’
is IN a body, the name, namely ‘white’, can be predicated of the substrates (‘the body is white’);
however, here, Aristotle is careless about the difference between ‘white’ and ‘the white’, because
only the latter can refer to the abstract property of being white.

In sum, one could say that this theorem about the difference between X is SAID OF Y and X is
IN Y above all serves the purpose of disambiguating the ordinary predicative ‘is’. The ‘is’ of linguistic
predications causes problems whenever we approach it with the expectation that the noun that
follows the predicative ‘is’ will tell us what the subject really or essentially is. In order to get rid of
this problem Aristotle distinguishes two underlying relations that can render a linguistic predication
true or false. Only predications corresponding to the ‘being SAID OF’-relation actually include the

27
Cat. 5, 2a27-34 (transl. by Ackrill, slightly altered).
17
essential ‘is’ telling us what something is, while the ‘is’ in predications corresponding to the ‘being
IN’-relations has no such impact.

The categories

The categories are Aristotle’s most important tool for distinguishing different meanings of being.
Even though the categories are also applicable to other notions (hen, kinêsis), the Categories
introduces them as a classification of beings:

“Τῶν κατὰ μηδεμίαν συμπλοκὴν λεγομένων ἕκαστον ἤτοι οὐσίαν σημαίνει ἢ ποσὸν ἢ ποιὸν
ἢ πρός τι ἢ ποὺ ἢ ποτὲ ἢ κεῖσθαι ἢ ἔχειν ἢ ποιεῖν ἢ πάσχειν. – Of things said without any
combination, each signifies either substance or quantity or qualification or a relative or
where or when or being-in-a-position or having or doing or being-affected.” 28

Even though he speaks in this passage of “what is said without combination”, it is relatively clear
from the context of these chapters that Aristotle intends to give a classification of beings (onta). Still,
there is a scholarly debate about whether the categories are meant to be a classification of beings
(onta) or a classification of predicates/predicables. Aristotle refers to the categories as ‘genera of
predication’ or ‘figures of predication’. The problem, however, is that in the Categories the category
of substance includes primary substances, which cannot be predicated of anything. Still, even if the
categories primarily classify beings, not predicates, it might be true that the idea and the notion of
categories originally derive from a division of types of predication. An obvious way in which different
types of predication have an impact on the meaning of ‘being’ is provided by the following quotation:
the idea seems to be that being has as many meanings as there are figures of predication, because
each and every predication using a verbal predicate (e.g. Socrates suffers) can be turned into a
predication using the copula is (e.g. Socrates is suffering) and thus implies a specific meaning of
being.

“καθ’ αὑτὰ δὲ εἶναι λέγεται ὅσαπερ σημαίνει τὰ σχήματα τῆς κατηγορίας·ὁσαχῶς γὰρ
λέγεται, τοσαυταχῶς τὸ εἶναι σημαίνει. ἐπεὶ οὖν τῶν κατηγορουμένων τὰ μὲν τί ἐστι
σημαίνει, τὰ δὲ ποιόν, τὰ δὲ ποσόν, τὰ δὲ πρός τι, τὰ δὲ ποιεῖν ἢ πάσχειν, τὰ δὲ πού, τὰ δὲ
ποτέ, ἑκάστῳ τούτων τὸ εἶναι ταὐτὸ σημαίνει· οὐθὲν γὰρ διαφέρει τὸ ἄνθρωπος ὑγιαίνων
ἐστὶν ἢ τὸ ἄνθρωπος ὑγιαίνει, οὐδὲ τὸ ἄνθρωπος βαδίζων ἐστὶν ἢ τέμνων τοῦ ἄνθρωπος
βαδίζει ἢ τέμνει, ὁμοίως δὲ καὶ ἐπὶ τῶν ἄλλων. – Those things are said in their own right to
be that are indicated by the figures of predication; for the senses of ‘being’ are just as many
as these figures. Since some predicates indicate what the subject is, others its quality,
others quantity, others relation, others activity or passivity, others its place others its time,
‘being’ has a meaning answering to each of these. For there is no difference between ‘the

28
Cat. 4, 1b25-7.
18
 man is recovering’ and ‘the man recovers’, nor between ‘the man is walking’ or ‘cutting’
and ‘the man walks’ or ‘cuts’; and similarly in all other cases.” 29

The quoted passage is taken from a passage in Metaphysics Δ. The status of this book is quite
peculiar; it represents, as it were, the pre-metaphysical level within the Metaphysics, i.e. a level that
deals with concepts familiar from the Organon and from the Physics that are significant for the
metaphysical theory, but does not itself formulate any core theorems belonging to this theory. Here
it is remarkable that Aristotle speaks of different meanings of ‘being’ or ‘to be’, while the Categories
seems to classify different types of beings – this might indicate a minor shift either in the motivation
or in the application of the categorial division. Still, the passage provides a useful link between
predications and (classes of) beings, for if the several types of predications come with different
meanings of ‘to be’ (presumably in the sense that the predicative ‘is’ can be divided into ‘S is-the-
substance X’, ‘S is-the-quality Y’, ‘S is-the-quantity Z’, etc.), we can ask about each being whether it is
a being in the sense of substance, in the sense of quality, in the sense of quantity, etc.

In what sense does Aristotle’s famous division of the categories rather belong to the analytic-
critical than to the constructive level? Clearly, it is also used on the constructive level and becomes
part of his ontological-metaphysical theory. However, it does make sense in abstraction from other
core theorems of Aristotle’s metaphysical theory and Aristotle often uses it as a tool in dialectical
thinking and as a tool to block certain alternative approaches to ontological metaphysical theory. For
example, this division of the categories is used in realm of dialectical reasoning in order to avoid, as it
were, easy logical confusions. In the Topics Aristotle recommends to check whether the species and
the genus actually belong to the same category, in order to examine whether the genus has been
properly established. 30 Similarly, in order to check whether two locutions refer to one and the same
thing (for example the definiens and the definiendum), one has to ensure that both belong to the
same category. 31 Also, the categories provide an important tool for detecting hidden ambiguity or
multivocity, for it may turn out that one and the same term belong to different categories and, thus,
cannot have one unified meaning. 32 Aristotle illustrates this for the term ‘good’, which, when applied
to dishes or medicine, means something that is productive (namely of pleasure and health,
respectively), but when applied to the soul means a quality (e.g. that the soul has a just or
courageous quality) and when applied to a good opportunity means a time. This is the kind of, as we
put it (see section 3 above), ‘easy logical confusion’ that analytic-critical ontology can help to avoid.
But even relatively easy logical confusions can have important philosophical consequences. This

29
Metaph. Δ.7, 1017b22-30.
30
Top. IV.1, 120b36–121a10.
31
Top. VII.1, 152a38–b5.
32
Top. I.15, 107a3-17.
19
becomes obvious when in the Eudemian and in the Nicomachean Ethics Aristotle uses the same
move, 33 namely noting that ‘good’ may be used in different categories and, accordingly, means
different things in different categories, to preclude competing accounts of ‘the good’ and thus
competing approaches to moral philosophy; after all, this analysis of the good excludes the possibility
that moral reasoning could take a unified form of the good as its principle. Plato’s form or idea of the
good requires a unified sense of means to the good, but this, according to Aristotle’s analysis,
neglects the simple fact that ‘good’ occurs in the categories with different meanings. When Aristotle
in his own theory of the good characterizes the good as a goal and as the proper object of desire, this
is meant to avoid what he takes to be the confusion of the Platonic account, i.e. construing ‘good’ as
designating one unified property belonging to things in different categories. In a similar way, the
categorial analysis of ‘being’ is in the background of Aristotle’s criticism and rejection of what he
takes to be the most basic flaw within the Platonic or Academic account of ‘to on’, namely to think
that ‘being’ is like a genus 34 or that ‘being’ and ‘one’ could be the essence of anything. 35

5. Transition to the constructive level: The comprehensive pollachôs-legetai account

In sections 2 and 4 we encountered several scattered passages (mostly from the Organon) in which
Aristotle drew the reader’s attention either to the peculiar character of the verb ‘to be’ or to the
many uses or meanings of ‘being’. In section 3 we considered examples from the Physics where
Aristotle diagnosed basic confusions in his predecessors’ accounts that were due to their failure to
pay attention to the peculiar character and the various uses of ‘to be’. However, in all these passages
Aristotle did not even care about the fact that his slogan about the many uses of ‘to be’(‘pollachôs
legetai to on) does not always refer to the same kind of ambiguity. Sometimes he hints at the
difference between one-place and two-place uses of ‘to be’, sometimes to the differences between
the being of a substrate and what can be predicated of a substance, sometimes he is concerned with
the difference between ‘being in one’s own right’ and accidental or incidental being, sometimes the
different meanings he has in mind are analysed in terms of the ten categories, sometimes the main
difference boils down to the being of substance on the one hand and the being of non-substantial
entities on the other and in one instance we considered, he is mainly concerned about the difference
between being in actuality and being in potentiality. There was no single passage though –
particularly not in the treatises of the Organon – that attempted to bring all these various analyses

33
Eudemian Ethics I.8, 1217b25-1218a1 and Nicomachean Ethics I.6, 1096a19-34.
34
APo. II.7, 92b14, Metaph. XI.3, 1060b33-5, III.3, 998b22-7, etc.
35
Metaph. VII.16, 1040b16-20.
20
together. In some passages Aristotle was mostly interested in one single motif for distinguishing
senses of being, for example in the categorical division of being, while in some other passages, the
hints that ‘to be’ and ‘being’ must not be taken in one single sense were pretty much ad hoc in order
to attack a certain predecessor’s account. It is telling that the most differentiated attempts to give a
comprehensive overview of the several uses of ‘to be’ can be found in the Metaphysics – the longest
of which is in Book Δ of the Metaphysics.

Book Δ deals with different meanings of some core concepts and it represents, as it were, the
pre-metaphysical level within the Metaphysics, i.e. a level that deals with concepts familiar from the
Organon and from the Physics that are significant for the metaphysical theory, but does not itself
formulate any core theorems belonging to this theory. The four main meanings of ‘being’ that are
distinguished in Δ.7 are taken up in some of the following books of the Metaphysics, most explicitly
in E.2 and Θ.10. As we will see, these four main meanings are also meant to provide some sort of
guideline for the unfolding of a metaphysical theory that is essentially based on ontology, namely as
a ‘study of being qua being’. In light of the present paper’s attempt to distinguish an analytic-critical
level of ontology from a constructive level, one might interpret this scenario along the following
lines: In Metaphysics Δ.7 Aristotle presents a comprehensive and systematized version of the
theorem that ‘being’ or ‘to be’ is said in many senses. This comprehensive account integrates
previously made distinctions, most notably the categorical analysis of being. On the one hand, this
comprehensive account relies on some of the divisions made on the analytic-critical level, on the
other hand in this particular book and this particular chapter Aristotle does not (yet) say how these
various meanings of ‘being’ or ‘to be’ are meant to structure the subsequent treatise. In this sense
the comprehensive account of the ‘pollachôs legetai to on’ represents the transition from the
analytic-critical level to the constructive one. 36 If this is so, Aristotle’s metaphysical theory is, to some
extent, built on insights provided by the analytic-critical level of ontology, but at the same time it
clearly goes beyond this level.

Let us first turn to the comprehensive account given in Metaph. Δ.7. The most important division is
between what is in its own right (kath’ hauto) and what is said to be only in an accidental sense:

“Τὸ ὂν λέγεται τὸ μὲν κατὰ συμβεβηκὸς τὸ δὲ καθ’ αὑτό, … - Things are said to be in an
accidental sense and by their own nature …” 37

36
For an alternative assessment of the role of this chapter within the Metaphysics see Menn, S., ‘Aristotle on
the Many Senses of Being’, In: Oxford Studies of Ancient Philosophy 59, 2021, 187–263.
37
Metaph. Δ.7, 1017a9.
21
This principal distinction provides the first two senses of ‘being’, namely being per se (or being in
one’s own right) and being in a merely accidental sense. This is clearly reminiscent of the distinction
between being in one’s own right and being through being something else (that we discussed in
section 2 above), however the details are different. First, Aristotle comments on being in the
accidental sense:

(i) “κατὰ συμβεβηκὸς μέν, οἷον τὸν δίκαιον μουσικὸν ἶναί φαμεν καὶ τὸν ἄνθρωπον
μουσικὸν καὶ τὸν μουσικὸν ἄνθρωπον, παραπλησίως λέγοντες ὡσπερεὶ τὸν μουσικὸν
οἰκοδομεῖν ὅτι συμβέβηκε τῷ οἰκοδόμῳ μουσικῷ εἶναι ἢ τῷ δομεῖν ὅτι συμβέβηκε τῷ
οἰκοδόμῳ μουσικῷ εἶναι ἢ τῷ μουσικῷ οἰκοδόμῳ (τὸ γὰρ τόδε εἶναι τόδε σημαίνει τὸ
συμβεβηκέναι τῷδε τόδε), … – In an accidental sense, e.g. we say the just is musical, and
the man is musical and the musical is a man, just as we say the musical builds, because the
builder happens to be musical or the musical happens to be a builder; for here ‘one thing is
another’ means ‘one is an accident of another.” 38

Just as it is accidental for the musical person to engage in the activity of building, it is accidental for
the just person to be musical, for a man to be musical or for musical to be accident of a man.
Therefore, when something is said in an accidental sense to be something else, this is because either
both items belong to the same thing that is (when e.g. just and musical accidentally belong to the
same thing that is) or that to which the attribute belongs is (when e.g. musical belongs to man) or
that is which is the substrate for that of which it is predicated (when e.g. the musical is said to be
man). All these things are said to be only by being accidentally related to something that is said to be
in its own right.

Accordingly, the second main sense of being is ‘being in its own right’:

(ii)” καθ’ αὑτὰ δὲ εἶναι λέγεται ὅσαπερ σημαίνει τὰ σχήματα τῆς κατηγορίας·… – Those
things are said in their own right to be that are indicated by the figures of predication …” 39

This is the passage we quoted in section 4 above. It explains that each predication can be
transformed into a version that includes a predicative ‘is’, and the meaning of this ‘is’ is said to vary
in accordance with the ten categories, i.e. it means something different when it says that something
is a substance as when it says that something is a quality, etc.

As the third main meaning the comprehensive account introduces the veridical sense of
‘being’ or ‘is’:

38
Metaph. Δ.7, 1017a9-13.
39
Metaph. Δ.7, 1017a22-23.
22
 (iii) “ἔτι τὸ εἶναι σημαίνει καὶ τὸ ἔστιν ὅτι ἀληθές, τὸ δὲ μὴ εἶναι ὅτι οὐκ ἀληθὲς ἀλλὰ
ψεῦδος, ὁμοίως ἐπὶ καταφάσεως καὶ ἀποφάσεως, οἷον ὅτι ἔστι Σωκράτης μουσικός, ὅτι
ἀληθὲς τοῦτο, ἢ ὅτι ἔστι Σωκράτης οὐ λευκός, ὅτι ἀληθές· τὸ δ’ οὐκ ἔστιν ἡ διάμετρος
σύμμετρος, ὅτι ψεῦδος. – ‘Being’ and ‘is’ mean that a statement is true, ‘not being that it is
not true but false; - and this alike in affirmation and negation; e.g. ‘Socrates is musical’
means that this is true or ‘Socrates is not-white’ means that this is true, but ‘the diagonal of
the square is not commensurate with the side’ means that it is false to say it is.” 40

In this sense, ‘to be’ and ‘not to be’ amount to saying that something is or is not the case. Applied to
statements or propositions that can be true or false, it means that the corresponding statement or
proposition is true or false. The being or not being of a statement or proposition is different from the
being that mostly matters for metaphysics, for the truth or falsehood of a statement is always
grounded in a fact: the statement that Socrates is musical is true because of the truthmaker
consisting in the fact that Socrates is musical. Even though the veridical sense will not play a major
role in Aristotle’s Metaphysics, it is important to address this meaning in order to distinguish it from
what is or is not in reality.

It remains to account for the fourth and final sense of ‘to be’:

(iv) “ἔτι τὸ εἶναι σημαίνει καὶ τὸ ὂν τὸ μὲν δυνάμει ῥητὸν τὸ δ’ ἐντελεχείᾳ τῶν εἰρημένων
τούτων· ὁρῶν τε γὰρ εἶναί φαμεν καὶ τὸ δυνάμει ὁρῶν καὶ τὸ ἐντελεχείᾳ, καὶ [τὸ]
ἐπίστασθαι ὡσαύτως καὶ τὸ δυνάμενον χρῆσθαι τῇ ἐπιστήμῃ καὶ τὸ χρώμενον, καὶ
ἠρεμοῦν καὶ ᾧ ἤδη ὑπάρχει ἠρεμία καὶ τὸ δυνάμενον ἠρεμεῖν … – Again, ‘being’ and ‘that
which is’, in these cases we have mentioned sometimes means being potentially, and
sometimes being actually, for we say both of that which see potentially and of that which
sees actually, that it is seeing, and both of that which can use knowledge and of that which
is using it, that it knows, and both of that to which rest is already present and of that which
can rest, that it rests. … 41

This is a distinction we already encountered in section 3 above. As commonly known, the distinction
between being in potentiality and being in actuality is the background for important theorems of
Aristotle’s metaphysical theory; in several contexts, Aristotle argues for the priority of actuality and
he requires that the first principle of all exist in actuality (energeiai) and not merely in potentiality
(dunamei). In Metaph. Θ Aristotle develops this difference by showing that there is also an ambiguity
in the notion of dunamis, for dunamis is not always a capacity for change, but can also be used to
signify a mode of being, namely when the reference is to being-in-potency. In common language
there are certain hints to this difference of actuality and potentiality, for example, when people
distinguish between the use and the possession of something, as for example the use and the

40
Metaph. Δ.7, 1017a931-35
41
Metaph. Δ.7, 1017a35-b6.
23
possession of some piece of knowledge. However, it is not (always) obvious in the common usage
whether the words ‘is’ or ‘being’ refer to something potential or to something actual. Therefore,
actuality and potentiality are also mentioned among the many uses of ‘being’, but observing the
ambiguity of being in actuality and being in potentiality does not yet amount to nor does it
presuppose a full-blown modal ontology, as developed in Metaph. Θ.

So, in one sense the comprehensive account of the ‘pollachôs legetai to on’ collects
distinctions and meanings mentioned already in the Organon (where they derived from Aristotle’s
analytic-critical interest in ontology) and another sense it goes beyond these distinctions and
presents them in a systematized way. While many of the distinctions drawn for the other notions
discussed in Metaph. Δ won’t play a major role in the following books of the Metaphysics, the four
main meanings of ‘being’, as distinguished in Δ.7, are taken up several times in the course of the
Metaphysics. Most notably, in Metaph. E.2 Aristotle gives a short version of the comprehensive
account presented in Δ.7. 42 Afterwards, in Metaph. E.2-3, he deals with being in the accidental sense.
E.4 argues that the veridical sense of ‘being’ is irrelevant. This is a first hint that the comprehensive
account is used as a sort of guideline for the following discussion, for it seems that it is owing to this
account that Aristotle first discusses accidental and veridical being; and moreover that it is due to the
exclusion of these two senses that at the beginning of the next book, namely in Metaph. Z.1, Aristotle
can turn to the more central senses of being. Indeed, Z.1 starts off by referring to the several
meanings of being and thus, probably, to the comprehensive account in Δ.7:

“Τὸ ὂν λέγεται πολλαχῶς, καθάπερ διειλόμεθα πρό-[a11]τερον ἐν τοῖς περὶ τοῦ ποσαχῶς …
– Being or that which is is said in many ways, as we went through earlier in our remarks 'on
the number of ways' [in which things are said] …” 43

Afterwards he refers to the difference between being in the substantial sense and being in the sense
of one of the ten non-substantial categories in the categories. He briefly argues that it is the
substantial sense of being that is primary, and in what follows he focusses on this primary sense by
dealing with substance in the subsequent books Z and H. At the beginning of the next book, in
Metaph. Θ.1, Aristotle declares that the discussion of being in the primary, i.e. the substantial, sense
has been completed and reminds the reader that being in accordance with the non-substantial
categories is always dependent on substantial being. He introduces the main topic of this book, the

42
See Metaph. E.2, 1026a33-b2: “But since the unqualified term ‘being’ has several meanings, of which one
was seen to be the accidental, and another the true (non-being being the false), while besides these there are
the figures of predication, e.g. the ‘what’, quality, quantity, place, time, and any similar meanings which ‘being’
may have; and again besides all these there is that which is potentially or actually.”
43
Metaph. Z.1, 1028a10-11, transl. by Furth. See Furth, M., Aristotle Metaphysics, Books Zeta, Eta, Theta, Iota
(VII‒X), Indianapolis 1985.
24
treatment of actuality and potentiality, as though he were working himself through the four main
meanings of ‘being’:

“… ἐπεὶ δὲ λέγεται τὸ ὂν τὸ μὲν τὸ τὶ ἢ ποιὸν ἢ ποσόν, τὸ δὲ κατὰ δύναμιν καὶ ἐντελέχειαν

καὶ κατὰ τὸ ἔργον, διορίσωμεν καὶ περὶ δυνάμεως καὶ ἐντελεχείας – And since ‘being’ is in
one way divided into what, quality, and quantity, and is in another way distinguished in
respect of potentiality and actuality/completion, and of function, let us discuss potentiality
and actuality/completion.” 44

It seems plausible, hence, to say that the comprehensive account of the pollachôs-legetai is used as a
guideline and agenda for major parts of Metaph. E, Z, H, Θ – even though the discussions of Metaph.
ZH on the one hand and Metaph. Θ on the other might be considered as more or less self-contained
endeavours. It remains to mention that the comprehensive account is repeated one more time,
namely at the beginning of Metaph. Θ.10. Again, he briefly reminds the readers of the four main
senses distinguished in Δ.7; however, this time he enters into a discussion of the veridical sense, i.e.
‘being’ as being true and ‘non-being’ as being false. The relation of this discussion to Metaph. E.4,
were he tried to exclude the veridical sense as less pertinent, is somewhat unclear and controversial
(especially since the discussions of Metaph. ZH and Metaph. Θ have given a new direction to the
metaphysical project); still, it is fair to say that the renewed discussion of this topic is motivated by
reference to the comprehensive account and the insinuated need to go through all of these four
senses.

6. The constructive level of ontology: What is still missing?

In the previous section we saw how the comprehensive account of the ‘pollachôs legetai to on’
comes close to defining a sort of agenda for the central books Metaph. E, Z, H and Θ, in that each of
the four main senses of ‘being’ is addressed in one of these books. Arguably though, just going
through the different senses of being one by one is not yet sufficient for what Aristotle announces as
the study of being qua being, because an enumeration and unconnected discussion of scattered
senses of ‘being’ as such would not make up a full-blown ontological theory; for, after all, Aristotle
seems to conceive his study of being as a sort of science or science-like endeavour. 45 So what is still
missing? In order to establish the study of being qua being as a science or a science-like endeavour, it

44
Metaph. Θ.1, 1045b32-35.
45
In Γ.1 and in E.1 Aristotle says or implies that the study of being is an epistêmê.
25
is necessary above all to define a unified subject matter. This provides some serious difficulties, since
‘being’ does not seem to be a well-defined subject matter. Let’s back up a little bit!

At the beginning of the Metaphysics Aristotle introduces the idea of sophia (wisdom), which
tackles the first principles and causes. In order to get to the first principles and causes one cannot
stick to a subdomain of being or exclude any subdomain of beings. This is why, or so it seems,
Aristotle gets interested in the notion of being, for when one deals with being qua being (and not
with, say, living beings or mathematical beings or beings insofar as they are moved, etc.) one includes
everything that is and does not exclude any domain of reality. While the principles and causes
specific to a restricted domain of beings (say of living beings) cannot be the first principles and causes
(but only principles and causes of living beings), the principles and causes of the widest possible
domain are likely to be the first principles and causes tout court. For this reason, sophia, the inquiry
into the first principles and causes, eventually (namely after Metaph. B) takes on the form of
ontology, the study of being qua being. Accordingly, Aristotle says: “Therefore, it is of being as being
that we also must grasp the first causes.” (Γ.1, 1003a30-31) and “We are seeking the principles and
the causes of the things that are, and obviously of things qua being”. (E.1, 1025b3-4). Against this
background, it seems understandable that Aristotle picks ‘being’ or rather ‘being qua being’ as the
proper subject matter of his inquiry, even though it is not delimited in the sense that the subject
matters of all other sciences are.

Still, if one regards ‘being’ as the subject-matter of a science or science-like endeavour, it is a

problem if ‘being’ turns out to be a homonymous or multivocal term, for given the different senses of
‘being’ it might well be that the linguistic surface covers a problematic heterogeneity of the subject
matter of the study of being qua being: If the word ‘being’ has many senses, how can we be sure that
there is a unified subject matter of ontology? This threat to the project of inquiring into being qua
being is well expressed in the following section:

“Ἐπεὶ δ’ ἐστὶν ἡ τοῦ φιλοσόφου ἐπιστήμη τοῦ ὄντος ᾗ ὂν καθόλου καὶ οὐ κατὰ μέρος, τὸ δ’
ὂν πολλαχῶς καὶ οὐ καθ’ ἕνα λέγεται τρόπον· εἰ μὲν οὖν ὁμωνύμως κατὰ δὲ κοινὸν μηδέν,
οὐκ ἔστιν ὑπὸ μίαν ἐπιστήμην (οὐ γὰρ ἓν γένος τῶν τοιούτων), εἰ δὲ κατά τι κοινόν, εἴη ἂν
ὑπὸ μίαν ἐπιστήμην …· – Since the science of the philosopher treats of being qua being
universally and not of some part of it, and ‘being’ has many senses and is not used in one
only, it follows that if it is used homonymously and in virtue of no common nature, it does
not fall under one science (for there is no one class in the case of such things); but if it is
used in virtue of some common nature, it will fall under one science. …” 46

46
Metaph. Metaph. K.3, 1060b31-6.
26
Indeed, this seems to be the main challenge for the constructive level of Aristotle’s ontology. In order
to establish a unified ontological theory or, in Aristotle’s own terminology, to conduct the study of
being qua being as a science, he has to show that the various senses of being do not jeopardize the
unity of his project, but are rather connected in a systematic way. Aristotle does this by arguing that
there is a primary sense of being, which he identifies with the being of a substance, and that all other
‘beings’ are said to be only and exactly because they are related in one way or the other to the
primary sense of being, namely the substantial one. This is why, to a considerable extent, the study
of being qua being can focus on the primary sense of being (which means that, to a considerable
extent, it can deal with substance and substances) as every science focusses on the primary objects
within its proper domain. The main testimony for this theoretical move can be found in a famous
passage of Metaph. Γ.2:

“Τὸ δὲ ὂν λέγεται μὲν πολλαχῶς, ἀλλὰ πρὸς ἓν καὶ μίαν τινὰ φύσιν καὶ οὐχ ὁμωνύμως ἀλλ’
ὥσπερ καὶ τὸ ὑγιεινὸν ἅπαν πρὸς ὑγίειαν, τὸ μὲν τῷ φυλάττειν τὸ δὲ τῷ ποιεῖν τὸ δὲ τῷ
σημεῖον εἶναι τῆς ὑγιείας τὸ δ’ ὅτι (1003b) δεκτικὸν αὐτῆς, καὶ τὸ ἰατρικὸν πρὸς ἰατρικήν
(τὸ μὲν γὰρ τῷ ἔχειν ἰατρικὴν λέγεται ἰατρικὸν τὸ δὲ τῷ εὐφυὲς εἶναι πρὸς αὐτὴν τὸ δὲ τῷ
ἔργον εἶναι τῆς ἰατρικῆς), ὁμοιοτρόπως δὲ καὶ ἄλλα ληψόμεθα λεγόμενα τούτοις, — οὕτω
δὲ καὶ τὸ ὂν λέγεται πολλαχῶς μὲν ἀλλ’ ἅπαν (5) πρὸς μίαν ἀρχήν· τὰ μὲν γὰρ ὅτι οὐσίαι,
ὄντα λέγεται, τὰ δ’ ὅτι πάθη οὐσίας, τὰ δ’ ὅτι ὁδὸς εἰς οὐσίαν ἢ φθοραὶ ἢ στερήσεις ἢ
ποιότητες ἢ ποιητικὰ ἢ γεννητικὰ οὐσίας ἢ τῶν πρὸς τὴν οὐσίαν λεγομένων, ἢ τούτων
τινὸς ἀποφάσεις ἢ οὐσίας· διὸ καὶ τὸ μὴ ὂν εἶναι μὴ ὄν φαμεν. – There are many senses in
which a thing may be said to ‘be’, but they are related to one central point, one definite
kind of thing, and are not homonymous. 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 in the sense that it possesses
it, another in the sense that it is naturally adapted to it, another in the sense that it is a
function of the medical art. And we shall find other words used similarly to these. So, too,
there are many senses in which a thing is said to be, but all refer to one starting-point;
some things are said to be because they are substances, others because they are affections
of substance, others because they are a process towards substance, or destructions or
privations or qualities of substance, or negations of some of these things or of substance
itself. It is for this reason that we say even of non-being that it is non-being.” 47

The passage includes many controversial points, but the main tenets are clear enough. It mainly
builds on the notion of pros-hen, which is conceived as an alternative either to homonymy or to
accidental homonymy (for Aristotle says that being – though being said in many ways – is not
‘homonymous’, which seems to mean that it is not homonymous in a merely accidental sense, such
as – in English – ‘ring’ and ‘ring’, ‘right’ and ‘right’, etc.). The upshot of this solution is (a) that there is

47
Metaph. Γ.2, 1003a33-b10.
27
a primary sense of being which exclusively belongs to substance(s) and (b) that all other beings are
only called beings in virtue of the fact that they are in one or the other sense related to substance.
Even if scholars disagree about how to construe this peculiar pros-hen-relation, 48 it seems clear that,
in making this suggestion, Aristotle turns to a hierarchically structured ontology (i.e. he proceeds
from saying that there are many of senses of being to giving a hierarchical structure of several kinds
of being). And this is clearly one of the core theorems on the constructive level of his ontology.

The pros-hen-model, as formulated in the text quoted above, is the precondition for
regarding the science of being as a unified project, but it does not yet determine the nature and
agenda of this science. What does this agenda consist in and what is the philosopher doing when
inquiring into being qua being (apart from listing several senses of ‘being’)? Amazingly, there is no
uncontested answer to this question, as it is not clear and, again, not uncontested whether the
agenda of this ontological project can be separated from the research program of the Metaphysics as
a whole. However, the Metaphysics as a whole, is not committed to just unfolding the study of being
qua being, and not even the part that follows upon Metaph. Γ. Metaph. Λ, most notably, establishes
the unmoved mover as a first principle that exists in pure actuality. It has been argued that this is an
extension of the ontological project, but it is not obvious, to say the least, that it is meant to be part
of the study into being qua being as announced in Metaph. Γ. Similarly, Metaph. MN rejects Platonic
forms and numbers, but not as a contribution to the study of being, but because they were
promoted as first principles in Plato’s Academy. Tentatively, one might distinguish two main paths
along which the study of being qua being could be further developed. According to the first of these
two paths, ontology, the study of being, to a considerable extent, boils down to ousiology, the study
of substance. Immediately after introducing the idea of a primary entity on which all other beings
depend in Metaph. Γ and after saying that this primary entity is substance, Aristotle continues: “If,
then, this (i.e. the primary entity) is ousia (substance) it is of ousiai that the philosopher must grasp
the principles and the causes.” (Metaph. Γ.2, 1003b17-19). This might be taken to mean that it is the
most distinguished task of ontology to gather the various senses of ‘being’ and to establish the
primacy of substantial being, but once the primacy of substance has been established, the inquiry
will (almost) exclusively focus on substance and the principles of substance, so that, according to this
path, ontology is mostly meant to set the stage for the study of substance (and indeed, the
programmatic announcements about ontology in Metaph. Γ and E are followed by a lengthy study of

48
The pros hen-relation, also known as ‘focal meaning’ has been the subject of intense debates; see for
example Owen, G.E.L. Logic and Metaphysics in some earlier works of Aristotle. In Düring, I., Owen, G.E.L.
(eds.), Symposium Aristotelicum: Aristotle and Plato in the mid-fourth century. Gothenburg: Almqvist & Wiksell
1960, 164–191, Ferejohn, M. T. (1980): Aristotle on Focal Meaning and the Unity of Science. In Phronesis 25,
1980, 117–128, and, more recently, Tolkiehn, N., The notion of homonymy, synonymy, multivocity, and pros
hen in Aristotle, Munich: Münchner Hochschulschriften 2020.
28
substance and even Metaph. Λ presents itself as a study of substance, one type of which is
represented by the unmoved mover). According to the second path, the study of being qua being
follows more neatly the scheme of all other sciences. For other, ordinary sciences are supposed not
only to look into their proper objects (like numbers for arithmetic, birds for ornithology, etc.), but
also into the per se attributes of these proper objects. In ordinary sciences, these per se attributes
are demonstrated to belong to the proper objects, which again makes up a major part of an
Aristotelian science. Now in Metaph. Γ.1 and 2, Aristotle also suggests that the per se attributes of
‘being’ should be examined. Above all, he demands that the same study should also inquire into the
‘one’, which is said to be implied by ‘being’; and in a similar vein, the same and the similar and other
concepts of that sort should be examined. And if these concepts fall into the ambit of the study of
being qua being, their opposites (plurality, all kinds of contraries) do so as well. This offers a different
perspective on the agenda of ontology: ontology, according to this picture, deals with all trans-
categorical (or ‘transcendental’) notions such as ‘being’, ‘one’, ‘similar’, ‘many’, ‘opposed’, etc.
Indeed, some traces of such a project can be found in the rest of Metaph. Γ and in Metaph. Iota, but
especially the latter book is notoriously difficult to accommodate within the main argument of the
Metaphysics.

It seems then that this second picture of Aristotelian ontology is less suitable for
accommodating the main subprojects of Aristotle’s Metaphysics. Possibly, Aristotle did not want to
suggest that the discussion of ‘one’, ‘similar’, etc. should be the main occupation of ontology, but just
wanted to make the more modest claim that, since these notions are akin to ‘being’, they should be
treated by no other science, but should be part of the study of being qua being, even though – and
this would be an attempt to reconcile the two competing pictures of ontology – primary being, i.e.
substance, remains at the centre of the ontological inquiry.

29