RELATIVES IN ARISTOTLE'S CATEGORIES : RESEARCH FOR A DISCRIMINATING CRITERION
In the treatise of Categories, after enumerating the ten categories in Chapter IV, Aristotle undertakes to examine each of the principle four in a separate Chapter. On the first reading, it seems difficult to understand Aristotle's goal in this detailed study. The unity of the inquiry is not really evident: Aristotle tests certain criteria (contrariety, a more and a less, simultaneity) for each category. Nevertheless, when we more closely compare the structure and the results of Chapters V, VI, VII, and VIII, we can put forward an idea of Aristotle's aim and propose an interpretation in which he would look for determining a distinctive character (idion) of all items that belong to one and the same category and of them only.
Indeed, Chapters V and VI both end in the same way: Aristotle concludes with what is most distinctive of substance and quantity, respectively being "numerically one and the......
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