Aristotle

6. FOUR METHODICAL MAXIMS

6 FOUR METHODICAL MAXIMS As mentioned above, Aristotle’s methodological views can be found not only in the Organon, but also in excurses or remarks scattered throughout his treatises. A passage in the Ethics (VII 1, 1145b2–7) is concise, but it is also meant to apply to other topics . In general, three things matter here: (1) establishing the phenomena (tithenai ta phainomena), (2) working through (diaporêsai) the difficulties, and (3) proving (deiknynai) the credible opinions (endoxa), at least the most and the most important. “For when the difficulties are solved and the credible opinions remain, one has given sufficient proof.” (Similarly Ph. IV 4, 211a7–11 and EE VII 1 f., 1235a4–1235b18.) According to the De anima (I 1, 402a10–22), there is no unified method that is the same without differentiation for all science, but the aforementioned passage only appears to contradict this, since the three elements do not have the meaning of precise procedures but of methodical maxims. Furthermore, they do not exhaust Aristotle’s instrumentarium: what is conspicuously lacking is linguistic analysis, which should be discussed in addition, in a certain sense as the fourth maxim. 6.1 ESTABLISHING THE PHENOMENA We all know the situation of someone being convinced that a certain course of action is right and yet not following it. We call this weakness of will or lack of selfcontrol (akrasia). Aristotle considers Socrates’ opinion that this cannot happen an obvious contradiction of the phenomena (EN VII 3, 1145b22–28). In order to save it, he develops a theory that takes Socrates’ misgivings seriously without denying the possibility of lack of self-control. He proceeds in a similar way with Parmenides ’, Melissus’s, and Xenophanes’ view that nothing else can exist beside the one Being (Metaph. I 5, 986b18 ff.). He counters their attempt to establish a theory against a clear phenomenal basis with a charge of insufficient consistency. Conceptually , he says, Parmenides knows only the one, but according to perception he admits various things, so that he finds himself forced to obey the phenomena, in this case everyday experience. Incidentally, he finds greater clarity in Parmenides’ “obedience” than in the “uncouth views” of Melissus and Xenophanes. Elsewhere, too, Aristotle refers to everyday experience, for example, in the teleology he cites the experience that an acorn always produces oaks, and the procreation 61 of humans always produces humans. Phenomena also need to be established in astronomy , because many observations are unreliable (APr. I 30, 46a20; cf. APo. I 13, 78b39 and 79a2–6; Cael. III 7, 306a5–17), as well as in zoology, since a description of the animal kingdom must begin from the stock of phenomena before embarking on any classification (PA I 1, 639b5–10 and 640a13–15). Occasionally Aristotle follows the first maxim without spelling it out, for example, in his critique of the view that there is no science (APo. I 3). In general, he warns against bending the phenomena to make them fit a pre-established theory instead of looking for a theory that fits them (Cael. II 13, 293a23–30). As Owen (1961) says, what Aristotle calls phenomena are not always of the same kind. Astronomy, zoology, and other empirical sciences need to ascertain the foundation of experience, the that (hoti), before they can explore the why (dihoti), that is, the causes and reasons. In their case the phenomena correspond to empirical data. In philosophy—in the theory of science, natural philosophy, ethics, and ontology—on the other hand, the phenomena are interpretations, that is, opinions , so that the first methodical maxim merges into the second. However, the first maxim hints at something that is not expressed by the second: the apprehension that a way of thinking that strays too far from conventional views could lead to absurdity (atopos: e.g., Ph. I 2, 185a11). Faced with interpretations, “establishing the phenomena” means to give an intuitively plausible, if vague, opinion a justification and conceptual acuity. By means of the theory established in the end, however, the phenomena not only become intelligible, but they are also interpreted more precisely and not infrequently in a different, or even radically different, way. 6.2 DOCTRINES Aristotle assumes that his audience thinks less about texts than about the world— that is, about the world of disputation, perception, poetry, and public speech, and in particular the natural and social world. This is the reason why, unlike most philosophers in our times, he generally starts immediately from the thing itself rather...