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Chapter 7 Denouement: If the One is Not The One That Is Not: Toward the Others (160b–163b) The sixth beginning, like the other sections of this dialogue, juxtaposes the two thematic orientations: pros itself, as opposed to pros others. And as in the other beginnings, in the sixth Parmenides’ irony serves a double function. If the suggestion of sophistry perhaps confounds the young Aristotle, at the same time, Parmenides evokes a deeper level of paradox for Socrates. He continues to further differentiate between modes of being and logos, and in the sixth beginning Parmenides reveals typical pitfalls of dialectical differentiation (toward-another) apart from existence: for the sixth beginning begins with the assumption of the one’s nonexistence. Parmenides begins this section of the discussion by noting that when someone utters the phrase if the one is not, we know immediately that this differs (diapherei) from the hypothesis if the not-one is not. He asks Aristotle whether these two hypotheses only differ, or whether they are entirely contrary (pan tounantion). The young Aristotle agrees (160c), and from this point, at the outset of this beginning, the ambiguities will unroll smoothly. Parmenides has already repeatedly affirmed that only what shares in being may be spoken of meaningfully. But it is not insignificant that it is in the culmination of toward-itself discourses that Parmenides explicitly denies intelligibility when the subject is considered entirely in abstraction from being. Because this sixth orientation will make thematic the one toward the many (if one does not exist), it is a pros the others orientation. In this tropos, Parmenides indicates that, in relation to other natures, the one that does not exist admits of intelligibility, but ambiguously. In this way, toward-another disclosure is shown to indicate a mode of being, even on the assumption of the one’s nonexistence. The humorous suggestion of fallaciousness in this reasoning nonetheless confirms that it is the juxtaposition of unifying formality against its others that allows intelligibility. Like the second and fourth 159 beginnings, the sixth shows that certain ambiguities may be resolved by logical rules; that is, by formal criteria of significance. But the sixth beginning acknowledges the paradox of the instant insofar as it evokes a sense in which even the allegedly atemporal rules that allow dialectical differentiation in abstraction from existence are derivative misrepresentations. On the one hand, if a one is assumed not to exist, some intelligibility is still disclosed by way of formal differentiation. But this means that whether or not the one exists, intelligibility is allowed only by the allocation of differing modes of ale mtheia: conceptual unification in opposition toothernessallowsintelligibilityinsofarasitindicatessomemodeofbeing. But if p implies q and not-p implies q, then q is necessarily true. Like the first five beginnings (if one is) the sixth indicates that no term in itself signi fies anything: only signifying opposition is disclosive. On the other hand, in conjunction with the dialogue’s sustained thematization of time, the sixth beginning also implies that the allegedly timeless logical rules that resolve certain kinds of ambiguities are also implicitly misrepresentations of being. Parmenides indicates in this sixth beginning that such principles are necessary but not sufficient for disclosure of existence / nonexistence in logos. The sixth beginning indicates boththeutilityofdistinctionswithregardtotheconceptualizationofbeing as well as the misrepresentation implied by such reductions. The implication is that because being is not simply a thought (132b–c), allegedly atemporal intentions may resolve ambiguity but nonetheless these obscure as they clarify. The Being of One That Is Not? Parmenides claims that when we hear phrases like “if largeness does not exist” or “if smallness does not exist,” we recognize that in each case it is a different thing that is supposed not to exist (160c). In the same way, when we hear the phrase “if a one does not exist” we recognize that what is said not to exist is something different from other things, and we know what it means (160c). A one taken as not existing is nonetheless something known (gnomston), and recognized as differing from the others, whether it is said to exist or not (160c). What is spoken of as not existing is none the less known (gignomsketai), and differs from the others (160d). Here, Parmenides’ repeated emphasis makes it plain that he is speaking of the one that does not exist in a different way in this beginning than he did at the culmination of the first beginning (141e–142a), where a...

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